Month: July 2014

A reader asks behavioral economist Dan Ariely, “If indeed, as suggested by loss aversion, people suffer from losing more than they enjoy winning – why would anyone become a fan of a team?” He responds:

Your description of the problem implies that people have a choice in the matter, and that they carefully consider the benefits vs the costs of becoming a fan of a particular team. Personally, I suspect that the choice of what team to root for is closer to religious convictions than to rational choice – which means that people don’t really make an active choice of what team to root for (at least not a deliberate informed one), and that they are “given” their team-affiliation by their surroundings, family and friends.

Another assumption that is implied in your question is that when people approach the choice of a team, that they consider the possible negative effects of losing relative to the emotional boost of winning. The problem with this part of your argument is that predicting our emotional reactions to losses is something we are not very good at, which means that we are not very likely to accurately take into account the full effect of loss aversion when we make choices.

Meanwhile, Argentina really could have used a World Cup win:

The national team, known here as La Selección (The Chosen), gave the country something to cheer for during a time of relentless bad news and sharp political division. Inflation in the country is running near 40 percent. Argentina’s vice president is facing corruption charges. A recent U.S. federal court judgment has ordered the government to pay back the creditors whom President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner derides as “vultures.” Many worry their savings will be wiped out if Argentina defaults on its debts for the second time in 13 years. … The team’s World Cup run, said factory worker Diego Morales, “managed to unify the country, rich and poor,” at a time when the fraying dynasty of Fernández and her late husband, in power since 2003, has left Argentines too often feeling as though they’ve been playing on opposing teams.

(Photo: Argentinian fans in Rio de Janeiro watch as Germany defeats Argentina 1-0 in the final game of the 2014 World Cup. By Carlos Becerra/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images.)

An older reader snarks:

I’m sure my son appreciates your approval of the Millennial generation. Now, shall I have his things shipped directly to you, or would you like to stop by the house to pick them up?

On that note, Derek Thompson recently argued that statistics about millennials living with their parents are “criminally misleading”:

Almost half of young people “living with their parents” are in college, where all campus housing counts as “living with their parents.” Scary Millennials Trends are fun and popular—young people read them to feel outraged; parents read them to gauge their own Millennial’s progress; others read them for schadenfreude. If we’re going to freak out about young people, let’s do so for the right reasons. Unemployment is too high, entry-level jobs are depressingly salaried, and many have taken on student loans that will negatively shape their immediate future.

But David Dayen rebuts:

First of all, Thompson plays a bit with his age ranges. The statistics he pulls on the increase in college enrollment are for millennials aged 18-24. However, the trend of more young adults living at home, based on Current Population Survey statistics, extends from 18-34. You can see the upward trend for men and women aged 25-34 specifically. It’s hard to figure that this all comes from dorm living. Especially considering that college enrollment has actually fallen the past two years, yet young adults living at home continued to rise.

Put this all together, and you get the result that economist Jed Kolko of housing analysis site Trulia finds: even after you adjust for increased college enrollment, “millennials were more likely to live with parents in 2012 and 2013 than at any other time for which a consistent data series is available.” Even eliminating all full-time college students aged 18-24 from the data shows the trend.

Yglesias comes to the same conclusion. Back to the reader discussion:

While I agree that the Millennials have taken huge strides beyond our generation, it is well to remember one thing: they have the enormous advantage of being the second generation to grow up with massive change.

For example, why do they have fewer problems with gays and gay marriage? Well, consider that in my lifetime, anti-miscegenation laws were still the norm in the US. California, for example, only got rid of its laws in the middle of the last century (which means that, at the time I was born, my marriage would have been illegal). If you wonder why voters in our parents’ generation have so much trouble adapting to gay marriage, consider that they were raised in a culture where things didn’t change much – technology changed in some regards, but society much much less so.

Not to minimize how well the Millennials are doing at building a better society. But, as with all social constructions, the foundations were laid by those who went before. It’s all too easy to forget that.

Meanwhile, a pessimistic reader across the Pond writes:

I was born in 1995 and have become politically aware only during the
last couple of years, and here in England, what I see does not fill me with great confidence.

