On politicians that don't give away much

Tyler Cowen complains there's nothing new to say about Obama, despite the extensive coverage he receives. In my view, that's something to be expected of a well-run campaign for two reasons:

1. What's the point of staggering the release of information? The information you want out there is 'released' on day one, and there's no need or desire for more information later on.

2. The point of a presidential campaign is to reach Average Joe, not to keep the likes of Tyler and myself happy by feeding us with more news, and even more so important news. There's a simple message to be communicated - 'vote Obama cos he'll bring change' - and it will be communicated over and over again until it has reached everyone, preferably more than once. That's why companies run information-poor 30-second ads over and over again; the point is not to reach out to the afficionados, as they can no more keep a company afloat than they can win you an election.

Even more importanly, a politician that doesn't commit to specific policies (as is the case with the current low-information Obama campaign) is simply more powerful when in office, and given checks and balances and the fact that Average Joe is vehemently anti-market, anti-foreigners, anti-reason, etc, that's not necessarily a bad thing - think of how rarely referenda are used, and how the Western World would look like if that wasn't the case.

So stop complaining about politicians speaking without saying anything; on the one hand they are good marketers, and on the other they would like, once in power, to actually have some. A *successful* politician who communicates too much substance before an election can only be a populist.

Bonus: This comment on Tyler's post is worth perusing:

Obama is too intelligent and well educated to have any fixed principles. He has fixed inclinations and preferences, but not principles.

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The BBC

Does not do economics. Does not believe in it. Anything vaguely related to economic reasoning is alien to anything that has anything to do with the Beeb. Check this one out:

The likes of Jonathan Ross and Chris Moyles are not receiving salaries above the market rate, according to a review of how the BBC pays its top names.

That’s not taking into account the fact that the BBC has massive price-setting power, being by far the biggest broadcaster in the land (and controlling 2 of the 5 terrestrial channels, only one of which has anything near it’s market share)... I would also think that Jonathan Ross, Chris Moyles, etc pretty much ARE the supply side of the market for extremely well-known and trustworthy TV presenters.

So, over-simplifying but just a little, the report says that the BBC does not pay more for its stars than what the BBC pays for its stars. Nice.

And ignoring market structure completely, they utterly fail to understand what the law of one price implies. ‘The BBC does not pay more than others’ – what’s the alternative? That they paid more than ITV for the same thing just for the fun of it?

I want my license fee back! And yes, I love Dr. Who and Have I Got News for You, but £130 a year?

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Natural born bigots

Stephen Landsburg, writing before the last presidential election:

If George Bush had chosen the racist David Duke as a running mate, I'd have voted against him, almost without regard to any other issue. Instead, John Kerry chose the xenophobe John Edwards as a running mate. I will therefore vote against John Kerry.

Duke thinks it's imperative to protect white jobs from black competition. Edwards thinks it's imperative to protect American jobs from foreign competition. There's not a dime's worth of moral difference there. While Duke would discriminate on the arbitrary basis of skin color, Edwards would discriminate on the arbitrary basis of birthplace. Either way, bigotry is bigotry, and appeals to base instincts should always be repudiated.

There's not a dime's worth of moral difference indeed. But then why stop at trade policy? (protectionism, at the end of the day, screws the majority of Americans as much as it screws foreigners) I would think that every policy that any government ever comes up with is geared towards benefiting its citizens, with little consideration for the interests of Johnny Foreigner.

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The thing that freaks me out the most

Watch it here.

No, I don't think it is actually the most scary thing out there, but it freaks me out alright.

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Would an economist kill him? The case of Leonel Torres Herrera

I am an innocent man, and something very wrong is taking place tonight. May God bless you all. I am ready.

This is from the last statement of L T Herrera, from a long, comprehensive list of last statements preserved by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. (via Pharyngula)

Excerpts from the opinion of the Supreme Court, delivered by Chief Justice Rehnquist, including a description of the case:

Petitioner Leonel Torres Herrera was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in January 1982. He unsuccessfully challenged the conviction on direct appeal and state collateral proceedings in the Texas state courts, and in a federal habeas petition. In February 1992--10 years after his conviction--he urged in a second federal habeas petition that he was "actually innocent" of the murder for which he was sentenced to death, and that the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment and the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of due process of law therefore forbid his execution. He supported this claim with affidavits tending to show that his now dead brother, rather than he, had been the perpetrator of the crime. Petitioner urges us to hold that this showing of innocence entitles him to relief in this federal habeas proceeding.[Emphasis DC] We hold that it does not.

