Bob Lord

Posted by Bob Lord

Pretty insightful analysis by Roger Cohen in today's NYT piece, Israel's Iran Dilemma. It's actually short enough to quote:

The United States is prepared to conceive of an Islamic Republic fully reintegrated in the community of nations, with equal rights. 

[snip]

Not Israel under Benjamin Netanyahu, who wants to keep Iran down. “Push us down, that is all I hear when I listen to Netanyahu,” one Stanford and Harvard-educated Iranian businessman told me. He has a strong belief that drawing Iran closer to the world is essential, a strong dislike of the Iranian regime, and a strong sense of outrage at Israel’s contempt for Iran’s national aspirations.

Diplomacy involves compromise; risk is inherent to it. Iran is to be tested. Nobody can know the outcome. Things may unravel but at least there is hope. Perhaps this is what is most threatening to Netanyahu. He has never been willing to test the Palestinians in a serious way — test their good faith, test ending the humiliations of the occupation, test from strength the power of justice and peace. He has preferred domination, preferred the Palestinians down and under pressure.

Obama and Kerry have invited Netanyahu to think again — and not just about Iran. Nothing, to judge by the hyperventilating Israeli rhetoric, could be more disconcerting. Nothing is more needed. Cheap allusions to 1938 are a poor template for Israel in the 21st century.

I'd go a step further.

Posted by Bob Lord

Let's be perfectly clear: This post is not in any way a knock on Kyrsten Sinema for having completed an Iron Man triathlon. If you read it that way, you're misreading it. I have trouble with many of the votes Kyrsten has cast, but I totally applaud her completion of the Iron Man. It's an awesome accomplishment, I milestone I wish I had achieved myslef, but never did.

How do I know it's an awesome accomplishment? Because I actually completed a half Iron Man myself, a quarter century ago. To do that, I spent months putting in three hours or so a day training. A full Iron Man doesn't require twice that much time, but it's awfully close. It requires incredible dedication.

Which, when you think about it, tells us how broken our Congress really is. If the House were working remotely as it should, the job duties of a Rep would be far too demanding to allow the time needed to train for an Iron Man on the side. Kyrsten sits on the House Financial Services Committee, the one responsible for banking legislation. It's time consuming work, both in committee and out. Unless of course you're not legislating.

Posted by Bob Lord

This one may make ole Thuckarooskie's head explode when he reads it: Blame Rich, Overeducated Elites as Our Society Frays, from Bloomberg yesterday. Yes, those wonderful "job creators" he admires so much are not really our saviors, they're our destroyers. Who would have guessed? 

The author, Peter Turchin, focuses on inequality, but not from the rich vs. poor perspective. He observes that there is a proliferation of elites associated with inequality, which by itself causes problems. 

Increasing inequality leads not only to the growth of top fortunes; it also results in greater numbers of wealth-holders. The “1 percent” becomes “2 percent.” Or even more. There are many more millionaires, multimillionaires and billionaires today compared with 30 years ago, as a proportion of the population.

Let’s take households worth $10 million or more (in 1995 dollars). According to the research by economist Edward Wolff, from 1983 to 2010 the number of American households worth at least $10 million grew to 350,000 from 66,000.

Rich Americans tend to be more politically active than the rest of the population. They support candidates who share their views and values; they sometimes run for office themselves. Yet the supply of political offices has stayed flat (there are still 100 senators and 435 representatives — the same numbers as in 1970). In technical terms, such a situation is known as “elite overproduction.”

And, along with elite overproduction, we have lawyer overproduction:

Posted by Bob Lord

I rarely have trouble with something Paul Krugman says. And I don't today, but I do have a little trouble with what he didn't say. 

His piece in today's NY Times, A Permanent Slump?, was half great, half disappointing. He starts out on fire, pointing out that those economists who believe the new normal is one where demand is inadequate and the typical state is one of mild depression are now mainstream. Commenting on Larry Summers' remarks at the IMF annual research conference, Krugman explains:

Posted by Bob Lord

Back in July, I predicted here that George Zimmerman would serve time eventually for another violent act. My prediction:

Zimmerman right now is telling himself he better clean up his act, because next time he may not be so likely. His father, his older brother and his wife likely are telling him the same thing. But deep down inside, Zimmerman knows he just got away with murder. And in his mind of minds, he thinks he can get it away with it again. 

Remember, this was not Zimmerman's first brush with the law, or even his second. Zimmerman has a criminal bent. Short term, his trial will cause him to be more careful. Long term, it will cause him to be more brazen. One day, the animal in Zimmerman will act out again. It may not be another murder, but it will involve violence.

It may take awhile, but one day Zimmerman will spend time behind bars.

I actually was quite confident of the prediction, but thought it could take a few years to be proven correct.

Probably not

From today's Huff Po: