“Sen. Lisa Murkowski took her battle with the Environmental Protection Agency to the floor of the Senate today, saying she was left with no choice but to fight a federal agency she believes is “contemplating regulations that will destroy jobs while millions of Americans are doing everything they can just to find one.” The Alaska Republican announced she would seek to keep the EPA from drawing up rules on greenhouse gas emissions from large emitters, such as power plants, refineries and manufacturers. Murkowski did it by filing a “disapproval resolution,” a rarely used procedural move that prohibits rules written by executive branch agencies from taking effect.”
Also this week Jeff Id has continued his analysis of the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN) temperature data. It can be found here: http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/long-record-ghcn-analysis/ One quote from the article is: “What this shows is that on average the adjustment process more than quadrupled the trend in raw temperatures, increasing the trend of the mean from 0.0113 for raw data to 0.0536.”
Which leaves us the question: is the bulk of the temperature increase an artifact of the processing?
There been much more this week. If we have interest in GW this week I will add more later.
“Sen. Lisa Murkowski took her battle with the Environmental Protection Agency to the floor of the Senate today, saying she was left with no choice but to fight a federal agency she believes is “contemplating regulations that will destroy jobs while millions of Americans are doing everything they can just to find one.” The Alaska Republican announced she would seek to keep the EPA from drawing up rules on greenhouse gas emissions from large emitters, such as power plants, refineries and manufacturers. Murkowski did it by filing a “disapproval resolution,” a rarely used procedural move that prohibits rules written by executive branch agencies from taking effect.”
Also this week Jeff Id has continued his analysis of the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN) temperature data. It can be found here: http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/long-record-ghcn-analysis/ One quote from the article is: “What this shows is that on average the adjustment process more than quadrupled the trend in raw temperatures, increasing the trend of the mean from 0.0113 for raw data to 0.0536.”
Which leaves us the question: is the bulk of the temperature increase an artifact of the processing?
There has been much more this week. If we have interest in GW this week I will add more later.
I thought the Vulcans were OK. I read the book. You don’t give them enough credit, what they were doing was not arbitrary. On the contrary, they were very discipline in what they were doing regardless of how they were doing in the polls. You can really see the contrast with the current occupant of the oval office. He’s gyrating wildly from no drama Obama to populist firebrand Obama like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Crazy and undisciplined is the change.
Out of Iraq and further into Afghanistan. We just gotta be at war with Islam somewhere, don’t we? Israel wouldn’t like us if we weren’t. And if Israel didn’t like us it would be so awful we’d just curl up and die. It is marvelous how all ths hysteria about government spending never seems to extend to the Pentagon and our imperial war machine. Of course that is for our “defense” for the dupes who will swallow that crap. “Defense” Dept; “defense” contractor: I giggle when I hear those terms of plutospeak. I do kinda hope that this billion/trillion dollar war just keeps on and on and on until something in Washington snaps, like the budget. And financial ruin is upon us. We deserve that, sooner rather than later.
My brother was out of town and asked me to go down to the DMV to pick up license plates for his car. He had tried to get them once but was told he had to go to a Police Station first for a VIN inspection first. He gave me the application, the completed “VIN Inspection” form and a signed check.
1) Take a number. Upon entering the DMV office, I was confronted by the ‘Take a Number’ machine. I dutifully took my number and proceeded down the velvet rope line where a que of 10 people were formed into a single line, each holding their numbered ticket. After about 5 minutes, I asked aloud the unspoken question that seemed to be on everyone’s mind: “Why did we have to take a number, if there is a line?” “You can have either a number system or a line, but you don’t need both.” The guy in front shook his head and said “I know….”, the woman behind me said “It don’t make no sense…..”
2) Upon my turn, I proceeded to the counter. “Do you have a number?” she asked. I said “yes” and apparently that was all the info she needed. “I’m here to pick up plates for my brother” I said. Evidently this was not clear enough, as we conversed for about 5 more minutes trying to figure out what to do before exclaiming “Oh they must be in the safe”
3) The Form. After about 5 minutes she returned with the plates. I handed her the “VIN Inspection” form. She said “You don’t need that, it’s a new car.” I told her that they told my brother he had to get it, and she took a look at the paperwork and pointed to the previous clerk’s signature and said “She don’t know what she is doing…..she’s new.”
I’d love to see China begin to get a lot nastier about our military along its coast and in its backyard. China has the power to shove us out of its area of influence (East Asia and western Pacific) more or less whenever it wants. It would be delicious to see our military obligations stretched to the limit and then snap and collapse. I’d also love to see Russia punch NATO in the nose so hard that it panics and runs. The way it did re Georgia.
PS Sammy. Why health care lost is quite simple. It would have been good for the peasantry and perhaps cost the plutocracy a wee bit so it had to be trashed. You see, the US exists for the benefit of plutocratic excess and luxury, and not for the people. That idea (that the US is a democracy) is just plutopropaganda and cover behind which the superrich operate by pulling the wool over the eyes of the masses. You don’t understand this at all since you are one of their willing dupes, (I suspect). I added the words in parentheses to be polite.
4)The calculator. Unlike many states, Oregon license fees are pretty simple: $77 for the title fee, $195 for new car registration, $109 for used car registration. When it came time to calculate my fee, she grabbed a post it note and wrote down the $77 and $195 and manually added itup (“12 carry the one….17 carry the one….2….) to total the $272. No calculator on the desk, no published rate sheet……
5) No debit cards. Payment is cash or check only……much to the chagrin of the guy at the next window. “Who doesn’t take debit cards???” he implored to the heavens. Then he pleaded, “Why don’t you have a sign up so I could have gotten the cash?” as he left empty handed, presumeably to go to the ATM and return to the back of the line.
A private business with this level of customer service would last about 1 month in business. My brother, who is not really interested in politics, called and I relayed the story. There was a long pause and then he said “And they want to run healthcare?”
So there’s your answer to why Obamacare failed: the DMV. It could have been the greatest plan in the world, but this is what you are up against.
Ah me. The python wins again. No hope of escaping from its coils. Better just give up and stop struggling. Won’t do a bit of good. Maybe if we don’t try to excape it won’t sqeeze us so hard. Why did we ever imagine we could defeat it and escape? Silly us.
Dont know that Bruce meant it this way but I see the “arbitrariness” of the Vulcans as choosing arbitrary definitions of concepts which fit their ideology.
For example; “Freedom” only means freedom of entrenched interests to avoid having to pay for stuff they dont want and for military interests to seek redress for whatever grievances they have. The rest of the world is not permitted this freedom. Freedom for an individual is only about freedom from government or responsibility to others.
Words like “constitutional”, “American”, “liberty”, “terrorist” were all narrowly, arbitrarily and rigidly defined for their purposes. While their organization was and is something to be marveled at, (Im not sure I would say admired) I still prefer the messy nature of the democratic party in general. It actually reflects reality better and allows one to be ready for the very UN-rigid nature of life.
You ever tried to get a claim processed by a PHI? Their tactics make the DMV look downright hospitable. And they actually pay people hundreds of thousands of dollars to perfect these hoop jumping trials.
This DMV argument is so silly which is exactly why it is so effective with the simpletons who vote republican.
You’re like the DB who has given up 4 TDs and in the 4th qtr you knock the chinstrap off a receiver, stand up, taunt and strut around for the camera. T
There was a lot of good this week too. Paul Volcker got moved off the bench and he’s going to take on the big banks. Bank stocks plummeted and the bankers were crying to Timmy Geithner.
What does this have to do with the price of tea in China? I live in a country with “government health care” and have had no-trouble health care for 35 years. The idea that government services are necessarily stupid and complex is simply false. Most of them, north and south of the border, work very smoothly.
Here’s a funny by a Prof. Emeritus of UCLA. He has a proposal to prevent more disasters brought on by reckless bankers:
The banks have found high leverage a simple way to gain rates of return several times higher than the rates of profit earned in the rest of the economy – as long as the going is good.The great escalation of executive compensation in finance derives mainly from this business strategy.Double liability would change the risk-return calculation that executives would apply to the strategy.
We would expect to see lower leverage ratios – and a moderation in executive compensation packages. This way of doing it just might work better than Basel rules of leverage and government imposed limits on compensation. A variant of the scheme would make E-shares marketable. It would be somewhat more cumbersome to administer. Investors who are not bank employees would have to post collateral adequate to back the double liability and records tracking all transfers of shares would have to be maintained. It might however make the market more efficient. The discount on E-shares relative to ordinary shares would reveal to the market what insider’s think of the bank’s prospects. And when E-shares start to trade at negative prices, it is time for the regulatory agencies to step in and take over the bank. Double liability – or some variant thereof – makes eminent sense. Too much so, perhaps, to be politically feasible ************************************************** Ah yes, but you see, as he says at the very end, it really is hopeless to struggle vs the python. The latter will just tighten up its coils and make things worse. No point really in doing so.
Take a number! The imagery is more exciting than anything coming out of a coupla billion dollar satellite tracking Usama.
Results will arise, sometime, just send more money and more of your kids.
Here is another example why we should shut down big gumint.
18 Jan 2010, 7 yes 7 terrists initiated the Islamic Mini Tet 2010 in Kabul, AfPakistan.
70,000 US troops, 30,000 reinforcements rushing to be at hand.
Target of 400,000 Afghan troops to be raised soonest, since we been there for 8 and a half years.
