Republican Delusions In Front of Holy Reagan

Political debates tend to be great forums for spreading misinformation. Of course, the September 7th, 2011 Republican debate at the Reagan Library was no exception. Three major fact checking sources have already taken aim at a few of the claims given during the Republican debates:

• Fact Checker: "Fact checking the GOP debate at the Reagan library"
• Politifact: "Fact-checking the Reagan Library debate"
• FactCheck: "FactChecking the Reagan Debate"

In addition to these, I thought I would share a bit more, as well as highlight a few major points.

Perry blew it

As conservative blogger David Frum put it "The revelation from the Republican presidential debate: Rick Perry and his team utterly failed to prepare answers to utterly predictable questions":

1. "Perry’s Social Security answer delivered President Obama the perfect clip for a 2012 negative ad"
2. “military adventurism”
3. Perry's performance was "Nervous, irritable, stuttering, floundering"
4. Perry failed to explain away the lousy statistic about health insurance coverage in his state.
5. "How could a Texas governor be unready to talk about immigration?"

Utterly unimpressive.... I can only hope it hurts is image solely with non-Republicans.
Of course the most memorable part of the night was when Rick Perry referred to Social Security as a "Ponzi Scheme". For a moment, let us set aside the fact that this may not sit well with the 75% of Americans who support Social Security. Politifact has already tackled this claim quite often in the past and found it to be incredibly misleading at best. This comment also motivated Glenn Kessler to write "A primer on Social Security"


Bachmann misses the market crash

Michelle Bachmann made an interesting comment during the debate:

Don't forget the day that President Obama took office, gasoline was $1.79 a gallon. It's entirely possible for us to get back to inexpensive energy.

Politifact rated the statement True. Of course they also pointed out how little the president can do about gas prices:

"Other than lip service, there is little any president or member of Congress can do about the price of gas, since 70 percent of the cost of a gallon is determined by the cost of crude oil," said John B. Townsend II, a spokesman for the mid-Atlantic region of the American Automobile Association... (emphasis mine)

So, although the statement is technically true, the context in which it was given (that it was Obama's fault and she can fix the problem), is almost entirely false.
However, what seemed to be left out of the analysis is that the reason gasoline prices were at $1.79 when Obama took office is almost entirely due to the fact that much of the world was falling into a deep recession, significantly lowering the demand for gasoline. There is little evidence that increased drilling would have nearly the effect on gasoline prices that Bachmann predicts. The only realistic way to get gasoline prices THAT low during a Bachmann presidency would be another massive recession (which may not be all that unlikely during a Republican presidency). Does Bachmann want that?

Perry gets it spectacularly wrong on Galileo

During the debate, Rick Perry made an interesting remark about climate change and Galileo:

“The idea that we would put Americans’ economy in jeopardy based on scientific theory that’s not settled yet to me is just — is nonsense. I mean, it — I mean, and I told somebody, I said, just because you have a group of scientists that have stood up and said, here is the fact — Galileo got outvoted for a spell.”

Henry Fountain of the New York Times dove right onto this statement (with some help from historian Thomas Mayer):

Galileo, whose astronomical observations confirmed the Copernican theory that the Earth revolved around the Sun, was basing his assertions on empirical knowledge and faced opposition from the Roman Catholic Church, which supported the Ptolemaic view of an Earth-centered universe.

Mr. Perry, by contrast, has said repeatedly that he does not believe the empirical evidence compiled by scientists in support of climate change, but that he does adhere to faith-based principles.(emphasis mine)

In other words, Perry got it spectacularly wrong. Galileo was not a "maverick" among scientists. Scientists often agreed with him. His real opposition was from the Church. And that was mostly due to disobedience, as well as his attempt to fit the Copernican model of the solar system to the bible.

Update 9-12-11: Chris Mooney brings up a few more points on the Perry/Galileo comment.

Job Spin

No political debate would be complete without a few politicians either taking credit or dishing out blame for job creation (or the lack thereof). Romney, Perry, and Huntsman each had a little share in this sort of fun. Of course, this tends to be an issue mostly with candidates who have previously held (or currently hold) executive positions (presidents/governors/mayors). In this case, all three of these candidates have had experience with such a position. FactCheck took on a few of these claims:

• Romney tried to take credit for reversing the job situation in his state when he assumed office. However, he left out the part where Massachusetts also ranked 47th in the nation in job growth.
• Perry once again attempted to spin his "success" with job creation as governor of Texas. However, he left out quite a few other statistics, ones that would not look so favorable. For instance, while actually being nothing special in regards to unemployment (27th in the nation at 8.4% in July 2011), Texas also has the highest percentage of hourly workers paid at or below minimum wage as well as the highest proportion of medically uninsured people in the nation.
• Huntsman used BLS survey data to support his claim that Utah was #1 in the nation in job growth from Jan 2005 to Aug 2009. However, using payroll data (a preference for most economists), Utah only ranked 4th (notably behind Texas).

Update 9-12-11: The Fact Checker takes a look at the claims of Perry, Romney, and Huntsman about eachother's jobs records.

Recently Republicans have had little trouble divorcing themselves from reality. These Republican debates provide no divergence from this trend.

Weely Roundup - Time, Income Inequality, Green Energy, Texas Jobs, and Hurricane Irene (8/28/11-9/3/11)

Welcome to the second edition of my Weekly Roundup, a collection of some of my favorite Facebook posts for the last week. I understand I post a lot of things Facebook and, for anyone who is interested but doesn't have the time to read them all, this will give them a chance to see what I think are the most important. I will also get a chance to elaborate a bit more on certain posts. I will try to do this on a weekly basis but we will see if it works out. I am busy with school so I may not get a chance to do this every week.


Sciencey kinda stuff
 For my science posts this week, I started off with an interesting post from Sean M Carrol presenting a few facts about time ever one needs to know. Skeptical Science debunks more claims from climate "skeptics" about the negative aspects of renewable energy. I also ensured to post a link to Conway's game of life, a great simulator to help demonstrate that complexity can arise from chaos. Skeptoid takes on a few student questions, including the abuse of the word "information" by creationists. Skeptical Science points out the fallacy in claiming CO2 is just a trace gas and can therefore not have a significant effect on global warming. Finally, Paul Krugman laments the days when at least Mitt Romney actually accepted modern science.


Sean Carroll: "Ten Things Everyone Should Know About Time"
‎Sean Carroll talks time metaphysics, relativity, human experience and memory, aging (even in reverse), complexity, and entropy:
On time metaphysics...

Intuitively we think that the “now” is real, while the past is fixed and in the books, and the future hasn’t yet occurred. But physics teaches us something remarkable: every event in the past and future is implicit in the current moment(emphasis mine)

On human memory...

When you remember an event in the past, your brain uses a very similar technique to imagining the future. The process is less like “replaying a video” than “putting on a play from a script.” If the script is wrong for whatever reason, you can have a false memory that is just as vivid as a true one.(emphasis mine)

On "reverse-aging"...

We all grow old, part of the general trend toward growing disorder. But it’s only the universe as a whole that must increase in entropy, not every individual piece of it.... As one biologist told me: “You and I won’t live forever. But as for our grandkids, I’m not placing any bets.”(emphasis mine)

Skeptical Science: "Michaels Mischief #2: Opposing Climate Solutions":
Climate "skeptic" Patrick Michaels makes some pretty poor errors for someone who posts in a business magazine. These are common errors seen among climate "skeptics" who ignore basic economics 101 in order to make the claim that renewable energy is inefficient:
Michaels claims that solar energy and wind energy markets are not doing so well, despite government subsidies. However:

"The U.S. solar power market grew a record 67% last year [2010], making it the fastest-growing energy sector... The story is similar for the wind industry, which is already rebounding from a brief stall in its growth in 2010"

Michaels complains about Electric Cars and Plug-in Hybrids, criticizing their current price tags. As a result he says they are not the wave of the future. However, this is an obvious economic fallacy:

Michaels seems to believe that for a technology to be "the wave of the future," it must immediately be available at a high "comfort level" and low cost. Perhaps Michaels needs to be reminded that the first cell phone weighed 2 pounds (~1kg), offered just a half-hour of talk time for every recharging, and sold for $3,995. Not quite cheap or comfortable, and yet they were undeniably "the wave of the future."

See the article for more rebuttals to Michaels' ridiculously amateur claims...


John Conway's "Game of Life":
The computer simulation is a great tool for understanding how complexity can arise out of apparent chaos. It shows how a few simple rules can create immensely complex systems. This should help out anyone who seeks an honest understanding of Reductionism and "bottom-up design," which have both become strong pillars of modern physics and biology.


Skeptoid: "Student Questions: Energy Shots and Sunscreen":
This recent episode of Skeptoid deals with some interesting questions sent to him by students. Here he tackles myths about "5-hour energy shots," as well as a common creationist abuse of the word "information" in regards to entropy. Although he does not give the best response to the "information" issue, the first comment on this thread actually does a good job. I even chimed in later. However, he is basically right that Creationists do abuse the term.


Skeptical Science: "CO2 is just a trace gas":
A common claim you may hear from Climate Change "skeptics" is that CO2 makes up a tiny fraction of the atmosphere and therefore shouldn't have any significant impact on temperatures. For example John Coleman has made such a claim before. This article does a great job pointing the fallacy in this idea.
One thing this article does not mention is that this "trace gas" is "the only thing between us and a frozen planet." (see link to John Coleman's statements)


Paul Krugman: "Republicans Against Science":
Even Romney is back-peddling from his once admirable pro-science views. This should give us a hint to his true character. However, anyone who has paid attention to the Wall Street Journal over the past few years knows that it is now increasingly promoting heuristics as a substitute for real critical thinking. Frum presents a few


What About Obama
 All of my favorite posts this week about Obama came from Conservatives. Bruce Bartlett, while criticizing the Obama Administration's plan to extend the Payroll Tax Cut, effectively presents a great argument against Republican calls for low taxes to stimulate the economy. David Frum lists 3 of what he considers to be Obama's biggest Mistakes. Finally, Greg Mankiw congratulates Obama on his nomination of Alan Krueger to chair the CEA.


Bruce Bartlett: "The Case Against a Payroll Tax Cut":
The payroll tax cut is often seen as an effective stimulus idea among politicians from both sides of the political spectrum. It is direct and instantly noticeable. Conventional Macroeconomics states that the extra money that goes back to workers, as a result of this cut, will increase aggregate demand. However, Bartlett gives a four reasons to be skeptical of the theorized effectiveness of this tax cut:

"First, the tax cut only helps those with jobs. While many have low wages and undoubtedly are spending all their additional cash flow, those with the greatest need and most likely to spend any additional income are the unemployed.
Second, the payroll tax cut helps many workers who have no need for it and will only pocket the tax savings.
Third, economic theory and the experience with tax rebates in 2001 and 2008 tell us that people are strongly inclined to save temporary increases in income. People only increase their spending when they perceive an increase in their permanent income.
Fourth, even if one assumes that the cost of employment has declined and employers can somehow capture some of the payroll tax cut, there’s little sign that labor costs are the principal factor holding back hiring....
Another issue is whether the Social Security tax is really a tax at all. A case can be made that it is really part of a worker’s compensation, rather than a reduction of it... ...workers may well view a cut in Social Security taxes as diminishing their future benefits, which may cause them to increase their saving rather than spend the additional cash flow."(emphasis mine)

David Frum: "Obama's three big mistakes":
Frum explains some of what he perceives as Obama's biggest mistakes:
1. Obama let Congressional Democrats Shape the stimulus instead of his own economists.
2. Obama sat by while the fed reacted to unjustified inflationary fears.
3. Toward the public, Obama treated this recession like a normal cyclical recession instead of the financial meltdown it truly was.
Although I fully agree with his second and third criticisms, I only half agree with his first. The individual tax rebates were definitely a poor move. And yes the stimulus was not perfectly designed. However, I have pointed out before that the stimulus actually did a bit better than its critics like to think. I would likely add the caveat that Obama's stimulus was not designed for the right kind of recession. This ties into his 3rd criticism. All it was really meant to do was stop the economy from free-falling. The assumption that the economy would then heal itself was clearly wrong (as this was not a cyclical recession, rather a financial meltdown).
Jared Bernstein critiques Frum.
David Frum responds to Bermstein.


Greg Mankiw: "Alan Krueger to chair CEA":
Former CEA Chairman and Harvard Economist Greg Mankiw commends President Obama on his nomination of Alan Krueger to replace Austan Goolsbee as chair of CEA. He also gives a few comments on the decision. One thing to note is that Krueger specializes in labor economics and not generalized Macroeconomics. We will see how this goes...
Paul Krugman also gives his take on the nomination.


Fact Checks
 This week I posted a great article for Liberals seeking to show how bad income inequality has become. FactCheck posts a comprehensive nonpartisan article looking at the details behind job growth in Texas (a must read for anyone planning on voting in this next election). Politifact points out a few important facts in looking at how the US fares on energy resources. Finally, Politifact once again dispels a popular Democratic myth about the GOP and medicare.


Politifact: "Robert Reich says ratio of corporate profits to wages is highest since before Great Depression":
A significant factor to this has been the recession/financial meltdown. Still, there has been a general trend toward this since the Great Depression.
One note on this: Dan Mitchell with the libertarian CATO institute blames this mainly on "a climate of economic uncertainty, largely thanks to the threat of more taxes and regulations." However, Bruce Bartlett has recently noted that "there’s little sign that labor costs are the principal factor holding back hiring." The real problem is a lack of sales. He notes that in "the latest survey [from the NFIB], 23 percent of businesses said poor sales were their No. 1 problem and only 4 percent cited the cost of labor." Since regulation and taxes primarily effect the cost of labor, there is little reason to consider future taxes and regulation a significant effect.


FactCheck: "Texas-Size Recovery":
Good overall view of the Texas job-growth situation:

"Texas job statistics are a mixed bag. Perry’s supporters and Perry’s detractors select the statistics that suit their spin. Here we'll just lay out a balanced look at the facts — good and bad alike — and leave the spin to others."

Politifact: "Michele Bachmann says U.S. is No. 1 in the world for energy resources":
Although this may be technically true. There are a few very important caveats that make the context in which this fact was cited highly questionable.


Fact Checker: "Biden’s claim that the GOP will ‘eliminate’ Medicare":
At least Obama now uses the caveat "as we know it." This is the Democrats' lie of choice, similar to the Republicans' "Obamacare is a government takeover of the health care industry." Sadly, it is this kind of tactical dishonesty that wins elections nowadays...
Note: Hochul ( "elections" link) skirted the line on the GOP medicare plan


Oh that crazy ole GOP
What would a good Weekly Roundup be without a bit of GOP bashing. Religion news service starts us out by making the case that Bachmann's "joke" about hurricane Irene may be seen as quite serious by a few of her constituents. David Frum asks the question on every one's mind. Krugman bashes Eric Cantor's hostage-taking of Hurricane Irene victims. Finally, I post an article showing more evidence the GOP may be in danger of losing support in the future.


Religion News Service: "Bachmann’s prophecy, joke or not, has lots of company":
Although Bachmann's remark about Hurricane Irene being a message from God was meant only as a joke. There is reason to think a substantial number of white evangelicals just might take it seriously...


David Frum: "Is Perry Dumb?":
Sarah Palin wasn't dumb. She was just ignorant and unqualified. Perry however may be another story...

Paul Krugman: "Eric and Irene":

The primary issue should be the extraordinary nihilism now on display by Mr. Cantor and his colleagues — their willingness to flout all the usual conventions of fair play and, well, decency in order to get what they want.
Not long ago, a political party seeking to change U.S. policy would try to achieve that goal by building popular support for its ideas, then implementing those ideas through legislation. That, after all, is how our political system was designed to work.
But today’s G.O.P. has decided to bypass all that and go for a quicker route. Never mind getting enough votes to pass legislation; it gets what it wants by threatening to hurt America if its demands aren’t met. That’s what happened with the debt-ceiling fight, and now it’s what’s happening over disaster aid. In effect, Mr. Cantor and his allies are threatening to take hurricane victims hostage, using their suffering as a bargaining chip. (emphasis mine)

Steve Landsburg critiques Krugman's blog post on this subject.
Krugman responds to Landsburg.


Eric Levine: "Minority data shows a grim future for the GOP":

"The latest wave of 2010 Census data, released this week, confirms what earlier surveys have strongly hinted: virtually half of recent births in the U.S. are minorities...
Unless the GOP is willing to fundamentally change a few of its sacred views, the party is in severe danger of losing support in the long term."

A little Fun
As most people with an iPhone know, the built in "auto-correct" function can sometimes be a hassle, often creating a few hilarious texts. damnyouautocorrect.com lists quite a few of these. After reading these, whether or not you decide to turn the auto correct on or off is up to you.

Weely Roundup - Fact Checks, Rational Conservatism, Perry's Blunders, End of CSA, Minecraft (8/21/11-8/27/11)

I have decided to attempt a weekly roundup of some of my favorite Facebook posts for the last week. I understand I do post a lot of things Facebook and, for anyone who is interested but doesn't have the time to read them all, this will give them a chance to see the most important. I will also get a chance to elaborate a bit more on certain posts. I will try to do this on a weekly basis but we will see if it works out. I am busy with school so I may not get a chance to do this every week. At the very least, most of them won't be as long as this first one. In the future I am thinking of keeping these down to 10 (minus support links).
Note: Some of these articles/posts may be more than a week old. I'm including them here because I linked to them on Facebook this week.


Rick Perry is becoming the new Bachmann:
Texas Gvoernor Rick Perry, who officially entered the 2012 Presidential Race recently (Despite the fact that he said he would definitely not run for president in 2012), has been trash talking Obama, the Fed, and Liberalism quite a bit lately. However, he often does not get his facts straight. Michelle Bachmann has been criticized for playing fast and loose with the facts. Now it seems as though Perry wants to take her place as the Candidate divorced from reality:

Fact Checker: "Fact checking Rick Perry’s announcement speech":
Once again, more examples of Rick Perry playing fast and loose with the facts, although not quite as patently false as other times.

"On a blended basis, we would rate this as a Two Pinocchio speech, similar to many of the other announcement speeches — a mishmash of high-flying rhetoric and facts sometimes tethered uncertainly to the truth."

Fact Checker: "Rick Perry’s claim that Obama has ‘killed more jobs’ than any other president":
"We gave Romney one Pinocchio because his statement lacked context even though it was technically accurate. Judging from Perry’s statements in his first week as a candidate, he doesn’t seem to care all that much about even technical accuracy; he just shoots from the hip."
As a caveat to this, the Fact Checker was corrected for a mistake he made on a similar post regarding his definition of job creation:
"The Post Fact Checker Gless Kessler writes yesterday: “By the standard definition of job creation during a presidency, [Obama] is on track to be the first president to have negative job growth in the modern era.”
This is all arbitrary and stupid, since boom/bust periods and presidential administrations don’t magically align their cycles like Smith College roommates....

The “standard definition” cited by Kessler is a link to this WSJ 2009 analysis, showing that job creation under George W. Bush was the worst under any president since WWII.... there is so rarely any very significant change in employment from month to month, and never has there been a very large change in the month a new president was inaugurated.
Until, of course, January 2009.
In the four transitions before 2001, job growth from December-January ranged between 0.24% and 0.3%.  In 2001, it was close to zero.  But during January 2009, the U.S. economy shed more jobs – 820,000– than in any month since WWII, and 0.61% of all jobs....
So the “standard definition” Kessler cites is fundamentally incorrect because of the dates used...
It’s also fundamentally flawed because it doesn’t take into account population growth.... A fair assessment of job creation has to incorporate population growth. A much better assessment of job creation is the change in employment as a share of the population, the employment ratio.  Using that measure, half of the previous 10 presidents saw the employment situation decline during their tenures. This should not come as a surprise; hearing that Obama would be the first president in history with bad job creation numbers should raise a red flag about the qualify of the analysis." (emphasis added)

Fact Check: "FactChecking Perry":

"In his announcement speech, Perry said the U.S. cannot afford four more years of "rising energy dependence on nations that intend us harm." But U.S. reliance on foreign oil has dropped under President Barack Obama, and it is expected to decline again this year...
Perry also incorrectly claimed in his speech that Obama's economic policies "have given us record debt." U.S. public debt as a percentage of the nation's economy is at its highest level since World War II, but not at a record high...
Last November, Perry exaggerated the financial problems of the Social Security system...
Also in November, Perry exaggerated how much Texas' share of Medicaid costs would increase as a result of the new federal health care law. Perry said the new law would cost Texas "$27 billion more, over and above what we’re already paying over the next 10 years... the federal government will pay most of the extra cost... The total Medicaid cost for the state would be $4.5 billion — but that's only 5.1 percent more, or $219 million, than it would have been without the new law."

Paul Krugman: "The Texas Unmiracle": 
Although this article isn't a "fact check" of Rick Perry, it does make a few good points clearing up Perry's various claims to fame about job creation in Texas:

"the Texas miracle is a myth, and more broadly that Texan experience offers no useful lessons on how to restore national full employment. It's true that Texas entered recession a bit later than the rest of America, mainly because the state's still energy-heavy economy was buoyed by high oil prices through the first half of 2008.
So where does the notion of a Texas miracle come from? Mainly from widespread misunderstanding of the economic effects of population growth.
For this much is true about Texas: It has, for many decades, had much faster population growth than the rest of America -- about twice as fast since 1990. Several factors underlie this rapid population growth: a high birth rate, immigration from Mexico, and inward migration of Americans from other states... the high rate of population growth translates into above-average job growth through a couple of channels. Many of the people moving to Texas... bring purchasing power that leads to greater local employment...
What Texas shows is that a state offering cheap labor and, less important, weak regulation can attract jobs from other states. I believe that the appropriate response to this insight is ''Well, duh.'' The point is that arguing from this experience that depressing wages and dismantling regulation in America as a whole would create more jobs... involves a fallacy of composition: every state can't lure jobs away from every other state.
In fact, at a national level lower wages would almost certainly lead to fewer jobs -- because they would leave working Americans even less able to cope with the overhang of debt left behind by the housing bubble, an overhang that is at the heart of our economic problem."(emphasis added)

Herb Silverman: "Science is not democratic":

Although this article is not a "fact check" of Perry, it points out the absurdity of Rick Perry's comment, "In Texas, we teach both creationism and evolution. I figure you're smart enough to figure out which one is right." 

"Apparently, Perry’s theory of science teaching is to tell children they are smart enough to figure out what is right and what is made up. Here are other scientific questions to ask small children: When you walk around, does the earth look flat or round? When you look at the sun in the morning and evening, does it look like the sun is moving around the earth or that the earth is moving around the sun at approximately 67,000 mph? Never mind the scientific consensus, you’re smart enough to just know...
We don’t take polls asking people if they “believe” in gravity, though the theory of evolution is better understood by scientists than is the theory of gravity...
...we are becoming one nation undereducated. "

Fact Checks:
This week, my favorite posts have been from the Washington Post Fact Checker, Glenn Kessler.

Fact Checker: "Obama’s denial that Biden called tea party activists ‘terrorists’":  
The evidence to suggest that Biden called TEA Party-ers "terrorists" is sketchy at best.

"On balance, then, we are going to give President Obama a rare Geppetto [pass] for his denial that Biden uttered those words. There is no firm evidence to believe Biden did" 

 Also note what George W. Bush’s former Treasury Secretary, Paul H. O’Neill said:

“The people who are threatening not to pass the debt ceiling are our version of al-Qaeda terrorists. Really. They’re really putting our whole society at risk by threatening to round up 50 percent of the members of the Congress, who are loony, who would put our credit at risk.”

Seems a bit hypocritical for conservative to complain...

Fact Checker: "Michele Bachmann’s too-good-to-be-true stat on federal workers":
The major raises in federal pay came from Bush. Obama, on the oher hand has had both the smallest pay increase since 1975 and an actual freezing of government pay. This is another fail for Michelle Bachmann.


Fact Check: "Obama’s Canadian-American Bus":
Actually, the Bus was purchased from a Tennessee bus-conversion company who got the bus from Canada. The bus was thought to be the only one with the required specs. It's 1/2 to 2/3 American made, by cost. I wonder if the Republican presidential nominee will turn down his/her own Canadian-American bus? My dad also pointed out:

The only American-owned company that builds over-the-road buses is Motor Coach Industries (MCI), based in Schaumburg, Illinois, and that company was actually founded in Winnipeg, Canada. GM and Flxible used to be the two big intercity bus manufacturers, but their operations were sold and subsequently discontinued. Gillig Corporation of Hayward, California, is the only American-owned company making transit buses.

Fact Check: "Front Group Claims EPA Threatens 7 Million Jobs":
Industry studies that donb't undergo thorough peer-review should always raise red flags.

"[The group] also answered our questions about the source of the ad's claim that 7 million jobs would be "at risk" because of the EPA's proposal. The basis turns out to be an economic study produced by the Manufacturers Alliance and financed by the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Petroleum Institute...
...the industry study's projection of 7 million lost jobs is disputed. Laurie Johnson, chief economist for the Natural Resources Defense Council, calls the study "junk analysis" and states: "No serious economist would consider this study valid." She also asked Professor Richard B. Howarth of Dartmouth College to evaluate it. Howarth called the industry study "fundamentally flawed, resting on an analytical framework that is scientifically unsound." He said it would rate a grade of "incomplete" if handed in as an undergraduate honors project." (emphasis added)

Eric Levine: "The Weekly Standard still thinks long division is a good substitute for critical thinking [Defending the Truth-O-Meter] ":
In my current Edition of Defending The Truth-O-Meter, I take on a rebuttal from The Weekly Standard against a Politifact Ruling. You may have seen a few politicians claim the Stimulus cost taxpayers $278,000 per job. Politifact Texas attempted to explain why this was inaccurate, yet TWS didn't understand. So i take a shot at explaining it to them.


Rational Conservatism (Surprisingly not an Oxymoron)
Rcently I have become a fan of the FrumForum. This site gives me a chance to get a conservative perspective from a source that seems to care at least a bit about reality. David Frum is Republican of the Reagan era. He has very little patience with today's modern Tea Party movement. He is quick to criticize the movement and it's ideas. He yearns for the day that Republicans return to the days of Reagan, when they actually had a positive relationship with reality yet still held true to Conservative ideals. If you are a conservative, I highly recommend reading his posts. I also suggest Liberals read these posts as well so that they can understand that one can be conservative AND rational. I may not agree with everything he says. But we do have common ground. Anyone interested should first listen to this interview from Discover columnist Chris Mooney.

David Frum: "Can Romney Believe What He Says?"
David Frum has often appeared to support Mitt Romney. However, he spends this article criticizing Romney for pledging  "himself to policies that will squeeze jobs in the near term, at least according to conventional economic theory." He looks at four possible reasons for why Romney would do this, but none seem likely. His first possible explanation is the most interesting:

"1) Romney has become a true believer in the “confidence” theory of job creation. Unemployment remains high (according to this theory) because big government and loose money detract from business confidence. By cutting spending and tightening money, we can restore confidence and inspire business to hire again. This theory has been endorsed by many Republicans including Speaker Boehner. Maybe Romney has joined the crowd?
Problem with Answer 1: Romney just seems too damn smart to believe something so at odds with reality."

David Frum: "Huntsman 2016?" 
Even the most moderate candidate for the Republican Party is more concerned with cleaning up after the crisis is over than actually ending the crisis itself. ...though Jon Hunstman seems to be the only Republican with even a half-way serious plan.

David Frum bashes the Wall Street Journal:
David took note of the Wall Street Journal's recent attempts to bash the Fed. David Frum clears up the misinformation created by the Wall Street Journal in a series of posts. Here are a few I've linked from this series (don't know if that's all of them):
"Time to Downgrade the Journal’s Editorial Page": The WSJ continually has to make up pseudo-facts in order to continue promoting their idea of "sound money," despite how much it hampers near-term job creation.
"The Journal’s Memory Hole": Frum continues to point out the Wall Street Journal's pseudo-facts and revisionist history about this recession. He again points out the soulless bitching of those in favor of "tight money," as millions of Americans are currently out of work.
"Nice Central Bank You Have Here"

David Frum: "America's imagined inflation problem":
Why are Republicans still so concerned with inflation (let alone Hyper Inflation)? They are either delusional or they are trying to ensure the price of Gold continues to rise. If that is their plan, if is failing. The price of Gold finally fell this week.

Climate Change and Scientific Philosophy:
Skeptical Science: "Settled Science - Humans are Raising CO2 Levels":
This article gives a simplified rundown as to how we know increasing atmospheric CO2 levels are man-made (with links to more sophisticated detailed explanations). This article is a must-read for any layman interested in the science of climate change. I would also highly suggest this site as a standard resource when investigating the science of climate change.

The Economist: "We have a winner: British Columbia’s carbon tax woos sceptics":
From Greg Mankiw's Blog:
British Columbia has successfully instituted a Carbon Tax. The economy is still doing quite well and the public loves it. Maybe we can learn from them. For example, we could fund a cut to the payroll tax and/or corporate tax. We could also fund tax cuts for green energy in order to obtain a revenue neutral Carbon Tax.

The Intersection: "Michael Mann Cleared Again":

"Yet another organization, this time the National Science Foundation, has cleared climate scientist Michael Mann of wrongdoing (here is a pdf of the report closeout memorandum)...
The NSF also studied the university emails related to “climategate” and found “nothing contained in them evidenced research misconduct within the definition in the NSF Research Misconduct Regulation.”

Cosmic Variance: "What Can We Know About The World Without Looking At It?":
Physicist Sean M Carroll explains a common problem with Theologians think when dealing with God and Cosmology:

"Believing that something must be true about the world because you can’t imagine otherwise is, five hundred years into the Age of Science, not a recommended strategy for acquiring reliable knowledge. It goes back to the classic conflict of rationalism vs. empiricism. “Rationalism” sounds good — who doesn’t want to be rational? But the idea behind it is that we can reach true conclusions about the world by reason alone. We don’t ever have to leave the comfort of our living room; we can just sit around, sharing some single-malt Scotch and fine cigars, thinking really hard about the universe, and thereby achieve some real understanding. Empiricism, on the other hand, says that we should try to imagine all possible ways the world should be, and then actually go out and look at it to decide which way it really is...
But the intellectual history of the past five centuries has spoken loud and clear: the dream of rationalism is a false one. The right way to attain knowledge about the universe is ultimately empirical: we formulate all the hypotheses we can, and test them against data...
The temptation of rationalism can be a hard one to resist. We human beings are not blank slates; not only do we come equipped with informal heuristics for making sense of the world we see, but we have strong desires about how the world should operate. Intellectual honesty demands that we put those desires aside, and accept the world for what it actually is, whatever that may turn out to be."(emphasis added)

Note: A great site dealing with modern Rationality (informed by Empiricism) is the site Less Wrong. 

Common Sense Atheism: "Why I Don’t Care about Atheism vs. Theism Arguments Anymore":
This used to be one of my favorite sites dealing with the topic of Atheism/Naturalism vs Theism. Luke Muehlhauser (a.k.a Lukeprog) has created a great resource for anyone tired of the sloppy arguments from Dawkins or Comfort. He instead promoted Martin, Carrier, Loftus, Dawes, Craig, Swinburne, Plantinga, Copan and other sophisticated philosophers/historians. He provided a great reading list (as well as an easier version) for anyone seriously interested in the subject. His two podcasts were intellectually stimulating and entertaining. He didn't just merely attack theists for being irrational. Instead he actually engaged their arguments, admitting where he was wrong, and ultimately arguing his case for Metaphysical Naturalism.
However, in this recent article, Luke decides he no longer cares about these arguments anymore:

"The reason I’m an atheist isn’t because of the argument from evil or from unbelief or from inconsistent revelations or anything. No, the reason I’m an atheist is because theism drastically fails Solomonoff induction.
If I want to pull somebody away from magical thinking, I don’t need to mention atheism. Instead, I teach them Kolmogorov complexity and Bayesian updating. I show them the many ways our minds trick us. I show them the detailed neuroscience of human decision-making. I show them that we can see (in the brain) a behavior being selected up to 10 seconds before a person is consciously aware of ‘making’ that decision. I explain timelessness.
And if they have time to consume enough math and science, then The God Question just fades away as not even a question worth talking about."

As a result, Luke has instead dedicated his site to "math and the cognitive science of belief-formation and decision-making." His new slogan reads:

"Atheism is just the beginning;
now it's time to solve the harder questions."

I will have to admit I do find it ironic that, after bashing the new atheists, Luke finally succumbs to a similar line of reasoning about religion.

What? More Politics?
Brookings: "Will Obama Ever Say What He Should About the Jobs Crisis?":
Here, William A. Galston expresses many of the same feelings I have about what direction Washington should be going:
"we became infatuated with financial manipulation at the expense of the real economy. Not only did a rising share of profits go to the financial sector, but also many of our most talented young people were diverted from other careers in the productive sectors of the economy. We focused too much on financial innovations, some of which severely damaged our economy, and not enough on innovations in products and services...
Budget deficits this year and next are much less important than what happens over the next decade. We need a balanced, binding, and enforceable plan to stabilize our debt as a share of the economy within the next ten years, not the next two....
We need pro-savings, pro-investment, pro-growth tax reform...
To win the future, we need to make smart, targeted investments in those areas where the market won’t—in education, basic research, and infrastructure. And to do that, we’ll have to reduce spending in areas less directly related to growth and innovation...." (emphasis added)


Summer Ludwig: "10 Reasons Not To Vote For Ron Paul":
Although I posted this before last week, I thought it would be important to include. Anyone who considers themselves liberal, centrist, or anything other than a right wing nut-job, should not vote for Ron Paul. He is further to the right than any other candidate. I seriously regret ever supporting this wacko!
Many social-libertarians may be attracted to his message due to the fact that he often sounds more dedicated social-libertarian principles than liberals. However, a deeper dig should give liberals and social libertarians pause over whether or not this man supports their priorities or not.

That's It:
Well that wraps it up for my first "Weekly Roundup." However, I'm sure I will have to shrink these articles in the future, significantly. I may also add a few more things as well, such as any new podcasts I think may be worth mentioning. I also think I will wrap these up with a little bit of "brain candy:"

I, along with millions of others, have recently given up significant amounts of our lives playing a game called Minecraft. This "lego game" is amazingly fun and addictive. Right now, it is still in the Beta stage of development. However, a long anticipated "Adventure Update" is soon to appear. Needless to say, almost every player is excited. The new features will fundamentally change many of the aspects of this game, rewarding exploration and combat. So for the Minecraft fans currently reading this, i leave you with ""Revenge" - A Minecraft Parody of Usher's DJ Got Us Fallin' in Love - Crafted Using Noteblocks":


Note: I originally posted the "sped up" version of this video on accident. The original is now posted