Month: January 2017

The inauguration of the Trumpenfuhrer has prompted fresh outpourings of grief from my Facebook friends. What could be worse than “Orange McFuckface” in the White House, a man “so corrupt that his mere presence on the national stage inspires people to hate crimes and harassment, and whose narcissism prevents him from seeing the stakes he’s playing with: our republic, global stability, and the climate”? (typical quote)

How about being diagnosed with ALS at age 34? Amazon is currently streaming Gleason, based primarily on a video journal that Steve Gleason started for his unborn son in case the child never got a chance to know him. If you weren’t previously impressed by the determination of professional football players, you will be by the time you finish this movie.

Grousing about the challenges of daily life with an adult partner? (But never on Facebook! Plenty of complaints about King Donald I but I’ve never seen anyone complain about laundry left on the floor in the domestic environment.) Check out what Michel Rae Varisco signs up for (given Louisiana’s no-fault divorce system, she could have walked away, with most of the cash, on any day that the marriage was no longer convenient for her).

How about practical inspiration for those of us without a terminal disease? We can turn the camera around from time to time. When our kids are adults they’ll be able to see and hear us. We can write some autobiographical material that will help adult children understand their roots even if we’re not around when they happen to get curious.

Full post, including comments

American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant covers the Civil War extensively. As I’m not a Civil War scholar, however, and it is a big and familiar subject, I’m not going to say too much about it except the book is worth reading.

According to the author, contrary to what his political opponents said during his lifetime, Grant was not a drunk. He may have overindulged in booze while stationed at a lonely Oregon outpost before the Civil War. This possibly led to his resigning from the Army. There then followed a period of failed efforts at making money in the private sector, which might have driven Grant to drink but did not. Once back in the Army and while serving as President, he was abstemious by the standards of the day.

As during other wars, it was hard to suppress Americans’ commercial spirit:

Northern Illicit Trade for cotton angered Grant. By the Civil War, cotton had become the indispensable lifeblood of the Southern agriculture that grew it and the Northern manufacturing that processed it. Cotton was to the nineteenth century what oil would become to the twentieth century. Union coastal and river blockades were put in place to deprive the South of necessary staples, but Northern businessmen were more than willing to break the blockades in order to exchange all manner of goods covertly for Southern cotton. The problem, as Grant observed in Memphis, was that Northern goods did not go just to sustain civilians, but to supply the Confederate army. As Sherman wrote Grant, “We cannot carry on war & trade with a people at the same time.

War could be chaotic and inglorious then as now:

The Second Corps, which had been commanded by Stonewall Jackson—who was accidentally shot and killed by his own men at the Battle of Chancellorsville—was now led by Virginian Richard Ewell.

Abraham Lincoln is portrayed as a near-saint by the author, though my friends who didn’t go to K-12 here in the U.S. tend to think of him as a tyrant seeking to maximize power.

“Please read and answer this letter as though I was not President, but only a friend.” It was an intriguing opening to an unusual request Grant received that same month: “Without embarrassment to you, or detriment to the service,” could Grant find a place for twenty-two-year-old Robert Lincoln, a recent graduate of Harvard, on his staff? Although the letter did not mention Mary Lincoln, behind the request lay a family struggle involving a son who wanted to join other young men serving in the war, a mother who had already lost two sons and feared losing a third, and a father caught in the middle. Grant replied, “I will be most happy to have him in my Military family in the manner you propose.” He suggested the rank of captain. Unwilling to make the U.S. Treasury pay the bill, Lincoln bought his son his military outfit and equipment as well as a new horse.

Grant was gracious in victory:

As Grant started back to his headquarters, news of the surrender spread like wildfire. Spontaneous firing of salutes exploded everywhere, but Grant immediately sent an order to stop all such demonstrations. “The war is over; the rebels are our countrymen again.”

What did it cost to keep North America as home to three countries rather than four?

When the North and the South went to war, the United States population stood at barely more than thirty million. For that small nation, the accepted total of deaths in the Civil War stood at 620,000—360,000 from the North and 260,000 from the South—far and away the largest toll of any American war. Now, new research using digital census data from the nineteenth century has revealed that the acknowledged death total was far too low. It is now accepted that the Civil War cost the lives of nearly 750,000 men—20 percent higher than the original total

I do wonder if it was worth it. Slavery ended everywhere else at close to the same time, usually without bloodshed. Whenever I point out that Singapore is richer than the U.S. people are prone to say that it is due to them having a smaller population. Canadians seem happy. If being part of a population of more than 300 million is so great, why don’t the Canadians try to join up?

More: read American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant.

Full post, including comments

A forthcoming major motion picture: A Fistful of Dongles.

Plot: Clint Eastwood buys a Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 and wants to transfer some files from his old hard drive, in a USB 3.0 enclosure, only to discover that the machine lacks standard USB connectors.

Dialog:

• Joe: “Get three coffins ready.”
• Engineer: “It could be one millimeter thinner if we force consumers to use USB-C.”
• Joe: “My mistake. Four coffins…”

Related:

• A Fistful of Dollars

Full post, including comments

Your Thanksgiving devolved into a fight about Hillary’s foundation cashflow and Donald Trump’s statements about what women are willing to do for wealthy TV stars? It was a lot worse for the future General/President Grant. From American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant by Ronald White:

Ulysses and Julia seemed barely conscious of the internal tension beneath the surface of their happy wedding. She was the daughter of a slave owner. He was the son of an ardent antislavery father. Jesse and Hannah [Grant’s parents] decided not to attend the wedding.

Now that he was home, keeping his political views to himself, Ulysses planned to build a house, cultivate the land, and become a farmer. Julia’s father had given her sixty acres of uncleared land as a wedding present. With all his children married except Emma, Dent was eager to keep Julia nearby and offered help with equipment. The owner of more than twenty slaves, he gave his daughter three—Eliza, Julia Ann, and Dan—to serve as maid, cook, and houseboy. Ulysses spent a “pleasant” winter at White Haven, eager to begin farming in the spring. Ellen Dent orchestrated the delicate balancing act of providing hospitality for the joint household, but Colonel Dent did not hide his displeasure. All his other children had married well, yet Julia, his favorite, had married a man who at thirty-two seemed to have few prospects for success.

 

Full post, including comments

“U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination” (Reuters) says that “the technology company systematically paid its white, male employees more than other workers” and then “Oracle was far more likely to hire Asian applicants – particularly Indian people – for product development and technical roles than black, white or Hispanic job seekers.”

Does this make sense? Suppose that Larry Ellison wants to run a club where white guys can talk about their college frat days and steals from shareholders by overpaying these guys. But at the same time he tries to avoid hiring any more white guys to join the backslapping and beer pong club? Going forward, he prefers to hire Indians?

For all of this to be true, doesn’t the company need to have multiple personality disorder? It doesn’t care about profit for existing workers so it just ladles out way more cash than it needs to, as long as the worker is a white male. When it comes to new workers, though, the company would much rather hire an Indian applicant than a white applicant because the white applicant would cost more (see above).

Readers: Can anyone explain how both allegations could be simultaneously true?

Full post, including comments

From American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant by Ronald White…

Before the conflict in Texas erupted, Mexicans regarded the United States highly. Many politicians wished to emulate American democratic institutions. But Americans did not appreciate how much more difficult and complex Mexico’s path to becoming a nation was as it sought to shed the bonds of imperial Spain. From the Mexican perspective, America’s determination to tear Texas from Mexico initiated generations of distrust.

These letters [to Julia, his future wife, in 1846] reveal his observant, artistic eye. While some soldiers wrote home disparagingly of Mexico, he marveled about Monterrey: “This is the most beautiful spot that it has been my fortune to see in this world.” With feeling, he described the “beautiful city enclosed on three sides by the mountains with a pass through them to the right and to the left.

Grant would come to believe the Mexican War was unjust—a large nation attacking a small nation—but he had high praise for the American army. “The men engaged in the Mexican War were brave, and the officers of the regular army, from highest to lowest, were educated in their profession,” he declared. “A more efficient army for its number and armament I do not believe ever fought a battle.”

The Mexican War of 1846–1848, largely forgotten today, was the second costliest war in American history in terms of the percentage of soldiers who died. Of the 78,718 American soldiers who served, 13,283 died, constituting a casualty rate of 16.87 percent. By comparison, the casualty rate was 2.5 percent in World War I and World War II, 0.1 percent in Korea and Vietnam, and 21 percent for the Civil War. Of the casualties, 11,562 died of illness, disease, and accidents. Thirty-nine men Grant had known at West Point died. Four members of his 1843 class lost their lives.

What did we get as a reward for our aggression?

On February 2, 1848, Trist concluded a peace treaty that the commissioners signed at Guadalupe Hidalgo. The Senate ratified it on March 10, confirming American claims to Texas and setting the boundary at the Rio Grande. The Mexican government ceded to the United States New Mexico and Upper California, which included present-day Arizona and New Mexico, as well as parts of Nevada, Utah, and Colorado. In exchange, the United States paid Mexico $15 million and assumed claims against Mexico by United States citizens. The Mexican Congress ratified the treaty on May 25. United States troops began leaving Mexico five days later.

After the Civil War and the Presidency, it was time to think about commerce with Mexico:

Traveling with friend and diplomat Matías Romero, Grant became convinced that investment of foreign capital would “put the people on their feet” so that “Mexico would become a rich country, a good neighbor, and the two Republics would profit by contact.

Think that the debate over the pros ad cons of NAFTA and free trade with Mexico are new?

Knowing of Grant’s interest in Mexico, in early 1882 Chester Arthur—president of the United States since the death of James Garfield by an assassin’s bullet in September 1881—invited Grant to become U.S. commissioner to draw up a commercial treaty with Mexico. Mexico appointed Matías Romero as one of its two commissioners. The commissioners quickly agreed on terms of a free trade treaty that would remove tariffs on U.S. and Mexican products. The treaty of reciprocity was signed on January 20, 1883, but needed to be approved by the senates of both countries. The treaty was defeated in both countries.

In the United States, protectionists decried the free trade provisions. Some in the United States and Mexico charged that Grant and Romero were involved primarily for their own pecuniary gain.

More: read American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant

Full post, including comments

“Federal Debt Projected to Grow by $8.6 Trillion Over Next Decade” (nytimes) describes the basic economic situation with which Trump is faced. If the economy meets Congress’s rosy growth projections, which seems unlikely given that a rising minimum wage will reduce labor force participation (see Puerto Rico), the government will spend 3.8 percent of GDP over and over any tax revenues received. (The article is unintentionally humorous:

Despite the swelling deficit, the report describes an economy that is currently on “solid ground,” with increasing output and job growth on the immediate horizon.

How can an economy that has to spend more than it generates, borrowing from a hoped-for brighter future, be considered on “solid ground”?)

Given that members of Congress are addicted to being reelected and Americans are addicted to showers of cash (SSDI, SSI, Social Security, food stamps, etc.) and what they perceive as free services (Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare subsidies) from Washington, what can Trump do as a practical matter? Every federal spending program is popular. Even Reagan wasn’t able to persuade Congress to cut anything substantial (which is why there were big deficits back then; Congress heeded his call to cut taxes, but ignored the calls to cut spending).

If we could grow our way to a Singapore level of per-capita GDP (50 percent higher than U.S.) then all of our fiscal dreams could come true. But Singapore seems to have done that by (1) running an effective public school system, and (2) not having a substantial welfare system (mostly an earned income tax credit-style system in which people whose market-clearing wage is low get a boost, but, unless they’re disabled, they do need to work). Public schools are beyond federal control and the U.S. welfare state has grown more or less continuously since the 1960s.

Full post, including comments

“Trump Abandons Trans-Pacific Partnership, Obama’s Signature Trade Deal” (nytimes) says that the Trumpenfuhrer has done what both Hillary and Bernie suggested. The 5,000-page TPP is dead.

Given our heavy debt from pensions, bonds, etc., (at least five years of GDP) my method of evaluating the TPP would be whether or not it could have been expected to lead to per-capita GDP growth (obviously there would be winners and losers, but at least with growth there is a chance for the gain to be larger than the pain).

As an Econ 101 graduate I was vaguely in favor of this deal, though I admit that I didn’t read any of the 5,000 pages. Should I be sad or glad that it is dead?

Full post, including comments

What happens after boy meets girl at a meeting of the Collaboration of Male Peer Educators Against Sexual Assault and Stereotypes (COMPASS)? The Michigan State University group’s mission:

We seek to educate our community, and particularly men, about sexual assault and how to prevent it, teach men how to interact with and assist survivors of sexual assault, support campus or community organizations and groups that seek to raise awareness about sexual violence and how to prevent it, engage men in dialogue about how their status and privilege can be used to create positive change on both personal and community levels, and confront stereotypes surrounding men and issues of masculinity.

This question is answered in “An unwanted touch. Two lives in free fall. A dispatch from the drive to stop sexual assault on campus.” (Bridge, January 19, 2017):

They first met in 2013 through a campus group called Compass. Ironically, the group’s mission was to help men create a safer and more respectful campus, to support women students. The son of a Birmingham psychologist and psychiatrist, political progressives, Nathan saw himself as a political being, a person trying to do good in the world.

As with most people accused of crimes, the cisgender guy here was popular with his mom:

“He is a humanitarian. He’s the sensitive one. He’s the kind of guy you want dating your daughter. That’s the kind of person he is,” his mother, soft-spoken and weary-looking, told me. “You know, he conducted training in sexual harassment…” He was so proud of his involvement in Compass that he invited his mother to attend a couple of meetings with him.

Well, you can probably guess what happens next. Unusually for today’s college students (see Missoula, below), it seems that (kangaroo court) plaintiff and defendant were able to have sex without first consuming alcohol.

What makes this situation a great example of the Zeitgeist:

More than two years after the incident, even Melanie’s gender has changed. When 16 months later she reported what happened on the train tracks, Melanie had been taking male hormones for 12 weeks; she had legally changed her name, adopting a male identity. Her voice dropped; she shaved her facial hair. The woman referred to in this account as Melanie now hopes to surgically alter her gender in the future, and lives and dresses as a man.

(Thanks to German for letting me know about this article.)

Related:

• Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town (a.k.a. majoring in partying and football)
• “The Domestic Violence Parallel Track” (turning abuse allegations into cash)

Full post, including comments

First of a series of posts drawn from American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant by Ronald White.

First, the name. President Grant was born “Hiram Ulysses” in 1822 and changed his name to “Ulysses Simpson” upon entering West Point:

Ulysses went the next day to register. Having decided to reverse his first two names, he reported to the adjutant, presented his deposit of $48, and signed the register “Ulysses Hiram Grant.” By transposing his two names, he believed he could start afresh at West Point—no more HUG. To his surprise, his name was challenged. After checking the official list, the adjutant told the young man standing before him the records showed clearly that a Ulysses Simpson Grant from Ohio was to be enrolled in the entering class. Ulysses protested, unaware that Congressman Hamer had bungled his name. The adjutant informed Ulysses that any changes to his name would have to be approved by the secretary of war.

Grant grew up as one of six children. The idea of a government school hadn’t caught on yet:

Ulysses’s formal schooling began when he turned five. Education in small communities in the old Northwest merged public and private spheres: public in that it was open to all boys and girls in the community; private in that parents decided which of their children would attend, then provided a “subscription” to pay the teacher. Parents who had the money gave between $1 and $2 for a typical thirteen-week session; others paid in corn, wheat, or tobacco. Class sessions were usually conducted only in winter, when it was too cold for boys to be working outside on family farms.

The young Grant was an accurate shot, but wouldn’t kill animals. He loved horses and his parents let him do substantial solo drives.

Around this time, Jesse developed a delivery service. Capitalizing on his young son’s prowess with horses, the father became comfortable with “my Ulysses” transporting travelers in a small carriage to various destinations: the nearby river towns Ripley and Higginsport, where passengers could get an Ohio River steamer; inland to West Union; across the river twenty miles to Maysville in Kentucky; and fifty miles east to Cincinnati. Eleven-year-old Ulysses created quite a sensation when he arrived in Cincinnati and attempted to check into the Dennison House for an overnight stay. According to the story, the hotel manager was not sure what to make of the boy standing in front of him; finally, with reluctance, he let Ulysses sign the register and handed him a room key.

Some debates are never settled:

At [Grant’s] second meeting [of a school debate club], he took the winning affirmative side on “Resolved: That females wield greater influence than males.

(See Gender equity should be measured by consumption, not income? for example)

Grant’s father was a tanner:

… 1838, as Ulysses approached his seventeenth birthday, his father announced, “I reckon you are now old enough to go to work in the beam-house” in addition to his schooling. The most repulsive part of the tanning process took part in the beamhouse. Beamhouse derives from an ancient practice of hanging the hide over a curved log or table known as a “beam” for the arduous process of de-hairing. In the beamhouse, workers removed flesh and hair from raw hides, wielding long knives for this tough and unpleasant task. Ulysses responded, “Well, father, this tanning is not the kind of work I like. I’ll work at it here, though, if you wish me to, until I am one-and-twenty, but you may depend upon it, I’ll never work a day longer at it after that.” With these words, Ulysses voiced his generation’s fealty to a father’s wishes for a son but at the same time declared his determination to chart his own life path. Jesse replied, “My son, I don’t want you to work at it now, if you don’t like it, and don’t mean to stick to it. I want you to work at whatever you like and intend to follow. Now, what do you think you would like?” Ulysses responded, “I’d like to be a farmer, or a down-the-river trader, or get an education.

Mostly because it was free, the answer turned out to be West Point and then the Army:

West Point understood itself to be primarily an engineering school. During Grant’s four years at West Point, nearly 70 percent of his classes would be concentrated in engineering, mathematics, and science. In the curriculum before the Civil War, cadets studied military strategy for merely eight class periods in their final year. The liberal arts, especially the study of English and American literature, went missing in action. The heavy technical emphasis at West Point would be challenged from time to time, but Thayer and the superintendents who followed argued that mathematics and engineering promoted reasoning power.

He would complete his four years ranking twenty-first in a graduating class of thirty-nine students.

More: read American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant

Full post, including comments