These 7 guys held out for 8 hours eventually all the Karzai horses and all the Karzai men took them out.
And the 100,000 NATO forces: wanderin’ the country side winning hearts and minds………..
Killin’s a few terrists who they happen on whose demise has no connection to anything.
Yeah take a number at the doctor’s office because the militarily insane need the rresources to make sure next time 1000 highly trained troops don’t get whipped by 6 terrists.
Send Lockheed another $100B so that the US cannot treat Grandpa as well as the Canadians!
A private business with this level of customer service would last about 1 month in business.
No. I think you mean to say “a private business that depends upon providing services (as opposed to just collecting fees), is without effective competition and one doesn’t get to pick and choose its customers would last about 1 month in business.” Govt run agencies can be very inefficient…I know because I work for one. But they are by no means the worst. The worst are these publicly protected monopolies and oligopolies whose main business plan seems to be finding ways of cherry picking customers and then spending 20 percent of their revenues on finding ways to deny services to those customers. Just to mention a few examples….your friendly cable company, the old Ma Bell, warranty insurers, and health insurance companies. You can do a lot worse than government inefficiency.
BTW, were there chairs in that DMV office? That’s the usual reason for having everyone take a number. Not everyone is able to stand in a line.
Obama’s election alerted the python that its victim was trying to escape. So, every watchful and zealous, the python got busy and squeezed a little harder and has successfully prevented any further escape plans of its victim. Not hard to do really when the agent of change was black in a racist society.
Arbitrary does not mean random. It means action ruled only by ones own will. Idi Amin and Hitler were just arbitrary in two different ways.
“As the 20th century draws to a close, the United States stands as the world’s preeminent power. Having led the West to victory in the Cold War, America faces an opportunity and a challenge: Does the United States have the vision to build upon the achievements of past decades? Does the United States have the resolve to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests?”
Note the words ‘build’ and ‘shape’. Not that the measuring point is whether the result is ‘favorable’ in American ‘interests’. The Vulcans simply decided on a project to transform the globe into something that would be described as ‘The New American Century’ and the choice of the rest of the world was to follow or get out of the way.
I am not surprised you found so much to admire. American Exceptionalism plus Arbitrary Exceptionalism translates perfectly into German: Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Fuhrer. As does Christian Nation and Traditional Family Values and Christian Nation: Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche.
The authoritarian impulse isn’t new, far from it. But it is always ugly and all too self-revealing about those who willingly fall into line behind the Leader. Yes the Vulcans were disciplined. So is a property trained Doberman. And after awhile they accept the muzzle and the occassional use of force on them. And wag their stubby tales when the master pays attention.
Good Cantab! Good. Now Stay! Well if it works for you.
Greg, how much wealth do you need to see lost, before you realize some policies are just not good. This demonization is not good. Big: banks, oil, retail, energy, pharma, health insurance, agriculture, business, etc. and this is just a partial list. What is there that you folks are not against? Moreover, what are you for?
When we do accept liberal recommendations, for instance, windmills, solar panels in the desert, etc, and what do we get back? Another liberal group (and sometinme the very same gorup) fighting the implementation.
The Joint Strike Fighter, renamed after 15 years of wandering in the desert of military technology waste, now the F-35 Lightnining II is not delivering test models at the contracted rate. Don’t miss the connection between waste.
Can’t predict what Lockheed will send to be tested Pax River or when. And they are already telling the folks around John, buy Airbus tankers, McCain’s fiefdom at Luke AFB to get aural proterctors for the noise.
So, Bob Gates cuts back the production buy of untested airplanes from 52 to 42 in the 2011 budget.
The proper answer to Lockheed’s failure is to ask for the money back.
But the militarists are not doing business they are plundering the US.
I’m afraid that Jeff Id is a little confused about time series analysis. Notice that all of his analyses arbitrarily used an ARIMA(1,0,0) framework….that’s what an AR(1) model is. Why? Well, the I’m afraid that the answer is because that’s the most intuitive and the easiest to code. But that’s a bad reason. For one thing, the GHCN data reflects temperature anomalies of “levels” data. Now Jeff Id admitted that there was serial correlation, so his first choice should have been an ARIMA(0,1,0) model rather than an ARIMA(1,0,0) model. Again, a little refresher course on Box-Jenkins methodology would have helped. My co-worker was one of Jenkins’ grad students, so he’d have a fit about this.If there was a unit root, then the famous “Airline model” (ARIMA (0,1,1)) might have been a good choice. An ARIMA (0,1,1) model without a constant is mathematically equivalent to the simple exponential smoothing model. Second, the data visually suggests at least the possibility of a second order difference equation with complex roots….i.e., there appears to be a sinusoidal pattern. It would have been worth the effort to at least investigate this possibility further. And note that there was no attempt at addressing a seasonal ARIMA model even though the data is monthly. Incredible. But all of this pales when you look at Jeff Id’s real whopper of a mistake. Notice that he interprets (or perhaps I should say misinterprets) the AR(1) coefficient as a “trend.” Yes, it’s a slope, but it is not a “trend.” And I think this reflects a basic and fundamental misunderstanding that I see in a lot of the stuff you post here. In an ARIMA model the trend term is a separate deterministic parameter that is extracted from the data before you do the ARIMA analysis. You don’t use ARIMA models to detect trends….you first detrend the data and then run the ARIMA analysis. ARIMA models assume stationarity, and you cannot have a stationary data set if there’s a trend. What the AR(1) slope parameter represents is serial correlation of the residual or irregular term; it is not the trend of the data series. This is just flat out wrong.
There was other news. GISS reported that 2009 was the second warmest year on record worldwide…largely because exceptionally warm temperatures in the southern hemisphere and arctic north overwhelmed the exceptionally low temperatues experienced in the lower 48 states. And the decade was the warmest on record. And yes, I know that Bob Tisdale has been trying to explain it all away with his crackpot “step theory.” .
Why someone tells a joke with a clear basis in racism or misogyny it really doesn’t matter if it if delivered with a smile. Sammy tells the ‘inept DMV’ story for what is collectively the 10 billioneth time thinking he is making some fucking point about the inherent ineptitude of bureaucracy over the magic of private markets and people get a little peeved. And then people like ask “Hey what’s the big deal, its just a joke!”
Lazy stereotypes maquerading as argumentation bore me and in excess make me angry at the implied accusation that I am just too fucking stupid to see the bullshit even as it covers my boots. And Christ the act is tired enough without you clutching your pearls in faux concern.
Arbitrary certainly has an element of randomness to it. If by random you mean scattershot then I agree with you but arbitrariness is random in the sense that it does not result from the examination of reality, it merely tries to make its OWN definition of reality.
In Massachusetts they’ve turned the DMV into a potemkin agency that is actually pretty efficient. I guess they got sick of being a example of a failed agency. Of course without the private sector as a role model they never would have improved.
Good question CoRev. How much did the policies of the previous administration lead to the enormous fall in wealth in 07-08? Some policies are not good but to simply judge a policy by how it affects the stock market is pretty short sighted and is actually part and parcel to why we are here to day.
I do not celebrate the loss of wealth, I celebrate the idea that someone from out side the financial cartel MAY, I repeat MAY, start getting an opportunity to examine and determine a different direction for our financial institutions. You may think we should totally leave them alone…….but you would be wrong. We have been getting lip service on reform but with Volcker we may actually get something meaningful. They have run amok with much aid from democrats, plutocrats and republicans and it must stop. The stocks of their companies falling on the announcement of Volcker being put in the game may be an indication that big banks are wary………….GOOD. I dont think we have begun to get the rot out of the system………………. its way past time.
Im against predatory capitalism and FOR healthy competitive markets(competitive markets require rules and referrees) where 5% of the companies do not control over 70% of the dollars. They didnt get that way because they were more innovative, smart or just better, they got that way because they captured the regulatory authorities, bought the polticians and in many cases (like during Cheneys second term as president) WROTE THE ENERGY LEGISLATION!
2slugs, take it up with Jeff. I gave you the reference. It would be interesting to compare results and probaly improve his work. Unless you do that, what you state here is just opinion as to what is the better approach. Stistics is funny that way. Y’ano methods to “tease” out a signal.
BTW, his article provides the code for extracting and processing the data. Go on over and use it. Do it your way and present it.
Thank heavens we are still warming since the Little ice Age! The alternative sucks as we already know.
Go on over to Bob Tisdale’s blog and tell him what’s wrong and make it right! Improve his work! Your opinion is meaningless until it is added to the body of work.
Greg, overall I agree with your statement, but feel there is a contradiction in this statement: “They didnt get that way because they were more innovative, smart or just better, they got that way because they captured the regulatory authorities, bought the polticians and in many cases (like during Cheneys second term as president) WROTE THE ENERGY LEGISLATION!” I’m not sure that capturing the authorities before your competitors is not both smart and innovative. There are other and betteradjectives it may be.
As to the Cheney example, for heaven’s sake beware. Your party just showed it is far worse in crafting the health care bill.
Thanks for making my point for me by using the health care bill. What makes you think I support the health care bill as is? I think that big pharma and insurers captured the legislators and removed the significant reforms, but this was NOT at the objection of Senate republicans in any way shape or form. This was specifically because the true progressive wing of the democrats got muzzled by the Nelsons, Libermans and Baucus’ Any republican led bill would have simply focused on demonizing lawyers (plenty to dislike there I admit) and removing the ability of individual states to hold insurance companies to standards of coverage. I didnt use the Cheney comment as a slam only at republicans but at the corporate capture of government which you have ended up agreeing with.
Lets just say that I dont consider capturing authorities “innovative” and “smart”. This amounts to bribes, extortion and sometimes blackmail which are three of the oldest tricks in the book. Effective when you can pull it off but far from “outside the box” thinking. I’m not naive to think that this will ever stop and I know that business has an ugly underbelly, but I still refuse to heap acclaim on those who use it successfully. Its the last resort of a thug basically.
you didn’t say what state this was in. DMV is a state functioin. In Oregon we don’t have lines and we don’t wait much. Sometimes a citizen who can’t read or who thinks the rules shouldn’t apply to him slows things down. They could solve even that problem by hiring more clerks, but that would require more taxes, don’t you know.
I suspect the people were waiting in line when they had numbers because they are so used to waiting in line it never occured to them to just wait for their number to be called. Sometimes citizens are even stupider than government workers.
you hit it. one reason i lobby for worker paid health insurance. or employer paid… it’s the same thing… once you are not asking the plutocrats to pay for it you can hope to get it done. just like Social Security… oh, they are trying to make Social Security “means tested” meaning that you won’t get what you pay for then the plutocrats kill it. on accounta they just don’t like the idea of workers having anything at all. see that guy with the fishing pole? that’s a wasted resource. he should be working for someone making a profit.
please note that the key to the whole thing is higher wages for workers so they can afford their own health care insurance. this is doable, but you have to convince the workers that “the dole” is not really free money.
if your friend is talking about the OREGON DMV he must have really gone out of his way to have a bad experience. i suspect the “rest of the story” would be revealing if not entertaining.
Why the anger? Lets just call it ………………….exasperation at the decades long assault on public servants. This DMV story and the Post Office story are getting so old and are sooooooo beside the point that only the most simple minded people, unable to actually consider all that needs to be considered in the health care debate, will find this a persuasive argument against the health care bill. In fact this is used to dissuade ANY AND EVERY health care bill that might even be conceived. ” Oh sure, these guys cant even get the DMB right why we want them doing health care” Ive never had an issue with the DMV. Hows that for an argument? If we are going to base our decisions anecdotes we need to get ALL the anecdotes not just a couple. If you really think that is an effective argument I have serious doubts about your analytical skills.
Here’s a less anecdotal and more comprehensive story form the private sector and I’ll ask should we use this as an argument to assert public control over all production? How is it that developers, builders, real estate agents and loan officers all thought we should continue with the mini malls and subdivisions at the rate we were going in 06/07 with all the information they had at their disposal? These people had their fingers on the pulse of the market and still declared the market healthy when it was in shock.
Sorry, Mark, not true. When a third party quotes one expert, one does not take apart the article and then expect the third party to do all the supporting. It is always better to have two “experts” talk directly instead of inserting a third party.
As to 2slugs assertions about the statistical approach, if it is a better approach then it is up to him to prove it. The weakest link in this whole AGW science has been the use of statistics. Even simple things as the measurement of climate change is a statistical exercise, so if there are many ways to “tease” the signal out of the data, then prove one is better.
Bruce – Considering Obama is following exactly the same play-book as Bush, except for upping the ante in Afghanistan, I’m not sure what your gripe is. Its your guys doing it.
BTW, Where are all the GITMO protestors?
Where are all the anti-war demonstrations?
Or was it all just a protest becuase the current President had a ‘R’ as teh party versus a ‘D”. Sure looks like everyone on the left is quite happy with the current wars and GITMO etc now that a Dem is running them…
I see diminished confidence in the video. At some points he starts speaking using clipped sentences. Other points he gets stuck looking for words. It’s not a meltdown but it’s less than what we have come to expect from him.
Since last Tuesday we’ve heard a lot of nonsense about how Brown’s win in Mass. will force Obama to “deal” with Republicans. The example that know-nothing talkingheads hold up is what happened to Clinton when the GOP trounced the Democrats in 1994. The problem is that the 1994 experience is irrelevant here for some fairly obvious reasons. When the GOP took control of Congress in 1994, that gave the GOP a strong incentive to actually see legislation pass. In 1994 both parties had an incentive to accomplish various objectives, so there was an incentive to compromise. The GOP was not a minority out-of-power party after the 1994 election. This meant they could not be obstructionist. But that’s not true in 2010. And it won’t be true after the 2010 election. The GOP will still be a minority party. That means their incentive structure is a lot different than it was after 1994. Tuesday’s election result changed nothing in terms of the GOP’s incentives. The goal will still be to bring down Obama at all costs (ensure his “Waterloo” to use Sen. DeMented’s term). The GOP will still lie about wanting to deal in good faith. Hey…Sen Grassley was even caught on tape bragging about how he hoodwinked the Administration and pretended to support mandatory coverage even though he opposed it. The only thing that Tuesday’s election did was embolden the GOP. The lesson learned was that lying, obstructionism and bad faith are the keys to making Obama look bad. It’s not about accomplishing anything; if it were, then the GOP would not have put out a four page cartoon with no numbers and tried to pass if off as a serious budget proposal. (I at least give Eric Cantor credit for telling John Boehner that this was stupid idea.)
You recommended the article, so evidently you agree with it. Now that you’ve been challenged on the technical stuff you’re trying to run away from it. This isn’t the first time you’ve done that.
I saw the code. Jeff Id is treating time series data as what is called a “degenerate regression”. This isn’t a matter of arguing about one statistical approach being better than another. We’re not arguing in the footnotes here. What he is doing is just wrong. Plain old wrong. The math is wrong. Time Series 101 wrong. The slope term in a AR(1) model is not a trend term. The trend variable is deterministically extracted before you do the AR(1)…okay, technically software programs do this simulatenously as part of a maximum likelihood estimate….but conceptually you detrend before you apply the ARIMA filters. The intuitive meaning of a slope parameter for an AR(1) model is that it tells you the speed with which serial autocorrelations die out. For example, a slope parameter of 1.00 means that 100 percent of the residual from the previous observation is carried over to the next observation…this is called a unit root. So when this guy tries to pass off the slope of an AR(1) coefficient as some kind of trend variable, then I know that he’s just some hack with programming skills.
This is what I mean when I rant about amateurish eyeball analysis. That’s why I asked you about this chart (see attached). If Jeff Id had looked at the data behind this chart using an AR(1) model he would have wrongly concluded there was a strong and obvious trend. If he had done it right and first deterministically detrended and then used and ARIMA(0,1,0) model instead of an ARIMA(1,0,0) model, then he would have known that this was just a unit root process with a determinisitic trend.
We’re not talking about having two “experts” hashing it out. The guy obviously doesn’t know diddly squat about ARIMA modeling.
I’m all for a robust debate to improve the statistics. For example, M&M had a meaningful contribution to the debate when they pointed out the error in Mann’s principal components analysis. That was a useful exercise. But M&M have made some big mistakes of their own and one of them was incorrectly selecting ending points in the data, which is how they arrive at some of those unusual warming trends in the late Middle Ages. And what M&M didn’t tell you was that after correcting for the principal component error the bottom line results were essentially unchanged.
In case you haven’t noticed, 2slugs is not a good debater. If he can’t refute your point, he OBFUSCATES it, no matter how simple the point is, and usually with a lot of arcane language to give himself credibilitly. This accomplishes his goal of diverting focus on a point he has lost, but it adds nothing to the pursuit of truth.
2slugs, stop trying to impress me and the AB readers. Take it up with Jeff and/or Bob Tisdale. As I have said, I am truly unimpressed with statisticians, as well as climatologists and economists. There are too many ways to get an answer that confirms an original assumption.
So after you’ve redone Jeff’s work, are we warming and/or cooling. And, how does that apply to the overall variability for the past millenium, 100 millenia, 10 million years?
If you are so bent on splitting hairs, please do it in fora where it will be added to the existing work.
One final question, just what is your opinion of AGW, and what’s your evidence?
Sammy tells the ‘inept DMV’ story for what is collectively the 10 billioneth time thinking he is making some fucking point about the inherent ineptitude of bureaucracy
Sorry Bruce. I was trying to do you a favor by explaining why the voters slam Government run health care. Now I realize that the truth hurts, and you are already hurting badly today.
BTW, I just went to the Post Office to pick up a registered letter and to mail my brother’s license plates. It was closed. This is in spite of the fact that the slip they left in my mailbox said that I could pick it up Saturday 9-12, and despite the fact that the sign on the lobby said they were open Saturday 9-12. So I went to Postal Annex (they were open) to mail the plates, and I will have to find some way to make it back to the Post Office M-F 9-5.
So you have a tough road to hoe there, convincing the people to turn health care over to the Government.
2slugs, sigh!!! At lreast you have given a grudging acknowledgement of M&M’s contribution. That is an improvement. The rest is NYAH, nyah, nyah, my opinion is that my approach is better than their documented an reviewed findings.
Buffpilot. Bush surrendered Iraq when he bent to Maliki’s demands to remove combat troops. His Administration and supporters like you were citing the 60 year occupations of Germany and Japan to suggest that a similar occupation of Iraq was in the cards and the constructution of the largest Embassy Building in the world (totally out of scale for a country of 26 million) plus construction of what were clearly intended to be permanent US Airforce and military Bases show that withdrawel by 2010 was certainly not in the plans. Bush surrendered and in so doing gave up the clear plans being advanced in his Administration to launch a ground invasion of Syria (using purportedly buried Iraq WMD as an excuse) as well as to facilitate/support an Isreali nuclear attack on Iran. For some reason Bush took the burden of surrendering his war aims on himself thus allowing Obama to simply carry out the terms of that surrender. Of course twenty years from now you will be “explaining” why liberals lost Iraq. In any event the notion that Obama is following the Bush playbook only works if you ignore all the events between Sept 2002 and late 2006 where the only plays they seemed to know were “Double Down” or “All In”
Obama is committed to get out of Afghanistan, after fixing Bush’s clusterfuck if possible, but out, and GITMO is slowly being addressed. Bush promoted and then put in place a policy of permanent agressive war with the aim of establishing a Cheney/PNAC New American Century, Obama for all his faults from the perspective of the Left is being given a chance, but if you don’t think that there is some anti-Obama anger brewing on the Left it is only because I suspect you don’t spend much time over where the outrage is building, those street protests may be closer than you think.
The Republican Health Care Bill was scored by CBO as reducing the deficit by S54 billion (ironically by income taxes on doctors for malpractice premium savings) while covering exactly zero more uninsured people, and effectively removing all state insurance protections for everyone by lowering the regulations to that of the lowest denominator, which under their rules didn’t even have to be a state.
And now they claim the answer is to work seriously with them.
Sorry there is not enough room in that particular clown car for any more riders.
I’m not a climatologist. I’ve read some books on the physics of climate…including the standard reference text of that name, but I’m not a scientist. My dad was a physicist and mathematician. I have a nephew who is a physicist at Cambridge (UK). The pure science is their thing, not mine. But I do understand econometric techniques. A simple bivariate VAR model tells me that after 1880, CO2 has a statistically significant impulse/response effect on temperature. There is evidence of Granger causality. And I’m hardly the only one who has found the same thing. And I also know enough about risk modeling (afterall, I’m an ORSA/econ guy by profession) to understand that the best public policy is to provisionally assume manmade global warming is approximately true.
Before talking about China I think it would be wise to read Martin Jacques’ book, When China Rules the World. I caught part of a talk he gave at Harvard and found it fascinating. Two points that stuck in my mind were (1) ideas that China will break apart are very wrong. 90% of Chinese citizens regard themselves as Han and the nation does not have or admit the diversity of culture that the US, Brazil, India, etc. do. Tibetans and others are treated as folklorish anomalies, not really disruptive of Chinese unity; and (2) the Chinese government has more legitimacy with the population without elections than does that of the UK or US or more Western “democracies” do with elections. In short, all the wishful thinking in the West that China will break apart or that it will lose popular support is nonsensical. Interesting indeed.
Han also form the economic elite in Indonesia and in general throughout SE Asia. This means in effect that China and Chinese who identify with China control most of the economies of all of SE Asia, not merely that of mainland China.
The Kaiser/Harvard poll shows that those Massachusetts voters 75% of BROWN voters felt that he should work with Democrats to try and incorporate “some” Republican ideas into legislation. That’s not what Brown seems to believe. He interpreted his mandate as one of defeating Obama. Seems to be the way you see it as well. But only 19% of BROWN’s own voters believe he should try and do what he has announced he will do.
I just checked the CIA world statistics site and found the following:
Chinese (Han) are 23.7% of the population of Malaysia. They are 76.8% of the population of Singapore. They obviously dominate the economy of these two nations. I would suggest that a US equivalent might be the Jewish domination of Wall Street and the higher echelons of major US financial institutions. In all these cases they probably view themselves as citizens of where they live and work but still have intense ethnic ties to other places..
Bruce said: “those street protests may be closer than you think.” Are you suggesting the right and left will sandwich the “O” with ongoing protests? Nah!! Can’t happen.
Even if it does happen, we will have the coolest organization name. I betcha crowd count and coverage goes up for the left’s demonstrations. Won’t matter, your ideas are being rejected. More importantly, the silent (not) majority will dominate the polls.
BTW, who the heck are you, the left, going to vote for?
2slugs, so you can compare the temp data that is now seriously in question, and as a nonscientist make assumptions about the relations of CO2 to those questionable temps to conclude…. what?
And saying: “…the best public policy is to provisionally assume manmade global warming is approximately true.” But, then who has said it is not (assumed to be approximately true)? We have many public policies to counteract manmade impacts on climate, some even on temps.
So which policy are you considering? Cap & Trade is a dead political possibility. And, for what purpose? Do you wish to make us even more cool? Change the current trend? You see I am having a hard time translating your insistence on attacking the nits and seeing how it impacts the bigger picture of your reality.
Have you yet gone over to Jeff’s or Bob’s blogs? You might add some value.
The issue with DMV’s or equivalent depends upon where you live even in a given state. In Texas you will wait in the big cities (at least you did in Houston) but could buy license tags at the grocery store, but in a small town in a small counties (in TX the tax assessor collector, does the DMV function) its in and out. Partly this may be because the tax assesor is an elected position in the county so service is important. This is actually also true at the drivers license bureau you will wait in the big city but its one or two persons in line in the country.
2slugs, I can’t predict what will happen in the short term for the HC bill. Clearly, the current version is dead. I suspect the Repubs will, even again, document a version for discussion purposes ( a trial balloon). I’m not sure there is enough blood left (after the recent blood letting) in the Dem Congress to even try another run at it.
I am convinced the voters would accept a truly bipartisan bill. I’m just not sure the current Dem leadership are capable of starting and following through on that effort.
and as a nonscientist make assumptions about the relations of CO2 to those questionable temps to conclude…. what?
I can conclude that the post-1880 relationship between CO2 concentrations and global temperatures cannot plausibly be explained by pure chance. And exogenous shocks to CO2 levels impact temperaturs, but the relationship does not work the other way around.
So which policy are you considering? Cap & Trade is a dead political possibility. It’s dead for now…at least in this country. That doesn’t mean the problem goes away, it just means that you’re doing what conservatives always do…kick the problem down the road to the next generation. And it will be more expensive for them, but it won’t be your problem. Other countries might still pass something like cap & trade, which means that our exports will become very expensive. That will make us poorer.
I’m not arguing for a cooler plan. Just stabilizing things would be fine with me.
I have not posted anything at Jeff’s or Bob’s sites, although I have read stuff there. My experience at a lot of similar sites has not been good. By that I mean the near immediate deletion of contrary comments.
Just as I’m not a scientist, you are not an economist. So why do you keep saying that cap & trade would be an economic catastrophe? Real economists have actually studied the economics here. The CBO has studied it. A large team of economists at MIT have studied it. Economists at Yale have studied it. Agricultural economists from hither and yon have looked at the economic costs of global warming. The verdict is nearly unanimous. The cost of cap & trade is not trivial, but it’s not crushing either…somewhere around 2 percent of GDP. And the cost of not stabilizing global temps will far exceed that cost for future generations. I think this is morally indefensible because you are literally giving zero regard for the welfare of future generations. All so you don’t have to be inconvenienced.
You must be right because I obviously didn’t get my point across. I thought I was refuting CoRev’s points. That’s why I went into the details behind the math that was used to build those charts.
And I didn’t think the language was all that “arcane.” You can’t even get an undergrad degree in econ at most American universities today unless you’ve taken at least an intro course in time series analysis and ARIMA models.
Re China I might had added that China does not suffer from the political infighting and confusion that the US has and that tends to block the government from getting much of anything useful done. The GOP is delighted to have made a mess of Obama’s first year and kept him from achieving any of his goals. As if this were good for us. China doesn’t have this problem and is probably the better because of it. The government there enjoys the support and respect of the population and can do what is needed when necessary.
Don’t forget that Clinton hired Dick Morris. Do you think Obama will hire Dick Morris? Do you think Obama will tell us the age of big government is over? Do you think Obama is going to be rescued by another Timothy McVeigh?
You’re like the DB who has given up 4 TDs and in the 4th qtr you knock the chinstrap off a receiver, stand up, taunt and strut around for the camera. Ha ha ha. Very good analogy! But you have to consider, R’s are like the Detroit Lions – we don’t win very often. So we might over-celebrate when we do 🙂
2slugs, you need to go to better sites. The only sites I see that kind of action is on the pro-AGW sites. I have yet to see it on Jeff’s or Bob’s site. The few times I have seen someone banned on WUWT is when they act like MM and ILSM here, taking over a thread with OT comments and then continuing those comments thread after thread and warning after warning. Banning and/or deleting and even changing comments is common at RealClimate, banning and deleting comments is common at Climate Progress, Deltoid, and even LGF. All are left leaning blogs.
So how would you go about stabilizing the temps? Say for the last two years when we have shown lower temps? Or how about the past 12 years where the temps have been stable. Since Global Average Temps are a calculated temp, how would you lower those temps? What would be your target temp? Moreover, what range would you try to maintain? Within 1C? 2C? 3C? More? Less?
Which one of the sinks would you attack first Oceans, 70% of the planet’s surface? Land? Or are you proposing taking some of ILSM’s Gazillion nuclear bombs off line in the Sun? If you think it is just CO2 that dominates temp change, then you have obviously missed the reality-based world of climate.
Once you have your control system in place how do you propose to measure the effects? And, finally, why?
There is so much more in your last comment to discuss, but that will just get us further offbase.
