It's been a busy week-plus for me - no time to think thoroughly about anything other than the computer stuff I'm being paid to write about. I don't, however, want to let this blog go completely fallow, so I'll calling in a guest post for today.

The following is from an opinion-and-analysis website to which I received a subscription on my recent birthday. Called Stratfor.com, the site publishes a series of remarkably well-balanced, screed-free analyses on a topics from economics to security to politics to military matters and more.

Today's posting is a recent Stratfor article about why we shouldn't allow ourselves to be panicked by the threat of biological terrorism. I thought it was a nice example of clear-headed thinking (if not concise writing), so I'm sharing it with you - and, yes, I do have permission... - Rik

BUSTING THE ANTHRAX MYTH
By Fred Burton and Scott Stewart

Dr. Jeffrey W. Runge, chief medical officer at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, told a congressional subcommittee on July 22 that the risk of a large-scale biological attack on the nation is significant and that the U.S. government knows its terrorist enemies have sought to use biological agents as instruments of warfare. Runge also said that the United States believes that capability is within the terrorists’ reach.

Runge gave his testimony before a subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity, and Science and Technology that was holding a field hearing in Providence, R.I., to discuss the topic of “Emerging Biological Threats and Public Health Preparedness.”

During his testimony, Runge specifically pointed to al Qaeda as the most significant threat and testified that the United States had determined that the terrorist organization is seeking to develop and use a biological weapon to cause mass casualties in an attack. According to Runge, U.S. analysis indicates that anthrax is the most likely choice, and a successful single-city attack on an unprepared population could kill hundreds of thousands of citizens.

Later in his testimony, Runge remarked that many do not perceive the threat of bioterrorism to be as significant as that of a nuclear or conventional strike, even though such an attack could kill as many people as a nuclear detonation and have its own long-term environmental effects.

We must admit to being among those who do not perceive the threat of bioterrorism to be as significant as that posed by a nuclear strike. To be fair, it must be noted that we also do not see strikes using chemical or radiological weapons rising to the threshold of a true weapon of mass destruction either. The successful detonation of a nuclear weapon in an American city would be far more devastating that any of these other forms of attack.

In fact, based on the past history of nonstate actors conducting attacks using biological weapons, we remain skeptical that a nonstate actor could conduct a biological weapons strike capable of creating as many casualties as a large strike using conventional explosives — such as the October 2002 Bali bombings that resulted in 202 deaths or the March 2004 train bombings in Madrid that killed 191.

We do not disagree with Runge’s statements that actors such as al Qaeda have demonstrated an interest in biological weapons. There is ample evidence that al Qaeda has a rudimentary biological weapons capability. However, there is a huge chasm of capability that separates intent and a rudimentary biological weapons program from a biological weapons program that is capable of killing hundreds of thousands of people.

Misconceptions About Biological Weapons
There are many misconceptions involving biological weapons. The three most common are that they are easy to obtain, that they are easy to deploy effectively, and that, when used, they always cause massive casualties.

While it is certainly true that there are many different types of actors who can easily gain access to rudimentary biological agents, there are far fewer actors who can actually isolate virulent strains of the agents, weaponize them and then effectively employ these agents in a manner that will realistically pose a significant threat of causing mass casualties. While organisms such as anthrax are present in the environment and are not difficult to obtain, more highly virulent strains of these tend to be far more difficult to locate, isolate and replicate. Such efforts require highly skilled individuals and sophisticated laboratory equipment.

Even incredibly deadly biological substances such as ricin and botulinum toxin are difficult to use in mass attacks. This difficulty arises when one attempts to take a rudimentary biological substance and then convert it into a weaponized form — a form that is potent enough to be deadly and yet readily dispersed. Even if this weaponization hurdle can be overcome, once developed, the weaponized agent must then be integrated with a weapons system that can effectively take large quantities of the agent and evenly distribute it in lethal doses to the intended targets.

During the past several decades in the era of modern terrorism, biological weapons have been used very infrequently and with very little success. This fact alone serves to highlight the gap between the biological warfare misconceptions and reality. Militant groups desperately want to kill people and are constantly seeking new innovations that will allow them to kill larger numbers of people. Certainly if biological weapons were as easily obtained, as easily weaponized and as effective at producing mass casualties as commonly portrayed, militant groups would have used them far more frequently than they have.

