New U.S. President

[rogue]

Originally Posted by ewmayer

He is unable or unwilling to admit that the Republican assault on regulation was to blame.

I've been doing a little reading and there are a number of writers who disagree with this statement. They have basically said that the businesses and industries that are regulated (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac come to mind) were most heavily involved with the toxic mortgages, while those entities that are less regulated were not. In fact one article suggested that Sarbanes-Oxley led to more of the "good money following the bad". I haven't done enough research to know the full accuracy of any statements, but to place all (or even most) of the blame on deregulation seems to be an effort to deflect blame from other sources.

Of note, I have not talked to one person who supports the bailout. Everyone would have preferred the banks and Wall Street to flounder a little more before anything would come from Washington. Even though I own a house (okay a little more than 50% of a house), I would have preferred to see another 10% drop in its value before a bailout that does little to solve the root of the problem, America's (and American's) addiction to debt. I have yet to see either party submit a solution to this basic problem. Instead both say that we'll just continue to borrow the money and spend our way out of it.

I heard yesterday that there is a 10 million home surplus in the U.S (one web site suggests 30 million). This is a huge part of the problems that we currently experience. Apparently Nevada, Arizona, California, and Florida lead the pack in surplus housing. It has been suggested that housing will not rebound until this surplus is significantly reduced. In those markets I would have to believe that housing values will drop a lot more than 20% before this is over. Unfortunately the rest of us are being dragged down by the housing speculation

I did find one of McCain's remarks from last night incredibly frightening. If I heard him correctly, he basically stated the the U.S. government should absorb the loss of value of all of these properties so that the current mortgagees could refinance. This must be related to Palin's remark of houses valued at $300K that are only worth $100K (a disingenuous remark). Boy, I wish I had purchased a $1M home that was worth $350. Then the government could absorb that $650K loss instead of me. I could keep my house, then sell it for $1M when the market rebounds. That's a pretty good deal. BTW, I would have had a lot more respect for him if he would have just stated that both Republicans and Democrats where responsible for this mess instead he could only find fault with Obama and the Democrats.

[garo]

Can we just stop pretending that we have a binary choice between regulation and deregulation?

rogue, if deregulation is such a panacea, why do we have the FAA regulating safety standards on aircrafts? The market should be able to figure out what's right, no? Airlines that are unsafe will automatically go out of business.

There is good regulation and there is bad regulation. Sometimes it is hard to tell which is which but most of the time we can use a bit of common sense to figure it out. And we cannot repeat CANNOT trust businesses and markets to figure out what is good for the country. They can only figure out what is good for them and if it screws up the country, so be it.

If they could control their own greed for the sake of national good we wouldn't have had this bailout and we wouldn't have the coming severe recession.

So let's just stop pretending no regulation is the answer. Good regulation is the answer.

PS: We have had a removal of good regulation by the Republicans and an institution of bad regulation by the Democrats. Can we just leave it at that?

PPS: I'm not convinced that Sarbanes-Oxley is to blame. That is being used as a fall guy by some. The Gram-Leachey or whatever it is called seems to be more relevant here.

[rogue]

Originally Posted by garo

Can we just stop pretending that we have a binary choice between regulation and deregulation?

rogue, if deregulation is such a panacea, why do we have the FAA regulating safety standards on aircrafts? The market should be able to figure out what's right, no? Airlines that are unsafe will automatically go out of business.

There is good regulation and there is bad regulation. Sometimes it is hard to tell which is which but most of the time we can use a bit of common sense to figure it out. And we cannot repeat CANNOT trust businesses and markets to figure out what is good for the country. They can only figure out what is good for them and if it screws up the country, so be it.

If they could control their own greed for the sake of national good we wouldn't have had this bailout and we wouldn't have the coming severe recession.

So let's just stop pretending no regulation is the answer. Good regulation is the answer.

PS: We have had a removal of good regulation by the Republicans and an institution of bad regulation by the Democrats. Can we just leave it at that?

PPS: I'm not convinced that Sarbanes-Oxley is to blame. That is being used as a fall guy by some. The Gram-Leachey or whatever it is called seems to be more relevant here.

I never stated that regulation is a bad thing or that deregulation is a good thing. In general I agree with your statements, but how does one differentiate between good and bad regulation? It seems to me that regulation must evolve in order to be effective, but that neither party is really interested in that.

[garo]

If you cut out the lobbyists and the vested interests, most of the time one can tell what is good regulation. But as you say, none of the parties is interested in it.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by rogue

In general I agree with your statements, but how does one differentiate between good and bad regulation?

I suggest that often it's not a matter of good or bad legislation, but instead a matter of regulation more palatable to conservatives and regulation more palatable to liberals (or choose your own opposites), and the best answer is political compromise whenever there is not sufficient objective (and agreed-upon) data to clearly support one side or the other.

It seems to me that regulation must evolve in order to be effective,

Exactly. Sometimes after a compromise or experiment is put into effect (or, all too often, some calamity occurs), enough objective data results to make it clear(er) what needs to be done.

Originally Posted by garo

If you cut out the lobbyists and the vested interests, most of the time one can tell what is good regulation.

Well, I'm sympathetic to that, but both two- and three-piece-suited lobbyists and special interests are actually essential to represent fractions of the public who are genuinely informed and interested in particular pieces of legislation. I want a lobbyist who can advocate and explain certain matters that affect me more than the average citizen, because I have a special interest in those matters! But certain practices (bribery etc.) arise from application of human nature to objectively-sound lobbying, so we get messes that need regulation (to coin a word) to try to keep lobbying within proper bounds.

Originally Posted by rogue

but that neither party is really interested in that.

Originally Posted by garo

But as you say, none of the parties is interested in it.

Well, many in each party used to be, and some still are, interested in negotiating and being satisfied with compromises, but recent (3 decades) evolution of political strategy and tactics has worked to separate folks with differing worldviews into sharply different positions, which has not been favorable to reasonable compromises. (I've previously hinted whom I consider most responsible for that.) Hence my call for voters to vote for candidates who seem most likely to be able to reach reasonable compromises without insisting on entrenched extreme positions.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by rogue

I haven't done enough research to know the full accuracy of any statements, but to place all (or even most) of the blame on deregulation seems to be an effort to deflect blame from other sources.

... or else it's a sincere, honest, informed conclusion that most or all of the blame does lie with de-(or non-)regulation. Not everyone is a liar.

We saw bad finance-related things happen during the Reagan administration because of deregulation. Does "savings-and-loan scandal" ring a bell? Notice how some current discussions refer to what was done in the 1980s when large numbers of savings-and-loan institutions failed after doing non-cautious (or downright sleazy) things following deregulation in that industry? Over five hundred Reagan appointees were later indicted for felonies (ten times the number of Carter appointees, for comparison), mostly related to savings-and-loan-related misdeeds, according to a Wall Street Journal article sometime around 1990-91.

Some of us think there was a lesson from history there, as there were in other matters related to events that have occurred during the current administration of the only president in my lifetime to have stated that he didn't know much about history before the Reagan administration (e.g., Vietnam). Perhaps W didn't study all of what happened during the Reagan administration, either.

So, perhaps some blaming of other sources is an effort to deflect blame from de-(or non-)regulation, right?

[cheesehead]

Because I didn't watch much of Tuesday's McCain/Obama debate, I didn't know about this science-ignorant remark by McCain until reading about it just now:

Originally Posted by [URL

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_pl78[/url]]In the debate, McCain portrayed Barack Obama as an excessive spender, and he punctuated his attack (twice) with this example:

Turns out, a lot of people think we do. This is no ordinary overhead projector from your 5th grade classroom. The blog Cosmic Variance sums it up:

From Wikipedia's Adler Planetarium article, under heading "Controversy":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adler_Planetarium

In the second presidential debate of 2008, John McCain was critical of Obama's support for a $3 million earmark which would have bought a new projector for the planetarium. The current Zeiss Mark VI projector is 40 years old and no longer supported by its manufacturer, Carl Zeiss AG. The Adler has asked six area U.S. representatives and both Illinois senators for assistance in obtaining federal funding for various projects. Both Republicans and Democrats were enlisted for assistance. The replacement projector earmark was not approved.

Folks, if you've ever been to a planetarium, you know that in the middle of the room is a complex, precise optical instrument capable not only of projecting, overhead, an array of stars, but also of showing all sorts of other objects (Sun, Moon, planets, comets, asteroids) moving and/or varying (variable stars, novae, supernovae) among those stars, and furthermore of showing the long-term effects of Earth's 23,000-year precession on how all those change their alignments with our NSEW compass directions, plus a long list of other scientifically-educating optical effects worth millions of mere words in a textbook.

Surely, I would think, to anyone at all familiar with planetariums the phrase "overhead projector" in close proximity to a world-famous planetarium's name would at least cause a pause to consider what might be meant.

So, exactly which Republican in the McCain campaign translated any detailed reference to the Zeiss projector to "overhead projector" in order to portray it as a boondoggle? Whoever it was is either science-ignorant or a cynic willing to sacrifice accurate description to the goal of rousing science-ignorant members of the audience. (I can't imagine that McCain himself would misunderstand a factually-correct description. The idea that he himself would deliberately and knowingly refer to the instrument as a simple "overhead projector", for fleeting political purpose, would require him to have such an anti-science attitude that ... One of you McCain supporters help me out here: is McCain either that ignorant or that willing to sacrifice science to politics, or must McCain have been fed a distorted version by some subordinate?)

- - - - -

UPDATE: I have now learned, to my disgust, that apparently McCain himself is that willing to sacrifice science to politics.

McCain trained in a planetarium at the Naval Academy.

It wasn't simply repeating an underling's distortion.

It wasn't ignorance of what planetariums are.

He visited a planetarium less than a month ago.

"McCain: Planetariums are Foolish"

http://theperfectsilence.com/?p=417

Originally Posted by (I can't find the blog author's name)

Update: At the end of this article, giving McCain one last shred of the benefit of the doubt, I suggest that perhaps he doesn’t know what a planetarium is, maybe confusing it with some kind of fancy nickelodeon device or 1893 World’s Fair attraction. All of this despite McCain having trained in a planetarium at the Naval Academy. Well, now we can’t even consider that, since he visited a planetarium less than a month ago:

The presumed Republican presidential candidate, McCain was scheduled to speak at 9 a.m. today to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Orlando. Afterward, he planned to head for Cocoa, where he will attend an 11:15 closed-door, roundtable discussion with 18 local space industry leaders .

The meeting at the Astronaut Memorial Planetarium at Brevard Community College is closed to the public. Although McCain is expected to make a brief public statement afterward.

That’s the planetarium I helped build in 1994 - I know it very, very well. He probably walked by my old office, and sat under the planetarium dome where I spent a lot of blood, sweat and tears, silently nodding his head while looking up in awe, “So this is what a plantation looks like.”

—

He was waiting until my power went out for a few days to say this.

If you needed any more evidence that a certain major political party - at least on the Federal level - is on the completely wrong side of science education in this country, I give you the latest quote from Presidential Candidate John McCain:

McCain responded by criticizing Obama for seeking more than $900 million in these earmarks, by one count.

‘‘That’s nearly a million every day, every working day he’s been in Congress,’’ McCain said. ‘‘And when you look at some of the planetariums and other foolishness that he asked for, he shouldn’t be saying anything about Governor Palin.’’ (emphasis mine)

. . .

Many astronauts, engineers, scientists, and physicists cite their planetarium experience as a young adult as the inspiration for their careers. And something tells me that McCain is a fan of home schooling. Well, home school teachers use planetariums and museums extensively (to their credit) to teach their kids about the Universe and the wonders of nature. Why does McCain hate resources for home schools?

So planetariums are very much involved in the direct classroom education of the very kids we need to teach science to. That’s Foolishness You Can Believe In. But beyond that, and even more important than the direct lessons - is the role planetariums have in inspiring the next generation to envision themselves participating in a future of science and technology. Students and adults take away an incredible sense of awe from their planetarium experience, of being a part of something amazing as they fly through canyons on Mars and investigate the strange galaxies that contain hundreds of billions of stars. The planetarium allows kids to excersize their most amazing asset - their imagination - by simply giving them the place to throw their thoughts to the possible, as they sit entranced under the stars. I always got chills when I would first turn down the lights in the planetarium, to reveal the beauty of the night sky to a roomful of school kids. “Wwwoooooowwww!” they always collectively would shout to the stars. You tell me of another math or science lesson that gets that kind of response within the first minute.

More “foolishness,” please.

. . .

There couldn’t be any better use of such an “earmark” - the education about an important endangered species in nature - the Universe above us all. All in one of America’s premiere historic science teaching facilities no less. I guess McCain really hated the latest updating of the Smithsonian’s Einstein Planetarium, which he had to vote on, or his state’s own recently renovated planetarium at the Arizona Science Center in Phoenix, and I’m sure he’s banging his fist about the “foolishness” of the upcoming state-of-the-art planetarium at the University of Arizona’s Science Center located in Tuscon, one of America’s astronomy capitals.

Does McCain hate science education? Actually, I really don’t think so. Instead, I’m willing to bet that he doesn’t even know what a planetarium even is - even though he spent his college years training in one in a standard course in Celestial Navigation at the Naval Academy). Now that’s Irony You Can Believe In.

Planetariums are Bridges to the Future, and America would be a much better place if all the congressional earmarks went to projects like them.

Note that in the next-to-last paragraph the author was willing, as I was, to grant McCain the benefit of the doubt. (I have not changed anything above the "UPDATE" line since I learned of this later stuff, so you can judge for yourself how genuinely I was willing to give McCain the benefit of the doubt.)

Then we found otherwise.

- - -

Here's Phil Plait's take:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/ba...netariophobia/

- - - -

Go ahead, McCain supporters: explain how sacrificing science to politics, as the GOP has done for seven years and continues to do even now, is justified.

[ewmayer]

McCain just proposed bailing out every underwater mortgage in America at taxpayer expense, irrespective of how reckless the responsible lending institution and the homebuyer were, and he accuses Obama of pork barrel politics? McCain and the Repugnicans from Reagan onward have put future generations, our children and grandchildren, on the hook for many multiples of our GDP in federal debt, because they don't have the honesty to say that all this insane military spending and national-socialism-for-the-wealthy-and-the-profligate has to paid for somehow? Like I said ... lying scumbags. I can't even stand to hear anything that comes out of McCain's mouth anymore, my disgust at the way he is running his desperate smear campaign is so great. I tried tuning in to debate #2 the other night, and immediately had to change the channel. Alas, nearly every channel that was carrying anything of remote interest was broadcasting the debate, so it was off to the DVD collection.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

- - - -

Go ahead, McCain supporters: explain how sacrificing science to politics, as the GOP has done for seven years and continues to do even now, is justified.

BTW, to head off something I've seen in comments to the articles I linked, let me point out that it's not about the $3 million dollars, it's not about voting to disallow that earmark, it's not about government spending, and it's not about McCain's blanket opposition to all earmarks.

It's about McCain's deliberately deceptive portrayal of the Zeiss projector to the debate audience.

McCain didn't have to mention it. No one forced him to refer to it AFAIK. It wasn't a joke. Surely there are dozens of other earmarks Obama supported or inserted that McCain could've complained about ... honestly.

He _chose_ to introduce a deliberate distortion that fits right in with the anti-science drift of the Republican Party. (And he did so twice.)

Justify that, please, McCain supporters.

Please.

I beg you.

[mdettweiler]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

BTW, to head off something I've seen in comments to the articles I linked, let me point out that it's not about the $3 million dollars, it's not about voting to disallow that earmark, it's not about government spending, and it's not about McCain's blanket opposition to all earmarks.

It's about McCain's deliberately deceptive portrayal of the Zeiss projector to the debate audience.

McCain didn't have to mention it. No one forced him to refer to it AFAIK. It wasn't a joke. Surely there are dozens of other earmarks Obama supported or inserted that McCain could've complained about ... honestly.

He _chose_ to introduce a deliberate distortion that fits right in with the anti-science drift of the Republican Party. (And he did so twice.)

Justify that, please, McCain supporters.

Please.

I beg you.

Well, I for one had never heard of this projector thing prior to the debate--could someone enlighten me as to what exactly this projector is supposed to do that their old one doesn't? (And don't tell me that they didn't have an old one, since I'm sure that Congress has always had plenty of projectors all over the place.)

[ewmayer]

I'll betcha that Zeiss fella was a Nazi sympathizer. And he probably didn't support The Holy Surge, either.

So there.