56 Comments

1. S:

The difficulty of the cumbya foster development and prosperity ignores the Malthusian reality that is taking hold. Unleashing human potential does not inure to everyone as history shows. Osama had it right when he said pick the strong dog. Heretofore (recent history) the US has held that portfolio. But the world is changing. US equity indices have been flat for a decade and US competitiveness has been eroded (despite what they tell you). Can it come back, sure. Will it reach prior heights, no. Why? The 2.6B others. Even marginal increases in the rest of the world will come at the expense of the US. That is the cold hard truth and one that we should begin to acclimatize ourselves to. Not that this means terrible things, merely look at the UK. Still they live well. But the idea of trying to pawn off fighters they can’t afford is perhaps a foretelling of the future. The idea that it can never happen here is misplaced. If it took being hit over the head with a hammer for people to accept that their house is 60% overvalued, imagine what it will take for American’s to grapple with a dilution of the America centric century. Handing out passports seems like an overly simplistic formulation, if not red herring.

Aug 20, 2008 - 9:45 am 2. Nortius Maximus:

S, I think the “handing out passports” thing was intended ironically with respect to the likely behavior shift from “God damn the USA” to “Gangway, here I come!” in the protestors, if the offer were made. I doubt it was a serious proposal.

Aug 20, 2008 - 9:53 am 3. bvjnsebiuy3w9:

If George really had Obama’s genetic characteristics he would be a leader of people not a recluse. The fact that he is a recluse is telling. I’m not making a moral judgement, but the if someone with outstanding personal skills finds himself in George’s situation he will work with what he has and rise to the height his environment will allow him to.

There is nothing wrong with being a recluse, but you have to consider that there are some people who live in the US and choose to live like a recluse too.

I agree with your point that the US provides more opportunities, but I think the logic by which you arrive at it is not exactly correct.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:17 am 4. bvjnsebiuy3w9:

Actually, I ought to disclose that I have a lot more respect for a recluse living anywhere Africa or the US than a senator in the US.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:22 am 5. Captain Ramen:

Sorry S but your malthusian scenario only works when there is a finite amount of resources. And how much raw material is there in the Milky Way? Or in our own asteroid belt? I would be willing to be that there is enough iron and aluminum in the belt to provide every human being on earth with at least 10 cars.

I can see it now… 15,000 years ago Grogg the Caveman freaks out because there’s not enough room in his cave for his 4th kid. But then he leaves the cave…

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:34 am 6. Mike Sylwester:

This is why Francis Fukuyama’s book “The End of History” is correct. The USA has become the Earth’s undisputed model for political and economic progress. Unless you believe in a supernatural apocalypse that will terminate world history, it is obvious that the goal of any society’s political striving should be liberal democracy. (Here the word “liberal” means the toleration of free communication of thought.)

This does not mean that all conflicts or detours have disappeared. It means that liberal democracy is the ultimate goal for all people who understand that history develops only through normal human activities and will not be terminated by a supernatural apocalypse.

The USA and other modern societies provide a proven model for success, but this understanding can also be observed and derived through common sense. Reasonable and peaceful discussion, debate and voting about problems in a proper manner by all affected persons leads to better decisions for a society in the long run than other decision-making methods based on aristocracies or elites acting arbitrarily and secretly.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:37 am 7. DanM:

bvjns#$%-whatever,

Methinks you assume that Wretchard is speaking of ones innate abilities. I think he was speaking of ones environment and the opportunities that each provide.

Maybe a bit of a tangent on why hasn’t Obama taken his luck and passed it along to his African sibling? – as most of true African tribal families do.

My point here is that Obama is NOT African, he’s a product of American culture, opportunity (with the ability to “work with what he has” – as you put it) and structure. His step-brother has none of this “structure” to aid him. It does NOT, in my opinion, make him lower in “genetic characteristics” than his lucky step-brother.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:44 am 8. Zim:

If I lived in an environment where I had to fist fight to stay alive and had seen friends murdered I would be a recluse as well. Being a recluse in his situation is a point of survival, not personality.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:52 am 9. Konyok:

Interesting.
Senator Obama is presented as a “new face” for America that better reflects the world’s diversity. We are told that the various *streets* will feel better about us and cease their angry demonstrations.
This story about his half brother reveals that Obama is in violation of, and is probably unaware of the prime directive in the third world: take care of your family first!
Much of the corruption that so dismays Americans in many of these countries is actually a manifestation of good manners and breeding. When one member of the family achieves success, it is expected that he extend his influence to assist his siblings and cousins. This nepotism is the mark of a conscientious son, not a venal moral failing. (His time spent in Indonesia should have made him aware of this.)
That Obama doesn’t know this, that he hasn’t thought to make provision for his half brother is the first tangible sign of just what a foreign policy disaster an Obama presidency would be. He presents his African face to the third world, says “I am one of you!” and the demonstrates the stereotypical American selfishness by neglecting his family. This story will do much to reinforce bad feelings about America and Americans.
The muslim identity issue runs parallel. We ecumenical Americans are intrinsically pluralistic, the overwhelming majority of us sincerely believe that faith is an question of individual conscience. We have not dealt with the great possiblity that despite his membership at Rev. Wright’s church, there is, as of yet, an unknown percentage of muslims that consider his birth to a muslim father to obligate him to be a muslim. The important thing is not how Obama views himself, but how his is viewed by those communities. At some point it could become a very serious issue in the muslim world that the US is ruled by an apostate.

So, two points of intersection, collision, between individualistic American ideas and communal attitudes of the third world.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:58 am 10. Konyok:

I dare say that it is an existential dilemma for Barack Obama.

He offers us *hope* of a change to a kinder, more cooperative moral vision, but, he is actually an American “rugged individualist” at heart.

