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Clayton Cramer's BLOG

Clayton's commentary on news and events of the day. Broadly speaking, I'm a conservative with libertarian sympathies (getting more conservative as my children get older).




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Friday, October 03, 2003
 
Stories Like This Sound Too Good To Be True...

From AP:
SULTAN, Wash. -- An animal rights group's plan to free 10,000 mink from a farm turned deadly after many of the emancipated mustelids became cannibals while others went on a carnivorous feeding frenzy.

About 9,000 of the freed mink have been returned to Roesler Brothers Fur Farm since the Aug. 25 break-in, but keeping them alive has been a challenge.

Normally, only siblings are caged together, but workers cannot readily determine which of the recaptured mink are related, said Kate Roesler.

``The mink are fine when they're litter mates together, but when they're not they're quite vicious and they're cannibals,'' Roesler said. ``They do eat each other, and that's what we're battling.''

...

The Animal Liberation Front claimed responsibility and the FBI is investigating.
Cannibalism! How awful! Why can't they develop a taste for something more appropriate--like members of the Animal Liberation Front?

posted by Clayton at 4:13 PM permalink

 
Okay, Bill Gates, Match Bruce Willis

Bruce Willis was over in Iraq entertaining the troops recently, and offered to give one million dollars of his own money for Saddam Hussein. This is nice (and so is Bruce Willis having the guts to say things that you don't ordinarily hear from actors, such as this segment from an interview with O'Reilly:
WILLIS: No. I don't really feel the need to debate it. I believe the United States, everybody is certainly entitled to their own opinion, and as I am entitled to mine. I just happen to be patriotic and I'm very happy to see that, you know, the United States was able to come in and, you know, take down Saddam Hussein.

O'REILLY: Did the weapons of mass destruction controversy bother you at all?

WILLIS: I don't think that's what it's about. I think this is about a war on terrorism. And it's about trying to stabilize Iraq. Stabilize the Middle East, which, God knows, could use some stabilization. And it is about a war on terror. I don't -- I don't know. Maybe people have a short memory, but the memory of those people forced to jump out of the World Trade Center will forever be etched in my memory.

O'REILLY: They'll say, the opponents, they'll say Saddam had nothing to do with that.

WILLIS: Well, they're certainly entitled to that opinion as well. I see Saddam Hussein as a gangster and a terrorist who raped his own country for 30 years, and to simply abandon Iraq now would be a crime.
Now, Bruce Willis isn't poor, so a million dollars, while substantial by Middle Eastern terms, is probably not going to impoverish him. Perhaps some of the other people that have something to gain from a world where terrorism isn't the norm (like Bill Gates) can add to the fund? Bill Gates has been (finally) engaged in some serious philanthopy the last several years. Perhaps if he kicked in $100,000,000 to the reward fund, it might motivate some of Saddam's loyal retainers to suddenly see the virtues of turning in this thug?

posted by Clayton at 4:10 PM permalink

 
You Will Excuse Me While I Go Into Shock

The Centers for Disease Control have put out a report that says that reviewing 51 published studies of the effects of gun control laws on violence have found no clear evidence that such laws make a difference. The Washington Post article, doing its best to spin this positively for gun control, says,
About the only conclusion the CDC could draw from the surveys was that mandatory waiting periods reduced gun suicides in people over 55. But even that reduction was not big enough to significantly affect gun suicides for the overall population.
Of course, even then, a reduction in gun suicides in people over 55 doesn't necessarily mean a reduction in total suicides.

Predictably, the gun control advocates want more studies done. I suppose if I had some confidence that they weren't going to control the studies, I would be accepting of this--but think for a second--if 51 published studies don't make a case for the effectiveness of gun control laws in reducing violence, what does this say? Are the people doing the studies so incompetent that we should give them more money to do more such studies? Or more likely, if gun control does make a difference in violence, it's such a minor gain that it isn't apparent from this sort of review of the literature.

posted by Clayton at 11:18 AM permalink

 
David Kay's Report

For those who read (and trust) the mainstream news accounts of what David Kay's report on WMDs in Iraq said: read the actual report, here. (Thanks to Andrew Sullivan for the pointer.) The gap between the AP wire service story in my local paper today, and what Kay's report says, is a bit broad to be called careless reporting.

posted by Clayton at 10:44 AM permalink

 
Part of Why I'm Skeptical of the Claims Against John Lott's Work

It's because his opponents are clearly fierce anti-gun advocates, and not above a few tricks of their own. You read their work outside of the statistical area, and it's clear that the are either not very careful thinkers, or are playing fast and loose. As an example, consider this recent presentation by John J. Donohue III, one of Lott's strongest critics. The paper is ostensibly about the rise of non-discretionary concealed weapon permit laws (what Donohue calls "Right To Carry" or RTC). Donohue points to the recent example of actor Sean Penn, who has a California concealed weapon permit (apparently issued in violation of California law), and how two of his guns were stolen from his car. While Donohue acknowledges that Penn "succeeded in getting one of the relatively few gun permits in the non-RTC state of California," raising this issue as part of a discussion of RTC laws makes no sense at all.

Donohue also points to the now thoroughly discredited Violence Policy Center claim that in Texas, "41 permit holders were arrested for murder or attempted murder...." While admitting that some might have been falsely accused, Donohue never acknowledges that it is routine for Texas district attorneys to charge anyone engaged in a defensive shooting, and that many of these "arrests" never turn into criminal charges, because the grand jury refuses to indict. Donohue makes the claim,
During the first 5 and one-half years of the Texas RTC law, the Violence Policy Center was able to identify that 41 permit holders were arrested for murder or attempted murder (the number would be too low if the researchers didn’t capture every permit holder in their count or if some permit holders committed murder and didn’t get arrested, and would be too high if some were falsely accused). The Violence Policy Center, License to Kill IV (June 2002), http://www.vpc.org/studies/ltk4cont.htm. The current murder rate in the U.S. across all groups is roughly 5 per 100,000, so if one takes 150,000 as the average number of permits over the first five year period, one would expect roughly 7.5 murders per year from gun permit holders (if they killed at the same rate as the average American today), which totals 41 murders over the full period.
There are a number of misleading aspects to this statement. The VPC study claims 41 permit holders "arrested for murder or attempted murder" which Donohue then compares to "41 murders over the full period." Donohue's apples and oranges comparison is either a sign of carelessness, or dishonesty. Which does he want to cop to?

