Monthly Archives: April 2011

National Security Wisdom from the Joker

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Security TheaterCato’s Julian Sanchez brilliantly sums up the logic behind the national security policy that leads our government to impose this kind of absurd abuse on its citizens:

Batman’s archnemesis the Joker–played memorably by Heath Ledger in 2008‚Ä≤s blockbuster The Dark Knight–might seem like an improbable font of political wisdom, but it’s lately occurred to me that one of his more memorable lines from the film is surprisingly relevant to our national security policy:

“You know what I’ve noticed? Nobody panics when things go ‘according to plan.’ Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it’s all ‘part of the plan.'”

There are, one hopes, limits. The latest in a string of videos from airport security to provoke online outrage shows a six-year-old girl being subjected to an invasive Transportation Security Administration pat down–including an agent feeling around in the waistband of the girl’s pants. I’m somewhat reassured that people don’t appear to be greatly mollified by TSA’s response:

“A video taken of one of our officers patting down a six year-old has attracted quite a bit of attention. Some folks are asking if the proper procedures were followed. Yes. TSA has reviewed the incident and the security officer in the video followed the current standard operating procedures.”

While I suppose it would be disturbing if individual agents were just improvising groping protocol on the fly (so to speak), the response suggests that TSA thinks our concerns should be assuaged once we’ve been reassured that everything is being done by the book–even if the book is horrifying. But in a sense, that’s the underlying idea behind all security theater: Show people that there’s a Plan, that procedures are in place, whether or not there’s any good evidence that the Plan actually makes us safer.

And this is not all about civil liberties, either. As David Henderson points out, citizens who throw up their hands in disgust with the TSA’s security theater and elect to drive rather than take a short-haul flight risk a fatality rate that is 80 times higher per mile than travelers on a commercial airliner face.

In short, the TSA is killing people.

As with the overcriminalization of American life, the TSA is an ominous reflection of a federal government and major political parties that are increasingly remote and unresponsive to citizens.

Is it too late to change? That would be a good question for someone to ask President Obama, who was famously elected on the slogan of “change we can believe in.”

 

As the Rockets’ World Turns

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So, the Houston Rockets let Hall of Fame coach Rick Adelman go after yet another season in which the team was reasonably competitive, but again only the third best in Texas, much less the NBA’s Western Conference.

Interestingly, the Rockets’ move has generated polar opposite reactions. The majority view is that Adelman did a good job under difficult circumstances and should not be faulted for the Rockets’ continued mediocrity. After all, in four seasons with the Rockets, Adelman had a 193-135 record, the best winning percentage (.588) of any coach in franchise history. His 945 wins are currently eighth among NBA coaches.

On the other hand, some folks – reflected in this Chris Baldwin’s piece – think that Adelman was a bad fit for a young team trying to develop into a mature NBA contender.

As with many controversies, the truth is somewhere in the middle.

The reality is that both Adelman and Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey have done reasonably good jobs piecing together a competitive team while dealing with the obsolescent team model that they were handed by Rockets owner, Les Alexander.

Alexander – who is viewed by the mainstream media as a competent owner primarily because of the relative incompetence of Houston’s other professional sports club owners – handed both Morey and Adelman a team that was based on the talents of two physically brittle superstars, Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming.

When the injury risk took away both McGrady and Yao, Morey and Adelman performed admirably in developing a group of reasonably productive complementary players into a competitive NBA unit. Not a playoff caliber team, mind you. But one that at least won more games than it lost and generally played hard.

However, that competitiveness does not hide the truth that Alexander is the main problem with the Rockets. Despite the gibberish that is written about him in the local mainstream media, Alexander is a quite mediocre owner.

He did have the good fortune to inherit a strong roster when he bought the team back in the mid-1990’s, and that group promptly won two straight NBA titles for him in the first two years that he owned the franchise.

And Alexander did have the good sense five years ago to hire Morey, who has rebuilt the Rockets’ roster with relatively cheap, mostly young and productive complementary players who would probably provide a fine supporting cast for a true superstar, if only one or two were available.

Nevertheless, under Alexander’s management, the Rockets have now won precisely one playoff series in the past 14 seasons. That is a streak of futility that is matched by only a few other NBA teams.

So, as with most things, it’s important to place matters in context when thinking about the Rockets.

Neither Daryl Morey nor Rick Adelman had anything to do with the dubious decision to hitch the club’s wagon to Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming. They did the best that could be expected when that decision went awry.

Blame Les Alexander for the Rockets’ failure, as well as for making the team the third best NBA club in Texas for the past decade.

The Amazing Walkens

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“For a Walken, adolescence is a difficult time. You feel like you’re the only normal person in a school of nut jobs.”

So, Why No Pound of Flesh?

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That’s essentially the question that this Gretchen Morgenson/Louise Story/NY Times article asks.

Why have there been so few criminal prosecutions in regard to the 2008 meltdown on Wall Street that prompted a huge federal government bailout that citizens will be subsidizing for decades?

Yet, the intrepid NY Times reporters can’t quite bring themselves to recognize that whether the government pursued and obtained a criminal conviction of a businessperson over the past decade has had much more to do with chance and politics than prosecution of truly criminal conduct.

Could it be that federal prosecutors are finally realizing that old-fashioned greediness really is not be a crime?

Of course, the rationalization for the lack of villains now as compared to earlier crises has never been particularly compelling.

What the NY Times reporters refuse to confront is that business prosecutions over merely questionable business judgment is fundamentally bad regulatory policy.

Such prosecutions obscure the true nature of business risk and fuel the myth that investment loss results primarily from criminal misconduct.

Taking business risk is what leads to valuable innovation, wealth creation and – most importantly these days – desperately needed jobs for communities. Throwing creative and productive business executives such as Michael Milken and Jeff Skilling in prison may placate NY Times reporters, but it does nothing to educate investors about the true nature of risk and the importance of diversification.

Ignorance about business risk is one of the underlying causes of the the criminalization of business lottery. Basing criminal prosecutions on the luck of the draw breeds cynicism and disrespect for the rule of law.

Isn’t it about time that dubious policy be put to permanent rest?

Update: Larry Ribstein — who maintains an entertaining archive of blog posts that he wrote over the years on Morgenson’s misfires — comments on Morgenson’s latest posse-gathering effort here.

Two essential reads

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thinkerIf you don’t read anything else this week, don’t miss what Byran Caplan and Gary Taubes wrote.

First, Caplan provides a compelling case against helicoptor parenting based on, of all things, research into twins:

But twin research has another far more amazing lesson: With a few exceptions, the effect of parenting on adult outcomes ranges from small to zero.Parents change kids in many ways; the catch is that the changes fade out as kids grow up.  By adulthood, identical twins aren’t slightly more similar than fraternal twins; they’re much more similar.  And when identical twins are raised apart, they’re often just as similar as they are when they’re raised together.

Once I became a dad, I noticed that parents around me had a different take on the power of nurture. I saw them turning parenthood into a chore–shuttling their kids to activities even the kids didn’t enjoy, forbidding television, desperately trying to make their babies eat another spoonful of vegetables. Parents’ main rationale is that their effort is an investment in their children’s future; they’re sacrificing now to turn their kids into healthy, smart, successful, well-adjusted adults. 

But according to decades of twin research, their rationale is just, well, wrong.  High-strung parenting isn’t dangerous, but it does make being a parent a lot more work and less fun than it has to be.

The obvious lesson to draw is that parents should lighten up. .  .  .

Meanwhile, Taubes examines a penetrating question that is suggested by this recent post: i.e., is sugar toxic?:

This brings us to the salient question: Can sugar possibly be as bad as [being the primary reason that the numbers of obese and diabetic Americans have skyrocketed in the past 30 years and the likely dietary cause of several other chronic ailments widely considered to be diseases of Western lifestyles — heart disease, hypertension and many common cancers"]?

It’s one thing to suggest, as most nutritionists will, that a healthful diet includes more fruits and vegetables, and maybe less fat, red meat and salt, or less of everything.

It’s entirely different to claim that one particularly cherished aspect of our diet might not just be an unhealthful indulgence but actually be toxic, that when you bake your children a birthday cake or give them lemonade on a hot summer day, you may be doing them more harm than good, despite all the love that goes with it.

Suggesting that sugar might kill us is what zealots do. But [pediatric hormone specialist Robert] Lustig, who has genuine expertise, has accumulated and synthesized a mass of evidence, which he finds compelling enough to convict sugar. His critics consider that evidence insufficient, but there’s no way to know who might be right, or what must be done to find out, without discussing it.

San Fran to Paris in Two Minutes

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SF to Paris in Two Minutes from Beep Show on Vimeo.

The joke that is the budget compromise

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budget compromiseDon Boudreaux sums up perfectly why the budget compromise that was reached late last week is a joke:

Suppose that in a mere three years your family’s spending – spending, mind you, not income – jumps from $80,000 to $101,600.  You’re now understandably worried about the debt you’re piling up as a result of this 27 percent hike in spending.

So mom and dad, with much drama and angst and finger-pointing about each other’s irresponsibility and insensitivity, stage marathon sessions of dinner-table talks to solve the problem.  They finally agree to reduce the family’s annual spending from $101,600 to $100,584.

For this 1 percent cut in their spending, mom and dad congratulate each other.  And to emphasize that this spending cut shows that they are responsible stewards of the family’s assets, they approvingly quote Sen. Harry Reid, who was party to similar negotiations that concluded last night on Capitol Hill – negotiations in which Congress agreed to cut 1 percent from a budget that rose 27 percent in just the past three years.  Said Sen. Reid: “Both sides have had to make tough choices.  But tough choices is what this job’s all about.”

What a joke.

Which reminds me of what H.L. Mencken observed about the primary talent of successful politicians:

“Their power to impress and enchant the intellectually underprivileged.”