Finally, The Last Country Has Switched To Lead-Free Gasoline

 #358: The Day Our Afghan War Ended

...................

Back in 2018, Kevin Drum, then at Mother Jones (now blogging on his own), wrote a wrap-up piece on how leaded gas has been responsible for elevated levels of crime and violence.  Here's the link.   At the time, he suggested that the Middle East would be a much calmer place once all leaded gas is a distant memory (15-20 years or so).

Well, today, the BBC reports that Algeria finally made the world lead-free.   

The countries that have only recently gotten the lead out are a list of the world's troubled and war-torn areas: 

"North Korea, Myanmar and Afghanistan stopped selling leaded petrol by 2016, leaving only a handful of countries, including Iraq, Yemen and Algeria, still providing the toxic fuel in the latter half of the last decade."

So, by the 2040s, a place like Afghanistan will finally begin its return to a less feverish state. 

The Comeuppance Show

 #357: Skewering The Wrongheaded

........................

"Capitalism is the problem" is a trendy refrain that's...imprecise at best.  What critics of capitalism are usually objecting to is salesmanship taking over from actual worth.  Their valid critique is that when someone trys to sell something, their own interests in selling often trump their objectivity.

On the other hand, someone who borrows money to set up a workshop in her attic, where she makes jewelry, which she then sells online at a reasonable price, meanwhile paying off her loan, is of course participating in the capitalist system.  And most critics of capitalism would say there's nothing wrong with doing that.

What upsets most critics are unethical actions surrounding the buying and selling of merchandise.  Misrepresenting what one sells, destroying one's competition in order to corner a market, deceiving one's customers, donating to politicians in exchange for business 'assistance'.  There's even the unsustainable degradation of the natural world for profit.     

I wonder if TV networks have ever considered a half hour sketch show that skewers some of the more wrongheaded salesmanship in our economy.  

Here's an example: Lovable stop motion animals are having a picnic deep in the forest, next to a babbling brook.  Half-way through, a Mr Toad -like creature, oblivious to the impact of his actions, sends the picnickers in all directions as he drives a huge SUV up the creek bed.  He's being filmed for a commercial that touts a vehicle that "can go anywhere".   He drives off, leaving a mudhole, with the other animals in various states of disarray.  Several staggering characters hold up a banner that reads: "Attention Toads: Please Use Roads" 

A companion website could host the show's content and allow for explainers ("Despite what you see in commercials, please stay out of natural areas.") and interaction.

The feel would be light-hearted, fun, but thoughtful.  Like the best of cartoons.

Could A Unified, Binational Israel Work?

 #356: How Might It Come About

............................

Thanks to Lit Hub I was able to avoid the NYRB's paywall and read Omri Boehm's article about prospects for settling the Palestinian/Israeli situation.

It's hard to know whether the prospects for a 2-state solution are indeed as grim as the article contends.  If so, it seems equally unlikely that Israelis would agree to a unitary state that encompasses all of Israeli and Palestinian lands, assuming this means Israeli voters are eventually outnumbered by Palestinians.

Which would suggest there's no hope for the near future, unless, of course, compromises were possible.  Here's an outsider's notion of what compromise might look like:

First, the near-term is impossible; there really is little hope.  Instead, it might help to imagine a distant future by which time a gradual cooling of tensions could possibly end in peace.  If that future was, say 2100, and the time between now and then was spent preparing, rather than in fighting, a unified nation, composed of several generations who had grown up under this unfolding process might be in the cards.

Until then, all manner of cooperation would be called for to negotiate a relationship between a state and its intended.  Obviously, Palestinians would require a quasi-state for themselves, but one that was temporary.  Otherwise, a few possibilities:

An Education-Weighted Legislative Body For Palestinians.

A Palestinian Authority that is based on education-weighted voting (higher ed degrees would carry greater voting weight than would elementary ed; plus, educational opportunity would be expanded for all).  Incentivizing educational attainment could go a long way toward alleviating Israeli fears.  

Also, female leadership would be guaranteed a certain percentage of seats in a transitional legislative body.  Again, this would emphasize the importance of a gradual transition towards a cosmopolitan Palestinian outlook.

A Phased, Long-term Shift.

Rule of law, voting rights, and military conscription, for example, are gradually introduced for all non-Israeli Palestinians "between the river and the sea", with the process ending in 2100 with full integration.  Negotiations in the meantime concern a timetable and an unfolding process.

Palestinians Are Asked To Approve Any Deal.

A plebiscite open to all non-Israeli Palestinians within the nascent nation-state would be held in a number of years to approve this transitional process after initial negotiations to write up the question to be posed.

Update: Dec. 25th '23:  This blog entry has been totally rewritten.

Is A 'Smart Home' Worth It?

 #355: I Describe Minimal-Tech Easy

......................

Gizmodo ran a column recently by Andrew Liszewski that gives us a peek into the world of 'smart homes', where things like lights, music, temperature, even doors are all automated.  A tech geek can park his vehicle in the garage, have the porch lights come on, the door swing open, house lights turn on, with dinner and music on cue as well.  Robot vacuums have cleaned the floor and the air is purified and appropriately cool.  

Our columnist strikes a negative tone, though, discussing the hassles involved with set-up and coordination.

Since I use near-zero gadgetry, enjoy the spontaneity of doing things myself, and have long wondered how people have time to set up and maintain their gadgets, here's a short list of how I view the promise of the smart home:

1. Music.  Having grown up in an age where people actually sat together to listen to music, I wonder whether relegating music to a background roar that's barely heard--as other things are ongoing--makes sense.  I have Radio Paradise on, sometimes, when I'm sitting at my computer.  I occasionally listen to music when driving.  That's it.

2. Vacuuming. Since I often walk barefoot outside, my feet bring grass (often freshly mown) into the house.  Is this worth cleaning up?  Every once in a while I'll vacuum, but in that case, I'm in the mood,

3. Lighting. The idea of lights coming on automatically when one enters a room seems like such a small victory.  It's just the flip of a switch one is short-cutting.  Besides, I prefer no-light or next-room-light for places like the bathroom.  And turning off a light when you leave a room becomes second nature--especially if you care about conserving.  Plus the dramatic turning on of a light is stripped of all context when it's automatic.  What if a voice behind you says lazily "let's leave the light off".

I could go on, but you get the idea.  

The concept of a 'smart house' is perfect for selling us things we may not really need.  And for futurist writers who need something spiffy to point to in the future, the idea of the dumb servant, performing our chores for us, seems like a logical next step in civilizing our homes.  

Maybe I'm doing too many chores for my own good, but I doubt it.   

A Possible Explanation For Afghanistan's Path

 #354: From Developmental Psychology To Political Development

................................

In college I was drawn to the developmental psychology theorists (Piaget, Kohlberg) who saw stages of mental/moral thinking exhibited in maturing children and adults.  I was interested in what Kohlberg's theory might mean for society as a whole.  That is, might there be a natural progression of steps that all humans follow as they mature; and if so, might that mean that, collectively, forms of government could also involve steps along a path as history unfolds?

My thesis was way too speculative, so it was probably a good thing I didn't follow through.  Just for fun, though, here's the idea:

...............

First, Kohlberg's six moral steps that humans can take:

1. Obedience and punishment 

(How can I avoid punishment?)

2. Self-interest 

(What's in it for me?)

3. Interpersonal accord 

(Being a good boy)

4. Social-order maintenance 

(Law and order morality)

5. Social contract 

(Everybody has equal rights)

6. Universal ethical principles

(Principled, conscious decisions)

...........

Then, here's how I envision them, politically:

1. State of Nature - no government

(Dog eat dog)

2. Big Man Rules - Autocracy

(Trading loyalty for protection)

3. Tribalism - Aristocracy, Monarchy

(Identifying With A Privileged Group)

4. Ideology - Theocracy

(A set of laws, imposed)

5. Individual Rights - Representative Democracy

(A nation of equals, with equal rights under the law)

6. Principled Political Action - Direct Democracy

(Self-guided, but universal moral code) 

.........

Each step along the way can be seen as superior, logically, to the one before.  And although history certainly doesn't perfectly follow these levels, the important point is that, all things being equal, the next step is often easy to make.  So:

From 1 to 2: In a state of nature the logical thing to do is to find a power strong enough to ward off disaster in exchange for loyalty.

From 2 to 3: A privileged group is stronger in numbers than is a single authority.

From 3 to 4: Deriving authority from an outside source beats the selfish will of powerful individuals

From 4 to 5: Unwavering obedience fails when compared to individual rights and equality

From 5 to 6: Principled decision making is always better than the unprincipled kind

..........

Accordingly, one could say that Afghanistan had been at level 3, with 4 (political Islam) providing a logical step up.  Instead of the well-connected enjoying privilege, the teachings of the Koran would be used to level the playing field.  Meanwhile, the idea of individual rights (level 5) doesn't make sense, because the privileged are in charge, and certain to exploit their position in a representative democracy, thus mocking the promise of equal rights.  And then there's education.  We in the West, thanks to good educations, think for ourselves.  Without a basic education, this is difficult if not impossible.

The flip side to the attractiveness of level 4, in the form of Islamic dogma, is that it should eventually be seen as inferior to level 5's realization that there are varying perspectives on most matters, and everyone is entitled to their own opinion.  This is an easy step to make for cosmopolitan, educated, urban societies where different peoples are constantly mixing.  If so, it may be a long while before this step is made in a relatively isolated region of the world like Afghanistan--though its exposure to the outside world over the past 20 years may be a factor.   

