nerdgirl

No disagreement with GEN Petreaus. His words are carefully chosen: "True irreconcilables." Estimates of al Qa'eda core range from 200-450 (sources: Marc Sagemann, Egyptian govt, and USG). As I noted, Mullah Omar is in most likely in Pakistan. Remember, it was GEN Petreaus who suggested negotiating with the Taliban ... something which I am still hesitant to support. It mostly comes down to what he means by "the Taliban." The danger of focusing in on *only* that line without context is that it misses much and suggests the kind of strategy that the Soviets pursued (how well did that work out?). The rest of the story, as they say: “It is, of course not just additional combat forces that are required. ISAF also needs more so-called enablers to support the effort in Afghanistan – more intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms and the connectivity to exploit the capabilities they bring; more military police, engineers, and logistics elements; additional special operations forces and civil affairs units;” “… a surge in civilian capacity is needed to match the increase in military forces in order to field adequate numbers of provincial reconstruction teams and other civilian elements – teams and personnel that are essential to help our Afghan partners expand their capabilities in key governmental areas, to support basic economic development, and to assist in the development of various important aspects of the rule of law, including initiatives to support the development of police and various judicial initiatives. “It is also essential, of course, that sufficient financial resources be provided for the effort in Afghanistan. It is hugely important that nations deliver on pledges of economic development assistance, that the Afghan National Army and Law and Order Trust Funds be fully financed, that support be maintained for the Afghan Reconstruction Trust Fund, and that resources continue to be provided for the projects conducted by our military units and PRTs at local levels. “Of course, just more troops, civilians, dollars and Euros won’t be enough. As students of history, we’re keenly aware that Afghanistan has, over the years, been known as the graveyard of empires. It is, after all, a country that has never taken kindly to outsiders bent on conquering it. We cannot take that history lightly. And our awareness of it should caution us to recognize that, while additional forces are essential, their effectiveness will depend on how they are employed, as that, in turn, will determine how they are seen by the Afghan population. [one part of that is strategic communications .... but it's much larger really] “First and foremost, our forces and those of our Afghan partners have to strive to secure and serve the population. We have to recognize that the Afghan people are the decisive ‘terrain.’ “Securing and serving the people requires that our forces be good neighbors. While it may be less culturally acceptable to live among the people in certain parts of Afghanistan than it was in Iraq, it is necessary to locate Afghan and ISAF forces where they can establish a persistent security presence. You can’t commute to work in the conduct of counterinsurgency operations. Positioning outposts and patrol bases, then, requires careful thought, consultation with local leaders, and the establishment of good local relationships to be effective.” (i.e., directly contradictory to Peters recommendations - nerdgirl) “Positioning near those we and our Afghan partners are helping to secure also enables us to understand the neighborhood. A nuanced appreciation of the local situation is essential. Leaders and troopers have to understand the tribal structures, the power brokers, the good guys and the bad guys, local cultures and history, and how systems are supposed to work and do work. This requires listening and being respectful of local elders and mullahs, and farmers and shopkeepers – and it also requires, of course, many cups of tea." Human terrain. The cups of tea is a direct reference to Greg Mortenson’s book and his efforts to build girl’s school in rural Afghanistan. “When Gen. Petraeus read Three Cups of Tea,” Mortenson says, “he sent me an e-mail with three bullet points of what he'd gleaned from the book: Build relationships, listen more, and have more humility and respect.” That’s same message GEN Petraeus understood is the strategic component that many others need to hear. All hard power gets you the Soviet experience in Afghanistan. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

A complete one - no. No, single individual has the solution. And anyone who asserts that he or she does should be met with extreme skepticism, imo. Afghanistan is too complicated. Gen Petraeus has outlined a strategy and there will be a more formal one that he will sign-off on; there were a whole lot of people behind what he's talking about. I have some pieces. See my other post today on Afghanistan. Support most of LG Barno's recommendations. A few other pieces: -- Pursue application of COIN theory and smart power (both hard power *and* Joe Nye's soft power ideas). -- Continue support of and enlarge the Army's Human Terrain System. -- Invest in and develop *real* capabilities in strategic communications: "Public relations was invented in the United States, yet we are miserable at communicating to the rest of the world what we are about as a society and a culture, about freedom and democracy, about our policies and our goals. It is just plain embarrassing that al Qaeda is better at communicating its message on the Internet than America." -- Develop and implement 21st century Cooperative Threat Reduction Programs. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Thanks for the CFR piece - printing out the on-line piece and will order Engineering Peace: The Military Role in Post-Conflict Reconstruction. My favorite PhD historian has addressed the “where is the civilian reconstruction” capacity issue: US foreign service/USAID was decimated capacity-wise since the 1980s, so responsibility has largely fallen to the military. 2004-2006 State's Office of Reconstruction hemorrhaged staff because of lack of political support and inter-agency tension. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Another perspective w/r/t Afghanistan was put forth by Ralph Peters, LTC USA (ret) in a USA Today Op-Ed Wednesday “The Mendacity of Hope.” Peters is a very smart man. Think his assessment at its core is generally not too far off. Completely concur that the exact same counterinsurgency tactics and strategy employed in Iraq will not transfer to Afghanistan. It’s his recommendations w/which I disagree. “The conflict in Afghanistan is the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. Instead of concentrating on the critical mission of keeping Islamist terrorists on the defensive, we've mired ourselves by attempting to modernize a society that doesn't want to be — and cannot be — transformed.” Afghanistan? Regardless of the current outcome, perhaps one might be able to make a better case for “the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time” and Islamist terrorists w/r/t the nation ~1000 miles to the West, eh? And urban Afghanistan did modernize in the 1970s. The assertion of “the society” not wanting to modernize is problematic. The Taliban and the forces that rose to power in the security vacuum of Soviet withdrawal want to force the society to return to 7th CE (as long as the leaders get to keep their sat phones). “In the absence of a strategy, we're doubling our troop commitment, hoping to repeat the success we achieved in the profoundly different environment of Iraq. Unable to describe our ultimate goals with any clarity, we're substituting means for ends. “Expending blood and treasure blindly in Afghanistan, we do our best to shut our eyes to the worsening crisis next door in Pakistan, a radicalizing Muslim state with more than five times the population and a nuclear arsenal. We've turned the hose on the doghouse while letting the mansion burn.” Concur with the need for a strategy and mission in Afghanistan. There’s been a call for such over the last 3 years or so. Concur that the exact same strategy will not work. “Even if we achieved the impossible dream of creating a functioning, unified state in Afghanistan, it would have little effect on the layered crises in the Muslim world. Backward and isolated, Afghanistan is sui generis (only example of its kind).” To some extent that characterization (sui generis) is true. Just like snowflakes, every insurgency is unique. Otoh, one can look to Al Qa’eda in Maghreb or Abu Sayeff Group or Moro Islamic Liberation Front (the other MILF) in southeast Asia for other unique radical Islamist insurgencies. “Instead of floundering in search of a strategy, we should consider removing the bulk, if not all, of our forces. The alternative is to hope blindly, waste more lives and resources, and, in the worst case, see our vulnerable supply route through Pakistan cut, forcing upon our troops the most ignominious retreat since Korea in 1950 (a massive air evacuation this time around, leaving a wealth of military gear). Disagree with Peter’s recommendation. His first recommendation, which he calls "best" is a neutered version of what the US has been doing and what he calls a "good" course of action is "Leave entirely." “In any event, Pakistan, not Afghanistan, will determine the future of Islamist extremism in the region. And Pakistan is nearly lost to us — a fact we must accept. Our strategic future lies with India. Considering that the Taliban now controls Pakistan’s Swat Valley, which is 100 miles from Islamabad and a major weekend/vacation destination for Pakistani military/civilian leaders (somewhat akin to Tahoe for SF Bay area, but closer and more topographically impressive among other major differences), Peters is correct in highlighting the extent of radical Islamist presence in Pakistan. Again his implicit recommendation is where he and I differ. One self-identified conservative military blogger, "The Captain" offered one explanations for Peters recommendations: "I have concluded that Ralph has been smoking pot, or hash. I’m certain of it. Certain. Not any pot, mind you, but some bad, bad weed." Disagree with that ad hominem assessment as well. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Interesting and insightful (imo) comments released yesterday from LG Barno, USA (ret), who testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday. Agree with some … less sanguine about other aspects. From LG Barno’s written testimony submitted:“First, the Afghan people are the center of gravity of all efforts. This fundamental understanding must underpin and influence every aspect of a new approach in Afghanistan. Securing the population entails more than simply protection from the Taliban: success requires the Afghan people to have confidence in their personal security, health and education, access to resources, governance and economic future – a broad “human security” portfolio. The Afghan people, down to the local level, are the ultimate arbiters of success in Afghanistan. On the other hand, international civil and military activities that alienate the Afghan people, offend their cultural sensibilities, or further separate them from their government are doomed to fail. Nurturing the reasonable hope and cautious optimism of the Afghan people in a better future is the sine qua non of our collective success in Afghanistan.” I.e., just ‘killing terrorists’ – nevermind, the problem of exactly how one disaggregates “terrorists” from civilians or scared/stupid/brainwashed folks induced into Taliban is less than clear – ain’t gonna work. Mullah Omar is most likely in Quetta (southern Pakistan) these days anyway. “Second, creating actual unity of effort within the civil and military spheres is essential -- and ultimately integrating the two. Countless dollars and tens of thousands of troops have been committed to Afghanistan over the past eight years, but a sober assessment would conclude that the whole has totaled far less than the sum of the parts. The enemy seeks to disrupt our unity of effort; we have given him many of the tools to do so. Only by dramatically improving the coherence of the military effort and by connecting it to the civil reconstruction, governance and development effort will effective progress be made. The civil dimension of the enterprise has been even more fragmented than the disjointed military effort.” I.e., purely military solutions will not work (one can quote SecDef Gates there too). And the USAID, State’s CRC, etc need to get in gear as well. The US still doesn’t do the |R| of SSTR well. “Third, simultaneous bottom-up and top-down action is required. The recurrent debate between strengthening the central government versus strengthening capacity at the local level must be ended. Afghanistan requires both a capable national government in Kabul and effective, legitimate local institutions at province, district and village level. Models for this relationship exist in Afghan history over the centuries, most recently in the 1960s and early 1970s. Action in this realm must be two-pronged: Kabul and the central government as the ‘top-down’ focus of the Kabul-based international community; and province and district level ‘bottoms-up’ action, enabled (and sometimes led) by military efforts.” I’m less sure history supports LG Barno’s assertions here. He outlines a timeline through minimally 2025 of US and NATO military and civilian involvement in Afghanistan. He also notes the importance of Pakistan. One factor that I’m coming to the conclusion must also be addressed if Afghanistan is not going to return to a failed/failing-state for radical Salafist haven is the simmering Kashmir conflict between India and Pakistan, i.e., see Steve Coll’s latest in The New Yorker “The Back Channel.” Grand chessboard, eh? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

The "magic wand" metaphor reminds me of another one invoked by Friedman and the Chicago Boys: the "invisible hand" as part of neo-liberal economics. Actually the invisible hand was coined by Adam Smith in "The Wealth of Nations." I know that.

Suspect there is some fair bit of wisdom in what you write. The wisdom that is often (but not unilaterally, e.g, see Andrew Bacevich and Fareed Zakaria) difficult to see from inside the metaphorical fishbowl (one that's ~9.6km^2). Need the 'anthropologist' perspective who is not a member of 'our' group. It's a globalized world out there. The places that aren't engaging the globalized world (Somalia, Zimbabwe, Myanmar) are not models to emulate, imo. We are both responsible for our success and not-so-success ... and responsible in large part for the other parts of the world rising in capacity and prosperity (e.g., see Pres Truman's inaugral address, foreign aid, and the Dow). /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

On what operational or knowledge basis do you dispute and contradict those operators & operator-interogators? Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

The "magic wand" metaphor reminds me of another one invoked by Friedman and the Chicago Boys: the "invisible hand" as part of neo-liberal economics. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Thanks for clarifying that! A lot of my favorite people are Republicans ... some even pretty far-right wing ones. And I suspect, if such came to pass, I would have to join an American version of the French resistance ... or maybe the Norwegian resistance: Operation Gunnerside took out the German heavy water plant. Very important. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

It's a tenet of Keynesian economics to stimulate growth during economic stagnation, recession, or depression. A couple good references: Paul Krugman on 'There's Something About Macro' and "Keynesian Economics" from the Concise Encylcopedia of Economics. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

It’s not about *me*. Never has been. That’s the point. I’ve never invoked ‘me’ as reference (altho’ I will be speaking at the Capitol for the first time next week … but not about radical Salafists directly). It’s the direct words and experience of The USAF officer who led the intelligence and interrogation operations that led to finding and killing al Zarqawi. GEN Colin Powell, USA (ret) Senator John McCain FBI Special Agent Jack Cloonan, who averted a real-ticking time bombing situation with a radical Islamist terrorists FBI Special Dennis Formel, who obtained the identity of Ramzi bin al Shibh (the “20th hijacker”) LTC James Corum, USA (ret), military intelligence, he also was part of the Coalition Military Assistance and Training Team in Iraq in 2003 & 2004 Bob Baer, retired CIA operative David Becker, DIA Brian Boetig, FBI Michael Kremlacek USA Intelligence Robert McFadden, former CIFA (it was a DoD field intelligence agency) C.A. Morgan III, Intelligence Technology Innovation Center (aka ITIC, part of CIA, unless they’re ‘officially’ ODNI now) Kenneth Rollins, Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (another DoD agency) Scott Shumate, former CIFA Andre Simons, FBI the Marine Corps Interrogator Translator Other than Sen John McCain (recently) & Morgan those guys are all operators and/or interrogators. Like any model, strategy needs accurate data to generate accurate results. The alternative model for developing strategy is the one Doug Feith used, which ties well with your Tom Piras reference. Since you assert authority, on what operational basis do you dispute them? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

How is what is being proposed different from the terms of the SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) that went into effect 1Jan2009? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Responding as if you asked a real question. No, as there were no Congressional additions (“earmarks”) in the Stimulus Bill, going to your senator or Congressional Representative will not be effective for accessing the money released this year. Even if (for notional discussion) there were “earmarks” in the signed bill, those earmarks would have intended recipients. Congressional additions (“earmarks”) are things that the President does *not* request for the Executive agencies. I described some of the other differences here yesterday. If you are starting a new business, one route is through SBIR & STTR funds through NSF, DOE Office of Basic Sciences, or DoD. SBIR & STTR funds are based on a percentage (by Congressional law) of money a department or agency receives; so those that received more money for other things will also have more SBIR & STTR funds available. Don’t overlook money from your own State; all States have economic development offices, etc. I have not gone through the stimulus bill comparing it with R-forms (what the Executive branches send to Congress detailing past & intended expenditures on their programs) to know which are established acquisition programs and which are new programs (“ufers” in DoD-speak). If you identify a program – FedBizOpps.gov is the place to start looking for current business opprtunities. Established programs will have POCs or Program Managers who you can call or email to find out if your business plan/idea/product is appropriate. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Love the name!

I haven't heard about that potential explanation. Do you have something more on which one can read about that? That is one component factor -- an independent variable that exacerbated not solely causative -- that Stiglitz (& other have cited) that I've referenced a few times as *part* of the explanation (including in my "unrelated rant," aka post#8 of this thread). Perhaps. I suspect that the asset price bubble is an independent causative factor of the mortgage crisis. Do strongly concur that efforts to try to find a single "sole reason" are likely to be problematic and ineffectual because that does not address systematic and global changes that have occurred in the last 35 years. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