The VPC report also neglects to tell us how many of those murder and attempted murder charges involved guns. Doubtless, a majority, but what relevance would a murder committed with a knife, poison, or a blunt object have to the Texas concealed handgun license? Donohue has to know this. Where's the qualifying explanation?

Donohue acknowledges--parenthetically--that the VPC's number of murders and attempted murders "would be too high if some were falsely accused" but doesn't bother to look at the readily available evidence on this. Examining Texas statistics shows that as of May 17, 1999, there were 22 murder charges filed. Of these, 2 were convicted, and 4 were dismissed. The rest were still pending. Even making the unlikely assumption that every remaining charge would result in a conviction or guilty plea, this still means that VPC's "41" charges are going to be 33 or 34 convictions, and most likely, a good bit less than that. For the year 2001, there was one murder conviction of a licensee, and 157 convictions of non-licensees. This also suggests that the VPC's "41" charges overstates the actual number of murders and attempted murders committed by Texas licensees (unless, of course, 2001 was a very unusual year).

There are other problems with the VPC report that Donohue seems to have missed. The VPC report lists at least two murders that took place on the property of the killer (Jack Reynolds and Daniel Meehan)--where a concealed weapon permit makes no difference whatsoever.

The VPC also lists a kidnapping where no gun was involved, until the victim tried to get away from the kidnapper's home--at which point the kidnapper used a rifle. A license to carry made no difference in this case at all.

Some of the cases that the VPC points to seem to have left no tracks after the arrest. They list a Randy Phil Allen II who was arrested in 1999 for a 1988 murder (which would have been before the Texas RTC law took effect). But whatever happened? There is a Randy Phil Allen II who lives in Texas, but while he responded to my email, he refuses to answer my email inquiry if he is the same Randy Phil Allen II arrested in 1999.

1. It seems a bit hard to believe that this exact match of name is a coincidence.

2. If it is a coincidence, and he is not the guy who was arrested in 1999, why not respond with, "No, I am not the same guy."

3. If this is the same Randy Phil Allen II who was arrested in 1999, he clearly could not have been convicted, or he wouldn't be out of prison already.

If the claim is that John Lott has violated professional standards in how he has presented his information, Donohue is in no position to cast any stones. Using VPC's information, while not discussing its serious shortcomings, is clearly misleading. To quote Donohue:
It is also important for the political and scholarly audiences to be sensitive to signs of over-zealousness on the part of researchers as this may give clues that something more than the search for truth is motivating the research.

Labels:


posted by Clayton at 2:04 AM permalink

 
Irony Overload

Remember the organization Move On that formed after the Lewinksy scandal broke? That claimed what President Clinton did in his private life didn't affect his behavior as a public official, and we should just say, "Oh well, that's unfortunate, now that we know, but let's just move on?" They are now sending out this email to their supporters:
Subject: URGENT: Schwarzenegger's Abuse of Women -- Spread the Word
From: "Joan Blades, MoveOn.org PAC"
Date: Thu, October 2, 2003 4:35 pm
To: "XXXX XXXXX "


Dear MoveOn members,

This is a real emergency. The polls in California show Schwarzenegger
pulling ahead, while the truth about his character is only now starting
to get out. We have just a few days to make sure everyone in California
knows who this man is. Today we ask you to do two things: (1)
contribute to a TV ad that we will run across the state of California on
Sunday and Monday and (2) send this message on to friends, so they know
the details that are only just now getting into the press.

Please contribute to the ad at:

http://www.moveonpac.org/moveonpac/viewcandidates.phtml

We need to raise $500,000, by the end of day today.

This morning the Los Angeles Times published the stories of six women
who say they were physically abused by Arnold Schwarzenegger as recently
as three years ago. We've included excerpts from the article at the
bottom of this email. The stories are shocking, but they fit a pattern
of previous reports.

We're launching a television ad devoted to putting Arnold's problem with
women into the public eye. We feel that this is a critical step that
absolutely must be taken, but we need $500,000 to make this happen.
Please help us fund the ad campaign by clicking here:

http://www.moveonpac.org/moveonpac/viewcandidates.phtml

Then join us for these last few days of our campaign to defeat the
recall. There's a lot you can do to make a difference. Sign up to help
by going here:

http://moveon.org/pac/recall/?id=1747-2758498-GWHFHURxK0LQB0LCsHMNww

The stories published in the LA Times today are consistent with
statements Schwarzenegger has made and incidents he's been involved in
throughout his entire career.

If you think his personal views and behavior can be separated from his
new career as a politician, think again: Schwarzenegger has not included
a single woman on his economic council. In a state where there are tens
of thousands of women in positions of power, there was not even one he
respected enough add to his team.

Schwarzenegger has a serious problem with women, reflected in both his
actions and his words. His own statements -- even just months ago --
paint a clear picture of a man who has absolutely no respect for women:
Yet another reason that I hold liberals in contempt. We were supposed to "move on" when President Clinton was accused of at least equivalent behavior (Kathleen Willey getting groped) and in some cases much worse (Paula Corbin Jones), but now character matters.

posted by Clayton at 1:15 AM permalink

Thursday, October 02, 2003
 
Arnold Comes Clean

And admits that he behaved badly--in response to this article that first appeared in the Los Angeles Times--apparently, almost as badly as President Clinton did.

You know, if Republicans were pulling out this stuff to use against a Democrat, the Democrats would be screeching about how none of this matters. But now the same party that was claiming that Kathleen Willey lied about Clinton groping her, that said that the Monica Lewinsky matter was a private issue, and of no relevance, that responded to Paula Corbin Jones's very serious accusations with, "If you drag a hundred dollar bill through a trailer park, you never know what you'll find," is now pretending to be concerned about Schwarzenegger's immorality.

Yet another reminder of the utter hypocrisy of the Democrats.

UPDATE: Just to be clear on this: if I were still an inmate of that insane asylum that is California politics, I would probably have already decided to vote for McClintock, both because Schwarzenegger's victory is now assured, and because McClintock is a bit more serious of a candidate than Schwarzenegger. If there was any temptation to vote for Schwarzenegger, this would probably have been the end of such thoughts on my behalf.

