Unblemished Risk Assessment on Climate Change Reduction.

Cornell economics Professor Robert Frank offers up a solid op-ed in today’s New York Times on the economics of climate change. (Calling it a big step up from this recent climate monstrosity in the Times is an understatement):

Organizers of the recent climate conference in Copenhagen sought, unsuccessfully, to forge agreements to limit global warming to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century. But even an increase that small would cause deadly harm. And far greater damage is likely if we do nothing.

The numbers — and there are many to choose from — paint a grim picture. According to recent estimates from the Integrated Global Systems Model at [M.I.T.], the median forecast is for a climb of 9 degrees Fahrenheit by century’s end, in the absence of effective countermeasures.

The gist of the piece is that based upon non political, objective, logic based risk assessment, and basic economics, there really isn’t a decent case against immediate climate change redress. Summarizing, Frank notes:

In short, the cost of preventing catastrophic climate change is astonishingly small, and it involves just a few simple changes in behavior.

The real problem with the estimates is that the outcome may be worse than expected. And that’s the strongest possible argument for taking action. In a rational world, that should be an easy choice, but in this case we appear to be headed in the wrong direction.

(A few quick examples of how the market could be motivated to effect much of this change on its own, while preserving personal choice and promoting growth at the same time,  are here.) Ironically, the piece could have painted a stronger picture for action and been more objective and accurate at the same time.  For example, it concludes:

Most people would pay a substantial share of their wealth — much more, certainly, than the modest cost of a carbon tax — to avoid having someone pull the trigger on a gun pointed at their head with one bullet and nine empty chambers. Yet that’s the kind of risk that some people think we should take.

First, and more controversially, this follows the common and likely erroneous presumption that addressing climate change sensibly “costs” money rather than simply serves to shift what constitutes GDP.   But more pointedly, Frank’s assessment is based upon a probability of 10 percent of a rise of 12 degrees or more.  Yet the same M.I.T study Frank relies upon for this, as noted earlier in the piece, projects the median rise to be 9 degrees. (In other words, half of the projections come in above 9 degrees, half lower, if no remediation action is taken.)  Thus, to continue the analogy, the other chambers are not “empty.”

Frank notes this himself earlier:

Essentially, the risk is that if current estimates turn out to be wildly pessimistic, the money spent to curb greenhouse gases wouldn’t have been needed to save the planet. And yet that money would still have prevented substantial damage. (The M.I.T. model estimates a zero probability of the temperature rising by less than 3.6 degrees by 2100.)

Thus, NONE of the chambers are empty; and half of them are not that far off from the 12 degree “bullet.” But what was left out of this assessment is that if current estimates turn out to be wildly pessimistic, there are still other significant reasons why the expenditures would not have been a waste.

First off, as noted above, they won”t serve as “true” expenditures in the long run — but will shift what we do spend our GDP dollars on. So if they “do nothing,” we probably would have preferred having more flat screen TVs (metaphorically speaking) and instead we will have more historically stable CO2 levels.  But since in the long run happiness is not correlated with absolute levels of wealth, but rather an ongoing increase in growth and job opportunities, even this is fairly trivial, again, in the long run. (Implementing cleaner, less destructive fuels prompts jobs and GDP growth the same as building a few extra flat screen TVs does.)

But they won’t do nothing, even apart from the climate change issue.  Much of the climate change challenge stems from fossil fuel use.(The rest stems from deforestation, changing agricultural practices and grazing ruminant livestock, and other sundry causes.) We have to get off of these anyway. They are finite. Extremely so in the case of oil. We might as well get off of them now.

And in addition, fossil fuels also cause considerable harm in addition to being largely responsible for an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels to levels that on a sustained basis may well be unprecedented in the past fifteen million years:

They are responsible for a large proportion of our atmospheric pollution, CO2 (which is not a “true” pollutant), aside.  In the case of coal, they are also responsible for a majority of the toxicological poison mercury that is bio-accumulating in our food chain. Also in the case of coal, they are responsible for a significant amount of degradation to the natural landscape and watersheds where coal is mined. (Sometimes even causing the irreversible destruction of entire mountain tops).  And in the case of oil, they are responsible for unnecessary national security vulnerabilities created by relying upon, and sending hundreds of billions of dollars to, foreign oil selling regimes overseas that we often view as hostile to our interests.

Another interesting aspect of the piece is when Frank notes that we may be “headed in the wrong direction.” Quoting Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert, Frank notes:

“Global warming is bad, but it doesn’t make us feel nauseated or angry or disgraced, and thus we don’t feel compelled to rail against it as we do against other momentous threats to our species, such as flag burning.”

But we’re also headed in the wrong direction for a few other reasons. Number one is an incessant parade of nonstop misinformation on the topic, along with poor media coverage of it.

Number two is that climate change is abstract. We can’t feel it, touch it, taste it, see it, or smell it. Sure, we see and feel the weather everyday, but climate change is a decades long process; the weather at any particular time is all but irrelevant, and of course, all over the board.

Number three is that, perhaps given a natural desire to believe such conclusions, people tend to confuse the lack of precision or absolute certainty on climate change with the certainty of the physics that underline the phenomenon; including the certainties that heat drives climate (ultimately through the oceans), heat trapping gases trap heat, and levels of heat trapping gases have ratcheted upward at geologically breakneck speed to extremely high levels — and are still climbing.

Number four may be the most infrequently mentioned, yet, after misinformation, perhaps the most important.  An increase in atmospheric trapped heat is ultimately going to warm or otherwise alter the planet, and produce some sort of radical change (likely warming) through the oceans.  It takes an extremely long time to heat up oceans. (And, as we would expect, oceans are slowly retaining more and more heat.) Decades, if not more.  For this reason, among others, there is a considerable lag in climate change between cause and effect.

That is, given natural variability, we won’t “know” the effects of climate change (as opposed to mere, bizarre, variability) for years. And even then we still won’t because there will be multiple decades of effect built up in the pipeline.

