Too little. Too late?

The focus of this blog lately is the nation's current economic mess and how we got there. This is installment 2. Here's #1.

As I argued yesterday, the Great Recession of the last few years was facilitated by 30 years of zombie economics, which consisted of deregulating industry, privatizing services, cutting taxes for the wealthy, and eroding programs that promoted shared prosperity.

In late 2008 and early 2009, Congress and the Bush and Obama administrations enacted policies designed to correct course. First, under Bush's watch, the TARP program or Wall Street bailout was passed. Most people hated it, for good reasons, although it may have actually helped stall the slide of markets and lending institutions and wound up costing less than expected.

The second was the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, better know as the stimulus. It was a big bill and a massively mixed bag, consisting of some elements that really helped boost the economy (like extending unemployment insurance, subsidizing COBRA and boosting food stamps) while others that didn't (things like tax cuts for businesses).

Here's the rationale behind it: three things drive economic growth: private spending, business investment and government spending. In a recession, the first two tend to tank, leaving the third to take up the slack.

The main problem with the Recovery Act, as several economists have argued (search this blog for more) is that it wasn't big enough and it didn't place enough focus on direct job creation. At the time it was designed, it was estimated that unemployment would peak at around 8 percent. More than two years later, the rate is still 9.1 nationwide.

The Recovery Act probably did help end the recession in at least a technical sense of helping GDP to stop falling and it did keep millions of Americans from falling into poverty, but it didn't go far enough or last long enough. Now, as it trickles to a halt, we're likely to see more and more layoffs, especially at the state and local level, and more cuts to needed programs and services.

The biggest problem with an inadequate stimulus was political: right wing opponents attempted to brand it as a failure with considerable success and use anger at slow job growth to turn public attention in another direction.

About which more tomorrow.

MORE OF SAME here.

SHOCK DOCTRINE. Don't fall for it (again).

TALKING SENSE. Here's a statement from the AFLCIO on real and bogus crises.

WHAT ABOUT THE TOOTH FAIRY? Some evangelicals are questioning the literal historicity of Adam and Eve.

WHY NOT PEOPLE? A new study suggests that chimpanzees are more generous than previously thought. Perhaps humans are less so.

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Taking one for the team

Regular readers of this blog may have noticed that El Cabrero enjoys taking regular swipes at the ideology of Ayn Rand (methinks it doesn't rise to the level of philosophy).

Most of what I know about her views comes from her own statements, interviews, and non-fiction. However, I must admit that I haven't actually her two most influential works of fiction, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Until now.

I just started The Fountainhead. Holy turgid prose, Batman! Is this what all the shouting is about? I will keep the Gentle Reader updated about my progress, if that's the right word, through this dense forest. But I have a feeling it isn't going to be a lot of fun.

SHOCK DOCTRINE, REVISITED. Here's a rant from yours truly about the federal budget debate.

KILLING MEDICARE. Some Republicans are having second thoughts.

MILITARY SPENDING. Here are some ideas about that.

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A creepy place

We don't have too many monsters in this pond, aside from a snapping turtle or two.

The theme at Goat Rope lately has been Beowulf, along with links and more or less snarky comments about current events. I chose Beowulf for two reasons. One, it really is a great poem. Two, the WV legislature has been in session and I've been kind of busy watching the chaos, though with precious little so show for it.

Having an ongoing theme at such times is a chance to get down ideas about a classic--and it saves a lot of what-the-hell-am-I-going-to-blog-about time. Now that the session is over (thank God) I plan on winding it down, but not before following the tale to its conclusion.

Some of the most memorable lines occur when Danish king Hrothgar describes the haunted mere or lake where Grendel and his mother dwell. It is there that the hero must go if he is to kill Grendel's mother, who is if anything more fierce than her man-eating son. It is a great description of a REALLY CREEPY PLACE. I'm going to break up the lines to make it easier to read. Enjoy:

"They in a dark land,
Cliffs of wolves, dwell, windy nesses,
Dangerous marshes, where mountain-stream
Under clouds of the nesses flows down below,
Lake under the earth. It is not far hence
In measure by miles that the mere stands,
Over which hang the rustling groves,
Wood firm in its roots; they cover the water.


There one every night a strange wonder may see,
Fire on the flood: so wise a one lives not
Of the children of men that knows its bottom:
Although the heath-stepper pressed by the dogs,
The stag, strong in horns, may seek the grove,
Pursued from afar, his life will he give,
His life on the shore, ere in it he will
Hide there his head.

That 's no unhaunted place;
Thence the boiling of waters rises up high
Wan to the clouds, when the wind rouses,
The hateful storms, while dark grows the air,
The heavens weep. Now is ready counsel
Again in thee alone. The abode yet thou knowest not,
The terrible place, where thou mayest find
The much-sinning being: seek if thou dare.

I for the contest thee will repay
With old-time treasures, as I before did,
With twisted gold, if thou comest away."

As someone who lives around deer and dogs, you know it's a bad place when a deer would rather be torn apart by canines than jump in the water to escape.

JAPAN. This looks really bad. I hope another disaster can be averted.

A TRAGIC ANNIVERSARY. The Triangle Factory Fire, which killed 146 garment workers, mostly young immigrant women, occurred on March 25, 1911. Since we seem to be headed back in the direction of pre-New Deal plutocracy, it might be good to reflect on the bad old days.

THE RIGHT'S LATEST BOOGEY-WOMAN is longtime consumer advocate Elizabeth Warren.

A CASE IN POINT for what Naomi Klein called The Shock Doctrine is Wisconsin.

SOCIALIZING. Here's a look at what made early hominids human.

DO SPERM WHALES HAVE NAMES? Maybe.

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Shoddy gods

By way of wikipedia, The Worship of Mammon, 1909, by Evelyn De Morgan.

Lots of people take up blogging in order to rant. For the most part, I didn't and generally try to keep Goat Rope relatively rant-free or at least keep the impulse under control.

Ordinarily, I go for a fairly serene tone here, with reflections on some ethereal topic followed by links and comments about current events. I'd prefer to be blogging about Beowulf now. However, I feel the need to rant today.

It occurs to me that of all the causes to which people have thrown their lives away or surrendered their ideals, integrity and _____ (fill in the appropriate body parts), the most pathetic is to utterly surrender one's human autonomy to the service of plutocracy and grovel at the feet of it. I'm sure it's a good gig for those who can take it, but it is one utterly devoid of honor.

Of course, people need economic resources to survive and thrive. That's what the fight is about. And in pursuing those things, we all have to do things we'd rather not. But here as elsewhere there is a line that sometimes gets crossed.

I can understand the appeal of many of the lesser gods humans have served, whether these are viewed as mere symbolic personifications or real persons. Aphrodite, Ares, Artemis, Hermes, Isis, and even violent ones like Kali and Tlaloc may have their limited place in the scheme of things. But surely Mammon is the shoddiest idol of all.

I have much more sympathy for those who sin in the service of some love or passion for an individual, a group or an ideal than those who choose greed for the filthy lucre or servility to those who command it.

(Regarding the applications of the above rant, which are Legion, as Bob Marley sang, "Who the cap fit, let them wear it.")

KOCHED RED HANDED. Here's more on the Koch crank call to Wisconsin's governor about billionaire backed union busting.

AND, WHILE WE'RE AT IT, a friend pointed out to me today that the aforementioned Wisconsin governor in his conversation with an imagined Koch didn't really talk about the state budget. Wasn't that what all this was supposed to be about? But, as Paul Krugman argues, in reality it's a classic case of applying what Naomi Klein called the shock doctrine.

A MODEST PROPOSAL. Here's an idea for West Virginia: set aside a portion of severance tax revenues to create a trust fund that could be used to promote job creation once extractive industries decline.

HOWEVER, rather than bold endeavours, it looks like the WV legislature is scaling back legislation to regulate the Marcellus Shale gas boom.

A LITTLE GOOD NEWS. The West Virginia CHIP (Children's Health Insurance) board voted yesterday to raise eligibility for the program to 300 percent of the federal poverty level. Previously, benefits were capped at 250 percent. As I understand it, this will cover around an additional 800+ children when fully implemented, although the news article linked above uses a slightly lower figure.

A LITTLE NOT SO AWFUL NEWS. Jobless claims dropped more than expected last week.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

INTRODUCING THE HILLBILLY HEALTH CLUB, AND LOTS MORE

At this time of year, lots of people join gyms. El Cabrero is all set to cash in on this trend. I hereby announce the founding of the Hillbilly Health Club. It's all right there in the perty picture.

It has the latest in exercise equipment--including sledge hammer, wedge, splitting maul, wheel barrow and sycamore stumps--and offers a comprehensive exercise program with the following elements:

*Resistance. Splitting and chopping wood. Sycamore is all about resistance.

*Flexibility. Bend over, pick up the split wood, and put it in the wheel barrow. If you are anything like El Cabrero, this can be the hardest part, especially after an hour or so of splitting and chopping.

*Aerobics. Push the wheel barrow to the woodpile.

Holistic health--Appalachian style!

Annual memberships are now available, with special discounts to Goat Rope email subscribers. Ask about special family rates.

SHOCKED, SHOCKED. El Cabrero would like to round out the week of New Year by mentioning three 2007 books that are worth a look. Today's choice is Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Her basic thesis is that economic, political, and ideological elites have taken advantage of human-made and natural disasters to impose an extreme version of unregulated capitalism on populations that would otherwise have rejected it.