I can sort of ignore misbehavior as far back as 1975--it doesn't tell us much about Arnold today. (I would not want everything that I did in 1975 widely discussed, either.) But 2000? That's close enough to today that it doesn't say much good about Arnold's current character. If Calfiornians want a guy who treats women like sexual playthings, there's always Bill Clinton.

posted by Clayton at 2:28 PM permalink

 
Remember When Liberals Were Defenders of the Constitution?

I remember about 20 years ago, there was discussion of calling a constitutional convention to pass a balanced budget amendment. Liberals were all worried about what could happen. Anything could happen! The Bill of Rights might be scrapped! Our government might be replaced with some sort of authoritarian nightmare!

Now a rather prominent liberal, Professor of Law Sanford Levinson of the University of Texas, explains why he would not sign the Constitution, and lists the many, many problems with it.
One feature that is more significant is that States have equal numbers of votes in the Senate - which gives the Rocky Mountain states, especially, a totally unwarranted stranglehold on important aspects of public policy.
This is where I start to smell a political motivation on this. Yes, the Rocky Mountain states have a disproportionate influence--but so does any state with a small population, because it's guaranteed two U.S. Senators, the same as California or New York. So which are the ten lowest population states? From the 2000 U.S. Census:









Ten Lowest Population States 2000
statepopulation
Wyoming493,782
Vermont608,827
Alaska626,932
North Dakota642,200
South Dakota754,844
Delaware783,600
Montana902,195
Rhode Island1,048,319
Hawaii1,211,537
New Hampshire1,235,786

Hmmm. Two Rocky Mountain states are in the bottom ten of population. So why did Professor Levinson pick on the Rocky Mountain states for their disproportionate influence? Could it be because the other eight smallest states often send Democrats to represent them, and in general, aren't very conservative?

Levinson also complains:
As a legal matter, Article V makes it next-to-impossible to amend the Constitution - which is itself a mistake. There has been no significant amendment of the Constitution since the Progressive Era, unless one counts the 22nd Amendment and its two-term rule, which almost certainly is the explanation for Bill Clinton's not running for re-election as President in 2000. And as a practical matter, Article V tends to discourage any serious discussion of the Constitution's adequacy - precisely because it makes it appear that, if it is indeed inadequate, then there is nothing we can do about that.
Now this is really interesting to me. Professor Levinson says that it is "next-to-impossible to amend the Constitution"? I guess Ashcroft's stormtroopers must have come through and expurgated Professor Levinson's copy of the Constitution. The Progressive Era is usually considered to be 1900-1916. I count nine amendments to the Constitution "since the Progressive Era," including the 22nd Amendment, but excluding the 27th Amendment (which was proposed by the First Congress, and only ratified in the 1990s).

No significant changes since the Progressive Era? I guess one can argue about what constitutes a significant change. Let's see: the Prohibition Amendment (18th Amendment, ratified in 1919), and its repeal (21st Amendment, ratified 1933)--those were pretty significant changes to governmental power. (Liberals and progressives would like to forget that much of the support for Prohibition came from progressives back then.)

Voting rights for women (19th Amendment, ratified 1920). That wasn't significant?

Changes to when the President takes office after an election (20th Amendment, ratified 1933). Not major, but evidence that when something is obviously in neeed of change, there's no problem amending the Constitution.

District of Columbia voters get to vote for President (23rd Amendment, ratified 1961). Not major, but not trivial, either--a dramatic change to the voting status of DC residents.

The amendment that prohibited use of poll taxes to prevent voting (24th Amendment, ratified 1964), which broke much of the power of the South to prevent blacks from voting. Professor Levinson doesn't consider this pretty significant?

Let's see, we completely change the sequence by which we replace a dead or disabled president with the 25th Amendment (ratified 1967). Not significant?

Votes for 18 year olds (26th Amendment, ratified 1971)? Not significant?

Oh yes, the one of those amendments that Levinson does consider significant he seems to disapprove of--because it kept Bill Clinton from running for re-election.

How hard was it to get these amendment ratified by the states? Prohibition Amendment? Less than two years from passage by Congress to ratification. Votes for women? A bit more than a year. Change in the date the new president takes office? Less than a year. Even the poll tax amendment, which must have been very controversial in the South--took less than two years from passage to ratification.

Levinson has lost it--along with his copy of the Constitution.

posted by Clayton at 12:37 PM permalink

 
One Of The Reasons That I No Longer Take Liberalism Seriously

Read this piece here about how federal law prohibited racial discrimination:
But then, Congress also provided, in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, that
no person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be ... subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance. [42 U.S.C. § 2000d]
A lot of good that did.
Yup. Liberalism today operates on the theory that refusing to discriminate is some sort of racist plot.

posted by Clayton at 10:18 AM permalink

Wednesday, October 01, 2003
 
I Guess He Should Have Been Distributing Condoms Or Pornography Instead

This is from the Philadelpia Inquirer via How Appealling!:
A federal appeals court has upheld a judge's decision that a New Jersey school system acted properly in prohibiting a 5-year-old student from distributing pencils and candy canes with religious messages to his classmates.

In a ruling issued in August, a three-judge panel of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court's finding that school officials in Egg Harbor Township did not deprive Daniel Walz, then a pre-kindergarten student, of his rights.

...

The pencils in question read "Jesus loves little children" and the candy canes came with cards explaining that their "J" shape was in honor of Jesus Christ and that the red stripes represented his blood.

The items were confiscated when the boy tried to distribute them at holiday parties at the H. Russell Swift School in 1998.
Look: I can understand and agree that it would have been completely inappropriate for a public school to distribute stuff like this. But a student? He is not an agent of the government. No one is required to take these gifts. What happened to the much talked about right of free speech? Or does that only apply to flag burning and smearing chocolate sauce on your naked body on stage?

UPDATE: Here's a somewhat similar case, except that a kid came to school wearing a T-shirt calling Bush an international terrorist. The school told him to not wear it. The ACLU to the rescue, and a federal judge decided that the right of free speech took precedence.

Now, if you want to advance the free speech argument, I can buy that. If kids can't handle an unpopular point of view on a T-shirt, that's their problem. But you will notice that it's not to express religious sentiments (at least, those of the ruling class of judges disapprove).