It’s abstract, it’s in the future, and there are considerable cause and effect, and potential variability lags on top of that.  Those things, however, do not make it any less real. We are, however, very counter productively, treating it as if they do.

If we purchase a stock at 100 dollars, and we knew it had an 80 percent probability of going to zero, and a 20 percent probability of going to 125, we would sell it in an instant. And at a steep discount from 100 dollars, also. We would never go “but we don’t know with certainty that it is going to go to zero” as a rationale for doing nothing.

But that is precisely what we are doing, with respect to climate change.  The precise number of the effect is all but irrelevant when it comes to future harm.  What matters is the range of likely outcomes, their expected probabilities, and likely, attendant harm for each.  Somehow — perhaps through natural confusion over the science, and the four reasons listed above along with the one posited by Gilbert and Frank — we are completely confusing this.

The suspicion here is that misinformation driven by ideology is in fact playing the leading role, with the other factors merely facilitating the process and allowing for easy and in many cases, perhaps even earnest, confusion and misinformation promulgation on the issue.

New York Times Blindly Plays Right into Tea Party Rhetoric, Media Abandoning Principles Contributing to Problem

(Updated below)

In a feature piece yesterday by David Barstow, the New York Times blindly plays into Tea Party rhetoric. And then in yet another display of ridiculous “false balance,” highlights the very first comment to the piece, which itself plays into the rhetoric far, far more zealously:

What a great article — very informative…

…These people, though, if they are the way you describe them, seem much more progressive in their views toward individual rights vs. government than any of the self-proclaimed “progressives” of whom I am aware.

I will start paying much closer attention. I might have just found a new political home.

In stark contrast, consider these recent questions regarding the same Tea Party movement:

The funny thing is Tea Partiers say they are for more freedom, but most of the real threats to freedom — creeping authoritarianism; an expectation that people are the same or similar; distrust of differences; condemnation of different views as unpatriotic, or, worse, as “traitors;” an increase in unchecked governmental power over citizens; an increasing governmental intrusion into both privacy and the morality of individuals; a continual evisceration of privacy rights and of course calls for a national ‘Id’ card, etc.; an increasingly powerful, creeping corporate oligopoly; an abominable and somewhat radical recent Supreme Court decision that granted corporations the dollar purchased speech rights of private citizens plus even more at the expense of actual, meaningful, individual free speech; sweeping security checks and procedures based solely upon religion or race; etc. – are advocated or supported by a majority of the so called “Tea Party” movement.

At least the newspaper didn’t block the following comment (like voodoo climate author Steven Levitt’ did on his Times blog column as noted here), one that raises a question that still begs an answer: Why was the following ridiculously misleading reference, among others, included in the Times piece?

“Tea Party leaders say they know their complaints about shredded constitutional principles and excessive spending ring hollow to some, given their relative passivity through the Bush years. In some ways, though, their main answer — strict adherence to the Constitution — would comfort every card-carrying A.C.L.U. member.”

That rings a little hollow. I have yet to meet a Tea Party member who doesn’t seem to despise the ACLU. (Though I am sure there are some.) The unrecognized hypocrisy is only scantily referenced by the note on the “relative passivity” through the Bush years, a far more imperial, more autocratic, far more intrusive, and a far more constitutionally violating, presidency than the current administration.

And Glenn Beck? That’s who you note many Tea Partiers are getting their information and spirit from? Maybe one of the biggest propagandists in the Western world since Benito Mussolini, and at any rate one of the most profoundly misinformed, wildly misleading, and exceedingly inflammatory voices of the modern age?

The real questions that need to be asked of and about the Tea Party movement, where a lot of well meaning people may be being mislead, a lot of rhetoric is exceedingly far from the reality, all while there is a lot of misplaced anger and misinformation brewing. (Just see link above about Beck lest you have doubts, as obviously, many who listen to Beck must.)

Some may argue that the Obama Administration is not “far more constitutionally violative,” just “more constitutionally violative.”  But the points above all stand.  As do perhaps some of the potentially more chilling points made by yet another Times reader:

Is the tea party movement just a folksy grass-roots movement or is there something more dangerous brewing here? Apparently tea party activists are motivated by a fear that the federal government is too big and too intrusive. Many tea-partyers are libertarians and some are attracted to the militia movements. The events at Waco and Ruby Ridge are often mentioned.

It’s interesting that this movement was quiescent during the eight years of the Bush administration, when the federal government clearly violated people’s civil rights. It was only after the first black president in history was elected that this movement, which exclusively attracts white people, really got going.

Think back to 1995, when the deadliest act of terrorism prior to the September 11 attacks was perpetrated by Timothy McVeigh. McVeigh was a member of a militia, he was partial to libertarianism, he blamed the federal government for just about everything wrong with society and guess what? The events at Waco and Ruby Ridge were major motivations for his act.

Or think back even farther. In the 1920’s there was a certain political party that started out in Bavaria. A grass-roots party when it started, it attracted people who hated the federal government, and who were partial to conspiracy theories especially ones about Jews. It had no clear leadership until an enterprising fellow named Adolf Hitler came along. The rest, shall we say, is history.

Unfortunately many times more people will read author David Barstow’s false balance and far right kowtowing Tea Party fluff piece, than some random comments.  And that fluff piece is in the New York Times:  ”Fair and balanced” coverage of the Tea Party movement disconnect between assertion and actual fact is often worse elsewhere.

A few things to add here:  First, it is not only a black president, it is a moderate, rather than right or far right wing President (not withstanding that Tea Partiers are convinced he is a “socialist”) who also just happens to be black, and, even less coincidentally, a Democrat.

Second is that these are loose, and potentially somewhat unfair connections, by and of themselves. The real problem is the excessive rhetoric, and its often enormous disconnect with reality. This is something that the media, as exemplified by this leading Times story, is not serving as a check upon, but often as a simple parroting stenographer for.

Third, is a statement I would again reiterate, famously made by the late Louisiana Governor Huey Long.

Fascism, shall come, in the name of Anti Fascism.

As the Times piece noted (emphasis added):

That is often the point when Tea Party supporters say they began listening to Glenn Beck. With his guidance…

Glenn Beck. Here (again, see middle portion) is just a synopsis as of last summer (Beck’s gotten even worse since) of some of the profoundly ignorant, outrageously hypocritical, highly inflammatory, and incredibly misleading assertions an obviously spintastic Glenn Beck has foistered upon both himself, and an increasingly angry listening public – not angry at Beck for misleading them, but angry at others, and other things, real and, often imagined, because of Beck.

That Person.  The person who expresses more anti Fascism fervor — almost everyone who disagrees with Beck is a “Nazi,” by the way — than perhaps anybody in America. And who exhibits many of its underlying tendencies.

Refer back to the famous quote by Huey Long, above, “fascism shall come, in the name of anti-fascism.” Consider last comment block quoted just above. Apply.

Many Tea Partiers are no doubt well meaning, and very earnest, and maybe not always radical right wing folks.  But when the gap between rhetoric and reality gets as large as it is becoming today, and the biggest purveyor of that gap in the United States becomes the de facto leader or “inspiration,” it should be a wake up call to Democrats, Liberals, Independents, Moderate Republicans, and in particular the media, that something simply has to be done in this country to start to lessen the growing gap between rhetoric and reality. A vibrant and secure democracy simply can not function this way.

Maybe it would be helpful, if instead of a kowtowing fluff piece, the New York times engaged in actual journalism, and did a real piece on the issue. But then, some suggest (including myself), it is the breakdown in our media’s role as a Fourth Estate check that, more than anything else, is enabling this increasingly large disparity between rhetoric and fact in America today, and which is, in many ways, starting to become a mirror of it.

It’s not what Thomas Jefferson had in mind when he said that given a choice between having government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, he would “not hesitate” to choose the latter. And he was not talking about simply shouting out in the village square — a vital and separate right also guaranteed by the First Amendment.  (And which today, in its modern technological equivalent, is reflected in the increasing prevalence of Internet “information and opinion” sites and reliance, that ironically enough, because of its ease and immediacy, is serving as a further threat to the media itself) . But it has no check upon it.

As I noted here (also on the New York Times site):

People shouting out in the village square is a key part of democracy, and clearly protected under the First Amendment. But it’s not journalism, and it’s not a substitute for the Fourth Estate.

Despite the fact that the Internet does bring excellent access to information (both correct and incorrect), it is still really nothing more than the modern high tech version of the village square.

And as such popularity and popular will and opinion are in effect tending to serve, more than anything, as the determiner of what is “right” or correct, even when it comes to objective facts — whereas in reality, popular opinion is often wrong, and can not serve as a check upon itself. It is why a fourth estate was so vital.

As these two – a fourth estate merging into just a more sophisticated if not as polarizing version of a parroting stenographer, and a (Internet) popularity arbiter of what is news and what is important and what gets read — merge, we are gradually losing the essence of this critical Fourth Estate check that Thomas Jefferson once thought even more important than government itself.

We are beginning to see the results of this:  With people who say they are for less government intrusion, more individual liberty, yet who actually tend to despise the ACLU; who say they want strict adherence to the “Constitution” yet in most cases supported a Bush Administration that was not only imperial, highly secretive, and completely lacking in accountability, but which employed an extreme “Unitary Executive” theory of the Constitution which gives the Executive the Unilateral Discretion to do whatever he/she wants in the name of “national security,” obviating the basic reason our Constitution was designed in the first place, and exactly what our Founders feared in motivating them to create it; people who say the are for individual liberty and less government services, but who suddenly only rose up in outspoken, and often demonizing anger, after a far right administration left the White House, and was replaced by a moderate Democratic Administration. People who in many cases, are taking up arms, and supporting militias. Not against an autocratic governmental regime, but because what was an increasingly autocratic leaning government regime, has just been replaced by a far more moderate one.  Whom a certain individual has nevertheless convinced many people is “coming after” them.

People who are being led by one of the most manipulatively misinformed, misleading, demonizing, and inflammatory voices in a long, long time. Glenn Beck.

With this person, another world class expert in rhetoric and little else, as their Keynote speaker.
____________

Update: The Cato Institute continues to sometimes kid itself: A few days ago, Vice President Gene Healy writes:

Anyone who’s been to a Tea Party rally knows this is no Astroturf movement. These are ordinary citizens, rightly furious that the federal government has sold the country a junk mortgage on its future, sticking America with an unsustainable debt.

They may be “ordinary citizens.”  But with Glenn Beck as perhaps the prime instigating force — as even the fluffy New York Times article above supports — and with Sarah Palin perhaps not far behind, these are ordinary citizens who have been greatly mislead and have a lot of illusions regarding political processes in America.

Government debt is what they say is a lot of the “fury;” but which programs are they advocating to be cut? And they are more furious about “pork”?  In the middle of the night several years back, after the Bush Administration’s Medicare Administrator (Tom Scully) threatened the program’s chief actuary if he shared his true cost estimates with Congress, one of the biggest corporate handouts in the history of the world was occasioned. At taxpayer expense.

That medicare “prescription drug plan” within just fourteen months of its original passage, was expected to cost well over a trillion dollars.  Most other pork complained about is barely even noticeable in comparison, combined.   Where was the outrage over a one trillion dollar giveaway — count to a thousand, that is how many billions are in a trillion — to corporate interests, at taxpayer expense. Where was the outrage?

To make matters worse, the Bush Administration did it by misleading Congress, as even some leading Republicans have complained about. Where was the outrage?  Where were the Tea Parties?

The closest thing we had to Tea Parties before today — one could call the outrage leveled against the Clinton Administration the tea party precursor — was during the Clinton Administration — an Administration that inherited absolutely gargantuan budget deficits, and enabled by favorable productivity gains due to the widespread implementation of computer technology along with sensible fiscal policies, left the incoming Bush Administration with a surplus.

Whether it is a good idea or a bad one (thought most economists fully urged this action), the current spending at least had the stimulus angle and a belief that this country was in dire economic times.  Where was this outrage when the Bush Administration was doubling our historical outstanding national debt at a time when total military and national security spending was still lower (percentage wise, the only measurement that matters) than during any decade but one in the past half a century?  When the Bush Administration was literally shredding the basic preventative purposes of the Constitution, rendering it void at the Executive’s discretion and thus Articles I and II essentially voluntary?

In the second paragraph Healy does briefly note at least part of this seeming “oddity.” (Which, if one understands the tea party, and the true motivations and mis-perceptions behind it, is really no oddity at all):

Yet there are those who doubt the new activists’ sincerity, asking, in effect, “Where were you when George W. Bush was spending faster than Lyndon Johnson?” It’s a fair question.

It’s also one, among others, that Healy never answers.

The answer can be found, in the post above.  And in the ravings of Glenn Beck, and others.  And in the media kowtowing to this, with, title aside, absurdly fluffy pieces, and the even more inane mainstream media liberals’ blinding dismissal of it all.

I’ve emailed Healy and invited him to comment on the above post, including this update.

New York Times Searches Far and Wide for the Most Qualified Experts

Space on the prestigious NY Times opinion pages is extremely limited.  And most of that space is routinely taken up by the paper’s own editorials and columnists.

So one imagines that on the rare occasions when the Times ventures to outside sources from among the constant inundation of submissions it normally receives, it chooses its pieces carefully — to represent a particular point of view or perspective, with careful, reasoned and logical support.

Thus, in its search far and wide for someone to provide  a provocative, informative, non misleading and relevant opinion piece on the timely and global issue of climate change recently, the Times apparently scoured the entire globe itself, finally settling upon an expert from New Zealand. A professor of philosophy named Denis Dutton.

Just below is how Dutton’s fantastic work of reason, logic, and coherency might have made its way onto the famed and highly selective pages of the NY Times.

Note that the following conversation is merely a simulation (one supposes) of a conversation that could have occurred, illustrating both the value of Dutton’s piece, as well as how it might have ended up on the highly influential and venerable NY times opinion pages:

DUTTON: I think some may be overreacting on climate change here.

So far, notice, this is a short, one sentence, unsupported suggestion, not an oped.  So how does it turn into one?

NY TIMES:   Why may some be overreacting?

DUTTON: because sometimes people overreact.

NY TIMES:  We know sometimes people over react to things.  That’s like saying that we are under-reacting to climate change because “sometimes we under react.” What’s your reason why some are overreacting on this issue?

DUTTON: because people tend to find apocalypses intriguing!!

NY TIMES:  That’s not an argument for saying climate catastrophe is overreaction, catastrophes do happen; that’s an argument for saying the world is literally coming to an end due to climate changer alone – an argument that maybe all of four people are making – and three for intended hyperbole.

When sometimes we under react to things, and other times we over react to things, saying that we are “overeacting” to climage change by giving a reason why sometimes people over react to things, which otherwise has not specific applicability to this particular instance, is tautological,and logically nonsensical.

It is like saying “I think my neigbor’s wife is having an affair;” we ask why, you say “because sometimes wives have affairs,” we ask why her, and you give a  reason why sometimes wives in general have affairs, such as “because they are lonely or bored.” You have done nothing to support why you think your neigbor’s wife is having an affair;  and you have done nothing to support why our response to climate change is an over reaction rather than an under reaction.

So do you have anything else more than “we overreact sometimes,” we under react other times, this time we are over reacting, based upon the reasoning that “we overreact sometimes”?

DUTTON: Yes, yes, of course I do.  Here goes. Here is my reason.  Drumroll please: “It seems to me.”

NY TIMES: Hey, that’s pretty good. In other words, you are not just arguing “sometimes we over react to stuff, sometimes we under react to stuff, on climate change we are over reacting, the end,” you are saying that, but with “it seems to me” thrown in.  As they say on the Guinness commercials, “brilliant!”

But do  you have anything else?  That, would make it even better.

DUTTON: Yup.  I sure do. I have even more. Since this is a scientific issue, why should we bother with any actual science, when instead we can botger with stuff that is even better than science; namely, science fiction.   Ready?  Mary Shelley Created Frankenstein.

Thus, you see, people are fascinated with this stuff, like Frankenstein, so we are over reacting on climate change!  And no one will ever pick up that we also tend to overlook other stuff, like actual science, or scenarios where there is a big lag between cause and effect, so we are underestimating climate change.  Instead, here, we are over reacting, because of Frankenstein, and fascination with Frankenstein!

NY TIMES:  Absolutely brilliant.  This is great stuff. No one will eve see what a hoax this logic is (including us!).

But allthough we know it says so much more, it might appear as if your argument says nothing more than “We are over reacting, not under reacting, this time, because because Mary Shelley created Frankenstein.”

Brilliant and relevant as that argument is, can you fill this piece with an otherwise also completely irrelevant yet excruciatingly detailed example of a time when we over-reacted as opposed to under-reacted, overlooking how that also illustrates exactly nothing — yet allowing you to essentially, and wonderfully, wasted your entire piece on it!

Since we already know we sometimes over react, just like we know we sometimes under react, giving us an example of a time we overreacted tells us nothing.  But it will come across to readers as if it does! Particularly if you spend almost your entire piece on it.  And that is what we want to do here at the NY Times. Print logically nonsensical pieces of garbage that might masquerade as something of worth.

So, can you not only give us an example of an otherwise unrelated time that we over reacted, but spend most of your at this point otherwise two sentence piece on it?

DUTTON: Sure, absolutely. Like what?  Like, maybe, talk about how many people and countries way over reacted to Y2K?

(Editor of ELA, not of the NY Times here. Ahem, Dutton, “ahem.”  Not many people but those of us that did; since the editor of this website  thought the entire notion of an unavoidable enormous Y2k breakdown just because the years on many computers were in double rather than quadruple digits, was ridiculous, and said so repeatedly.)

NY TIMES:  Exactly.

DUTTON: Done. Check  your in box.

Hard to believe, right?

NY TIMES: If you don’t believe this speculated mockusation, come read our pages, December 31, and see for yourself.

Simply saying “We overreact to some things, perhaps we are to climate change, here are some reasons why we are over-reacting here,” flawed as the conclusion that we are overreacting likely is, is fine. Dutton does not come close to doing that, however.  He suggests that sometimes we over react to things; he explains why he thinks we over-react to things sometimes (fascination with the eschatological), and then suggests that “we are over-reacting here” for no reason other than the completely tautological explanation that sometimes we do, along with the completely irrelevant reason why we sometimes do.

If anything, there would be far more driving the idea that we are under-reacting here.  Likely results are many years in the future.  The implications to many, of this, are extremely negative, because of the (flawed) perception that sensibly addressing this means we have to sacrifice our economy. There is a general lack of general scientific understanding among the populace. And our expectations are grounded in what we have come to expect, and the difficulty we seem to have grasping the ideas that 1) there is an enormous time lag here between both cause and effect, and 2) effects are very likely to be non linear (that is, potentially accelerating with increased input).

Whether that last paragraph, was a good or bad (but short) opinion piece for the Times, at least it offered reasons. Dutton offers none. What he offered is like suggesting “remember how in medieval times the plague hit, and people did not take it seriously enough;” then spending most of the time writing about how bad the plague was and how wrong everybody was; then offering up a bunch of reasons why in general people often don’t take things seriously enough (and they tend to number far greater than “fascination with eschatology”) and then concluding “it seems to me climate change is the same. The end.”  That would be a truly inane piece.  And, analogously, it is exactly the logic — and all of it — that the NY Times chose to publish.

Communication, Not Disdain or Presumption, Moves the Debate

 
The following is a letter sent to Glenn Greenwald, September 15, 2009.  It is about communications in politics and political and policy discussion in America today.

It could have been written to almost anybody who is an active Democratic leaning columnist, commentator, or politician today.   But Greenwald’s column, as have several of his otherwise very strong columns, serves as a particularly good example of the points expressed.  And, apart from the basic tendencies explored below, Greenwald also writes clearly and powerfully on some critical issues.

Dear Glenn:

This letter is in regard to your September 11 column and a few of the common assertions made in it, and contains an analysis of the early Iraq war issue. But all of this, by way of example, is centrally relevant to the underlying issues surrounding our political state, policy making, discussion and debate today.

Also, please note up front, many of the points in the column were excellent…These points are not included, because they are not relevant to the fundamental — and I think very important — ideas being communicated below. On the other hand, the situation which you attempt to describe and complain of, very much is.

You write, Friday, Sept 11:

“What a crazy extremist loser he is. To recap: everything the Republican leaders said about Iraq turned out to be false, fictitious, imaginary — and their false-pretense war led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings.”

Consider that widespread, and heartfelt, sentiment, immediately above. Is there thus only one perspective that “a rational, reasonable person” could have? We’ll look at this very important question more, in a moment.

But let’s look at this first, in combination with something else you write from that same column:

“Those who use curse words to oppose torture, wars and lawbreaking are evil and unSerious (The Angry Left); those who politely and soberly advocate morally repugnant, indecent policies are respected and Serious.”

Consider the comparison between the use of curse words, and “those who politely and soberly advocate morally repugnant, indecent policies.”

You know, or you think you know, what is in any such instance, “morally repugnant,” or “indecent” policy wise. But the fact of the matter is that neither you, nor anyone else, has a monopoly on this.

The problem stems from the idea that you believe you are speaking of certain instances in which “it is obvious.” But instead, consider the question as to who and what then makes the determination of what is “obvious.”

The use of what, to many people, are offensive curse words — which often breeds hostility and immediate defensiveness (and thus more of a tendency to defend even erroneous positions) is, in contrast, not subjective, but reasonably objective. It also does nothing to advance or show a point of view. Why would they be expended when critical points, that people don’t know, could otherwise be illustrated? Or are they expended for headline appeal? If so, headline “appeal” — rather than the immediate rejection of even the general political positions maintained therein — for who?

Thus the prevailing, implicit assumption is that everyone already knows everything that is required to be known in order to have what you would deem a “sensible” position; or has not been manipulated; or do not themselves have illogical thoughts, etc. And just as bad — those who “don’t” can’t be reached. So the notion “consider the media’s response” to how these things are presented, or the perspective of regular ole’ American voters, who really don’t yet know the facts and/or may have had their opinions shaped in part by misleading rhetoric, is of seemingly little significance. But it is one of the most profoundly important concepts in politics, and in particular in America today.

And it is one of the reasons that I have tried to point out, repeatedly, that “everyone does not know” what Democrats seem to think they themselves know and repeatedly predicate much of their active communications, and messaging, upon. As a result of this often unrecognized presumption, they often implicitly think that just pointing out what they “know,” even with curse words, rather than effectively showing why to those who do not already see it this way or otherwise know the relevant facts and bases,” somehow gets it across. But outside of the choir, it largely doesn’t.

Further perpetuating this self protracting, somewhat tautological belief, is that while ample objective evidence that it hasn’t gotten across materializes, excuse after excuse — from blaming voters, to blaming the media entirely, to blaming opponents lies, to blaming this or that, to recreating history over how well moderates, Democrats, and Liberals have done or are doing — is indulged in. While, at the same time, the “choir” is often confused (that is, mistaken for), the rest of America.

Look around you at America over the past nine years. (And even today over this ridiculous health care “debate” — namely, a “debate” that has dominated the headlines for months, when most Americans, including many in the media partaking in this debate and many more Americans who are “angry” one way or the other, don’t even know the basic facts of the issue.) Who has won? Who has been unduly influential given their size? Certainly, in relation to the facts and numbers, a small cabal on the far right, over and over. A cabal that when people are sat down, shown the facts, politely, dispassionately, objectively and non partisanally reasoned with, probably over 70 percent of Americans (and maybe even some in that cabal – who deceive themselves far more than they purposefully “lie” as you and many Democrats repeatedly assume) don’t agree with at all.

But yet it still never is considered that maybe it has something to do with the way the so called “left — predominantly the politically active left and Democrats or even just those who support their positions — communicates to all the rest of America who is not otherwise simply knee jerk automatically on their side on every little item and issue.

Now let’s take a look at your first quote, the one given at the outset, by way of example

“To recap: everything the Republican leaders said about Iraq turned out to be false, fictitious, imaginary — and their false-pretense war led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings.”

(We could have used any example here, but this is a decently standard one we have seen time and time again, so we’ll use it.)

You can make any claims you want, but what many Democrats and those who support them seem to often overlook is that the Right, and in particular the far right, is almost always tying their claims into a buzz word, phrase, concept or idea that has overriding communicative value; and almost always selling and showing the beliefs and points they want to get across.

Simply concluding does not do anything. The claim you make above — albeit subjective, and we will see in a moment, objectively unclear — is not a terrible claim as far as claims go, in so far as in comparison with some of the claims made by the far right. Yet the claim does nothing whatsoever to establish a whit of credibility with those who don’t otherwise already see it this way.

Of course, the response goes, “but everybody already knows those things.” Which is exactly my point from above. Only those who already see it this way, do. (And in this particular instance, as noted, it is not even objectively correct.)

Yet Democrats and some of those who are fighting their battles (such as, in taking up some of the most important ones, often in an exceptionally well researched, documented, and reasoned way), often “think that everyone knows what they know.”

And they base their communications and presumptions upon it.

So let’s briefly return to the curse word example.

I dislike putting political, sociological, and policy considerations and proponents into “sides,” as it often misleads and perpetuates counterproductive stereotypes. But to simplify, let’s take a hypothetical example and say that “one side” shouts forth “the truth” but is uncivil, utters conclusions, doesn’t show, doesn’t reach anybody or even recognize that it is not effectively trying to reach anybody outside of its own choir, and constantly utters forth self righteously proclaimed profanities. And let’s say, for lack of a better term, “the other side” in your own words, “advocates morally repugnant, indecent policies.”

Which claim is going to be listened to?

This takes us right back to the question of “who decides” who is, in fact “advocating morally repugnant, indecent policies.”

But again, that is answered, because, they are “obvious.”

We have now come full circle.

That is, they are obvious, because to active Democrats and sometimes those in active support thereof, “everybody already knows.” When the fact is, everybody does not already know: or even see it the same way based upon even similar facts, in those rare instances when even the basic accurate facts are known. So they are not “obvious.”

And in this particular instance, you state a conclusion above which is subjective, and which does not build credibility — because it is one sided, and seemingly partisan (even if you yourself do not have strong partisan feelings.) Some of the most important things written on the Constitution in recent years sometimes come off this way to the media — who only need a fraction of the excuse provided above to dismiss some of the more important points on constitutional principles I have seen written online. Sometimes, written by you.

Let’s take a brief look at how you condemn and scorn all those who do not recognize exactly what you do — at least insofar as the media, and others who need to hear precisely the points you are making, see it — and yet at the same time, with respect to this issue (with which you are not nearly as familiar or knowledgeable?) are being somewhat subjective yourself: Or, to bring us back to the top, failing to consider another perspective altogether; and one that is not unreasonable.

I would not necessarily use your precise terminology, but the Bush Administration, for four years, certainly engaged in advocating what you would conclude were morally repugnant, indecent policies. (I personally would simply say very far right wing, extremely anti open government, and very anti open, rigorous, thoughtful, informed discussion, etc.) Okay. Yet half the country voted for Bush.

That is, half the country voted for what was, in your view, the advocacy of morally repugnant, indecent policies. So getting back to the idea that everybody knows what these are, clearly everybody does not know.

But once again we come full circle, and we get back to the excuse making game; as to “why,” Bush won. Or why Obama, a strong candidate running on an almost unprecedented inherent party advantage at a time when it would have been almost impossible for the incumbent party to retain the White House — against a campaign with the world’s poster child for ignorance and rhetoric as its running mate, on a campaign of constant dissembling, misinformation, contradiction, and almost non ending blatant head candidate inconsistency — only got 53% of the vote, and lost among whites. (The most common excuse here being that he is “Black,” or, once again, simply disparaging voters as those who make “bad” decisions because they are not as “smart.”)

So the question is once again avoided; or, we could say, the question is never even properly considered. Because, “everyone knows what we know.” And, thus it is okay to use curse words and engage in off putting incivility, so long as your position is not “morally repugnant and indecent,” based upon online Democrats, and in this case your similar, interpretation of what is morally repugnant and indecent.

Yet, again, if we all knew what in fact was the case, Bush would not have gotten one third of the vote in 2004, and we would not be having the “debates” and current ridiculous framing on issues that we, in America, still again do today.

So let’s look at that statement you make, that is so often repeated as a matter of accepted, gospel truth. We’ll skip the also problematic and obviously hyperbolic assertion that “everything the Republican leaders said about Iraq turned out to be false, fictitious, imaginary,” because certainly a large amount of it was wrong, and look at this:

“And their false-pretense war led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings.”

What was the false pretense? That Iraq had WMDs?

How many years had it been since weapons inspectors had been in Iraq up until that point?

Four years. As for inspections prior to that? Considered non probative, because Iraq had not cooperated. And the state of our actual intelligence, as a result? Almost every single intelligence agency report noted that our beliefs about Iraq WMDs were assumptions rendered “in the absence of credible data.”

To take one example, why had Senator John Kerry voted, to quote Democrats as well as Republicans, “for war”? He pointed out on the floor of the Senate how many who opposed the Iraq Resolution had called for weapons inspections. In his words, just before the vote, “In order to force inspections, you need the [real] threat of force.” Kerry, then, verbatim, again just before said vote, clearly stated: “Let me be clear, the vote I will give to the President is for one reason and one reason only: To disarm Iraq of WMDs, if we can not [achieve this through] ….inspections in joint concert with our allies.”

Between all the shouting; cursing; presumptiveness; blaming of Kerry’s sometimes meandering explanations; abysmal media coverage; Democrat ridiculous acquiescence in, dismissal of, or — almost as ineffective presumptuous anger toward (without adequately illustrating) this same abysmal media coverage; and near constant far right misrepresentations, there was no clarity. (And still isn’t.)

And what happened after that vote? By December, we had international weapons inspectors in Iraq, for the first time in years, and for years more than that since viable inspections had actually taken place. And guess what, as reported in both the Washington Post and the NY Times (though both papers apparently did not read their own articles, when formulating their rah-rah groupthink cheerleading views): Inspectors were not finding anything, and were unequivocally saying to “wait.” (It’s in some measure why most of the permanent members of the Security Council voted against authorization, rendering our action, technically, and patently, in violation of international accords.)

Bush, from Cincinnati, back in October, told the entire nation, in a speech, that approving the Iraq resolution did not mean that war with Iraq was imminent, or unavoidable. The only two things that changed after that speech were 1) that expected UN (aka widespread international) support and authorization — absolutely essential in a non provoked military action engaged in to win over “hearts and minds” in an otherwise highly skeptical and fairly hostile region — did not materialize; and 2) the given pretense for the war, WMD’s, by March of ‘03 based upon facts that were publicly available, was of highly questionable value, and likely incorrect.

So how was it that the Bush supporters/Neo-cons brought us a false pretense war?

Again, what false pretense? That Iraq had WMDs? And why was that, because the Bush Administration knew better than every single major intelligence report, that stated “these are assumptions”? That they knew better despite the fact that there had been no credible weapons inspections in Iraq for many years? They knew better despite the fact that all credible intelligence reports stated it was an educated guess based upon presumptions that required confirmation? They knew better despite the fact that once the world was able to actively engage in said confirmation, inspectors, before we initiated action, were unanimously saying there was no indication of said confirmation?

The fact is, most people thought Iraq had WMD’s. And most — including most media sources (notably and absurdly, as we have discussed, according to the Post’s David Ignatius, because “Democrats did not make the case”) — simply did not pay attention to the objective facts, as they were developing. (An extraordinarily dangerous policy, by the way, when it comes to matters of war.)

To merely summarize that as a “false pretense war” on the part of the Bush administration and supporters alone, when a) we had the facts necessary to make a decent determination at the time, and collectively, as a country, neglected to do so, and b) most people, reasonably, had thought Iraq had WMDs, simply does not capture the true story.

What it does capture, or do, is blame mongering.

And, moreover, what if Iraq had WMDs? Does that make it not a false pretense war? Was Iraq really going to turn them over to mad men bent upon rampant civil destruction on American soil?

International terrorism is a grave, perhaps underrated threat. But the fear of a sovereign state, even surreptitiously, trying to engage in it themselves, or provide the WMDs for such acts, albeit theoretically real, was a little out there as a justification to lose sight of eradicating al-Qaeda, and engaging in the dangerous, wildly costly, and extremely risky task of nation building in a country otherwise unconnected to the original acts.

But let’s look at the second part of that statement that you assert, namely:

“…led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings.”

Technically, this may be accurate. In a “but for” causal sense. But it is statements and ironclad assertions (without effectively showing) like it, which helped keep the country so in the dark in the election of 2004, on the very related issues of Trust, and National Security, in a race which John Kerry essentially lost; on the issues of Trust, and National Security.

That is, by taking the “everyone knows what we know” attitude, few were ever reached who were not otherwise knee jerk against that war and the Bush Administration; and many other Americans, who well would have been reached, were not.

And what caused them not to be reached, more than anything else (aside from Democrats simply not making and showing their case, of course), was the implicit presumption that it was simply a “lie” engaged in by “bad, evil” men who are “responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands.” Or 2004’s earlier version of that.

It lacks credibility with anyone who does not have that same point of view. Today, more people may have that view, but the exact same phenomenon still applies. (And even a media, that should be integrating some of the very insightful, powerful, and important, constitutional points that you make, into their coverage, thus easily dismisses them because they get erroneously, and lazily, thrown into the same category of “absolutist;” which is — as you aptly point out — otherwise so preposterous.)

The fact is, Iraq was ruled by a malevolent dictator, who was in repeated non compliance with UN resolutions. That does not give us the right to unilaterally decide how, when, and by whom — in direct contravention of UN permanent member Security Council vote — such non compliance must be enforced. (Another argument that was ridiculously botched by both the media, and Democrats, as this “debate” waged on throughout 2004; with many to most Americans believing that the UN had voted for this action by essentially passing a non compliance resolution, and that our actions were perfectly legitimate therein. And most Americans, including many Democrats, still think Kerry was a “flip flopper” on the Iraq war; the defining issue of the election.)

But it is fairly relevant. Iraq lived under extremely repressive, dictatorial rule. Many in the country did in fact welcome our efforts to “liberate” them. (Many more did not; and in one of the bigger, lazier, and more dangerous media misconstructions of the decade, Iraqis who may have been misguided in their views as to why we were in Iraq but had the right to believe we were in their country hostilely and thus the sovereign right to take up arms, were mistakenly all lumped in together with culturally psychotic terrorists.)

There was always an underlying theory, which frankly, in some ways made more sense than the idea that Iraq had WMDs, even if Iraq had WMDs. And that was in fact the “nation building” theory. The same thing that Bush had emphatically told the nation, while a candidate against Al Gore back in 2000, that he absolutely would never engage in.

Democrats often confuse the fact that neo-cons and others often offered differing rationales for support, with the mistaken conclusion that therefore all rationales offered must have been invalid — and so tend to prematurely dismiss this. But it was likely a main reason behind the war:

In March of 2003 weapons inspectors were clearly saying “we see no signs of WMDS.” But public support at that moment was high. What was the case against waiting, if WMDS were the real issue? Yet what was the cost, as more and more information that weapons inspectors could not find anything, filtered in, of waiting for those who simply wanted to prosecute this war.

Think about that. Maybe the President himself, and perhaps the Vice President, were so smitten with hatred of Iraq, and perhaps the President with the task of finishing the war that his father prematurely, but understandably, ended — and upon the leader who had also apparently plotted to take his father’s life — was overtaken with the fervent belief that Iraq really had WMDs. But do you believe everyone else in relevant support — or acceptance — of the war was really blind to the basic facts, simply because our media was doing a rather poor job of getting them out there?

The war was terribly managed. Many of the same points “Kerry the alleged flip flopper” — according to conventional wisdom, his opponents, the media, and many in his own party — had advocated, were finally taken up by the Bush Administration, after hesitancy and mismanagement had greatly exacerbated the situation. Then when Kerry, almost completely unsupported by Democrats, tried to make these points in conjunction with the broader, more widely supported idea that this administration was not competent enough to lead on these issues — in classic Orwellian fashion Kerry was continually portrayed as “undermining” our troops. And Democrats permitted it. Why? Because they likely presumed, just as on everything else, that it was so obvious that it was wrong.

Yet it wasn’t obvious. To half the country. And as we’ve briefly seen, excuses were made with respect to that, too. (With some Democrats burying their head even further in the sand by somehow confusing the very legitimate issue of what happened in Ohio, and who really won the election, with the idea that Kerry theoretically may have (or in their minds, “did”) win, with the still stark reality that almost half the country did not get these points — because they were not shown; merely presumed, to be “obvious.”)

There was an exceptionally strong case to be made that the Iraq action, at the time, and in the fashion that we were undertaking it, was both strategically unsound, and an unwise move. (I actually attempted to explain why, in a failed attempt to get an Op-Ed published in the Washington Post around February of 2003). And to much of the rest of the world, our engagement in Iraq represented a fairly threatening, bullying action, by the most powerful country on earth, who had apparently just decided that international law and accords were discretionary, based upon the idea of significant WMD presence — when shortly before the action was initiated, weapons inspectors, conducting valid weapons inspections, were saying they were not finding anything.

But the cause was not for oil (that is a seemingly far fetched claim that also makes little practical sense). It was to create freedom for Iraqis (those not killed in the process), no matter that it is not necessarily our right to do so, or that we may have done so largely because we believed it was in our interests. Aside from the terrible management, the nearly as bad media coverage (and “opponent” response both leading up to and in the first year afterward, including the allowance of those on the right and almost constantly in the media to completely commingle the action, in the public dialogue, with our efforts in Afghanistan), the “war” was not this highly criminal, completely evil endeavor as it is frequently made out to be, and in which characterization you somewhat engage as well.

More importantly, to claim that we “relied” upon the Bush Administration’s ostensible claims of “special information” is somewhat far-fetched, even if “it” has become the conventional “left,” and perhaps even media wisdom to which you seem to have automatically attuned. (Let alone in consideration of the yellowcake fiasco. And there was evidence of this prior to late March of ‘03).

My bottom line point to you is that in an otherwise excellent column, you exhibit a lot of the same “everybody knows what we know and if you don’t know this or see it you can’t be serious” tendencies that have kept otherwise important messages and facts from gaining the widespread traction, let alone saturation, that they need. And the idea that thinking that “morally repugnant and indecent ideas” have to always be objectively known (even in those case where they in fact are morally repugnant and indecent) — when if they were, we would not as a nation be having the discussion in the first place — whereas it is otherwise okay to curse and scream instead of making the case that needs to be made, is a big part of the reason why.

Maybe it’s all right to express these “views” this way. But it is exactly this which has helped to lead to the unnecessary, and increasingly shrill, and counterproductive polarization that has materialized on the web — the same counterproductive polarization that perhaps, as part of it, you don’t seem to fully realize is not adding to the debate in the manner the self echoing reverberation chamber believes it to be.

As exhibit A, consider the fact that just a few days before this column appeared, you wrote about how for so many years, the media had “no checks;” but how now today bloggers and commenters are “checking” it and making it better! Without any apparent awareness that the media has gotten worse, or how getting an occasional fact corrected in an increasing sea of bad, groupthink, and skewed reporting, is not the big picture. The big picture is why incredibly ridiculous errors (such as that committed by NY Times reporter Robert Mackay ) are occurring, and it is precisely because Democrats, and the so called “bloggers/commenters” are not acting as the broad check that you want to think that they are, and which “big picture” can easily be perpetuated by always just blaming the media, and “evil, lying” people on the Right.

And it perpetuates the direction this country is headed in. (What will be the sob story when Democrats, when they lose control of Congress in 2010, after having been absolutely demolished in national elections most of this decade not by Republicans, but often by Far Right Republicans, while running against three exceedingly untrustworthy national campaigns that nevertheless won twice (three times among the white vote) based upon trust more than anything else?)

What type of blame game will take shape then? What type of self righteous cursing and justification of incivility will take place: justification that undermines the one real thing — since they can’t sell and spin as nearly as well as those on the Right — Democrats have going for them, and that is reasonable debate and discussion, focusing in on the actual facts.

What defines “reasonable,” as there is no other objective way to do so, is not the points made, but the degree to which they are supported (or appear to be supported) and the degree of graciousness, respect, and civility with which they are conveyed. If not necessarily to one’s opponents, at least to, most importantly of all, the American people themselves. And this is what is at the root of all of this — which Bob Somerby of the Daily Howler sometimes writes of; Democrats talking down to them. And taking them for granted, treating American voters either like they already know everything, or if they don’t, dismissing the need to reach them.

And one classic example of that is the idea, of course, that it is okay to “curse,” “shout”: and so forth, so long as you are right. But here’s the catch. If the American people, not just the self reverberating echo chamber, knew that you were right? There’d be no perceived need to “curse” and shout,” would there be. Reach them, and reach outside of that chamber.
 ____________________________________