Aug 20, 2008 - 11:01 am 11. DanM:

bvjns#$%!-whatever,

“Actually, I ought to disclose that I have a lot more respect for a recluse living anywhere Africa or the US than a senator in the US.”

I posted my response to your comment prior to reading your following comment. But, it still applies…

I understand your “bootstrap” thought, and agree with it, all things being equal. Things aren’t equal in this circumstance…

Aug 20, 2008 - 11:04 am 12. Staring In Disbelief:

Why do people like “S” still see the world as a zero sum game? As Capt Ramen has pointed out, available raw material is only one (and perhaps the least important) measure indicating limitless availability. The “Asian Tigers” are all “Resource Rodents” but “Culture Tigers”. The same goes for the US. The only time I begin to glumly think like “S” and his “best days are behind us” crap is when I contemplate what the America-hating left is doing to our amazing culture, sapping its strength with there unremitting BS criticism, lies and hatred. Wretchard’s story is SPOT ON – when people who KNOW BETTER are given a REAL CHOICE they choose Uncle Sugar, baby, ’cause they may be poor but they ain’t stupid.

Aug 20, 2008 - 11:05 am 13. DanM:

Staring In Disbelief,

Zero sum games fit the model. Any deviation from that blows the model’s “perfection”. It’s the common downfall of statistics modeling. You get so wrapped up in the perfection of the model, you gather data that supports it.

Aug 20, 2008 - 11:10 am 14. mark_b:

Mike Sylwester:

The USA and other modern societies provide a proven model for success, but this understanding can also be observed and derived through common sense. Reasonable and peaceful discussion, debate and voting about problems in a proper manner by all affected persons leads to better decisions for a society in the long run than other decision-making methods based on aristocracies or elites acting arbitrarily and secretly.

———————————————————————–
Was Putin’s decision to invade Georgia wrong? An elite acting arbitrarily and secretly?

Aug 20, 2008 - 11:17 am 15. DanM:

Sorry to get WAY off topic, but couldn’t resist posting this..

Another Karl Rove plot

They’re still stuck on stupid…

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:22 pm 16. trangbang68:

While economic prosperity may not be a zero sum game; the decimation of American manufacturing is certainly worrisome. There are large swaths of the country that are in real malaise (the rust belt, the rural South where the textile industries have fled abroad). I get vexed by those who compare the death of American industry to the obsolescence of the buggy whips.
America still has vast potential and a can do spirit but stagnation, personal debt and the collapse of much family structures do present some real challenges.

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:24 pm 17. programmer:

In this way and that I tried to save the old pail
Since the bamboo strip was weakening and about to break
Until at last the bottom fell out.
No more water in the pail!
No more moon in the water!

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:36 pm 18. mark_b:

DanM:

Maybe a bit of a tangent on why hasn’t Obama taken his luck and passed it along to his African sibling? – as most of true African tribal families do.

——————————-

That was my exact thought. How can I sponsor this guy to get him into the US?

I wonder how Obama’s church Feels?

http://www.tucc.org/black_value_system.html

First, the source of the value system:

“Trinity United Church of Christ adopted the Black Value System, written by the Manford Byrd Recognition Committee, chaired by the late Vallmer Jordan in 1981.

Dr. Manford Byrd, our brother in Christ, withstood the ravage of being denied his earned ascension to the number one position in the Chicago School System. His dedication to the pursuit of excellence, despite systematic denials, has inspired the congregation of Trinity United Church of Christ. Prayerfully, we have called upon the wisdom of all past generations of suffering Blacks for guidance in fashioning an instrument of Black self-determination, the Black Value System.”

Now on to the ethics:

“These Black Ethics must be taught and exemplified in homes, churches, nurseries and schools, wherever Blacks are gathered. They consist of the following concepts:”

…

” 3 # Commitment to the Black Family. The Black family circle must generate strength, stability and love, despite the uncertainty of externals, because these characteristics are required if the developing person is to withstand warping by our racist competitive society.

Those Blacks who are blessed with membership in a strong family unit must reach out and expand that blessing to the less fortunate.”

…
Summary:

Can we use this to say Obama is a hypocrite?

Christians adhere to a biblical standard.
Christians, being sinners cannot maintain this standard.
Christians are hypocrites.

The Christian apologetic freely admits this, and states, “There was only one perfect man, and look what they did to him!”

You cannot use sin as a basis for calling into question one’s Christianity.

However, one can be judged by one’s actions. And the fact that it was part of the Church’s doctrine means that he was exposed to it. And considering that Dr. Manford Byrd was likely someone whose work Obama would have been interested in, it is likely that he was familiar with this doctrine.

He knew he had a poor brother,and he knew of his responsibility towards him.

We don’t know why he did not contact his brother then, or now. I would not view him as a liability, but apparently Obama does. Why is he a liability?

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:40 pm 19. Eggplant:

I think our current civilization is in trouble due to resource depletion and over-population. IMHO, the maximum population for our planet based upon fully renewable resources is not less than 0.5 billion and not greater than 2 billion. We’re currently at 6.6 billion and the number is growing.

The average world GDP – per capita (2006 est) is $10,200. Based on CIA “World Factbook”, the average world GDP – per capita is between Costa Rica and South Africa. A person with money can live comfortably in Costa Rica (not a bad place to retire to) but the standard of living there is far below that of the United States ($ 45,800) or Western Europe. I’ve traveled to South Africa many times (married to a South African) and know that it’s apparent wealth is an illusion. Most of South Africa’s populaton lives in shanty towns and endures grinding poverty.

If the world’s wealth were evenly distributed then the United States’ standard of living would be at least a fourth of what it currently is (misapplied globalization is dangerous). However this is only part of the story. Wealth generates more wealth. Much of America’s wealth is tied up in economic infrastructure, e.g. wheat fields, forests, factories, universities, etc. If our standard of living was knocked down to Costa Rica’s then most of our economic infrastructure would have gone away.

IMHO, the way to achieving equitable wealth in the world is through rational maintence of existing economic engines (this means temporary acceptance of present day economic inequity), developing better technology (encourage worldwide literacy and education), reducing the world’s population through birth control and seeking extraterrestrial resources for future growth (Space Exploration).

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:54 pm 20. newtland:

OT: can anyone direct me to a thorough and unbiased assessment of what the hell T. Boone Pickens is proposing?

Thanks in advance.

Aug 20, 2008 - 12:55 pm 21. Eggplant:

mark_b said:

“We don’t know why he did not contact his brother then, or now. I would not view him as a liability, but apparently Obama does. Why is he a liability?”

Since B. Hussein views his middle name as a liability, why should he not view his brother as a liability?

What an embarrassment for the United States that this guy has a real chance at being elected President! Proof positive that something is broken.

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:00 pm 22. S:

America hater? Pathetic.

Total (+Contintgent) liabilities in the $70-90 Trillion range. GDP 14T (and inflated). Annual tax revenue $2.5T going to $3.5T (with no tax hikes) by 2013. Annual outlays: $2.9T going to $3.5T in 2013. So just on the increasing debt load alone, every 1% rate increase cost the US government $100B (essentially little less than an offset to Iraq war cost). So on budget, a move in the yield curve more than offsets any cuts from Iraq. Any wonder they are front loading the debt issuance on the yield curve? During GD I tax revenue fell ~40% peak to trough (’31-33). Assume 10-20% and you get another $500M in debt, assuming no cuts.

“Captain Ramon” – if we had a few more people who spent a little more time on introspection than wallowing in what was, the US would be in a vastly different state (arguably more competitive, better positioned and less indebted). As for malthusian nonsense about caves, a cute rhetorical tactic, well time will tell I suppose. Maybe that is the reason for the neo moonshot banter. Are there limitless resources, no. if there were then the green movement wwould have long since died. The race for those resources is no longer got mad in America on it. China is not Russia. India is not USSR. The USSR never called the US up and told them to back Agency debt, as much as I can remember.

Are these up and comers disfunctional? Yes. But technological diffusion ensures that monoploy rents are ending. Ask yourself, in a world without leverage how does the US grow?

The US is an amazing place, it has just lost its soul. The argument is about how best to adapt the model to meet the future. Moonshots like resources on mars and time travel are best left to Darpa and their brethren around the world. Denial, Anger, Barganing, Depression,
and Acceptance…

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:10 pm 23. Alexis:

MS:

If the social history of the West has ended, what were the September 11 attacks, a blast from the past?

At present, the fashionable social model to be emulated is liberal democracy, but that is only because western military and financial might are superior. In the 1930’s, many “intellectuals” were undecided whether fascism or international socialism would rule the world; it was obvious to them that liberal democracy’s days were numbered. If the United States is truly the undisputed model for political and economic progress, there are those from the Middle East who have not noticed. Worse than that, Dubai is riding on a bubble as it seeks to supplant New York as the world’s financial hub.

Many people seek to emulate the American model of politics, but not everybody does. Liberal democracy has become more fashionable, but that hardly means our ways have triumphed. Royalism and theocracy have not gone away, certainly not with the wave of a Beltway philosopher’s hand.

Liberal democracy has its advantages. Still, let’s not indulge in the solipsistic narcissism of assuming that everybody else wants to be like us. They don’t and they won’t. Moreover, if the appeal of liberal democracy is pinned upon the sugar water of material prosperity, those who embrace our way of life because they like the money will leave once the money is gone. Was the establishment of the Weimar Republic truly a triumph for American ideals of freedom? Not really. There must be something about liberty in and of itself that people like, for the appeal of liberal democracy must endure even in the face of Nazi soup kitchens, Taliban schools, and Hamas hospitals.

Even within the philosophies of liberal democracy itself, there are differences. Isn’t it interesting how Ambassador Bremer imposed the Israeli/Italian model of democracy with its proportional representation onto Iraq, not American federal republicanism? And now, Iraqi democracy has effectively imported the flaws of the Israeli/Italian system. By the standards of western Europe, America’s federal system with its electoral college, activist judiciary, and first-past-the-post gerrymandering comes across as ancient. Meanwhile, many aspects of European society come across as antiquated on this side of the Atlantic. For example, German public schools are segregated according to religious confession.

When America is perceived with awe, I get worried. This is because the more America gets worshipped by foreigners, the more foreigners dehumanize Americans – and eventually demonize us. America is danger of getting trapped into an impossible ideal that can never be lived up to, where American actions can never measure up, and where liberal democracy must always come up short of expectation. America is not God, never mind how anti-American bigots seem to think it is. The problem with making the mistake of thinking that the world revolves around America is that it encourages every hater in the world to turn America into an object of their hatred and Americans into their victims.

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:34 pm 24. Zim:

“The US is an amazing place, it has just lost its soul.”

What the hell are you talking about? Do you mean “lost its soul” being her manufacturing base or in some mopey, dark eye shadow, listening to the Cure sense?

Either way, yeah its not good to have the debt the US carries, and maybe moving from a manufacturing based economy into a services based will not turn out well for the US. But “lost its soul” is really just beyond hyperbole.

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:34 pm 25. dla:

The US is still at the peak. It may be sliding, but it will take a long, long time to get down to the level of Kenya.

And that is the reason the “have nots” of the world (most of them are Muslim by the way), dream of the opportunity in the US.

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:49 pm 26. Mike Sylwester:

mark_b:
“Was Putin’s decision to invade Georgia wrong? An elite acting arbitrarily and secretly?”
———

The Russian military intervention in Georgia has gone too far, and so the Russian government will be burdened with some consequences internationally and domestically. Wretchard and many commentators here have pointed out many such consequences. I will add the thought that excesses gradually will cause increased criticism among Russian’s own citizens, who have access to information and opinions from abroad.

Russia’s population has accepted an authoritarian leadership because Russia has suffered huge problems transitioning from communism and dictatorship to capitalism and democracy. The brand-new capitalist and democratic institutions were overwhelmed by demagogues, manipulators, fraudsters and gangsters.

We here might disapprove of many of Putin’s actions, but the Russians approve him strongly, because they perceive that he has accomplished a course correction that was necessary. There still are huge problems, but the situation and tendencies are much better than they were under Yeltsyn.

We might criticize the Putin administration for being secretive, brutal and unlawful, but keep in mind the rampant criminality that his administration has had to deal with.

The Russians admire the USA. They admire our history, our government, our economy, our culture. They want peace, friendship and cooperation with the USA.

The Russians will listen to, consider and respond to our criticisms about their conduct in Georgia. People on all sides should calm down and move back toward cooperation. We all can be critical of each other but try to tone down the hostility.

Aug 20, 2008 - 1:55 pm 27. Konyok:

Alexis,

I appreciate your point that there is nothing inevitable about neo liberal democracy. (This is the wellspring of the Anglosphere meme ….)

Even more, I appreciate your concern about America worship dialectically becoming America hatred. On a micro level, that’s what I was trying to say about Obama.

Aug 20, 2008 - 2:02 pm 28. NahnCee:

“…the way to achieving equitable wealth in the world …”

Why on earth do we want to do anything as daft as to “achieve equitable wealth”? Isn’t that the same as communisim which has never, ever, worked?

And isn’t Darwinism predicated upon the stronger/smarter/more flexible winning and/or surviving, which has got to mean that Mother Nature isn’t a fan of “achieving equitable wealth” either.

I think it would be cool to scoop Obama’s brother up and bring him to America but I’ll bet that his Kenyan nurture will overcome whatever genetic nature Obama’s DNA might have thrown into the mix, and he’d end up behind bars just like all the other immigrants do who depend upon their fists.

But it’d be fun to watch Obama squirm in the meantime.

Aug 20, 2008 - 2:29 pm 29. Nomenklatura:

I can see some commenters above are having trouble getting their mind around it, but what Richard says in his post is literally true.

Life is much simpler for affluent westerners if they buy into the ‘America is evil’ riff, because in so doing they can place themselves permanently on the superior side in terms of morality, and still do what they really want, i.e. hang out with their friends and engage in very part-time ‘activism’ (the two usually amount to the same thing).

In the Third World anti-Americanism is about something different. The tiny elites who run those countries have to come up with a justification for why they should be permanently in charge, and for why at the same time their countries are continually such a mess. If you think about it, there aren’t many options available to fill this need. Anti-Americanism is the global standby means of propping up bungling domestic elites simply because it’s convenient.

Aug 20, 2008 - 2:33 pm 30. wretchard:

The main argument for liberal democracy is that it is best at unleashing new and workable ideas. Hence, it is argued that there is a one to one correspondence between liberty and prosperity. But suppose an authoritarian society simply adopted the most commercially successful ideas and processes of a liberal society. Then the one to one correspondence would not necessarily hold. After all, there is an apparent one to one correspondence between hard work and prosperity too, but robbers have found a way around it. You work, we steal. Why not you invent, we copy? But this is only possible in a globalized world. Where barriers to information existed, or were even self-imposed (as in the old Soviet Union) the correspondence between liberty and prosperity were probably more pronounced.

It’s interesting to consider how domestic radicals can accept, with perfect naturalness, the income from their trust funds or the profits of the businesses they own, as their right while hating the system that makes their wealth possible. That can only happen when there is no necessary correspondence between an embrace of the Enlightenment ideal and benefiting from that Ideal. I guess it is possible to eat bacon without liking the pig.

Aug 20, 2008 - 2:48 pm 31. Aether:

trangbang68:

“While economic prosperity may not be a zero sum game; the decimation of American manufacturing is certainly worrisome.”

In what way has American manufacturing decimated ? are you referring to the same way that American agriculture has been decimated ?

Perhaps you’re conflating a decline in manufacturing employment with a decline in output or productivity …

(http://www.industryweek.com/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=14159)

key passage’s:

“Total employment figures only tell part of the story, though. The percentage of U.S. workers employed in manufacturing has dropped from 16.5% in 1987 to 10.8% today. Even so, as the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) points out, when you consider that manufacturing accounts for $1.5 trillion in gross domestic product (GDP), if U.S. manufacturing was a country, it would be the eighth largest economy in the world. In fact, three manufacturing sectors — food and beverage, computers and high-tech, and transportation/motor vehicles — account for roughly 30% of the total manufacturing GDP.

The most significant counterbalance to the drop in total employment has been the dramatic rise in productivity. Indeed, during the recession years, productivity (as measured by output per hour) rose by 7.0% in 2002 and 6.2% in 2003. According to NAM, over the past two decades, manufacturing productivity has grown by 94%, considerably faster than the rest of the U.S. business sector, where productivity grew by 38% over the same period.”

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:02 pm 32. Lifeofthemind:

Wretchard,
Every stereotype and cliche is true, to a point.
Jewish neighborhoods support chinese resaurants. Some years ago there were a spate of reports that Audi cars were experiencing a phenomena known as “unintended acceleration” in which the car would lurch into gear and hit the owner standing in front of it. The largest number of these accidents happened in Skokie Illinois. That community also had the greatest concentration of Holocaust survivors per capita in America. They convinced themselves somehow that buying an Audi was not the same as buying a Volkswagen. The fantasy persisted until the Director of Audi escaped from wherever his PR staff were hiding him and found a microphone. “Vee are undevahring to teach our customrz zee diffahrentz betveen der brahk und dur aczelahrator” Audi disappeared from America for over 10 years. Now their children and grandchildren have convinced themselves that the world is just like the TV shows they write or their college campuses, only with better food and plumbing.