Militant groups are generally adaptive and responsive to failure. If something works, they will use it. If it does not, they will seek more effective means of achieving their deadly goals. A good example of this was the rise and fall of the use of chlorine in militant attacks in Iraq.

Anthrax
As noted by Runge, the spore-forming bacterium Bacillus anthracis is readily available in nature and can be deadly if inhaled, if ingested or if it comes into contact with a person’s skin. What constitutes a deadly dose of inhalation anthrax has not been precisely quantified, but is estimated to be somewhere between 8,000 and 50,000 spores. One gram of weaponized anthrax, such as that contained in the letters mailed to U.S. Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy in October 2001, can contain up to one trillion spores — enough to cause somewhere between 20 and 100 million deaths. The letters mailed to Daschle and Leahy reportedly contained about one gram each for a total estimated quantity of two grams of anthrax spores: enough to have theoretically killed between 40 and 200 million people. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that the current population of the United States is 304.7 million. In a worst-case scenario, the letters mailed to Daschle and Leahy theoreticall y contained enough anthrax spores to kill nearly two-thirds of the U.S. population.

Yet, in spite of their incredibly deadly potential, those letters (along with an estimated five other anthrax letters mailed in a prior wave to media outlets such as the New York Post and the major television networks) killed only five people; another 22 victims were infected by the spores but recovered after receiving medical treatment. This difference between the theoretical number of fatal victims — hundreds of millions — and the actual number of victims — five — highlights the challenges in effectively distributing even a highly virulent and weaponized strain of an organism to a large number of potential victims.

To summarize: obtaining a biological agent is fairly simple. Isolating a virulent strain and then weaponizing that strain is somewhat more difficult. But the key to biological warfare — effectively distributing a weaponized agent to the intended target — is the really difficult part of the process. Anyone planning a biological attack against a large target such as a city needs to be concerned about a host of factors such as dilution, wind velocity and direction, particle size and weight, the susceptibility of the disease to ultraviolet light, heat, dryness or even rain. Small-scale localized attacks such as the 2001 anthrax letters or the 1984 salmonella attack undertaken by the Bhagwan Shri Rajneesh cult are far easier to commit.

It is also important to remember that anthrax is not some sort of untreatable super disease. While anthrax does form hardy spores that can remain inert for a period of time, the disease is not easily transmitted from person to person, and therefore is unlikely to create an epidemic outside of the area targeted by the attack. Anthrax infections can be treated by the use of readily available antibiotics. The spores’ incubation period also permits time for early treatment if the attack is noticed.

The deadliest known anthrax incident in recent years occurred in 1979 when an accidental release of aerosolized spores from a Soviet biological weapons facility in Sverdlovsk affected some 94 people — reportedly killing 68 of them. This facility was one of dozens of laboratories that were part of the Soviet Union’s massive and well-funded biological weapons program, one that employed thousands of the country’s brightest scientists. In fact, it was the largest biological weapons program in history.

Perhaps the largest attempt by a nonstate actor to cause mass casualties using anthrax was the series of attacks conducted in 1993 by the Japanese cult group Aum Shinrikyo in Tokyo.

In the late 1980s, Aum’s team of trained scientists spent millions of dollars to develop a series of state-of-the-art biological weapons research and production laboratories. The group experimented with botulinum toxin, anthrax, cholera and Q fever and even tried to acquire the Ebola virus. The group hoped to produce enough biological agent to trigger a global Armageddon. Its first attempts at unleashing mega-death on the world involved the use of botulinum toxin. In April 1990, the group used a fleet of three trucks equipped with aerosol sprayers to release liquid botulinum toxin on targets that included the Imperial Palace, the National Diet of Japan, the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, two U.S. naval bases and the airport in Narita. In spite of the massive quantities of toxin released, there were no mass casualties, and, in fact, nobody outside of the cult was even aware the attacks had taken place.