Nevertheless, the idea that level 5 fits in a very poor country (where the incentive to exploit level 3's privilege is so great) is a hard case to make when an obvious intermediary step (politicized Islam) enters the picture.  In this view, the American attempt to jump from level 3 to level 5 was doomed from the start.

........

We haven't mentioned level 6, except in passing.  To clarify, the idea that principled decision making allows direct democracy is easier to grasp if you think about level 6 as being everyone making principled, judicious choices all the time, usually based on what society would say is the right thing to do.  This allows figurative, if not literal, democracy of the direct kind.

Bi-Partisan Legislation Has A Natural Advantage

 #353: Why Everybody Likes Finding Common Ground

........................

This post will be very short, as there's something very simple at the heart of our tendency to approve of bi-partisan agreements in Congress: our brains are wired that way.  We have a left and a right lobe that together integrate their functions.  This balance produces a superior result, since otherwise we'd have evolved differently.

US Presidents: Who's Up, Who's Down

 #352: I Revise My Presidential Rankings

...................................

Today is Barack Obama's 60th.  Let's celebrate by checking out the most recent presidential rankings.

Alex Voltaire, over at The Northumbrian Countdown feeds off the latest (this time from a CNN panel of presidential historians).  Note: Voltaire has an interesting point about the over-abundance of conservatives among CNN's experts.  

My approach, below, is to take Wikipedia's list of 22 rankings over the past 75 years, average the results, and then compare them to the latest CNN panel's opinion to see who's up and who's down.  My own opinion then follows.  Each number is the position of a given president among the 41 possible ranks (I don't include presidents who served very short terms).  #1 is best and #44 worst (CNN ranked all 44).  The names are listed in historical order.

Using 5 and 10 points as handy dividers, we have Jackson falling off a 10-point cliff (Down), and Van Buren, Tyler, Polk, Pierce, Buchanan, Johnson, Hayes, Cleveland, Wilson, and Hoover taking minor spills of 5 points or more (Dips), but less than 10.  Meanwhile, Grant rises nearly 10 (Upwards).  All presidents experiencing slight declines of more than 1% or so are colored Red.  All with slight upticks of more than 1% or so are Blue.  Bold Red and Bold Blue are indicative of 5 point 'Dips' and 'Upwards' motion.  Underlined names are the big movers.

                            Average    2021                                          My     

Washington             2.59        2                                                5         

Adams                   13.14      15                                              16                 

Jefferson                 4.86         7                                              10        

Madison                12.14       16                                              25                

Monroe                 13.59       12                                                9        

JQA                       17.82       17                                              17                

Jackson                 11.32      22         Old Hickory down        34        

Van Buren             24.23      34        Another down               33         

Tyler                      33.86      39         Late slaver dips            28    

Polk                      13.00       18        Expansionist dips           23          

Fillmore                34.36       38                                               30       

Pierce                   36.95       42         Antebellum dip              36       

Buchanan             38.86      44        Antebellum dip II            39        

Lincoln                  1.59          1                                                   1      

Johnson                37.23       43       Ugly Period dip                38      

Grant                    29.18       20       Upwards Revision             7    

Hayes                   25.86        33     Winner's up...er, not           21      

Arthur                  28.00         30                                                 27     

Cleveland            18.05         25      Double dipper dips            13   

Harrison              29.00          32                                                 31     

McKinley           17.14          14                                                 19      

T. Roosevelt         4.50            4                                                    4       

Taft                     21.23          23                                                  15    

Wilson                  7.73         13           Race-based dip               18                

Harding              38.18          37                                                   26       

Coolidge             28.36         24                                                    32      

Hoover               29.73         36      Hooverville Road dip           22     

FDR                     2.14           3                                                      2      

Truman                7.05           6                                                       8          

Eisenhower          9.24           5                                                    20   

Kennedy            11.35           8                                                       6             

LBJ                    12.90         11                                                     11          

Nixon                 29.70         31                                                    37        

Ford                    26.10         28                                                   29                   

Carter                  25.70         26                                                   14                 

Reagan                13.89          9                                                    33       

Bush I                  21.06         21                                                   24        

Clinton                17.50         19                                                   12      

Bush II                 31.09        29                                                    40     

Obama                 11.88        10                                                      3    

Trump                  42.30        41                                                    41   

As might be expected, our recent Presidents stayed put, for the most part (though Eisenhower and Reagan almost rose 5 points each).

My own opinions are occasionally off by a lot (Red and Blue, in bold).

.............................................