There are some minor differences in the cases, of course. The Walz decision made its case based on the claim that while high schoolers may engage in acts of political advocacy, elementary school kids may not, because it would interfere with the legitimate teaching actions of the school. They also argued that a party is really a teaching experience for the kids, learning to socialize. A kid wearing an offensive T-shirt through the halls and in classrooms, however, that's very, very different.

posted by Clayton at 5:13 PM permalink

 
You MUST Read This!

It's a blog consisting of letters from service members serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, and nearby places. It's the sort of news that CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC, don't want you to know about. If you can read these letters and not get a lump in your throat from pride in having men and women like these representing our nation abroad, then you must be a leftist! My eyes are tearing up just from reading thise accounts.

posted by Clayton at 5:01 PM permalink

 
Well, This Is News!

But is this article from the Hindustan Times for real?
Kuwaiti security authorities have foiled an attempt to smuggle $60 million worth of chemical weapons and biological warheads from Iraq to an unnamed European country, a Kuwaiti newspaper said on Wednesday.

The pro-Government Al-Siyassah, quoting an unnamed security source, said the suspects had been watched by security since they arrived in Kuwait and were arrested "in due time." It did not say when or how the smugglers entered Kuwait or when they were arrested.

The paper said the smugglers might have had accomplices inside Kuwait. It said Interior Minister Sheik Nawwaf Al Ahmed Al Sabah would hand over the smuggled weapons to an FBI agent at a news conference, but did not say when.

posted by Clayton at 4:30 PM permalink

 
Of Human Bondage

That was the title of W. Somerset Maugham's 1915 novel--one that college students used to read. Now they engage in bondage.
Ames, Ia. - Jayme Howard spends his days at computer science class. At night, the Iowa State University freshman learns how to tie up and spank partners.

He gets his nighttime lessons from Cuffs, a campus club that teaches students about bondage and other sexual fetishes.

The club, after dissolving last year, is trying to make a comeback at ISU. Today, Cuffs leaders plan to ask the ISU student senate for $100 from the student fee fund, mostly to pay for promotion.
Is there anyone besides me who finds the notion that student fees should be funding something like this a bit repulsive? There are already enough people who connect sex, degradation, and pain. (If they don't get consent, they are called rapists.) I find myself in agreement with this guy quoted in the article, who is concerned that anything that legitimizes this connection is not a good idea:
"This is an alarm bell," said Chuck Hurley, president of the Iowa Family Policy Center in Pleasant Hill. Hurley says rape is vastly underreported on college campuses.

"I think for the university to condone this act in the light of the rape problem is like throwing gasoline on a destructive fire. It's just going to make it worse," he said.
Of course, if you believe that there is nothing right or wrong--just what you enjoy--then what's the big deal?
Student senators were divided over the club's worth to a college campus, said David Boike, who oversees the senate's books.

"Some people thought they actually provided a legitimate service and served the university community well and deserved money for it," said Boike, a senior from Dike.

Cuffs was the target of jokes, ridicule and letters to the student newspaper in its first year.

The fanfare on campus has died since, aside from the Cuffs posters that disappear within a day of their distribution across campus.

"To me, that's kind of what college is about, to be liberal and to do what they want to do," said Adam Bosman, an ISU sophomore from Madrid. "I think any club has the right to be here. It's not any different from the Hackey Sack Club and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance."

posted by Clayton at 3:25 PM permalink

Tuesday, September 30, 2003
 
I Guess CNN Isn't The Only Group Having to Pander to the Young

I've been bugged by how much supposed "news" on CNN Headline News is now just popular culture pandering to get young people to watch. But I see that CNN isn't the only organization having to do this. From the Harvard Crimson, an amusing description of a presentation by the ACLU at Harvard:
The second half of the event featured performances by spoken-word poet Saul Williams, DJ Kuttin Kandi and rappers Dead Prez.

Marsha Zeesman, senior communications strategist with the ACLU, said the organization was trying to appeal to young people by combining music and political dialogue.

“We’re getting a much better sense of college students,” she said. “We’re trying not to talk at them. We’re trying to listen to them.”

Nancy Uhlar Murray ’67, director of the Bill of Rights Education Project at the Massachusetts ACLU, cast the event as political outreach rather than as a recruitment effort.

“It’s partly a matter of building the organization, but also a matter of building an inter-generational front to roll back the post 9/11 threats to civil liberties,” she said.
Of course, the highlight of the presentation was Larry Flynt doing what he does best: offend.
Flynt’s assertion that the main accomplishment of the feminist movement “has been getting a bunch of ugly women to march” drew loud boos from the audience.

posted by Clayton at 4:48 PM permalink

 
Are Judges Bound to Obey the Constitution? Or Existing Precedents?

I was reading Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore's request for certioriari in the Ten Commandments case (thanks to How Appealing! for the link), and he makes an interesting point--that judges are not bound to obey the federal judiciary, but to obey the Constitution--and he cites Marbury v. Madison (1803) for that point:
Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void, and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument. [emphasis added]
Of course, this particular case involves this question: should Justice Moore have obeyed a federal judge whom Moore believes is incorrectly following precedents, rather than the Constitution itself?

Moore's brief is a little clumsy in places (and remember, I agree with him that the Lemon decision and its progeny are "intellectually bankrupt" and contrary to the original intent of the Constitution), but he does make the point that U.S. Supreme Court needs very much to clean up the mess that they have created. I read appellate court decisions that in some places, in some times, allow the Ten Commandments on public property, and in other places, do not, and I agree with Moore: there is no rule of law at work here. The rationalizations that end up in these decisions remind of that great line in Raiders of the Last Ark: "I'm making it up as I go along."