How was anything I wrote either “unrelated” or a “rant”? I asked for clarification w/r/t what sounded like an assertion that a 1999 NY Times article implied causality, i.e., “triggered.” I replied that it _did_ suggest something to be investigated, but that it didn’t demonstrate causality. Rather than just replying with a dismissive one-line response, 6 other NY Times articles that also suggest something to be investigated as other possible causative explanations or independent variables were presented. Again returning back to the original assertion, a test case for the causal assertion in the original post that subsequently endorsed by other was proposed: if the causative explanation offered was the independent variable (or as I wrote, any action by the Republican party either), similar mortgage crises should not be observed in other nation-states. It's also context. Unless one wants to make the case that the US Democratic party of the 1990s control/influence the entire world housing market and all world governments and regulatory practices, that’s a test case directly related to the original post. It’s an application of logic to a hypothesis. Constructively, I also offered alternative explanations that suggest multiple independent variables, including one by Alan Greenspan. The OP has indicated he would like "intellectual conversation;" that does not necessarily correspond to mealy-mouth acquiescence or virtual 'high-fiving.' How was any of that specifically, generally, or tangentially unrelated to the OP or other posts in the thread? If you can't refute the argument, it's not my fault ... or are you invoking a strawman ad hominem? Questions that are difficult or challenging to your opinion does not make either the questions or the questioner 'wrong,' nor does it make it an "unrelated rant." How do you rationalize asserting that I made an “unrelated rant” after you’ve written multiple posts responding with “Where do you jump?” or making pejorative comments about my username? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

What difference does that make? It may have happened in other nation-states. It might not have. Scott - Are you genuinely asking a question that you want a response, being rhetorical, or are you trolling? Previously I would have, as usual, functioned under the assumption of the first. A pointed but a real question. Over the last month or so, the dialogue here has rapidly degraded, with the downward trend accelerating in the last 10 days. So I don’t know anymore whether you’re actually asking or question or just trolling /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

That's fine, imo. Hopefully each time a few more folks learn a little more and the story gets a little fuller – because it is very complicated. I've learned from folks here. And there does seem to be some forward progress, e.g., the fewer folks asserting simplistic “blame the CRA” hypotheses. “Triggered” – do you mean to imply some casual factor? Maybe it did" … I suspect it was a dependent not an independent variable, tho'. The article you posted does suggest something worth investigating. It doesn’t prove causality (“smoking gun”). If one wants to point to NY Times articles that might prompt other investigations into correlations and causalities for the mortgage crisis one might look to increase in McMansion’s, this one on accounting mismanagement by executives at an insurance corporation, this one on deregulation and collapse of large energy corporations as indicative of corporate malfeasance, this one from 1995 on derivatives and lack of regulation, this one from 2005 on risks of derivatives still not being adequately addressed, or this one from 1988 on securitization of consumer loans. If Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are to blame for the “current economic condition,” there is one test that one can do: those are American institutions; have similar housing bubbles and subsequent mortgage default crises been observed in other nation-states? If no, that would support the hypothesis that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were independent variables (something causal) in the economic crisis. If yes, it suggests that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were responding/pressured/changed/adjusted in response to some other variable in the larger system. Mortgage turmoil spread through Europe to South America, particularly Brazil, and to Russia. Does anyone want to argue that Putin created a housing program for poor, minority people? Altho’ *he* has tried to blame the US : “it is the U.S. banks’ careless policy as well as the U.S. Congressmen unwillingness to undertake measures to rectify the situation that is to be blamed for it [Russia's financial crisis]” … If it’s all the Democrats fault (or the Republicans for that matter), how is Iceland’s meltdown explained? In addition to the less than complete but much better than most descriptions depicted in the video I posted over the weekend: Credit Crisis Visualized, the 3 most complete and causal explanations have been from Stiglitz (Nobel prize winning economist), Greenspan (on the challenges of regulating risk), and a Kansas City MO columnist (on the asset price bubble), imo. Would love to pull those apart more … but I have a couple North Koreans to meet with on nuclear issues (along w/folks from US State).

