Supply Side Economics...

finally takes a beating. And a well deserved one!

A view from Hollywood

Inside the hollywood liberal conspiracy. Too funny.

More Homeopathy Silliness

Courtesy of Skeptico


"The fact that [it] was never tested, and goes against all science tells us, does not necessarily mean it is wrong. But it does mean the evidence it works needs to be stronger than the evidence we demand for other things."

"Why should homeopathy not be required to demonstrate that it works to the same standards of real medicine? Why is it that this magic water defies the simple procedures of testing that works with everything else?"

Liberal Media

Very nice media analysis of the news pundits role in political discourse.
Salon.com - Daou Report

Kevin Trudeau

Jake Tapper on Nightlight did a nice takedown of informercial marketing scam artist Kevin Trudeau.

The video interview broadcast on Nightlight (1/13/06) from which the transcript was created even more dramatically illustrated how sleazy this guy is.

He impressively spins his out of court settlement and agreeing not to sell any more products to "there was no finding of wrongdoing" and "they had to drop all the charges". He also says with a straight face that "There was not one penny in fines" (technically, his $2 million dollar payment was "consumer redress").

Is it any wonder that he's thinking of running for national political office?

And of course, he's still running the same scams, only instead of selling worthless and dangerous products, he's now selling worthless and dangerous information in his best selling book.

This is a very dangerous and evil man.
More reading on Trudeau.

Follow up on tax policy

A beautiful quote, via the howler:

No one could believe, as a general matter, that lowering tax rates brings higher revenues. For example, did George Bush believe this during Campaign 2000? Obviously, no—he did not. During that campaign, Bush proposed lowering the marginal tax rate from 39.6 percent down to 33 percent. But if lowering the tax rate brings higher revenues, why would Bush have drawn the line there? Why not lower the tax rate to thirty-two percent? No, to thirty-one! No, to 30! Obviously, no politician seriously thinks that lowering the tax rate brings higher revenues. But the claim has lived as a staple of talk-show discourse over the course of the past several decades.

It's so staggeringly simple. If lowering tax rates actually increased government revenues, no one in the world would be against it. If we can only lower the tax rate enough, we'd have more than enough money to cover the deficit, pay for the Iraq war, universal health coverage, you name it.

Rrrrrright!

Some fascinating evolution facts

Get Busy Livin', Or Get Busy Bloggin': The Sternberg Saga Continues

Nice follow up to the Sternberg saga, the guy who went on O'Reilly to complain about the horrible treatment he received from scientists when he allowed an ID paper to be published in the journal he edited.

All tax cuts are not good for the economy!

Andrew Tobias points out an argument that isn't heard nearly enough.

We've heard it argued countless times that when the government cuts, it's revenues always go up, which is absurd on it's face. Of course, as Andrew argues, that is clearly true when the top tax bracket is preposterously high, as they were during, Ike, Kennedy, and even Reagan's terms.

However, there is an obvious limit to this argument. If you cut taxes to 0%, your tax revenues will not go up. Therefore the trick is to find the threshold at which the reduced revenues in taxes caused by the rate reduction are made up by the increase in the size and growth of the overall economy, creating a net revenue gain. A simple example is, if a cut from 15% to 10% causes a double of the overall income generated, that is a net gain. 15% of 100,000 is 15,000. 10% of 200,000 = 20,000.

Many would argue as Andrew does that the Clinton top rate of 39.6% was about right, and the Bush cuts overshot the mark. There is a fair amount of evidence to support this position.

Any honest assessment of tax policy has to start with the position that all tax cuts are not a good idea. If you can't admit that, you shouldn't be allowed to talk about taxes.

The war on Christmas

Brought to you by fox news. O'Reilly, Gibson, and the entire network are pushing this thing, and I have to say that I completely don't get it. Among all the "secular progressives" I know, I don't know anyone who is against "Merry Christmas". Lots of non-religious people enjoy christmas as a secular event, myself included.

I'm sure there are a handful of crackpots out there, but I fail to see the giant conspiracy. And I don't understand what the heinous threat this poses. Is there even the slightest bit of evidence that the ACLU and George Soros are trying to get private companies to stop saying Merry Christmas?

Isn't the simpler explanation that retail companies simply choose to generify their holiday message, largely out of a risk-averse corporate strategy to appeal to as wide a base of shoppers as possible -jews, muslims, wiccans, et. al.? Is that such an offensive idea?

Yet, on fox news, it is an indisputable fact. Now, they are just breaking down the horrible consequences. Best bizarre recent quote (hat tip sadly, no!):

FOX News Financial analyst Tobin Smith says that the War on Christmas could lead to a world economic collapse:

The War on Christmas: Could the left win its crusade against Christmas and does that threaten our stock market and entire economy?