I see an electorate dominated by older generations who are terrified at the changes going on throughout the country. I would say that the political awakening that Millennials feel in this country is revulsion and cynicism. We don’t want anything to do with the obviously stitched-up system. Our only route is to get a good education and then get the hell out of this place before the older generations shut the doors to the continent and to the world through their palpable fears of everything. And our apathy and their fears have created a vicious circle, since if my generation wants nothing to do with the system and then abdicates the levers of the system to the older generations, then things will only get worse. I worry about my country.

I don’t know what can be done. I think Millennials will become more apathetic as our democracy becomes more corrupt, which will only worsen the corruption. It has become so bad that I now actually hope that Scotland will vote to leave the union in September. Maybe that can bring enough shock to the system that something can be rescued. I don’t know. I don’t hope much.

Another reader weaves in another thread:

Your reader is right that liberalising theology won’t get millennials rushing back to the pews. Partly this is because it will take time for churches to stop being associated with gay bashing, covering up child abuse and so on, it doesn’t get forgotten that instantly. And partly because it’s not enough for organised religious groups to remove some barriers to relevance; they also have to BE relevant. What does an organised church actually offer even to a millennial with faith in God that they can’t get from praying on their own or with friends or family, let alone to anyone wavering?

If nothing else, the millennial generation refuses to accept institutions and rules just because they are there or because they are venerable, and they’re getting old enough it can’t be written off as adolescent rebellion anymore. To me it is one of their most attractive features, but I imagine it aggravates people and institutions used to unquestioning obedience.

A reader connects the podcast to the ongoing thread on evangelicals and gay marriage:

A moment that jumped out at me during your podcast with Matthew Vines (partially because of my own interests and background as a former Presbyterian) was when you responded to Vines’ description of John Piper’s attempts to use the Greek to determine whether porneia was a valid excuse for divorce, and whether that divorce separated a married couple or a couple that was merely betrothed. You described this sort of hermeneutics as a sort of insanity. Matthew responded with the argument that if scripture is the word of God then we could and should take it seriously.

That exchange really intriguingly revealed the cultural distance between your Catholic upbringing and Matthew’s experience in a conservative reformed church. It was one of the few times when I thought you were both unable to achieve a mutual understanding of perspective and experience. Your faith traditions, I think, have materially different positions on what scripture is, what it’s for, how it’s interpreted, and what it should mean for our lives, going even beyond the simple Lutheran formula of sola scriputura.

In recent history, the reformed and evangelical churches responded to historical literary criticism of the texts by digging in their heels and doubling down on inerrancy and scriptural authority. But the whole exercise is a bit circular.

If you ask a good reformed Presbyterian how they know about God, they’ll say scripture. If you ask why scripture is any good, they’ll say because it’s inspired by God. If you ask them how they know that, they’ll probably cite 2 Timothy 3:16, “All scripture is God breathed and useful for rebuking correcting and training in righteousness.” See, scriptures says it’s God-breathed, so it must be true.

Which is why 1 Corinthians 7, cited by your evangelical reader as a source for Christian theology of singleness, is one of my favorite passages. Besides revealing Paul’s eschatological perspective and apparent belief that the end of the world was coming any minute, and all the juicy marital advice, Paul comes straight out and says on matters of singleness and marriage, his advice is NOT from the Lord, but only his own opinion. This passage is even used by Biblical inerrancy advocates to argue that Paul himself could tell that there were times he was writing under the inspiration of God.

But what do you do when God-Breathed scripture states explicitly that it’s not God-Breathed? Which part of that statement is inspired word of God? And what does it mean for Paul’s advice to single people? Is it a worth a hoot? Hard to tell.

My previous thoughts on the podcast are here and here.  And don’t forget to check out Matthew’s remarkable new book, God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships.

Damon Root believes the lawsuit has legs:

That “failure to implement” refers to the White House’s controversial unilateral action delaying implementation of Obamacare’s employer mandate, the provision of the 2010 health care law requiring firms with 50 or more employees to provide qualifying coverage. As Peter Suderman noted in July 2013, the legality of that delay has always been in doubt. In fact, even Democratic supporters of the health care law have raised questions about the propriety of Obama’s actions on that front. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), for example, declared, “This was the law. How can they change the law?” How indeed? Perhaps we’ll find out as the House’s lawsuit moves forward.

In a roundup of legal opinions relevant to the suit, Kliff finds that the precedent benefits the president:

Congress and the courts have repeatedly recognized that the White House needs some space for discretion to make laws work. Legislation is often a broader blueprint with a particular policy goal in mind — in the case of the Affordable Care Act, for example, expanding access to insurance. The agencies that turn that blueprint into actual regulation, courts have ruled before, need some space to make decisions about the best way to handle that process.

In 1984, for example, Supreme Court’s Heckler v. Chaney decision examined whether the Food and Drug Administration had acted unlawfully when it refused to stop prisons from using lethal injection drugs that it hadn’t approved for such a purpose. This is, after all, a hugely important job for the FDA: making sure Americans are using drugs safely. But in Heckler, the Supreme Court ruled that agencies exist in a world where there are budget constraints and scarce resources and competing priorities, and sometimes they need to use their discretion in figuring out how to make the trains best run on time.

In Eric Posner’s view, the lawsuit’s entire premise, that Obama “failed to execute” the ACA employer mandate, is off-base:

Forget what you learned in seventh grade: It’s simply not the case that Congress sets policy and the president executes it. The two branches battle over policy, using all means at their disposal. The laws themselves are frequently vague and loose. In the end, the president enforces most of the laws in an even-handed way because most laws are popular—that’s why they were enacted in the first place. If you don’t believe me, consider how rare it is for presidents to use the pardon power, which is without doubt discretionary, for partisan or ideological ends. President Obama has not gone beyond public opinion—for example, by releasing prisoners from Guantánamo Bay—because he fears a political backlash, not because it’s illegal.

This conflict is baked into our system. It’s a result of the founders’ decision to give the executive and the legislature different sources of political authority. This is how our government differs from a parliamentary system, in which the prime minister operates at the pleasure of the legislature. If you want to blame someone, don’t blame Obama. Blame the Constitution.

Boehner’s choice of subject for his lawsuit is inscrutable to Arit John:

Republicans would have to prove that the president’s lawless failure to enforce the employer mandate is an attempt to derail his signature policy initiative. (Conservative pundits and media outlets have been surprisingly silent on how this might work.) If the House had gone after the president’s gun control actions or, as many suspected, his immigration orders to defer the deportations of children brought to America illegally, then the lawsuit would have at least made sense. …

Boehner could have sued the president for enacting a number of policies his base doesn’t approve of: letting “Dreamers” stay in the country, any of his 23 different gun orders, or even ending LGBT discrimination among federal contractors. Instead he’s suing him for delaying a mandate Republicans would happily delay permanently.

Nicholas Bagley highly doubts the House has standing to sue on this issue:

The memo also asserts that there is no “legislative remedy” for the delays. That’s just false. Congress could, for example, enact a statute withdrawing the President’s claimed enforcement discretion. Congress retains the power of the purse, giving it enormous leverage in negotiations with the President. And don’t forget about the impeachment power. These options may not be politically viable, but that just means Congress isn’t willing to use its power, not that it lacks the power.

On the politics of it, Yglesias sees Boehner’s lawsuit against Obama as further evidence that the speaker is, as he puts it, in zugzwang – a chess term for when a player is forced to move when his best option is to pass:

The best thing for House Republicans to do this summer and fall is nothing — Obama’s approval rating is underwater, the GOP is poised to pick up seats in the midterms, and there’s no need to rock the boat. But conservative activists won’t tolerate a pass strategy. They hate Obama and want Boehner to do something that expresses that hatred. Lawsuits are a milder move than impeachment, so given the realities of the situation the litigation is arguably a savvy move by Boehner rather than a blunder. But the impatience of the activist right is still a gift to the White House. Rather than leaving Obama to struggle impotently from the White House, it allows him to underscore the basic reality of the situation — there’s stuff he would like to do that Republicans are furiously fighting to keep from happening.

Ezra considers it a safety valve of sorts for Republican rage:

Assuming House Republicans ultimately back Boehner’s lawsuit, it will begin a lengthy legal process as the case winds its way through the courts. House Republicans will be able to go back to their districts and tell their base that they’re doing something radical and even unprecedented to bring Obama to heel. Meanwhile, Boehner can argue that attempting impeachment before the case finishes would be counterproductive: if Republicans raise impeachment as a remedy there’s no way the courts will get involved. They’ll just let Congress work it out. Boehner is letting Republicans throw as many parties as they want in the House so he can make sure they don’t drink and drive home.

