Tucker Carlson

Traitor

And ain't it funny
How you said you were friends?

Now it sure as hell don't look like it

You betrayed me

And I know that you'll never feel sorry

For the way I hurt, yeah

Is Tucker Carlson a Traitor?

How well does Tucker Carlson live up to the standards of "Truth, Justice, and the American Way".This is of course from the lines repeated at the beginning of every episode of the daily Adventures of Superman TV show when I was a child.

Superman was created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, children of Jewish immigrants, as a retelling for modern times of the Moses story.  A baby was placed by his parents in a basket (rocket) and sent off for his safety.  His birth name for goodness sake is Kal- El.

I won't get into Tucker Carlson's shameful attitudes about Truth and Justice.  But if he is against the American Way, then he is by definition a Traitor to America.

The fact is that the American Way is to stand with the Jewish President of a country who is opposing an unJust invasion of his Country because of unTruths.  ( Ukrainians like Zelensky are Nazis?  Really? Really?)

If Tucker Carlson is against the American Way, then he is a traitor in my, and many, eyes.

I have written to YouTube TV, my streaming service, because while I can boycott the products of companies who advertise on Tucker Carlson's show, I know that my YouTube TV subscription dollars go to keeping this filth on the air.  While I am delighted that YouTube TV carries ESPN, Nickelodeon, and TMC, I regret that my subscription is supporting Tucker Carlson on Fox News.

Tucker Carlson is against the American Way, which makes him a traitor to Americans like me.

Sanctions

Dazed and Confused

You hurt and abuse,
Tellin' all of your lies
Run 'round, sweet baby, lord, how they hypnotize
Sweet little baby, I don't know where you been
Gonna love you, baby, here I come again

So who is confused about strategy and tactics?

Sanctions have been proposed by President Biden as a strategy for dealing with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  Some in the GOP have complained that sanctions are weak and ineffective.  Those individuals  are confusing strategy with tactics.  Are sanctions an effective tactic? No, but they were never claimed to be.

Those individuals opposing sanctions as ineffective must also be fans of Pyrrhic victories.  In case you have forgotten, a Pyrrhic victory is one where the victory, and the tactics used to achieve that victory, work against a winning strategy.  E.g. you won the battle, but lost the war.  They might make the tacticians who achieved that victory proud of themselves.  But a mid-season sports victory that came at the cost of injuring the team's star player almost always guarantees a losing season.  A gambler who won $100,000 in a game, but has lost $400,000 over the last year is still a loser.  The winner of an auction who paid more than the asset is worth will probably be bankrupt in the long run.  Or particularly germane to current events… the French Invasion of Russia in 1812 and the taking of Moscow.  It should be particularly fitting to listen to Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture today, and everyday, until the Russian invasion of the Ukraine becomes the latest example of a Pyrrhic victory.  Kind of makes you want to listen again on Election day, and when the Truth Social app crashes and burns as well!  I’d rather be weak than dazed and confused!

Inflation IV

 

Subterranean Homesick Blues

Look out kid, don't matter what you did
Walk on your tiptoes, don’t tie no bows
Better stay away from those that carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose, watch the plainclothes
You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows

But you do need to know that there IS a difference between
short term weather
and
long term climate.

If there is a fixed amount of money, and money is the medium of exchange in trade, then all trading must stop if one group of players has all of the money.  On the other hand, if society wishes trade to continue, then it must increase the supply of money to allow trade. 

The first situation describes when the supply of money is based on a fixed asset, e.g. gold or crypto currency ( e.g. Bitcoins will be eventually limited to 21 million).  When money is based on a fixed asset, it is said to be a commodity currency, such as the gold standard.  The second situation describes a fiat currency, where society creates money to accommodate trade. The first is the Chicago School, the second is  Keynesian. 

The United States Dollar was on the gold standard until 1933, when private ownership of gold was made illegal.  However gold still was the international trading currency.  After Bretton Woods, the United States Dollar became the international trading currency backed by gold.  Predictably, international players accumulated more and more dollars, and potentially gold, until the Nixon Shock of 1971.  This was followed by an economic readjustment, as the supply and demand curves had to readjust to this new reality.  Since that time, while long term inflation has been persistent, short term corrections between the supply and demand curves have been minimal.

