Liberal pundit rips health tax

From the N.Y. Times:

There is a middle-class tax time bomb ticking in the Senate’s version of President Obama’s effort to reform health care.

Journalists and objectivity?

Maybe this explains why bloggers do better than established pundits:

But experiments rarely tell us what we think they’re going to tell us. That’s the dirty secret of science.

Democrats destroy party

Democrats seem to think their health-insurance overhaul will be a crowning achievement; instead, it will be the death of the party -- insofar as has been the protector of the little guy.

For that is how it has always seen itself. The party's roots go back to Thomas Jefferson, who inveighed against both the federal government and the money men who always seem to swarm around the federal funds, as in the Bank of the United States (the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac of its day).

His successors continued the tradition. The party took its modern form with Andrew Jackson. Whether it was letting the muddy-booted masses into the White House to celebrate his inauguration, or killing the second version of the Bank of the United States, he made his mark as a champion of the common man.

Our discussion is not about whether their policies were consistent, or in the long run actually helped average Americans. Also left out is the reality that the party became the defender of slavery. What we are talking about is the political and psychological image of the party in the public mind.

That continued after the Civil War, with William Jennings Bryan its emotional leader. But mere opposition must have begun to seem frustrating as the corporations only grew bigger and the rich seemed to grow richer. Under Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt, the Democratic Party no longer sought merely to oppose the concentration of power in Washington and Wall Street, but to take over Washington and dominate Wall Street. Whatever their successes and failures, they at least seemed to be taking the side of the average person.

And that's what average people seek. This may come as a shock to Big Business, but a great host of people don't trust the big corporations. That's why people want an ally. They are under no misconception, in most cases, that the Democratic Party is a perfect ally. But for decades it seemed to be the only ally they had.

That's why the current battle for nationalized health care could mark a serious turning point for the party. WhenBarack Obama took office, most people thought that Democrats would take their side against the big insurance andpharmaceutical companies — and probably the hospitals and doctors, too.

But the battle over the 2,000-plus insurance bills has revealed that, far from being allies of the people, the Democrats have become allies of the big corporations and the elite.

In June, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America cut an infamous backroom deal with the White House and Senate Democrats. The companies vowed to hand over $80 billion in lower drug costs over the next decade and also pony up for a multimillion-dollar TV ad campaign to back the Democratic plans. The payoff: The legislation would take it easy on Big Pharma. The longer-term picture: The drug companies get more customers and less competition as government control stifles innovation.

As for Big Insurance, they too sold out. The big firms have already agreed to stop denying coverage to the sick and charging people higher premiums because of their gender or health status. What's in it for them? The mandate: ObamaCare will force Americans to carry health insurance, i.e., be customers, while driving smaller companies out of that business.

Those are just the big guys. Other industries and special interests did all they could to buy off the Democrats.

As the Journal has pointed out, they are finding out that the Democrats may be stabbing them in the back. However, that just shows the truth of the old adage that an honest politician is one that stays bought, and there aren't many in Washington who meet even that low standard.

Nevertheless, ObamaCare changes the psychology of the Democratic Party. It will no longer be a partner of theAmerican people; it will be a partner of business and the professional elites. The Democratic party may be thesenior partner, but it will be a partner nevertheless of the ruling establishment of our day. Allied with the establishment, the Democrats will be invariably drawn every tighter with the corporations and special interests they once fought.

That's just the broad view of the health-insurance bills. In a host of ways, they take power from the people and give it to elites: bureaucrats, businesses, and Washington power players.

If Democrats pass ObamaCare, they will be abandoning the American people. The people will know. They will turn then to who best seems to play the role of Jefferson, Jackson, Bryan or FDR. When that happens, historians will look back and see 2009 as the time the Democratic party turned its back for good on its heritage — and the American people.

Psychology behind Climategate

By Jim Tynen

To understand Climategate, its psychology must be better understood. And then we can perhaps understand why a certain class is so willing to destroy the society that created it.

For it's strange to see scientists, bureaucrats, politicians and journalists backing measures that would destroy the industrial society that sustains them. Lowering carbon emissions along the lines ofAl Gore and the Copenhagen cohorts seek would require taking energy use back to the level of the 19th century. There was far less of a need then for researchers, policy specialists, assistant directors, Ph.D candidates, and the whole New Class that so fanatically supports such measures.

But the modern scientific mindset abhors any thought that the cosmos as an order or purpose. Therefore it must be chaotic, meaningless, random.

"The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless," physicist Steven Weinberg famously said.

Stephen Jay Gould proclaims, "Darwin argues that evolution has no purpose. Individuals struggle to increase the representation of their genes in future generations, and that is all."

Evolution advocate Richard Dawkins asserts, ‘The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference."

As biologist George Gaylord Simpson put it, "Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind."

This is what members of the scientific establishment believe, on some level. The result, however, must be that they hate and fear nature.

How could it be otherwise? There is, Darwin forbid, no organization in nature. It is a ceaseless, random swirl of matter, headed in no particular direction. Therefore, it is a danger to man. Anything could happen, for no reason at all, and therefore the cosmos, and nature, always threaten humankind. So that's how scientists must imagine the future.

Look at the warming scenarios. The ice caps melt; rising seas swamp Bangladesh and New York; monsoons smash into India, hurricanes ravage the U.S; the Amazon jungle dies off; the American Southwest becomes an uninhabitable desert; millions die of diseases; societies are devastated; millions of refugees roam the continents.

This reflects perfectly the scientific worldview. So in a sense the data are beside the point. The scientific imagination, shaped by a nihilistic worldview, can't help seeing nature as a malign, chaotic force. One decade it's another Ice Age, the next it's devastating heat.

