American Mohist

things buying Jan'12

2012-01-21T20:23:00.000-08:00

NcStar Glock Rail
NcStar Beretta Rail
Leatherman Wingman
Lula pistol loader
Heinz jelly packs

Army, ADA, and AirSea Battle

2011-11-10T16:58:00.000-08:00

Galrahn has been discussing AirSea Battle for quite awhile, specifically focusing on the absence of any Army contribution to the overall public discussion. It is quite sad that the Army has not publicly engaged on the AirSea discussion. Only this month has the AUSA come out with a rebuttal to the Navy and Air Force's public discussions.

One big reason Big Army is not contributing to this AirSea concept is because of internal Army politics. Specifically the decline of Air Defense Artillery. It is quite paradoxical that, while Ballistic Missile Defense has taken on greater strategic significance, Army itself is institutionally moving away from ADA in general.

ADA is composed of two components, HIMAD and SHORAD. For much of the 90s, the active officer corps was split 50/50: 10 Battalion of HIMAD and 10 Battalion of SHORAD. Right after OIF1, though, Big Army saw that there was no low-altitude threat at all, so it moved decisively to eliminate the SHORAD formation. I think right now there's only 10 Stinger/Avenger batteries providing a residual capability, which is a 75% cut.

You'd probably say it's long overdue, but the key is that the loss of 30%+ of total ADA corps means that many fewer O4s and O5s writing papers to Parameters and other professional journals. Sure, we have several ADA generals at the Pentagon, including the current G-8, but where do you think the generals' talking points come from? It's those O4s and O5s.

The BMD mission has slightly increased the HIMAD side of the house, but it did not make a dent against the SHORAD loss. The unit manning the GMD missile field is a Guard unit (Colorado/Alaska Guard), whose officers do not worry about professional journals. Ambitious officers transfer to other hot fields to make their stars.

ADA probably will never attain the reverence of the Soviet PVO branch, but its preoccupation with self-preservation means that Big Army has little brainpower thinking about AirSea. Horror upon horrors, but sometimes I wonder if we should have folded ADA into the USAF like the Europeans have...

More Real Estate Shadow Inventory

2011-07-08T16:03:00.000-07:00

NPR had a story yesterday detailing the cost Fannie Mae is incurring, to keep up with the 150,000 homes it owns due to owner mortgage default.

Well, hell, you might say, why not just go ahead and sell them, so we don't have to pay for their upkeep? Without getting into the financial wisdom of selling now or later, I will simply present this as evidence that the housing market is weighed down by all that shadow inventory. Everyone is waiting for this inventory to come to the market. With the shadow inventory staying in the shadows, the market cannot adequately price the houses on the market now. So buyers are holding out for more certainty. Fannie Mae's action is preventing the market from hitting bottom.

Obama And Banks Ran Out of Time

2011-06-22T20:25:00.000-07:00

I just want to emphasize that the Obama Administration and the banking industry has run out of time, referencing my previous post where I said that they were hoping to wait out the recession. They were hoping that, by delaying the foreclosure process, they could soft land the housing market and the economy, and rebound before the banking industry and consumers run out of money. Well, as I said yesterday, the consumers have definitely run out of savings. The Greek debt drama could soon drain the banks dry, too. So yes, they have run out of time. We are now entering the second dip of the classic depression.

Liberal Economists' Blind Spots

2011-06-21T22:09:00.000-07:00

Derek Thompson of the Atlantic asked, "How did 2011 go so wrong?" He could not understand why the year started out so well, with all of the economic indicators pointing toward a recovery, yet 6 months later we are stalling.

Well, he came pretty close to the answer himself: Housing. He himself said that investment (for the top 10% of Americans mostly) plus housing constitutes the savings for American households. Therefore the housing collapse, which we are still sorting through, dampens the demand. And then, at the very end, Thompson concluded, well, "The hardest thing for Washington to understand is that not every economic question can be solved in Washington."

What Thompson has conveniently forgotten is that we are still sorting through the housing wreckage because of the Bush/Obama administration's housing policy. At the beginning of the crisis in 2008/9, the presidents concluded that a "soft landing" is our top goal. Therefore, they slowed down the foreclosure process. The banks themselves, fearful of exposing their own liabilities and thus going out of business, went along. The TARP program allowed the administration to dictate foreclosure policy and pace for awhile. The Making Home Affordable program of mortgage modification gave many people the false hope of staying in their homes, and thus exhausting their savings trying to save that sinking ship of their houses. The search for foreclosure scapegoats ended up at the robo-signing title agents, which does not change the material facts behind the foreclosure cases, but simply delaying the process.

The federal government has succeeded in their economic policy of soft landing housing. The economic cost of that priority is the current malaise we're going through. We have yet to find the bottom of the housing market. There is still a huge shadow inventory in the foreclosure pipeline. The administration's TARP funding prevented the banks from running out of cash, yet the banks' safety net allowed the banks to hold onto their foreclosed inventory, hoping that the housing prices will come back up before they run out of cash, thus allowing them to still make a profit. So consumers' savings are tied up in their houses. Too many people have exhausted their savings trying to stay in their untenable houses. The rest are waiting for the market to recover before realizing their real estate savings. The real estate market is sucking the liquidity out of the market, preventing a consumer demand-driven economic recovery.

See, in a "normal" recession, housing market starts crashing. People start losing jobs and have to stop paying mortgages. They either arrange a short-sale or foreclosure. The banks start accumulating properties instead of the revenue streams of mortgage payments. Thus banks quickly runs into their own liquidity crises. Even though the rational banker wants to hold onto the properties as long as possible, to recover the investment, the liquidity crises forces him to offload properties. The glut of housing supply is quickly realized, allowing the real estate market to discover the bottom quickly. At this time, the people with cash move in. They buy the cheap houses with their savings, releasing the cash into the economy. The discovery of the bottom allows business owners to start planning for the recovery. The additional cash in the economy greases both demand and investment. Voila, recovery.

An additional factor is that, as people lose their jobs and got foreclosed on, they move to greener pastures. The liberated labor move to where jobs are, satisfying the labor needs and increasing the monetary velocity of these growth areas. The result feeds back into the overall recovery and we get onto the peaks again.