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:06 pm 33. Konyok:

The other dichotomy that the American New Left has had to contend with is this same individual vs communal problem
When they rebranded themselves a la Ayers and Dohrn in the 1960’s, the circle that they sought to square was how to force the Marxist square into the individualistic American circle. How to avoid being dour Comintern agents and fire up revolutionary zeal with a youthful libertarian “do your own thing” self image? The best solution has been self deception.
On the left, the “speak truth to power” romance still feeds on the impressionistic superstition that conservatives are *mean* authoritarians trying to impose a grim theology on free thinkers (them). As long as that other is in the front of the mind, it isn’t necessary to think about the implications of imposed equality. Defeating the meanies is the proximal goal, everything else will take care of itself. Pay no attention to the atrocities on your TV, they are only a neocon provocation …

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:14 pm 34. cedarford:

Captain Ramen:
Sorry S but your malthusian scenario only works when there is a finite amount of resources. And how much raw material is there in the Milky Way? Or in our own asteroid belt? I would be willing to be that there is enough iron and aluminum in the belt to provide every human being on earth with at least 10 cars.

Escapist science fiction fantasy.

The human population is running up against hard stops of energy, arable lands, potable water for consumption & agricultural use, fossil fuel derived fertilizers, and scarcity of certain strategic minerals. Additionally, we have hard stops appearing in forest loss, wild lands we can claim without causing another huma-driven mass extinction event, and have clearly exceeded limits on what a Pope in the 60s stupidly called “the unlimited food harvest of the oceans that allows God to have as many children born as possible and all can be easily well-fed on the ocean’s bounty.”

Sci-Fi fantasy ignores other stars and the “boundless resources of the Milky Way” are unreachable, and getting stuff out of other solar system gravity wells or the money and energy needed for travelling to and from, then defeating the energy of angular momentum to get objects with low gravity wells potential energy needing to be cancelled(asteroids), then the energy needed to slow down and land stuff on Earth – makes the cost of getting an asteroid of solid gold (or #2 diesel fuel) back here a massive economic loss.

Eggplant is right. It looks like all the research on sustainable ecosystems and resources needed to support a human population without strain means a permanent human population of maybe 2 billion. The notion that limitless population growth automatically betters the life of each member of any living “herd” is silly, given the pattern of all living organisms is population booms, then mass die-off cycles unless the population is controlled by predators. Or internal population control measures like predators killing the spawn of rivals to limit teritorial population growth to what is the range and food the alpha wishes to have available and controlled for their own offsprings use.

Human assertions that “miracle technology” will allow limitless growth or immigration and avoid the numbers vs. resources trap other living organisms cope with are baseless.
Human history shows we are subject to the same boom and busts, since the “miracle technology” does not always show up at the last minute like the calvary in Hollywood movies.
It hasn’t happened in America, but other, longer lived nations or peoples are well aware of their die-offs or causing other’s die-offs in wars of resource ownership/ethnic cleasing to gain new territory. The times of mass famine and then disease ravaging hunger-weakened populations. Or of floods and storms killing all the people on marginal lands they were driven to by overpopulation or land controlled by the more powerful and acquisitive. No “exciting technology” saved them.

========================
If you go to Kenya, you see mass overbreeding has led to 40-60% unemployment, desertification, and the transformation of once livable cities (Mombasa, Nairobi) into living hells for most of their residents.

I disagree with Richard Fernandez in that the key is not being born in America, but being born in a country where the structures of government, the economy and resources permit a reasonable opportunity to each generation to work and improve their lot. Not just the spawn of the owner class and ruling elites, but all citizens.
This is not an American monopoly.
George Hussein Onyango Obama was fucked from birth by being the son of man who fucked up himself back when social mobility was still more possible when Kenya had 1/6th the people it no has. Not fucked by not being an American. If he had promise, he would have had a shot at a better life if he had begun existing in Ghana, S Africa, the Bahamas, France, UK, Antigua, Cuba, the Brazilian job-needing Cerro instead of the Sao Paul slums.

But not Kenya. Not if he was outside the privileged classes.

Same is happening in Pakistan, most of the rest of Africa, Bangladesh, and most Arab countries. High birth rates have led to breeding exceeding what the economy needs in workers and what the land can support.
Same 40-60% unemployment rates, same being fucked from birth applies to most Egyptians, Yemenis, Saudis, Paks…Which, as we learned as radical Islam has risen as a salve — can give us some real problems and dangers right here in America.
Just as mass immigration threatens many aspects of our culture, safety, energy and other resources adequacy, and future standard of living.

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:29 pm 35. wretchard:

Jay Ambrose recalls how Obama took America to task for being “selfish”.

Barack Obama, in a discussion with evangelist Rick Warren about his Christian faith, said he had been guilty of a “fundamental selfishness” that had contributed to regrettable youthful behavior. Then he confessed for the rest of us. “Americans’ greatest moral failure in my lifetime,” he said, “has been that we still don’t abide by that basic precept in Matthew that whatever you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me.

Being familiar with a culture (the Philippines) which expects politicians to “take care” of their relatives, I’m not sure Obama should similarly provide for his siblings. But opportunity is another thing. What America provided Barack, which Kenya didn’t give George in so great a quantity, is opportunity. Opportunity is the greatest form of charity. It allows a person to give to himself. Human talent is distributed pretty evenly among the races. By now there should have been a dozen Einsteins from Africa; a dozen John von Neumans or Bill Gates’ from the Muslim world. But we don’t observe any not because we won’t contribute dollars to Barack Obama’s selflessness boondoggle, but because those countries don’t provide opportunity.

