Peter_Puget

What is it about a stong intelligent woman that scares men so much. Any ideas MArylou?

You are in fact being an obscurantist. I could care less if the richest man in America had an effective rate of zero. Such a fact while being of some interest in no way would change the fact that the federal tax structure is in fact progressive and it's become more progressive over time. (For grins I made a quick & dirty graph showing trended effective tax rates for the 10%, 5% and 1% groups - notice the positive slopes!) J_B says: "moreover, pp contradicts himself since he now says there is evidence we are now close to a flat tax system. how could a flat tax system be progressive?" What I wrote to inspire that comment- emphasis added:"As far as other taxes I posted a link of a study several weeks ago suggesting that when taken as a whole the US might be pretty close to a flat tax situation right now. I would only add the following comment: The study I refered to included Federal, State,Local and regional taxes in its analysis. The CBO report as supported by its title is concerned with Federal taxation. PP

The accuracy of J_B’s data notwithstanding he is confused or deliberately being an obscurantist. The question here is the progressivity of the Federal Tax system and whether a significant piece of information should have been included in the Seattle Times article.. I have little time but did prepare a simple graph of trendlines for table 1A in the CBO link. (see attachment) I simply would point out that the trendline for four of the quintiles is negative and for the other it is positive. As far as other taxes I posted a link of a study several weeks ago suggesting that when taken as a whole the US might be pretty close to a flat tax situation right now. I am not sure how accurate the study is but it is fuel for thought. Further just recently a study was released by a University of Kansas Prof and a Fed Reserve member. It studied the possible impact on GDP of a change to a flat tax system. This article was also not referenced. EDIT: By the way J_B claims I am making a judgement on data 30 years old. I am confused by this as the data I have introduced to the thread only goes back to 1979.

A couple of comments. 1 J-Fisher first creates a scenario explaining how my attachment is consistent with the article. The scenario is presented as fact. Of course the fact his scenario is at odds with the data shown in the link from which the attachment is taken is ignored. What he has done is simply ignore the facts. 2 When I point this out he suddenly takes exception to the data because the time series ends at 2001. Note that this date was of no importance when he was using it to support his fallacious argument. Here is his response: “Huh? The data in CBO report you linked to had data through 2001, which was before the Bush tax cuts even took effect. The article was about the effects of the Bush tax cuts. The CBO report is irrelevant to the topic.” I would note that in June 2001 Bush signed the “ Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 .” Some provisions of this act were effective immediately. J_Fisher’s comment is clearly contrary to fact. It is also off base because the topic was in fact the Seattle Times Article. I believe that any responsible article would mention recent trends in progressively. That this CBO report was ignored shows poor reporting. The impact of future changes in the tax code are simply speculation and should be taken as such. For example at the site linked by J_B is a wonderful write-up that contains the following quote: “Second, after Bush cut taxes for his rich friends , unemployment actually increased over the previous year.” I think that it is clear from the data that in 2001 the federal tax system had become more progressive. Typical BS from a J_B link. Most on this site are pretty young and won’t remember the screaming that went on over the Reagan tax cuts. Look over the data. The undeniable trend is to greater progressively. PP

Ah selective analysis. Look at my original link: it shows effective tax rates! Quote form my comments on the Seattle Times article: In today's Seattle Times. Note that the report I linked above is not referenced at all. Seems as tho the progresssive nature of our tax system has in fact increased.

RP/HB Brass nuts - Broken cable strands. RP/HB Brass Nuts – Deformed wedge from fall Wired Nuts Various Brands – Kinked/broken cables Old Style TCU – Blew up in fall Forged Friend – Cam deformed (flattened curve) in fall Various Carabiners - hairline cracks Various Carabiners – Loose pins Tricam – hairline fracture.

well i had mark and colorado correct

Hall of Mirrors starts out with a two pitch climb Misty Beethoven that I think was put up by Mark Rolofson. Anyway I did it back in the days of EBs and the EB rubber would literally squeak on the polished granite. Modern rubber seems to have lost the “squeak”. If I remember correctly TP has some small edges and is not a pure friction route.

Where did that come from? Summary from data presented two posts above.

Piece of %$#@ Article In today's Seattle Times. Note that the report I linked above is not referenced at all. Seems as tho the progresssive nature of our tax system has in fact increased. See attachment on the post directly above.

See attached summary.

Once a long time ago I was belaying a friend on an 11c crack in the Valley. He climbed up past the crux decided he needed a piece or two he left on the ground. He then down climbed the route including the crux and climbed back up to finish it. I say it was an onsight and brilliant climbing to boot.

Given that choice I'd go with 9+

Link PP

Why don't you suggest a better rating? Are you saying that TP is 5.12?

Sorry but I thought this was a good read and the registration process at the LA TImes is a pain. EDIT: Rubin is fluent in both Arabic and Farsi. LA Times , April 4, 2004 By Michael Rubin, Michael Rubin is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and was a governance team advisor for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. WASHINGTON — Last summer, as Iraqis sweltered outside, the Coalition Provisional Authority met in the marbled corridors and air-conditioned offices of one of Saddam Hussein's former palaces to hash out how to fund political parties. The State Department was adamant, insisting that the CPA should maintain "an even playing field" and should not favor one party over another. Parties affiliated with the Iraqi Governing Council's militant Islamists and liberal secularists should receive the same treatment. There should be no special consideration given to groups seeking to unite Iraqis rather than dividing them by ethnicity or sectarian affiliations. This may sound like the way to ensure fair elections. But while the CPA has maintained its neutrality, our adversaries have shown no such compunction. Until recently, I worked for the CPA, living in a nondescript house outside Baghdad's Green Zone. I traveled the country with Iraqi friends, paying spot checks on borders, political parties, shrines and markets. Because I was not in a convoy or traveling with heavily armed guards, Iraqis could easily approach me. Professionals, politicians and religious figures telephoned at all hours for meetings, knowing they would not have to wait at the fortified gates of the palace complex. I quickly learned that most political business in Iraq happens not at Governing Council sessions, but in private homes between 9 p.m. and 3 a.m. One February evening, a governor from a southern province asked to see me. We met after dark at a friend's house. After pleasantries and tea, he got down to business. "The Iranians are flooding the city and countryside with money," he said. "Last month, they sent a truckload of silk carpets across the border for the tribal sheikhs. Whomever they can't buy, they threaten." The following week, I headed south to investigate. A number of Iraqis said the Iranians had channeled money through the offices of the Dawa Party, an Islamist political party, led by Governing Council member Ibrahim Jafari. On separate occasions in Baghdad and the southern city of Nasiriya, I watched ordinary Iraqis line up for handouts of money and supplies at Dawa offices. The largess seems to be having an effect: Polls indicate that Jafari is Iraq's most popular politician, enjoying a favorable rating by more than 50% of the electorate. The CPA's evenhandedness may be well-intentioned, but to a society weaned on conspiracy theories, the United States' failure to support liberals and democrats signals support for the Islamists. Equal opportunity may exist in Washington, but not in Baghdad. Why, Iraqis ask, would the CPA ignore the influx of Iranian arms and money into southern Iraq if it had not struck some secret deal with Tehran or did not desire the resulting increase in militancy? Why would the Iranian border be largely unguarded a year after liberation? Iraqi liberals are especially sensitive to signs of support for Shiite politician Abdelaziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, whose visit official Washington welcomed in January. Students affiliated with the Badr Corps, Hakim's militia, roam Basra University, forcing women to wear the veil. Signs proclaiming the supremacy of Hakim are affixed to doors across the university, and professors say they are afraid to remove them. In Nasiriya and Karbala, Iraqis lament they can no longer speak openly, lest they become the subject of retaliation by Iranian-funded gangs. While Sens. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts and Carl Levin of Michigan demand yet another government audit of the Iraqi National Congress (previous audits have found no wrongdoing), radical clerics find their pockets full, their Iranian sponsors more interested in mission than political cannibalism. Last month, I visited a gathering of urban professionals in Najaf. They repeatedly asked why the CPA stood by while followers of firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtader Sadr invaded homes, smashed satellite dishes and meted out punishment in ad hoc Islamic courts. We may dismiss Sadr as a grass-roots populist, but his rise was not arbitrary. Rather, his network is based upon ample funding he receives through Iran-based cleric Ayatollah Kazem al Haeri, a close associate of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In signing the bill authorizing $87.5 billion for reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan in November, President Bush called the massive campaign to rebuild both nations "the greatest commitment of its kind since the Marshall Plan." There is daily progress. Shops have opened. Roads are repaved. But, the CPA remains hampered by a strategic communications strategy geared more toward Washington than Iraq. American newspapers may report our $5.6 billion investment in Iraq's electrical infrastructure, but what Iraqis see are signs such as a billboard of Hakim, the radical politician, affixed to a newly refurbished Ministry of Electricity office in Baghdad. On March 26, a team of United Nations election specialists arrived in Baghdad to prepare the country for elections following the scheduled June 30 transfer of sovereignty. Iraqis may welcome elections, but it would be an abdication of American leadership if we do not support our allies, especially as Iraq's neighbors fund proxy groups and radicals with goals inimical to democracy. We should not be more willing to help our adversaries than our friends. Democracy is about not only elections, but also about tolerance, compromise and liberty. Twenty-five years ago, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, declared "the first day of God's government." In a rushed referendum supervised by armed vigilantes, Iranians voted for theocracy. For a quarter century, they have struggled to undo their mistake. It would be a betrayal of Bush's vision as well as 24 million Iraqis if we replicate it in Iraq.