When the botulinum operations failed to produce results, Aum’s scientists went back to the drawing board and retooled their biological weapons facilities to produce anthrax. By mid-1993, they were ready to launch attacks involving anthrax; between June and August of 1993, the group sprayed thousands of gallons of aerosolized liquid anthrax in Tokyo. This time, Aum not only employed its fleet of sprayer trucks but also used aerosol sprayers mounted on the roof of their headquarters to disperse a cloud of aerosolized anthrax over the city. Again, the attacks produced no results and were not even noticed. It was only after the group’s successful 1995 subway attacks using sarin nerve agent that a Japanese government investigation discovered that the 1990 and 1993 biological attacks had occurred.

Biological Weapons Production
Aum Shinrikyo’s team of highly trained scientists worked under ideal conditions in a first-world country with a virtually unlimited budget. They were able to travel the world in search of deadly organisms and even received technical advice from former Soviet scientists. The team worked in large, modern laboratory facilities to produce substantial quantities of biological weapons. They were able to operate these facilities inside industrial parks and openly order the large quantities of laboratory equipment they required. Yet, in spite of the millions of dollars the group spent on its biological weapons program — and the lack of any meaningful interference from the Japanese government — Aum still experienced problems in creating virulent biological agents and also found it difficult to dispense those agents effectively.

Today, al Qaeda finds itself operating in a very different environment than that experienced by Aum Shinrikyo in 1993. At that time, nobody was looking for Aum or its biological and chemical weapons program. By contrast, since the Sept. 11 attacks, the United States and its allies have actively pursued al Qaeda leaders and sought to dismantle and defang the organization. The United States and its allies have focused a considerable amount of resources in tracking and disassembling al Qaeda’s chemical and biological warfare efforts. The al Qaeda network has had millions of dollars of its assets seized in a number of countries, and it no longer has the safe haven of Afghanistan from which to operate. The chemical and biological facilities the group established in the 1990s in Afghanistan — such as the Deronta training camp, where cyanide and other toxins were used to kill dogs, and a crude anthrax production facility in Kandahar — have been found and destroy ed by U.S. troops.

Operating in the badlands along the Pakistani-Afghan border, al Qaeda cannot easily build large modern factories capable of producing large quantities of agents or toxins. Such fixed facilities are expensive and consume a lot of resources. Even if al Qaeda had the spare capacity to invest in such facilities, the fixed nature of them means that they could be compromised and quickly destroyed by the United States.

If al Qaeda could somehow create and hide a fixed biological weapons facility in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas or North-West Frontier Province, it would still face the daunting task of transporting large quantities of biological agents from the Pakistani badlands to targets in the United States or Europe. Al Qaeda operatives certainly can create and transport small quantities of these compounds, but not enough to wreak the kind of massive damage it desires.

Al Qaeda’s lead chemical and biological weapons expert, Midhat Mursi al-Sayid Umar, also known as Abu Khabab al-Masri, was reportedly killed on July 28, 2008, by a U.S. missile strike on his home in Pakistan. Al-Sayid, who had a $5 million dollar bounty on his head, was initially reported to have been one of those killed in the January 2006 strike in Damadola. If he was indeed killed, his death should be another significant blow to the group’s biological warfare efforts.

Of course, we must recognize that the jihadist threat goes just beyond the al Qaeda core. As we have been writing for several years now, al Qaeda has undergone a metamorphosis from a smaller core group of professional operatives into an operational model that encourages independent grassroots jihadists to conduct attacks. The core al Qaeda group, through men like al-Sayid, has published manuals in hard copy and on the Internet that provide instructions on how to manufacture rudimentary biological weapons.

It is our belief that independent jihadist cells and lone-wolf jihadists will almost certainly attempt to brew up some of the recipes from the al Qaeda cookbook. There also exists a very real threat that a jihadist sympathizer could obtain a small quantity of deadly biological organisms by infiltrating a research facility.

This means that we likely will see some limited attempts at employing biological weapons. That does not mean, however, that such attacks will be large-scale or create mass casualties.

The Bottom Line
While there has been much consternation and alarm-raising over the potential for widespread proliferation of biological weapons and the possible use of such weapons on a massive scale, there are significant constraints on such designs. The current dearth of substantial biological weapons programs and arsenals by governments worldwide, and the even smaller number of cases in which systems were actually used, seems to belie — or at least bring into question — the intense concern about such programs.

While we would like to believe that countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom and Russia have halted their biological warfare programs for some noble ideological or humanitarian reason, we simply can’t. If biological weapons were in practice as effective as some would lead us to believe, these states would surely maintain stockpiles of them, just as they have maintained their nuclear weapons programs. Biological weapons programs were abandoned because they proved to be not as effective as advertised and because conventional munitions proved to provide more bang for the buck.

In some ways, the psychological fear of a “super weapon” — undetectable, microscopic, easily delivered and extremely deadly — shapes assessment of the threat, more so than an objective understanding of actual capability and intent (not to mention the extreme difficulties of ever creating some sort of a super bug). Conventional weapons systems, and unconventional tactics, continue to be the most cost-effective and proven methods of warfare, whether between state actors or between state and nonstate actors. Nuclear weapons have also been shown to have true weapons of mass destruction power.

To help keep the cost-benefit calculation of a biological warfare program in perspective, consider that Seung-Hui Cho, the man who committed the shooting at Virginia Tech, killed 32 people — more than six times as many as were killed by the 2001 anthrax letters. John Mohammed, the so-called “D.C. Sniper,” was able to cause a considerable amount of panic and kill twice as many people (10) by simply purchasing and using one assault rifle. Compare Mohammed’s effort and expenses to that of the Aum Shinrikyo anthrax program that took years of work by a huge team and millions of dollars to develop but infected no one.

Now, just because biological weapons are not all they are cracked up to be does not mean that efforts to undermine the biological warfare plans and efforts of militant groups such as al Qaeda should not continue or that programs to detect such agents or develop more effective treatments and vaccines should be halted. Even though an anthrax attack probably will not kill huge numbers of people, as we saw in the case of the anthrax letters, such an attack can be quite disruptive. Cleaning up after such an attack is expensive and takes considerable time and effort. Like a dirty bomb, an anthrax attack will more likely serve as a weapon of mass disruption and not a weapon of mass destruction.

Due to the disruption and the potential for some deaths as a result of an anthrax attack, the threat against the United States does remain a significant concern. However, the threat it represents is not as great as that of conventional attacks using firearms and explosives against soft targets, and it certainly does not rise anywhere near the level of a threat posed by a terrorist attack using a nuclear weapon.

Homeland security resources are very limited and have been shrinking as we move further from 9/11 and as other items begin to take precedence in the federal budget. This means that an array of different programs is being forced to scramble for an ever-shrinking piece of the funding pie. In such an environment, it is often a temptation to overstate the threat. Such overstatements are harmful because they can sometimes prevent a rational distribution of resources and prevent resources from being allocated to where they are needed most. [back to top]

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The next time I hear John McCain say that Barack Obama wants to "lose in Iraq," I may ... hmmm ... is it still legal to make outlandish fantasy threats against presidential candidates in public without being thrown in the hoosegow, or is Guantanamizing grumblers only an accepted punishment for threats against Duh Prez Hisself?

Better not risk it...

Take two: The next time I hear John McCain say that Barack Obama wants to "lose in Iraq," I may toss my cookies so violently that I'll spend another few days at Chez Nasogastric Intubation. What so gastrointestinally irks me isn't McCain's obvious - and disgusting - farting in the general direction of Obama's patriotism (Barack isn't "truly American," y'know - he's one of "them"). No, it's that he and his handlers so blatantly ignore the dynamics of mid-2008 Iraq. They're either mendacious, manipulative, or moronic - or all three.

Here's the truth: There's no more "winning" or "losing" in Iraq anymore. The civil war that began with the bombing of Samarra in February 2006 is over. The Shi'a won. The Sunnis lost. Game over.

The "surge" only affected the ending of that civil war by keeping the Shi'a irregulars - and, to a lesser extent, the Mahdi Army - from offing the remaining Sunnis who had been routed from Baghdad. The surgenistas also helped organize - and pay off - the local Sunni leaders who were smart enough to know which side their pita was hummussed on. But the civil war was essentially decided by the time the surge began surging - after a minimum of 100,000 Iraqis were dead and five million were forced from their homes.

It's over. The Shi'a won (which also means, of course, that Iran won). The biggest losers, of course, were the Iraqi people - which is true in all wars, but most brutally in civil wars.

There an interesting interview with Ali Allawi (brief bio at link) in the current Brown Journal of World Affairs that pretty much supports my assessment. (It's always nice when I discover that someone smarter than me agrees with me.) Allawi goes on to say, however, that Iraq has entered a new phase of its post-war reconstruction, one in which "the role of U.S. forces has become questionable." Polite man.

The challenge in post-civil-war Iraq is whether its government, to put it bluntly, can get its excrement organized. Here, the U.S. presence is more a hindrance than an aid. The French (and, of course, one charismatic polack) helped the U.S. win our revolutionary war - but did we want them around as we developed our governing systems? Uh ... no.

So, back to John McCain. Are he and his party interested in helping Iraq get back on its feet as an independent, self-governed country, or are they merely beholden to the corporatists who want that poor, benighted country to be an American pawn in the Middle East's increasingly hot energy wars, complete with bases, favorable status-of-forces agreements, sweetheart oil deals, and all the other perquisites of neo-colonialism?

Duh...

Oh, and one final note: If you were Osama bin Asswipe, bomber of the innocent, which would you prefer, the U.S. out of Iraq or in it? Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding! Yep, you're right - expect Osama and his comrades in arm (or, after a suicide bombing, his comrades without arms) to continue their indefensible brutality of bombing innocent Iraqis so that they can give the American pro-colonialists a reason to justify the continued U.S. occupation by saying, "See - we're needed here for security!" Clearly, it's to al Qaeda's advantage that the U.S. remains bogged down in Iraq - not only does it fuel anti-Western hatred ("Hey you crusaders, get off my lawn!") but it also conveniently distracts both attention and resources from the al Qaeda buildup in Waziristan.

Contrary to John McCain's feeble arguments to the contrary, Barack Obama's belief that it'd be wise to disengage from Iraq and engage in Afghanistan - well, Pakistan, actually, but what's a few mountain ranges between mortal enemies? - is a far more realistic assessment of what'd be better for the America people, and not merely better for the American business sector. (Hey, even Nouri-al-Maliki likes Obama's plan.)

Iraq is so over - let's go home. But, unfortunately, we may have to stop by Uncle Perv's place on the way back.

On Sunday, July 20th, blog reader Jeff Carlock commented: "Appreciated that  'war is over if you want it' blog, it chimes (ding ding ding ding ding!) with my feeling that 'victory' & 'defeat' in the Middle East are undefined, changeable, vague & effectively meaningless talking points, or like the old song says,'After you get what you want, you don't want it . . .' " [back to top]

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To clumsily paraphrase The Beatles' "A Day in the Life," I got the bill today, oh boy.

Regular readers of this space will recall that early last month I spent three nights in the hospital (or, as The Beatles would say, "in hospital") with an intestinal loveliness called an ileus. Yum. Long story shortened: Loads-o-pain, no permanent damage, all better now - and lost ten pounds, which I've so far managed to keep lost.

Today I received in the mail a 14-page document from my health insurer, UnitedHealthcare (What is it about InterCaps? [aka CamelCase] Can't anyone afford a space anymore?) entitled "Explanation of Benefits." Well, my dictionary defines explanation to mean "a statement or account that makes something clear." Not to denigrate the fine folks at InterCapHealthCare, but "explanation" isn't the first word I'd use to identify this document - opacity, thy name is health insurance.

But leaving aside for a moment the Gordian complexities of this document, let's jump to the bottom line - which is, all told, around $35,000. Due to the fact that I have excellent (if both expensive and temporary) health insurance, the total cost to me for those lovely four days and three nights in sunny Pacific Heights was to be found on the final line of the Service Detail section of the bill:

"Patient Pays: 0.00."

Sighs of relief all around Bancel-Myslewski Enterprises Inc., to be sure, but an unsettling feeling remains: How on earth can this be considered fair? Admittedly, I pay an arm and a leg for health insurance (I'm in the final six months of the COBRA plan I took over after leaving my last full-time job), but I at least have health insurance - and an excellent plan, thanks to the Eurocentric attitude towards healthcare of my former employer, whose parent company is based in England.

Okay, so the fact that the healthcare system in the United States is broken isn't news. (And if you think it isn't broken, you're either a member of the current ruling party or you own a large stake in the insurance industry.) But every once in a while we need a harsh reminder of the fact that our current healthcare system is absolutely bonkers.

Think about it. Who in America is insured? Well, either folks employed in full-time positions with generous companies or individuals who can afford hefty monthly premiums. If you're working at a low-end job, no insurance for you - either your company doesn't provide it or since you have a low-end job, you can't afford it on your own.

So let's say you have to spend, oh, four days and three nights in the hospital because your gut gets grumpy. If you have a good job with good benefits or are flush enough to afford good insurance, you won't pay a dime. If, on the other hand, if you have a low-end job or don't have the scratch needed to fund your own insurance, you get a bill for $35,000.

In other words, the folks who can afford emergency healthcare don't pay for it, and the folks who can't afford it get charged exorbitant fees.

Yup. Ass-backwards.

And this insanity isn't the half of it. One line of my "Explanation" of Benefits lists Misc. Services to run a cool $21,256.40. However, the amount paid towards that total by my CamelCaseCare insurer is listed as $586.00 - which, if I read the fine print correctly, means that $20,670.40 is forgiven by the hospital due to their contractual agreement with InTerCapHealthSerVices. Apparently, if you're uninsured - meaning if you're underemployed and/or essentially broke - your individual hospital liability is far greater than if you're insured. In other words, the poorer you are, the more health care costs, whether you pay for it or your insurer does.

That's nuts.

Finally, just to take one ... um ... hypothetical case, say you're a self-employed older guy with a self-employed spouse and you both have relatively expensive ongoing medical problems and your COBRA coverage runs out in six months and you're trying to find some health plan to cover you and there are literally hundreds of ludicrously complex plans to decipher but that's okay 'cause you're relatively intelligent but woe betide the Average Joe™ who needs to navigate the welter of options but since you're saddled with "pre-existing conditions" you're an expensive insurance risk so even if you have decent savings and income it's a thorough pain in the ass to find someone who'll insure you for less than, say, a squillion dollars per month.

What then?

More to come about that particular conundrum. [back to top]

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It's my birthday.

It's also late in the evening, and I just finished a wonderful dinner with friends and family - gołąbki made by my daughters, accompanied by wonderfully tasty and obscure brewskis.

If I had any sense I'd be shuffling off to bed. However, seeing as how this blog all too often tends to focus only on bad stuff in the news, I thought it'd be a good time to drop a quick pre-sleepytime note about three good pieces of news from the benighted Middle East.

This'll be quick, then I'm off to an ale-inspired appointment with a welcoming pillow:

1. Bush's Iraqi status-of-forces extortion attempt seems to be a dead letter. News came today that BushCo has dropped its insistence on its previously insisted-upon status-of-forces agreement with the Iraqi goverment. "Our" government has has given up - at least for the time being - its demands for complete criminal and civil immunity for American troops and contractors, total freedom to conduct whatever military operations it wants without Iraqi approval, and the right to establish and maintain dozens of permanent bases in Iraq.

Why are these demands being put on hold? Surprisingly, because the Iraqi government seems to have found a simulacrum of a spine - or because it's feeling the heat from the street (or from al Sadr, which may indeed be the same thing). And then there's its close affiliation with Iran, the real winner of the Iraq invasion.

To be sure, the U.S's demands haven't gone away; BushCo has simply put them on the shelf until the next administration takes charge of the Iraq debacle. If John McCain is our next president, they're sure to reemerge; if Obama wins, they may or may not become our negotiating stance. (I'm quite disillusioned with Obama these days, but he's still one %$#@! of a lot more promising than McCain.)

2. Lebanon has finally formed a unity government. Here's a shocker: After - what has it been? eight months? ten? - Lebanon has finally managed to assemble a unity government that balances input from both its pro-Western and its pro-Syrian citizenry and that gives true parliamentary power to Hezbollah - that broad-based, multi-faceted organization supported by a large number of Lebanese voters.

Two quick thoughts: First, this could not have happened without the U.S. giving at least its tacit approval - which means that Condi 'n' company may have become a wee bit less craniorectal. Second, it means that Lebanon is asserting its independance from both "the West" and Syria by saying, "Hey, we have two competing schools of thought in our country - our country. Let's give each of them a voice, and maybe by doing so we might keep them from bombing not only each other but also the many innocent folks who happen to be standing in their way."

A promising development in an ugly part of the world.

3. Ahmadinejad says that he'd welcome a U.S. diplomatic office in Tehran. Okay, so this one is a bit dicey. Ahmadinejad is a loose canon, so when he says something, hey, he may contradict it tomorrow. Also, Señor I'm-a-Dinner-Jacket doesn't call the shots in Iran; that's the mullahs' job - he's merely their stalking horse. But still, with all the recent saber-rattling among Israel, Iran, and the U.S., it's good to hear at least one hothead say, "Hey, let's talk."

Your move, George and Ehud.

Should this cat-and-mouse game continue until January 20, 2009 - which we should assume it wiil - remember that John McCain, of course, isn't the man to take on a negotiating challenge (c.f. his recent "joke" about ciggies and Iran). Obama has said that he wants to "talk with our enemies," but let's wait a month or three to see whom he next morphs into.

As I said, this post is just a quick note of optimism inspired by a warm and cozy birthday celebration. When I feel the rare warmth of hope wash over me, I need to write it down before it cools - as it all too often does. [back to top]

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My friends and family are convinced that I'm a pessimist. I prefer to think of myself as a realist. As the old saying goes, an optimist sees the glass as half full while the pessimist sees it as half empty. The realist sees half a glass of water.

So while watching the slow train wreck that is the U.S. economy, events like today's crumbling of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac cause me to stop and look at the evidence rather than either cooing "All will be okay in time" or throwing up my hands and crying "The end is near!"

Both Fannie Mae (known more prosaically as the Federal National Mortgage Association) and Freddie Mac (the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation) took a beating on the NYSE today, plummeting hard, then recovering somewhat before the close of trading. (If you're not familiar with Fannie and Freddie, today's New York Times ran an informative FAQ.)

This is disconcerting.

While we've all heard a lot in recent months about the "subprime meltdown," the "credit crisis," and other woes, we've also read voluminous reports about how those financial fuck-ups were caused by predatory lenders, opaquely bundled securities, and other shenanigans. The implication has been that although the foreclosures and home-value nosedives of the aforementioned meltdown/crisis/fuck-ups have been tragic, the brunt of the suffering has been experienced by others - meaning at one end the poor deluded schmuck who can no longer afford his home, and at the other the detestable greed-blinded schmuck who can no long afford his nightly bottle of Cristal.

But now stalwart, solid, mainstream, middle-of-the-road Fannie and Freddie are joining the gamblers and speculators who are diving into the fiscal dumpster. These two mortgage behemoths don't deal in risky, subprime loans. Hell, the bulk of their portfolios contain long-term, fixed-rate mortgages that have been carefully vetted and conservatively managed.

Something's wrong - and I've got a theory. In a nutshell, the various and sundry indices that we're being fed to tell us that the economy is inherently secure may very well be simple hogwash. When you have a free moment, dig into how the government's economists calculate inflation (real consumer inflation, not the no-fuel no-food "core inflation"), the consumer price index (CPI), and the gross domestic product (GDP). I've been investigating these indices for a few weeks, and although I haven't yet reached the point of paranoiac conspiracy theories, something does indeed appear to be amiss.

We're told inflation is low, yet we all know that eating, driving, shopping, and just generally living feels more expensive than it did a few years back. Are we wrong, or is the way the government calculates inflation wrong?

We're told that our country's productivity is up, but we watch as plants close, jobs dry up, and our country is transformed from one in which wealth had been created by building things into one in which wealth is created by manipulating the flow of money. Are we wrong, or is our country actually become less productive (that is, when it comes to producing actual products)?

Something's going on - something slippery - when it comes to how economic data is being reported. Most of us aren't aware of the sources of this chicanery - I'm certainly in the dark - but I think we can all guess the reasons. Remember the ol' mushroom theory of management? Besides, it's an election year.

And today, despite all of the governmental bromides about recovery and solid fundamentals, those two great gray eminences, Fannie and Freddie, took a dive. Solid portfolios, solid clients, and disastrous losses. I don't want to sound pessimistic, but...

I'll leave you with one related thought: Today, money is being used merely to make more money, not to create a productive infrastructure. John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Henry Frick, Leland Stanford, and Cornelius Vanderbilt would wet themselves if they were reincarnated and told of the non-productive but wildly remunerative successes of their 2008 counterparts. True, those aptly named robber barons were ruthless businessmen, but their steel mills, railroads, and oil fields helped American working men and women build a productive country.

What do today's Collateralized Dept Obligations build? Squat.

Something's got to give. Just ask Fannie and Freddie.[back to top]

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Normally when I don't post for a week or more it's because I have nothing worthwhile to say. This past week-plus has been a bit different. My brain hasn't been slumbering. On the contrary, I've had two mindstorms playing "Point/Counterpoint" behind my eyes.

The first was inspired by a trip to San Francisco's de Young Museum, where I saw - endured? - an exhibition entitled "Chihuly at the de Young." This overwhelming load of Dale Chihuly's decorative and oh-so-colorful glass sculptures launched me into an as-yet-fruitless meditation about what's art, what's craft, and what's kitsch. Spirals of thought. Fruitless scribblings. No conclusions. Jury still out. I haven't given up, but neither have I made an intellectual breakthrough worth reporting.

Then Jesse Helms died, which led me to ruminate about how I should mark the death of an adversary, and why we humans tend to not speak ill of the dead unless said dead have been culturally vetted as being worthy of thorough revulsion (cf. Adolph Hitler and Pol Pot). Helms, however racist, homophobic, and opportunistic, was not a monster - more a prickish and ambitious product of his time and culture ... and one who in less-controversial areas of his reign was of nurturing value to the working-class whites he represented. And how should one react to the death of such a man? Celebration? Reconciliation? Condemnation? I haven't yet decided.

And so, having no firm insights to share, I've been silent.

Today, therefore, I want to take a break from Deep Thought™ and instead simply share a few less intellectually challenging items that have been floating around the ol' brain pan in the past few days.

To wit:

A Sticker: Here in California there will be a proposed constitutional amendment on the November ballot that "provide[s] that only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." This baldly discriminatory measure is a clear and tiny-minded response to our recent State Supreme Court's decision that legalized same-sex marriage. When this ballot proposition was (finally) given a number - eight - my younger daughter came up with a catchy visual slogan. Using the power vested in me by good ol' Adobe Photoshop, my Epson Stylus Photo 2200, and Papilio inkjet white waterproof vinyl media and LLA5000 UV Spray Laminate, I've printed out a stack of bumper stickers that announce opposition to Proposition 8 (see below). Want one? Two? More? Just drop me an email, and I'll send you as many as you want - within fiscal reason, of course.

A Poster: Okay, so this next item is a shallow, cheap shot - but I couldn't resist. I've been thinking about John McCain's crankiness, his roots in a bygone past, his detachment from today's youth, and the Republican sense of insular defense-through-offense, and it suddenly dawned on me what an honest McCain campaign poster might look like. So here it is:

A Laugh: As you know, George Carlin died recently. Of course, most of the popular press focused on his deservedly well-known "Seven Words" routine. All well and good, but allow me to present you with his 2005 "Modern Man." Sure, some of the humor is obvious and some of it is clichéd, but all in all it's a wonderful piece of verbal gymnastics:

An Ass: Finally, in counterpoint to George Carlin, a man who used his verbal skills to uncover truths, I'll end with Dick Cheney's chief of staff, David Addington, who, along with his partner-in-crime John Yoo, recently appeared before a Congressional committee that was investigating the current administration's countenancing of torture. Words fail me when I try to express my revulsion at this man's arrogance, ego, and contempt for his country. Oh, and after you've finished with Addington, check out an equally frustrating dance routine by Woo.

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