If you think that I am wrong on this, however, let me recommend that you read this list of statements from state constitutions, constitutional conventions, official acts of the Continental Congress, and the First Congress--and then tell me that these people would have objected on Constitutional grounds to the presence of the Ten Commandments in a courtroom. The Framers of many state governments were requiring officeholders to swear an oath that they believed in the Old and New Testaments, that they were Christians, and in the more liberal states, that they believed in an afterlife of rewards and punishments!

posted by Clayton at 4:32 PM permalink

 
The Onion, As Usual, Gets It Right

And before you get too self-righteous, I know that you are reading this from work!
BOSTON—An Internet worm that disabled networks across the U.S. Monday and Tuesday temporarily thrust the nation into its most severe maelstrom of productivity since 1992.

posted by Clayton at 3:52 PM permalink

 
This Is Worrisome

I don't know how seriously to take this, but U.S. News and World Report claims that Hugo Chavez's government in Venezula is providing identification documents and assistance to narcoterrorist groups in Colombia, Middle Easterners who are "persons of interest" to the U.S., and seems to be forging close ties with al-Qaeda and Castro's Cuba.

Bush warned us on 9/20/2001 that this wasn't going to be a short war.

posted by Clayton at 3:29 PM permalink

 
Acceptable Behavior in Hollywood

Part of why I believe that widespread acceptance of homosexuality is part of the slippery slope towards acceptance of child molestation isn't just the active role of groups like NAMBLA in international gay organizations; it's also what is considered acceptable behavior in the entertainment industry, the primary gay advocacy group in America today.
One of the most popular movies currently playing at the box office, "Jeepers Creepers 2," is a teen horror flick directed by a stomach-turning registered sex offender who was convicted of molesting a 12-year-old-boy he targeted, groomed, seduced, and filmed in pornographic home videos.

Hollyweird strikes again.

The celebrity pervert's name is Victor Salva. The scheming Salva wrote children's books, participated in the Big Brother program, and worked at a San Francisco-area daycare center where he met his prey. He molested the victim, Nathan Winters, from the time the boy was 7.

Salva pleaded guilty in 1988 to five felony counts of child sex abuse; he served a measly 15 months of a pathetic three-year prison sentence. Winters' scars will last a lifetime.

Salva made Winters the star of his first feature film, "Clownhouse," a revolting low-budget movie about three murderous clowns who terrorize three young boys. (The movie won praise at Robert Redford's Sundance Film Festival.) While working on the project, Salva forced Winters to perform oral sex on the "critically acclaimed" director and captured the acts on tape. When police raided Salva's home, they found not only the sex videos of Salva and Winters, but also tapes of naked young men taking showers and a pornographic album of still photos.
You know, there was a time when a person with a conviction for molesting children--little boys or little girls--after serving his prison sentence, would have found himself living in a cardboard box somewhere. Decent people would not have made excuses and said, "He's served his debt to society." Decent people would have shunned him. If he found employment, it would have been cleaning Port-a-Potties--not making movies.

Of course, Hollywood doesn't really qualify as "decent people," does it?

posted by Clayton at 12:44 PM permalink

 
Fair Coverage of Ohio's Open Carry Demonstration

The Ohio Supreme Court refused to deal with Ohio's incoherent ban on concealed carry, so our side had a demonstration instead. Open carry is lawful, and constitutionally protected, according to the Ohio Supreme Court, so they did.
In a scene reminiscent of the Wild West, about 75 people paraded through Northside with handguns strapped to their sides Sunday.

Unlike the Old West, though, it was a modern-era media publicity stunt to protest last week's Ohio Supreme Court ruling upholding the state's ban on carrying concealed weapons.

"Don't break any laws, then go home and watch the news," gun march organizer Vernon Ferrier instructed protesters from the yard of his Northside home.

Had protesters concealed their guns, they would have violated the law. But they openly and legally toted their firearms as they marched 1.4 miles on Northside sidewalks for about an hour.

Police in cars and on bicycles followed the marchers, but there were no arrests. Several monitors from the Cincinnati Human Relations Commission tagged along after the protesters in case there was any trouble, but there was none.

There was heckling, however, from a half-dozen counter-protesters, some of whom carried plastic "Super Soaker" water guns and walked alongside demonstrators packing real guns in their holsters.

On numerous occasions, counter-protesters poked their water guns in the faces of marchers and asked, "How do you like a gun pointed at you? You gonna murder somebody?"
As the rest of the article makes clear, the "counter-protesters" are ill-mannered sorts, engaged in insults and taunting. (People that don't trust anyone else with a gun, probably because they don't trust themselves.)

posted by Clayton at 9:03 AM permalink

 
Humor From Thomas Sowell

My computer operating system is so out of date that people don't even write viruses for it any more.

posted by Clayton at 8:22 AM permalink

Monday, September 29, 2003
 
What Influence Does Illegal Immigration Have On California's Health Costs?

I mentioned this earlier today, and received a very upset note (but I think you'll see that) from a regular reader who lives in Los Angeles County. He is of Japanese ancestry:
My son was born at Los Angeles County (USC) General Hospital.

My son's birth certificate from Los Angeles County (USC) General Hospital lists his race as "WHITE."

My wife (at the time) is "WHITE" (Irish-Italian) and speaks only English.

When my son was born at Los Angeles County (USC) General Hospital, my wife was shown a film on "how to take care of her newborn."

The DAMN film was in FRIGGIN' Spanish.

The newborn nursery nurse said, "too bad!...most of the [Los Angeles County (USC) General Hospital] patients are illegal aliens from Mexico."

I complained to the hospital administration:

1) Why are American U.S. Citizens given "how to take care of your newborn baby" instructions in Spanish, when the vast majority of American U.S. Citizens speak English and do not understand Spanish?????

2) Is Los Angeles County (USC) General Hospital located in the State of California, United States of America...or is this FRIGGIN' Mexico?????

3) Why are illegal aliens who pay very little taxes (because the vast majority of them are paid under the table) put on a DAMN pedestal...while LIFE-LONG TAXPAYING U.S. Citizens (for twenty years I had 39% of every paycheck going to taxes) are given "THE SHAFT," even to the point of endangering their newborn babies because they are given instructions in "taking care of the newborn" in DAMN Spanish, a language most U.S. Citizens DO NOT understand?????

posted by Clayton at 9:08 PM permalink

 
Responding to Tim Lambert's Email

Those who have been following the John Lott question know that Tim Lambert has been trying to be to John Lott what I was to Michael Bellesiles. Dr. Lambert recently emailed me a question, based on an email I sent him back in January, when this brouhaha was beginning to boil over.
> > > "Clayton E. Cramer" writes:
> > >
> > > > The publisher of Dr. Lott's new book doesn't want that information
> > published
> > > > before the book comes in March. (A not terribly surprising matter from
> > a
> > > > marketing standpoint.)
> > >
> > > Forgive me, but I still don't understand. You wrote "I appear to
> > > have scrambled a few details". Do you mean:
> > >
> > > 1. The "bit more than 4%" was incorrect, but you can't tell me what
> > > the actual number is because Lott asked you to keep it secret.
> >
> > Yes.
>
> When his book came out, Lott said the number was 5%, which means that
> the "bit more than 4%" was correct. It appears to me that Lott lied
> to you.

No, I answered the second half of your question. The number was a bit more than 4%, and I had given out information that I was not supposed to have given out. I figured that within a few weeks, you would see the actual published number, and see that I had only answered the second half of the question. It was rather a difficult position, because I had unintentionally revealed more than I should have, and yet I didn't want to confirm this data unnecessarily.

I have been confused by Dr. Lott's continually changing situation all along. I still don't see from reading the latest installment of your charges that there is something unambiguously false on what he has said--but then again, there are a number of technical questions here that require a lot more study than I am able to put into this right now. (I've just started teaching two history classes, along with my full time job.)

I've been pretty careful all along to emphasize that Dr. Lott's work came up with small but statistically significant declines in several violent crime rates. When I've been asked about it, I have long emphasized that multivariate statistical analysis is a complex process, and that I don't know enough to be able to meaningfully evaluate the validity of his methods--there aren't, as near as I can tell, a lot of people who can--and those who have the appropriate expertise seem to be about as partisan anti-gun as Lott is partisan pro-gun.

My impression (and it is more impression than anything else) is that many of the disputes between Lott on one side and Ayres & Donohue on the other, turn into questions of appropriate models--for example, what assumption should you make about the behavior of crime rates when a law is changed. Some people argue that crime rates were going to drop anyway, because of the normal ebb and flow of crime rates (ignoring pretty much the entire period 1964-1976); others argue that they were going to continue rising. Pretty obviously, this affects the question of whether you saw a drop in crime rates that was going to happen anyway.

Some of the claims about Lott miscoding the effective dates of these laws I do know enough about that I am not impressed with the critics. I recall seeing inaccurate criticism concerning the effective date of the Georgia law, for example, which was based on an Attorney-General's opinion about the meaning of the statute. However, Georgia's law presents an example of why there are some serious problems about determining when is the appropriate starting date for a statute. Unlike many of the other states, where the concealed weapon statute changed through legislative action, and took place to considerable press coverage, the Georgia Attorney-General's opinion seems to have been fairly unpublicized. When is the effective date? The date it was issued? Or several months later, when every county in the state was aware of it, and started to issue permits based on it? Maine, as another example, could be legitimately coded as two different years--depending on how you read the statute in question, and more importantly, how the officials responsible for permit issuance read the law.

I have also told people that I found Lott's claims plausible, and consistent with what I would expect from using much cruder tools, such as state lavel bivariate analysis of murder rates and a dummy variable for passage of the new law. I have also freely acknowledged that I found his results attractive because they are consistent with what the historical record shows for why concealed weapon regulation took place, and what I would like to find. That doesn't make them right, nor does it make them wrong.

Some of the issues that you have raised are not of that level of complexity--the questions about the 1997 survey, for example. While the questions raised have been understandable by all, they have been mired in enough uncertainty that it is difficult to prove that Dr. Lott lied, nor is it possible to prove that he told the truth.

I will certainly re-enter this controversy when I have the time and energy to review the charges of fraud. I am hoping that those engaged in this controversy can nail down the arguments to something that is a bit less effort to follow. At least the question of the 1997 survey's existence was a clear-cut statement by you: he made up the survey. That was something that could be easily understood without a high technical knowledge of statistical methods. Dr. Lott's responses, and Mr. Gross's appearance at a cliff-hanger moment, while not very satisfying--indeed, quite unsatisfying, in many ways, left the burden of proof on you to prove the 1997 survey did not take place.

I would draw this analogy to law: an accusation of a crime requires a very high standard of proof; a civil suit requires only a preponderance of evidence. The question of whether a scholar has made a mistake--even a very serious mistake--requires only that you provide more evidence that he is wrong than he provide to show that he is right. Fraud, however, requires a very high standard of proof.

I will confess that I never found Dr. Lott's argument rock solid, simply because I know the limits of multivariate analysis on a sociological problem, and because I know my own limits to understanding how someone may have screwed up in defining the problem. This can be intentional manipulation, or more likely, honest mistakes in figuring out how to approach the problem. It doesn't take an enormous amount of evidence to argue that Dr. Lott was in error. It appears from the last that I have read from Ayres & Donohue, that they argue that there is no net reduction in violent crimes, and perhaps even a very tiny increase.

On the issue of whether there is a net gain to society from passing non-discretionary permit laws, I am quite prepared to say that different people throw numbers around, and the range of possible results suggest that such laws don't enormously change things, either direction. If there is a net gain, it's not huge, and if there's a net loss for society, it's even smaller. The argument about such laws again returns to these core questions, which are not prone to statistical argument and manipulation:

1. Does the corruption and racism which is a fundamental part of concealed weapon permit issuance in most states justify a reform of these laws?

2. There is a fundamental right to defend one's self and family from criminal attack. Do such laws allow one to defend one's self from criminal attack?

Minor changes at the margins to correct problems of concealed weapons permit laws that are too strict, or too lax, do not bother me. As an example, I recently suggested to my representatives that Idaho's concealed weapon permit law should be changed to make drunk driving convictions a disqualifying conviction for either three or five years. But I will not at any point support passage of a law that divides law-abiding adults into two classes: those with the right political connections or race to get a permit, and those who have to fear leaving their house at night for fear of being beaten, raped, or murdered by thugs who fear nothing.

posted by Clayton at 9:03 PM permalink

 
Those Heartless People Who Save Money By Providing Inadequate Health Care

Can you believe? There are 2800 people who are going to go blind because their insurance company wants to save some money! Before you call up the Democratic candidates and tell them of this latest outrage that demands a national health system, like Britain's--it's the British National Health Service that is doing this:
The Department of Health has condemned 2,800 people to blindness by needlessly postponing the nationwide introduction of a new NHS eye treatment until next summer, a charity said yesterday.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind described the delay as a "crude, cynical and indefensible" attempt to ration NHS treatment.