[...] In any system of criminal justice, "innocence" or "guilt" must be determined in some sort of a judicial proceeding. Petitioner's showing of innocence, and indeed his constitutional claim for relief based upon that showing, must be evaluated in the light of the previous proceedings in this case, which have stretched over a span of 10 years.

Once a defendant has been afforded a fair trial and convicted of the offense for which he was charged, the presumption of innocence disappears. [...] ("The purpose of the trial stage from the State's point of view is to convert a criminal defendant from a person presumed innocent to one found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt"). In the eyes of the law, petitioner does not come before the Court as one who is "innocent," but on the contrary as one who has been convicted by due process of law of two brutal murders.

And excerpts from the dissent, delivered by Justice Blackmun:

We really are being asked to decide whether the Constitution forbids the execution of a person who has been validly convicted and sentenced but who, nonetheless, can prove his innocence with newly discovered evidence. Despite the State of Texas' astonishing protestation to the contrary [...] I do not see how the answer can be anything but "yes."

The protection of the Eighth Amendment does not end once a defendant has been validly convicted and sentenced. In Johnson v. Mississippi, 486 U.S. 578 (1988), the petitioner had been convicted of murder and sentenced to death on the basis of three aggravating circumstances. One of those circumstances was that he previously had been convicted of a violent felony in the State of New York. After Johnson had been sentenced to death, the New York Court of Appeals reversed his prior conviction. Although there was no question that the prior conviction was valid at the time of Johnson's sentencing, this Court held that the Eighth Amendment required review of the sentence because "the jury was allowed to consider evidence that has been revealed to be materially inaccurate." [...]

Just as an execution without adequate safeguards is unacceptable, so too is an execution when the condemned prisoner can prove that he is innocent. The execution of a person who can show that he is innocent comes perilously close to simple murder.

The opinion, and to a lesser extent the dissent, do a horrible job of expaining and addressing the issue at hand.

Society has a certain 'model' ('judicial proceedings') it uses to determine whether a person in guilty or innocent. The issue before the Court is really very simple: does the expected gain in the predictive power of the model as a result of utilising the previously unavailable information justify the cost - in a wide sense - of a re-trial (i.e. re-running the model)? Both the opinion and the dissent touch on this in an incoherent manner, and treat these considerations as peripheral.

Chief Justice Renquist's thesis basically consists of stating that re-trials are costly so we need to take into account the output of previous trials even when these did not utilise all available information ('once a defendant has been afforded a fair trial and convicted of the offense for which he was charged, the presumption of innocence disappears.') while Justice Blackmun is mainly concerned with asserting that utilising more information would be beneficial. In the end, there is no systematic attempt at stacking one against the other.

When will courts start thinking and arguing clearly? The wonderful lessons of economics - define a clear question, explicitly state your assumptions, reach a robust conclusion - must make their way to the hallowed halls of justice, where they will find a natural, welcoming home.

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What all borders should look like

Kris-Stella Trump travels to Helsinki.

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It's the economy, stupid

Andrew Gelman has more, the paper (free access) is here.

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Party finance reform: a different idea

Party funding is in the news again, and once more the focus is on caps and bans, as well as increased taxpayer funding. What's missing from the debate is another possibility: why not tax 'unwanted' or 'undesirable' contributions and spending proportionately to the degree of their undesirability rather than ban them outright? Here's what I wrote back when there were about three people reading this blog:

I am no expert, but these are the main issues as I understand them:

1. Owing to their ability to make higher contributions, rich individuals and corporations disproportionately influence the political agenda and government decisions. On the other hand, small contributions by individuals are seen as beneficial, as they promote wider participation in the political process.

2. The bulk of campaign spending is socially wasteful, closely resembling an arms race. If there was a way to bring total spending down in a universally accepted manner, everyone would be better off.

3. The main approach in the UK and the US to rectifying problems 1 & 2 above is legislation that imposes more transparency (parties have to declare the contributions they receive) coupled with restrictions on the amount of money an individual or organisation can donate.

