They Lost Me With 'Hello'

Glenn links to Stacy Mccain, who is fired up about this new Harvard/Berkekey study on income inequality and intergenerational economic mobility. I will revert to Mr. McCain momentarily but first let me deplore the lead sentence to the NBER working paper:

The United States is often hailed as the "land of opportunity," a society in which a child's chances of success depend little on her family background.

Says who? This is certainly a convenient definition for a team of economists who are embarking on a measurement of outcomes and hoping to pass it off as a measure of opportunity, but who really believes that parents have no influence on the success of their kids? Just by way of example, one might suspect that financial success is influenced by some combination of intelligence, good looks, height, good health, and high energy. All of these factors are subject to genetic inheritance, so one would not be surprised to see the child of successful parents having a bit of a head start. Other traits, such as self-discipline (aka impulse control) or a love of learning can be taught, but are more likely to be exemplified by parents who already possess those traits.

So, to pick an example almost at random, one might expect Sasha and Malia Obama to become successful women based on the genetic gifts and cultural values passed on by their parents. Who among us will attribute any of their future success merely to their parent's high income?

Gary Becker has lots on this; a snippet:

The relation between intergeneration mobility and meritocracy becomes still more complex after we recognize that earnings in a meritocracy would depend not only on cognitive abilities, such as IQ. For it depends also on investments in education and other human capital, on getting to work on time, on being able to take criticism, and on many other psychological characteristics. Families that are more educated and have high earnings tend to invest a lot in their children’s human capital, and in various non-cognitive traits. In a merit-based economy where earnings depend on the totality of abilities and skills, children of high earning parents would also tend to be high earners because their parents would pass on both cognitive skills and investments in various forms of human capital.

Even after including parental investments in education, non-cognitive traits, and other human capital of children, an economy where success and failure are determined by merit would still have low intergeneration mobility. To be sure, investments in education and many other types of human capital are not only determined by parents, but also by government policies and by philanthropists. To the extent that governments and philanthropists invest more in the human capital of children with less successful parents (as appears to be the case for governments in Scandinavian countries), a merit-based economy could have relatively high intergenerational mobility since children from poorer and less educated families might have high levels of human capital investments.

Nevertheless, a big jump is still required to make inferences from the intergeneration mobility in a country to the role of merit in determining success and failure in that country. In particular, although the United States has considerably lower intergeneration mobility than many Western European countries, this does not imply that merit is a less important determinant of success in the American economy than in these other economies.

And all of that said, I further dispute that "the American dream" was ever a claim that one parent's were irrelevant. This is James Truslow Adams, no relation to the Oresidential family:

Adams coined the term "American Dream" in his 1931 book The Epic of America. His American Dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position."

By way of contrast with a Europe of landed nobles and hereditary guildsmen, America was notably lacking in barriers to self-improvement and advancement.

Now to pick up on Stacy McCain's point - he is deeply dubious of a study that tells us that West Virginia is more of a land of opportunity than, say, Silicon Valley or New York City. Good point!

By way of illustration, here are San Jose, NYC and a few beacons of opportunity from West Virginia:

San Jose

California

12.9%

New York

New York

10.5%

Spencer

West Virginia

14.7%

Buckhannon

West Virginia

12.6%

Welch

West Virginia

16.0%

These results reflect the probability that a child who was "raised" in the locale above in the lowest economic quintile (really, living there at about age 15 regardless of prior or subsequent movement) will eventually rise to the top quintile *of their age cohort* by about age 30. Parts of West Virginia have it all over the Big Apple or the biggest city in Silicvon Valley, which activates Mr. McCain's BS detector:

Stipulating that the data in the study is complete and accurate, and that everything in the analysis is legit — well, why is there a bright spot on the resulting map in the vicinity of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, but no corresponding bright spot near Athens, Georgia? Why does rural Arkansas look like a beacon of upward mobility, while the bustling economies of Atlanta and Charlotte produce no such effect?

Most of all, why does the map referenced by O’Brien show that impoverished Appalachia offers more opportunity for advancement than any of the more prosperous surrounding flatlands?

To use a social science term: Your data is obviously fucked up.

Well, that's as maybe. Eric Mertz commented over there with a follow-up on his blog, noting that the decision to fix children to one locale based on where they were at approximately age 15 is fraught with implications.

I will say this: the authors attempt to check the validity of that assumption and conclude that all is well. I am a non-buyer and suspect that a deeper dive into the data would unearth trouble in paradise. But first, their comments in anticipation of this objection:

We permanently assign each child to a single CZ based on the ZIP code from which his or her parent led their tax return in the first year the child was claimed as a dependent. We interpret this CZ as the area where a child grew up. Because our data begin in 1996, location is measured in 1996 for 95.9% of children in our core sample. For children in our core sample of 1980-82 birth cohorts, we therefore typically measure location when children were approximately 15 years old.

For the children in the more recent birth cohorts in our extended sample, location is measured at earlier ages. Using these more recent cohorts, we nd that 83.5% of children live in the same CZ at age 16 as they did at age 5. Furthermore, we verify that the spatial patterns for the outcomes we can measure at earlier ages (college attendance and teenage birth) are quite similar if we define CZs based on location at age 5 instead of age 16.

So that is reassuring. This, however, is far less so:

Importantly, the CZ where a child grew up does not necessarily correspond to the CZ she lives in as an adult when we measure her income (at age 30) in 2011-12. In our core sample, 38% of children live in a different CZ in 2012 relative to where they grew up.

That is a lot of movement, so they offer a bit of a breakdown:

44.6% of children who grow up in rural areas live in urban areas at age 30. Among those who rose from the bottom quintile of the national income distribution to the top quintile, the corresponding statistic is 55.2%.

So the poor move even more than the average. This final test reassures them but not me:

In row 8 [of Table V, p. 68], we assess the extent to which the variation in intergenerational mobility comes from children who succeed and move out of the CZ as adults vs. children who stay within the CZ. To do so, we restrict the sample to the 62% of children who live in the same CZ in 2012 as where they grew up. Despite the fact that this sample is endogenously selected on an ex-post outcome, the mobility estimates remain very highly correlated with those in the full sample. Apparently, areas such as Salt Lake City that generate high levels of upward income mobility do so not just by sending successful children to other CZs as adults but also by helping children move up in the income distribution within the area.

"Apparently"?!? As best I can follow, they looked at the aggregated data for Commuting Zones ("CZ") both large and small and and concluded that dropping the kids who eventually moved didn't change the results much. But that means that CZs with a large population, such as New York, will drive the population-weighted result and swamp whatever story the data might be trying to tell about Spencer, West Virginia.

So when they write that "apparently" Salt Lake City is seeing a combination of kids succeeding in the area and kids succeeding after moving away, my not-so-unreasonable question is, what did the data actually show for Salt Lake City specifically, as opposed to the aggregate? In the data tables all I can find is that without weighting for population the result for "8. Children who stay within CZ" has a correlation of 0.87 with the baseline estimate. However, when they re-weight by estimated population, the correlation rises to 0.95. That makes me think that rural areas are showing a much weaker correlation than urban areas. That overlaps with their comment that rural areas show a lot more movement, but the overall impoact is not to reassure.

And I am not at all sure what to make of this. Are we to conclude that Welch, WV is a great place to be born because it is easier to leave and prosper elsewhere? Or that being poor in Atlanta is dreadful but not so dreadful that people actually leave? Baffling.

GO AHEAD - MAKE MY DAY. Ask about Denmark.

Comments

[Truthbetold]

Wake up sheeple! Do you really think this is about Obama?

[Jane]

Henry, I think the stock market is looking for a reason for a 2008 type dip, so she wouldn't have to work so hard.

And I don't think he gives a shit about blame at this point.

[clarice]

That's my thought, DoT. I expect a case for injunctive relief is in the offing.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

Inatz@10:44- heh, you're the best. One of my paralegals provided this character test, which he claims is infallible:

The Lerner-Loewe Broadway musical My Fair Lady--
does it have a happy or tragic ending?

[narciso]

what could possibly go wrong;

http://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2014/01/28/someone-just-said-something-about-the-japan-china-conflict-that-scared-the-crap-out-of-everyone/

[Truthbetold]

Clarice

Van Ness Feldman has a seat at a rigged game.

How much money do you and Howard rake in on the EPA and climate change scam?

[Account Deleted]

Miss Marple,

I believe I'd focus on the tenured thieves and student loan scam. Walker lead the way on that and proved it can be done. I'd much rather see devolution by block grant rather than direct rebate from Uncle Sugar. Block grants can be reduced with less political grief than trying to wean suckers who believe in "free". It's easier for states to erect fences by modifying eligibility standards.

[James D.]

NK, I'm afraid to ask which answer is the "correct" one on that test. Because I'd call it tragic.

[Mel Supremo]

It's a special sort of Revisionism. Not only do they re-write History, they ignore it with arrogant pride.

They are juiced to know current events originated only after 2008.

[Dave (in MA)]

The Lerner-Loewe Broadway musical My Fair Lady-- does it have a happy or tragic ending?

It's a musical, so I'm unhappy to begin with.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

JamesD-- no 'correct' answer it is a character test. The answer defines the character of the person answering. So now we know about YOUUUUuuuuuu. :)

[narciso]

Except no increase is deemed sufficient, Governor Luthor asks for 1.8 million, for education, he's called a Scrooge;

http://hotair.com/archives/2014/01/28/romney-i-must-admit-i-was-getting-a-little-upset-at-candy/

[Truthbetold]

Mel Supremo

Who do you think put them in office? Wake up.

[Mel Supremo]

We pick our leaders the way we choose bags at the Supermarket.

'Paper, or plastic, Ma'am?'

Freedom means choices. We have choices.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

Narciso-- thanks for that link. There is no doubt that the Han elites are itching for a fight in Asia. They are filled with outrage that they were punching bags for the Japanese-- and Russians-- in WW2 and fodder in Korea.

[Old Lurker]

Paper or plastic?

Here in MD either one will cost you 5 cents each.

[Mel Supremo]

The NSA (chortle) is spying on Angry Birds players.?..(guffawwwww)

Clearly they are leaving no stone unturned in their efforts to keep us safe.

[narciso]

I liken them to the Control group, that seized Manchuria, in the 30s, now the question is who would Obama side with, sorry rhetorical question,

[Truthbetold]

Mel Supremo

No, we don't pick our leaders.

Obama was picked for you. Wake up.

[Jane]

They are spying on Angry Bird players to determine if they are gay. But not US citizens, according to them.

So why does the NSA care about a terrorist's sexual orientation?

Maybe they want to give them amnesty.

[sbwaters]

Spent some time with Pete Seeger on the Clearwater in the early 1970s. He and the sloop were delightful. It’s quite something to be up on the rigging on the Hudson by Storm King Mountain.

For the fun of it I had wired a 5-string banjo with four other strings -- like a 12-string guitar. He played it a little bit but decided that the sound was too much in between the sharp banjo and a 12-string. Also said I needed to tighten up the banjo drumhead.

He was every bit a gentle man to be with, however wrongheaded were his ideas to better the quality of life of people whose life needed bettering. Progressive ideas came from his time.

I begrudge not Pete, but we children of the 1960s who never helped Aquarius grow beyond the dawning and who, unhappy with the past, discarded history without saving what was worthwhile.

[Dave (in MA)]

We pick our leaders the way we choose bags at the Supermarket.

And I use mine to throw away cat shit.

[Mel Supremo]

"I begrudge not Pete, but we children of the 1960s who never helped Aquarius grow beyond the dawning and who, unhappy with the past, discarded history without saving what was worthwhile."

The GenXers/Millenialls are more than glad to give Boomers the credit for past failures.

[narciso]

Exactly why we won't,

http://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2014/01/28/why-the-west-must-join-the-ukraine-protesters/

interestingly Clancy's last collaboration, with Greaney, featured exactly this type of confrontation,

[Thomas Collins]

Re the article linked in narciso's 11:06 AM post: Sooner or later, US foreign policy types are going to have to confront the reality that for Xi Jingping's Red China, limited war is a fine and dandy option for furthering Red China's power politics ambitions. They are also going to need to confront the reality that even before China was Red China, it was a hard nosed realpolitick player (see below link to an Amazon web page on a book that examines Ming dynasty grand strategy as reflective of this hard nosed approach).

http://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Realism-Strategic-Culture-Strategy/dp/0691002398

[Truthbetold]

Clarice

Tell your friends the real reason Patrick Fitzgerald was sent to Chicago.

[Dave (in MA)]

Seeger supposedly threw a hissy fit at Newport when Dylan appeared with a band that featured the Highway 61 Revisited lineup playing electric instruments. In recent years he claimed that he was only complaining about the sound quality, kind of like how in his dotage he decided maybe Stalin wasn't so great after all.