If the comparison is with China, an obvious difference is that China is much much quicker to execute, with Amnesty Intl estimating just under 10,000 executions per year. Meanwhile, California hasn't executed a single person in 3 years because anti death penalty judges have ruled even lethal injection to be a cruel form of punishment. It’s a list of #1, #2, and #3 by absolute number of prisoners (to 2 sig figs for USA and PRC). My first guess was that 10k executions, which I find to be a credible estimation, would be lost in sig figs (3) compared to populations. It’s not quite by my calculation but nearly. Of course, every one is significant for those executed and their families. When the number of prisoners is normalized by incarceration rates (to take into account 1.31B versus 296M populations of China & USA, respectively), China would have had to execute 8.27M prisoners a year (rather than 10k) to match the US incarceration rate. China has 1.55M prisoners at an incarceration rate of 118 prisoners per 100k people. Adjusting China's prison population to match the US incarceration rate (738 prisoners per 100k people, per US Bureau of Justice statistics, part of DOJ) corresponds to 9.82M Chinese prisoners. 9.82M prisoners – 10k prisoners executed – 1.55M current prisoners =’s 8.26M prisoners less by rate including the executed ones (per AI's estimate). Now those are just the numbers ... and I encourage someone to double-check my math; I just back-of-the-enveloped it. And to be explicit, which I'm confident you and a good number of folks realize … but am concerned some might not …, that does not mean anything w/r/t causality. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

It was full of pork, not earmarks. Many consider the distinction unimportant, but it makes the statement true, or as as true as any propaganda coming from the White House for the past several residents. I would argue that the distinction is very important. From an Executive agency execution and oversight perspective the difference is tremendously large. Programs (whether 'pork' or justifiable - the difference largely seems to come down to how close it gets to one's own interests) are subject to federal acquisition regulations (FAR), competitive award (usually), and oversight. Folks who are recipients of funds that are not Congressional additions can have that money pulled back (in extreme situations) or be terminated. The Executive Agencies *really* do not like earmarks --> they don’t fit into planned programs, they take time (time =’s $) to administer, and they distract from the what they're supposed to be doing. Some earmark recipients (pure ‘guestimate’ ~40%) are interested in working with the agencies; others just want their $$$. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

For me, & I own this very much as reflective of my own religious & spiritual beliefs: yes, such a discovery would change them. But not in a negative or normatively 'bad' way. I hope we're not alone in the Universe. Based on probability & science, like others who've responded, I suspect there are other life forms in the Universe; at what level of development is another issue, as well as if they might be based on Silicon or Boron. 3 base pairs ... or 6? Or a completely different system? Suspect the probability of single- or simple multi-cellular life forms to be reasonably high. The probablility of more complex is more complicated. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Hmmmm, a survey of Speakers Corner participants exploring correlations between polite behavior and gun ownership. Number & frequency of warnings or bannings might serve as a stand-in metric for "politeness." Any speculations on what that correlation would look like? One might be hard-pressed to argue that posters in Speakers Corner are indicative of the wider population, tho' ... If one compares 3 nation-states: Netherlands, Norway, & USA (see Table 2): Households w/firearms: 1.9%, 32.0%, & 41.0% Gun homicides per 1M: 2.7, 3.6, & 62.4. There is a huge disparity btw Netherlands and Norway w/r/t gun possession but the homicides rate are close (if not w/in statistical variance by year; data not given), which strongly suggests presence or absence of guns is not the sole variable w/r/t homicide rate. Norway is a comparatively homogenous state (ethnically, religiously, and economically & beautiful from an out-of-doors perspective!) That may suggest acase for the argument that it’s cultural issues, i.e., homogeneous culture may correlate to lower violence … & the gun ownership is unrelated. It's a lot easier to count dead bodies and count guns than measure culture. Need some data that reflects other non-gun-related crime and some way to control for the relatively larger heterogeneity in Netherlands, which has a substantial young, non-integrating minority of Northern African and other Muslims (I think it’s close to 10% ....). I remain curious as whether there is a correlation between civil/human rights and gun/private armament rights in the US? We know places like China have very low civil/human rights and no private gun ownership. OTOH, Norway has fairly high percentage (32%) of households having guns as well as extensive civil & human rights. Totally acknowledge that’s speculation on my part. In what situations are high rates of private gun ownership observed? (1) wealthy countries or (2) countries with recent, intense violent conflicts. The former is the case for US & western Europe; the latter reflects the situations in places like Angola and Columbia. See page 21 this report for a graph showing the range of GDPs and correlation with per capita civilian gun ownership. The authors discuss where that model breaks down, which it does. Where does gun ownership intersect with gun violence? My hypothesis is that there will not be a direct dependency found, i.e., crime levels and extent of gun ownership are independent variables, i.e., not causation. One known physiological link (correlation … possible causation) has been found for increase in violent crime: lead poisoning in US cities in the late 1970s & 1980s and with the accompanying decrease in crime in the 1990s as exposure to lead has decreased (via elimination of lead in gasoline & paint). Lead … not gun availability or gun control. Is that likely to be the only factor? No. Very, very rarely (if ever) are there single independent variable explanations for observed social phenomena, of which incidence of crime is an example. And this is contrasted with violence levels in the UK, which did not beginning eliminating lead until the mid-1980s and early 1990s and saw increase in violent crime in the 1990s. Popular press accounts and links to primary data here. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