Here's a different idea. Why not tax campaign contributions to the extent they are deemed to be socially undesirable? I propose instituting the Undue Influence Tax (UIT), to be introduced as part of the 'Invigorating Democracy Act' and waged on individual donations (and to give it an extra bit of harmless spin, it should be paid by the political parties rather than the donors). It will start at 0% of the value of the contribution, jumping to 30% after the first $5,000 or so, 50% after $10,000 and reaching 95% beyond $50,000.

This will make 'buying' political influence much more expensive - and as we know, when the price of a good rises, quantity falls. It will increase the relative value of small contributions, making candidates reach more to 'the people', rather than the wealthy and large corporations. Suitably calibrated, it can rectify all the actual and perceived ills of the current campaign finance framework.

Furthermore, the UIT is a tax-man's dream. It could become the most popular tax in history, as it only affects a small number of citizens, while clearly contributing towards a greater public good - 'giving power to the people'. The revenue obtained should allow for cuts elsewhere in the tax system or increased spending on public services. There is no need for additional bureaucracy - parties already have to declare contributors' names and donations. Whatever the rate, avoiding the tax is an option only for candidates with a political death-wish. Finally, it can be introduced gradually and fine-tuned to desirable levels , without generating any distortionary behavioural effects.

I'm sure the membership of the (carbon) Pigou club would approve.

That's what I wrote back then, but it seems I have ignored another important benefit of using a tax approach. Since cross-party agreement is needed, moving from banning to taxing also means that the policy space becomes a continuum rather than a series of discrete choices where it's impossible to meet the other party 'in the middle'. Allowing variable tax rates in the policy space means that the probability a mutually agreeable compromise can be reached is much higher than when choice is restricted between binary 'ban-no ban' options.

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Double standards

This must be the most rambling and disjointed post that has ever appeared on Bluematter.; the reader would be well advised to scroll further down.

It is a fact that, at least ignoring second-order effects, the whole house market crash/ subprime crisis thing will have no long run effects on output. Concerns about the distribution of wealth apart (the current mess will lead to a massive redistibution from home-owners and loan issuers to the rest of society), there is no effect on anything other than how we value a single good: the land and the houses are still there and they are exactly the same as before; the only thing that is in fact different is that a house now buys fewer tomatoes than it used to.

In other words, there is nothing special about a house market crash or correction; it's just a change in the relative prices of different goods in the economy. In fact, to the extent that land is a capital good, society as a whole is better off: think how much better off we would all be if oil was free (ignoring pollution). If Saudi Arabia gets screwed in the process, we can always compensate them so that the advent of 'free oil' consitutes a pareto improvement.

Many economists reading this will argue that this is all well known; the long run is not the issue at all here and the reason everyone is so worried is the short run and the probability this will push us into a recession.

Now think of our approach to free trade and immigration. The parallels are striking: in the long-run, society is better off (again, ignoring the effects of redistibution), much as is the case with lower land prices. In the short-run, many people see part of their wealth (e.g. human capital) dramatically change in relative price terms. The only difference between freeing up trade and letting the housing market go to bust taking the homeowners with it is speed and numbers. The dismantling of barriers to trade or immigration has never been so rapid or universal so as to allow that many people to get screwed at the same time so that a recession ensues. (at least not at the national level; you can always look at the dying cities of Detroit or Buffalo in the States, the great industrial and mining towns of the UK and most farming towns in the Continent).

Economists are generally gung-ho when it comes to liberalising trade, while they tend to express concerns when they see falling asset prices. The difference between the two, however, does not amount to much other than the *natural* speed at which each occurs. I'm all for both, but the different approach has to be seen as a comment on the desirability of shock therapy when it comes to economic policy.

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Race and brains, once more unto the breach

If the previous post did not persuade you to stop wasting your time thinking about it, McMegan links to Jim Manzi who addresses the question. He concludes his well researched piece with this:

Do genetic differences accounts for any material portion of the difference in IQ scores by self-identified racial groups in the US? The only honest answer is that we don’t know. This, not political correctness is why the American Psychological Association’s formal consensus point of view on this question is stated without qualification: “At present, this question has no scientific answer.”

All right and proper, but that's not the right question to ask. What you really want to know is this: are 'black genes' leading to materially less intelligence than 'white genes'? And the answer is simple: IQ tests can't tell you that.

My understanding is that IQ scores say nothing about 'absolute' intelligence, they only provide a ranking. Or to use terminology more familiar to some of my readers, IQ scores only have an ordinal, not a cardinal meaning. It is very well likely that someone scoring 110 is only trivially more intelligent than someone scoring 90; what the difference between 110 and 90 actually means in terms of 'amount of intelligence' is anyone's guess.

OK, I hear you say, but don't we use quasi-cardinal interpretations for IQ scores? (e.g. isn't 'normal intelligence' supposed to lie between 90 and 109?) Quoting Manzi again:

There are statistically significant differences in IQ test performance between self-identified racial and ethnic groups in the US, and these differences have been sustained over long periods of time. The specific difference that is most widely discussed is the fact that in the US Non-Hispanic whites score, on average, about 15 points (~1 STDEV) higher than African-Americans. (Leaving aside the complication that it matters exactly how we define “long periods of time”, since, for example, there is circumstantial evidence that the black-white IQ gap may have been reduced substantially over the past several decades.)

So, 15 points is the maximum possible difference between the races. We also know with certainty that environment plays a role in determining intelligence, so the difference that can be attributed to genetics is a maximum of 10 points or so, with the actual difference (if it exists) likely to be much smaller. That's nothing: let me remind you that the average (and I think also median) person scores 100 by design, that 'average' or 'normal' intelligence is a 20 point band, and that in any case IQ is a flawed measure of 'intelligence' as used in everyday language (and a 'better than random' - but not by much - predictor of 'success' in life).

To bring the human element into this, my own results from several IQ tests are uniformly distributed across a 35 points range, and while I'm pretty good at arriving to answers to almost every IQ test type question thrown at me - questions that the average person won't answer at all - I take more time than the average person to do so (does that make me more or less intelligent?). And since the human element sells, I got more for you: here is a long list of highly successful and intelligent people who were very likely autistic, and here's the corresponding long list of people with dyslexia. What's the point? Intelligence is not a uni-dimensional variable.

And just to make sure, I should also mention the Flynn effect, quoting from this (excellent) paper (free access):

Since 1932 and probably prior to that, test scores have been increasing at a rate of 3 to 6 IQ points per decade, depending on the IQ test used. The preponderance of evidence indicates that scores are continuing to rise at a constant rate (Flynn, 2006b).

And since you apparently have to be a genius to read Bluematter., I won't even draw out the implications of the following observation on the likely (non)persistence of any currently observed differences amongst races (ala Manzi's circumstantial evidence):

There is at least one exception, however. The Scandinavian countries currently are showing little or no rise in their test scores (Flynn, 2006a). As large IQ increases were seen in Norway prior to 1968, Flynn suggests that Scandinavia might have experienced early increases that have since abated. This raises the possibility that IQ increases in other industrialized nations will also end.

So in IQ we have a metric with no cardinal interpretation, with a weak correlation to 'general intelligence' and an even weaker one to 'success in life', with the observed differences between races being pretty small and most likely diminishing even before controlling for environmental characteristics.

What's the issue again?

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Assume blacks have lower IQ than whites and DNA is to blame

Now name one thing you would do differently - as a politician, as a citizen or as a human being. I'll be damned if you can come up with a single example.

I really, really can't understand what this debate is all about (other than in an immature 'I did not evolve from the apes' or 'I am really frustrated the earth is not at the centre of the solar system' kind of a way). Hell, even this debate is more relevant.

Now can we please, as a culture, move on?

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2008 Election Top Donors

Open Secrets has the full list.


The numbers are based on contributions from PACs and individuals giving $200 or more to federal candidates and parties as reported to the Federal Election Commission. All the numbers are for the 2008 election cycle and are based on data released by the FEC on Monday, September 24, 2007. Source: Center for Responsive Politics.

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Niloufar

From Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis.

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Unions and inequality redux

Paul Krugman says (via Mark Thoma):

All of the world's advanced nations have to compete in the same global economy. Yet America's combination, of soaring incomes at the top and stagnant wages for most workers, is unique.

We're told that unions, once a key support for wages, have become obsolete in the modern world. Yet the collapse of the union movement in America hasn't been matched elsewhere in the advanced world, even in our neighbor Canada. About 30 percent of Canadian workers are union members, compared with only 12 percent of workers here.