I never cease to be struck by how often an unemployed, shiftless, unmotivated Filipino man can, with a change of context — by migrating to Singapore, Western Europe or the United States — can be transformed by opportunity into a small businessman, successful professional and productive citizen. His genetics didn’t change, but his framework did. And it’s fair bet that if someone gave George Obama a job in a Seven Eleven he’s soon become a store manager, and in time, leave to start his own little shop.

Which is why it is more than little puzzling why some people want to get down on their hands and knees before the worst leaders in the world; leaders who rob their citizens of their potential and tell these thugs “oh America is selfish. America is unworthy. Forgive us.” Let them ask for forgiveness from their generations they have blighted first before anyone seeks absolution from them.

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:36 pm 36. cyc:

S has neglected two important facts.

1. Our debt is made possible because countries with a lot of cash are looking for the best bet, and America is that bet. Their continued investment in America shows that they don’t agree with your claim that we are going down. They wouldn’t buy our bonds or our buildings if they thought they’d drop in value, would they? So, whatever you think, the world still likes America’s risk/return.

2. Inflation is a very real and immediate problem. Greenspan, in his arrogance, kept his foot on the accelerator, and kept the fuel flowing to the point that now we are awash in money supply, and prices are going up because of it. Inflation needs to be addressed for local reasons – it hurts the baby boomers in their retirement. But it works in our favor internationally because all the debt that you decry will likely be paid off with cheap, cheap dollars when the notes come due.

Besides, if push comes to shove in a real big way, we can always cancel our foreign debt and thank the world for their patronage. Better to owe than to be owed when all hell breaks loose.

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:39 pm 37. RWE:

Captain Raman:

Interesting statistic: Assuming a world population much greater than today, there are enough metals in the asteroid belt to supply each and every one of those individuals at the same per capita metal use as in the USA today.

And enough to do that for 30,000 years.

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:52 pm 38. Philip Sells:

OT, but nevertheless — @programmer: that looks like a Chinese poem. Am I right? Do you have a collection of those?

Aug 20, 2008 - 3:59 pm 39. Lifeofthemind:

Wretchard,
The general principal that human genetic equipment is the same can be accepted without conceding your argument that any adult person can thrive if offered an opportunity by changing their location. Human productivity is determined by two factors, genetic and cultural. The reason that there is so little creative activity in the Islamic world is not due to rigid socialist regimentation. For most people economic activity takes place at the local level and despite flowery proclamations of Socialism by strongmen over the last 60 years entrepeneurship and small scale independent activity abounds. The problem must lay at a deeper level that discourages the essential skills of innovation, critical analysis, risk taking, tolerance and discovery that fuels economic growth. Culture is largely transmitted through language, less so through art. I am not a Linguist but would like to see a study of how the repetetive and constant focus on the words of the Koran have mapped human perceptions in a manner that a similar process of focus on the words of the Hebrew bible have produced different results. Here we have an almost perfect experiment, related cultures, related languages, related conditions, different results. Moving a person who lacks essential skills for adapting to a different culture will not make them productive. MOving a person who has lacked opportunities but whose culture encourages them to study and adapt will be succesful.

Aug 20, 2008 - 4:18 pm 40. bobal:

Well said Cedarford. If we don’t get immigration under control we’ll be third world soon ourselves. Both parties, for their own reasons, have been totally irresponsible on immigration.

Aug 20, 2008 - 4:25 pm 41. bobal:

ICE AGES ACTED AS A BIOLOGICAL PUMP SPURRING EVOLUTION

One of the most shocking realizations of all time has slowly been dawning on us: the earth’s climate does great flip-flops every few thousand years, and with breathtaking speed. In just a few years, the climate suddenly cools worldwide. With only half the rainfall, severe dust storms whirl across vast areas. Lightning strikes ignite giant forest fires. For most mammals, including our ancestors, populations crash.

Our ancestors lived through hundreds of such abrupt episodes since the more gradual Ice Ages began two and a half million years ago–but abrupt cooling produced a population bottleneck each time, one that eliminated most of their relatives. We are the improbable descendants of those who survived–and later thrived.

William H. Calvin’s marvelous A Brain for All Seasons argues that such cycles of cool, crash, and burn powered the pump for the enormous increase in brain size and complexity in human beings. Driven by the imperative to adapt within a generation to “whiplash” climate changes where only grass did well for a while, our ancestors learned to cooperate and innovate in hunting large grazing animals.

Calvin’s book is structured as a travelogue that takes us around the globe and back in time. Beginning at Darwin’s home in England, Calvin sits under an oak tree and muses on what controls the speed of evolutionary “progress.” The Kalahari desert and the Sterkfontein caves in South Africa serve as the backdrop for a discussion of our ancestors’ changing diets. A drought-shrunken lake in Kenya shows how grassy mudflats become great magnets for grazing animals. And in Copenhagen, we learn what ice cores have told us about abrupt jumps in past climates.

Perhaps the most dramatic discovery of all, though, awaits us as we fly with Calvin over the Gulf Stream and Greenland: global warming caused by human-made pollution could paradoxically trigger another sudden episode of global cooling. Because of the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the oceanic “conveyor belt” that sends warmer waters into the North Atlantic could abruptly shut down. If that happens again, much of the earth could be plunged into a deep chill within a few years. Europe would become as cold and dry as Siberia. Agriculture could not adapt quickly enough to avoid worldwide famines and wars over the dwindling food supplies–a crash from which it would take us many centuries to recover.

With this warning, Calvin connects us directly to evolution and the surprises it holds. Highly illustrated, conversational, and learned, A Brain for All Seasons is a fascinating view of where we came from, and where we’re going.

William H. Calvin is affiliate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle. He is the author or coauthor of ten books, including Lingua ex Machina, The Cerebral Code, How Brains Think, Conversations with Neil’s Brain, and The River That Flows Uphill. The last third of A Brain for All Seasons is based on his cover story “The Great Climate Flip-Flop” in The Atlantic Monthly.

Aug 20, 2008 - 4:33 pm 42. Aether:

Cedarford:

“High birth rates have led to breeding exceeding what the economy needs in workers and what the land can support.”

The population explosion you reference derives more from low Death rates, than from high birth rates.

The birth rates in the undeveloped regions you reference have always been high, and when western institutions introduced modern standards of hygiene to those populations, perinatal, infant, and maternal morality rates plummeted.

Of course in the developed countries, birth rates fell as the economies boomed and women gained voting rights and moving into the work force.

So the answer to many of the population problems you reference appears to be the lowering of birthrates via Enfranchisement of the Women.

The only real alternative…

higher death rates.

Aug 20, 2008 - 5:30 pm 43. Aether:

that should read “mortality”

Aug 20, 2008 - 5:36 pm 44. trangbang68:

Aether,
I’m not a practitioner of the dismal science so I can’t trade stats and charts with you. My evidence is empirical and sensed. Western New York where I was raised is bleak with chained up factories and relatively high unemployment. In
eastern Alabama long standing textile plants went first to Mexico and then Asia. No fear though meth labs have filled the void. The North Carolina furniture industry is nowhere what it was. In my experience in custom woodworking, raw lumber is shipped to China and returned as inferior but cheap wood products.
What smokestack industries gave unskilled Americans was entry into the middle class. Did unions overstep? Sure, but it is driving an increasing wedge between upper and lower classes in America.

Aug 20, 2008 - 6:02 pm 45. Peterike:

Trangbang68 makes a very important point. As a country, the US has shed much of it’s low-skill yet decent paying manufacturing base. The better educated have moved into service jobs, technology, media, whatever, and ought to be thankful they don’t have to stand on an assembly line all day for their coin. But the low-skilled have much less access to decent paying work. Making things worse, the endless onslaught of immigrants, both legal and illegal, drives down the pay of those low-skill jobs that exist.

Why, I wonder, do we allow a single low-skilled immigrant into this country while we still have thousands of able-bodied black males on welfare? Why, I wonder more, haven’t the Republicans scored hugely on the devastation immigration causes to black men? (Never mind, I know why — because the Republicans are gutless whores.)

Tbang also notes the growing disparity between upper and lower classes. Yes, there is always a range of wealth in any society, but vast differences ultimately bring damage. Making things worse, our media worship of the uber-wealthy and the constant voyeurism of their lives (”Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” started a very poisonous trend in American media) only slaps people in the face with how much they don’t own.

The pillaging of the corporate till by CEOs has been disgraceful, especially in the face of moving jobs out of the country. And to answer the more glib counter-arguments: yes, I WOULD prefer to pay $300 more for my television or ten dollars more for my shirt, and have it made in America. Americans have entirely too much junk anyway. God almighty, ever middle-class kid in America must have fifty articles of clothing he never wears.

One of the great things energy development would do for America is bring back vast numbers of blue-collar jobs. Though of course as things are now, those jobs would all be filled by Mexicans.

It’s a quaint irony that in the 80s, Lefty punk musicians would sing bitter songs about life in the factory, cajoling the youth into quitting those soul killing jobs (as per The Clash: “it’s better than some factory/now that’s no place to waste your youth/I worked there for a week once/I luckily got the boot”). A scant few decades later we’re complaining about not having those jobs. A factory would look pretty good right now to a lot of people.

Aug 20, 2008 - 7:20 pm 46. Fat Man:

Acts 22:

[27] So the tribune came and said to him, “Tell me, are you an American citizen?” And Paul said, “Yes.”
[28] The tribune answered, “I bought this citizenship for a large sum.” Paul said, “But I was born a citizen.”

Aug 20, 2008 - 7:32 pm 47. bobal:

Wetback 22: So the ICEman came and said unto the woman, “Tell me, are you an American citizen?”

And the woman answered him saying, “No.”

The ICEman spoke unto her, “You will have to leave this land.”

The woman again answered him saying, “My child was born on this land. She is an American citizen.”

Aug 20, 2008 - 7:49 pm 48. Mike Sylwester:

Alexis:
“At present, the fashionable social model to be emulated is liberal democracy, but that is only because western military and financial might are superior. In the 1930’s, many “intellectuals” were undecided whether fascism or international socialism would rule the world; it was obvious to them that liberal democracy’s days were numbered. If the United States is truly the undisputed model for political and economic progress, there are those from the Middle East who have not noticed. …. ”
————-

I recommend that you read Fukuyama’s book “The End of History” instead of just spouting opinions about it. You obviously are a very smart guy who will appreciate Fukuyama’s thinking.

Aug 20, 2008 - 8:42 pm 49. jwillie:

Wretchard – But suppose an authoritarian society simply adopted the most commercially successful ideas and processes of a liberal society.

I assume you mean China. In their case it only works in the short term. Absent private property and the legal system that supports it, China funds most economic activity with debt. Their system therefore lacks the flexibilty and adaptability inherent in the capitalist economic system. China’s economic model will inevitably crash when it hits moderate to severe economic turbulence, which will then disrupt its social model big time.

I would submit that the US is Exhibit #1 for the case that liberal democracy will only thrive and flourish when it is accompanied by a capitalistic economic system.