[Mel Supremo]

"Obama was picked for you...."

I think that was my point. Who's the next anointed King?

King Plastic...Emperor Paper? Go ahead. Pick one. It's your Constitutional right.

[Jane]

I think Millennials will end up being the most conservative generation in many decades.

[narciso]

No one tells he doesn't have the leverage he had in 2009, when he had the House, a larger Senate cohort, the problem is no one tells that to the GOP either, they need several rounds of the shock collar to get a clue,

[Truthbetold]

Mel Supremo

My apologies.

[Truthbetold]

Jane

Millennials will not be allowed to be conservative.

[narciso]

So Tom Steyer, is resurrecting the wily Canadian menace;

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2014/01/27/UK-Tea-Party-surges-to-become-most-favored-political-movement-in-the-country

[Extraneus]

I think Ernie is losing it. Or drunk.

[Truthbetold]

Extraneus believes things will get better as soon as the republicans take back control.

[Truthbetold]

Extraneus

Watch what the GOP does on immigration.

[henry]

No Ext, just Ernie's inner antisemitism coming to the surface.

[Jane]

Get lost TBT. No one cares what you think.

[Mel Supremo]

THAT's the essence of the delusion. Barack only took the reins after the Plantation had been stripped and plundered BAR.

As soon as the rest of the suckers have been lured back into stocks and bonds, and the scraps tallied, the tale will conclude.

[Ignatz]

--One of my paralegals provided this character test, which he claims is infallible:

The Lerner-Loewe Broadway musical My Fair Lady--
does it have a happy or tragic ending?--

What does it say about ones character if you could never make it past the halfway point without dozing off or changing the channel to Bugs, Porky and Daffy and consequently have no idea how it ends?

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

Nihilist!!!!

[henry]

Ig, it says you are more patient than I am.

[Beasts of England]

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

[sbwaters]

Jane: Get lost TBT. No one cares what you think.

I encourage other JOM readers to lose TBT the way I did some time ago. Now I only see her reflection.

[cathyf]

Remember, this whole crazed and distorted system was not brought about by market forces exerted by freely acting consumers. It was brought about by the federal government instituting wage and price controls, and then trying to tweak what they had done by fiddling with the tax code.

Except that the craziest and most distorted part of the system is that it allows treatments to exist and get paid for when virtually no sick individual could afford those treatments.

Without something to artificially boost the value of health insurance, everyone would simply plan to be a free rider if they got sick, and if they don't get sick to take the money that they would have spent on premiums and use it to buy nicer cars, nicer houses, take more/better vacations, have nicer clothes, eat out at nicer restaurants, buy nicer food, etc., etc., etc. Since there will be no way to pay for expensive treatments that save people's lives and health, there will be no expensive treatments developed that save people's lives and health. Since there will not be any expensive medical treatments for anyone to buy at any price, people will simply die or be disabled if they have those things.

And people like DoT would point to this smoothly functioning market which produces no medical treatments that cost more than an average family can just pay out of pocket if they need it, and say that this is undistorted and uncrazy. The same as what would happen if people got to freely choose how much military protection they wanted to pay for. And it wouldn't even look like people were lacking for anything -- the people crippled from arthritis before the invention of $25,000/year treatments just considered their arthritis bad luck and there was nothing to do but suffer. We can't know a priori what new treatments will be created and when they will be created if a way can be found to pay for the medical research that creates the technology. And if we destroy the ability to pay for expensive health care we simply won't have it.

[matt]

Taste in music is taste. For sheer virtuosity on the guitar I would pick Leo Kottke. And no one mentioned Clapton? SRV? Jimi?

Then you get into the spectacles; the Van Halens and Nugents and even Garcia and the Dead in the day and U2 today.

When Dylan went electric the whole folk world exploded in anger. "How dare he?" was the general line. Newport '67, was it?

FWIW there is a band out there from Venezuela called Los Amigos Invisible that's pretty good if you like disco/techno/musicality. Very talented and they actually have more than one good song per album typically.

I find @ 95% of everything that is put out there today to be dreck.

[Account Deleted]

"I think Millennials will end up being the most conservative generation in many decades."

Jane,

Possibly not. I would be surprised if self-identification as a conservative went much above 40% for the Millenials and I'd also be surprised if necrotic progressivism dropped much below 20% (after all, stupidity is a heritable trait).