Klein does an interesting job of weaving the history of shock therapy and other efforts at mind control with the rise of the Chicago School of economics as represented by Milton Friedman until his recent death. Friedman opposed unions, social programs, public education, business regulations, safety laws, etc. in the name of the "free" market.

He acknowledged that most people would find this distasteful, and said that

only a crisis--actual or perceived--produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.

Friedman got the chance to put his ideas into action when General August Pinochet overthrew the democratically elected president of Chile in 1973 and imposed a military dictatorship. Then, with the help of mass murder, repression, and torture, he was able to advise the regime on how to impose the blessings of the "free" market.

Klein's book looks at several examples of disaster capitalism in the U.S. and around the world. Katrina was a classic case in point, as was the development of Iraq's "Emerald City" as a free market utopia under the direction of Friedman disciple Donald Rumsfeld in Iraq. Both of those went over real well...

It's interesting that in WV, some advocates of "Unleashing Capitalism" have tried to create a climate of panic and crisis in the hopes of pushing through a political agenda which includes attacks on union membership, worker safety rules, etc.

SAD NEWS from Kenya.

PUBLIC OPINION ON IRAQ is at odds with the views of many presidential candidates, according to this item.

THE STATE OF THE NATION in the Bush years is the subject of this New Year's Eve NY Times editorial.

LABOR UNDER ATTACK. Here is some info on the anti-union bias of the Bush Labor Department.

TWO YEARS AFTER SAGO, mine safety is still an issue. As Ken Ward reports in today's Gazette, 67 US miners have died since that disaster.

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THE MERRY DANCE OF DEATH AND TRADE

Caption: Image courtesy of wikipedia.

Recently El Cabrero re-read Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. I was struck more than ever by the force of its denunciation of colonialism and imperialism. It was set in the Congo of a century ago, where the "Christian" king Leopold of Belgium and his minions perpetrated a holocaust that rivaled Hitler's. (See yesterday's post.)

I know that the interpretation of this short novel remains controversial. A colleague who is a native of Congo pointed out to me recently that the great writer Chinua Achebe thought that the novel de-humanized Africans by denying them language and culture.

Achebe has a point, but in fairness Conrad would probably get clobbered these days for presuming to speak for Africans as a European. And, with the exception of the narrator, the Europeans in the novel who do speak talk nonsense. Conrad went as far as he could go in this novel, which was pretty far. It is an unmistakable and explosive condemnation of the atrocities perpetrated not so long ago.

I first became aware of Conrad's brutal gem in the late 1970s with the release of the film Apocalypse Now, which is still one of my favorites. The film, as the reader will no doubt recall, was set not in Africa but in Vietnam, but it seems to me to be pretty close in spirit to the novel that inspired it.

But while Apocalypse Now was a film about war, Leopold's holocaust was perpetuated in a time of official "peace" in the name of Christianity, commerce and humanitarianism. Conrad described it best ironically in the tile of this post: "the merry dance of death and trade" whereby millions of people were exploited, exterminated and/or mutilated, physically or otherwise.

Sad to say, the merry dance continues, although generally in a more subtle form.

SHOCK AND ALL. Here's an interesting piece on neocons and the roots of the "shock doctrine" of disaster capitalism which was the subject of Naomi Klein's recent book.

SOCIAL EUTHANASIA. A few years ago, a dear friend and comrade applied for Social Security disability. By the time she finally got it, death was near. As this New York Times article shows, her case was not an isolated one:

Steadily lengthening delays in the resolution of Social Security disability claims have left hundreds of thousands of people in a kind of purgatory, now waiting as long as three years for a decision...

But in the meantime, more and more people have lost their homes, declared bankruptcy or even died while awaiting an appeals hearing, say lawyers representing claimants and officials of the Social Security Administration, which administers disability benefits for those judged unable to work or who face terminal illness.

WHAT DUMB ANIMALS? In lieu of Goat Rope's usual gratuitous animal picture, here's an item on animal intelligence. And here's one about the longstanding bond between animals and fermentation. Drink up!

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PSYCHED OUT

Photo credit: Dave Hogg, courtesy of EveryStockPhoto.

It used to be a joke that every college freshperson wanted to be a psychology major. That is the age when people are trying, generally with very limited success, to figure out themselves and other people.

El Cabrero fit that pattern back in the previous geological age. I had somehow stumbled on to Freud, Jung, and Nietzsche in high school and imagined that psychology classes would be that cool.

Would that it were so.

To my horror, I seemed to have stumbled in to a den of behaviorists. If there is one ideology I like even less than Stalinism or economic libertarianism, it's gotta be behaviorism.