You bring up, perhaps inadvertantly ... perhaps not, a related issue: relative incarceration rates. Why is it that the US has less than 5 percent of the world's population. But it has almost a quarter of the world's prisoners? [url http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/law/research/icps/worldbrief/wpb_stats.php?area=all&category=wb_poptotal]Absolute number of prisoners by nation-state: USA 2.3M China 1.6M Russia 0.9M Comparative incarceration rates: USA 737 per 100,000 people Russia's 611 per 100,000 St. Kitts and Nevis' 547 per 100,000 (that's adjusted, as they don't have a population of 100,000) Perhaps we enforce laws better? Perhaps we have better trained and rewarded monetarily lawyers as prosecutors than most nation-states, i.e., we have a cultural value that considers enforcement of criminal law important therefore reward those who prosecute? (How much do we pay our police officers, tho'?) Are we more restrictive and creating more laws that one could break? Do we just have more law breakers? One hypothesis put forward by Dave Grossman is that it's due to exposure to television and video game violence: "Trained to Kill: Are We Conditioning Our Children to Commit Murder?" (Btw, that's the same Dave Grossman, Lt Col USA (ret) that popularized the sheepdog/sheep/wolf metaphor.) He presents a mix of intellectually provocative ideas; rhetoric, including self-reinforcing rhetoric; and pseudo-science, im-ever-ho, but he does ask interesting questions. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

“Well-documented” by whom? Various studies show that mandatory sentencing does not have a significant deterrent effect on crime. “Many [studies] show no change in deterrent effect. Those that purport to show a deterrent effect commonly have persuasive non-deterrence explanations, such as a change in incapacitative effect. The few studies that segregate deterrent and incapacitative effects tend to reinforce the conclusion that rule formulation has a deterrent effect only in those unusual situations in which the preconditions to deterrence exist. Even there, the deterrent effects are quite minor and unpredictable, hence inadequate grounds to influence criminal law rule making.” "We find no evidence that imprisonment reduces the likelihood of recidivism. Instead, we find compelling evidence that offenders who are sentenced to prison have higher rates of recidivism and recidivate more quickly than do offenders placed on probation." Incapacitation has more effect -- relatively --than harsher criminal sentences. But ... "The Lethal Effects of Three-Strikes Laws"Three-strikes laws provide very long prison terms for certain criminals with prior convictions of serious violent crimes. It is likely that the laws increase homicides because a few criminals, fearing the enhanced penalties, murder victims and witnesses to limit resistance and identification. With a state-level multiple-time-series design, we find that the [Three Strikes] laws are associated with 10–12 percent more homicides in the short run and 23–29 percent in the long run. The impact occurs in almost all 24 states with three-strikes laws. Furthermore, there is little evidence that the laws have any compensating crime reduction impact through deterrence or incapacitation. How well has harsher sentencing worked in deterring illegal drug use, ilegal drug sale, or illegal drug distribution? There’s a wealth of data to mine. Don’t worry – we all know: you don’t care. It’s hard to have a dialogue with you when you’ve acknowledged you don’t/won’t respond constructively or relevently. The information is available for those who want it. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying