Category: Politics

Self-interest doesn’t have to match an altruistic goal.

A reader writes to Andrew Sullivan about capitalism and same-sex marriage (emphasis mine):

One of the most astonishing (and underreported) instances of this phenomenon is the defeat in committee of the marriage ban in the Indiana legislature. This past April a group of major corporations (Cummins Engine, Wellpoint, Dow AgroSciences, Eli Lilly, and Emmis Communications, etc.) lobbied against the measure and won.

While I’m not surprised at the lack of coverage, I think it’s important to note smaller victories like this in the civil rights movement. … But it’s also one of the few remaining conservative states remaining that did not write discrimination into its constitution. As a progressive Democrat with a strong populist streak, (as much as it may pain me to admit it) I really have to give credit to big business for doing the right thing on this one.

It’s a nice thought, but is that how it happened, big business doing the “right” thing? The story:

Eli Lilly and Co., Cummins, WellPoint, Emmis Communications and Dow AgroSciences spoke out against the amendment in the days leading up to Tuesday’s vote. All five companies argued that the amendment would send the message that Indiana was not inclusive and hurt their ability to attract top employees to the state.

The additional quotes in the article leave open an interpretation that these businesses behaved in a strictly altruistic manner, but that interpretation is strained. They acted in self-interest. Businesses, like individuals, will behave in a manner consistent with achieving what they desire. Eli Lilly wants to continue attracting talented employees, so it opposed a policy that could alienate some of those employees.

Partisans selectively remember that incentives matter. As Mr. Sullivan’s reader indicates, he normally doesn’t give credit to big business. I won’t presume to know exactly what the reader believes about big business, but I am willing to guess that it involves big business failing to act in a specific manner consistent with the reader’s beliefs. If a business values something else, it’s wrong.

Government incentives are then designed to accommodate inconsistent ideals. Big business should care about making their employees part of the middle class rather than paying them a fair wage based on merit, for example¹. When its incentives don’t match the goals of the government, surprise, a partisan concludes that the business does not respond as it “should”. The new expectation is that it’s evil because it ignores what’s “right”. The entire process is perverse and results in a ceaseless cycle of new incentives, often in the form of restrictions. But it remains the fault of the business, not the policy dictated by the government which is inconsistent with incentives.

The other side of the partisan spectrum acts in an identical manner. Those who believe individuals should not ingest certain substances or read certain material follow the same cycle of being so shocked anyone would defy what’s “right” that more legislation is necessary. The manner in which more legislation skews the incentive toward different evasion rather than compliance is ignored because the intention is what matters. They know how you should behave.

This is where libertarianism excels. There is a minimum expectation of civility, but beyond that, each person decides what’s best for his life. Libertarianism understands that incentives matter. Because it’s impossible to know what the incentive is for everyone, or anyone, libertarianism doesn’t direct anyone to a specific goal or outcome that she “should” pursue for herself. It will not push for the manipulative affect of government intervention on the individual.

¹ I’m assuming a specific belief here, but of a generic progressive partisan, not Mr. Sullivan’s reader. A fine distinction, I know, but my later example of a generic social conservative partisan is meant the same way.

The process of getting it shows why it will fail to deliver utopia.

Medpundit offers a concise summary of the fallacy that U.S. universal health care/coverage will mimic other established universal systems. It also explains why I don’t believe that universal health care/insurance will lead to the end of routine infant circumcision in America. (I removed the links from this excerpt because they make it appear too busy, but they’re worth reviewing at the original entry. Emphasis here is in original text.)

The British are often held up as the standard to which we should aspire. But we don’t live under a British style of government. We live under a government that’s truly government of the people, by the people, for the people. And what the people want, the people get. Witness the influence of disease activism even now on disease specific government funding and treatment mandates. In England, the government only pays for colonoscopies to check for colon cancer if there are symptoms suggestive of cancer or a family history of colon cancer. In the United States, the Medicare pays for a colonoscopy every ten years for everyone over 50, regardless of symptoms or risk. So do many insurance companies., sometimes if not by choice, by mandate. In England, mammograms are only covered for women between the ages of 50 and 70, and then only every three years. In the United States, we pay for mammograms beginning at age 40, yearly, and with no upper age limit. We just don’t have the heart for rationing that they have in other countries.

It’s possible, probable even, that universal coverage would reduce the number of unnecessary circumcisions performed as compared to our quasi-private system now. However, I suspect the decrease will be neither significant nor long-lasting. The fundamental flaw in populism is that it can’t say “no” if a majority demand a “yes”. Principles and rules do not matter. The rights of the minority do not matter.

In this particular procedure, the opinion of the patient will continue to not matter. He is treated as a statistic, at best. If the procedure has the potential to prevent a problem later on, regardless of the actual risk faced, the foreskin’s contribution to that risk, or the consequences of that risk, the illogical defense allowing parents to continue cutting the healthy genitals of their sons will continue.

Remember that populism doesn’t care about proper context in cost-benefit, or even the existence of such analysis. As long as the case could be made, every parent is assumed to be making it. And every infant is assumed to be pleased at that assumption, depsite the undeniable evidence that intact adult males almost never choose or need circumcision.

The out-of-context nonsense we use today is illogical to anyone seriously considering all the evidence. The risks are small. There are less-invasive treatments and preventions available. Comparable countries that do not circumcise manage to achieve the same low levels of disease. These facts are ignored because they contradict our mental conditioning. We believe of circumcision what we want to believe, not what is true. That is why we hear that male circumcision reduces the risk of HIV infection by 60% rather than the more honest explanation of how much it reduces the absolute risk. Sixty percent is far more persuasive than two percent.

For the United States we must be honest and ask if a central planner wannabe who is immune to the rights of individuals enough to issue mandates wouldn’t also be immune to fiscal rationing for non-medically-indicated circumcision, as long as it pleases “the people”.

Via Kevin, MD

Who dreams of being Rich Uncle Pennybags?

The National Association of Broadcasters issued a press release yesterday, quoting NAB Executive Vice President Dennis Wharton:

“XM and Sirius have spent upwards of $20 million trying to bamboozle the Beltway into believing that a monopoly is good for consumers. Yet when you cut through all the distortions displayed by XM and Sirius, you are left with one undisputable fact: Never in history has a monopoly served consumers better than competition.”

The NAB conveniently leaves out any facts to corroborate this bold statement. I’m not interested in challenging it directly, because the basic gist is fine if unrevealing. Competition is good. I believe that. I just wish the NAB believed it.

The existence of press releases and lobbying demonstrate that the NAB knows that it competes with satellite radio. If it didn’t, it wouldn’t spend millions to defeat this merger. It is not acting solely in the best interest of consumers. Incentives matter, and here the incentive is to reduce the strength of all providers of competing technology.

I rarely listen to terrestrial broadcast radio anymore. There is a sameness that is pre-packaged and unimaginative. It’s simply not interesting. I’d rather listen to the artists I enjoy and discover new artists through friends, blogs, and iTunes. Even the limited broadcast offerings I enjoy are available as podcasts, which demonstrates that terrestrial broadcasters agree with the Sirius-XM view of the radio industry’s competition model.

Satellite radio didn’t turn me away from NAB’s clients. Sirius and XM existed when I went looking for an alternative. To be fair, I don’t listen to the music channels on Sirius that often. The repetition of a limited playlist exists there, as well. Maybe it’ll cost Sirius my subscription in the future. Maybe they’ll change. But for now, it has Howard Stern, which is what I want.

The NAB’s press release includes a list of groups and lawmakers opposing the proposed merger, which is its only support for the validity of its position. It takes a little more than that, unfortunately. Instead of putting out pointless press releases calling for competition with a list of politicians, it could actually query those politicians and ask why they abhor the Constitution’s First Amendment, as just one action in the interest of consumers. Or does the NAB not actually care about consumers as much as it cares about remaining partnered with politicians to limit its need to compete?

Will Democrats challenge or fold?

John Cole’s position on the nomination of Michael Mukasey for Attorney General is the best I’ve read:

And so on and so forth. Again, confirmation is probably the right thing to do, but I would do it with some opposition, because the despicable bastards on the right will just expect you to let him continue the popular Bush policy of ‘DOING WHATEVER THE FUCK WE WANT’ should he be greenlighted without opposition.