Tobin Smith: The War on Christmas is real and taken to the extreme turning Christmas into a second-class holiday would kill much of the retail specialty stores. The next target would be Easter. This definitely does hurt the economy. Retailers have fallen under the pixie dust spell of consultants and this idea of being politically correct becomes this insidious little disease.


A world economic collapse?? I don't quite know what to add to that.

The Booming Economy (?)

The Howler helps the media break down the disconnect between the booming economy, and the reality of most people.

Just because the GDP is growing nicely and corporate profits are high doesn't mean most people are better off, as Krugman and Reich explain. As with the Bush tax cuts, the economic boom mostly only helps those at the top of the income scale. As Andrew Tobias says, "It's a grand time to be rich in America."

The democrats and pundits simply don't explain this. Capitalism is the best economic system there is, but there is a difference between capitalism that helps hard working people get ahead and live the American dream, and "robber baron" capitalism. And that critical difference is largely a product of government economic and tax policy.

Inside the Mind of the Intelligent Designer

by Adam Felber.

Cheers to Krauthammer

I strongly believe that science and religion need not, should not, and must not be at odds. Those trying to convince people of faith that science is at odds with their faith does them and this country a great disservice. It's insane to be discouraging anyone from pursuing science for such absurd reasons.

Senate Says No to Torture, 90-9

Nice work, Senators McCain, Graham, and Warner, for forcing this issue to the floor. Not to mention heroes like Ian Fishback for risking their careers to tell the truth.

And the shame award goes to the Torture is OK! Senate delegation from Oklahoma.

More Psychic / Allison Dubois Thrashing

From the fine folks at The Two Percent Company.

I especially love it when psychics make supernatural claims that would be trivial to prove beyond any doubt, "Yes, when I'm playing poker I can hear other people's thoughts".

But of course, they never actually do. Gee, I wonder why.

Michelle Malkin is making sense

...at least some of the time. And no one is more surprised than me, but good for her.

Today she's going after the obscene Alaskan "pork" in the highway bill.

Previously she's been beating on the administration's dangerous cronyism hiring practices.

Here's hoping we can all agree that professionalism, competence, and responsibility are bipartisan values. The absence of such must be called to account, whether democrat or republican.

Crackpot of the Day

Don Feder. He used to infuriate me several times a week when I read his column in the Boston Herald 10 or 15 years ago.

He makes the unassailable case that Katrina is god's punishment for, well, you know, the usual stuff.

Wingnuts to the left

Meet Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Now we are all learning what it’s like to reap the whirlwind of fossil fuel dependence which Barbour and his cronies have encouraged. Our destructive addiction has given us a catastrophic war in the Middle East and--now--Katrina is giving our nation a glimpse of the climate chaos we are bequeathing our children.


So, Haley Barbour caused the hurricane by writing an anti-global warming memo in 2001. I think we've set a new high water-mark (sorry, couldn't resist) for the phrase "poison pen".

Wingnuts to the right

Meet John J. Tierney Jr.

The author said he has "grave, grave problems with the conduct of the operation in Iraq" and wouldn't want to see his 20-year-old son go there. But he said it is "automatic" that anybody who joins a protest by one of the offending groups is supporting communists.

The war may have grave, grave problems, and I wouldn't send my son, but anyone who protests is a commie. Nice!

Richard Sternberg & ID

Caught this guy on O'Reilly tonight. He was the editor of a biological journal that published a paper by Stephen Meyer on "Intelligent Design". Sternberg was claiming he's been subject to tremendous harassment by the scientific community for publishing this supposedly peer reviewed paper. O'Reilly was only too happy to jump in and claim the usual claptrap about the secularist scientific community being intolerant of any dissent.

Or maybe, it's just really, really bad science! Real scientists tend to be against that, too. The always reliable Panda's Thumb has the full dissection of the merits of Meyer's paper.

They also point out that Sternberg has a creationist background, and the topic of the paper itself is well outside the normal area of study and review of this particular publication. That in itself lends suspicion to the idea that this paper was seriously peer reviewed, as Sternberg claimed. O'Reilly didn't mention either of these facts.

The thing is, if you want to compete in the real science world, you have to actually do real science - serious peer review, testing of hypothesis that can be independently verified, that sort of thing. If the IDers actually had some real science, maybe they'd be taken seriously by real scientists, and not have to play their cards via politicians, and on "the factor".

The conclusion of the article says it best:

"There is nothing wrong with challenging conventional wisdom - continuing challenge is a core feature of science. But challengers should at least be aware of, read, cite, and specifically rebut the actual data that supports conventional wisdom, not merely construct a rhetorical edifice out of omission of relevant facts, selective quoting, bad analogies, knocking down strawmen, and tendentious interpretations. Unless and until the "?intelligent design"? movement does this, they are not seriously in the game. They'?re not even playing the same sport."


