Shabbat Shalom!
I'll be gone for the weekend so I figured I'd leave you with some food for thought:
1) How much do you know about the expulsion of Jews from their homes/businesses/synagogues in Gaza? Take the quiz! For more information on the "disengagement" see Daniel Pipe's article. Also, here are pictures of the massive anti-disengagement protests last week.
2) Jonah Goldberg criticizes populism and polls:
"The people" are often wrong. And I don’t mean this solely in an ideological or partisan sense. I mean it in terms of cold, hard fact. According to the polls, “the people” are liars. Big, fat, honking liars. Just one example among many: John F. Kennedy won the presidency in 1960 with 49.7 percent of the vote. This is as close as we get to a historical fact. Indeed, that might overestimate things, since many believe Kennedy stole (i.e., invented) votes in Illinois and Texas. Yet, as Bob Dole might say, “whatever.” By 1963, 59 percent of Americans told pollsters they voted for him. And after JFK’s death, 65 percent claimed to have done so (much like the huge numbers of French who remembered fighting for the resistance only years after the war ended).
In other words, “the people” lied or honestly deluded themselves. Or at least 15 percent of them did. But we don’t know which 15 percent and we never will, just as we don’t know how many Americans lie, fudge, or mislead pollsters. We know a large number must, because pollsters are constantly asking “the people” about incredibly complex issues and “the people” almost always pretend to know what they think.
But I do know a lot of really smart people, and when I ask them the same questions pollsters regularly ask (Should Israel trade land for peace? Is the war in Iraq going well? Is Social Security partial privatization a bad idea? Why is Charmed still on TV while Angel and Buffy were cancelled?) and I usually get six-part answers, festooned with ifs, ands, buts and on-the-other-hands. But “the people” always seem to have a fully formed opinion handy.
And this leaves out the fact that a big chunk of “the people” are grotesquely ignorant of their government and current events. And I’m not just referring to that running segment on The Tonight Show where Jay Leno asks people to figure out what Flag Day celebrates. Just this month, the ABA (hint: the lawyer thing, not the bunch with the red, white, and blue basketball), released a poll that found that 22 percent of Americans think the three branches of government are Republican, Democrat, and Independent. In 1991 another ABA survey found that one third of Americans didn’t know what the Bill of Rights is. In 1987, 45 percent of Americans thought Karl Marx’s dictum “from each according to his ability to each according to his needs” was in the U.S. Constitution. In 1964 (!) only 38 percent of the American people knew the Soviet Union wasn’t in NATO.
Now, I don’t think the American people are as stupid or confused as all this suggests. But if they aren’t, the polls must be. Maybe people panic when they talk to pollsters. Maybe the methodology stinks like that aardvark-sock thing. Maybe respondents are distracted by the pollster’s annoying habit of tapping his glass eye with a ballpoint pen while awaiting an answer. Who knows?
What I do know is that, even if the polls were 100-percent accurate, they would still be a stupid way of setting policy. Why? Because “the people” only exist on Election Day. Before and after that, they’re just a bunch of individuals spouting off to strangers.
(And here's another one criticizing the media for pitting opinion journalists against political party hacks on political news shows.)
3) I've always been into nature and the environment (remember: I want to put the "conservative" back in "conservation"!) and I've recently started getting into health/organic food so I'm looking forward to this book: Crunchy Cons : How Birkenstocked Burkeans, gun-loving organic gardeners, evangelical free-range farmers, hip homeschooling mamas, right-wing nature lovers, and their diverse tribe of counter-cultural conservatives plan to save America (or at least the Republican Party) by Rod Dreher.
By the way, that's the longest book title I've ever seen. I challenge you to find a longer one!
4) I recently got into a debate with my brother's socialist friend. He saw me wearing my "Viva la Reagan Revolucion!" t-shirt and he was horrified that I could actually like Reagan (nevermind that 49 out of 50 states elected the guy). I asked why he disliked Reagan and he responded that "Reaganomics didn't work" and that the Bush tax cuts are just as bad. I countered that both have proven good for the economy and noted that tax revenues have increased even as tax rates have decreased, a vindication for the Laffer Curve. He ranted about "tax cuts for the rich" so I countered that everyone's taxes were cut. He correctly noted that the poorest American's didn't receive a tax cut but I explained that's because they don't pay an income tax. He said that tax cuts "for the rich" don't help poor people. I explained that the money that the "rich" don't have to pay for the government is either spent (thereby helping the economy and creating more jobs), saved (thereby used by banks as loans so people can by houses or businesses can create more jobs), or invested (thereby allowing businesses to create more jobs). Still, he complained that the tax code isn't fair because it isn't "proportional" -- I immediately agreed. If there were a flat tax, then everyone would be paying an equal proportion of their income, but right now we have a progressive tax system where the poorest pay nothing and the richest pay upwards of half or more of their income. (I am a proponent of a progressive tax code, not a flat tax, but the system should be more equal.) He didn't believe me when I said that the richest 10% of taxpayers pay over 50% of the income taxes. In fact, he challenged me to a $10 bet; I agreed to a $50 bet. Here's the results:
In the United States, the Congressional Budget Office produces a number of reports on the share of all federal taxes paid by taxpayers of various income levels. Their data for 2002 shows the following: (Table 2)
-The top 1% of taxpayers by income pay 33% of all individual income taxes, and 22.7% of all federal taxes.
-The top 5% of taxpayers pay 54.5% of all individual income taxes, and 38.5% of all federal taxes.
-The top 10% of taxpayers pay 67.4% of all individual income taxes, and 50% of all federal taxes.
-The top quintile pays 82.5% of all individual income taxes, and 65.3% of all federal taxes
Go here for more current data and projected data.
Where's my $50, socialist? (I'm liking this kind of wealth redistribution!)
5) And finally, here's a charity event the guys at my yeshiva held just days after I left:
On Thursday 6th of Av, Mayanot Bochurim raised money for a local tattoo artist in the Ben Yehuda area in Jerusalem. The money was raised through an apple eating bonanza where bochurim would pledge money per apple eaten.
Eilya Gutner managed to gorge 18 apples in about an hour.
1) How much do you know about the expulsion of Jews from their homes/businesses/synagogues in Gaza? Take the quiz! For more information on the "disengagement" see Daniel Pipe's article. Also, here are pictures of the massive anti-disengagement protests last week.
2) Jonah Goldberg criticizes populism and polls:
"The people" are often wrong. And I don’t mean this solely in an ideological or partisan sense. I mean it in terms of cold, hard fact. According to the polls, “the people” are liars. Big, fat, honking liars. Just one example among many: John F. Kennedy won the presidency in 1960 with 49.7 percent of the vote. This is as close as we get to a historical fact. Indeed, that might overestimate things, since many believe Kennedy stole (i.e., invented) votes in Illinois and Texas. Yet, as Bob Dole might say, “whatever.” By 1963, 59 percent of Americans told pollsters they voted for him. And after JFK’s death, 65 percent claimed to have done so (much like the huge numbers of French who remembered fighting for the resistance only years after the war ended).
In other words, “the people” lied or honestly deluded themselves. Or at least 15 percent of them did. But we don’t know which 15 percent and we never will, just as we don’t know how many Americans lie, fudge, or mislead pollsters. We know a large number must, because pollsters are constantly asking “the people” about incredibly complex issues and “the people” almost always pretend to know what they think.
But I do know a lot of really smart people, and when I ask them the same questions pollsters regularly ask (Should Israel trade land for peace? Is the war in Iraq going well? Is Social Security partial privatization a bad idea? Why is Charmed still on TV while Angel and Buffy were cancelled?) and I usually get six-part answers, festooned with ifs, ands, buts and on-the-other-hands. But “the people” always seem to have a fully formed opinion handy.
And this leaves out the fact that a big chunk of “the people” are grotesquely ignorant of their government and current events. And I’m not just referring to that running segment on The Tonight Show where Jay Leno asks people to figure out what Flag Day celebrates. Just this month, the ABA (hint: the lawyer thing, not the bunch with the red, white, and blue basketball), released a poll that found that 22 percent of Americans think the three branches of government are Republican, Democrat, and Independent. In 1991 another ABA survey found that one third of Americans didn’t know what the Bill of Rights is. In 1987, 45 percent of Americans thought Karl Marx’s dictum “from each according to his ability to each according to his needs” was in the U.S. Constitution. In 1964 (!) only 38 percent of the American people knew the Soviet Union wasn’t in NATO.
Now, I don’t think the American people are as stupid or confused as all this suggests. But if they aren’t, the polls must be. Maybe people panic when they talk to pollsters. Maybe the methodology stinks like that aardvark-sock thing. Maybe respondents are distracted by the pollster’s annoying habit of tapping his glass eye with a ballpoint pen while awaiting an answer. Who knows?
What I do know is that, even if the polls were 100-percent accurate, they would still be a stupid way of setting policy. Why? Because “the people” only exist on Election Day. Before and after that, they’re just a bunch of individuals spouting off to strangers.
(And here's another one criticizing the media for pitting opinion journalists against political party hacks on political news shows.)
3) I've always been into nature and the environment (remember: I want to put the "conservative" back in "conservation"!) and I've recently started getting into health/organic food so I'm looking forward to this book: Crunchy Cons : How Birkenstocked Burkeans, gun-loving organic gardeners, evangelical free-range farmers, hip homeschooling mamas, right-wing nature lovers, and their diverse tribe of counter-cultural conservatives plan to save America (or at least the Republican Party) by Rod Dreher.
By the way, that's the longest book title I've ever seen. I challenge you to find a longer one!
4) I recently got into a debate with my brother's socialist friend. He saw me wearing my "Viva la Reagan Revolucion!" t-shirt and he was horrified that I could actually like Reagan (nevermind that 49 out of 50 states elected the guy). I asked why he disliked Reagan and he responded that "Reaganomics didn't work" and that the Bush tax cuts are just as bad. I countered that both have proven good for the economy and noted that tax revenues have increased even as tax rates have decreased, a vindication for the Laffer Curve. He ranted about "tax cuts for the rich" so I countered that everyone's taxes were cut. He correctly noted that the poorest American's didn't receive a tax cut but I explained that's because they don't pay an income tax. He said that tax cuts "for the rich" don't help poor people. I explained that the money that the "rich" don't have to pay for the government is either spent (thereby helping the economy and creating more jobs), saved (thereby used by banks as loans so people can by houses or businesses can create more jobs), or invested (thereby allowing businesses to create more jobs). Still, he complained that the tax code isn't fair because it isn't "proportional" -- I immediately agreed. If there were a flat tax, then everyone would be paying an equal proportion of their income, but right now we have a progressive tax system where the poorest pay nothing and the richest pay upwards of half or more of their income. (I am a proponent of a progressive tax code, not a flat tax, but the system should be more equal.) He didn't believe me when I said that the richest 10% of taxpayers pay over 50% of the income taxes. In fact, he challenged me to a $10 bet; I agreed to a $50 bet. Here's the results:
In the United States, the Congressional Budget Office produces a number of reports on the share of all federal taxes paid by taxpayers of various income levels. Their data for 2002 shows the following: (Table 2)
-The top 1% of taxpayers by income pay 33% of all individual income taxes, and 22.7% of all federal taxes.
-The top 5% of taxpayers pay 54.5% of all individual income taxes, and 38.5% of all federal taxes.
-The top 10% of taxpayers pay 67.4% of all individual income taxes, and 50% of all federal taxes.
-The top quintile pays 82.5% of all individual income taxes, and 65.3% of all federal taxes
Go here for more current data and projected data.
Where's my $50, socialist? (I'm liking this kind of wealth redistribution!)
5) And finally, here's a charity event the guys at my yeshiva held just days after I left:
On Thursday 6th of Av, Mayanot Bochurim raised money for a local tattoo artist in the Ben Yehuda area in Jerusalem. The money was raised through an apple eating bonanza where bochurim would pledge money per apple eaten.
Eilya Gutner managed to gorge 18 apples in about an hour.