And George Will’s column in today’s Washington Post is exactly the opposition necessary given this president’s absurd Constitutional claims. Primarily, this, in the form of questions for Mr. Mukasey:

The Bush administration says “the long war” — the war on terrorism — is a perpetual emergency that will last for generations. Waged against us largely by non-state actors, it will not end with a legally clarifying and definitive surrender. The administration regards America as a battlefield, on which even an American citizen can be seized as an “enemy combatant” and detained indefinitely. You ruled that presidents have this power, but you were reversed on appeal. What do you think was the flaw in the reasoning of the court that reversed you?

I’ve read that civil libertarians are unlikely to find reasons to agree with Mr. Mukasey’s approach. The American “enemy combatant” example alone is enough for me to be aghast at his concern for our Constitution. His inevitable push for more “tools” in the president’s never-ending war is scary, too. Unlike what the Wall Street Journal prefers us to believe, Mr. Will understands the Attorney General’s job.

Attorneys general serve at the pleasure of the presidents who choose them but swear to uphold the Constitution.

The Constitution should be held above mere politics. I have no faith that it will be before January 2009.

Nationalized does not mean sane or restrained.

Megan McArdle links to a recent Matthew Yglesias post on nationalized health care. Here’s the key part of the excerpt she quotes:

In effect, a highly centralized state run health care system is able to put a cap on how much demonstrative caring can be done through the health care system.

She replies to a hypothetical example of how the government would cap such demonstrative caring through health care with this:

But after the legal revolution of the 1970’s, American public services look, well, like American ones: unable to deny anything to anyone. What would actually happen in the case Matt describes is that the patient would form an activist group, sue, get the treatment, and use the government settlement to buy the kids organic fruit and a trip to Disneyland.

Bingo. This is why I don’t trust the argument that nationalized health care would result in no further government funding for infant circumcision. One boy would get a UTI that results in a kidney infection. The lawsuit shows up, the verdict ignores logic, and we’re back to funding infant circumcision. And we probably end up with pressure to perform it on all male infants because it will save the government money in the long run. We can’t legislate away unintended consequences.

Maybe Bush should nominate Harriet Miers.

The Wall Street Journal is upset that Sen. Harry Reid is politicizing the pending nomination for Attorney General.

“Ted Olson will not be confirmed,” declares Senate Majority Leader Reid. “He’s a partisan, and the last thing we need as an Attorney General is a partisan.” That standard could certainly stand some fleshing out. As “partisans” go, Mr. Olson doesn’t come close to Bobby Kennedy, the brother of JFK; or Griffin Bell, close friend of Jimmy Carter (and a fine AG); or for that matter Janet Reno’s Justice Department, which was run for years not by Ms. Reno but behind the scenes by close friend of Hillary Clinton and hyper-partisan Jamie Gorelick.

Selective memory? Do we really need to go further back than Alberto Gonzales to find a partisan Attorney General?

… the real Democratic game was given away by none other than Mr. Leahy, whose own “partisanship” is so raw he can’t disguise it. Number Two on Mr. Leahy’s helpful “Checklist for Choosing the Next Attorney General” is this: “A proven track record of independence to ensure that he or she will act as an independent check on this Administration’s expansive claims of virtually unlimited executive power.”

The belief that the president is bound from unlimited powers is not a partisan position, since it requires only an honest reading of our Constitution. <sarcasm>Although, to be fair, I do see the point that advocating for an Attorney General who will acquiesce to the Decider’s legal preferences isn’t raw partisanship.</sarcasm>

I won’t argue that Mr. Olson can’t be the independent official that Democrats claim to want. Members of Congress should make the case for why Mr. Olson isn’t qualified if/when he’s nominated. But the Journal’s editors should acknowledge that whoever becomes the next Attorney General should not expect his/her job to include being a “legal advisor to the president.” Let President Bush hire qualified White House counsel instead.

We should not shy away from an independent Attorney General, even if it’s a new idea because the founders rejected it. It is possible that we might have a better, broader understanding of effective limited government. As we’ve learned, though, the Journal’s editors are in no way interested in limited. And they’re often good at demonstrating no concern for effective.

Parents decide what is reality-based education.

Evesham Township in New Jersey is under fire for including a video in its third-grade classes – as part of the state-manadated curriculum – that shows a child with two dads.

The issue first arose in December after a class of third graders at the J. Harold Van Zant School here was shown “That’s a Family!,” a documentary created by an Academy Award-winning filmmaker intended to show students the different forms that families can take, as part of the curriculum required in New Jersey. But the district temporarily stopped showing the video after some parents complained that they should be able to decide whether their third-grade children should learn about same-sex couples in the classroom.

My stance is that the only valid discussion in this context is third-grade, as opposed to children. Of course it’s possible to cherry-pick whatever quote you need to make whatever point you want to make. The article has exactly what you’d expect, but I’m sure the sentiment is moderately common:

“I don’t think it was appropriate,” said Jennifer Monteleone, 35, who is a parent of two children at the Robert B. Jaggard Elementary School. “If it was maybe in fifth grade, but in third grade they’re a little too young.”

It’s reasonable to debate this, as I said. But it can’t stop there.

Yet Ms. Monteleone also questioned whether the video should be shown at all because of the presence of the same-sex couples.

“It’s something to be discussed within families,” she said. “I think it’s the parents’ responsibility to teach the kids about that stuff.”

I don’t have a problem with this statement. But prohibiting this discussion in school addresses the symptom. When government is in charge of education, you have considerably less freedom to limit facts, or even decide what should be facts. But education is provided by the government. As a blunt instrument it can work against any agenda as much as it can work for one. Don’t be surprised when it happens.

In this case, parents do not have a right to make up their own facts. Same-sex marriage civil (in-)equality is the law. In acknowledging same-sex relationships, the state of New Jersey is dealing strictly in fact. Again, question the third-grade aspect and the debate is useful. (I think third-grade is fine, but I won’t pretend to base that on anything other than my instinct.) But you don’t get to impose this on everyone:

Delores Stepnowski, a parent of another Jaggard student, said parents should have been given more notice that the video would be shown.

“Something that controversial should have been discussed,” Ms. Stepnowski said. The children “shouldn’t learn questionable things in school that they’re not ready for and don’t understand.”

The evaluation of fact is open to subjective opinion. The existence of fact is not. The word questionable has nothing to do with this.

Karl Marx is available on iTunes.

Of course:

Lawyers suing [Apple] said the new devices bolster their antitrust case accusing Apple of trying to monopolize the markets for digital music players and online music sales.

“The inability of the new line to play competing formats is part of the case,” said Gregory Weston, an attorney with one of the nation’s premier class-action firms, Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins of San Diego. “That is evidence that the company is acting like a monopolist and not competitive.”

Just ignore that there are competing formats, that they continue to exist, and that companies continue to release new products capable of playing those formats. None of that proves anything about competition and consumer choice. The iPod is really popular and Apple has a lot of money!

In court documents, Apple said demanding that the company work with competitors “may facilitate the supreme evil of antitrust: collusion.”

“Forcing Apple to deal with rivals may lessen the incentive for Apple or rivals to innovate and invest in economically beneficial facilities,” Apple wrote in court briefs. “It would require antitrust courts to act as central planners, identifying the proper price, quantity and other terms of dealing — a role for which they are ill-suited.”

Ill-suited? Absolutely. But central planning is exactly what anti-capitalists want, especially if they can steal money in the process of getting to centrally-planned, where they can steal more money for the “good” of consumers.

The [class-action status seeking antitrust] suit alleges Apple customers were economically harmed because, once they bought an iPod and purchased music at iTunes, they were locked forever into buying iPods.

Perhaps they should ask each individual iPod customer if he or she has been economically harmed. I don’t. I valued the iPod and all its alleged limitations more than the $400 I paid for it. The same was true of the second iPod I bought. It was going to be true of the third iPod I intended to buy, the iPod Touch, but I don’t like the limited size of both hard drive choices. I will be keeping my $400 and Apple will be keeping its iPod. Behold competition.

Did I mention that the iPod’s success is largely due to its superior design and user interface? Central planners have never concerned themselves with quality, of course. Quantity matters exclusively. Apple has sold the most mp3 players (to lemmings, apparently), so they’re monopolists. Ridiculous.

Fred Thompson – The New Divider

Remember back when Fred Thompson didn’t-but-really-did endorse an amendment to the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage? Yes, well now that he’s in the race officially, he wants to win your socially-conservative vote.

“I would support a constitutional amendment which says some off-the-wall court decision in one state, that recognizes the importance of marriage in that state, like Massachusetts, which is a good state, do not come to another state and have it recognized in that state,” Mr. Thompson said. “You’re not bound by what that other state does.”

“My concern is under the full faith and credit clause that some court — in the second state — is gonna say that you’re gonna have to recognize that marriage. That should not be the case,” Mr. Thompson said.
…

… “The second part of my amendment would also state that judges — judges could not impose this on the federal or state level, unless a state legislature signs off on it.”

So, parts of the federal Constitution pose the risk of giving him an outcome that won’t win him votes he doesn’t like. In the name of federalism, he proposes that we scrap that bit of language, but only in the context of marriage, because he wouldn’t think of toying with the Constitution in the future to meet some undetermined threat to our sensibilities. He holds the Constitution sacred. He’s a prudent federalist.

As to the second part, why don’t we just do away with courts? Obviously we’re uninterested in legal scholarship. The masses know how individual rights should be offered. You want to claim a right, put it to a vote. Until the populace agrees, through the legislature, you are merely requesting special rights. That’s un-American. How dare you?!

Fred Thompson clearly does not understand that our government is a three-pronged system of checks and balances. He can’t be trusted to respect the independence of the judiciary from the legislative, so I shall assume he can’t be trusted to respect the independence of either branch from the executive. Eight years of that is enough.

I won’t show “special” compassion for Sen. Craig.

Quin Hillyer has the dumbest argument in defense of Senator Larry Craig:

Compare the reaction to his alleged crime and the one that it appears Sen. David Vitter (allegedly) participated in. Why does prostitution (especially involving a married man) earn more of a pass than gross-but consensual sex? And the hypocrisy is far greater in Mr. Vitter’s case: He based a large part of his career on moral preening. Contra the left, though, I fail to see how it is hypocritical for Mr. Craig, though, to have voted against “gay marriage” and special “gay rights.” One can participate in homosexual acts and yet still think, quite consistently, that it is bad public policy to create special rights and protections for homosexuals or to put the positive imprimatur of the state on the “union” of two homosexuals.

I have no problem with Mr. Hillyer’s larger point that Sen. Craig should be shown compassion. I happen to hold that as a virtue, so I can agree. Unfortunately, contrary to Mr. Hillyer’s assertion, Sen. Craig’s votes against same-sex marriage (no quotations needed) were and are hypocritical. At the time he had a chance to show compassion – and equality – he chose politics. Forgive me if I have trouble generating much sympathy for his self-imposed predicament.

Sen. Craig swore to uphold the Constitution. As such, he should be familiar with the various amendments to that Constitution that enshrine the protection of rights, equal for all. Those are not collective group rights. They are individual rights inherent at birth. The good opinion of society’s delicate sensibilities remain as irrelevant today as they were at our founding. That means our government must treat each person equally. It does not do that when it says a person may only receive the benefits of marriage by entering into the civil contract with a specific group of adults.

The notion of “special ‘gay rights'” is a hollow talking point that conveys no reality-based truth about the push for equality. “Special” rights would be akin to pushing for a $1,500 wedding cake voucher for same-sex marriage licenses. There is no such push. Instead, we have “moral” crusaders pushing to retain special rights for one subset of Americans. Granted, heterosexuals are the overwhelming majority of America. That doesn’t make their right any less “special”, in Mr. Hillyer’s context. Individual rights are not subject to the whims of the majority.

Forget that Sen. Craig is a no-longer-closeted, self-loathing gay man determined to stay in denial. That’s his choice to make, regardless of anyone’s belief that he should accept who he is. But he’s chosen a life that demands denial in exchange for power. He traded the rights of the American people in exchange for continued access to that power. I can’t think of a clearer definition of hypocrisy.