Calls to go to a commodity currency, where that is backed by gold, or by crypto currency, appears to risk subjecting the economy to major corrections in the supply and demand curves.  Overall, the markets have been generally stable after they recovered from the Nixon Shock. But long term inflation has increased because the  international trading currency was a domestic fiat currency which was not growing to account for international trade ( the Triffin Dilemma) .

The year to year increase in the 2022 CPI was 4.4%.  The December 2020 to December 2021 increase was 7%, but 4.4% is based on the average of monthly CPI weighted by the days in each month.  The 7% increase is only relative to the lower demand in December 2020.  Given that the long term inflation has been suggested to be 4%, this change in short term inflation might not be cause for alarm. The increase in CPI seemed to begin in March of 2020, which is also the start of the COVID shutdown. Making policy decisions based on a comparison of today with COVID conditions would appear to be unwise.  It is like declaring that a drought is over based on a comparison of today’s rainfall with that during of the worst of the  drought.  The short term change is nice to know, but it is the change over the long term that is important.

Fraternities

 

La Marseillaise

Aux armes, citoyens

Formez vos bataillons

Marchons, marchons!

Qu’un sang impur

Abreuve nos sillons!

Vive L' Liberté! Vive L'Égalité! Vive L' Fraternité!

Fraternities are a way to have a tribe (i.e. a fraternity) within a tribe (i.e. a university).  The issue is whether the large tribe has a selection standard with which the smaller tribe agrees.  The selection criteria in European Universities was either already class based (e.g. Oxford, Cambridge, Eton, the “right” schools, etc.), or was merit based. ( e.g. the Sorbonne, Bologna, Copenhagen, etc.).  In many cases there are already colleges (schools, houses) within a university, so the need to join a smaller tribe is already provided.  Pembroke College is within Cambridge University.  You apply to Cambridge.  You are assigned to Pembroke.  Harry Potter applied to Hogwarts. Once at Hogwarts, he was sorted into Gryffindor House.

Joining a tribe is a perfectly natural and justifiable instinct ( “there is safety in numbers”).  Excluding members from your tribe on prejudice, is not a good thing.  ( e.g. Jim Crow laws, "No Irish  need apply").  The good purpose of a fraternity is such that when you travel to other places you can identify someone in your tribe ( e.g. same Fraternity, different chapter house). But fraternities are also exclusive (e.g. a potential member, a pledge, can be blackballed.)

In the European country with which the US is most familiar, the United Kingdom, there was already a very definite class system (“Upstairs, Downstairs”).  There was no need to exclude "lower" classes from the “right” schools, since  those schools were only for the “upper” classes anyway. The university was already class‑based, or in other countries where the society has no classes, there was no need to adopt an exclusive class structure within a university. This is not the case in the U.S.  Exclusive schools admit people who are not in your class (e.g. I am an Irish-Polish, Catholic, working-class graduate of an Ivy League university).  The alternative is to form fraternities, i.e. tribes, within those colleges where you can exclude the “wrong” people from your tribe.  Some that are excluded, may seek to form their own fraternities where they, and others like them, can be accepted, while others view this exclusion itself as folly ( “I don't want to belong to any club that will accept me as a member.”- Groucho Marx.)

Can fraternities do good? Absolutely.  Is there a benefit of joining with others? Absolutely.  Can fraternities exclude people? Yes, and that is their cost.  Members have to decide for themselves whether the benefits outweigh the costs. Fraternities don’t exist in European Universities because there was no need for Fraternities.

2022 Winter Olympics

 

The Way We Were

Memories
Light the corners of my mind
Misty watercolor memories
Of the way we were

What memories should we have of the 2022 Winter Olympics?

You can say that this is the Winter Olympics of Kamila Valieva, of Mikaela Shiffrin, of Eileen Gu, etc.  I will prefer to think of this as the Olympics of Finland's Iivo Niskanen, the Netherland’s Kai Verbij, and the United States’ Elana Meyers Taylor.

·       Kamila Valieva is the poster child for doping and cheating in sports.  But she is just that, a child.  She may have taken illegal drugs but she was told to take those illegal drugs by the adults who were responsible for her.  Blaming her is blaming the victim.

·       Mikaela Shiffrin might not have won any Gold Medals for the US at this Olympics but she did win Gold Medals in two previous Olympics, is the youngest winner of an Alpine skiing Olympic medal for the US, and is tied for the most Alpine skiing Olympic medals for a US team. In World Championships, she is the most decorated American alpine skier in history, having won the most medals overall, eleven,  a record six of them gold.  She was after all skiing for herself.  As an American, I can take vicarious thrills in her victories, but I can not blame her for not giving me more vicarious thrills.

·       Ailing (Eileen) Gu was raised in the US, will attend Stanford University, and might have closer ties with the US but chose to compete for China.  As Americans, we can no more “strip” China of those medals, unless we are also willing to give  Kaillie Humphries’ Gold Medal in the Women's Monobob to Canada, because Kaillie changed her citizenship from Canadian to the United States because of a dispute with her coach.

Instead can we celebrate-

·       Finland’s IIvo Niskanen who won a Gold Medal, in the Men's Cross-country Skiing 15km and instead of going off to celebrate or recover, he patiently waited 20 minutes for every one of the 94 competitors behind him to complete the race.

·       The Netherland’s Kai Verbij who backed off on the final crossover straight in his Speed Skating run, knowing he didn't have quite enough speed to get in front of Canada's Laurent Dubreuil.  Rather than a risk a collision, Verbij popped out of his racing crouch and slowed so he stayed clear of Dubreuil, who zipped away to capture the silver medal.

·       Elena Taylor who won the Silver Medal in the Women's Monobob and the Bronze Medal in the Two Woman Bobsled and will proudly carry the flag for the US during the closing ceremonies.  Despite the shabby treatment of past minority Olympians, such as Jesse Owens, Jim Thorpe, and Duke Kahanamoku, she clearly does not hold a grudge, for which this American is delighted.  And she recently survived COVID and an emergency C section to boot.

The Olympics should not be about remembering the way we were, but striving for the way we would like to be.

 

Inflation Predictions

Revolution

Never make a politician grant you a favor (Doo-doo-doo-doo)
They will always want to control you forever, eh! (Forever, forever)
So if a fire make it burn (make it burn, make it burn)
And if a blood make ya run (make ya run, run, run)
Rasta de 'pon top, can't you see? (Doo-doo-doo-doo)
So you can't predict the flop eh-eh! (Doo-doo-doo-doo)

What can you predict?

NPR’s Planet Money recently aired an episode titled Predictions: Inflation.  These predictions might have been easier if it was recognized that the Consumer Price Index is a combination of long term inflation, which is related to the US  money supply, (the medium of exchange between buyers and suppliers), and short term inflation, which is related to changes in the demand (buyer) and supply curves. If the proposed equations of long term inflation is removed, the changes in inflation (as measured by the Consumer Price Index) show a much different picture.

Viewed in this manner, changes in price appear much more stable than would otherwise be expected.  Taking a deep breath when viewing year to year changes in prices would appear to be warranted.  Most of what is called inflation may be long term inflation caused by the money supply, not by changes in the supply and demand curves. Making predictions about the short term changes in CPI could  be a lot easier if we realize that there is also a long term component.

Blame

 

The Name Game

Billy, Billy, bo-gil-ly, bo-na-na
Fanna, fo-fil-ly,
Fee fi mo-mil-ly, Billy!

The Name game is harmless fun.  Can we say the same about the Blame game?

When  you try to assess blame you are looking only at the past.  You look at a harmful act that has already occurred and try to assign responsibility for that harm.  But if those harmful actions were random, or you can not determine the cause of the harm, it may be tempting to assign blame to an individual.  But assigning blame to individuals who are not responsible for that action can’t prevent those harmful actions from occurring again.  If an investigation does correctly assess blame, and that blame is criminal, penalties can be  imposed to prevent that action from occurring again or make the individual who is responsible mitigate that harm.  Either the individuals who are responsible can be prevented from undertaking take that harmful action again, or those who might have considered such an action are deterred from that harmful action because the costs of that action outweigh the benefits.

But if those individuals are not responsible, punishing those individuals serves no purpose. It does nothing to  prevent the action from happening again.  The purpose of an investigation should be to prevent that action from occurring again.  If you assign blame incorrectly and punish the wrong individuals, those resources can not go into actually identifying the correct cause and possibly preventing such an action from ever occurring again.  Blaming the right person only has a benefit if it deters the harm attributable to that person in the future.  Blaming the wrong person can not deter harm in the future. Doing the right thing in response to a tragedy may be commendable, however doing the wrong thing is worse than doing nothing at all. Finding out correctly who, or what, is responsible is productive.  Simply assigning blame, particularly if that blame is assigned incorrectly, is not.