I would probably have a lot less trouble learning that a good friend was a cannibal than I would to learn that he or she was a fan of B. F. Skinner. Actually, that happened recently and I'm still trying to deal with it.

Clarification: by behaviorism, I don't mean attempting to study behavior in measurable ways. That's fine. I mean metaphysical behaviorism, where people pretend that there's no such thing as conscious or unconscious mental activity and that we're all balls of stimulus response conditioning.

I remember some professors ridiculing the idea of consciousness, mind, and similar ideas and thinking "These people are idiots."

It seems to me the height of loopiness for beings who are only aware of the world through their own consciousness to deny that it exists. And I think there's something evil about reductionism, the attempt to reduce the complexity of human life to any simple deterministic factor, whether it's conditioning, genes, economics, "rational choice," etc. We're way too messy for that. Sometimes I wish we weren't.

As Dmitri Karamazov said in Dostoevsky's classic novel,

Yes, man is broad, too broad. I’d have him narrower. The devil knows what to make of it!

That was the end of my psych major.

Fortunately, it appears that the discipline has recovered from this mental disorder, thanks in part to research from many quarters, including brain science, evolution, ethology, etc., not to mention common sense.

SHOCKING IRAQ. Here's a video segment of Keith Olbermann discussing the application of the "shock doctrine" in Iraq with Naomi Klein.

TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS. Corporate lobbyists, nervous about 2008, are pressing to grab all they can in the months ahead.

MINE SAFETY then and now, courtesy of the Gazette's Ken Ward.

TWISTS AND TURNS. There have been some strange developments in the Megan Williams case lately. First, the WV Attorney General Darrell McGraw's office declined a request of the Logan County prosecutor to offer an opinion on pressing hate crimes charges in the case. Then the AG expressed a desire to take over the the case. Both moves were not well received by prosecutor Brian Abraham.

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LAPLACE'S DEMON

Caption: This is him.

The guiding thread through this week's Goat Rope is the topic of determinism, which El Cabrero is writing about of necessity even though he doesn't quite buy it. If this is your first visit, please click on earlier posts.

When it comes to determinism, the French scientist Pierre Simon Laplace (1749-1827)was hardcore:

We may regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future. An intellect which at a certain moment would know all forces that set nature in motion, and all positions of all items of which nature is composed, if this intellect were also vast enough to submit these data to analysis, it would embrace in a single formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and those of the tiniest atom; for such an intellect nothing would be uncertain and the future just like the past would be present before its eyes.

In other words, he thought it was possible for an intellect that had all the correct information about a given moment to completely reconstruct the past and predict the future.

Note: he didn't refer to the hypothetical intellect as a demon; that title was bestowed by later writers.

The story is also told of his interview with the Napoleon, where he presented him a copy of his work. The Emperor said, "M. Laplace, they tell me you have written this large book on the system of the universe, and have never even mentioned its Creator."

He replied, "I had no need of that hypothesis."

One wonders what Einstein or Spinoza would have said. All I can say is that I find it easier to believe in Zeus' merry band of Olympian immortals than in a completely mechanistic universe.

THIS HORRENDOUS West Virginia story about the abduction and weeklong sexual abuse and torture of an African-American woman has made national news. Six suspects, all white, have been arrested. The FBI is participating in the investigation at the Logan County Sheriff's Department request and is investigating this as a hate crime. Here's the latest from today's Gazette. AFSC staff and others here are working now on a local response.

MORE ON THE SHOCK DOCTRINE AND DISASTER CAPITALISM. Yesterday's post mentioned Naomi Klein's new book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Here's another review from the NY Times and a link to a short film from her website. WV's own right wing is attempting to "unleash" its own version here.

WHAT DO THEY KNOW? Here are the results of a new poll of Iraqis about their views of the situation:

Barely a quarter of Iraqis say their security has improved in the past six months, a negative assessment of the surge in U.S. forces that reflects worsening public attitudes across a range of measures, even as authorities report some progress curtailing violence...

More Iraqis say security in their local area has gotten worse in the last six months than say it’s gotten better, 31 percent to 24 percent, with the rest reporting no change. Far more, six in 10, say security in the country overall has worsened since the surge began, while just one in 10 sees improvement...

More directly assessing the surge itself – a measure that necessarily includes views of the United States, which are highly negative – 65 to 70 percent of Iraqis say it’s worsened rather than improved security, political stability and the pace of redevelopment alike.

The survey was conducted by ABC News, BBC, and Japanese broadcaster NHK.

REMEMBERING THE CCC. The Charleston Daily Mail had a good piece yesterday on a reunion of Civilian Conservation Corps workers. New Deal era programs like that build a great deal of WV's--and the USA's--infrastructure. They had a real president back then, too.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED