Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

Sorry. This was the second post of mine today for which people just totally missed the point. (No, I'm not even counting Ty's "huh?") When everyone is honking at you on the freeway, it's time to move beyond "they must all suck as drivers."

My main point was found in the last sentence, in which I look at CA's propensity to do exactly what the examples illustrate, and not just in a wage-for-profession sense.

Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

Schools don't have a funding crisis. Funding is at an incredible level, historically.

Schools have a role crisis. We've tried to turn them into parents, doctors, jailers, counselors, AAG's, propogandists, therapists, nutritionists and soup kitchens, fashion arbiters, moral guides, . . . .

If we want them to do everything, we should just give them all our money, and our kids, 24/7.

But I don't think that's what we really want. I, for one, just want them to teach my kids the things that schools historically taught kids. I can do the rest.

Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

I wouldn't lay all that at the feet of parents.

I also think that an awful lot of money is spent on some kids with particular needs, and so it's not quite the right comparison to include them in the mix.

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

I'm not a member of the Arizona CLU, but Hi! anyway.

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

Quick question! you went to public schools and your parents were liberals, right?

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

Yes and no and yes and no.

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

flip flopper!

aV

Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

If she sold and bought a more expensive place (then her current place originally cost her), she would have higher property taxes than she currently has, but these would be more than offset by the appreciation on her first home. The delta works both ways. The lower her first place initally cost her, the greater likely increase in her property tax, but also the greater appreciation she would realize. In other words, I don't think this is a significant deterrent for most.

I also don't think those in this position are numerous enough to greatly affect the housing market.

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

The committee on PB post quality met, and I proposed that when I do a blanket slam of the libs I switch to you being the poster child- not Ty. then RT admitted that even the libs think you're brain damage so you wouldn't work in the Ty role. It's one of those things I'm not sure I should tell you about, like when your sis worked my cousin's bachelor party, but then and now I just thought you would want to know.

Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

It's very odd to find myself having to explain to you why a screwed-up government initiative is messing up the operation of markets, but here we are. Of course my neighbor will benefit from the appreciation on her current abode, offsetting the increased property taxes, but the proper comparison here should be to a world without the distorting effects of Prop 13. (And she already knows she'll get the one-time boost from selling her current place, but she'll have to pay those property taxes every year.)

This clearly affects housing markets, in the same way that rent control distorts them. Maybe it's not a "significant deterrent for most," but that's not necessary for it to affect housing prices. Prop 13 makes housing more expensive.

Anyone Catch Herpes Last Night?
 

Well, I suppose if China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Zimbabwe can be members of the UN Commission on Human Rights . . .

I knew Tyrone Slothrop,and you sir are no Tyrone Slothrop
 

See, Ty would have included the US under the Bush administration in the list....

Anyone Catch Arnold Last Night?
 

One goal of any person with appreciated capital is to avoid realizing that gain and having to pay taxes on it. If one's home has appreciated in value, every incentive is to avoid a sale and have to pay taxes on the k-gain. (I.e., paper gains are more valuable than actual gains). Realizing the gain does nothing, other than to avoid any loss in the future--that's the only benefit. One can easily take advantage of teh increased value through a refinance. So, there's no "delta" to work in your favor by selling.

Prop. 13 locks in homeowners to their current homes, because all things being equal, the taxes on teh current abode are lower than the taxes on a new house. Why would one want to sell a $1m home and buy another one for $1m, when the taxes will be higher? In fact, downsizing a home probably still means an upsizing in tax bills, if one has owned the older home long enough. In many cases, the net present value of the increase in taxes may be so large that a sale makes no sense (absent exiting the market altogether).

Prop. 13 may have social benefits, but a much better targeted program could achieve the same benefits without the lock-in costs.

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

Is that the only explanation as to why Rather's head isn't rolling as well?

(link)

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

More like "Homines quod volunt credunt."

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

Hows about, "owhay arescay, anywayway?"

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

Are we putting statutes of limitation on discussion? Because then I propose we delete all of last year's discussion on "Iraq: should we invade?"

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

Yes.

S_A_M

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

I think I was pretty clear that I never cared about Rather.

If I lived in VA, I'd join you. I presume someone has suggested advertising such a reading of the proposed law to Planned Parenthood or some such?