Back in June, I said: (and there's more where this came from)

Many economists suggest that the declining fortunes of unions are the main driver behind the increase in income inequality over the past few decades. While I agree that decreases in union membership and increases in wage inequality go hand-in-hand, I believe the standard narrative is somewhat misguided when it comes to causality. Rather than declining unions leading to increased wage inequality, it is the increasing variance of individual worker productivity that lies behind both. [...]

The fall in the power of unions was not a random event that then led to the increase in wage inequality we observe. This development should be attributed to the changing nature of production and the subsequent increase in potential wage inequality: unions were merely a short-run obstacle to achieving that new equilibrium.

I'm not aware of any empirical study looking into this potential endogeneity, and no suitable instruments spring to mind. In any case, Herb Gintis, approaching this from a somewhat different angle, seems to agree.

And if you do follow this last link, for the record, I think the bonobos will not only survive, but they will prosper too. What keeps the pig coalition together is not a love for free markets or opposition to redistribution, it is common social values (anti-abortion, pro-Jesus and the like - so much for 'only caring about what's in their trough'). The bonobos will eventually compromise on these - a process already underway - and the redistributive hand of the state will start moving more boldly once again.

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A girl argues with God

This is from the superb Persepolisby the Iranian Marjane Satrapi. If you read one thing this year, this should be it.

I will be posting a couple more excerpts from the book and commentary in the following days.

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The 7 wonders of the totalitarian world

Esquire has an interesting list of monuments to megalomania (via Peter Klein). Make sure you check out this abomination from North Korea, easily the ugliest thing I've seen in my entire life.

(but if you a relatively new Bluematter. reader you should also see this video from Arirang in North Korea, a truly daunting exhibition.)

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A visit to a West Bank settlement, part 2

A few months ago I recorded a discussion with a Palestinian friend who had recently returned from a trip in the West Bank, where he visited an Israeli settlement. Before reading this post, make sure you read part 1, and the disclaimer.

Part II

About the wall. What they did, they said because we want to protect ourselves from suicide bombers, we are going to build a wall around Palestinian territories. And they told the world that it's around the West Bank only, you know, just to protect Israel from suicide bombers.

Apparently, the wall is not only around the West Bank - it's like, they don't like this village, there is a wall circling it all over. It's more like small prisons rather than a single wall identifying one country from another. It's going all the way according to their, you know - it's disconnected. It's not like one single wall.

I was telling you at the beginning about the settlement. So I told him [Asad's cousin], I want to go see a settlement. And he said, yea, I know a settlement next to Ramallah, they sometimes allow Palestinians to go. I said, how come they allow Palestinians to go into this settlement - he said yea, it's good business for them - not any Palestinian, they know that you are going to buy food or clothes or something. Right now it's calm, there isn't much tension, so they might just turn a blind eye and let you in. So I said OK, let's go and check it out.

And he goes, for him, you know -- 'it's the best supermarket you'll ever see in your life, it's out of this world, the supermarket is huge, you can find anything you want'. I mean, it was definitely like a 7-Eleven, or a Tescos or Sainsbury's - but my cousin, you know, compared to the standards they have in the West Bank - for them, it's something out of this world. [Asad's cousin lives in Nablus]

So, anyway, we were stopped outside the settlement - all the other cars are passing, but the soldier at the checkpoint in front of the settlement says 'you come this way'.

My cousin is very cynical, you know; when he speaks, he says everything as a kind of joke or something. So he tells the soldier - 'Why, everybody is passing through here, and you are telling us to stop'. And the guy with the rifle [the IDF soldier] says 'You are Palestinian'. And my cousin says 'But we are the best people!' [Asad laughs at this point] And he asks the soldier 'Why, where are you from?'; by the way, the guy with the rifle was speaking in Arabic. And he says 'I'm Israeli' - so my cousin tells him 'Ah, you are also the best people!' [Asad laughs again].

So the guy smiles, you know, and he told us 'OK, guys, since you are Palestinians, do you have any guns hidden, or rifles, or bombs' - so my cousin looks at him and he tells him 'But you are carrying the gun! It's not me carrying the gun'.