That's a fundamental reason Climategate happened. Some of the e-mails depict scientists bewildered at the failure of a warming trend to develop. To them, the data just can't be right. So the scientists fix the data.

Such bias is true of all human beings, as psychologists have long known. In climate science this is especially true when the data are so complex and hard to evaluate. This isn't Galileo measuring the speed of a falling object. This is the evaluation of thousands of temperature readings. The difficulty is multiplied when that data is used to understand the world climate; then made even more complex when trying to predict the effects on the globe.

More importantly, it suggests that no actual action could quell these fears.

For instance, the Copenhagen goal for worldwide emissions of carbon dioxide us 450 parts per million. Al Gore has said a better target would be 350 parts per million.

He's been quoted as saying, “Are we doing enough? The answer is obviously no — 450 is not the right target. But it is presently seen as beyond the capacity of governments around the world."

But no target can still the anxieties of those whose fundamental worldview is that the cosmos is chaotic and malign. For, logically, if carbon dioxide is a threat in such a world, any amount could be dangerous. It would be very difficult to assuage such anxiety. And f somehow those fears are relieved, another fear will take its place. For global warming, like a neurotic's fear, is just a symptom of a deeper anxiety. A couple of decades ago it was a new Ice Age; it could be that again in a few years; or something else. But only a change in the fundamental worldview will erase such terror. There's little sign of that happening.

On a practical level, moreover, there is no point in trying to compromise with the warming crowd. Nothing humanity can do will relieve their fears. The only reasonable course is to pursue common sense ways of using energy more efficiently, such as nuclear power, and brace to meet the next panic in the scientific world.

The uncertainty principle

Kausfiles:

Lots of talk on the Sunday chat shows about how the uncertainty over health care reform is discouraging businesses from hiring, since they don't know what sort of taxes, etc. they'll be facing. But if what business wants is certainty ... well, at this point the fastest way to get certainty is for the Dems to pass a bill quickly, no?

My response:

No -- this measure makes uncertainly perpetual. A hundred federal agencies will be issuing diktats; no business can ever keep up with them or be sure it won't be blindsided.

And if anxiety among the people is the problem ... ditto. I'm 58. I know what my insurance covers now. But if ObamaCare passes -- I will never know if one of those hundred agencies has just passed a diktat that will hurt me. I may be OK -- but what if the over-65 crowd pushes through a new mandate, and Congress decides my cohort should pay for it? OK, we Boomers have had a lot of clout so far. But what if Congress starts thinking like the ad agencies -- we in the 55-to-65 set are too, um, set in our ways, we'll never switch brands, so they can abuse us at their will.

The invention of lying

On Climategate and the psychology of lying:

Let us look only at the psychology of this. Key fact: they destroyed notes to the most important discovery of all time.

The CRU people reportedly destroyed the original data. That is a lie; it is psychologically impossible. Look, this was the data to the most important scientific discovery of all time -- in their minds.

This wasn't old sales receipts from ten years ago. This wasn't your old pile of National Geographic. This was key information. You have to keep that. What if something comes up? What if you need to take a look at it? You keep it in a safe.

If -- if -- you treasure that information.

There's another aspect that's just as important. This information is the equivalent of Darwin's notebooks. Someday it will be displayed in the Museum of Climatology, as a memorial to how brave scientists saved the planet.

If you believe that, that is. There's no way you destroy that information.

2. The howls. Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov. (Pevear and Volokhonsy translation.) The elder Zosima, on lying: (p.44, paperback ed.)

"A man who lies to himself is often the first to take offense. It sometimes feels very good to take offense,doesn't it? ... And surely he knows that no one has offended him, and that he himself has invented the offense and told lies just for the beauty of it,that he has exaggerated for the sake of effect, that he has picked on a word and made a mountain out of a pea ...."

If it's a minor thing, why the howling?

The British prime minister quoted in the Guardian:

"With only days to go before Copenhagen we mustn't be distracted by the behind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics," Brown told the Guardian. "We know the science. We know what we must do. We must now act and close the 5bn-tonne gap. That will seal the deal."

Similarly, raising the ante. Al Gore: “Are we doing enough? The answer is obviously no — 450 is not the right target. But it is presently seen as beyond the capacity of governments around the world. We are stretching the capacity of governments even to hit a 450 target.” Gore thinks the target should be 350. This raising the ante is another form of bluff, as it is in cards.Which of course comes back to the data. Why wouldn't you be showing it off everywhere? Publishing it on the Internet.

3. A lot of mysteries begin with motive. There is no money in saying: "The weather for tomorrow is immensely complex. The world climate is exponentially more difficult."

There is a motive to lie, as many have said. Billions are being thrown around, if you can say there is a huge cataclysm.

Moreover, how can it be disproved? It's huge, it's complex. And who want to get off the gravy train? It's like the Madoff scam. Who can prove you wrong? You can make money, for awhile.

Conclusion: The best thing I ever learned about politicians was: Assume they are lying until proven otherwise.

Sadly, this may now apply to scientists. There are a lot of reasons why they might be lying.

Was data dumped?

So does CRU have data?

Say you had raw data for the most important scientific finding of all time. In your eyes, the fate of the world hangs on this.

Moreover, it's your legacy. If you're right -- and you are absolutely positive you are — that data will be a treasure someday. It will be like Newton's or Darwin's notebooks. It will be displayed in the British Museum. Or have its own museum. You will keep it in a fireproof vault guarded night and day.

You won't toss it in the Dumpster because it might clutter your new offices. No way, no how.

See also good summary at:
http://tinyurl.com/yc3kv9g