De mortuis nihil nisi bene
 

And I never cared about WMD's.

Fat lotta good that did me.

more bad news from Iraq
 

from Andrew Sullivan (who is more than a little excitable, so take this with a grain of salt):

more bad news from Iraq
 

Listening to the experts, I'm now convinced that either the whole place is going to degenerate into a bloody civil war within weeks, or a new government and feelings of empowerment will guide the Iraqis into creating a new, stable society.

One or the other.

At this point, I don't know.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Well, we're here to help.

My thoughts: the contrast between relative success in Afghanistan and relative failure in Iraq is very revealing.

In Afghanistan, our troops have expended more "Civil Affairs" effort than combat effort. While there have been a couple of points in time when troops were pulled back into combat-only roles or where issues arose over how to execute CA missions (e.g., in uniform or out of uniform, with other aid groups or separately), the military, both ours and the allies, has spent a lot of time engineering new bridges, rebuilding the ring roads, repairing schools, and even helping plant crops.

In Iraq, it's too dangerous and we're unwilling to take the risks to engage in the same level of CA activity. And the aid groups are reluctant to wander too far from protection.

In Iraq, we did not have a solid national base leading the charge, outside of Kurdistan. In Afghanistan, we knew who the Northern Alliance was and had a good sense of how to work the local alliances.

In Iraq, there was a premium on rapid victory, and we let our tactics rule. In Afghanistan, the rapid victory almost took us by surprise - we had prepared for and were preparing the Nothern Alliance for a much more protracted battle, and had thought the battle through in a strategic rather than a tactical manner.

So, now that we've learned something, should we be trying to figure out how to do it in a way similar to Afghanistan? Unfortunately, the process of building a local base when signing up with us gets you a free ride to power doesn't necessarily encourage the idealists we need to come to the fore.

more bad news from Iraq
 

The comparison between Afghanistan and Iraq is going to be misleading because the country's governments were so different previously. Notwithstanding the Taliban's success at imposing order on much of the country, Afghanistan has had very weak central governments in recent years. Kabul's writ has not had much force in the provinces, which are ruled by local strongmen. Until we prevented Hussein from exercising power in the north and south of his country, the opposite was true in Iraq. I would suggest that our nation-building in Afghanistan has appeared successful if you look at Kabul, but that it's not clear that Karzai presides over a government that can rule very much of the country. The men with guns in most of the country answer to other people.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Agreed in the south and west, but not in the north, east and center (though very few live in the center anyways). But I think that with a continuing military presence from the US, Karzai has room over the coming years to work the folks in the west into his government. The South is going to be effectively occupied territory for a long time, but then, we should have kept our south under occupation much longer than we did.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Dissent.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Fisting on the FB and The War of Northern Aggression on the PB. What a day!!

more bad news from Iraq
 

Not only is Sullivan excitable, he (intentionally?) misstates the actual point of the article he quotes from. Its not that the US lost the opportunity to win the "war to control the insurgency or create democracy," it's that that wasn't the war we were actually there fighting (which has actually been rather successful), but the admin appears to have come to mistake its spin for a real goal, thus creating problems for itself (because the "spin" goal for the war was inherently contradictory and unachievable and, worse, irrelevant to US interests). A better "money" quote, IMHO:

"We did not and do not agree with the view that the invasion of Iraq was a mistake. It had a clear strategic purpose that it achieved: reshaping the behavior of surrounding regimes, particularly of the Saudis. This helped disrupt the al Qaeda network sufficiently that it has been unable to mount follow-on attacks in the United States and has shifted its attention to the Islamic world, primarily to the Saudis. None of this would have happened without the invasion of Iraq.

As frequently happens in warfare, the primary strategic purpose of the war has been forgotten by the Bush administration. Mission creep, the nightmare of all military planners, has taken place. The United States has shifted its focus from coercing neighboring countries into collaborating with the United States against al Qaeda, to building democracy in Iraq. As we put it in May: "The United States must recall its original mission, which was to occupy Iraq in order to prosecute the war against al Qaeda. If that mission is remembered, and the mission creep of reshaping Iraq forgotten, some obvious strategic solutions re-emerge. The first, and most important, is that the United States has no national interest in the nature of Iraqi government or society. Except for not supporting al Qaeda, Iraq's government does not matter.""

Or: the war actually went pretty well in achieving it's original strategic purposes, but this sideline bullshit at some point came to center stage and it's all just a big cockup in both conception and execution.

Not sure which version is more damning to the Bushies, but there you are.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Aren't we accomplishing the coercive aspect simply by our presence? If we are, (and I think we are), then we've only set our sights higher than our first goal by taking on a second. Further, what is more coercive to the entire ME problem of despotic states provoking popular rebellion than to push democracy in the neighbor and so set an example of a better way - a more satisfying way, eventually - to rebel than the Islamicists' way? After all, the various populations are attracted to the militant Islamicism only because they lack other vision for life improvement - why not show them a more productive way?

I know we've blown some operational issues, but I just don't see this double-damning.

more bad news from Iraq
 

If that's the goal, there are two problems: (i) it seems to make regional instability in the short term a primary goal of US foreign policy, which I find hard to believe; and (ii) in order to work in the long run Iraq must not become an unstable area similar to the Caucuses or the Taliban-era Afghanistan, where there is a rats nest of terrorist training grounds in an area where it is difficult to project police or military authority.

Point (ii) above means that if the Bushies were crazy enough for regional instability to be their goal, as a tool in combating terrorism, they really need to accomplish stabilization and installation of a new Iraq regime, preferably democratic, not because of mission creap, but because to do otherwise would undercut the original mission.

more bad news from Iraq
 

(iii) It would be good if the Iraqis do not use their new-found democratic rights to elect, say, Moqtada-al-Sadr.

This is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but the Mideast may prove the old right-wing saw that some people just aren't "ready" for democracy.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Yes. Higher or "unsupportably and unnecessarily expanded," which is their view. I think their view is that the US went to the house of Iraq to mow the lawn to impress the neighbors, but that doesn't mean that staying to redo the plumbing and wiring also is also a good idea. Particularly when you are a landscaper and not a plumber or electrician. The jihadists don't represent popular rebellion. They represent a very specific (and not actually very popular) view of a pan-islamic state standing in opposition to the non-islamic west. Even to the extent that seeing anyone thumb their nose at the local bully is popular, the vast majority of people living in despotic middle-eastern regimes don't particularly want to swap their current despots for al Qaeda, and certainly don't think al Qaeda has their interests any more at heart than the US does. I think that's a naively dismissive view of militant islam, actually. It presumes that its adherents just don't know any better. However, while some of the low-value throw-away grunts (think: the recent unsuccessful attacks on US consolate and saudi intelligence buildings in Saudi Arabia a few weeks ago) may sign up just because they feel oppressed and can't think of anything else to do, the core of the movement seems to be composed of well educated, even western educated, men who are well aware of other options (from democratization to militant secular arabism) and rejected them.

That said, I don't disagree with your view that creating a sucessful democracy somewhere in the ME would be a great defeat for MI. But I suspect Stratfor is correct that the US cannot, in fact, really do anything to achieve that goal, and therefore being seen trying to do it sets the US up to look like it is suffering a defeat, even in a situation in which it has been reasonably sucessful at advancing its national interests (as I think they have been on a number of levels in Iraq).
I think the original strategy was good (actually, impressively devious), but the operational issues blown have been really quite bad. Tho Stratfor also indicates that they think it is a good thing Rummy didn't commit to a bigger force for Iraq early, because that means he now doesn't have additional troops to waste on the mistaken pursuit of the (in their view, at least) unnecessary and wasteful sideline of democratization.

And, GGG, I think the view of many is that instability in Iraq is irrelevant in light of the larger war on terror because, for many internal reasons, even an unstable Iraq is not going to become a welcoming staging & recruiting ground for al Q a la Afghanistan. So your (i) isn't a goal but is irrelevant to larger American purposes because (ii) just isn't realistically in the offing. (Dunno if I agree with that, but I believe that is the way the argument runs.) Now, Saudi Arabia would be another story ...

more bad news from Iraq
 

I'm not sure I agree with this. We have shown neighboring countries that we are willing to use force, but we also have made clearer the limits on our force. Without sufficient forces to secure Iraq, we are in no position to invade anyone else now. I also don't understand why we think invading Iraq has "reshaped" Saudi behavior. The Saudis are more threatened by Al Qaeda than we are. I don't seem any plausible nexus between the invasion of Iraq and whatever disruption of Al Qaeda has happened -- other countries (like Pakistan) were cooperating with us post-9/11 and pre-Iraq, and it is this cooperation that made the difference. Iraq was not supporting Al Qaeda, of course. To suggest that the disruption of Al Qaeda would not have happened without the invasion of Iraq is, in a word, ludicrous. Indeed, the invasion of Iraq has been counterproductive in some respects. It has been well chronicled that military resources were diverted from Afghanistan -- where we are still dealing with what's left of a regime that actually did support Al Qaeda -- to Iraq, and I have posted previously about how our focus on Iraq cost us Syria's assistance with Al Qaeda.

Had we only been interesting in coercing other countries, we could have gone to the brink with Hussein and then accepting something short of full capitulation from him -- weapons inspectors, etc. But we didn't want to coerce him, we wanted to replace him. The mission creep you describe includes the war itself.

more bad news from Iraq
 

Me either. Certainly Sullivan doesn't, but he pretends they agree with him (i.e.: the war is now a total loss). I think Stratfor believes that is one excellent reason it was a mistake to try to secure Iraq. If they were shut of trying to keep a lid on that mess, our troops would be free to wreak havoc elsewhere, like stomping on those alleged jihadist camps in Syria, conduct interesting border raids into Iran, stage cooperative strikes with local intelligence agencies in Saudi Arabia, etc. I disagree. The source of our coercive power is having a pantload of our troops on the ground in Iraq. Now, had that partial capitulation Saddam's you posit included permitting the US to set up humongous bases from which to "monitor" his WMD and otherwise kick al Q butt in all the neighboring region, replacing him might indeed have been unnecessary to the primary goals of the war.

more bad news from Iraq
 

I don't agree with the view that our war aims were limited to coercing countries in the region to cooperating more with us, and was trying to make the point that our behavior leading up to the war suggests that the planners took my view, not yours. Woodward's book (for example) makes pretty clear that Bush settled on a course of invading Iraq early on, and never really entertained an alternative course.

more bad news from Iraq
 

How is this coercing the Saudi government to do anything? You cannot possibly think that the current regime fears a US invasion. We're more likely to invade England.

more bad news from Iraq
 

I don't see why any of that supports your view (primary goal was regime change - wait, was this your view?) any more than it does mine (primary goal was securing a well-situated long-term troop base in region). I'll even throw in "sanctions & policing were not getting desired results and were really damn expensive and tended to make the US/UN look incapable of follow-through on threats," which argues for regime change regardless of other strategic goals, though in that view regime change itself could be seen as a mere tool for forwarding a different strategic goal in the WOT - beign seen in the islamic world as a bad-ass that would actually punish those who made themselves our enemies. But the two goals are really quite complimentary; permitting relative instability in Iraq actually achieves both goals, the "keeping troops there" goal particularly. In fact, if the US hadn't set itself up as the savior of international democracy, we could have quite a convenient arrangement, as we do in Afghanistan, where we aren't really doing much by way of providing security but have a fairly free hand in the outskirts of the country to conduct raids into neighboring hostile territory. (Hmm, I'm beginning to see the logic of Stratfor's position more and more.)

None of that makes Iraqi democratization a more (or less) useful goal for forwarding US strategic interests vs. militant islam.

more bad news from Iraq
 

We don't have to invade to carry out tactical operations. See UEA and Pakistan (yes, I know that formally we deny engaging in operations in Pakistan). And, in SA, the threat of taking out al Q operatives by drone (or kidnapping or whatever) is particuarly nasty, since they are well aware we consider some members of the ruling family to be such. And all of that is much easier when we are already nearby.

But the coersion of SA was a bit more subtle than that. Invading Iraq permitted us to pull our bases out of SA, allowing the ruling class to realize "oh, shit, we sort of depend on US military support & presence to back us up in the face of popular opposition to our rather unpopular regime" and then bend over backwards to help us enough just to keep us from publicly telling them "fuck off, you're on your own and good luck to you," but not so much as to inflame popular rebellion because they are a US puppet. Compared to either of those, both of which would probably result in a fairly quick dispatching of the house of al Saud, a model democracy in Iraq is a distant threat to their regime survival.