[Asad and the other friends in the room are all laughing] And the whole scenario is just so funny, because of the stereotype you get that we are meant to be trying to attack them, and here's the guy holding a gun and asking us if we have weapons.

So he [the soldier] said 'OK, open the boot of the car'. So we opened the boot, we had a few bottles of arak that I got from the duty free when I arrived in Nablus, and he looks and he goes 'Tsk, Haraam, Haraam - Muhammed, this is Haraam!' [Asad laughs again]. And we told him, 'ah, we are just having fun, and we are going out, for a night out in Ramallah, so we stocked for that'. So he goes, 'OK, good luck, go in'.

So we went into the settlement, and we were trying to park. The settlers, of course, they are all carrying weapons - it's a very nice family, you know, you get to see little girls, kids; each settler has - these guys they make babies much better than the Palestinians, I have to admit that. [Asad laughs]. You see them walking with five-six kids and the dad carrying a big M-16, a nice family.

Of course they can tell from the plate that we are Palestinian, trying to park - nobody's letting you to park. He's coming with the trolley, you know, and his family; he sees that this car, Palestinian car, wants to park, it's like against his religion you know [laughter]. He looks at you and goes 'no, no, you can't - I'm not leaving'. So we stayed there for thirty minutes maybe, and we are trying to find a parking spot.

At that moment, to be honest, I was scared. Because they can easily lock you up, or hit you, and what's gonna happen? At the end of the day, you are nobody. They will fuck you up and say, well, he's in a place that he shouldn't be. So I told him [Asad's cousin], 'man, it's OK, I don't want to see it, let's leave'. And he said ' no, no, don't worry, you'll get used to it'.

So in the end we managed to park and we walked to the supermarket. Because we were late for half an hour the guys [the IDF soldiers at the checkpoint] had already spoken on the walkie talkie to the guys inside the settlement asking if we had showed up, so they were looking around for us; when we showed up they came to us and said hello. Because, anyway, they can't tell by looking at someone's face that they are Palestinian - in the settlement you get people that are Moroccan-looking, Iraqi-looking, British-looking, French-looking, all sorts. So they can't tell that someone is Palestinian just by looking at them.

I'll be posting the final part soon.

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A visit to a West Bank settlement, part 1

A few months ago I recorded a discussion with a Palestinian friend of mine who had recently returned from a trip in the West Bank. Asad is from a well off family, he is UK-born and holds a British passport. He grew up in Nablus in the West Bank, and he has spent more than 10 years in the UK where he went to boarding school (from the age of 15) and university. He currently lives and works in Jordan.

Before continuing, a disclaimer: I am not a journalist, and the text below is not meant to be a fair and balanced depiction of reality, or even a statement of my own views. If you have any objections to anything you read, especially concerning facts, comments to this post are open and (respectful) contributions welcome.

What follows is a verbatim transcription of the discussion. Whenever anyone other than Asad speaks the text is in italics (I remained silent throughout, but other friends - all Europeans - were also taking part). Here goes:


Part I

The West Bank, politically, is Palestinian land - under UN law it is for the Palestinians. Now you get a Jewish guy coming from Russia, and they all have a station car or a four-wheel drive. And he's allowed to go anywhere - you know, it's his country - so he goes at the top of a mountain for example. He camps there, first with a tent. Then a few friends come along. It's just a tent - by law that's all right.

By the way, by the law they are not allowed to build anything; if the soldiers know they are meant to stop them. In the beginning, there will just be tents; then after a while you see a single house has appeared. If you complain about it, nobody shows up to check the house. After a few months, after the house has been there for a while, practically it's his - even though it's your land. The guy has a weapon, you cannot go in, and that's how it starts.

So we went to this settlement that's next to this Palestinian village. My cousin is a distributor for [a big Israeli company], so they've given him identification so he can move around the West Bank, including the settlements.

- So, normally Palestinians are not allowed to visit the settlements? 

No, and not just settlements, there's no way you can move around in the West Bank; you come from this village, you stay in this village; you come from this town, you stay in this town. You get people who haven't left their village or town for ten years now.

-So from Nablus you can't go to, say, Bethlehem.

Man, you get people in Nablus who haven't been outside Nablus in ten years now. Never seen anything outside Nablus for ten years.

- So is the wall covering the whole of Nablus?

Actually, there is no wall next to Nablus, but on the main streets there are three checkpoints. The checkpoints, I'll tell you about them.