I never keep records myself but a couple of times I have contacted people out of the blue about routes they did back in the “Golden Age” of big walls and have been surprised that they sent me photo copies from fairly detailed journals. Same thing happened once before going to Zion years ago. I wonder what % of climbers actually maintains a fairly comprehensive journal.

read this

Good route. Someone go clean it again. Picture by Lancegranite

OW - I have no idea about 120,00 deaths but I'd bet the rest of this year's paychecks that the 8K on the CDC is less than the real numbers of deaths caused by poor medical care by physicians. For example at lunch I was reading this which included the remarkable statistic that 10% of people who get bypass surgery don't have any clinical conditions for which that seems like an appropriate therapy.

Sorry I usually just put links put thought I'd post this entire essay by Arnold Kling: "What was different in the 20th century? Certainly, the technologies underlying the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) - nuclear, biological, and chemical (NBC) - were powerful, and the weapons an enormous threat. But building nuclear weapons required, at least for a time, access to both rare - indeed, effectively unavailable - raw materials and highly protected information; biological and chemical weapons programs also tended to require large-scale activities. The 21st-century technologies - genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics (GNR) - are so powerful that they can spawn whole new classes of accidents and abuses. Most dangerously, for the first time, these accidents and abuses are widely within the reach of individuals or small groups. They will not require large facilities or rare raw materials. Knowledge alone will enable the use of them." -- Bill Joy, "Why the future doesn't need us" When frequent TCS contributor Glenn Reynolds recently pointed to a new weblog entitled ClusterFuckNation, my mind leaped via free-association to the Department of Homeland Security. Nothing strikes me as more misguided than trying to tackle the problem of small, nimble terrorist organizations with a bureaucratic monstrosity, such as the UN or DHS. Instead of looking into who was to blame for failing to prevent the 9/11 attacks, I would like someone to hold hearings on who was to blame for creating a mega-merger in the name of fighting terrorism. At some point, we need to think about a rational way to structure government to deal with decentralized threats. This essay is on that topic. Bill Joy, formerly the top technologist at Sun Microsystems, raised quite a few hackles with his essay, quoted above, on the dangers that exist at the frontiers of modern science and engineering. Virginia Postrel, having written The Future and its Enemies, denounced Joy's essay as "a screed against unpredictable change, a call for a static world, and an assault on commerce and the individual desires it serves. It is the same old attack on the open society, just wrapped in cool clothes." Joy's proposed solution was a worldwide renunciation of research in such fields as biotechnology, nanotechnology, and advanced computing. Postrel called this idea "childlike and childish." I, too, disagree with Joy's solution. However, as Postrel and other detractors acknowledge, the problems posed by Joy are real. In particular, I believe that the unprecedented ability of terrorist networks and deranged individuals to commit mass murder represents a fundamental challenge for social architecture. Diffuse Power Industrial-era power was mass power. The leaders of World War II measured strength by counting numbers of soldiers, tanks, airplanes, and ship tonnage. Military strength was something that came in large, highly-organized units. Information-age power is diffuse. When your product can be delivered as bits and your retail presence is a web site, you do not need factories, delivery trucks, warehouses, and stores. Individuals can have impact outside of the context of the mass-power industrial world. Dan Pink, author of Free Agent Nation, likes to point out that it is modern capitalism rather than Marxism that enables workers to own the means of production. The same technological forces that reduce the barriers to entry for entrepreneurs also make weapons of mass destruction accessible to small organizations. Even if we did not face the threat of Islamic terrorism, we could see massacres committed by a few individuals acting out the "banality of evil." Think of the Columbine killers acting on a scale of 9/11. Imagine the Unabomber with Anthrax. Organized terrorism falls somewhere in between industrial-age military force and the sort of random, individual threats that could emerge as technology advances further. Terrorist organizations have less "overhead" than nation-states, but they do have some exposed components. They can be disrupted through military attacks and co-ordinated cutoffs of funding. However, this will not be true much longer. In the future, when an isolated terrorist cell or even an individual may be able to access weapons of mass destruction, none of today's tactics for disrupting terrorism will be effective. What Would Madison Do? In my view, the only solution to the threat of small-group usage of weapons of mass destruction is comprehensive surveillance. The challenge, as I will describe below, is to design an approach to surveillance that is not itself a danger to life and liberty. The problem is analogous to the dilemma faced by our nation's founders, such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. They knew that the United States needed a central government in order to provide for the common defense. However, they also believed that it is easy for government to slip into tyranny, undermining rather than protecting people's rights. The solution that they developed was a system of checks and balances embedded in our Constitution. The idea was that the powers of one branch of government would be checked by other branches, thereby containing the threat of tyranny. The Constitution can be viewed as an attempt to balance two risks. One is the risk that the government will be too weak to protect individual liberty and property. The opposite risk is that the government watchdog will turn on its master, becoming the people's oppressor rather than their protector. Today's surveillance technologies pose an analogous problem. If left unused, they could leave our country vulnerable to mass murder, blackmail and defeat. However, if we casually turn surveillance powers over to existing government agencies, such as the FBI, the risk of abuse is unacceptably high. Had today's technological conditions been in place 220 years ago, our founders might have provided us with a solution. Instead, we have to try to think along the same lines, and ask ourselves what they might have done in our place. David Brin's Approach David Brin, author of The Transparent Society, also believes that the threat of terrorism will pull society in the direction of surveillance. However, he believes that the "push" toward surveillance will be even stronger, in the sense that technological innovation and low cost will inevitably unleash a flood of surveillance equipment. Cheap cameras, miniature radios, and other devices will become pervasive. For Brin, the question becomes, how can we live with this pervasive surveillance technology? His answer is that we must insure equal access. The worst scenario, in his view, would be if government or corporate elites obtained monopoly access to surveillance technology. Such a monopoly would allow the elites to overpower ordinary individuals, ending freedom and democracy as we know it. Brin argues that if surveillance technology were treated as public property, like city streets or national parks, then the potential for evil could be contained. He envisions a world in which no one can avoid being watched, so that there is "mutually assured surveillance." Even if I were tempted to be a peeping tom or a stalker, the ability of others to observe my behavior would act to deter and constrain me. When people argue that surveillance tools should be kept out of the hands of government, Brin argues that this is unrealistic, because officials inevitably view this as hampering their effectiveness. It is more realistic, in Brin's view, that we could strike a deal in which government has access to the best tools to do its job on the condition that the public has access to those same tools. My concern with Brin's approach is that I think that it requires a citizenry that is well educated and adapted to the environment that he envisions. Before we reach that point, an elite could have used surveillance technology to install a permanent tyranny. Perhaps eventually we will evolve to the transparent society that Brin proposes. For now, however, I believe we need a formal structure to preserve liberty -- a constitution of surveillance, if you will. Two Agencies What I propose is to use a Constitutional amendment to create two agencies with authority to use surveillance technology. The Security Agency would have the sole purpose of preventing acts of terrorism. The Audit Agency would have the sole purpose of ensuring that the Security Agency stays within its boundaries. It is important to keep the two agencies separate. They must not report to the same boss. I would propose that the head of the Security Agency be appointed by the President, and that the head of the audit agency be appointed by the most senior Supreme Court justice who has not been appointed by the current President, with the Chief Justice treated as the most senior justice. Senate confirmation would be required for the head of each agency. Congress would have additional indirect oversight over the two agencies. Each agency would have a five-person oversight board, with members chosen for staggered ten-year terms. Selection of board members would alternate between the Senate majority leader and the House majority leader. The oversight boards would be required to give annual reports to Congress on the effectiveness of each agency. The oversight board for each agency would have the power to fire the head of that agency. The Security Agency's mission would be limited to preventing terrorism, and any change of mission would require a Constitutional amendment. No one employed by the Security Agency would be permitted to use surveillance for personal purposes, for political espionage, or for dealing with any crime or threat other than terrorism. To take an extreme case, even if someone were stalking your daughter and threatening to rape and murder her, you could not use access to surveillance information to try and stop it. Penalty for improper use of surveillance technology would be a long prison term. The Audit Agency's mission would be to make sure that the Security Agency sticks to the rules. The Audit Agency would evaluate the Security Agency's internal policies, procedures, and controls to make sure that they are sufficiently strong to prevent abuse. The Audit Agency would be given irrevocable, 24-hour access to the employees, computers, and records of the Security Agency. The Audit Agency could set any requirements it chose for the Security Agency to provide copies of emails, transcripts of meetings, and so forth. However, the Audit Agency employees would be held liable for any breach of security or privacy that they might commit. Incidentally, I am not presuming that surveillance of ordinary citizens would be common. Instead, radio technology and wireless networks might be used to track movement of materials, such as chemicals that could be used to make a bomb. Cameras and sensors might report unusual activity in biological or chemical laboratories. Some individuals identified as high risk, based on behavioral profiles, would be monitored. In order to create the risk profiles, to know whom to watch and whom to leave alone, the Security Agency would need to maintain a database with information on everyone. However, the agency would be required to have policies and procedures that prevent the database from being abused. The auditing of the processes surrounding such databases would be very intense and thorough. In order to undertake surveillance of ordinary citizens, the Security Agency would have to show that this is necessary and cost-effective. They would have to convince the Audit Agency of this. I am thinking that the head of the Audit Agency would have a very strong libertarian bent -- someone as passionate as the ACLU about freedom of speech. Such sentiments would be welcome in the head of the Security Agency, too, for that matter. Not the FBI I would rather this country's surveillance practices be debated up front and governed by a Constitutional process than have them evolve out of existing institutions and practices. What I do not want to see is increased surveillance as conducted by our legacy law enforcement agencies, such as the FBI. The FBI's unfavorable track record includes: A lot of experience with trying to obtain convictions of drug dealers, as opposed to preventing terrorism A history of resistance to external oversight and criticism A predilection to push for maximal surveillance authority Instead, I want to see a brand new agency, unhampered by the FBI's institutional baggage. There are experts on terrorism in the Bureau who might be hired by the new agency, but only if they do not bring the FBI culture with them.

Hmm I sent you two! Maybe email was messed up. Looks like a gorgeous route.

Gosh Darnit RumR you never answered my email about Da Kine!

When I first read J-B’s link to a Fisk report I thought why bother reply he always reads this biased crap. For example look at both the Independent's and the Guardian’s coverage of the Israeli incursion into Jenin. I mention this because I posted many links on CC.com regarding the incredibly inaccurate reporting of this incident by these two outlets. Fisk himself is unbelievably biased for example he has called Arab men “Eagles and Lions” compared the Arab women to “Madonnas" of renaissance artists. Hardly unbiased reporting. Of course his evident bias notwithstanding his grasp of the facts is equally suspect. Here are two examples. 1 ) He blamed the 1994 bombing of Israel’s London embassy on a mysterious “Israeli agent,” exonerating the Palestinians who were tried and convicted by British courts. 2) An April 17, 1996 report on Israel’s Grapes of Wrath campaign against Hizbullah. Visiting a power station supposedly left a “smouldering wreckage” by an Israeli air strike, Fisk reported that Lebanon’s power supply had been “cut by up to a third for the next 18 months.” Israel’s targeting was so devastatingly accurate, Fisk claimed, because in 1982 prescient Israeli soldiers stole “all the plans and maps of the transformer lines and switching systems.” Another reporter, however, no less unfriendly to Israel than Fisk, revealed that the power outage “was actually a result of a deliberate switch-off by the government. This tricked the Israelis into calling off further attacks …. Power was switched back on in full as soon as the cease-fire ‘understanding’ was reached ….” (Godfrey Jansen, MEI, May 10, 1996) Andrew Sullivan (Andrew Sullivan.com) regularly mocks his biased reporting as well. Of course J_B will respond that I am attacking the man rather than his argument. I say in order to judge the argument you must know the man. Fisk himself has been very aggressive in his attacks on other reporters. Here from an interview in the Progressive is a nice statement judging the American press: "American journalists, whether they be on television or in the press, are very frightened of writing a report which is going to make Israel -- or, more important, Israel's supporters in the United States -- unhappy. If you dare to criticize Israel's policies or their actions... you will inevitably get the claim that you must be racist, anti-Semitic, and that is intended to shut you up." Cheers, PP

Principled Positions Held By John Kerry