Debt Ceiling, Poopship Destroyer

National politicians, such as Senators and Congresspeople, are some of the busiest people you'll ever meet, but, near as I can tell, they don't do much. Their deputies shoehorn more fundraisers, meetings and events into their calendars daily than I could tolerate over the course of a year. It's not that onerous mentally, though, as they aren't required to do much at these events. They speak a lot and greet people all of the time, but the speeches aren't new and few of the people must be remembered. They just have to be there, smiling and present. Their presence is important, because they are important. QED.

When Senators and Congresspeople do act, we quickly discover why we prefer that they avoid action at all costs. Of all these avoidable acts, few could have been avoided as easily as the poop-ship that is the debt ceiling. The USS Debt Ceiling is truly foul: a dinghy that sails only in the stinkiest water. It festers. It sails laboriously, if at all. Ultimately, the only thing the boat could ever accomplish is preventing other ships from going where they need to go. But there it is, sailing around our national bathtub, threatening everything in sight.

Only two developed countries have chosen to a erect a "debt ceiling," an internally imposed limit on the amount of borrowing that the country can do at any given time. The US and Denmark are the only ones. This is not common. Usually, lender-borrower practices, private or public, are governed by the interest rate at which a lender is willing to lend and the rates at which a borrower is willing to borrow. Sometimes, lenders will arbitrarily set limits on the amounts borrowed, as is the case with credit-card limits. But a borrower who sets an arbitrary limit. his own spending is less common.

The reason is simple: well, why would you? If someone's willing to subsidize your standard of living by giving you a low-interest loan and you need the money, you should take it. Or least you should give yourself the option. There's no reason to force yourself into thievery or prostitution if it's not absolutely necessary, right? Wrong.

We need to get spending under control, as the argument goes, and for that reason, we have imposed a debt ceiling. Not that anyone cares about the number that the US has as its current debt ceiling, or the next number that will come after this debt ceiling -- they don't. The real issue is that the United States spends nearly twice the amount it brings in each year through tax revenue. That's a big effing problem. And solving the problem would require the United States to eliminate something that cannot be eliminated, politically or practically, such as the armed forces. Or the department of education. Or social security. Or increase revenue by raising taxes. None of the these things will happen.

The real issues will not be confronted by people whose primary incentive is to get re-elected. You don't get re-elected by raising taxes or eliminating the army or the department of education. And it is unclear whether sailing around a poop-ship such as the USS Debt Ceiling will get you elected, either. But there are some who would like to believe that it gives off the impression that we are confronting the issues. We are not. We are sailing around a poop-ship around a filth-ridden bathtub. We'd be better off playing with a rubber ducky.

Our debt problem will get resolved eventually. By some combination of default or severe devaluation, and only when the alternatives are worse. Until such time, expect more poop-ships and similar vessels. They're the only boat Congress knows how to build.

NBA lockout

The NBA may have overestimated the leverage it has over its players with this lockout business. This throws a chainsaw into the NBA owner's negotiating strategy. Lockouts are effective if you have a monopoly or near-monopoly over your labor pool. This had been true for most major American sports, specifically baseball, football, and basketball, since they were invented. But it's less true now for basketball than it has ever been. Basketball is the second most popular team sport in many parts of Europe and perhaps South America. Many of these teams have rivalries that run deep and owners with the resources to acquire expensive assets that might help them bully their rivals -- and perhaps show off their wealth to a few friends. And with the economy going well for the top 1/1000th of 1%, they might just pull the trigger.

While not all NBA players have the option to go abroad, its most important players will. The 9th man on an NBA bench has little leverage regardless. True superstars have infinite leverage, but also have the wealth and resources to avoid the most serious consequences of a lockout (not being able to pay the bills). It's the folks between those two categories that will determine what gets negotiated when.

Part of me thinks D-Will is bluffing. But if he's not, and if enough European owners are willing to bring on some foreigners to put on a show, NBA owners might find they were playing a trump card in a game where, in reality, there was none they had to play.

Kenneth Faried and Denver's tolerance

Denver is my home. It is where I was raised, and where I have decided to settle. I know its strengths and weaknesses well. It is majestic in some ways, but mediocre and unimpressive in others. It has better weather than most realize and immediate access to phenomenal landscapes and natural playgrounds, as most know full well.

Culturally, though, it is a minor-league city at best. The music scene is sub par, and there is not much to speak of in arts and theater. The foodie scene is improving, but that's coming from humble beginnings.

As a citizen of Denver, I'm a fan of the Denver Nuggets. As a white male, this makes me an anomaly. Most white males favor the Broncos, Rockies, or Avalanche. I could come up with lots of theories for this, but the easiest one is that Denver is a pretty WASP-y city, and basketball is not exactly the WASP-iest of sports nowadays.

By way of example, John Elway is very Denver. Carmelo Anthony never was. Joe Sakic, though Canadian, was fully embraced by city. Alex English, sorta kinda. Todd Helton and Troy Tulowitzki? Check and check. The great skywalker David Thompson, Michael Jordan's hero? You'd barely know he played here.

And the most popular Nugget today? Chris Andersen. He of drug suspensions and 5.6 points and 4.9 rebounds-a-game fame.

In case you're not familiar with all these names, the popular ones in Denver are all white and the less-than-super-popular ones are black. Maybe that's an accident and maybe it ain't. But I have my suspicions.

The Nuggets drafted Kenneth Faried a couple of weeks ago. He will be a good Litmus test for the perhaps-burgeoning-in-cosmopolitan-character city and its ability to accept less WASP-y sports figures. He's a high-flying, super energetic, mega-intense rebounding machine. He holds the NCAA college basketball record for total rebounds collected in his career. He led tiny Morehead State, his alma mater, to the second round of the NCAA tournament.

But he's black. And he's a Muslim. And his mother is a lesbian (not sure exactly how those last two go together.) He's got crazy-long dreads. But if you separate out that stuff, he's exactly the same type of player as Chris Andersen, except he's probably better.

I can't wait to see how he's treated.