Last week the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) announced that photo dynamic therapy would be available for some patients with the most aggressive form of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a common cause of sight loss in old age. Another group would get the new treatment, but only if it took part in clinical trials to assess its effectiveness.

Normally health authorities have three months to implement new guidance from Nice. But the Health Department wrote to NHS chief executives last week telling them: "On this occasion we are extending the direction to require the NHS to make funds available within nine months."

posted by Clayton at 3:22 PM permalink

 
I Can't Decide Whether to Laugh Or Be Disturbed By This Article

The Guardian has an article about a New Yorker who runs a program that combines sadomasochism and exercise. I won't quote the article itself (too kinky), except to mention that "Victoria will not reveal the identities of her celebrity clients but tantalisingly adds there are a couple of professional athletes on her books."

This may explain a lot of why Hollywood hates America so much. They have just come out of a session with dominatrix Victoria, and think it's time to take out their aggressions on us.

posted by Clayton at 2:52 PM permalink

 
I'll Try Not To Snicker About This...

Something that I did not know about Iraqi marriage customs. In Iraq,
nearly half of marriages are between first or second cousins, a statistic that is one of the more important and least understood differences between Iraq and America. The extraordinarily strong family bonds complicate virtually everything Americans are trying to do here, from finding Saddam Hussein to changing women's status to creating a liberal democracy.
THe rest of the article goes on to explain that this complicates the social structure, causing much stronger loyalties to the highly in-bred families than to larger institutions, such as the nation.

It was always apparent from looking at photographs of Hussein and his Cabinet that there was a lot of very close family relationships involved in his government. It appears, however, that this problem of family trees that don't branch is a bit wider than just Hussein's family. To my surprise, while the article puts the West's disapproval of cousin marriage onto the Catholic Church, it also admits in the second part, "The practice became rare in the West, especially after evidence emerged of genetic risks to offspring, but it has persisted in some places, notably the Middle East....."

We've heard a lot for several years from the leftist Hussein apologists about horrifying birth defects in Iraq, supposedly caused by use of depleted uranium shells during Gulf War I. I wonder: is the birth defect rate in Iraq unusually high because of too much in-breeding?

posted by Clayton at 2:45 PM permalink

 
Violent Adolescent Males

Interesting description of a teenager:
"They go through a stage where, physically and psychologically, they're growing much stronger, and become much more lean and long, and containment can be an increasing challenge at that age," he said.
Before you make any assumptions: it's an adolescent male gorilla.
The gorilla, known as Little Joe, escaped Sunday night and roamed through the Franklin Park Zoo and along nearby streets for nearly two hours before it was sedated with tranquilizer darts, according to Zoo New England CEO and President John Linehan.

Eighteen-year-old Courtney Roberson worked at the zoo and was taking 2-year-old Nia Scott, her friend's little sister, for an outing when Little Joe escaped, according to family members.

The gorilla grabbed the child, threw her to the ground and jumped on her, according to Dale McNeil, Scott's godmother.
So why do some zoos prohibit concealed carry? If it had been my two-year-old, I would have shot the gorilla.

posted by Clayton at 2:28 PM permalink

 
Why Is Arnold Suddenly Doing So Well?

Public opinion surveys show that Arnold Schwarzenegger has pulled way out in front of Cruz Bustamante recently. Why? Arnold Steinberg over at National Review Online suggests that Cruz Bustamante's campaign has been inept, and mentions the race issue--that Bustamante's ads are overwhelmingly aimed at non-whites. He also mentions the driver's licenses for illegal aliens bill that Davis just signed.

Being a California refugee, I am inclined to think that the illegal alien driver's license bill may be a lot of it. Schwarzenegger has expressed his disapproval of this sort of thing--no surprise, he had to wait in line like everyone else that wanted to immigrate to America--and this is a surprisingly strong sentiment, even among Hispanics in California. As you might well expect, except among the most liberal of Californians, there is a lot of irritation about this.

Yes, you can write this off to racism--in America's most liberal and multiculturalist state--but there's something a big deeper going on than racism.

There is enormous resentment of the fact that some people get to disobey the law in California.

There is an awareness that the illegal aliens, because they are generally take the lowest paying of jobs, are more likely to end up receiving government assistance for health care, contributing significantly to California's budget problems. (Yes, the public employee labor unions are contributing far more to those budget problems, but at least they aren't clogging up the emergency rooms at the hospitals with sick kids. I speak from experience on this matter.)

There is also a bit of resentment of how "multiculturalism" has become an excuse for dumbing down the curriculum in public schools, to accommodate kids who are coming from impoverished, non-English speaking homes--and not surprisingly, do very poorly in school. I don't blame these kids for it, and I don't blame the parents--but there are definitely some ugly consequences to it.

posted by Clayton at 11:50 AM permalink

 
Ungrateful Little Snots

An ad I found on astromart.com that makes you wonder what the world is coming to:
BOUGHT SEVERAL ASSEMBLED CELESTRON TELESCOPES AS GIFTS FOR GRANDCHILDREN. NOONE WANTED THEM. I BOUGHT THEM AT A SPECIAL PRICE, AND WILL TAKE ANY REASONABLE OFFER.

posted by Clayton at 11:28 AM permalink

 
The Constitutional Right to Polygamy

Thanks to How Appealing! for the link to this Deseret News story.
COLORADO CITY, Ariz. — Utah needs to change its "stupid, old-fashioned law" against polygamy, several hundred polygamists from Arizona told Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff.

"I just said I'd love for them to come to Utah and help me do it, and they asked if I wanted them to be like Rosa Parks," Shurtleff said Friday after attending an invitation-only, two-day session with polygamists from Centennial Park, a plural community on the outskirts of Colorado City and Hildale, Utah.

"We talked about making it (polygamy) a misdemeanor. But first they have to try to end the practice of child-bride marriages and they have to educate people and let them know what's going on in their community," he said.
Yup. The Lawrence decision does seem to have opened the floodgates. Does anyone want to guess how many years it will be before the argument is that there is a constitutional right to "child-bride marriages"?

posted by Clayton at 10:21 AM permalink

 
This Is Actually A Pretty Rare Type of Tragedy

From an Australian paper, about an event in Maryland:
FOUR-year-old boy found a loaded gun in his family's house and fired it through the front door, killing his five-year-old sister and seriously wounding another boy, authorities said.

Another sister, aged 10, had seen the child pick up the semi-automatic handgun in the house last night and had rushed the other children outside to try to protect them, but the bullet went through the door, hitting them, said Prince George's County police spokeswoman Diane Richardson.
There are very, very few such events in America--but let's do our best to make them even more rare. If you have a gun in your house, you should:

1. Properly secure the gun to prevent this sort of misuse or theft.

2. If you can't properly secure the gun, and especially if there are kids in the house, the gun should be unloaded, and the ammunition removed from the house when you aren't present. (I believe that even in New York or Massachusetts, having a box of ammunition in your trunk is legal if you don't have a gun in the car as well.)

3. You should take your children somewhere that they can see how destructive a gun is, and that it is not a toy. Shooting a hole in a milk jug filled with water works. Buy a cute little teddy bear at the store and shoot that. That should sober up even the smallest of kids.

posted by Clayton at 9:40 AM permalink

 
Global Warming--on Pluto?

I've mentioned previously that the evidence suggests that global warming may not be man-made, but the result of changes in solar output. One of pieces of evidence is that the Martian ice cap is shrinking. Another is a recently discovered archive of data at Armagh Observatory from 1795 forward that suggests that solar output changes are at least partially response for global warming.

Now I see that Pluto's atmosphere
is expanding and warming even as the planet moves away from the Sun, scientists reported this week. In a paper published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature, a team of planetary astronomers reported that Pluto's atmosphere, as of August 2002, has expanded considerably since it passed perihelion in 1989. The atmosphere, composed primarily of nitrogen with a surface pressure of only a few microbars, has likely warmed by about one degree Celsius as well.
That article goes on to point out that this could be for the same reason that the warmest part of the day on Earth is usually late afternoon, not directly at noon. Still, the lag here on Earth is measured in hours--but fourteen years later, Pluto's atmosphere is still warming?

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posted by Clayton at 9:23 AM permalink

 
Recovering Economy

This Reuters story indicates that the recent tax cuts are having the desired effect:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. personal spending increased at a healthy rate in August, the government said on Monday in a report boosting hopes the crucial household sector will be able to support the shaky economic recovery.

The Commerce Department said spending grew 0.8 percent in August after an upwardly revised 0.9 percent increase in July. Personal income, propelled by a large tax cut enacted by Congress in the spring, gained 0.2 percent in August.

In another sign that consumer spending gathered momentum in the third quarter, retailing giant Wal-Mart (WMT) said it expected September sales to rise. In a recorded update, the Bentonville, Arkansas-based discount retailer said sales at U.S. stores open at least a year were at the high end of its forecast for a 3 percent to 5 percent gain.
However, many consumers took actions that while sensible for individuals, are not necessarily good for the economy as a whole:
A combination of lower tax withholding rates and the advance tax credit checks sent in July and August to families with children gave disposable personal income -- personal income minus taxes and other bills -- a shot in the arm. Disposable income grew 0.9 percent after a 1.5 percent jump in July. The July gain was the biggest monthly gain since January 2002, according to Commerce.

But consumers did not pour all of the extra money into spending, as the personal saving rate -- savings as a percentage of disposable income -- grew for a second straight month, to 3.8 percent, its highest level since February.
The best hope for getting the economy firing on all cylinders again is for you to go out and buy stuff--and ideally, American-made stuff to put your fellow Americans back to work. However, even buying foreign-made goods does some good. Dock workers have to unload stuff coming in from overseas; truck drivers have to haul it to your local Wal-Mart; clerks have to put it on the shelves, and then ring it up at the register.

posted by Clayton at 9:09 AM permalink

Sunday, September 28, 2003
 
Iraq WMDs: The Plot Thickens

I had mentioned a few days ago a Fox News interview with a former Iraqi official who claimed that Iraq was pretending to have WMDs well past the point where they actually had them. Fox News this evening interviewed a Newsweek reporter named Weisskopf who said that it appears that it may not have been that Hussein was misleading the rest of the world, but that the heads of some Iraq's WMD programs were misleading Hussein! Why?

Weisskopf suggested that these officials misled Hussein about the extent and availability of WMDs in order to keep funding going for their programs. This is, when you think about it, not too terribly surprising. Hussein was, to put it mildly, not all that knowledgeable about the sciences. As long as Hussein thought his scientists were building WMDs, they had jobs, and not too much chance of being tortured to death.

There's another reason that I can think of why they might have lied to Hussein. At the end of World War II, Hitler was giving orders to move various German Army units around--units that no longer existed. No one dared tell Hitler that these units no longer existed. If WMD program officials had been accepting money for programs that produced nothing, they would have been understandably very reluctant to have this news get to Hussein. Perhaps the intercepted messages that led the U.S. to believe that Iraq had WMDs available on 45 minute notice were like those phantom German Army units--who wants to tell Hussein that they don't exist?

UPDATE: And here's the Time magazine article (quite interesting, and worth reading in full) that makes the same argument:
Saddam's underlings appear to have invented weapons programs and fabricated experiments to keep the funding coming. The Mukhabarat captain says the scamming went all the way to the top of the mic to its director, Huweish, who would appease Saddam with every report, never telling him the truth about failures or production levels and meanwhile siphoning money from projects. "He would tell the President he had invented a new missile for Stealth bombers but hadn't. So Saddam would say, 'Make 20 missiles.' He would make one and put the rest in his pocket," says the captain. Colonel Hussan al-Duri, who spent several years in the 1990s as an air-defense inspector, saw similar cons. "Some projects were just stealing money," he says. A scientist or officer would say he needed $10 million to build a special weapon. "They would produce great reports, but there was never anything behind them."

If Saddam may not have known the true nature of his own arsenal, it is no wonder that Western intelligence services were picking up so many clues about so many weapons systems. But it helps answer one logical argument that the Administration has been making ever since the weapons failed to appear after the war ended: why, if Saddam had nothing to hide, did he endure billions of dollars in sanctions and ultimately prompt his own destruction? Perhaps because even he was mistaken about what was really at stake in this fight.

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posted by Clayton at 9:40 PM permalink

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