Whereas, because of the delay in the foreclosure process, we have too many people holding on in the Rust Belt (And California), instead of moving to the Sun Belt where the jobs are. This exacerbates the unemployment problem, and decreases the monetary velocity in the Sun Belt. [With less labor in the Sun Belt, employers have to bid up wages. People with higher income have lower velocity. Thus, lower monetary velocity for everybody, and slowing down recovery.]

So yes, the government can do plenty to improve the economy. They can start by encouraging people to move to where the jobs are, and speed up the foreclosure process.

Oh, and we are starting to see the voices saying that a default on Treasuries is better than austerity measures. If that happens, we are going to drag the world economy down with us. The only thing standing in the way is the Republican House. Let's hope that they hold the line.

Charles Stross's Saturns Children and Thoughts on AI

2011-06-12T20:30:00.000-07:00

Finished Charles Stross's Saturn's Children this weekend. It was a great read. The "sex scenes", which obliquely referenced sex but not directly, are a welcome break from the modern fiction these days. Given that the heroine is a pleasure robot, the sexual references were exactly right, relevant and integral to the story, without detracting from it. Compared to, say, Tom Clancy, this book is a textbook example of addressing this subject. One suspects that the extraneous sex scenes in books these days are a plague inflicted by the book agents.

In any event, Saturn's Children paints a thoughtful picture of Artificial Intelligence inheriting the earth. The classic tragedy of robots bound by the human property laws, in a world where humans are extinct, is haunting. The constraints of economic reality on robots' actions is a great reminder that, despite the hopeful communism of Star Trek, et al, Resource Limitation is the universal condition no matter the scale of your civilization.

The notion of Artificial Intelligence having to pattern the human brain to achieve symbolic manipulation, is in line with current thinking on AI. The spontaneous emergence of consciousness is the combination of the hardwired neural complexity and the profusion of environmental stimuli. To recreate that neural complexity in software form is probably too expensive, compared to implementing that complexity in hardware form. Moreover, the role of the environmental stimuli is crucial in guiding the development of the neural complexity. Without the interaction with the environment, a brain is only latent, not realized. There are some interesting research taking place on this particular AI hypothesis, and we will soon find out if the hypothesis hold any validity.

One note of caution, though, is that current researchers may be underestimating the amount of environmental stimuli required to realize intelligence. Brains emerged to interact with the environment, not just to observe it. Without interaction with the data stream, these new AI brains may starve just like the sensory-deprived orphans of post-communism Russia and Romania. Or worse, the Hikikomori phenomenon in Japan. One might think that the current projects are somewhat flawed because they are focusing on building the brain itself, rather than the educational apparatus required to realize the intelligence.

If the prototypes succeed, Dr. David Brin's future of AI working alongside man will be close at hand. That future of augmented intelligence (where a brain can interact with a digital computer) definitely sounds exciting!

MGI Might Revive Bushmaster Pistol

2011-06-08T17:19:00.000-07:00

Mack Gwinn Industries, the inventor of the Marck-15 Hydra weapon system with modular mag wells and quick change barrels for multiple calibers, and the licensee for the Valkyrie belt-feed system, [which itself was a revival of the Ciener light machine gun,] has publicly expressed interest in the Bushmaster pistol. Mack Gwinn, Jr, founder of MGI, was the primary developer of the original Bushmaster pistol, which later went to the Bushmaster Firearms company, had a rifle variant, and merged with the Edenpine SAK-30 to become the Bushmaster M-17S bullpup rifle. Whew, that was a handful.

Duncan Long's AR-15 Sourcebook said that Bushmaster and Mack Gwinn developed the Bushmaster pistol on their own, and which later evolved into the M-17S rifle. However, other sources such as Small Arms Review's article as well as Guns.Ru stated that the M-17S directly descended from the Armstech/Edenpine SAK-30. The original Bushmaster pistol does not appear to have the tensioned barrel that M-17S has, so perhaps M-17S inherited the barrel from SAK-30, and the receiver/fire-control/bolt/bolt-carrier from Bushmaster Pistol. All three used the gas system from the AR-18.

In any event, MGI said that they want to bring the Bushmaster Pistol back into production, which is great news! [You can find the announcement in their Facebook wall photo album.] In an earlier ('07-'08?) private correspondence with their marketing rep, they had expressed interest in reviving the M-17S at a later date. Perhaps the time has come for this bull-pup design. I hope they bring back the M-17S and the pistol together, but either one would be great. Given their Hydra mag-wells and quick-change barrels, perhaps MGI can add these features into the new gun. Guess I need to start saving money now! :D

Books I buy

2011-05-13T16:21:00.000-07:00

SAVE THE LAST BULLET FOR YOURSELF: A Soldier of Fortune in the Balkans and Somalia
Matterhorn: A Novel of the Vietnam War
SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance
Glee Encore
Negima! Magister Negi Magi, Vol. 28
The Life Eaters
7 Deadly Scenarios: A Military Futurist Explores the Changing Face of War in the 21st Century

Humanitarian Service-LAPEL PIN
Shirt Stay Belt
MP5 Mag Pouch - MulticamTM
Iraq Campaign Medal-LAPEL PIN
The Real Ghostbusters: Complete Collection
The Golden Age of Science Fiction: An Anthology of 50 Short Stories (Unexpurgated Edition) (Halcyon Classics)
Lights Out
Panzer Tactics: German Small-Unit Armor Tactics in World War II

Libya and Nation-State Paradigm

2011-03-31T19:15:00.000-07:00

Well, the Obama administration sure did dodge a big fat bullet there w/ the Libya crisis. Before the passage of the UN Security Council resolution, the Benghazi people did everybody a favor by declaring independence from the Qaddafi regime. With a nominally state structure, we are now able to negotiate with Benghazi for aid and assistance. The US didn't have to figure out how to deal with a non-state actor.

But the question remains un-resolved. If Benghazi did not declare independence, could the US provide overt assistance such as a publicized shipment of ammunition? Like I said earlier, the CIA could provide covert assistance when Obama signs a presidential finding, but not the Defense Department. The weapon export regulatory regime (ITAR) requires a specific, drawn-out process to make this overt assistance happen. With this drawn out process, Congress would get involved, slowing things down further.

Maybe this Libya adventure will provide the legislative impetus for Congress to start working this problem.

International Aid: Skip the Middle, Skimming, Man?

2011-02-28T17:58:00.000-08:00

Slate had an article this past Friday on the international aid/development community: Is it better to give money directly to the poor people of the Third World, or give to their governments, who in turn distribute to the people. This article coincides with the current discussion over Mubarak's and Qaddafi's personal fortunes skimmed from their countries. Many government employees in the Third World are corrupt. Development groups and advocates have long recognized the inefficiency of corruption.

There have been previous attempts to impose accountability on Third World bureaucracies. American governmental aid generally comes with auditors, monitors, and reams of forms to fill out, in part to minimize foreign corruption. The structural adjustment programs of IMF and World Bank were a response to the bloated and corrupt bureaucracies: With the ministries and state enterprises being a source of patronage and a job program for the ruling parties, it was no surprise that these countries would have to default. To get new loans and aid, then, these countries must pare back their government, enact "austerity measures", to get back to an affordable level.

We can see that the Structural Adjustment was a proximate cause of the current troubles in Egypt: World Bank and IMF forced Egypt to limit government size and to divest state enterprises. Therefore young men could not get a cushy government job like their parents. Therefore they can't marry and they got angry. QED revolution. Although the fundamental question naturally arises: How did their parents get all those iron rice bowl government jobs?

In any event, Mubarak and his people had it coming to themselves. Knowing that structural adjustment was coming, they could have prepared their people for a private-sector economy. The redtape against starting a business in Egypt is legendary, sometimes exceeding the already bloated obstacles in India. That could have been a starting point for Mubarak, coincident with the privatization.

In any event, the move to cut out the middle man/government in dispensing aid is an alluring proposition. If you just give poor people money directly, they can spend it well. We're in the post-Westphalian age, anyway. But the authors went ahead and cited two native government programs, where the government, that skimming government, was monitoring the poor for compliance with program conditions. So you end up having to depend on a bureaucracy, either government or private, for ensuring compliance [such as sending kids to school and receiving vaccinations.]

To go around the government corruption problem, aid organizations and donors will essentially have to create their own private bureaucracy to execute the program on the ground. Then, if corruption is an intractable cultural problem, this private bureaucracy will become corrupt over time, less and less effective. And that's assuming your conniving government was willing to stand aside and forgo its loot. Cutting out the government works only when the government has ceased to exist.

In addition, Western donors and aid organizations run into the command economy problem: they just do not have enough information at their level to make effective spending decisions on a long term basis.

The real answer, as many conservatives concluded in the '80s, was to cut the dole. Most of the Third World governmental dysfunction come from our misguided welfare program. Western food subsidies drive African maize and yam farmers out of business. Western aid creates a large bureaucracy more focused on life in the cities than the poor in the countryside. College grads make more money being the drivers of aid workers than being an engineer. Only by stopping the money can we hope to starve the distorted incentive structure we have created.

Book Review: John Reed's Hyperinflation

2011-02-09T19:34:00.000-08:00

I wrote this awhile ago. I just started a new job, hence the lack of activities recently. Anyway, here it is.

When I found out that John T Reed was writing a book on Hyperinflation and Deflation, I was really excited. His book, Succeeding, was a true self-help book that focuses on working hard, saving money, and doing the right things. He writes clearly, with a minimum of flowery language, and includes checklists and other tools to help readers implement his advice. His preview articles on this subject promised unconventional advice on coping with currency fluctuations.

I pre-ordered 2 copies, and they arrived right after the release date. The book starts off with a review of the current state, a history of hyperinflation and deflation, and then Reed's financial countermeasures. The book is clear and well-written, with Reed's characteristically critical tone. It is an engaging read.

If you have read Laurence Kotlikoff's The Coming Generational Storm: What You Need to Know about America's Economic Future, then you are familiar with the scale of the US financial liabilities. [IE, The US owes more in current and future obligations (Medicare/Social Security) than it will ever have the money to pay off.] In fact, Reed cites Generational Storm as a major source in the book. However, if anything, Kotlikoff understates the problem, if that was possible, as Reed made abundantly clear. The only saving grace for the US is that the rest of the world is worse off than the US. Conversely, the US's critical economic position means America will amplify the economic crisis and spread it to the rest of the world. Regardless, the 'flations are coming soon, and all investors need to hedge the 'flations.

Reed's financial countermeasures are definitely unconventional. He explained in great detail his reasonings, and cited multiple sources to back it up. His chapter on precious metals goes against most writings on the subject [of both pro & con], but will help you avoid trouble with future legislation and law enforcement. The current brouhaha over the 1099-Misc. $600 requirement (Obamacare) is just a portent of the negatives of a PM-only strategy. Reed is not avoiding PMs altogether, but is serving as a corrective against the lazy-thinking behind a PM-only strategy. In a 'flationary environment, governments inevitably restrict usage of precious metals instead of currency. Therefore, the prudent investor has to rely on other countermeasures to adequately hedge against the 'flations.

Every prudent investor needs a copy of John Reed's Hyperinflation & Deflation. His book is still timely and will help you survive the 'flations.
------------
I wrote that 4 months ago (Sep'2010). Since then, the economy has improved slightly, making 'flationary concerns less pressing to most of you. However, the fundamentals has not changed. The US Dollar is still unsound. As Reed recently commented, the current debt ceiling debate in Congress is a good opportunity to fix our problems, but that Congress will sadly squander. With the improving stock market, it is a good time for many investors to diversify their recovered portfolio into the other assets Reed recommends. Now is the time. Like the Chinese saying, "Short pain is better than long pain."

For all readers, Fernando Aguirre's The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse is a good complement to Reed's Hyperinflation. Aguirre provides a good ground-level view of an economic collapse, and gives you a good understanding of the interplay of recession, hyperinflation, and deflation. Aguirre offers other good tips on preparing for a 'flationary future. His blogs are good to keep up with.

For readers interested in the academic background on the American debt obligations, Generational Storm, though dated (2005), still offers a good backgrounder. It explains the math, too. Kotlikoff's recent works could be good reading, too.

Notes on Survivalist Site Defense

2010-11-29T15:00:00.001-08:00

There was a thread on AR15.com, discussing the minimum manning requirement for a site defense. I think it is useful to readers who are not paying members, to archive part of this thread. It also merits further clarifications on the tactical considerations for defense planning in a semi-rural/suburban area.
http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=10&f=17&t=641061&light=
For a defensive position, you need to establish a perimeter, and station guards. Obviously, not everyone can be pulling security at the same time. You need to let people rest. Also, food production and other manufacturing activities are vital in a long-term situation. So only a small fraction of the group can stand security watch at a time.
The purpose of the sentry is to give time for the reserve/QRF to get ready. The time, in this case, is distance. Say your defenders need 1 minute to go from work detail to defensive positions. People can rush 200 meters (in gear) in a minute, give or take. So your sentry(ies) need to see at least 200 meters out from your perimeter. You may need 8 ppl per shift to cover that distance, but most likely 2 people, in a protected position (rooftop nest), will suffice. So 10 people are capable of handling that duty. I would go with 12am-12pm 12-hr shifts personally, as opposed to the 6am-6pm shift beloved by everybody else. It's easier on your biological clock.
[In a homestead, your perimeter is not the whole farm, but rather the living area complex (barn, house, outhouse(?), et al.)]
Where the people requirement really come in is in the active defense plan. In other words, patrolling. You have to keep up a patrol schedule if hostiles are in the area. The manpower requirement varies, but SOFs give us a guideline here. SAS go w/ 4-men teams, while Force Recon go w/ 6-men teams. If you have 1 team out, 2 teams resting/working, you need a minimum of 12 people. Factoring in the sentries would give you 4 teams min, 16 people.
Your sentry acts as your Observation Post(s). You can go up, or go out horizontally. If you have the altitude, a guard tower is good. If you cannot go up, then you have to put your sentries outside your perimeter. Speaking of guard towers, it is unconscionable to place people in unarmored guard towers. All guard towers need to be sandbagged at a minimum. Overhead shade obviously. A protected entrance. A rooftop nest with internal access is the best. Obviously the house need strategic sandbagging as well. Sandbags are easily accessible to the homesteader. An alternative is using those Amazon shipping box, with a plastic liner. Or just build a sandbox with plywood.
If you are in a built-up area, you will need more people because you need to have eyes-on for all of the dead space, possible infiltration routes. In addition, you need to subdivide your compound, so that infiltrators cannot compromise the defense of your whole site. In other words, you need to have "water-tight compartments", to use a naval analogy. For the perimeter defense, if you have a square, four firing ports/bunkers/strongpoints can complete your defense by putting out a wall of lead along the perimeter.
"Think of the effects of a probe on your BOL site not once or twice a day , but 10,12,or even 20 times a day and night."
Yes, it would be unwise to go battle stations with just a pot shot. Manning the defensive line/battle positions is only for an active assault, ie, you see people breaking from the tree line. And yes, you should clear as many trees as you can, out to 500m from your squad nests/houses, when possible. In a suburb/city, you may have to use obstacles to channel the enemy main assault, and rely on vigilance against the infiltration attempts.

"Lets revisit that probing issue. You say you will just send out a patrol to run them off. Thats a great way to get ambushed, ect."
Well, you do have to clear the area. Active patrolling means you should have a team in the field at all times. If you're doing it right, this is when you call the patrol team back to clear that sniper.
The preper needs to remember that the patrol team is out there to disrupt enemy assault preparations and recon operations. Therefore, the team needs to look for possible enemy objective rally points/patrol bases. They recon enemy ingress routes and vehicle staging areas. They check for signs of passage and occupation at these sites.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Speaking of vehicles, that will be the biggest threat to the survivalists. Think of it as modern cavalry. A pick up can greatly disrupt your defense, if you're not planned for it. You will need vehicle barriers [trenches and those giant caltrops/dragon's teeth] to block and channel a mechanized assault. You may also need to place an OP on the possible vehicle rally points for early warning.
The enemy mode of operation will probably be distributed, 1-vehicle scouting parties, ranging all over their area of ops looking for prey. Upon target selection, the scouts/swarm is recalled to mass against the target. Obviously the mass is depending on the perceived target difficulty. If you happen to be in the AO of such a gang, and you have just repelled the scout, it is time to run away. Unless you are organized and trained enough, or can call in enough posse, to ambush/interdict the gang coming your way.

Education, Global Governance & Development

2010-11-29T10:15:00.000-08:00

A couple of interesting links here. One on education, the other global governance.

Althouse commented on an NYT op-ed, which was calling for less emphasis on testing. Instead, Ann commented that we're seeing a debate on teacher's pet vs testing. With so much testing, we're finding out that American teachers have been giving good grades to the "good" students, who behave in the classroom and do what the teacher says. And the testers had been losing out, until recently. Obviously we need to do both. Teaching compliance as well as learning skills. As the Far East has shown, teacher's pets will study hard and test well, if that is the new metric. The key objective, as ever, is to foster creativity. Although people impugn the US education system as good at creativity, it's not certain that is the case. With so little testing, what is left is creativity, so that's what you see. But you can take it to extreme, and it underserves the disadvantaged students, which is what had happened.
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2010/11/standardized-testing-has-embarrassed.html

Ken Anderson remarked on the Climate Change movement from the global governance and "development" perspective. It dovetails nicely with the current Playboy's article on Vulture Funds, which demand full payment for the bonds of insolvent states. The Playboy article is from the perspective of the "development" community and the subject states, but it does highlight the corruption exposure Vulture Funds do in getting paid. It turns out that, if you expose corruption in, say, Congo, they will pay you to stop doing that. As John Reed would say, a state does not need to borrow money to function.
http://volokh.com/2010/11/29/cancun-and-copenhagen-and-carbon-as-pure-regulatory-object/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulture_fund
http://johntreed.com

Anderson highlights that third world countries see Climate Change as a way to get paid. Over the past 30 years, international development had been trending away from states, because of the blatant corruption in 60s and 70s. Climate Change offers a way to go back to "state-centric" development, where bureaucracies and rulers can skim off the top, again. For the UN bureaucracy, it is also a way to increase its power over the world. Climate Change advocates often ignored this aspect of the Climate Change movement, which led to gross distortions of the carbon regime.

Anderson also looked into why the BRICS, and China in particular, opted out of the Copenhagen/Cancun rounds, even as the advocates dangled more incentives. It is an interesting thought on the boundaries of Chinese behavior.

Collapse of Micro-Credit in India

2010-11-18T14:40:00.001-08:00

New York Times bring us the sad story of the collapse of Micro-Credit in India. Apparently politicians encouraged people to default.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/world/asia/18micro.html?_r=1&hp

It is sad that this is happening. The industrious poor can often lift themselves out of poverty, with just a little bit of help. The daily vagaries of poverty can set people back [car troubles, sick days] despite their best efforts. Either a strong network or available credit is necessary to meet the cashflow demands. In a transitional economy [industrializing, marketizing, etc.], where the social networks are weak and in flux, credit availability is even more important.

Micro-Credit is a hope to by-pass traditional loan sharks in providing cheap credit to the poor. [the industrious ones.] That the micro-banks are now meeting political resistance is just sad. Some of them are perhaps becoming payday lender with higher rates, prompting this movement.

The chaotic beast that is Indian politics and bureaucracy continues to perplex.

h/t Global Guerrillas http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2010/11/links-18-november-2010.html

Insights into Philippines' Strategic Re-Alignment

2010-11-17T12:51:00.001-08:00

Asia Times has an interesting article outlining the Philippines' strategic embrace of China. We saw the Philippines' rebuke of Sec Clinton at the recent ASEAN conference, and now we have some of the reasons why.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/LK17Ae01.html

Filipinos are turning against the US due to the legal shelter of the Visiting Forces Agreement, which protects US servicemembers from local prosecution. At the same time, China is donating equipment to the Philippines military. Thus public sentiments align with the elites in turning away from the US.

It is a question whether this re-alignment is temporary or permanent. The article reminds us that the VFA is up for renewal. The ASEAN drama could be the Philippines leveraging their position in the VFA negotiations. It could also be the Philippines steering a neutral course between China and the US, getting the mostest from both sides.

The Philippines dispute the South Sea boundary with China. With this neutral course, it could be bargaining for a more favorable outcome in the border negotiations, compared with Vietnam. That they had not fought a war with China certainly make the Philippines more amiable toward China. China also has an incentive to demonstrate its peaceful intentions to the world. A successful resolution to Sino-Filipino border would be a good counterpoint to the on-going disputes with Vietnam and India.

This is a nice illustration of the axiom that nations do not have friends.

h/t China Defense Mashup http://www.china-defense-mashup.com/?p=8515

More Government Pork in India: Software Edition

2010-10-28T10:55:00.001-07:00

India's Defence Research and Development Organization, which is the Indian equivalent of the American DARPA and the service materiel commands rolled into one, wants to build its own computer operating system. It cites computer security as the impetus.
http://www.itworld.com/operating-systems/123566/india-plans-develop-its-own-computer-operating-system

While the goal is noble, it is patently a boondoggle. DRDO is setting up TWO software engineering centers to write this one operating system. Its waste is evident when you think: MIT computer science students used to write an operating system for their 6.033 design project [not sure if they still do that.] Linus Torvald largely wrote the Linux kernel on his own, over a 4 month period. [Other people contributed codes for features later on, but Torvald finished the functional prototype.]

The Linux example stands out particularly, because it is open and already working. China's software institute, for example, has customized a couple versions of Linux for domestic use. If India cares about developing a useable product and plugging security holes, it should deploy a suitable Linux version immediately, instead of putzing around with an ego project/pork like this operating system project.

That India is continuing with Windows while waiting for DRDO, with its long history of over-budget and over-schedule projects, means that this stunt was for political purposes rather than to satisfy a present capability gap. For most computing needs, there are open software products available.

Tests are Good

2010-10-14T15:05:00.001-07:00

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39674299/ns/health-kids_and_parenting
http://www.livescience.com/culture/high-school-students-cheat-100512.html

Tests help kids retain information and improve learning outcomes. Americans need to get over their fear of testing straitjacketing their kids. You can be both creative and take tests. It is not either-or.

And have more recess time. Asian countries have 10 minutes between each class, so kids can recess throughout the day.

The Absurdity of the Zero Interest Mortgage Meme

2010-10-12T12:38:00.001-07:00

MSN quotes this gem of an article, speculating on the home mortgage interest rate in America. The unknown author thinks that the interest rate has a good chance of hitting zero percent. He reasons, "0% financing has long worked as an incentive in the auto industry." And, "After all, two years ago, few people would have thought a 4% mortgage was possible, Larson said."
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Banking/HomeFinancing/could-mortgage-rates-drop-to-zero.aspx

The author ignores the fundamentals of bank financing. For home owners, their payment consists of two parts: principal and interest. If the sum of principal and interest is within his means, the home owner can afford the house. The laws of supply and demand says that the monthly payment of the average house will be affordable to the average home owner. Interest rate is but half of the price here, the other being home price. If there is excess inventory on the market, the sellers will have to lower the monthly payment to move inventory, meaning lowering both interest and principal.

The other market here is the financing market, being the bank. Banks do not care about the price of the monthly payment, per se. They only care about the interest payment. With a zero interest mortgage, the banks will lose money. With positive inflation, the interest rate has to be higher than inflation. With zero or negative inflation, keeping money in the bank is worth more than taking on the risk of lending. If we ever do get to a deflationary economy, banks will never incur a loss from mortgage lending. They will either not lend at all, or they will milk a government subsidy to cover their risk of lending.

In addition, in a deflationary period, by definition the home price will go down with the rest of the economy. With a lower home price, once again the monthly payment is within reach of the average buyer, all without having to resort to zero interest.

The author seems desperate to believe home prices will not fall. That desperation, and the political will to prop up the home prices, is harming all Americans and holding back our economic recovery.

Naval Strategy and South China Sea

2010-10-11T21:29:00.000-07:00

This article in Asia Times adds to our understanding of nationalist elements in Japan politics. The writer's pro-China bias is so thick that even I could pick it up, but he makes clear the current [and maybe emergent] Japanese strategy: Aggressively patrols the Senkaku Islands as territorial waters, but not crossing the bright line of settling the islands. Japan's strategic concern is in not antagonizing Taiwan on the Diaoyutai issue, which can strengthen the pro-unification camp in Taiwan. [The independence movement in Taiwan is pro-Japan for historical and geo-strategic reasons.] If Taiwan ever reunifies, Japan will settle the Senkakus in a heartbeat.

More broadly, Japan's overtures to Vietnam, and Phillipine's ASEAN rebuke to Sec. Clinton's South Sea remakrs, underscores an interesting anti-colonial dynamic [for lack of a better word] at play in South East Asia. [The Hate Triangle that is North East Asia is well-documented.]

In all ASEAN states [except Singapore and maybe Brunei], there are strong sentiments and biases against both China and America. [A bit of Japan, too, but that's faint compared to the other two.] The Chinese outposts in the South Sea are sore spots to the surrounding countries, but their people don't like the Americans, either. For example, Vietnam would really prefer Russia over the US in balancing China, but Russia cannot do more than sell weapons at present. In fact, Russia wants to refurbish Cam Ranh Bay, but we'll see if it actually happens. Up Country portrays well both the strategic inevitability of a US-Vietnam security alliance, and Vietnamese reluctance to do so.

Phillippines has been pissed off about the American evacuation of Clark Air Base in 1991. Its intelligentsia are suspicious of America over its support of Marcos regime. Indonesia has regional aspirations, colonial baggage, past military dictatorships, and an Islamic identity, all of which build the above bias as well.

All this is to say that the US may have no "entry point" into a Battle of the South Sea. While the US has a freedom of navigation concern, the combatants (China + one more) will not want its help in resolving the battle. The most likely scenario is where the US Navy escorts neutral convoys together with Singapore and Japan, a la the Tanker War'84-88. The escort scenario will require several squadrons of FFGs, which the US Navy is retiring soon.

Most of the popular South Sea scenarios envision the US taking a combatant role against China's southern fleet, which in turn feeds into the general support for more destroyers and aircraft carriers. However, the political emphasis on the higher end of the Navy is unbalancing it for meeting the full spectrum of requirements. The combatant scenario is but one of the possible futures of the South Sea. Another equally likely future is the above escort scenario. Convoy escort is generally the duty of frigates, but we are coming up against a frigate gap. The current difficulties of the Littoral Combat Ships program means it may be cut short. It will take time to start up a replacement frigate program. So there may be a long gap between the retirement of the last Perry and the introduction of the next frigate, in the near future. If the South Sea Battle falls during this gap, the US Navy will have to commit our Aegis destroyer squadrons [which are national strategic assets for missile defense] for convoy duty, which is a much lower strategic priority. So the USN is on the trajectory toward a disastrous South Sea.

[The LCS as currently configured is completely incapable of convoy air defense, and only possibly capable of the convoy ASW, pending its ASW module.]

Another question we need to answer is the strategic priority of the South Sea itself. With the opening of the Northwest Passage, the South Sea is no longer the petrol lifeline of Japan. Australia, another ally, does not depend on the South Sea for petroleum. Other than the possibility of oil, and the general global commerce, why should the US care about the South Sea?

The popular South Sea combatant scenarios may be the manifestations of a US Navy in search of a strategic purpose. The continuing focus on a "near peer competitor", aka China, is unbalancing the US Navy from its other strategic priorities, as I outlined above. We need some sanity over this piece of ocean, at least in the US. That the ASEAN states go crazy over the submerged atolls there does not mean it will start World War III. The most important role for the US is to contain the conflict, and compartmentalize its effects from the rest of the world. With a robust convoy escort capability, we can minimize the harm of a shooting war on global commerce, and avoid foreign entanglements. The Senkaku flare up reminds us all that there are no easy territorial disputes left in the world. All of the remaining territorial disputes have no clear title holders; every claimant has a legitimate claim to the title. The rest of the world should not suffer from these petty title fights.

Senkaku/Diaoyutai, and Reflections on Maritime Low-Intensity Warfare

2010-10-01T13:50:00.001-07:00

Watching the Senkaku dispute, one is reminded of the passion people feel toward land, especially a piece of land that most people have never seen and almost uninhabitable. That people can feel so passionate of land speaks ill toward conflicts like the Israeli-Palestinian struggle.

What is the next step? In the Hobbesian world of international relations, possession is 90% of the game. Japan had erected markers and a lighthouse on Diaoyutai, but has no permanent presence on the islands. Therefore, the first actor to "settle" the islands will resolve the dispute in his favor.

Indeed, as NightWatch reports, Japan is considering stationing troops.

I thought China might deploy the PLA to garrison the islands much like it did in the south china sea, but this article suggests that China may not have the will to escalate.

A unilateral occupation of any island [of the 4 "habitable" ones] will trigger a military race to settle the other 3 islands. The second mover will also embargo the opposing garrisons to "freeze" the situation, pending diplomatic resolution. Both sides will try to re-supply their marines on shore. A naval confrontation is inevitable in this scenario. Due to the distance, neither side is capable of enforcing an aerial embargo for long, so aerial resupply will keep the garrisons at survival level.

[If Japan moves first, Taiwan will face political pressure to deploy as well. Such a three-way race risks driving Taiwan away from Japan, which may be one of the few current constraints holding Japan back.]

In this scenario of unilateral settlements, a military confrontation at sea will quickly reach a new local equilibrium, absent political wills for war. If domestic pressures increase, the political leadership may seek points through this escalation.

One further point on this military confrontation: To enforce the naval embargo against resupply, ramming will be the predominant tactic. As I mentioned previously, ocean-going tugboats are incredibly relevant on the maritime low-intensity battlefield. If a combatant is too fragile for ramming, its only resort will be warning shots, which is a very risky escalation on the force continuum, depending on gunnery skills and sea state. Whereas the physical force of a tugship enables safe resolution against non-cooperative vessels. While Galrahn has expounded on the necessity of including and elevating VBSS teams and naval infantry in the planning/doctrine & force structure of naval strategy, tugs and ramming represent the other leg of the low-intensity naval dyad. Indeed, a ramming touched off the current crisis, and the Japan Coast Guard cutters frequently resorted to ramming to enforce its claims over the Senkaku Islands. Both tugs & VBSS teams will depend on a mothership that is sorely lacking in the US Navy.

Given the prominence of nationalist groups in both Japan and China, a non-government actor may try to settle the islands. Japanese and Taiwanese civilian groups had attempted to resolve the sovereignty dispute through settlement. Japan Coast Guard were able to arrest and deport Taiwanese settlers in the past. Japanese settlers did not have the logistic support to stay long term. There is no fresh water on the islands nor much wildlife, making the logistic requirements unaffordable to most NGOs. The current diplomatic crisis may raise sufficient funds for such an expedition, though.

If a Taiwanese group undertakes a deployment, its primary obstacle will be Japanese eviction. The settlers will have to employ non-lethal measures to successfully resist eviction. For example, net launchers can trap RHIBs and swimmers in the surf zone, preventing Coast Guard officers from landing. Once on land, sticky foam and nets can immobilize the officers. Thus secured, the settlers can send the officers back out to sea on their RHIBs, for an intercept and recovery by their own cutters. The settlers may deploy an ADS-like device without contending with human-safety concerns, but fuel for power generation will be the primary constraint on its operation. Same goes for other direct energy systems.
[We focus on a Taiwanese group because of logistics, and because Chinese billionaires are unlikely to fund this endeavor without government clearance.]

A Japanese civilian group faces eviction risks from the Coast Guard as well. In the current environment, PRC will respond to a civilian escalation with a proxy civilian deployment [ie, a state-sponsored NGO.] To maintain the status quo, where Japn enjoys de facto sovereignty over Diaoyu with its cutter patrols, the Japanese government has an incentive to head off a low-intensity escalation by evicting Japanese settlers. In addition, a Japanese civilian escalation risks a Taiwanese response as well, which is against Japanese interests as stated above. Therefore, a Japanese NGO needs to invest in non-lethal measures to oppose landings.

An NGO can survive on the islands with reverse osmosis water purifiers and mussel/shellfish harvests. It is not impossible, but requires significant preparation and training.

At the moment, neither Japan nor PRC wishes to escalate the dispute. However, ignored domestic pressures can become rogue NGO actions. A successful NGO operation/settlement can force the governments into escalation, reaching the new local equilibrium of a naval embargo. A Solomonic resolution could divide each island into two, half to Japan and the other half China, with a Green Line going down the middle of each island. However, a settlement operation can preclude that division. We could end up with an Ying-Yang-esque division, with a Japanese Diaoyu Dao and a Chinese Taisho Jima. That would be an amusing ending to this 130 year old dispute.

PS (3OCT10): Edited title and added links and tags.

NYT's Tutoring Discussion

2010-09-28T14:34:00.000-07:00

Today's New York Times has an interesting story/discussion on the boom of after-school tutoring programs like Kumon and its ilk. Educators weighed in on what's driving this boom.
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/09/26/why-more-students-rely-on-tutors

One of the respondents, Dr Ormsby, opined that we need to get rid of calculators and bring back proof-based geometry in our math curriculum. He is right.

I studied Japanese abacus and mental calculations in elementary school, and indeed abacus and slide rules help students form a physical understanding of arithmatics, an understanding you do not get from calculators. Some kids will get arithmatics without an aid, but most students benefit from this physical understanding. Essentially, you are engaging the visual and the physical centers of the brain in understanding math, in addition to the verbal center. Anytime you use more than one part of the brain, you get better learning results.

In East Asia, elementary school students used to train on the abacuses as well as calculators as part of their arithmatics program. Of course, memorization of the multiplication table was a requirement, too. I don't know if these things are still there today, but I hope so. America would do well to import these requirements.

Proof-based geometry is another vital part of a rigorous high school math program. Students who cannot do proofs are not ready to take on technical majors in college [except maybe biology/psych.] We are doing students a disservice by depriving them of this vital piece of learning, therefore constraining their options in college. Proof-based geometry [and all proofs] is fun, more so than algebra, which is just pure drudgery. If you take the fun out of math and leave only drudgery, of course students will tune out.

When I was doing stuff like math teams, Academic Decathlon, and SATs, I found that I could do the problems more quickly without a calculator, than with one. The abacus training was great in that regard. During my time in AcaDec, the math sections were difficult for most contestants to finish, for some reason [I didn't have a problem.] Maybe it was when they were introducing calculators into the problems, thus causing that problem. Anyway, for contestans like me, it was a great place to pick up valuable points and pull away from the pack. I hone the strategy of quickly deciding if I should apply calculators to a particular problem or go w/ my mental abacus, which allowed me to complete the math sections. For standardized exams like the SATs, the math section is indeed a place where fast arithmatics is vital, and where a calculator will slow you down.

[I was extremely saddened when they subsequently dumbed down and trimmed the math sections at AcaDec. Going from a 50-problem set to a 35- -problem set is just pathetic.]

New York Times had another recent article on the testing culture in East Asia, and it is fascinating. I may have to put my kids into cram schools during their elementary years, just to make up for the lack of structure and discipline of today's American elementary education.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/12/weekinreview/12rosenthal.html?scp=1&sq=chinese%20testing&st=cse

Dysfunctional Colleges

2010-09-20T11:51:00.001-07:00

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/feature/college_dropout_factories.php?page=1

Dysfunctional colleges are just as sad as dysfunctional high schools. While many of the "at-risk" students are not ready for college-level course work, they are capable of the work with proper preparation. It is sad that machine politics, designed to empower and serve the disadvantaged, is now failing them with these horrible colleges.

My wife teaches at a lower-tier college, and her descriptions of the horrible purges going on at the school, plus inept administration [even when firing somebody they don't like], would be funny if they are not hurting the students.