We went out of Nablus, and he [an IDF soldier] said please walk, get out of the car. I told him we have the license and stuff, he said no - walk. They are like an international airport these checkpoints, it's not a checkpoint per se; you have a rotating door, and this is for the car, and several guns pointing at you from several directions; I got scared at that point. Why is he asking me to walk when I have the permit to leave?

So I walked out of the car and the guy said, well, he started speaking to me in Hebrew. I tell him no; only speak Arabic or English. One of them then goes, 'hold on, you speak English you said'? And I said yes, I do speak English. And he said - in Arabic - 'how is it to curse?'

And I thought, shit, this is gonna - because you hear stories, of them making fun, taking the piss. The guy is bored at the checkpoint and he wants to insult you basically so he tries to insult you in any way he finds. So I think, fuck, I'm not going down this route, you know.

And he said 'you know, bitch, fuck, how do you curse?' And I said 'I don't know these words man; I just learned English in school, they don't teach us these words'. And then he goes - in Arabic - 'no, you know, sharmuta, manyak - speak some Arabic swear words. I want you to curse'. And I spoke a few swear words in Arabic. And he said 'OK, come with me'.

So I went into that room, and they had a guy, they took out his shirt, put it on top of his head and two guys are kicking him. Apparently, on the check point, after he left, he cursed at them. And they did the whole thing, they made everyone wait for an hour, with so many cars behind you know, and they are beating this guy and waiting for someone to come and tell him that they are beating him because he is cursing on them. And most of the time of course they can speak full arabic. But it's just - you know, setting an example. So, in this case, the whole thing was for me to see what's happening so they can set an example - the guy [the IDF soldier] spoke perfect Arabic, they didn't need me to tell the guy anything. [pause]

At checkpoints, you cannot move unless he [the IDF soldier] tells you to move. And with these guys, you know, it's random; he can tell you 'wait for an hour and after one hour I'll let you guys move'. They don't need a good reason to do that.

- Where was that? 

In Nablus, going out of Nablus.

- How could you go out of Nablus? Because you have a UK passport?

No, because there is the permit which allows you to go. Personally, I had my British passport on me so, I wanted to use it, in case - but also, man, for them it depends on your face and whether they buy your story, it's all judgmental...

- So, the people who haven't been able to go out of Nablus for 10 years, they can't get the permit?

Yeah, some of them can't get the permit. And some of them when they go to the checkpoint - they ask you questions you know, 'where are you going?' - and if he doesn't buy your story, well, OK - go back. So you have to have a good reason [to move]- you go to the checkpoint, he'll ask you for your permit.

- So why can't they apply for the permit?

Well, most of them [Palestinians in the West Bank], they'll either not get it or not try to apply.

- So how come you got one? Was it because of your passport?

No, no, I applied normally - most people can exit and leave. But man, you end up paying £200 for the journey, you know over there some people just can't afford it. And most importantly, there are no guarantees that the town won't be blocked and then you can't come back; you know there's all these logistics. If you are going on holiday and you are not well off, and you know there is this a slight chance that Nablus will get locked for three weeks, I mean, this is not something you risk.


I will be posting parts two and three once I get a chance to transcribe them, hopefully later this week.

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Paul Krugman explains why I can't stand political reporting

Think about what passes for a “tough” question on the Sunday talk shows. It’s not “Senator Bomfog — you say X, but the statistics show that it’s actually Y. How can you explain this discrepancy?” In fact, I’ve never seen that happen. In political reporting, being wrong means, at most, that your claims are “in dispute.”

The excerpt is from his NYT blog, via Economist's view.

Paul is spot on. For some reason (misguided notions of unbiasedness? journalists and politicians that don't know their left hand from their right?) bringing reality to a political discussion is bad manners. Everyone is entitled to their own preferences and opinions, and their own facts too.

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England's suppresed religion

It is the fourth largest religion in the country, and by some accounts the fastest growing one, with 400,000 recorded believers. Yet there is no temple, no priests, no government funding; politicians and unbelievers dismiss it as foolish and irrelevant.

Stop the injustice now. Give the Jedi the respect they deserve.

Thanks to the England Expects blog for the statistics, from a post on the European Commission's desire to find out when you first got laid.

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