A Forum for Grinches and Ho-Ho-Hoes

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Analysis: Iraqi insurgency growing larger, more effective
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The United States is steadily losing ground to the Iraqi insurgency, according to every key military yardstick. A Knight Ridder analysis of U.S. government statistics shows that through all the major turning points that raised hopes of peace in Iraq, including the arrest of Saddam Hussein and the handover of sovereignty at the end of June, the insurgency, led mainly by Sunni Muslims, has become deadlier and more effective.

The analysis suggests that unless something dramatic changes - such as a newfound will by Iraqis to reject the insurgency or a large escalation of U.S. troop strength - the United States won't win the war. It's axiomatic among military thinkers that insurgencies are especially hard to defeat because the insurgents' goal isn't to win in a conventional sense but merely to survive until the will of the occupying power is sapped. Recent polls already suggest an erosion of support among Americans for the war.

The unfavorable trends of the war are clear:

• U.S. military fatalities from hostile acts have risen from an average of about 17 per month just after President Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003, to an average of 71 per month.
• The average number of U.S. soldiers wounded by hostile acts per month has spiraled from 142 to 708 during the same period. Iraqi civilians have suffered even more deaths and injuries, although reliable statistics aren't available.
• Attacks on the U.S.-led coalition since November 2003, when statistics were first available, have risen from 735 a month to 2,400 in October. Air Force Brig. Gen. Erv Lessel, the multinational forces' deputy operations director, told Knight Ridder on Friday that attacks were currently running at 75 a day, about 2,300 a month, well below a spike in November during the assault on Fallujah, but nearly as high as October's total.
• The average number of mass-casualty bombings has grown from zero in the first four months of the American occupation to an average of 13.3 per month.
• Electricity production has been below pre-war levels since October, largely because of sabotage by insurgents, with just 6.7 hours of power daily in Baghdad in early January, according to the State Department.
• Iraq is pumping about 500,000 barrels a day fewer than its pre-war peak of 2.5 million barrels per day as a result of attacks, according to the State Department.

"All the trend lines we can identify are all in the wrong direction," said Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution, a Washington policy research organization. "We are not winning, and the security trend lines could almost lead you to believe that we are losing."...

Knight Ridder

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by taxwonk

Add a bottle of wine and playing with kid and you've Ty's day.

[sgtclub]

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050124/D87QFDNO0.html

SF proposal to charge for grocery bags

etfl -- no charge! -- t.s.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by sgtclub
SF proposal to charge for grocery bags

etfl -- no charge! -- t.s.

How about charging the store instead--give the baggers an incentive not to put one apple in each bag.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
How about charging the store instead--give the baggers an incentive not to put one apple in each bag.

The store already pays for the bags once, and I'm not understanding why there's a market failure here that needs state intervention. Presumably stores don't want to charge by the bag, since the costs are small and doing so might prompt consumers to buy less. And there are the delays at the register, slowing down the shopper's transaction.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by sgtclub
SF proposal to charge for grocery bags

etfl -- no charge! -- t.s.

I don't understand. How can the board survive if you don't charge for this?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
I don't understand. How can the board survive if you don't charge for this?

The secret is volume.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

I'm a little surprised that there aren't more people itching to talk here about tort reform -- Hello! aside -- I mean, what could be more interesting? -- so perhaps I'll get the ball rolling a little. One of the tough questions is what kinds of cases are the "frivolous lawsuits" that the President keeps talking about. Take this example:

• A man provides a car for his teenage daughter to drive. Through no fault of her own, the daughter is involved in a minor fender bender. No one is hurt and the property damage is less than $2,500. The father could just turn the claim into his insurance company and be done with it. Instead, when he learns that the other driver was in a rental car and that the rental company provided the car to a driver with a suspended license, the father sues the rental car company for the property damage.

Frivolous or not?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
The store already pays for the bags once, and I'm not understanding why there's a market failure here that needs state intervention.

Externalities (litter, landfills, pollution)? (not that they're borne by SF'ans)

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop

• A man provides a car for his teenage daughter to drive. Through no fault of her own, the daughter is involved in a minor fender bender. No one is hurt and the property damage is less than $2,500. The father could just turn the claim into his insurance company and be done with it. Instead, when he learns that the other driver was in a rental car and that the rental company provided the car to a driver with a suspended license, the father sues the rental car company for the property damage.

Frivolous or not?

This gave me law school flashbacks.

I say not frivolous, but I also think that the size of the claim makes it inefficient to sue on.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sgtclub
This gave me law school flashbacks.

I say not frivolous, but I also think that the size of the claim makes it inefficient to sue on.

Are you saying you'd question the intelligence of the person who brought such a claim, or are you saying that you don't think people would bring this sort of claim because too little is at stake?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by sgtclub
This gave me law school flashbacks.

I say not frivolous, but I also think that the size of the claim makes it inefficient to sue on.

How can it be--if you tender to the insurance company, they'll raise your rates and not bother pursuing. By suing, you allocate the blame correctly (or more correctly). The insurance company's efficiency isn't necessarily just.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Are you saying you'd question the intelligence of the person who brought such a claim, or are you saying that you don't think people would bring this sort of claim because too little is at stake?

I think he is saying we need to find other P's and go class action on the bastards.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
How can it be--if you tender to the insurance company, they'll raise your rates and not bother pursuing. By suing, you allocate the blame correctly (or more correctly). The insurance company's efficiency isn't necessarily just.

It is still inefficient from the harmed father's p.o.v. because it will cost more than $2,500 to pursue himself and getting fees & expenses is a crap shoot. The transaction costs are too high to make re-allocation of the loss (much less proper allocation of the loss) economically feasible.

Call it a market failure. But not a frivolous lawsuit. The amount of loss has nothing to do with whether the claim is frivolous, and the fact that a deep pocket is (to some extent) at fault and thus recovery is more likely doesn't make the claim more frivolous.

But I fight the hypothetical - in almost all states rental car drivers are required to get insurance covering third parties, aren't they? File the claim against the rental insurance.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Are you saying you'd question the intelligence of the person who brought such a claim, or are you saying that you don't think people would bring this sort of claim because too little is at stake?

The latter. It would cost more than that to bring and there is no guaranty that costs would be recovered.

I would actually choose (c) and make the guy pay directly.