Gates Strikes Again

2010-08-10T13:24:00.000-07:00

Sec (Dr) Robert Gates has struck again. He is eliminating 50 flag positions and 150 SESs [Senior Executive Service], as well as chopping JFCOM down to size. This is great. We certainly should not fall into the Royal Navy's problem of having more Admirals than ships. That he's allowing the services to keep any future savings is certainly a good incentive for more cost cutting.

As Dr Gates has acknowledged, military healthcare is the elephant in the room that we need to control. As I've discussed before, right now the services get to pawn off retiree healthcare to the VA, which just lets them off of any consequences of abusing their people. We need to hold the generals accountable for excessive disability among the veterans, especially the preventable ones such as hearing loss and sit-up-induced lower spinal injuries.

The Institution of "Capitalism & Luxury Goods"

2010-08-08T00:58:00.000-07:00

Daniel Indiviglio had a great article on the gender pay gap earlier this week, "Why Working Mothers Fall Behind". This is based on the New York Times story and a recent study on the gender pay gap. Indiviglio's observation is, if we focus purely on men and women who stay in the labor force during their professional career [by discounting the women who take breaks or drop out], there is no gender pay gap. The gender pay gap, at this time, is basically a proxy for the real pay gap, between people who stay in, and people who drop out, of the labor force.

His article touched off some interesting discussions around the web. I finally had some time to look at the comments today, and it struck me, that this is another place where we can ponder Carroll Quigley's Institutionalization Theory! :D

A brief recap on Institutionalization: Over time, instruments of power calcify into institutions, thus stopping contribution into our civilization's growth, eventually leading to its collapse.

In our current Western Civilization, Quigley identified our "instrument" as free market Capitalism. As Quigley remarked, luxury goods is the engine behind the growth of commerce in general, and in today's economy, luxury goods and services [anything not essential to subsistence-level food and shelter] have grown to dominate the economy. Our current labor market system is a reflection of that, where most people labor to produce luxury goods and services. In this system, people advance by working harder AND making more personal connections than other people. Therefore, dropping out of the labor force [or part-timing during the toddler years] negatively impact one's professional growth, by limiting effort of work and opportunities to connect.

At the same time, this labor system does not look good demographically. The higher-paid professionals are having less and less children, while the lesser-paid people continue to meet replacement-level need. Therefore, demographically, we will have proportionally more descendants of the lower class and less of the upper class. If you subscribe to the theory that you learn productivity and work habits from your parents, then you can see that we're on the path to Idiocracy. Good thing that the US has a fairly mobile [and upwardly mobile] labor market/culture, where the schools have taken on the social function to inculcate "hard work" into the students. Looking across the pond toward Europe, they're at a much more advanced stage of the demographic Idiocracy than we are, a warning to us all.

Then again, we should re-examine this system, a confluence of free market capitalism and monogamy. Polygamy again has emerged as a discussion topic this week. As it happens, polygamy presents a possible answer to this demographic conundrum we're examining here: A business unit with organic [in the "internal to oneself" sense] childcare capability and multiple working parents who can stay in the labor force. The internal dynamics of a polygamous household does present significant challenges to the adoption of this practice. However, if we cannot figure out the educational institutionalization problem [where the education hierarchy, aka teacher union, is perpetuating an underperforming status quo, and where higher education is not adequately preparing students for the future], this is where we might have to end up at.

Speaking of polygamy, we have a kind of a polygamous system at present, with the prevalence of infidelity. The hypocritism that infidelity engenders today, as well as the sub-optimal economic arrangement [where the high wage earner has to support multiple, duplicated, childcare efforts as opposed to a single, consolidated childcare focal], makes the current polygamous system self-defeating.

And yes, I do realize that I need to find another book and author to harp on. Now that Megan McArdle is looking at Tainter, and I having just finished The Collapse of Complex Societies, I guess I should do my Tainter book report here.

Ideas on Military Personnel Costs

2010-07-22T11:31:00.001-07:00

These days, everybody is talking about military personnel costs, from Sec Bob Gates to the blogosphere. Recently, Bryan McGrath put forward two ideas on controlling retirement costs.

Commenter milprof passed along a paraphrase from the defense leadership: "Plan to take it out of force structure because it sure won't be coming out of pay and benefits". Indeed, we need to think critically about force structure, which directly relates to the personnel cost issue. As a primer for the discussion, I've found Dr. Cindy Williams's defense series to be illuminating. Holding the Line is a great book on alternative force structure and a discussion on the ideas. Filling the Ranks is another great book on incentives and personnel policy.

I've touched on this topic before.

Here are a few more proposals. The way to control medical cost is to make the military responsible. If the brass has to make the budget choice between retiree medical care and weapon acquisition, perhaps they will be more sensible.

A couple of quick examples: Sit-ups are known to cause lower spinal injury and later disabilities, yet it is still the standard in the Army. With budgetary incentives the brass would be in a greater hurry to change that. Hearing loss: passing through Al Asad Air Base (Marine) in '07, I saw the junior Marines frequently worked without hearing protection on the flightlines. In the army infantry only used earplugs on the rifle range. Electronic ear muffs have been a proven technology for 20+ years, yet only the start of OIF did the military purchase Peltor and other muffs in significant quantities.

Soldier care is an empty slogan until we hold the brass budgetarily accountable.

Retirement benefits: With so many military retirees working in the federal government, we need to start "means-testing" military retiree benefits. For example, if you're drawing retirement and GS salary at the same time, you will lose retirement dollar for dollar until (a) you're getting total GS-13 lvl 1 pay or (b) only 50% of retirement pay [not counting GS], whichever is higher. And maybe we do the same to federal contractor employees, too.

Moreover, if we do away with the 20-year vesting, and start giving retirement at 10-yr mark [but who would have to wait until 62 or 65 to start drawing retirement], then many more people will opt to retire earlier, thus ending up saving Gov't money. [The present value of that 15-20 years of retirement pay (48 to 65) may worth more than the retirement pay of that 2nd replacement soldier.]

So there are plenty of ways to lower the personnel cost. The only worry is that the various Associations will not be courageous and farsighted enough to take this problem head on, and that Congress will wait until the last minute [when we're broke already] to start slashing programs willy-nilly.