Month: July 2009

by Conor Clarke

Down the rabbit hole we go: My Harvard Law School interlocutor responds to my response about racial diversity at the Supreme Court. He emails:

To the first point: I agree that the benefits aren't easily quantifiable, but we can obviously try. To the second point: I think this proves too much! One reason why I prefer justifying affirmative action based on fairness ("we are making up for a lack of opportunity") rather than social utility ("this will give us better classroom discussions") is that the social utility argument can always cut in both directions. Maybe diversity will make those classroom discussions worse! (And as a sidenote, I will add that Robert Putnam has done interesting empirical research on this point.) I am of the feeling that fairness should trump utility.

by Chris Bodenner

Jonah Goldberg, on his quest to protect Americans from liberal fascists, wants someone to ask Sotomayor if she believes in eugenics.

Isaac Chotiner sighs.

By Conor Clarke

This seems like a incredibly stupid subject for a fuss, but that never stopped anyone. And I can't resist pushing back: I think it's really pretty obvious Obama was cheered in the stadium. And while the camera angle on the pitch was disastrous — the only thing we care about is whether it clears the plate and is caught, and the cameraman missed that! — we do have catcher Albert Pujols saying he caught it before it hit the ground and arguing that "It was a great pitch." Seems to me that he's in a position to know.

by Chris Bodenner

Among the detainees held by the Khamenei regime is Hossein Zaman, one of the biggest pop singers in Iran. David Corn drew attention to his plight earlier this month:

Zaman, who once served in the Revolutionary Guard, has long identified with the forces for reform in Iran. An article that appeared in the Iranian Times in 2000 noted that Zaman had performed at "political events" for the reformists. In 2002, according to Agence France Presse, he blasted the country's culture minister for not defending the rights of artists after he was blocked from performing near a shrine of a descendant of Mohammad. […] The next year, according to AFP, Zaman ran for a city council position in Tehran. And his music has been banned from state-controlled radio and television.

Throughout his musical career, Zaman has received little, if any, attention outside Iran. But a YouTube search turns up a video posted in 2007 for a Zaman song called "Parandeh."

by Patrick Appel

Ezra Klein addresses the innovation question:

Like Kevin Drum, there's one objection to a national health-care system that I find kind of interesting. As the argument goes, the United States overspends on health-care insurance. But that overspending has a point. It supercharges innovation. The rest of the world, in fact, free rides off of the high prices we pay for new drugs and ingenious technologies. That's not a great deal for us, but it's better than the grim future that awaits us in a world where the United States is not massively overpaying, and innovation thus grinds to a global halt.

The problem with that objection is that it's all theory.

I've never seen empirical evidence quantifying the benefits of domestic overpayment, nor the cost to innovation of, say, a government health-care system that cut spending by 15 percent. Similarly, you'd also want to consider whether further drug innovation was the most productive use of those dollars. Out of every $100 we spend paying more for drugs and devices than other countries, would those last $8 do more good contributing to "innovation" (along with profits, advertising, me-too drugs, etc) or funding early childhood education? Or cutting taxes?

Robert Waldmann also responds by pointing to government funded research. It's true that very important basic research is done by the government, but the private sphere also plays an essential role during the final stages of development. The idea that health care will stifle innovation relies on the idea that government will take over private enterprise and control costs. But health care spending is going to grow, hopefully less sharply, even if this bill passes. If the rewards for innovation are still in place, and growing health care expenditures would seem to guarantee that, why would innovation dry up? Jonathan Cohn addressed this topic a few years ago.

by Chris Bodenner

A powerful scene of mourning by the mother of Sohrab Aerabi, a 19-year-old found with gunshots to his heart:

A shorter subtitled version here. Tehran Bureau has more details of the young man's death. Update: A reader provides this partial translation:

by Conor Friedersdorf

Anyone interested in the issue of economic inequality should read this paper by Cato's Will Wilkinson, one of the most intellectually honest thinkers and elegant writers you'll find in the policy world. Jim Manzi summarizes Mr. Wilkinson's argument as follows:

Mr. Manzi also asks a chilling question:

Stay tuned.

UPDATE: Mr. Wilkinson answers here.

by Chris Bodenner

Robert Dreyfus reports from a panel on Iranian women and the recent upheaval:

So strong is the women's movement that a web site linked to Iran's intelligence ministry has begun referring to "woman commandos" in describing post-election protests […] Tohidi said women in Iran had been engaged in many years of quiet educational and organizational work, especially over the past fifteen years, and today the women's movement in Iran is the "strongest in the Middle East." […]

Jaleh Lackner-Gohari added that during the 1980s and 1990s, many women went into higher education and the professions precisely because they were barred from politics and, she joked, "had nothing better to do." Quietly, they built networks, professional organizations, and channels for communications — including, lately, blogs.

by Patrick Appel

A reader writes:

I came back from Iran 2 days ago from a three week trip. I wanted to share with you my observation. (By the way, andrewsullivan.com is blocked in Iran and that's how I figured you are extensively covering the situation.)

We arrived in Iran 5 days after the election. When I had heard the news of the protests before our arrival, I had thought that few young members of my extended family might have joined the protests or might have known the protesters but I was shocked to find out that almost everybody (80%) of my and my husband's family members over the age of 18 who lived in Tehran had joined the first week's protests at some point. Pregnant women, Mother and Father of young kids, 60 and 70 year olds, all had joined in and were saying that if you have joined one protest, you felt that you had to join more. There were young people who told me that their parents didn't know that they had went. There was a 50 year old woman who took his 20 year old son along instead of the other way around. There were young women whose mothers and fathers accompanied them out of worry. I was surprised of this over whelming activism. It especially seemed that women were more excited and determined to join. And these were cautious middle class people who had never joined any protests in the past 30 years and had thought their kids that threatening their life is not worth a protest  which might get crushed anyway and even if it doesn't, the outcome might not be right. These people had only voted in silence previous times but this time the fraud  was so blatant and obvious that people felt compelled to cry out. I think the biggest reason for this outrage was that this had been the absolute last ray of hope for non-violent change. Due to the results of the last revolution which had an unwanted consequence of establishing an authoritarian regime, many people didn't believe in revolutions and violence anymore. They believed in changing the system from within. And Mousavi was the best choice among the mere 4 choices that the system had put forward.

And this is what I saw in the people, It was anger mixed with excitement for the first week after the election. People were really encouraged by the large number of the people and by the fact that Mousavi was not backing down. The feeling in the air was that the calm protests can push the change.   One week after the election though, after hearing Khamenei's speech in the Friday's prayer, people were depressed and in shock that he wasn't going to give an inch and he was going to unleash the killers. He explicitly said that if anybody dies from now on, their blood will be on Mousavi's hand. Still Some of our family members joined the protests on the next day (The day that Neda and many others were shot and killed). As you know that day was brutal. There were many armed forces on the streets forcing people away from the main routes and then trapping them and hitting them with tear gas and batons. The area in the city that had problems was very very wide. but after that day, not many people were joining the protests. It was too dangerous and back to younger men and women who don't have anybody depending on them. The only form of disobedience which was still widely followed was the "allah akbar" and "death to dictator" shouts at night from the roof tops.

Before July 9th that was waning as well. Since policemen were marking the doors of the houses of some of the people who were shouting the chants with large red crosses and scaring them into silence.  People had also received notices from the police that they only had few days to take off their satellites. In Iran everyone had a satellite at their house and was hooked to BBC Persian or  Voice of America to get the news.  People were again scared to talk in the taxi or in the public. A rumour was going around that cellphones can turn into a listening device even if they are turned off. Public figures were continuously trying to scare people into submission by saying that students who attended the rallies will not be able to continue their education in the country and contacting any foreign media is considered treason. The iron-fist was coming down and people know that they are capable of all these but people feel that something has cracked in the system which will probably not come to fruition now but might later.

by Conor Clarke

Democrats in the House of Representatives unveiled their version of a health care bill yesterday afternoon, and the Congressional Budget Office released its preliminary analysis of the costs and benefits. If you sympathize with the case for universal health care, it's an occasion to be happy: the CBO says bill will leave 97% of the legal population insured by 2019. (I haven't read all of the summaries, much less the bill, so I'll happily outsource further thoughts to my former colleagues Jonathan Cohn and Ezra Klein. If you are a masochist, the full bill is here.) But the million dollar question — excuse me, the trillion dollar question — is who's writing the checks. The CBO says the bill will increase the deficit by $1,042,000,000,000 over the next ten years.

The House's answer is a surtax on the wealthiest Americans. The tax will affect families earning more than $350,000 a year, with rates ranging from 1% to 5.4%. On Monday, I posted some data about the decline of effective federal tax rates for the top 1% of families over the past fifteen years, and I think that is still helpful context for this discussion. The House's surtax will affect only the top 1.2% of families.

Nonetheless, the tax will be controversial, and I want to discuss some criticisms. For starters, here's a Washington Post editorial slamming the surtax:

The traditional argument against sharp increases in the marginal tax rates of a very narrow band of Americans is that it could distort their economic behavior — most likely by encouraging them to put more of their money into tax shelters as opposed to productive investments. This effect could be greatest in certain states, such as New York, where a higher federal rate would add to already substantial state income taxes. The deeper issue, though, is whether it is wise to pay for a far-reaching new federal social program by tapping a revenue source that would surely need to be tapped if and when Congress and the Obama administration get serious about the long-term federal deficit.

I'm not convinced. I agree the distorting effects of income taxation are more worrying on the state level than the federal level, largely because it's easier to move to the other side of the Hudson River than the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. But that's really not a good case against a federal tax! I guess it's possible, though not altogether likely, to imagine a federal increase coupled with a high state tax nudging a few Manhattanites over to the New Jersey. But that will affect revenues in New York, not federal revenues.

As far as I can tell, the Post's second point ("the deeper issue") is pretty solidly incoherent. Yes, we will need to get serious about the deficit. But if the Post thinks we shouldn't tap the rich to pay for health care because we will need to tap the rich to pay for the deficit, that's an objection to the health care spending, not the tax. The old lesson here is that money is fungible: A dollar of revenue spent on federal deficit reduction is exactly the same as a dollar spent on national health care. If you prefer deficit reduction, then don't increase the level of federal spending on health care.

I'll be writing more about healthcare funding questions later today, so please drop me a line with thoughts, attacks, other junk, etc: conorjclarke [at] gmail [dot] com