Western Europe and Corruption

Sepp Blatter, Dominque Strauss-Kahn, and Jacques Rogge -- the heads of FIFA, the IMF, and International Olympic Committee -- come from three different countries (Switzerland, France, and Belgium), so I suppose I shouldn't dump them into the same laundry basket, but, I do. They're old, jowly white men with slick hair (fact); they come from (at least partially) French-speaking countries (fact), and they're in charge of major international organizations (fact). And they apparently can get away with doing whatever the fuck they want (opinion).

The first two have tried their luck getting into scandals, with varying degrees of success. Sepp Blatter may or may not have been involved in a bribery scandal to sell their World Cup to oil barons (Qatar). As of yet, the allegations haven't worked their way through the system. Unfortunately, "the system" (FIFA) is the same corrupt, dank netherworld that created the corruption in the first place (FIFA). They hired Kissinger to help them deal with the allegations. Yes, yes, I see. Hiring Kissinger to help your organization improve transparency is like hiring Caligula to help you enforce a government austerity program.

Dominique Strauss has had the misfortune of committing his alleged misdeeds in a jurisdiction where his name doesn't carry sovereign immunity. But he's living in high luxury while on house arrest, so things are ok for the time being. I don't pretend to have any insight into what happened with the maid in NYC, and I won't condemn him for rape just yet. But it is a catastrophic hypocrisy for the international monetary fund, the organization dedicated to enforcing austerity programs on the world's most direly indebted nations, to be living his lifestyle. It sends a compelling "fuck-you-lowly-pig-take-and-like-it" message that can only end badly.

These narrow rants aside, the exploits of these two doodlefucks raises a more important question: how come the Frenchies (or, perhaps more accurately, Western Europeans) are in charge of all the international agencies? France, Switzerland, and Belgium, adjoining nations, have less than 1/35th of the world's population, but they manage to control all the major international governing bodies. Surely, there are at least a handful of smart folks available from South America, Africa, North America, India, Japan, or China capable of managing these posts. But their names don't appear on the lists of candidates.

As someone who is gleefully unaware of how international politics works, this strikes me as confusing. Western European nations, despite (or perhaps because of) a millennium of imperial dominance, have managed to sweet-talk the smaller nations into supporting their candidacies against those of candidates from other nations, large and small. Other powers, such as the US, Japan, and China, are failing at building effective voting blocks to get the votes. So are smaller countries. I don't know why. But I know that oligarchies tend toward corruption, stagnation, and insularity, and that's what I think we're seeing out of these jowly old clowns.

Thoughts on Osama

*When September 11th happened, I was living at home to save money while I was working as a bartender at a golf course. I didn't have the most rigorous schedule, so I woke up late. When I did, my mother told me that the Twin Towers had collapsed.

I told her that was impossible. Having worked as a temp a few months previously at the Sears Tower in Chicago, I understood that buildings this size weren't just buildings -- they were cities of people, each going to work everyday, most of them with jobs that were boring as hell. I couldn't grasp a city falling from the sky, much less two. But that's what happened.

I had a dentist appointment that day, to get a root canal, I believe. I called to see if it was canceled, and they asked me why. I told them about what had happened, and they said things would go ahead as planned. When I arrived at the dentist, a good three or four hours after this crap had gone down (I remember the Pentagon had been hit before I left home, and the Pennsylvania flight had crashed as well), no one seemed to act as if anything was different that day. In fact, when I sat down and the chair and told the dentist what had happened, he acted mildly bemused.

"Whoever it is," he said, "I hope they don't have anything against dentists."

That might have been the most poorly timed joke I have heard. I have not been back to that dentist since.

*As I said, I worked at a golf course that summer, as a bartender. You'd be amazed how many people still went golfing that day. The manager of the restaurant and I kept sneaking off to watch events on TV, but the customers were streaming in. By the time I started my shift, the attacks had started nearly 8 hours before. There were lots of dicks that day who wanted to keep their tee time, which was annoying. But what was more annoying was how many of them acted like nothing had happened that day.

*Osama's dead now, I hear. Bully for us. I'm as thrilled as anyone. But I'm not inclined to call it a Democratic victory. There's some things that, by politicizing, you show yourself to have no tact or appreciation for their significance. Let's just says it's an important event, give our neighbor a fist pump, and move on.

*I think Obama was right not to release the photos of Osama. I'm sure they would have been gruesome, and they wouldn't have proven anything to those who are not inclined to believe it.

Online gambling vs. the Grand Casino

The US Department of Justice has put an end to online gambling in the US.

Meanwhile, the US Department of Justice has yet to file an indictment against any of the players from the major financial institutions who caused the 2008 financial crisis. No one from Lehman Bros, Bear Stearns, JP Morgan, Goldman, AIG, or Countrywide has seen the inside of a criminal courtroom because of their actions. And while I don't have inside information on any of these firms, I find it difficult to fathom, given the hundreds of billions that were lost, that there wasn't a single person who made false representations at those firms to try to earn a little coin.

But at least we know people can't play online poker anymore. Way to go after the low-hanging fruit, DOJ! Very impressive.

Default: US vs. Ireland

I am a citizen of two countries: the United States and Ireland. For both countries, issues related to budgets have plopped themselves down at the front doorstep of the political debate. Ultimately, the debates have little in common. The Irish debate is largely involuntary, whereas the US has voluntarily chosen to make great political theater over a debate that, for now, only depends on itself. But the differences between the two are illustrative of when these debates are meaningful, how they evolve, and what each can expect from each. I'm not working today, so I will discuss each.

Sadly, I have no constructive solutions for either. Both countries will default, just as the sun will burn out one day. But, much as with the sun, I make no prediction of when it will happen. I just hope I'm somewhere else when these things go bad.

First, Ireland and the US got into trouble with their budgets in very different ways. In Ireland, it was really one bad decision that led the whole thing: Irish PM Brian Cowen's 2008 announcement that Ireland would guarantee all of its bank liabilities, regardless of size, seniority, and the nature of the creditor. This was dumb and foolish, but his critics fail to respect that there was a reason he did it. If he hadn't, Irish banks would have collapsed in weeks if not days, capital would have fled Ireland immediately, and the country would have sunk into depression that dwarfs what it is suffering now. The closest analogy to what it would have experienced would be what happened Iceland. The only problem is that Ireland is a part of a monetary union and Iceland was not. Ireland cannot let its currently go semi-worthless in an effort to quickly pay off debt. To Ireland's chagrin, its currency, the Euro, has grown stronger over the past few months. This makes Ireland's impossible-to-pay-off debt even more impossibler to pay off. Bummer.

The United States has not made one bad decision or even many bad decisions to get where it is today. Its entire existence is now, and has been for a long time, incompatible with a healthy fiscal equilibrium. But the root cause of this, its position as the only legitimate world super power, will prevent these problems from haunting it any time soon. This is because the United States still maintains a disproportionate share of net world demand (approximately one quarter). Its creditors (local treasury holders, Japan, China, international banks) would all suffer as much if not more than the US would if it were to stop funding American excess. So they keep funding it to keep their own economies humming.

Ireland has promised to fund bank liabilities so large that it would required to allocate all of its tax revenue for the next three to four years, at a minimum, to pull off the job. Fortunately for the Irish, firing every teacher, police officer, public servant, disbanding the armed services and reneging on every other government obligation from pensions to public services is not politically feasible. So Ireland is making small accommodations to its creditors and should be able to pay off the interest on its debt, at least for now. But this is akin to someone with 30,000 euro in annual income and 100,000 euro in debt making the minimum payments on its credit cards: It only delays the day of execution. Ireland will never pay off the principal. Default is the only option. The only question is when, the terms, and the time it will take to restore the faith of the bond markets after the fact. Ireland will get booted from the EU, return to the Punt, and eventually become healthy once again (though it may take time).

For the US, the question is more complicated, as the dollar is the world's reserve currency, and so any slight movement in the value of its debt (the dollar) has an enormous impact on the world economy. Default, which typically creates some of the biggest foreign currency movements that can happen, would be cataclysmic if it happened in the US.

Also, the US has the ability and the desire to devalue its currency. By devaluing its currency, the US can do what Ireland cannot do as of yet: make the debt easier to pay off in real terms. If the dollar is worth less in real terms (the dollar has lost 20% of its value relative to the Euro in the last 8 months, and as much 50% of its value relative to some commodities, such as silver.

For now, the choice about which items to cut from the federal budget are simply that: choices. Democrats prefer to cut less and Republicans prefer to cut slightly more, opting to trim the ever-shrinking discretionary spending budget, specifically those related to programs it finds ill-conceived or undesirable (health care and planned parenthood). But even if Republicans were to cut the entire discretionary spending budget, dumping everything from parks to federal funding of education to guarantees for home loans, the US still wouldn't be close to balancing the budget.

At the moment, neither party has proposed a significant reduction in defense spending. But, unfortunately, it's such a large percentage of the budget (approximately 60%, depending on how you define these things) that it's not possible to get there any other way. And not all the other stuff is optional. For example, approximately 5% of our budget goes to the judicial branch. Firing all judges and staff means no system of law, which means chaos? Think the SEC is bad now and that corporate types already can rob and steal with impunity? Cut their budget in half, and it will only get worse.

There's just not that much slack in the budget, and the only way to make the math work is to make the quality of every type of public service fall off a cliff. That means little to no unemployment insurance, drastically worse medicaid (and it's already pretty bad), worse conditions and equipment for the military, compensating our teachers even more poorly while making conditions much worse, to name just a few. These things are all, also, untenable politically.

These things will not happen by choice. They will only happen when our creditors refuse to fund our debt. And when that happens, cutting all branches of the government will be mandatory, rather than discretionary.

But this will probably not happen all at once. Japan's debt is more than twice as large as ours, as a percentage of GDP. And yet they still issue more debt.

History tells us that reality will set in sooner or later, just as the sun will some day die. Unlike the sun, however, I've got a feeling I'm going to have a front-row seat for this disaster. And it ain't gonna be pretty.

The Budget Debate, Illustrated

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Michael-Ramirez-040511-pie.png

Saudi Arabia again

After violently responding to protests in its own country, Saudi Arabia has now decided to violently suppress protests in neighboring Bahrain. Thankfully, the Obama administration has urged Saudi Arabia to exercise restraint.

Consider it exercised.

Scrot check

It's easy to wax philosophical about autocratic, repressive leaders in Libya and Tunisia. Freedom for the small potatoes, right? Sweet. I'm down. But let's see if we have the huevos to stand up to violent repression in Saudi Arabia.

Don't hold your breath.

$10 a gallon for gasoline, anyone?

Gladwell's Theory of Proficiency and a Question about Well-Roundedness

Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Outliers, presents the 10,000-hour rule, a theory that to become proficient at a given task, you must dedicate about 10,000 hours to said task. That equates to about four hours a day for ten years. Few of us spend that much time doing anything, with the possible exception of sleeping (and perhaps watching TV). And that's probably a big part of the reason why few of us develop our talents to greatness.

Gladwell's theory makes me wonder about my own lifestyle choices. I mean, I want to be great at stuff, but I also like to do a lot of stuff. I spend a lot of time writing, playing music and running, but not at a rate where I'll get to 10,000 hours any time soon. It makes you appreciate the difficulties in trying to be well rounded and trying to be really good at any one task.

It's certainly possible for some. For example, Nabokov wrote books in three languages, was one of the most accomplished translators of Russian literature, and was among the best lepidopterists of his time. He was great at all of these things, but it is doubtful that he spent 10,000 hours or more on each. Perhaps if the skills are interrelated, you don't need to spend all 10,000 hours to develop each individual skill. Time reading helps you become a better writer. Time listening to music could make you a better musician. Time translating Russian to English makes you a better writer in both languages.

And, of course, an otherworldly intellect doesn't hurt, either.

Creativity and Charlie Sheen

I don't find Charlie Sheen as fascinating as some, but one can't deny the phenomenon that is Charlie Sheen today. From what I've seen, his act strikes me as a cocky, sexual form of stream of consciousness. Kind of a less cerebral, more Bacchanalian version of Ulysses. It doesn't bother me and it doesn't pique my interest. But the broad-based viral obsession over his antics is real, and that's something that fascinates me.

I stumbled upon this Scott Adams commentary on Sheen, which is great. According to Adams, who has met the man, what makes Sheen noteworthy is his 1) extraordinary acting talent and 2) complete lack of filter. The former is debatable, but not of interest to me. It's the latter that strikes me as both true and worth analyzing. It's common to describe a person as having "no filter," but most people described as such are merely less tactful than most. Sheen, or at least when he's most interesting, appears to not know where his own thoughts are going. And to do that on broadcasts that are seen by millions is a rare.

Adams says (and I'm paraphrasing) that the great artist and the lunatic are the only people who have no filter. Manners are dull, and by avoiding them, an artist has an advantage in making their creativity attractive to others. By saying what they're thinking, artists act on what others only think, but don't do. This is part of the release of experiencing art that makes creativity attractive to others, and why Sheen is so enthralling.

Adams also says that for those who break ground artistically, many teeter on the verge of insanity. Or, at a minimum, that's the way they are perceived. Because insane people and those who live a filterless lifestyle -- let's just say there's overlap in their Venn Diagrams. The only difference, as I see it, is intent. Those who are insane have no choice but to live without filters. They are out of control. But the artist can go back and forth. Still, one can see how the lines could blur.

I'd like to propose two corollaries to the Scott Adams theory: First, it's not easy to be polite and creative at the same time. To avoid offending, you have to err on the side of the conventional. If you're conventional, it's hard to find an edge that will make you worth watching.

Second, one cannot function well in society without a filter. Sheen, an artist whose non-traditional lifestyle choices have been known for decades, lost his job when he let go of the shackles. Most professional workplace situations disallow any display of ad libbing, much less a complete lack of filter. That's why it's inconceivable for someone go from working at Microsoft for ten years and then start working as a professional comedian. Success at the one only comes with the death of the instincts that make you good at the other.

And that's all I have to say about that.

An open letter to New York Knicks fans

Perhaps you've heard, Carmelo Anthony is going to New York. On an intellectual level, I don't begrudge anyone's decision to go where they choose. On a personal level, he's been pissing in a lot of folks' Cheerios for months. There's a dozen people who are going to have to move their lives and their families to make him happy. That's pretty selfish, but few people reach his level of success without that kind of self obsession.

This letter is for anyone who is excited about seeing Carmelo Anthony play in New York. As a former Nuggets season ticket holder, I can assure you that he's fun to watch. Sometimes. He'll probably make the Knicks a better team from the first game he plays. He'll make the games more exciting. Initially.

But if you look closely, you'll see things that are hard to quantify with simple or advanced stats. You may not notice on TV whose man just went to the basket unguarded because his defender left him alone. But if you go to a lot of Carmelo Anthony's games, they are often his. And you may see an increased frequency of open dunks for opponents because somebody half-heartedly fought through a screen. And then there's all the times the home team has to play a man down because Carmelo Anthony is upset because he didn't get a call.

And then, a few seconds later, 'Melo will send home an alley oop or drain an unguardable shot, and you'll say, it's all worth it.

Repeat.

He's an amazing player - an epic talent - but as frustrating as any sports figure I've watched.

Good look, Knickerbockers.

Entrepreneurialism ad absurdum

I'm jealous of folks, including this guy, who create their own business model out of nothing. Chris Guillebeau loves to travel and hates traditional jobs, and so he's made himself the expert on non-conformity. Perhaps it's inaccurate to say that he's the expert on professional non-conformity. Maybe that's Johnny Rotten or Neil Hamburger, but he's made a business out of it. He's made a job out of being himself. And that sounds pretty great to me.

On his blog, he advocates others doing the same thing. And while I appreciate the sentiment, my sense is that entrepreneurialism is almost by definition something that cannot be generalized. The entrepreneur is akin to the pioneer who risks his life to stake out a homestead. Once an area has been settled and it's safe, others come and want to live in the same area, but those folks have to pay for their land. If you can make a business out of telling the late-comers how to homestead, good for you. But them folks missed the boat.

Chris Guillebeau writes books and speaks on how to start your own business. There's a lot more people out there, like me, who want to start their own business, but don't quite have the guts to give up the comforts of a stable job, than there are people who are willing to risk their livelihood and career on it, just as there are many more attempted entrepreneurs who attempt to start their own business than there are people who make a living off it. It's kind of an entrepreneurial pyramid scheme. Great work if you can get it, and those who pull it off are to be commended. But the homesteaders who sell the hope strike me as a bit disingenuous.

Iran's Perfect Timing

With all the excitement over democracy/anarchy spreading like margarine around the Middle East, I haven't heard many wankers wank about this just yet. Iran is deploying warships through the Suez Canal. Ho hum, right? Iran's always doing crazy shit.

True, but this is provocative, even by Iranian standards. It's a big, crooked, hairy Persian middle finger pointed at Israel. And Israel is a country known to be sensitive about middle fingers pointed in its direction. Particularly by countries that openly express hopes of turning their country into a sandlot.

So Israel might react. How much is hard to say. It's an escalation of tensions, for sure.

It makes me uneasy, but uneasy in a typical Iran sorta way. But the timing, well, that makes me scratch at my eyes a bit. A guy lights himself on fire in Tunisia, and a few weeks later, a dictator who'd been around since 1987, Ben Ali, gets run out of the country. Soon thereafter, protesters force another dictator, Hosni Mubarak, who'd been around since 1981, to give up his power. There's protests crackling in Algeria, Bahrain, Yemen, and Iran. All these autocratic countries start to get nervous. The "people" are upset, and they're starting to believe that this time, they might get what they want: a real chance at self determination. It's powerful stuff.

But if there's one thing the Muslim world hates more than their own corrupt and tyrannical governments, it's Israel. And if you're an Iranian dictator nervous about a coup d'etat, it's the perfect time to remind "the people" about their true enemy. The best way to make that happen is by provoking the beast.

Warships, anyone?

Henry Kissinger and the Grammys

Over the weekend, I read the book, the Trial of Henry Kissinger, by Christopher Hitchens. With documents released by the US in the last two decades, Hitchens convincingly argues that Kissinger should be tried for murder and crimes against humanity. Not just for his role in Vietnam War, but for his role in effectuating murder and destruction in countries against whom the United States never declared war.

The evidence is piled up and dropped right in front of you. There's not that much innuendo or argument. Hitchens plows through a bunch of evidence that Kissinger was involved in coups, murders, and assassinations in just about every continent except Antarctica. This is not speculation or circumstantial evidence. The materials are self evident. Yet Kissinger is an honored figure. He shows up on the news from time to time. He garners more than $25,000 for a public appearance.