Aug 20, 2008 - 9:10 pm 50. Konyok:

jwillie,

By the traditional definition, liberal democracy IS a capitalist economic system. The philosophy of Adam Smith was liberal in that it encouraged economic activity, regardless of social class.
In Europe the terminology is Social Democrat (*progressive*) vs neoliberal. European conservatives advocate aristocracy and monarchy, quite the opposite of our ideal of free markets.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:09 pm 51. Alexis:

…and all this time I thought the end of history happened in 31 BC with the Battle of Actium. Although this battle was won ostensibly by Octavian, that ideological war was decisively won by Cleopatra and her ideal of divinely sanctioned imperial rule.

wretchard:

What if the institutions of liberal democracy could actually inhibit scientific inquiry? In this bizarro universe, real science would atrophy due to a lack of popularity, new technologies would get blocked by special interests, and “free speech” would be used to promote a new “bonfire of the vanities” against unpopular ideas.

Meanwhile, an enlightened dictatorship would subsidize scientific inquiry and fiercely protect the academic freedom to study unpopular subjects. This dictatorship would make it a condition of doing business that it would reverse engineer every piece of foreign technology. The “enlightened dictatorship” would protect all inventions and make it a felony to patent any innovation that had actually been invented by somebody else, thus discouraging technological monopolies created by ruinous litigation (such as the Hughes fortune).

Imagine if a modern-day Lysenko could stifle scientific inquiry by leveraging his political clout to promote his own crackpot theories. He would create movies to promote his worldview while dissenters would face budget cuts due to the unpopularity of their ideas. The models of Prussia, Singapore, and the Ptolemaic Empire would be juxtaposed against stagnant democracy.

In the early twentieth century, many American academics admired Germany because its military muscle, planned economy, superior universities, and technological prowess were impressive. For many progressives, the German model showed the way of the future. According to a “Ptolemaic” view of history, Germany erred in becoming too democratic, with the effect that a bunch of low-class bums ran the government and banished Europe’s best researchers to America. Without democracy in Germany, it is easy to imagine that Europe’s best minds would have invented the atomic bomb in Europe instead of inventing it in the United States.

Suffice it to say that the United States itself would likely have been a failure were it not for the fortuitous accident of the du Pont family coming to the United States and establishing their munitions factory here. Given how Alexander Hamilton’s idea of a federal arsenal was blocked by Congress, and given how explosives manufacture requires at least some technological expertise, it is far from certain that a munitions industry would have been established in the United States were it not for the du Pont family.

So yes, if an autocratic meritocracy can create a legacy of wealth and technological achievement, it would effectively challenge the primacy of liberal democracy in the marketplace of ideas.

Aug 20, 2008 - 10:49 pm 52. Fletcher Christian:

cedarford:

You’re right. The cost of getting space resources down here is unacceptable and the carrying capacity of Earth for humans is maybe two billion. And both points illustrate a classic failure of those who try to predict the future – a failure of imagination.

Leave the stuff at the top of the well, where the sun shines 24/7/52. And soon enough the people will follow, and maybe your grandchild will be one of the first to walk the snows of Enceladus or take snaps of Jupiter from the surface of Ganymede. And the human race will have more than one basket to put its priceless eggs in.

Many things could end civilisation, and some of them could end us; Yellowstone letting rip, a major comet strike, Cumbre Vieja blowing its top and a large chunk sliding into the sea (and putting the east coast of the USA under 300 metres of water), catastrophic global warming, the next ice age, a major coronal mass ejection destroying most of our tech base – and of course some lunatic pushing the Button. I’ve probably missed some.

Get out there, en masse, and we are safe, and nothing can dislodge us all.

“The Earth is the cradle of mankind; but one cannot stay in the cradle forever.”

Aug 21, 2008 - 2:33 am 53. programmer:

To Phillip Sells: A paraprhrase of Joshu’s Mu.

Joshu’s Mu
Joshu (A.D. 778-897) was a famous Chinese Zen Master who lived in Joshu, the province from which he took his name. One day a troubled monk approached him, intending to ask the Master for guidance. A dog walked by. The monk asked Joshu, “Has that dog a Buddha-nature or not?” The monk had barely completed his question when Joshu shouted: “Google!”

Aug 21, 2008 - 4:31 am 54. Jay:

cyc: I believe that we are slowly defaulting on our debt but the folks in Arabia and China do not seem to notice it. Once central bankers figure out the game, where BLS economists are told to make up fictional low inflation numbers, the only way we will be able to sell US bonds is to raise interest rates to at least 3% REAL rates. We now have negative real rates.
As to what T Boone is up to, he rented space on his neighbors land for his windmills, go the Texas rate payers to pay for the power lines to bring the juice to the Dallas grid, and then his company (Nancy Pelosi investor) will build a pipeline under the lines to ship underground water to Dallas. The greens would stop the pipeline but once the green lines are in place the pipes will be green and the cotton farmers in West Texas will get screwed by T Boone and his gane of rent seekers.
The corruption of the US political class is more sophisticated than in the Phillipines and more profitable.

Aug 21, 2008 - 8:40 am 55. Holdfast:

I thought that Obama Sr. WAS a member of the ruling class – or was his faction deposed in a coup?

I don’t mind if the Russians don’t want democracy, as long as they stay on their side of the fence. They have massively overplayed their hand. I think most pragmatists were willing to let them have S. Ossetia and Abkazia, but if they insist on staying in Georgia, the US may be forced into stronger action to make them move.

Aug 21, 2008 - 8:56 am 56. Nomenklatura:

Exhibit A…

Reuters: “The United States has halted a program that united African refugees with relatives in America after DNA testing revealed many people were lying about family links, the State Department said on Wednesday.”

As one European blogger remarked: “…the truly shocking element is why anyone want to leave the tranquil idylls of Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Guinea, Gambia, Somalia, Ethiopia, or Liberia, for a life of serf-like squalor in the United States?… Perhaps these misguided souls attempting to gain entry into the United States do not read the Guardian?

Aug 21, 2008 - 11:40 am

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