I’m struck also by the speed with which the GOP establishment tried to rule out the Palin impeachment idea. They saw immediately how damaging it would be politically, and dismissed it. But if the lawsuit fails?

Previous Dish on the lawsuit here, here, and here.

(Photo: Brendan Smialowski/Getty)

In response to me, Douthat expounds on the nature of and audience for reform conservatism. This is well said:

The reality is that, except in truly exceptional cases, our politics is better off in the long run when views held by large proportions of the public are represented in some form by one of our two parties. Right now (to run down a partial list of divisive cultural issues), a plurality of Americans want the immigration rate decreased; about half the country opposes affirmative action; more than half supports the death penalty; about half of Americans call themselves pro-life. Support for gay marriage and marijuana legalization has skyrocketed, but in both cases about 40 percent of the country is still opposed. Even independent of my own (yes, populist and socially conservative) views, I think these people, these opinions, deserve democratic representation: Representation that leads and channels and restrains, representation that recognizes trends and trajectories and political realities, but also representation that makes them feel well-served, spoken for, and (in the case of issues where they’re probably on the losing side) respected even in defeat.

Because without that representation, populism doesn’t go away; it festers. Just ask David Cameron, Sullivan’s example of a modernizing conservative, a politician whose agenda has had a number of admirable features … but whose style and approach also helped roll out the red carpet for UKIP and Nigel Farage. In the United States, a more populist and conservative and religious country than Britain, the Farage scenario would look wilder and stranger and much, much worse for conservatism and the country. And so Republican politicians interested in outreach and coalition-building and modernization have an obligation to make sure they don’t also create a pervasive sense of populist disenfranchisement along the way.

I take Ross’s other points as well – especially about social issues like marriage equality. The GOP will probably adjust soon enough to the radically new landscape, and I may even find them more sympathetic if they try simply to protect a dissenting religious minority, rather than over-reaching. I’m in favor of religious freedom over any attempt to ram a new gay orthodoxy on the entire country. I still don’t see a powerful theme or a leader who could turn this constructive caucus into an administration. But the future is wide open. Frum joins the conversation:

The reform conservatives seem more open to the new. This is progress. If the policy agenda that follows remains cautious, remember: These conservative reformers aren’t trying to change the world. They’re trying to change a political party.

You don’t change people’s minds by telling them they are wrong, even—or especially—if they are wrong. You change their minds first by establishing an emotional connection with them. Next you ratify their existing beliefs. When it comes time to introduce a new idea, you emphasize its consistency with things they already believe. This is what the reform conservatives are doing, or have begun to do. If they seem to be moving slowly, well, take it from me: It’s no good being even 10 minutes ahead of the times.

Kilgore criticizes Frum for setting the bar so low:

As I recall, it was Michael Gerson, not David Frum, who penned George W. Bush’s memorable line that accepting bad public schools for poor and minority students reflected “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” But it’s a not a bad description for Frum’s attitude towards the GOP, and thus towards the reformicons. He clearly thinks his party is so deep in ideological sin that it can tolerate only brief and veiled exposure to the light.

Well, yes. This won’t be easy, especially if the GOP doesn’t want to chip away at its base as it now exists. Bernstein adds:

Liberals shouldn’t expect to agree with the reformers, or to find their policies appealing. But they should expect the other party to have real policy preferences, and something resembling policy proposals, and for them to abide by the basic norms of the political system. By those standards, reform conservatives deserve an incomplete grade, but one that is more positive than negative.

Drum’s take:

Are [reform conservatives] trying to build credibility with conservatives so they can later nudge them in a new direction? Or are they mostly just trying to put a friendly veneer on an essentially tea partyish agenda? We don’t know yet, because so far they haven’t been willing to take many risks. And with good reason. As a friend emailed just a few minutes ago, “The reformers are one bad suggestion away from being fully Frumanized out of the party.” I wish the reformers luck. And I don’t really blame them for their timidity so far. Still, it’s far too early to tell how serious they are. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Frumanized? I think he means Frummed.