Now we'll take a look at Alex's list, which is in bold when it's off by more than a few from CNN's:

1. Abraham Lincoln
2. George Washington
3. Franklin D. Roosevelt
4. James Monroe
5. Harry Truman
6. Lyndon Johnson
7. Theodore Roosevelt
8. Barack Obama
9. John Adams
10. George H. W. Bush
11. Thomas Jefferson
12. Dwight Eisenhower
13. Ulysses S. Grant
14. John F. Kennedy
15. John Quincy Adams
16. William McKinley
17. William Howard Taft
18. James Garfield  (omitted on above list, due to short term)
19. Bill Clinton
20. Ronald Reagan
21. James Madison
22. Grover Cleveland
23. Jimmy Carter
24. Rutherford B. Hayes
25. Zachary Taylor  (omitted, due to short term)
26. Chester Arthur
27. Herbert Hoover
28. Gerald R. Ford
29. Woodrow Wilson
30. Benjamin Harrison
31. Millard Fillmore
32. Warren Harding
33. Martin Van Buren
34. James K. Polk
35. Richard M. Nixon
36. John Tyler
37. Calvin Coolidge
38. William Henry Harrison (omitted, due to short term)
39. George W. Bush
40. Franklin Pierce
41. Andrew Johnson
42. James Buchanan
43. Andrew Jackson
44. Donald Trump

Alex deserves recognition for his prescient view of Jackson as one of our worst presidents (I can remember, as a boy,  thinking of Jackson as one of our most celebrated presidents).  Another revelation was reading Alex's view of Polk.

Perhaps Alex's most challenging placement is Monroe at #4.  I've now re-read his piece on Monroe from several years ago (a tab at the top of his website reads: "The Ranking of the Presidents"; he covers them all) and have revised my ranking of Monroe accordingly.  In doing so, I noticed that he has adjusted his rankings a bit.  The biggest changes include LBJ (downwards), Wilson (downwards), Grant (upwards), and McKinley (upwards).  

In the months after his multi-year project was finished he put together this reflective over-view.  Reading and responding to his Presidents Project has been a highlight of my limited experiences on the internet.   Anyone who's serious about knowing the former presidents should give Alex a chance.  Pick one president you'd like to read about, and see what a fine writer Alex is, and how fascinating history can be.

Biden, So Far

 #351: What He's Gotten Right/Wrong

............................

Right:

1. Infrastructure First.  

Although it's not really fair to compare the two, President Obama famously started his first term's agenda with Health Care.  Perhaps President Biden, due to his many decades in the Senate, knew the road to success lay in the immediate and tangible needs of communities (roads, power, broadband).  It's really no wonder that 17 Republican senators were willing to go along for the ride (at least initially), despite weak thunderings from the former president.  Simply put, you don't want to vote against ribbon-cutting ceremonies that will happen anyway: "My opponent voted to keep you at the bottom of this pothole.  Maybe he's OK with potholes.  Maybe he has potholes near his house--kinda doubt that one."  Forcing Republicans to help him pass Infrastructure gives Biden a glowing, bi-partisan sheen that ruins innumerable Republican talking points.

2. Ditch Loser Issues. 

There's no way to make certain issues into winners.  One example is expanding the Supreme Court.  If he says 'no', he alienates his left flank.  If he says 'yes' he's out on a shaky limb ("What'll he want to alter next, Motherhood?")  Much better: appoint a panel to study the matter and report back.

Similarly, Immigration's a no-win issue.  There are hundreds of millions of people who'd love to come to the US.  Many millions will try.  Saying 'no' comes across as mean.  Saying 'yes' riles up the opposition, giving them perhaps their strongest talking point ("He's flooding the country with more and more people.")  Much better to hand over the issue to Vice President Harris.

3.  Be A Populist.

Always stand with the Little Guy, and don't look back.  Although Republicans have the uncanny ability to frame Democrats as elitists, the antidote is, for example, to say that nobody making less than $400,000 pays more taxes.

Or, put checks in mailboxes.  There's little that can be criticized about that, especially if there's a sliding scale that chokes off payments beyond a certain 'Average Guy' amount.

 Regularly speak about monopolies, unfair advantages, and fat cat corporations that don't pay taxes.

Wrong: 

1. Didn't Can The Space Force.

Dumping the military's fifth branch could have been a way to underline cost-containment in government.  A first step along that path, that could've led to further reductions, simplifications and efficiencies.  The excess government talking point is one of the most effective for Republicans.  This was a missed opportunity.

2. Minor (only) Media Outreach.

We'll end where we began, by comparing Biden and Obama.  There's of course no comparison.  Biden is liked because, though he's plain and simple, he tries.  Obama, because he leans towards humility, but he's obviously majestic--in movement, oratory and humor.  So, obviously, Biden shouldn't try for a major media splash, himself.  But, getting a message out these days requires more than a press release.  Ideas:

  * Surrogates flooding the Sunday talk shows.  

  * Telegenic spokespersons on late night comedy shows, with Biden on live remote. 

  * A touring Chautauqua featuring cabinet secretaries, celebrities and music, that would discuss issues of the day, getting out the Biden Administration's message.