Libya: in the land of the liars, how to know the truth?

The New Neo Posted on by

Gaddafi’s son Saif surfaces unexpectedly:

Saif’s arrest had been reported both by rebels and the International Criminal Court in The Hague and his appearance before the foreign media raised questions as to the rebels’ credibility.

Ya think?

And this from Saif himself:

[Saif] took journalists to his father’s Bab al-Aziziyah stronghold. Television footage showed Saif smiling, waving and shaking hands with supporters, as well as holding his arms aloft and making the V for victory sign.

“We broke the back of the rebels. It was a trap. We gave them a hard time, so we are winning,” Saif said.

Who knows what the truth is at this point? Certainly not I—and not the media, whose reports of Saif’s previous arrest were greatly exaggerated.

[NOTE: The title of this post is an allusion to this series of riddles.

Also, I have written in depth about Saif before, here.]

Do it for the children!

The New Neo Posted on by

Joel Bakan, Canadian* law professor, wants to protect children from the predatory rampages of corporate greed:

By the early 20th century…[m]ost modern states embraced the general idea that government had a duty to protect the health, education and welfare of children. Child labor was outlawed, as were the sale and marketing of tobacco, alcohol and pornography to children. Consumer protection laws were enacted to regulate product safety and advertising aimed at children.

…But the 20th century also witnessed another momentous shift, one that would ultimately threaten the welfare of children: the rise of the for-profit corporation…[C]orporate interests now prevail…Childhood obesity mounts as junk food purveyors bombard children with advertising, even at school…

Much of what children watch involves violent, sexual imagery, and yet children’s media remain largely unregulated. Attempts to curb excesses ”” like California’s ban on the sale or rental of violent video games to minors ”” have been struck down by courts as free speech violations.

Another area of concern: we medicate increasing numbers of children with potentially harmful psychotropic drugs, a trend fueled in part by questionable and under-regulated pharmaceutical industry practices…

I read Bakan’s op-ed expecting him to mention that at least some of these and other trends he deplores have been allowed to take hold because of abdication of traditional parental responsibility to monitor what children are doing. But nowhere—not even once—does he mention that parents have any direct role at all. His sole remedy is through increasing state regulation.

This highlights one of the main differences between left and right: the left believes the individual is powerless, except to agitate for more state control. It’s the government’s responsibility to fix social ills, and liberty can certainly fall by the wayside in the effort. For the conservative, the accent is on individual and personal responsibility, and government should have as light a footprint as possible.

[*NOTE: Although Bakan has mostly resided in Canada since his parents brought him there in 1971 when he was 12, he was born in Michigan. I was unable to discover whether he is now a Canadian citizen or not.

After writing this post, I read a bit more of his Wiki entry and found the following (bingo!):

Joel Bakan is distinct by criticizing the actions of civil liberties groups and their overemphasis on individual liberty at the expense of collective rights and duties.]

And then there’s al Megrahi

The New Neo Posted on by

I was going to write a post about the second anniversary of Lockerbie bomber al Megrahi’s release, commenting on my lack of surprise at his continued existence despite the initial prediction that he had only three months to live. Meanwhile, with the probable downfall of al Megrahi’s protector Gaddafi, the plot thickens: what will happen to al Megrahi now?

There have been calls for his release and re-imprisonment—perhaps in Scotland, which clearly doesn’t want him. On the occasion of the anniversary, Scots authorities did their predictable dance, claiming once again (as they did last year on the anniversary) that they made the right decision.

Compare and contrast—last year’s statement by Alex Salmond:

Obviously people are going to have a range of views about the rights and wrongs of the decision ”¦ all we ask people to do is to accept it was a decision that was made in good faith following the due procedures that we have under the legislation and under the tenets of Scots law.

And this year’s–same guy, sentiment:

First Minister Alex Salmond said he stood by the decision, which had been made “in good faith and in the interests of Scots justice” – adding that it was based on the best medical advice at the time.

Will liberty come to the shores of Tripoli?

The New Neo Posted on by

The rebels claim to control Tripoli (80%? 95%?). Although Gaddafi’s forces fight on in a few areas, the flamboyant dictator himself is nowhere to be seen, and two of his sons have reportedly been captured.

President Obama exhorts:

The surest way for the bloodshed to end is simple: Muammar Gaddafi and his regime need to recognise that their rule has come to an end. Gaddafi needs to acknowledge the reality that he no longer controls Libya. He needs to relinquish power once and for all.

That’s the sort of thing a president has to say, I suppose, but I see no reason whatsoever why Gaddafi would voluntarily comply. After all, why would he want to end the bloodshed? Especially when his own blood is on the line. If Gaddafi and sons fail to flee the country and end up losing this battle (which seems highly likely) they are marked men, whether they go slowly or quickly. Whether death comes by enemy hand in a fight, or his own hand in an act of suicide, or a trial and a death sentence, it’s hard to see how Gaddafi gets out of this without forfeiting his life.

That certainly makes for a pretty powerful motivation to fight on—or to escape, which for all we know Gaddafi may have already done. After all, fellow-tyrant Idi Amin died in a hospital bed in Saudi Arabia (first having fled to Libya, by the way) [emphasis mine]:

On 20 July 2003, one of Amin’s wives, Madina, reported that he was in a coma and near death at King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, from kidney failure. She pleaded with the Ugandan President, Yoweri Museveni, to allow him to return to Uganda for the remainder of his life. Museveni replied that Amin would have to “answer for his sins the moment he was brought back”. Amin died at the hospital in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on 16 August 2003 and was buried in Ruwais Cemetery in Jeddah.

The people of Tripoli seem joyful that the grip of the tyrant appears to be finished, or near-finished, as well they might. I only hope for them that Gaddafi isn’t replaced with a new tyranny, which I think is unfortunately the most likely outcome both in Libya and Egypt. NATO will probably have a role in trying to prevent that; I wish them luck:

NATO, which helped provided air cover for the rebel assault on Tripoli over the weekend, said it stands ready to work with the Libyan people and the Transitional National Council. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the transition “must come peacefully.”

“They [the TNC] must make sure that the transition is smooth and inclusive, that the country stays united, and that the future is founded on reconciliation and respect for human rights,” he said in a statement.

But John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told Fox News late Sunday that the United States and its allies may not have done enough over the past five months to prepare for the fall of Qaddafi. He noted that Libya does not appear to have a stable military _ something that was instrumental in helping neighboring Egypt manage its civil uprising.

Egypt restored order fairly quickly—but then again, its revolution was relatively bloodless. What’s more, Egyptian society under Mubarak had never been subject to the same level of turmoil as Libya has, and had far less trauma to recover from and fewer institutions to rebuild. Even so, there is a good chance that the new regime will be a repressive and Islamist one. What are the odds that messed-up Libya can escape such a fate, and institute a government that favors liberty?

[ADDENDUM: This sounds inauspicious:

Even more so than in Egypt, Islamists are a powerful undercurrent in Libyan society and despite the apparent success of the partnership thus far between Libya’s Transitional National Council and Western allies, these Islamists — who were jailed, tortured and sometimes killed by Qaddafi — will have a claim on power and are suspicious and opposed to a strong Western stake-hold inside Libya.

From the start of the Egyptian overthrow of Mubarak and the Libyan rebel uprising, that has been my concern. The example of Iran is always before us, and an Islamist government is the most likely (although not the inevitable) outcome.]

Big doings in Libya

The New Neo Posted on by

It would appear that the Gaddafi forces are collapsing, although it’s impossible to know for sure. It also appears that, as so often is this case in these situations, the turning point may have come when Gaddafi couldn’t motivate his own defenders to fight for him any more:

Euphoric Libyan rebels raced into the capital Tripoli on Sunday and moved close to center with little resistance as Moammar Gadhafi’s defenses collapsed and his regime appeared to be crumbling fast.

Associated Press reporters with the rebels said they moved easily from the western outskirts into the regime stronghold in a dramatic turning of the tides in the 6-month-old Libyan civil war. A rebel leader said the unit in charge of protecting Gadhafi and Tripoli had surrendered and joined the revolt, allowing the opposition force to move in freely.

I wish I felt more hopeful about what will replace the abominable Gaddafi.

[Update here.]

[UPDATE II: The prognosis:

[Gaddafi’s] decades of iron-fisted rule have produced a country, analysts say, that is devoid of credible institutions and any semblance of a civil society ”” a potential source of trouble in the months and years ahead…

A senior American military officer who has been following the developments closely, and who has been in contact with African and Arab military leaders in recent days, expressed caution on Sunday about the prospects for Libya even if the Qaddafi government should fall. Even if Colonel Qaddafi is deposed in some way, the senior officer said, there was still no clear plan for a political succession or for maintaining security in the country.

“The leaders I’ve talked to do not have a clear understanding how this will all play out,” said the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly…

American officials say they are preparing contingency plans if and when Colonel Qaddafi’s government falls to help prevent the vast Libyan government stockpiles of weapons, particularly portable antiaircraft missiles, from being stolen and dispersed.

Untold numbers of the missiles, including SA-7s, have already been looted from government arsenals, and American officials fear they could circulate widely, including heat-seeking antiaircraft missiles that could be used against civilian airliners. “What I worry about most is the proliferation of these weapons,” the senior military officer said, noting that the United States had already been quietly meeting with leaders of Libya’s neighbors in Africa’s Sahel region to stem the flow of the missiles.

The officer said that small teams of American military and other government weapons experts could be sent into Libya after the fall of the Qaddafi government to help Libyan rebel and other international forces secure the weapons. ]

Chronic fatigue syndrome activists…

The New Neo Posted on by

…have made threats against researchers who dare to suggest that even part of their suffering might be due to psychological reasons.

Now, has that convinced you of how psychologically stable the activists are?

[Researcher] Crawley has spent years trying to unravel the causes, but her refusal to accept that the condition is a result only of organic external factors has resulted in her being deluged with hate mail from extremists. “You evil bastards ”¦ time is running out for you so you have [sic] better start denouncing your flawed inhumane therapy and pray to God for forgiveness,” said one.

“To those who are responsible for preventing us sick ME sufferers from getting the help we need … you will all pay,” stated another. “It is depressing to receive emails like that, but I make sure that it does not get me down,” said Crawley. “I do check packages that are sent to my office, however.”

Many of the extremists’ claims are bizarre, said Professor Simon Wessely, of the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London. “They say I am in league with pharmaceutical companies in order to suppress data that shows a link between viruses and the syndrome. But why on earth would drug companies do that? If they could link the condition to a virus they would be well on the way to developing lucrative treatments and vaccines. It is crazy.”

Wessely has installed speed dial phones and panic buttons at the police’s request and has his mail X-rayed. He gave up his research on chronic fatigue syndrome several years ago, though he still treats patients.

In the last few decades, patients have felt increasingly empowered to advocate for themselves. This is ordinarily to the good, but it can get out of hand. This, combined with scientific illiteracy (which I’ve written about before, here) has created a phenomenon that, paradoxically, stifles research that might actually help conquer the diseases from which they and/or their loved ones suffer.

Science used to be about the search for truth; now a lot of people seem to think it’s about validating their own agenda. Many people also seem to think that a solution should always be found, and soon—and that if it isn’t, scientists are either corrupt or lazy, or both.

Paul Tsongas has something to tell us

The New Neo Posted on by

Despite my interest in politics (or perhaps because of it?), there haven’t been many presidential candidates over the years who’ve roused much enthusiasm in me. In fact, the single exception might have been Paul Tsongas, who ran for (and lost) the Democratic presidential nomination in 1992.

Tsongas might be considered a strange choice for enthusiasm. For one thing, he was exceptionally low-key, and famously lacked what’s usually thought of as political charisma. Who cares? I certainly didn’t.

Do you remember him? If you listen to this excerpt from a speech he made in 1993, you might recognize some themes that resonate even more strongly today [by the way, the George Bush he’s referring to at the beginning of the quote is George H.W. Bush]:

Here is Tsongas’s record; pay special attention to his stance on the economy. And here are some reminiscences after he died, by those who knew him:

JIM LEHRER: …Mike, how would you describe Paul Tsongas?

MIKE BARNICLE, Boston Globe: Well, I would describe him, Jim, I think as a nice man, a smart man, and I think most of all in my mind someone who, it sounds corny, but someone who literally never forgot where he came from because he couldn’t, because he never left where he came from. I was struck today watching the President in his inaugural address, and I can recall when he ran, he was billed as the man from Hope, Arkansas. And I think he was in Hope, Arkansas, for, you know, maybe three months or so. Paul Tsongas lived on a hill in an old mill town in New England, Lowell, Massachusetts, a hill where the rich people in town always used to live. He made it up to the top of that hill in a beautiful home. And from that home you could look down on a clear day in the Meramac Valley in January and see where Paul Tsongas lived as a child. It was that close and yet that far away from his roots. His father was a dry cleaner. His mother died when he was quite young. And Paul Tsongas literally knew everyone on Main Street in Lowell till the day he died. And I think it’s an unusual sort of person who can achieve the United States Senate and run for the presidency of the United States and still maintain those roots and the strength of those roots as he did.

JIM LEHRER: Mike, a lot of people said that he was almost too good to be true. You just saw the interview he did with–

MIKE BARNICLE: Yeah.

JIM LEHRER: –with Judy, and you think, my goodness. I mean, politicians don’t talk that way. Was he really that way?

MIKE BARNICLE: You know, I think he was. He could be, you know, he could be kind of smug and arrogant at times. I don’t think there’s any question about that, especially with the media, but we deserve to be treated that way. But I think his cancer changed him a great deal. I think the fact that he combated it successfully gave him the opportunity to realize and to articulate publicly during the course of his presidential campaign that there was a tremendous market in this country for truth. And when he ran for the presidency, having faced death, he was certainly unafraid to tell the truth as he saw it. And I think to us that might make him seem unusual, but I think to the average person it would make him seem someone with just huge amounts of common sense.

The present-day politician who most reminds me of Tsongas is—of all people—Chris Christie. Physically, they couldn’t be more different; Tsongas was slight, a bit frail-looking, and Christie is a man of heft. Christie is also a much more aggressive in-your-face type of guy. But otherwise, they’re the only two politicians I can think of who project such a strong aura of straight-shooting no-BS talk.

In 1992 I was very disappointed that Tsongas faded after some early success and that Clinton won the primaries; I thought Clinton was far inferior, although I voted for him in the national election. Anyway, it turns out that, sadly enough, Tsongas would have died in office two days before the end of his first term—not from a cancer recurrence, as some have erroneously stated, but from a different disease that arose as a complication from his earlier aggressive cancer treatments. He was 55.

But if he were around today, he’s probably the only Democrat I’d consider voting for again—although I’m not so sure he’d be allowed in the Democratic Party any more.

Hating economics

The New Neo Posted on by

The article “Why Americans Hate Economics” caught my eye, for obvious reasons.

Here’s a quote:

Christina Romer, the University of California at Berkeley economics professor and President Obama’s first chief economist, once relayed the old joke that “there are two kinds of students: those who hate economics and those who really hate economics.” She doesn’t believe that, but it’s true. I’m surprised how many students tell me economics is their least favorite subject. Why? Because too often economic theories defy common sense. Alas, the policies of this administration haven’t boosted the profession’s reputation.

The problem is manifold. Much of what economists say is indeed counter-intuitive—especially if we use our own most familiar circumstances, managing a household’s finances, as a guide. For instance, stimulus spending by the government is going to help the economy? Doesn’t seem quite right. Raising taxes might not always yield more revenue? Why not?

The explanations—and there are always many—somewhat suffice. But then there are the counterarguments, and they are seemingly endless as well. The math (which economists say constitutes the proof of the pudding) is so arcane that most people can’t do it or understand it. Nor are we sure the math matters, as we’ve learned from the financial quants, who assured us that the derivatives trade was a-okay and housing could never fall and all that jazz.

And even if 75% of economists agree on something, there’s always that other 25% (or even 10%, or 5%) who just might turn out to be correct. We’ve seen people be wrong, wrong, wrong before, and suffered for it. Prognostications? Don’t make me laugh; the track record is just not good, nor is it consistent.

That isn’t to say I disrespect economics. I don’t (some of my best friends…). Most of them work very hard at a task fraught with inherent difficulties: analyzing what went wrong in the complex system known as our economy, and what might be done to make it right.

If you want to make your head spin, just take a look at the arguments over the Great Depression, and whether FDR’s policies helped it or prolonged it, and what finally got us out of it. If the past is that hard to understand and that controversial, how much more so is the present and the future? And yet so much is riding on being correct.

Perry’s cuts caused the achievement of Texas students to fall

The New Neo Posted on by

Or did they?

One would certainly think so from these quotes from US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan:

Duncan told Bloomberg Television that Texas schools have struggled under Perry, saying he feels “very badly” for children who attend them.

“Far too few of their high school graduates are actually prepared to go on to college,” Duncan said. “I feel very, very badly for the children there.”

But before I start to weep for the children of Texas, where per-pupil spending and teachers’ salaries have been cut, I’d like to know how much the actual education of pupils there has suffered since the austerity measures were instituted. And funny thing, although I read the article several times and also did some supplementary Googling on the subject, the answer was nowhere to be found.

Perhaps when the entire Arne Burbank interview airs on Bloomberg TV, those figures will be provided. Perhaps they will substantiate his claims. But perhaps not.

Texas was not in the forefront of education even before the Perry cuts, although teacher/student ratios are above average there, and students tend to score around average on National Assessment of Education Progress tests. But the reasons Texas has not generally been a leader in education may have something to do with demography: “The state has more poor children than most, with one in four children living in poverty, compared to the one-in-five national average.”

And—okay, I’ll ask the question, because the article doesn’t—how many Texas schoolchildren are illegal immigrants? No one knows, but as of December 2010 the answer appeared to be “somewhere between 3% and 8%” of the total. It is logical to assume that this affects the entire Texas educational system in various ways that are not necessarily positive, including the need to wrestle with the language problem.

Oh, and by the way, speaking of language problems—here’s a message for Arne Duncan, educator-in-chief: it’s not “I feel very badly,” it’s “I feel very bad.” Unless, of course, there’s something wrong with the nerves in the tips of your fingers and your tactile receptors have gone awry, or your emotional makeup is off-kilter. If so, I feel very bad for you.

Economic arrogance on the left

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve noticed a few articles and posts lately from people on the left containing the meme “we know exactly what to do to fix the economy, and the mean and destructive politicians just won’t do it.”

Here’s a good example from Kevin Drum:

Watching the world slide slowly back into recession without a fight, even though we know perfectly well how to prevent it, is just depressing beyond words. Our descendents will view the grasping politicians and cowardly bankers responsible for this about as uncomprehendingly as we now view the world leaders who cavalierly allowed World War I to unfold even though they could have stopped it at any time.

For the moment, let’s suspend the argument on who’s right about the best way to try to jump-start the economy and enhance confidence. Let’s forget about the fact that this is a worldwide problem, and the latest downturn seems to be more about events in Europe than in this country. Forget the argument about whether WWI could have been prevented, or whether even the omniscient Kevin Drum, had he been alive back then and Master of the World, could have foreseen the nature of the war that was to follow and known the exact steps to take to avoid it.

Just focus on that phrase “we know perfectly well how to prevent it.” The mind-boggling, toe-curling arrogance it expresses, the unbounded faith in the human understanding of exceedingly complex systems and human ability to intervene effectively, and the idea that failure to do so is a combination of failure of will and the evil impulse, is unapologetic and monumental arrogance of the classic leftist variety. The Vision of the Anointed in its purest form.

Spambot of the day

The New Neo Posted on by

A reasonable spambot query:

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Well, why ever not?

The market drops again…

The New Neo Posted on by

…but the good news is: mortgage rates are mega-low! Time to buy a home!

That is, if you’ve got any money left, or a job.

Here are some possible reasons why the market is tanking today.

And only 26% of respondents in a recent Gallup poll approve of Obama’s handling of the economy, down 11% since mid-May. The poll didn’t ask how many people blame Bush. But we know who/what Obama now blames: bad luck.

Obama the blame duck.