2slugs said: “You must be right because I obviously didn’t get my point across. I thought I was refuting CoRev’s points. ” so what was my point by providing a link to Jeff Id’s article and a couple of his graphs? Raw data does not come close to matching the “adjusted” data, and the NOAA and NASA adjustments are not well documented making us think they are arbitrarily made to support the warming theory by lowering older data and raising newer.
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps. IIRC, the GISS temps were taken from NASA. So, the best you can tell us is that Jeff Id’s temps may be better calculated. Remember his data show some warming. With data this poor are you on a quest for false precision? OK, since you think your approach is superior go over and tell him that.
Notice, none of the points were refuted! They were not even discussed! If you did touch on them your points were so clouded by the diversion to the better approach argument they were indiscernable.
You can’t even get an undergrad degree in econ at most American universities today unless you’ve taken at least an intro course in time series analysis and ARIMA models.
I must admit I missed out on the ARIMA model class. Sounds fun though.
Now here’s one for you: Do you know what the acronym G.I.G.O. stands for?
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps.
No, that was not what I did. The issue isn’t one approach versus another approach. The issue is whether or not Jeff Id understands what his own output actually means. He doesn’t understand that a slope coefficient in an AR(1) model does not have anything to do with whether or not there is a deterministic trend.
Here’s a good primer on simple ARIMA models. Note that if you don’t include an explicit trend variable as a dummy, then it’s really the constant term that drives the trend.
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps.
Again, this isn’t a question of competing approaches; it’s a question of understanding what the output actually means. Jeff Id failed to demonstrate that the data was incorrectly adjusted. His entire argument hinged on comparing AR(1) slope coefficients and saying that the adjusted slopes were 4 times higher than the raw data slopes. Sounds impressive, and it would be if the slopes actually meant what he seems to believe they mean. He misunderstands them to be synonomous with trend, and I suspect he thinks this because he is interpreting an AR(1) model as a kind of degenerate regression.
“The GOP is delighted to have made a mess of Obama’s first year and kept him from achieving any of his goals. As if this were good for us.” MM
Margie, That’s giving far too much credit to a gang that can’t shoot straight. The Democrates made little effort to forge a united caucus in the Senate. The President didn’t make much of any effort to communicate with the public in a leadership manner. He was obsessed with his concept of bi-partisan government in spite of facing a radical obstuctionist cabal. Obama gave not a hint of political strength. The Democratic leadership in the Senate may as well have joined the centrist wing of the Republican party. It’s not too extreme to suggest that the efforts of the Democratic party to effect some form of change is little more than a cynical ploy at maintaining the status quo of the past twenty years.
2slugs, why do you continue to try to disprove Jeff Id here? If he doesn’t know what he is talking about go there and tell him. The failure to do so after these many weeks is beginning to make we wonder why
An exercise in complete futility. The only half way decent “solution” would be for Palestine to become one state with equal votes and rights for all, both Zionist and Arab. In short the S. Africa solution. The white overlords in S. Africa were dethroned by the abolition of apartheid and this came about only because draconian sanctions were applied to the regime. The US needs to organize a similar set of sanctions, tell the Zionists we will not support them at all unless they do what we order them to, and push it through. But….silly fantasy. The Israel Lobby runs our policy and there is not a chance in Hell for a S. African solution to be imposed. So Unkie Sam keeps at his silly stupid exercise in futility.
Oh I think that is not correct at all. The GOP has become purely a party of obstruction as even not very bright pundits on TV have noted. Instead of proposing any solutions of its own it has just shouted down, as it were, Obama’s. The Democrat leadership in the Congress is not immensely bright, but under normal circumstances I think their intiatives would have passed.
Having the US arrange a peace between the Pals and Israel is rather as if Hirohito or Mussolini had been asked to arrange a peace between Stalin and Hitler. The whole idea is preposterous from the get go.
I kind of doubt that Obama will hire Dick Morris. But Sarah Palin might since both work at Fox News. Better yet, Sarah Palin might hire Karl Rove. They also both work at Fox News and Karl Rove could use the extra income now that the “family values” guy has dumped his wife and special needs kid.
Your argument is going in circles. You’re using Jeff Id’s analysis as a basis for concluding that the GISS data is garbage when the issue at hand is whether or not Jeff Id’s analysis is even right. If his analysis is wrong because he has misinterpreted what the ARIMA output means, then you can’t claim that the GISS data is GIGO. It’s completely circular.
What “misinformation” regarding Tea Partiers are you referring to?
Has anyone ever suggested that 25-30% of the population isn’t significant? Has anyone ever suggested that they are unable to force a change in conversation?
The major “misinforming” has been FROM the right I would say. Fox News blowing up the numbers at their rallies, Dick Armey acting as some sort of “populist” leader and talking heads assuring us that every fall in Obamas approval rating is directly related to the Tea Party platform swaying the independent voter.
The question isnt whether the Tea Partiers are significant or even effective but whether they are a positive force. Change is good, you better view it as such because its going to happen but to the Tea Partiers change has to be cataclysmic. They are not conservative they are RADICAL and REACTIONARY. They remind me of the Ohio St fans that want to fire Jim Tressel any time the Buckeyes lose a game. Tea partiers dont want increments they want wholesale throw the bums out. Problem is they aren’t all bums. I dont like the tea party movement because I dont think many of the adherents have a grounding in reality.
When you have people over the age of 65 at health care rallies carrying signs saying “I dont want the govt in my health care”……………………….Houston we have a problem. When you have people who are suddenly “shocked” by the debt level of this country and now want to do something about it. ……………. in the middle of the greatest downturn in 70 yrs…………. morons.
Radical solutions dont mean radical activity. The tea partiers have waaaayy too many talking about watering the tree of liberty with blood, waaaayyy too many who cite founding fathers the way they cite the bible, by pulling five word phrases out of the middle and missing the coherency of the document. We dont need more unthinking activism we need way less. The tea partiers think Sarah Palin would be a good choice simply because she is NOT an insider. It is this type of reactionary drivel that will not make our fragile democracy (all are fragile no?) stronger but weaker.
2slugs, it’s time to stop the BS. Refute the points: “Raw data does not come close to matching the “adjusted” data, and the NOAA and NASA adjustments are not well documented making us think they are arbitrarily made to support the warming theory by lowering older data and raising newer.” If you do not wish to, that’s OK, but stop the diversion and obfuscation. Either do the analysis and show us your work and results, or talk to those who are and improve theirs.
For those who need the Cliff notes version, it is an article tracking the email trail at NASA, not CRU, which explains the reasoning why arbitrary adjustmenst were made to the temp data after Stephen McIntyre noted an error in the post-2000 data. At that time the hottest year in the US was 1998. After correcting the pre-2000 data the hottest year was 1934. Over time we have seen the data shifting back so the hottest years are now the current set.
Questions arise over why correcting the pre-2000 records? Why are they shifting back? Why do nearly every adjustment lower older data and then raise newer? How much can we really trust the temperature calculations? And, finally, why does 2slugs attack the independent reviewers’ analysis process while ignoring the official agencies’ data collecting/handling/processing processes? Official agency processes are needed to be cleaned up before we can confidence in the analysis, whoever does it.
We need to get individuals negotiating and trying to find better health care deals for themselves. This is where the answer lies but the democrats will never take us there since there weak on individual empowerment.
A question was this in the big city or a small town? I suggest that the main difference in service may well be there, looking at the drivers license offices in TX. (Hint may be if there is a small town not to far away it may be worth going for a drive to the office) (It would be a time versus time tradeoff). In Tx they will let you charge your license plates but charge you the credit card fee in addition to the license fee. It used to be cash on the barrelhead period, but now they will take checks. I suspect that the info was actually on the web site of the DMV.
First off the quality of my weeks have NOTHING to do with the outcome of elections in MA nor Obamas popularity rating. This is so typical of our American right, short termism. “Yep, we’ve turned it around now, next thing you know we’ll impeach Obama throw Pelosi in jail and appoint Sarah Paln president because the American people HAVE SPOKEN!!!!!” See my football analogy above in response to Cantab. This is just like someone snickering when we have the coldest week in history down here, “YEAH!! Whats that you say about that GLOBAL WARMING BULLSHIT??!!” While on the other side of the globe (you know where its SUMMER) they are having record heat waves.
Do you care to actually address my points? Whom is it exactly that you think I am letting off the hook? Whom should I be assigning blame to?
I wasnt blaming anyone merely calling things as I see them from here.
Why was this MA election so indicative of the Tea Partys influence while two and a half months ago an election in a NY disrtict that hadnt gone democrat in over a hundred years REJECTED the Sarah Palin team is NOT viewed as a smackdown of Tea Party tactics.?
If you think I’m “blaming” the tea partiers for something (other than their own ignorance) or not properly blaming democrats for their failures, say so. Be specific. Give me a point to have a contention with.
If you want to argue that the tea party is a thoughtful, well intentioned group present your points. I’d like to have that discussion.
I’m exasperated with the ignorance in this country on all sides. Obamas ignorance in thinking that he needs to frame everything in centrist jargon, thinking that our national debt is a problem, thinking that health care reform WITHOUT a viable public option will be popular (60+ % of Scott Brown voters SUPPORT a public option) and thinking that his current financial team represents anything good. However I do believe that whatever the tea partiers have to offer right now (although Warren Mosler seems to be making a little headway with them so maybe there is hope) would be much much worse. They are just slinging poo and have no ideas for real reform. Their idea of reform is to get rid of EVERYONE. Not very constructive. Ive seen nothing that shows me they are nothing more than plain ANTI government. Whatever the hell that means.
Greg and your last comment answers your first question re: misinformation. “ Ive seen nothing that shows me they are nothing more than plain ANTI government. Whatever the hell that means.“
Here’s the basic view from the trenches, a card carrying member of the Tea Party movement. The economy is in the tank and we are bleeding jobs. Why did we concentrate on a healthcare reform bill that only ~5% of the electorate thought was important in 2008? Why did we have a stimulus bill passed that had major parts of the stimulus delayed for year two and three of the administration?
A politician that can answer these questions, make it understandable and believable to the masses, and proposes solutions to solve the jobs/economic problems will win in Nov.
To conclude, I’m not sure debating point(s) is the best approach. I do, however, think exchanging views can help expand our personal knowledge.
Then how is he going to pivot to be more like America. He comes across as a phony when he tries acting like a populist. He’s an elitist, or at least in relation to those in the community he used to try to organize. I don’t see his ticket out of Dutch. Remember your beloved Bill Clinton only got reelected with the help of Dick Morris, Timothy McVeigh, and a total lack of commitment to principled behavior. Obama is decent guy with some minor foibles but born from a fatally flawed idiological base. He’s in a lousy place with no way out.
The rise of China is drawing Japan into its orbit and out of the US orbit. The process is just beginning, but in due time Japan will be a satellite of China, not an American dependency. When we no longer occupy Japan with our military our Far East position will pretty much collapse.
Interesting that China would aggressively defend Iran vs. the USA. This should cause some consternation in Washington. Iran appears to have a very powerful friend.
Your view from the trenches offers nothing new. Who DOESNT know the economy is in the tank and isnt upset? Who DOESNT want the job hemorrhage to stop?
Your comment on health care reform shows how ignorant most of the tea party movement is about how the economy functions. The economy is tanking largely because over 70% of bankruptcies are related to OUT OF POCKET INSURANCE COSTS! Funny thing is most of these people have fricking health insurance. So to act like measures to stop insurance companies from denying coverage or rescinding coverage does not affect the economy is stunningly ignorant. It is this kind of noise coming from the tea parties that is as stupid as it gets. Acting like you can “fix” the economy without fixing health care is laughable. Your comment about less than 5% caring about healthcare reform now is the grossest lie ever uttered. They may not like the form it has currently taken but that is another issue entirely. Over 60% of people still want a public option.
Why did we have the stimulus bill that we did? Good question. Most of it has to do with our entire political spectrum having this irrational fear of govt debt and deficits. Why? Because they dont understand them. We can blame most of the economics profession for that because they either intentionally mislead or grossly misunderstand what tools we have as a monopoly currency issuer in a floating exchange rate environment.
Debating points is really the only approach. That is the only way one can understand each others views. People dont like being wrong but we must realize that we may be. I wrote a rant a year or so ago that actually got printed as a post here. In it I remember that I commented on how ridiculous the idea of creating more debt (govt debt) to solve our debt problem was. Well if I could I would go back and totally erase that post because I was totally ignorant of what govt debt was, thanks to most of our esteemed economists. Knowing what I know now I feel a veil has been lifted from my eyes, and I have a tea bagger to thank for it Warren Mosler.
Individuals have no negotiating power with health insurance companies, only GROUPS do. Standing around and yelling “No government”, Individual responsibility” and “Freedom” is not a solution.
Liberals, how was your week?
Really sucky. But better than the near decade the PNAC Vulcans/Arbitrary Executive/Pemanent Majority delivered us into.
Obama Administration = Berlin Airlift 1948. Yeah life sucks in the aftermath of but somebody is at least tryng to airlift help.
Global warming this week
Sen Murkowski (R-AK) has tried a new approach to limit EPA to implement its CO2 regulations. It can be found here: http://www.adn.com/front/story/1103776.html
“Sen. Lisa Murkowski took her battle with the Environmental Protection Agency to the floor of the Senate today, saying she was left with no choice but to fight a federal agency she believes is “contemplating regulations that will destroy jobs while millions of Americans are doing everything they can just to find one.”
The Alaska Republican announced she would seek to keep the EPA from drawing up rules on greenhouse gas emissions from large emitters, such as power plants, refineries and manufacturers. Murkowski did it by filing a “disapproval resolution,” a rarely used procedural move that prohibits rules written by executive branch agencies from taking effect.”
Also this week Jeff Id has continued his analysis of the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN) temperature data. It can be found here: http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/long-record-ghcn-analysis/
One quote from the article is: “What this shows is that on average the adjustment process more than quadrupled the trend in raw temperatures, increasing the trend of the mean from 0.0113 for raw data to 0.0536.”
Which leaves us the question: is the bulk of the temperature increase an artifact of the processing?
There been much more this week. If we have interest in GW this week I will add more later.
Global warming this week
Sen Murkowski (R-AK) has tried a new approach to limit EPA to implement its CO2 regulations. It can be found here: http://www.adn.com/front/story/1103776.html
“Sen. Lisa Murkowski took her battle with the Environmental Protection Agency to the floor of the Senate today, saying she was left with no choice but to fight a federal agency she believes is “contemplating regulations that will destroy jobs while millions of Americans are doing everything they can just to find one.”
The Alaska Republican announced she would seek to keep the EPA from drawing up rules on greenhouse gas emissions from large emitters, such as power plants, refineries and manufacturers. Murkowski did it by filing a “disapproval resolution,” a rarely used procedural move that prohibits rules written by executive branch agencies from taking effect.”
Also this week Jeff Id has continued his analysis of the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN) temperature data. It can be found here: http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/long-record-ghcn-analysis/
One quote from the article is: “What this shows is that on average the adjustment process more than quadrupled the trend in raw temperatures, increasing the trend of the mean from 0.0113 for raw data to 0.0536.”
Which leaves us the question: is the bulk of the temperature increase an artifact of the processing?
There has been much more this week. If we have interest in GW this week I will add more later.
I thought the Vulcans were OK. I read the book. You don’t give them enough credit, what they were doing was not arbitrary. On the contrary, they were very discipline in what they were doing regardless of how they were doing in the polls. You can really see the contrast with the current occupant of the oval office. He’s gyrating wildly from no drama Obama to populist firebrand Obama like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Crazy and undisciplined is the change.
Unintentionally funny:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100123/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_iraq;_ylt=AjLiqaG.7UwsWeeWhl7dQ4qs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTM3bDdrNm9uBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMTIzL21sX2lyYXEEY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBvcHVsYXIEY3BvcwMxBHBvcwMyBHB0A2hvbWVfY29rZQRzZWMDeW5fdG9wX3N0b3J5BHNsawN1c21hcmluZWNvcnA
Out of Iraq and further into Afghanistan. We just gotta be at war with Islam somewhere, don’t we? Israel wouldn’t like us if we weren’t. And if Israel didn’t like us it would be so awful we’d just curl up and die.
It is marvelous how all ths hysteria about government spending never seems to extend to the Pentagon and our imperial war machine. Of course that is for our “defense” for the dupes who will swallow that crap. “Defense” Dept; “defense” contractor: I giggle when I hear those terms of plutospeak. I do kinda hope that this billion/trillion dollar war just keeps on and on and on until something in Washington snaps, like the budget. And financial ruin is upon us. We deserve that, sooner rather than later.
warprofiteers=warmongers
Why Government Healthcare Lost
by sammy
My brother was out of town and asked me to go down to the DMV to pick up license plates for his car. He had tried to get them once but was told he had to go to a Police Station first for a VIN inspection first. He gave me the application, the completed “VIN Inspection” form and a signed check.
1) Take a number. Upon entering the DMV office, I was confronted by the ‘Take a Number’ machine. I dutifully took my number and proceeded down the velvet rope line where a que of 10 people were formed into a single line, each holding their numbered ticket. After about 5 minutes, I asked aloud the unspoken question that seemed to be on everyone’s mind: “Why did we have to take a number, if there is a line?” “You can have either a number system or a line, but you don’t need both.” The guy in front shook his head and said “I know….”, the woman behind me said “It don’t make no sense…..”
2) Upon my turn, I proceeded to the counter. “Do you have a number?” she asked. I said “yes” and apparently that was all the info she needed. “I’m here to pick up plates for my brother” I said. Evidently this was not clear enough, as we conversed for about 5 more minutes trying to figure out what to do before exclaiming “Oh they must be in the safe”
3) The Form. After about 5 minutes she returned with the plates. I handed her the “VIN Inspection” form. She said “You don’t need that, it’s a new car.” I told her that they told my brother he had to get it, and she took a look at the paperwork and pointed to the previous clerk’s signature and said “She don’t know what she is doing…..she’s new.”
I’d love to see China begin to get a lot nastier about our military along its coast and in its backyard. China has the power to shove us out of its area of influence (East Asia and western Pacific) more or less whenever it wants. It would be delicious to see our military obligations stretched to the limit and then snap and collapse. I’d also love to see Russia punch NATO in the nose so hard that it panics and runs. The way it did re Georgia.
warprofiteers=warmongers
How the plutocracy lives:
http://realestalker.blogspot.com/
PS Sammy. Why health care lost is quite simple. It would have been good for the peasantry and perhaps cost the plutocracy a wee bit so it had to be trashed. You see, the US exists for the benefit of plutocratic excess and luxury, and not for the people. That idea (that the US is a democracy) is just plutopropaganda and cover behind which the superrich operate by pulling the wool over the eyes of the masses. You don’t understand this at all since you are one of their willing dupes, (I suspect). I added the words in parentheses to be polite.
warprofiteers=warmongers
[continued]
4) The calculator. Unlike many states, Oregon license fees are pretty simple: $77 for the title fee, $195 for new car registration, $109 for used car registration. When it came time to calculate my fee, she grabbed a post it note and wrote down the $77 and $195 and manually added it up (“12 carry the one….17 carry the one….2….) to total the $272. No calculator on the desk, no published rate sheet……
5) No debit cards. Payment is cash or check only……much to the chagrin of the guy at the next window. “Who doesn’t take debit cards???” he implored to the heavens. Then he pleaded, “Why don’t you have a sign up so I could have gotten the cash?” as he left empty handed, presumeably to go to the ATM and return to the back of the line.
A private business with this level of customer service would last about 1 month in business. My brother, who is not really interested in politics, called and I relayed the story. There was a long pause and then he said “And they want to run healthcare?”
So there’s your answer to why Obamacare failed: the DMV. It could have been the greatest plan in the world, but this is what you are up against.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/77543-dodd-time-to-take-a-breather-on-healthcare
Ah me. The python wins again. No hope of escaping from its coils. Better just give up and stop struggling. Won’t do a bit of good. Maybe if we don’t try to excape it won’t sqeeze us so hard. Why did we ever imagine we could defeat it and escape? Silly us.
Dont know that Bruce meant it this way but I see the “arbitrariness” of the Vulcans as choosing arbitrary definitions of concepts which fit their ideology.
For example; “Freedom” only means freedom of entrenched interests to avoid having to pay for stuff they dont want and for military interests to seek redress for whatever grievances they have. The rest of the world is not permitted this freedom. Freedom for an individual is only about freedom from government or responsibility to others.
Words like “constitutional”, “American”, “liberty”, “terrorist” were all narrowly, arbitrarily and rigidly defined for their purposes. While their organization was and is something to be marveled at, (Im not sure I would say admired) I still prefer the messy nature of the democratic party in general. It actually reflects reality better and allows one to be ready for the very UN-rigid nature of life.
Sammy
You ever tried to get a claim processed by a PHI? Their tactics make the DMV look downright hospitable. And they actually pay people hundreds of thousands of dollars to perfect these hoop jumping trials.
This DMV argument is so silly which is exactly why it is so effective with the simpletons who vote republican.
Cantab
You’re like the DB who has given up 4 TDs and in the 4th qtr you knock the chinstrap off a receiver, stand up, taunt and strut around for the camera. T
There was a lot of good this week too. Paul Volcker got moved off the bench and he’s going to take on the big banks. Bank stocks plummeted and the bankers were crying to Timmy Geithner.
Greg, why exagerate? Most of us have had claims processed by HI providers. Fill out the form, send it in the mail and wait for the check is the norm.
BTW, why the anger? Why the name calling “simpletons who vote republican”? Can’t make points and influence folks like that.
What does this have to do with the price of tea in China? I live in a country with “government health care” and have had no-trouble health care for 35 years. The idea that government services are necessarily stupid and complex is simply false. Most of them, north and south of the border, work very smoothly.
Cantab,
Just fine here!
I just pushed my feet down on the floor and it pushed back!!
Orwell called the minitruth.
Here’s a funny by a Prof. Emeritus of UCLA. He has a proposal to prevent more disasters brought on by reckless bankers:
The banks have found high leverage a simple way to gain rates of return several times higher than the rates of profit earned in the rest of the economy – as long as the going is good.The great escalation of executive compensation in finance derives mainly from this business strategy.Double liability would change the risk-return calculation that executives would apply to the strategy.
We would expect to see lower leverage ratios – and a moderation in executive compensation packages. This way of doing it just might work better than Basel rules of leverage and government imposed limits on compensation.
A variant of the scheme would make E-shares marketable. It would be somewhat more cumbersome to administer. Investors who are not bank employees would have to post collateral adequate to back the double liability and records tracking all transfers of shares would have to be maintained. It might however make the market more efficient. The discount on E-shares relative to ordinary shares would reveal to the market what insider’s think of the bank’s prospects. And when E-shares start to trade at negative prices, it is time for the regulatory agencies to step in and take over the bank.
Double liability – or some variant thereof – makes eminent sense. Too much so, perhaps, to be politically feasible
**************************************************
Ah yes, but you see, as he says at the very end, it really is hopeless to struggle vs the python. The latter will just tighten up its coils and make things worse. No point really in doing so.
Thanks Sammy,
Take a number! The imagery is more exciting than anything coming out of a coupla billion dollar satellite tracking Usama.
Results will arise, sometime, just send more money and more of your kids.
Here is another example why we should shut down big gumint.
18 Jan 2010, 7 yes 7 terrists initiated the Islamic Mini Tet 2010 in Kabul, AfPakistan.
70,000 US troops, 30,000 reinforcements rushing to be at hand.
Target of 400,000 Afghan troops to be raised soonest, since we been there for 8 and a half years.
These 7 guys held out for 8 hours eventually all the Karzai horses and all the Karzai men took them out.
And the 100,000 NATO forces: wanderin’ the country side winning hearts and minds………..
Killin’s a few terrists who they happen on whose demise has no connection to anything.
Yeah take a number at the doctor’s office because the militarily insane need the rresources to make sure next time 1000 highly trained troops don’t get whipped by 6 terrists.
Send Lockheed another $100B so that the US cannot treat Grandpa as well as the Canadians!
sammy,
A private business with this level of customer service would last about 1 month in business.
No. I think you mean to say “a private business that depends upon providing services (as opposed to just collecting fees), is without effective competition and one doesn’t get to pick and choose its customers would last about 1 month in business.” Govt run agencies can be very inefficient…I know because I work for one. But they are by no means the worst. The worst are these publicly protected monopolies and oligopolies whose main business plan seems to be finding ways of cherry picking customers and then spending 20 percent of their revenues on finding ways to deny services to those customers. Just to mention a few examples….your friendly cable company, the old Ma Bell, warranty insurers, and health insurance companies. You can do a lot worse than government inefficiency.
BTW, were there chairs in that DMV office? That’s the usual reason for having everyone take a number. Not everyone is able to stand in a line.
I have had decent support from my DMV, and shoddy support from my FEHB “PHI”.
I don’t think it matters.
The bait and switch is not DMV vs health care, DMV is not pillaging the US, so much as private health phoney market scams.
The comparison must be militarism versus health care.
Militarism is MM’s red herring which the plutocrats (fascists) use to keep the useful idiots (Lenin’s strategy) doing themselves harm.
MM,
“It is what it is.”
It is Kharma.
Obama’s election alerted the python that its victim was trying to escape. So, every watchful and zealous, the python got busy and squeezed a little harder and has successfully prevented any further escape plans of its victim. Not hard to do really when the agent of change was black in a racist society.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/821dce96-0786-11df-915f-00144feabdc0.html
warprofiteers=warmongers
Arbitrary does not mean random. It means action ruled only by ones own will. Idi Amin and Hitler were just arbitrary in two different ways.
“As the 20th century draws to a close, the United States stands as the world’s preeminent power. Having led the West to victory in the Cold War, America faces an opportunity and a challenge: Does the United States have the vision to build upon the achievements of past decades? Does the United States have the resolve to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests?”
Note the words ‘build’ and ‘shape’. Not that the measuring point is whether the result is ‘favorable’ in American ‘interests’. The Vulcans simply decided on a project to transform the globe into something that would be described as ‘The New American Century’ and the choice of the rest of the world was to follow or get out of the way.
I am not surprised you found so much to admire. American Exceptionalism plus Arbitrary Exceptionalism translates perfectly into German: Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Fuhrer. As does Christian Nation and Traditional Family Values and Christian Nation: Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche.
The authoritarian impulse isn’t new, far from it. But it is always ugly and all too self-revealing about those who willingly fall into line behind the Leader. Yes the Vulcans were disciplined. So is a property trained Doberman. And after awhile they accept the muzzle and the occassional use of force on them. And wag their stubby tales when the master pays attention.
Good Cantab! Good. Now Stay! Well if it works for you.
Greg, how much wealth do you need to see lost, before you realize some policies are just not good. This demonization is not good. Big: banks, oil, retail, energy, pharma, health insurance, agriculture, business, etc. and this is just a partial list. What is there that you folks are not against? Moreover, what are you for?
When we do accept liberal recommendations, for instance, windmills, solar panels in the desert, etc, and what do we get back? Another liberal group (and sometinme the very same gorup) fighting the implementation.
The Joint Strike Fighter, renamed after 15 years of wandering in the desert of military technology waste, now the F-35 Lightnining II is not delivering test models at the contracted rate. Don’t miss the connection between waste.
Can’t predict what Lockheed will send to be tested Pax River or when. And they are already telling the folks around John, buy Airbus tankers, McCain’s fiefdom at Luke AFB to get aural proterctors for the noise.
So, Bob Gates cuts back the production buy of untested airplanes from 52 to 42 in the 2011 budget.
The proper answer to Lockheed’s failure is to ask for the money back.
But the militarists are not doing business they are plundering the US.