And he won the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1973, for his role in negotiating the end of the Vietnam War. He's one of the vilest, power hungry men in American history; a man who instigated war and assassination whenever he saw fit, causing irreparable harm to the US's reputation at home and abroad. Picking at random you could have done a better job. Hell, picking at random in a maximum security prison you would have found better candidates. Yet he was giving the most prestigious award award you can get for bringing about peace.

I didn't watch the Grammys. I haven't watched them in over a decade. But I hold their decisions regarding what's good in music in as high esteem as I hold the Swedes' decision to pick Kissinger as the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Lady Gaga and Ms. Antebellum aren't really even musicians, but rather musical entertainers. And that's fine. They're good at it. Bands like the Avett Brothers and The Arcade Fire have real musical talent. It's swell that they've been rewarded. But their presence at the Grammys doesn't make the award shows connection to music any more legitimate or a reflection of musical quality. The decision of whom to reward is a political and strategic attempt to stay relevant.

The decision to award the Lady Gagas and the Henry Kissingers is a decision to make sure people are interested in you. If you're looking to find good music, you're better off finding critics you respect (may I suggest the Onion AV club) or talking to a friend who knows music. And if you want to know who's working to create peace, you're almost never going to find them among those who dedicate their lives to cultivating their own power.

Egyptian Democracy and American Naivete

The facile triumphant attitude of some Americans with these Egypt revolutionaries is starting to get on my nerves. For anyone with a connection to Egypt, of course this is life-changing news. Celebrate and enjoy. Hopefully it will lead to better things. Now is a moment for hope.

But for Americans, perhaps now is a time for introspection, rather than celebration. The United States has been giving money and weapons to Mubarak for decades. And now we're cheering his removal from office? Wha? That's like cheering for a baseball team when they're winning, and then turning around and cheering when they lose. He's been our sonofabitch for three decades. Not sure we get to act as bastions of democratic principles in his departure when we have been the ones responsible for ignoring them on his behalf since 1981.

What's more, the United States still supports anti-democratic dictatorships throughout the region, most notably in Saudi Arabia. We have supported moderate to right-wing, pro-American dictatorships over anti-American democratic states since the days of Vietnam, Allende in Chile, Bangladesh, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Cyprus.

And these countries don't forget. So when they do depose their anti-democratic tyrants, they tend not to have a pro-American point of view. That's not a prediction. Rather, a point of logic and probability.

Nonexistentiamalaise

Today was a difficult day at work, for no good reason. I'm not sad or depressed. I'm not particularly busy. No one has been mean or rude to me. No one's pestering me about anything. I'm disturbingly problem free right now.

I'm in a problem-free malaise. It's not a particularly existential malaise. It's a non-existential malaise. A nonexistimalaise, to coin a phrase.

I had some extra time at work, so I wanted to post something on this-here blog. But I couldn't think of anything to write. At first, I tried to write something about Carmelo Anthony, and the lack of parity in basketball compared to football, but it just seemed so damned dull I ended up deleting the damned thing. I mean, who gives a fuck about that? I don't. So why am I writing it. Good question. Delete.

And so I wrote this, instead.

One of the challenges I face in writing creatively now is that I don't want for anything in my life, except creativity. As a young hack, it was easy to rail against machines and parents and Universities. But now, I'm pretty much in charge of my own shit. What I do is a product of my own choices. Crap I elected to do freely, without coercion. It felt easier to get on a high horse and criticize, because so much of what was happening to me seemed out of my control.

But now the things I do, I control. That means it's harder to find a foil, or a contrast to my own experience that moves me and makes me want to rail.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Occasional occasions

I don't care about who wins the Super Bowl. I don't care about the football. I hope that both teams lose. I don't understand why Green Bay still has a professional sports team. The pomp and pageantry make a Thanksgiving Day Parade look understated and minimalist. The damned thing takes forever. It's a violent sport that gives its participants brain damage in droves. That may be a blessing in disguise, though, because, at least in my experience, the vast majority of football players are brutish, uninteresting people (with some wonderful exceptions).

I prefer to watch with the sound off during the game and the sound on during the commercials.

But, still, I'm looking forward to it. A lot.

It's some of the best people watching this country has to offer. Americans eat like hell. We're materialistic and easily tricked. Our consumer culture dominates everything we are and do. It's facile melodrama with no substance - something Americans have talent portraying. And it's on full display Sunday. In fluorescent lights.

For me, it's theater of the absurd. So I'm going to drink a lot on Sunday and have fun.

Go team!

Egypt

The opposite of an autocracy is not democracy. It's anarchy. And that strikes me as pretty much what's going down in Egypt. If what follows this mess is a peaceful election to a semi-secular transition government, then this will be a great victory for progress. But right now it's mob rule. And no matter how well intentioned in principle, the end product is an iffy thing at best. And if it turns into a theocracy along the lines of Iran (which is a very real possibility), then expect renewed ugliness throughout the region.

It's for them to decide. But it may be wise to reserve judgment on who the winners and losers in this will be.

Sports and Projection

Sports fandom can get very heated. From Lebron James's decision to play basketball in a place much nicer than where he was raised to Jay Cutler's (or the Bears) decision not to play on a torn MCL. Folks get real excited about something that, from the outside, has no tangible impact on their lives. It's fun people-watching to see the degree of invective and vitriol some folks dedicate toward grown men throwing balls around.

It's all about projection and narratives. Most folks live in a way that, absent Steinbeck's gift of prose, doesn't make for a very good story. We work jobs that don't interest us to pay for things we may or not need and to support the well being of those who may or may not appreciate what we're doing. Or we're living off our parents and going to graduate school so that we can express ourselves artistically, even though we don't have a firm grasp on what we believe or what we love. Apply your own scenario here.

But sports have narratives and myths that demand our attention. Lebron James was supposed to be the savior of Cleveland. He's a superhuman talent who would restore respect and national acclaim to a city with diminishing resources and pride. Only problem was, he decided he wanted to have fun in Miami hanging out with his friends and winning basketball games. So he left.

And the folks who believed in the myth felt jilted. Because Lebron James's decision didn't fit their narrative. And they got real angry at him. Burned his jersey and stuff. But the degree of vitriol wasn't commensurate with the crime. But when you bust a myth that's someone else has projected on you, and that myth is THEIR dream, the response can be ugly.

In Chicago and Green Bay, folks like to think of themselves as hardy, down-to-earth folk. The weather is horrific, and, by most measures, there are simply better places to live. And it's no accident that sports worship tends to be most intense in these kinds of places. The Packers and Bears are expressions of cities. Sportscasters invariably talk about the strength of their defenses and their physical toughness, without any evidence to support their claims. And no one questions them. Because these are the myths that are associated with the towns.

Chicagoans and Wisconsinites are tougher than most, because they endure crappy weather. By analogy, so are their football teams, despite no connection between the origins of the players and the locales themselves.

Jay Cutler got hurt yesterday. He tore his ACL. But the rest of him was shredded far worse by legions of followers-on who commented on his absence. He was labeled as soft and weak. It was angry and vicious. And totally disjointed from the truth.

It's stupid to play on a torn ligament; the doctors pulled him from the game. But the Bears didn't win. And we need something to explain the narrative of why the Bears' toughness lost out to the Packers' toughness. And the easiest way to do that is to find a scapegoat to help resolve the native. A weakling infiltrated the Bears' toughness and made them lose to the Packers' toughness.

In reality, the Packers were, despite their inferior record, probably a better football team. Their points differential was far superior to the Bears. But that doesn't fit with the narrative. And so eff Jay Cutler. His personality flaws are the reason the Bears lost.

Never mind that folks with severe personality flaws win all the time (See, i.e.., Roethlisberger, Ben). We need a myth to believe in. After all, that's the only reason we cared in the first place.

Has it been a week?

Oof. No good. I'm starting to slack with this blog.

Was busy at work this week, but this Amy Chua book caught my eye. Haven't read it, but it sounds like the idea is that she attributes the success of Asian students to the hyper-disciplined attitudes of Chinese parents. Kids don't play much and they don't make their own choices, but they work nonstop and then they succeed.

I was also raised by immigrant parents, and I think much of what she attributes to Chinese parents can properly be attributed to other immigrant groups. Many Americans come to expect success and prosperity as a given, but non-Americans who were raised with a lower standard of living know more acutely that it is not. Nothing is a given, and as many relatively educated Americans are discovering today, the standard of living that we've been accustomed to enjoying is not always easy to maintain. The rest of the world wants a piece of our lifestyle, and with jobs and information crossing borders with ease, it's easier for them to get it.

Now, as a lawyer who went to a reasonably high-falutin' law school, I've met plenty of "successful" people. Some of them are extraordinary, but perhaps a few more are dull and underdeveloped. When you push hard to develop one aspect of your personality, others atrophy. Amy Chua, for example, adamantly opposes her children playing any instrument besides piano or violin. Perhaps there's prestige associated with those instruments not attributable to the trombone. But frankly, Amy Chua's orchestra, no matter how technically proficient, would suck. Jimmy Hendrix didn't play the violin, and Bill Clinton played the saxophone. Having a little personality is not to be avoided at all costs.

Amy Chua's children will succeed. And yes, maybe American children focus too much on self-actualization, to the extent that we lack basic skills. And if we lack basic skills, our lifestyle will deteriorate. But if you deny yourself worldly pleasures in their entirety in order to succeed, you are foregoing a higher quality of life to attain the success you will eventually obtain. And when you get there, will you know what to do with it? Why be successful, if you can't enjoy the quality of life it provides?

Fuck it. I'm going to go play the banjo.

Introspection

This article would seem to be an indictment of what I'm doing with this blog: First draft essays.

"The second worst thing you can do on the internet is waste someone's time." Noble idea, but I suspect for most folks, that's the very reason they're on the internet.

Age and Creativity

Most creative people are more productive when they're young than when they're old.

There are exceptions. Picasso, Vonnegut, and David Byrne, for example. I suppose Dylan's been decent in old age (though it's hard to argue he's as productive as he was as a youngster). But there are more examples to the contrary. It appears true in music: Paul McCartney, the Who, the Kinks, Neil Young. The icons of the 60s and 70s aren't producing music in the

Literature is more debatable. Hemingway and Fitzgerald peaked young. Henry James and Frost got better as they got older.

My instinct is that the change is not physiological, but social. Namely, is it not akin to learning foreign languages - in that if you don't do it when you're young it's difficult to acquire in old age. But rather, by their 30s, most struggling artists have given up their desired craft for more stable pursuits. And successful artists lose the motivation that made them artists: social isolation and lack of recognition.

The vast majority of aspiring artists either sell out or you acquire acceptance. Neither is conducive to further creative self discovery.

On Confidence

I remember about ten years ago watching an interview with Kid Rock. Now, I loathe Kid Rock and his hyper produced derivative rap-metal meme, but this interview grabbed me. It must have, as I still remember it today.

Actually, I remember only one thing from the interview. The interviewer asked him, if you weren't a rock star, what would you have done for a living? He replied [and I'm paraphrasing], "I would have been a rock star. No matter what it took. I always knew I was going to make this happen."

That confidence is remarkable. And because Kid Rock did become a rock star, it's tempting to say that this confidence is what enabled him to accomplish his dream. He didn't hedge his bets. He didn't let day jobs distract him. He was utterly consumed with a dream. And he got there. It doesn't matter that Kid Rock isn't that talented, and perhaps it's because of his mediocrity that this confidence was important.

It's a bit circular though. You need singular dedication and obsessive self belief to make it as a rock star. Kid Rock had that. Therefore, Kid Rock made it.

Sadly, that dedication and self belief is a necessary but not sufficient condition to stardom. Because there are lots of folks with that belief, but few who attain the prize. There are legions of unknown wanna-be Kid Rockers wandering around, disheartened and confused, and despite singular dedication and obsessive self belief, they never made it.

Personally, I don't have that kind of confidence. I'm inclined to consider a fuller range of possibilities. I could become a rock star. Or, I could get hit by an asteroid. I could get a desk job. Or, I could become a struggling artist who spends my life trying to achieve artistic renown, but failing. I could be mediocre. I could be above average. Meh.

And so I have hedged my bets. I didn't pursue my dreams all the way. I was once a poor writer, but after a year or two of failing to make much of a living, I got more stable jobs. This allowed me to live a better life, but I never pursued the dream to the fullest. Writers (more or less) in my age bracket, such as Klosterman, Simmons, and Will Leitch, stuck with it, despite the odds. But so did thousands of others toiling in obscurity, living on a pittance, each day knowing that they did not achieve the dream either, despite giving up everything to get there.

It's hard to know whether you have that talent unless you dedicate yourself singularly to that pursuit. But there are many more who try than those who succeed.

I'm not unhappy with the choices I've made. But part of me wonders if I was a bit more like Kid Rock, what would have happened.

Mens Rea

The term "Mens Rea" is latin for guilty mind. Doesn't mean much to most people, but it's deeply etched into most law students' minds after the first year of law school. Deeply etched, because it is a component of every crime, as important as the facts of whether someone did or did not commit the crime itself. First you determine if there was a crime, then you determine to what extent the author of the crime had a "guilty mind"

Without doubt, there's lots of folks out there with guilty minds after a gunman opened fire on a town-hall meeting with Arizona Congresswoman Gabby Gifford yesterday. Rightfully so. But in the law, in our own thought processes, it's important to be careful to distinguish levels of guilt.

Many are ready to throw Sarah Palin and Jared Lee Loughner, suspected shooter, into the same bucket of responsibility. That's certainly not right. One used inflammatory political rhetoric and imagery to serve her political needs, the other alleged pulled out a semi-automatic weapon and fired on human beings at close range. The former is, at worst, negligent. The latter is, if true, almost certainly guilty of premeditated, intentional, first-degree murder.

The law likes to distinguish between levels of responsibility, and so should non-lawyers. I'm no fan of Sarah Palin. But in my opinion, she shares almost no responsibility for what happened. She was not negligent, because no reasonable person would have taken her target imagery to mean that Palin wanted to remove Gifford, or any other Democratic representative, with violent force.

But, starting yesterday, our state of awareness has changed. Now, as if we needed reminding, it was shown to us in painful 3-D that not everyone who is on the receiving end of these images is reasonable.

The inflammatory language of the tea party has always been reckless. But now we can't pretend otherwise. Now, anyone who uses inflammatory rhetoric involving "guns," "charges," "revolution," and "targets" must be held to a higher standard. They moment the words are uttered, the implicit responsibility for what comes next begins to accrue.

Pervasive fraud and the legal system

In a major ruling in the Massachusetts Supreme Court today, US Bank and Wells Fargo lost the “Ibanez case,” meaning that they don’t have standing to foreclose due to improper mortgage assignment. The ruling is likely to send shock waves through the entire judicial system, and seriously raise the stakes on foreclosure fraud. Bank stocks are plummeting at this hour.

For the uninitiated, standing is a legal concept that basically means, "you have the right to file a grievance." For example, I might think that what happened with BP in the Gulf of Mexico is atrocious, but I don't have "standing" to file a claim against BP, because I live in Colorado, and any potential harm that's been suffered by me is too attenuated to get me time in front of a judge. I might argue that my shrimp weren't as tasty for a few weeks, but that's dubious, despite what you've heard from Rush Limbaugh and non-lawyer sensationalist, the legal system isn't down with giving people the time of day who haven't suffered.

In this case, a couple of banks have tried to foreclose upon a homeowner who hadn't paid the mortgage in months. Simple enough, the only problem is, they didn't have the proper paperwork to show that they owned the home. Through the process of securitization, the paperwork had been lost. If you don't have proper title, you don't own a home. My neighbor might be late on her mortgage, but that doesn't mean I can initiate foreclose against her. If I want to do that, I have to show that I am the mortgagor with proper title in hand.

If you can't do that, guess what? You just gave someone a free house.

Our system is deeply flawed, but the one thing this country has done well over the years is to protect the rights of property holders. And I would argue that the accumulated wealth we've acquired over the past 234 years is a result of that respect for the rights of property holders. If the government takes your land to build a highway, it's gotta pay you for it. Even when we dumped Japanese-Americans in internment camps in World War II and took away their freedom, this country still let them keep their land and property.

According to one of the concurring judges:

I concur fully in the opinion of the court, and write separately only to underscore that what is surprising about these cases is not the statement of principles articulated by the court regarding title law and the law of foreclosure in Massachusetts, but rather the utter carelessness with which the plaintiff banks documented the titles to their assets. There is no dispute that the mortgagors of the properties in question had defaulted on their obligations, and that the mortgaged properties were subject to foreclosure. Before commencing such an action, however, the holder of an assigned mortgage needs to take care to ensure that his legal paperwork is in order. Although there was no apparent actual unfairness here to the mortgagors, that is not the point. Foreclosure is a powerful act with significant consequences, and Massachusetts law has always required that it proceed strictly in accord with the statutes that govern it. As the opinion of the court notes, such strict compliance is necessary because Massachusetts is both a title theory State and allows for extrajudicial foreclosure.

This matters. It matters to whomever gets the property next. It matters to the person who isn't late on his mortgage but still gets and eviction notice (an increasingly common practice lately). It matters that we respect property rights and demand that banks do the same. If we don't, there is nothing separating us from a medieval culture where the powerful could take from the poor anything they wanted at any time, without recompense. That may sound a bit dramatic, but concrete property rights are more firmly rooted in our culture than any abstract notion of freedom. If we lose them, there ain't much lef.

The executive and legislative branches have completely failed to punish the banks for their pernicious roles in this housing quagmire. Here's to hoping that some judges with backbone will have the courage to act responsibly.

Booze

I haven't had a drink in six whopping days. That's a long time by my standards. Coming into the new year, I was averaging around 4 or 5 drinks a day, 4 or 5 days a week since September. That's near the boundaries of where medical health professionals might label you an "alcoholic."

I don't miss it. Not at all. I feel great. It's easier to get up in the morning. I think more clearly. My runs are going well. Lord knows it makes life cheaper.

Which makes me wonder, how come I was drinking so much before?

The short answer is habit. But the source of the habit is cultural and social. Overeating and overdrinking are more than heavily socialized aspects of yuppie culture. For many of us, they are yuppie culture. It's not part of what we do. It is what we do.

We self-identify with food and booze today in much the same way we self-identified with bands when in high school. Oh, you like Radiohead? I like Mr. Bungle. They're uniquer. Ergo, I'm cooler. Meh.

Just ate spaghetti squash with shittake mushrooms, shrimp, and truffle oil. Yum! I'm so special! Anyone who's spent time on facebook knows the way 20 or 30-somethings triumphantly boast about the meals they prepare and consume as if to show culture and sophistication. Though it usually comes off as sophomoric and petty, it's indicative of how we obsess publicly about what we eat and drink.

Adorned and tasty though they might be, food and booze are never accomplishments. With increasing frequency in my life, they've started to get in the way of them.

Window Dressing

I’ve got an amazing view from my office. On days like today, when there’s almost no pollution, I can see Mt. Evans and Mt. Massive, about 80 miles from my window, as if they were only a few blocks down the road. I can’t spend my whole day looking at them, because I have a job, but some of my best moments come when I sip a cup of tea, take a deep breath, and just stare out my window.

If you always focus on why you’re not lucky, you’ll never appreciate why you are.

I am the Walrus

Who was it that said perfect was the enemy of the good? Or that good was the enemy of great? Was it Lenin? Lennon? Elvis? I forget. I could google it, but, I'm tired. Whatever.

I've been kicking with this blog thing for nearly a month, and while I haven't provided Daily Effin' Content, I've come pretty close. That's not bad for a semi-busy lawyer with a questionable work ethic. Yet I haven't made any effort to promote it yet. There are two reasons for this: 1) I don't think what I've been writing has been all that earth shattering, and 2) I'm waiting for a time when I write a humswinger of a blog entry before I start telling people about it.

Both of these are character flaws, I suppose. I could die before I write a humswinger, and no one would even know this blog existed. Why not just put it out there, man?

There's an awful sandwich-load to be said for youthful naivete, when you aren't comparing yourself to the Klostermans and the Vonneguts of the world, but rather, you just put your retarded self out there are don't give a fuck what anyone else thinks. Because that person gets their crap out there and gets feedback. And that feedback makes that person better.

Meh.

Obamanomics

Tyler Cowen posted an article about his initial impressions of Obama's economic policies, written when Obama was still a candidate for President.

My view of Obama’s economics is a simple and straightforward one and it is consistent with his public pronouncements. I view him as an economic pragmatist who is willing to borrow good ideas from many sources. He stands further to the left than do most Americans (myself included) but he has lined up the very best economic talent to advise him.

KRM here: I agree that Obama is a pragmatist, but I disagree with his assessment that he's surrounded himself with the best talent to advise him. Tim Geithner is undeniably intelligent and charismatic, but I wouldn't classify him as the best talent available. Robert Schiller would have been better. He predicted the crisis, rather than participated in its creation, as Geithner did. Similarly, Ben Bernanke is extraordinary, but he was fatuous in the face of all signs that a housing crisis was blowing up around him. Similarly, Austan Goolsbee, current head of economic advisers, has more talent and personality than you'd ever need. But he was an apologist for the garbage loans that lead to the crisis. None of these men have been held accountable, which means that they're unlikely to change their practices.

Ultimately, the question is how do you pick the best talent. Obama chose conventionally. Perhaps pragmatically. He chose a lukewarm path and a continualist regime. It's no surprise that we should get a lukewarm recovery spurred on by continuing the same risky practices that got us into this mess (extend credit, repackage losses, change the balance sheet location of losses, reposition private losses onto public balance sheet).

Another compelling point by Cowen:

Obama is also famously detached and it seems he never loses his cool. He does not drink up ideology like a drug but instead is focused on creating his own personal success. That implies a very strong ego but also again a economic and also a foreign policy pragmatism, in the good sense. If Obama is elected, I expect the major economic storyline to be Obama pushing policies in the national interest (as he perceives it) and Congress pushing back with earmarked expenditures and special privileges for interest groups.

KRM here: I think Cowen got this one exactly right. Obama's administration has been one of him presenting new policy ideas and getting blasted for it. Obama has spent a lifetime of energy cultivating a record and image of near perfection. He wasn't willing to go out and put himself on the line and take any one risk that was going to endanger that. It's hard to blame him for that, I suppose. But I can't say that I really feel inclined to praise him for it, either.

Resources

Greg Mankiw, a Harvard economics professor, made reference to this piece by John Tierney on his blog. I recommend it highly. For anyone under the age of 40, I believe it discusses the most important question we'll deal with in our lifetimes, which is, "are there natural limits to growth?"

Economics is the field of perpetual growth. When an economy is healthy, economic growth exceeds inflation, and wealth and prosperity improve. When economic growth is below inflation, or if inflation is below zero, most economists would say that the economy is unhealthy, and economists with the power to impact such things, such as the heads of Central Banks, including the Federal Reserve's Ben Bernanke, tinker with the money supply to try to right the ship and make growth happen again. As cynical as people are towards Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve, high-level economics is an ingenious, nuanced field, and ever-more-complicated the more you learn.

The big question for me, a largely ignorant outsider, is how well their models fit reality, and whether their basic assumptions are correct. All models are imperfect representations of reality, and they would be the first to admit that. But at the heart of their models of growth, there is a question of whether there are limits to growth.

I believe that there are, though I don't think they are necessarily what Peak Oil theorists would have us believe (see link above). I think the limits to growth are a function of the weaknesses of human nature and our human social organizations. To wit, there are wars and there are conflicts. Civilizations rise and fall. Because we are human, what we do is inherently unstable. And the more complicated and interdependent we are, the more unstable we become.

I think oil futures will never cost $300 a barrel in real terms, because by the futures markets will become totally unhinged long before they do.

Right now, we are more interconnected than ever. An economic glitch in Greece or N. Korea negatively impacts access to credit in Topeka and Namibia. And our society is so utterly dependent on credit, that, as we found out two years ago, when we lose it, everything starts to spiral.

So as long as the spigots of credit continue to run loose, we should have growth. But the moment we lose it, or if it even starts to decline in size, we can expect a decline in worldwide standards of living. Perhaps not permanently, but for an extended period of time.