UPDATE: Excellent Analysis of the O'Reilly segment over at evolutionblog.

More Anti-Evolutionists

Yes, it's true, you can be a moonbat anti-evolutionist without being a christian fundamentalist! I give you new age whackjob Deepak Chopra, and an appropriate fisking by pharyngula.

Why Cindy Sheehan Matters

I don't know why it isn't obvious that it isn't actually about her. Ultimately, it doesn’t actually matter whether the president meets with her or not. And no reasonable person thinks Cindy Sheehan should set US foreign policy. She’s not running for any office. So, it’s irrelevant whether or not she’s a crackpot or a partisan or anything else. The Ad Hominem attacks upon her are senseless. The death of her son simply gives her standing to ask the questions many are asking.

The point is that the president must explain to Cindy Sheehan and all Americans why our continued expenditure of American blood and treasure makes sense, and when it will end. She is a symbol for the majority of Americans who no longer think the war was worth it, and don’t think the current Iraq policy is succeeding.

And there are many questions.

Why does it not make sense to set a deadline to pull out troops?
If it takes 5 or 10 or 20 years for Iraq to have a military that can defend itself, does that mean Americans will be there, in force, taking casualties day after day, for decades? No one believes that will happen. So clearly there is a limit to what we as a nation are willing to invest in this war. At some point, we have to get out. That’s no secret to the insurgency, either. It’s silly to pretend that setting a deadline will somehow help the insurgents "wait it out". And it’s a reasonable argument that our continued occupation creates more insurgents than we are killing.

More questions:
What evidence is there that this war has made us safer?

What evidence is there that conditions are improving in Iraq?

What are the real numbers of trained Iraqi troops who can replace US soldiers?

I think Senator Russ Feingold has it exactly right, calling for a removal of US troops from Iraq by December, 2006. If the new Iraqi government can’t stand up and defend itself by then, it’s hard to imagine that they ever will.

I want to believe that we still can succeed, and at least leave behind a stable Iraqi government that is no threat to (1) us, and (2) it’s neighbors. If it is a theocracy, so be it, as long as we can achieve the other two goals. It doesn’t matter if they don’t support same sex civil unions. At this point, we can’t even be concerned if women have the right to vote. Unfortunately, that falls in the category of “nice to have”, but not necessary to stop us from getting out of there.

But I fear that we’ve bungled this war beyond hope of saving Iraq from an inevitable civil war 10 minutes after the last US soldier leaves. I truly hope I’m wrong.

President Roosevelt had weekly fireside chats throughout WWII explaining in detail what was happening in the war, and what it meant to our security. President Bush needs to tell us what is happening, and when we are exiting. He should sell this war as hard as he tried to sell Social Security reform. “It’s hard work” and “We’re making progress” just don’t cut it.

Republican War on Science

Today brings us the news that Senator Frist agrees with President Bush that we should teach intelligent Design alongside of evolution in science classes.

This issue is nothing less than a threat to the future economic leadership of this country. The Chinese sure aren't teaching their kids that evolution is "just a theory, not a fact". They're studying hard to become the new generation of top scientists developing the technological breakthroughs that will define the 21st century, while we squabble over the absurd politization of what makes scientific theory.

This false ideological war is insane on many levels. It's simply completely unnecessary for there to be any conflict between religion and evolution. The mysteries of the origins of the universe will probably never be addressed by science. It's a topic that science is ill-equipped to test, and can easily be left to philosophers and religious scholars.

Meanwhile, this so-called conflict between science and religion sets up a situation where bright people who happen to be christians will be dissuaded from studying biology and science, fearing it is somehow against their religious teachings. We have too few scientists already, and cannot afford to fall behind in the global marketplace of scientific innovation.

I'm looking forward to reading the new book, the Republican War on Science for more depressing details, on this, the most ideologically anti-science administration ever.

My New Favorite Rush Limbaugh quote

"Wouldn't it be great if anybody who speaks out against this country, to kick them out of the country? Anybody that threatens this country, kick 'em out. We'd get rid of Michael Moore, we'd get rid of half the Democratic Party if we would just import that law. That would be fabulous. The Supreme Court ought to look into this. Absolutely brilliant idea out there."

Such a great idea, I can't believe the founding fathers blew that one.

Washington Post Slams President's Support of "Intelligent Design"

Choice excerpts:


"FOR MORE THAN 30 years, the conservative movement in America has been doing battle with the forces of relativism, the Â?do your own thingÂ? philosophy that eschews objective truth and instead sees all beliefs and all personal choices as equally valid. Instead, philosophically minded American conservatives have argued that there is such a thing as objectivity and that some beliefs really are better, truer or more accurate than others. Given this history, it seems appropriate to ask: Is President Bush really a conservative?"


"But the proponents of intelligent design are not content with participating in a philosophical or religious debate. They want their theory to be accepted as science and to be taught in ninth-grade biology classes, alongside the theory of evolution. For that, there is no basis whatsoever: The nature of the "evidence"? for the theory of evolution is so overwhelming, and so powerful, that it informs all of modern biology. To pretend that the existence of evolution is somehow still an open question, or that it is one of several equally valid theories, is to misunderstand the intellectual and scientific history of the past century."

Disturbing Account of Iraqi Security Forces

This article/editorial suggests the thoroughly depressing idea that the security forces being trained to take over in Iraq are largely loyal to the religious leaders, and are eager to enforce religious law over any emerging secular/national/constitutional government.

The epilogue to the story is that the reporter was killed days after the article appeared.

Rove

I'd say there is a fairly good chance that Karl Rove didn't do anything technically illegal when he revealed to reporters that Joseph Wilson's wife was a CIA operative. I do hope we learn how he knew such classified information himself. I don't see how anyone can claim that the CIA would put an operative in a front company if it wasn't a secret that she worked for them. But the criminal outing statute is very narrow, so the intent may be the issue.

However, the rush by the right to defend Rove as somehow heroic by revealing this, is absurd. Even if Wilson was 100% wrong in his public statements, that wouldn't come close to justifying the leaking of classified information. If Wilson was wrong, wouldn't there be plenty of non-classified info & spin that could supposedly discredit him?


As Andrew Sullivan so clearly put it, "Just a thought experiment: can you imagine the WSJ calling to give, say, Sid Blumenthal a medal for outing a CIA operative to counter misinformation in the Bosnia campaign?"

I'd say that's exactly the right parallel.

John Bolton

A nomination vote was blocked again today by failing to reach the 60 votes needed to force cloture.

I'm on record as not caring about the Bolton nomination to be UN ambassador, but I think the issue holding up the vote does have merit. Senators Biden and Dodd are being denied access to certain documents they'd like to see before a final vote.

No Democrat has said that they wish to filibuster this vote indefinitely. However, the White House and many Republican Senators are accusing the Dems of simply stalling because they don't want to vote.

It's always dangerous to ascribe motives to others that are contrary to what they may state, so I think this issue comes down to the simple issue of "Do Senators Biden and Dodd have a legitimate right to these documents?". The answer by every account is yes.

RFK Jr, Autism & The Anti-Science Crowd

It's truly sad to see a strong environmental advocate like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. get swept up by junk science. His recent article in Salon and Rolling Stone about the supposed link between autism and vaccines w/thimerosal, a preservative which contains mercury seems to show that he doesn't understand the difference between causation and correlation.

A few points:

(Almost) no thimerosal has been used in vaccines Canada or the Netherlands in 10 years, yet the rate of autism has not dropped in those countries, as you would clearly expect if that were the cause.

He speaks about the conflict of interest with the pharmaceuticals industry research and vaccine makers, which is a fair point to consider. However, his expert researchers, the Geiers, make their living as expert witnesses in torts against the vaccine manufacturers. Clearly they are no less the disinterested research scientists.

This is all extremely well analyzed over at Orac Knows.

UPDATE: Even more excellent analysis over at Skeptico.

More Facts on Malpractice Costs

Actual Malpractice costs (both legal judgments and out of court settlements) continue to grow at about the same rate at medical costs. The data shows little increase in the past 10 years. There have been slightly higher settlements, and slightly fewer cases.

So why the giant spikes in malpractice insurance rates, and fearmongering about doctors being driven out of business? Ask the insurance companies.

The Wisdom of Dick Cheney

Maybe this will be the time he's right. Let's hope so.

"I think we may well have some kind of presence there over a period of time. The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline. I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency." - vice-president Dick Cheney, May 31, 2005.

"They will do everything they can to disrupt the process up to those elections in January because they know that once you've got a democratically elected government in place that has legitimacy in the eyes of the people of Iraq, they're out of business. That will be the end of the insurgency." - vice president Dick Cheney, October 28, 2004.

(cribbed from Andrew Sullivan)

Judge: Parents can't teach pagan beliefs

Theocracy watch! I'm sure praying optimistic(?) this one will easily get kicked on appeal.

The Panda's Thumb: Creationist Fears, Creationist Behaviors

One of the best articles I've read on Inteligent Design/Creationist ideas.

Kansas and the Tylosaurus

Fun article.