That leaves the Muddle and the Muddle is receiving a fine practical education regarding the cost of allowing progressives to mismanage, misgovern and mislead. The Millenial BAristas are getting a monthly bill with the money going to tenured thieves and the ones who evaded penury by indoctrination are getting a $200 monthly bill to pay for $9 worth of 'free' pills.

If you had said "judging by their lumps and bruises, I'd say the Millenial Muddle is going to be the best educated generation in history", I'd tend to agree.

The ones who they were waiting for really deserve every lick they take.

[Ignatz]

Equating Bugs Bunny with nihilism is unAmerican.

[Ignatz]

Not getting your 12:11 cathy.
Are you saying with Barrycare no medical treatments that no individual could afford would exist, or without Barrycare but with a free market in insurance instead no such treatments would exist?

[Ignatz]

Disregard the double negative at 12:21.

[Ignatz]

No wait a minute regard it.
I've confused myself.

[Account Deleted]

Yes, you haven't.

[Ignatz]

No I definitely have.
Maybe cathy can figure it out.

[Ignatz]

I'm tempted to save that 12:21 sentence as perhaps my most convoluted, moronic construction to date.
The competition is fierce.

[rse]

Well it is snowing and sticking now perimeter near Pill Hill in northern arc ATL. School's not scheduled to let out for 3 hours so there better not be much moisture in those clouds.

Everyone trying to get home at same time never works well even if roads are not bad.

I went to a breakfast this morning on school choice. Given the level of duplicity and self-serving behavior from people who claim to be conservative and work for various state think tanks, we should never underestimate how many of the people are just conservative to get elected or make that the pitch that gets them a ride on the donation supported gravy train. It is NOT how they think in general though.

[Truthbetold]

Jane

The DoJ and the IRS (gestapo) are coming down on everyone and everything conservative, while the GOP stands by watching.

And you think the Millennials are going to be conservative?

They won't stand a chance, if you don't wake up.

[Danube on iPad]

I simply can't follow your economic model, cathyf. I believe peoplewould continue to insure themselves (as they have done for many years) against the risk that they will require a medical procedure that they could not readily afford. I am simply advocating a rational - and fair - tax treatment for insurance premiums.

Why hasn't the catastrophic circumstance you predict already occurred?

[Danube on iPad]

"...the craziest and most distorted part of the system is that it allows treatments to exist and get paid for when virtually no sick individual could afford those treatments."

Not only is such a system neither crazy nor distorted, it is the very essence of insurance. The treatment the patient could not personally afford is paid for by the premiums of those who never have the need for such a treatment.

[jimmyk on iPhone]

Cathyf, we weren't calling for the end of insurance, just he end of the subsidy plus over regulation.

[boris]

"Why hasn't the catastrophic circumstance you predict already occurred?"

I think your idea ignores the role the "old system" played in advancing medical technology.

[Truthbetold]

Get ready for a form of government run healthcare. That was the plan from the beginning. And the GOP establishment fully approves of it.

Behind closed doors.

[boris]

"end of the subsidy plus over regulation"

The tax benefit making company health insurance an employee benefit is one of the factors. The other is that a company has a captive base to get better rates.

[sbwaters]

Ezra Klein: Today, we are better than ever at telling people what's happening," Klein wrote, "but not nearly good enough at giving them the crucial contextual information necessary to understand what's happened.

Context? You can't handle the context!

Ezra has never recognized context; he’s only recognized a narrative.

[boris]

Another (speculative) factor is that without the tax and group advantages there probably would not be the kind of demand we now have for insurance to begin with. The demand IMO in no small part comes from seeing what health insurance does for those working for IBM, GM, Google etc.

If everybody had to just buy their own from their paycheck as individuals and were free to pass or put it off ... it might be a much smaller market.

[boris]

Notice how in theory cleo and tbt are at opposite ends of the spectrum but in practice they are just alike.

[Truthbetold]

Van Ness Feldman

Influence explorer
http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/van-ness-feldman/b09f5bfa66704b0ea384913f9ccc8ba0

[Ignatz]

--If everybody had to just buy their own from their paycheck as individuals and were free to pass or put it off ... it might be a much smaller market.--

It would certainly be a much different one as individuals weighed the cost of low deductible plans coming directly out of their checkbook rather than their fantasy it now comes out of the bosses.
I suspect it would make a smaller healthcare market as people utilized the system much less frequently for minor or marginal complaints.

[Danube on iPad]

If employers are going to continue to take a tax deduction for the cost of employees' insurance, then at the very least allow those in the individual market to do the same.

[boris]

Too difficult to prevent individuals from making phony health claims. Tax free pot ...

[boris]

"cost of low deductible plans coming directly out of their checkbook ..."

It's kind of the same effect as tax withholding. If people had to write a check from their savings account every April 15th for all taxes owed, the guv take would get smaller in a hurry.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

sbw@1:01-- well said.

[James D.]

NK, so what does one's choice about the ending of "My Fair LadY" say about one's character?

[Jane-Rebel Alliance1]

That leaves the Muddle and the Muddle is receiving a fine practical education regarding the cost of allowing progressives to mismanage, misgovern and mislead.

The other problem is their college education. I ran into a friend recently who dropped out of school because it was just so liberal. She got to the point where she couldn't bear it.

[centralcal]

The Obama Media in action:

Noah Rothman ‏@NoahCRothman 7m

Andrea Mitchell: 'Iran was More or Less an American Ally' before Bush's Axis of Evil speech. Unhinged.

-----

John Nolte ‏@NolteNC 6m

Andrea Mitchell thinks Iran was our ally before Bush put them in the Axis of Evil. This woman is a lunatic.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

Happy ending = Jane Austen like belief in true love conquers all;

Tragedy = melancholy Irish playwright like pessimism about human nature.

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

Andrea Mitchell = Botox has eaten her brain stem.

[narciso]

Oh, lord love a waterfowl, did she forget around Iran Contra, or Khobar Towers, that was a joint AQ/ Saudi Hezbollah operation, or has she smoking from the same pipe and Leverett and co?

[Truthbetold]

The insurance "Death Spiral" has already begun. Moot point!

[narciso]

my fishwrap is all verklempt about this;

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/28/us-detained-yemeni-may-rejoin-al-qaida-if-freed/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS

but it's just the Jayvee, after all;

[henry]

She's setting up the "what difference at this point does it make?" with respect to Carter shafting our Iranian ally (the Shah) and letting Imadinnerjacket & pals overrun the embassy with no retaliation. She gives away who her allies (and Hillary's) truly are.

[narciso]

I respect my elders, like those on this blog, but some deserve the eskimo treatment;

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/369652/senate-stake-two-ex-gop-senators-endorse-democrats-john-fund

[Captain Hate]

Andrea Mitchell: 'Iran was More or Less an American Ally' before Bush's Axis of Evil speech.

Maybe Trandrea thinks she can escape ridicule by saying "well obviously they fall in the 'less' end of the spectrum".

[Stephanie Yes I'm in how bout you?]

Yep. Snowjam is in full swing. The roads are becoming treacherous and the school bused are turning back to the schools. Accidents are mounting and it's taking an hour to go one mile on many roads. My county hasn't released the kids early and it's gonna be ridiculous when they do let out for the day.

[narciso]

Rouhani was one of those vaunted Iranian moderates even back;

During the Iran-Iraq war, Rouhani was a member of the Supreme Defense Council (1982–1988), member of the High Council for Supporting War and headed its Executive Committee (1986–1988), deputy commander of the war (1983–1985), commander of the Khatam-ol-Anbiya Operation Center (1985–1988), and commander of the Iran Air Defense Force (1986–1991).[8] He was appointed as Deputy to Second-in-Command of Iran's Joint Chiefs of Staff (1988–1989).[8]

[NK(withnewsoftware)]

CaptH-- Henry explains why Andrea M is making this absurdity of a statement. It's for gal pal Hillary. Iran during Willy Clinton? The Mullahs picked their spots to collaterally attack the USA-- funding Syria control of Lebanon, Khobar Towers, Buenos Aries Temple, but generally, they were happy enough to let Great Satan bomb Sadaam and keep the sanction on his oil. Directly attacking the USA too ofter didn't serve their interests- so they didn't. That makes them an 'ally more or less'-- risible.

[Stephanie Yes I'm in how bout you?]

The number of calls is crashing the cell towers in the area due to people calling each other to figure out how to get home and get their kids.

Lots of idiots running out of gas stuck in the traffic calling HERO units but they aren't gonna get gas anytime soon with the HERO units prioritizing accident response first.

[Jeff Dobbs]

We have snow falling here . . . snowflakes the size of dinner plates!

If a dinner plate was the size of a grain of sand, which it is not, so the above statement could have used some language tightening.

[bgates]

'Iran was More or Less an American Ally' before Bush's Axis of Evil speech.

I thought Iraq was our closest ally before that speech, because remember Rumsfeld shook Saddam's hand that one time? (That was back when a smile and a handshake meant ideological alignment and a pledge of support, not like today when smiles and handshakes and bows and bro hugs are just empty diplomatic forms.)

[Stephanie Yes I'm in how bout you?]

I was gonna take some orange balls and go play nine today and the club has closed. Bummer.

My dil is trying to get home and has gone about 2 miles in an hour and has 23 more miles to go.

[cathyf]

boris said it better than I...

The point of insurance is that it is about paying for risk, and people aren't willing to pay a market rate for the amelioration of risk because they don't really believe that bad things are going to happen to them. Or, more precisely, they don't really believe that the politicians can't be convinced to allow them to free ride on the paying people if they get sick. Or that the paying people won't let their really cute sick baby free ride just out of pity and guilt.

DrF is a brilliant man, actually understands quantum mechanics, but he still believes deep down that when he paid our life insurance premiums and we didn't die, and paid our homeowners premium and our house didn't burn down, that we were cheated. After 23+ years of marriage to someone who implements risk management algorithms which are a solution to the freaking heat transfer equation he's learned to keep his mouth shut, but after 23+ years of marriage I know he still feels that way.

I am utterly sure that the Marines would throw themselves in danger to save the Code Pinkos and the Pete Seegers of this country who want the military to disappear, and who would never pay taxes for that military. So I am quite convinced that the only way to have an adequate military to protect everyone -- including those people who don't want there to be a military -- is to force them to pay taxes under threat of prison and/or fines. Getting people to pay into the health insurance premium pool is easier, as there are large parts of the system which we managed to get and keep working privately.

It doesn't have to be a tax credit, although that works... I propose that the following would work just fine, too: if you don't have health insurance, you have to pay for all of your health care out of pocket, and also pay a 1000% sales tax. So Joe has insurance and goes to the ER and the bill is $800. Joe has a $5000 deductible, so he pays $800. Sam doesn't have insurance and goes to the ER and he has to pay $8,800 -- $800 to the hospital and $8,000 to the government as a tax. Now THAT is a mandate that has some real teeth. And, we're looking at YOU Dread Pirate Roberts, THAT is a tax!

Look, the system that we had developed over decades of cheaters finding holes and the holes being closed. Basically every one of those holes was a surprise when it appeared. Thinking that we can just throw it all away and enter a state of utopia is just as much stupid hubris as the Obamacare hubris of thinking that we can throw everything away and re-engineer something new from scratch at in a short series of 3am dorm-room bull sessions.

[Marlene]

Be careful driving all you southerners! There have been so many accidents here this winter,the roads have been messy,the black ice is brutal.You'd think Mainers could handle the poor driving conditions.The state troopers put out a terse statement over the week-end saying slow down!

[386J-I-B289]

Be a planet:)

[narciso]

Wouldn't it be logical to call the school, and they would be informed what the conditions are,

[matt]

The United States has not had diplomatic relations with Iran since 1979. We helped train Saddam's troops during the Iran-Iraq War. We are the Great Satan. And a supposedly rational, supposedly well educated one of our betters comes off with something like that?

We really are in cloud cuckoo land.

[Marlene]

Up here,the factor that determines a snow day is if the superintendent of a district can get to or from work.

[Truthbetold]

Their plan is government run healthcare.

[narciso]

Yes, although the bulk of military assistance, came from France, the USSR and other source, re
Timmerman, and SIPRI.

[Stephanie Yes I'm in how bout you?]

The schools are inundated with calls from parents but the buses here have just started picking up the high schoolers who go 7:15 to 2:10. The elementary go from 8:30 to 3:15 and the poor middle schoolers don't get out til after 4. By then the roads will be for shit and the neighborhood roads will be impassable.

Edumakators are awesome :eyeroll:

[henry]

Stephanie, did they schedule global warming projects for today?

[386J-I-B289]

jimmk,

UWS getting very dangerous.

Brian Ross hits jaywalker with his Beemer

Turns out Dati is not a Tea Partier:)