Thinking about gun violence in America

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This week's edition of On The Media focused -- once again -- on gun violence.

The whole show is worth listening to, but the last segment really got my attention. It's entitled, "Stopping gun violence without new laws", and it describes a program for addressing urban gun violence - a massively unreported part of the problem. OTM refers to it as CeaseFire, but it changed its name in 2012 to Cure Violence. Cure Violence treats gun violence as a public health problem, and takes a very data-driven approach to solving it. What's really great, though, is that Cure Violence offers a way to do something about guns that the NRA not only can't stop but isn't even opposed to.

They have gotten my support, and I urge you to support them, too.

Where did the jobs go?

Today's New York Times has a long article (How U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work) that offers a discouraging picture for job growth in the U.S. The problem isn't labor costs per se; rather, it's that the entire manufacturing supply chain has shifted from the U.S. to Asia. - a change initially caused by labor costs, but now self-perpetuating.

One former high-ranking Apple executive said that the focus on Asia “came down to two things.” Factories in Asia “can scale up and down faster” and “Asian supply chains have surpassed what’s in the U.S.” The result is that “we can’t compete at this point.”

The glass used in the iPhone's display provides a great example, As Corning's CFO observed:

“Our customers are in Taiwan, Korea, Japan and China. We could make the glass here, and then ship it by boat, but that takes 35 days. Or, we could ship it by air, but that’s 10 times as expensive. So we build our glass factories next door to assembly factories, and those are overseas.”

This isn't a change that can be undone overnight.

 But besides the supply chain issue, there's labor flexibility. That innocent-looking comment that factories in Asia “can scale up and down faster” really means that workers can be hired - and fired - on short notice. The jobs may pay well, by local standards, but there is no job security. Large portions of business risk are outsourced to employees.

Job security is an issue labor unions fought hard for in the first half of the 20th century, with considerable success.  It's hard to argue that job insecurity is a good thing for workers and the communities they live in, but this is exactly what U.S. manufacturers - and Republican politicians - are asking for when they want an easing of labor regulations and oppose unionization.

So what's the solution? Over time, I have to believe that Asia's workers will insist on better conditions, there will be greater balance between regions in terms of labor rules, and manufacturing will gradually redistribute closer to the point of consumption. But that will take decades.

I don't know how to solve this problem. But I do know that any politician - Left or Right - who promises a short-term solution is pedaling snake oil.

Rick Santorum is Google-bombed...

...and it made this week's issue of The New Yorker. The short article Bombs Away is a cautionary tale regarding importance of managing search results (to the extent that that's possible...). Warning: the top Google hit for Santorum is Not Suitable for Work.

How People Work

I just finished listening to the February 10th broadcast of Speaking of Faith Krista Tippett on Being, an interview with anthropologist Scott Atran. It's a phenomenal show! Here's the blurb:

We make deeper sense of the human dynamics unfolding in the Middle East and North Africa. Anthropologist Scott Atran offers bracing context on the promise of this moment and the response it asks from the watching world.

Atran's understanding of the Middle East, and human nature in general, is just astounding. I urge you to give it a listen. It's worth listening to the unedited version of the show; there's a lot of very interesting background on how Atran became an anthropologist that didn't make it into the edited, broadcast version.

How could I NOT say something?

President Obama. Wow.

It's strange watching this unfold from Hyderabad. I watched a bit of TV this morning before going downstairs for breakfast. Seeing U.S. election results interleaved with Indian TV ads was a bit surreal.

One of my colleagues from California arrived Monday. She's originally from Minnesota (which went for Obama) and now lives in California (which is going for Obama). It's great to have at least one other American to share this with.

President Obama. I like it.

Lies, Damn Lies and McCain Campaign Statements

The McCain campaign is so full of lies that even Republicans are starting to complain. See this article in today's New York Times.

The policy lies bother me the most; I think the most outrageous are in regards to tax policy, which I've already written about. McCain claims that Obama plans "painful tax increases on working families." In fact, the detailed and well-sourced comparisons at the non-partisan Tax Policy Center show otherwise. Their analysis states:

The two candidates’ tax plans would have sharply different distributional effects. Senator McCain’s tax cuts would primarily benefit those with very high incomes, almost all of whom would receive large tax cuts that would, on average, raise their after-tax incomes by more than twice the average for all households. Many fewer households at the bottom of the income distribution would get tax cuts and those tax cuts would be small as a share of after-tax income. In marked contrast, Senator Obama offers much larger tax breaks to low- and middle-income taxpayers and would increase taxes on high-income taxpayers. The largest tax cuts, as a share of income, would go to those at the bottom of the income distribution, while taxpayers with the highest income would see their taxes rise significantly.

Sarah Palin's assertions about her opposition to earmarks really get to me, too. She has said, "I told Congress, thanks, but no thanks for that 'Bridge to Nowhere' in Alaska. If we wanted that bridge, we'd build it ourselves." This is a flat-out lie. As a candidate for governor, Ms. Palin supported the project. She told the Ankorage Daily News in 2006 that she would like to see it and other projects built sooner rather than later, "while out Congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist." After the bridge drew national ridicule, making it harder to secure more federal money to meet rising cost projections, she abandoned it, citing the financial shortfall. Alaska was able to keep the federal money and direct it to other projects.

Wake up, America!

Update: Go watch the ABC news interview with Sarah Palin. Could she possibly be less prepared to be vice president?

Strange local politics...

I had an odd, unsigned note slipped into my mail slot sometime today, asking me to attend a City Council meeting tomorrow. The details of the situation aren't interesting to the general reader (look here if you really care), but I do want to say that I think it's slimy to slip unattributed political propaganda into people's mail slots.

This gave me an excuse, though, to noodle around a bit with Google Sites. I'm thinking that this is good enough to use for rehosting all the old content from narsil.org, which would finally let me power down the server in the basement...

Pakistan, Twitter, Schools and Shrinking Republicans

This week's Sunday New York Times Magazine is worth the price of the paper all by itself. Home delivery gives me the luxury of spending Saturday mornings with the Magazine, and today my lingering over coffee was especially stimulating.

Paul Tough leads off with 24/7 School Reform - What poor kids really need can't be taught in a classroom. He describes the two camps he sees in the Democratic Party regarding education - "the unionists" and "the reformers." The unionists argue that No Child Left Behind (NCLB) is the biggest problem in public education: that it encourages "teaching to the test" and blames teachers for the poor performance of disadvantaged children. The reformers, on the other hand, see problems with the implementation of NCLB, but applaud the accountability provisions and the encouragement of experimentation through charter schools. (Neither camp, it seems, are particularly attracted to vouchers - a policy I personally favor, which makes me persona non grata with much of my liberal cohort when it comes to discussions of education...)
The two camps are anxiously dissecting Barack Obama's speeches and policy announcements, looking for support.

Tough argues that both camps have missed the point: Obama's education plans are novel and interesting in that they largely involve institutions other than schools. Tough quotes a speech Obama gave last year:

If poverty is a disease that infects an entire community in the form of unemployment and violence, failing schools and broken homes, then we can’t just treat those symptoms in isolation. We have to heal that entire community. And we have to focus on what actually works.

This is a realistic assessment, one I agree with - but not one easily reduced to the sort of bumper-sticker catchphrase that seems so important any more in American politics.


Next up is I'm So Totally, Digitally Close To You, by Clive Thompson. He explores the effect of what he calls "incessant online contact" on friendship and privacy. This is a topic that I've long found interesting and blogged about before. By and large, people who have come of age in the past 10 years or so are very familiar with this. Older people, except for the tech-savvy like me, who've used email for over 30 years, tend to know little about about it and generally don't get it. This sort of "radical transparency" is freeing to some, terrifying to others, and emerging as a new norm.

Thompson is followed by David Frum's The Vanishing Republican Voter. Frum, author of Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again, argues that the growing income inequality in the U.S. is undermining the G.O.P. and must become a conservative issue. Frum seems to be calling for a return to the brand of "main street Republicanism" so colorfully described by Garrison Keillor in Homegrown Democrat (for a real treat, buy the audio book, read by Keillor).

Finally, Dexter Filkins gives us Right at the Edge, an insightful look at the complex relationships between Pakistan, the Taliban, Al Queda and the U.S. It's scary but compelling reading.

Yes, the election matters...

...and Sarah Vowell, frequent contributor to This American Life, author of the wonderful Assassination Vacation and voice of Violet in The Incredibles, has an explanation of why in this Sunday's New York Times. This excerpt captures, I think, the spirit of her piece:

I have spent the last eight years so disgusted with the incompetent yahoos of the executive branch that I had forgotten that I believe in one of the core principles of the Democratic Party — that government can be a useful, meaningful and worthwhile force for good in this republic instead of just an embarrassing, torturing, Book of Revelation starter kit.

If you're not already familiar with Sarah, here's a fun little video clip to help you out.

Economic Plans: What are the candidates really proposing?

This week's New York Times Sunday Magazine contains an excellent article on Barack Obama's economic philosophy and plans, by David Leonhardt. It refers to a study of the Obama and McCain tax proposals by the Tax Policy Center (TPC), a non-partisan joint venture of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute. The Times article is a great read, and I recommend it; the Tax Policy Center's study provides more detail (in particular, breakdowns of tax impact by quintiles, which I find far more useful than the usually-stated means).

Some interesting factoids:

The tax rates for individuals earning $5m/year (in current, inflation-adjusted dollars) have been:

• 1980: %60
• 1988 (end of the Reagan presidency): %35
• 1990s (Clinton era): %40
• current (GW Bush): %34

Both Obama and McCain would cut taxes for bottom 80% of population (those earning $118,000 or less). McCain's cuts would average $200/year for this group; Obama's would average $900. But the quintiles for Obama's plan are far more interesting than the single number:

Quintile	Top Income for Quintile	$ Change in Federal Tax Paid	Average Federal Tax Rate
20%	$19,740	-$617	-0.4%
40%	$38,980	-$950	8.0%
60%	$69,490	-$1,035	15.4%
80%	$117,535	-$757	18.9%
100%	Top	+$6,770	27.2%

The detail for the top 20% is interesting, too.

Percentile	Top Income for Quintile	$ Change in Federal Tax Paid	Average Federal Tax Rate
80-90	$169,480	-$442	21.7%
90-95	$237,040	+$448	23.3%
95-99	$619,561	+5,686	26.5%
Top 1 Percent	$2,832,449	+114,238	34.1%
Top 0.1 Percent	Top	+650,938	37.5%

Obama's plan is clearly targeted at cutting taxes for middle-income Americans, while fairly dramatically raising taxes on the very wealthiest Americans (but not back to even the top rates of the Clinton administration).

McCain's plan cuts taxes for everyone, including the wealthiest. Not surprisingly, this is reflected in projected increases in the national debt, as described in the TPC's summary:

Compared to current law, TPC estimates the Obama plan would cut taxes by $2.9 trillion from 2009-2018. McCain would reduce taxes by nearly $4.2 trillion. These projections assume the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expire in 2010 and that the Alternative Minimum Tax is fully effective.

So who's the fiscal conservative here?

Go, Tom Friedman!

Thomas Friedman's column in the Sunday NYTimes, 9/11 is Over, is spot on. It says, in part:

9/11 has made us stupid. I honor, and weep for, all those murdered on that day. But our reaction to 9/11 — mine included — has knocked America completely out of balance, and it is time to get things right again.

Scooter Walks

Lewis "Scooter" Libby had his jail time commuted today by his buddy, George Bush.

I think Senator (and presidential candidate) Barack Obama's comment says it pretty well.

“This decision to commute the sentence of a man who compromised our national security cements the legacy of an Administration characterized by a politics of cynicism and division, one that has consistently placed itself and its ideology above the law. This is exactly the kind of politics we must change so we can begin restoring the American people’s faith in a government that puts the country’s progress ahead of the bitter partisanship of recent years.”