See http://nosint.blogspot.com/2010/01/pentagon-underscores-commitment-to-f-35.html
CoRev,
I’m afraid that Jeff Id is a little confused about time series analysis. Notice that all of his analyses arbitrarily used an ARIMA(1,0,0) framework….that’s what an AR(1) model is. Why? Well, the I’m afraid that the answer is because that’s the most intuitive and the easiest to code. But that’s a bad reason. For one thing, the GHCN data reflects temperature anomalies of “levels” data. Now Jeff Id admitted that there was serial correlation, so his first choice should have been an ARIMA(0,1,0) model rather than an ARIMA(1,0,0) model. Again, a little refresher course on Box-Jenkins methodology would have helped. My co-worker was one of Jenkins’ grad students, so he’d have a fit about this.If there was a unit root, then the famous “Airline model” (ARIMA (0,1,1)) might have been a good choice. An ARIMA (0,1,1) model without a constant is mathematically equivalent to the simple exponential smoothing model. Second, the data visually suggests at least the possibility of a second order difference equation with complex roots….i.e., there appears to be a sinusoidal pattern. It would have been worth the effort to at least investigate this possibility further. And note that there was no attempt at addressing a seasonal ARIMA model even though the data is monthly. Incredible. But all of this pales when you look at Jeff Id’s real whopper of a mistake. Notice that he interprets (or perhaps I should say misinterprets) the AR(1) coefficient as a “trend.” Yes, it’s a slope, but it is not a “trend.” And I think this reflects a basic and fundamental misunderstanding that I see in a lot of the stuff you post here. In an ARIMA model the trend term is a separate deterministic parameter that is extracted from the data before you do the ARIMA analysis. You don’t use ARIMA models to detect trends….you first detrend the data and then run the ARIMA analysis. ARIMA models assume stationarity, and you cannot have a stationary data set if there’s a trend. What the AR(1) slope parameter represents is serial correlation of the residual or irregular term; it is not the trend of the data series. This is just flat out wrong.
CoRev,
There was other news. GISS reported that 2009 was the second warmest year on record worldwide…largely because exceptionally warm temperatures in the southern hemisphere and arctic north overwhelmed the exceptionally low temperatues experienced in the lower 48 states. And the decade was the warmest on record. And yes, I know that Bob Tisdale has been trying to explain it all away with his crackpot “step theory.” .
Why angry. Because it is the subtext.
Why someone tells a joke with a clear basis in racism or misogyny it really doesn’t matter if it if delivered with a smile. Sammy tells the ‘inept DMV’ story for what is collectively the 10 billioneth time thinking he is making some fucking point about the inherent ineptitude of bureaucracy over the magic of private markets and people get a little peeved. And then people like ask “Hey what’s the big deal, its just a joke!”
Lazy stereotypes maquerading as argumentation bore me and in excess make me angry at the implied accusation that I am just too fucking stupid to see the bullshit even as it covers my boots. And Christ the act is tired enough without you clutching your pearls in faux concern.
Arbitrary certainly has an element of randomness to it. If by random you mean scattershot then I agree with you but arbitrariness is random in the sense that it does not result from the examination of reality, it merely tries to make its OWN definition of reality.
In Massachusetts they’ve turned the DMV into a potemkin agency that is actually pretty efficient. I guess they got sick of being a example of a failed agency. Of course without the private sector as a role model they never would have improved.
Good question CoRev. How much did the policies of the previous administration lead to the enormous fall in wealth in 07-08? Some policies are not good but to simply judge a policy by how it affects the stock market is pretty short sighted and is actually part and parcel to why we are here to day.
I do not celebrate the loss of wealth, I celebrate the idea that someone from out side the financial cartel MAY, I repeat MAY, start getting an opportunity to examine and determine a different direction for our financial institutions. You may think we should totally leave them alone…….but you would be wrong. We have been getting lip service on reform but with Volcker we may actually get something meaningful. They have run amok with much aid from democrats, plutocrats and republicans and it must stop. The stocks of their companies falling on the announcement of Volcker being put in the game may be an indication that big banks are wary………….GOOD. I dont think we have begun to get the rot out of the system………………. its way past time.
Im against predatory capitalism and FOR healthy competitive markets(competitive markets require rules and referrees) where 5% of the companies do not control over 70% of the dollars. They didnt get that way because they were more innovative, smart or just better, they got that way because they captured the regulatory authorities, bought the polticians and in many cases (like during Cheneys second term as president) WROTE THE ENERGY LEGISLATION!
Ding, ding, ding! Bruce resorted to Godwin’s Law. All points lost. Penalty points applied.
2slugs, take it up with Jeff. I gave you the reference. It would be interesting to compare results and probaly improve his work. Unless you do that, what you state here is just opinion as to what is the better approach. Stistics is funny that way. Y’ano methods to “tease” out a signal.
BTW, his article provides the code for extracting and processing the data. Go on over and use it. Do it your way and present it.
Thank heavens we are still warming since the Little ice Age! The alternative sucks as we already know.
Go on over to Bob Tisdale’s blog and tell him what’s wrong and make it right! Improve his work! Your opinion is meaningless until it is added to the body of work.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100123/ap_on_bi_ge/us_obama_campaign_finance;_ylt=AntdBHyhzb94dw33cZNOLqhAw_IE;_ylu=X3oDMTNlaHBiOXRoBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMTIzL3VzX29iYW1hX2NhbXBhaWduX2ZpbmFuY2UEY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBvcHVsYXIEY3BvcwM0BHBvcwM0BHNlYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcmllcwRzbGsDb2JhbWFjYWxsc2Nh
Hey, wise up, you didn’t think the python was going to losen its grip, did you?
LOL
warprofiteers=warmongers
Greg, overall I agree with your statement, but feel there is a contradiction in this statement: “They didnt get that way because they were more innovative, smart or just better, they got that way because they captured the regulatory authorities, bought the polticians and in many cases (like during Cheneys second term as president) WROTE THE ENERGY LEGISLATION!” I’m not sure that capturing the authorities before your competitors is not both smart and innovative. There are other and betteradjectives it may be.
As to the Cheney example, for heaven’s sake beware. Your party just showed it is far worse in crafting the health care bill.
That one’s worth a Sheesh!
“2slugs, take it up with Jeff”
CoRev, the responsibility to support the post you initiated is well, yours.
Thanks for making my point for me by using the health care bill. What makes you think I support the health care bill as is? I think that big pharma and insurers captured the legislators and removed the significant reforms, but this was NOT at the objection of Senate republicans in any way shape or form. This was specifically because the true progressive wing of the democrats got muzzled by the Nelsons, Libermans and Baucus’ Any republican led bill would have simply focused on demonizing lawyers (plenty to dislike there I admit) and removing the ability of individual states to hold insurance companies to standards of coverage. I didnt use the Cheney comment as a slam only at republicans but at the corporate capture of government which you have ended up agreeing with.
Lets just say that I dont consider capturing authorities “innovative” and “smart”. This amounts to bribes, extortion and sometimes blackmail which are three of the oldest tricks in the book. Effective when you can pull it off but far from “outside the box” thinking. I’m not naive to think that this will ever stop and I know that business has an ugly underbelly, but I still refuse to heap acclaim on those who use it successfully. Its the last resort of a thug basically.
Sammy
you didn’t say what state this was in. DMV is a state functioin. In Oregon we don’t have lines and we don’t wait much. Sometimes a citizen who can’t read or who thinks the rules shouldn’t apply to him slows things down. They could solve even that problem by hiring more clerks, but that would require more taxes, don’t you know.
I suspect the people were waiting in line when they had numbers because they are so used to waiting in line it never occured to them to just wait for their number to be called. Sometimes citizens are even stupider than government workers.
margery
you hit it. one reason i lobby for worker paid health insurance. or employer paid… it’s the same thing… once you are not asking the plutocrats to pay for it you can hope to get it done. just like Social Security… oh, they are trying to make Social Security “means tested” meaning that you won’t get what you pay for then the plutocrats kill it. on accounta they just don’t like the idea of workers having anything at all. see that guy with the fishing pole? that’s a wasted resource. he should be working for someone making a profit.
please note that the key to the whole thing is higher wages for workers so they can afford their own health care insurance. this is doable, but you have to convince the workers that “the dole” is not really free money.
Sammy,
if your friend is talking about the OREGON DMV he must have really gone out of his way to have a bad experience. i suspect the “rest of the story” would be revealing if not entertaining.
Why the anger? Lets just call it ………………….exasperation at the decades long assault on public servants. This DMV story and the Post Office story are getting so old and are sooooooo beside the point that only the most simple minded people, unable to actually consider all that needs to be considered in the health care debate, will find this a persuasive argument against the health care bill. In fact this is used to dissuade ANY AND EVERY health care bill that might even be conceived. ” Oh sure, these guys cant even get the DMB right why we want them doing health care” Ive never had an issue with the DMV. Hows that for an argument? If we are going to base our decisions anecdotes we need to get ALL the anecdotes not just a couple. If you really think that is an effective argument I have serious doubts about your analytical skills.
Here’s a less anecdotal and more comprehensive story form the private sector and I’ll ask should we use this as an argument to assert public control over all production?
How is it that developers, builders, real estate agents and loan officers all thought we should continue with the mini malls and subdivisions at the rate we were going in 06/07 with all the information they had at their disposal? These people had their fingers on the pulse of the market and still declared the market healthy when it was in shock.
Sorry, Mark, not true. When a third party quotes one expert, one does not take apart the article and then expect the third party to do all the supporting. It is always better to have two “experts” talk directly instead of inserting a third party.
As to 2slugs assertions about the statistical approach, if it is a better approach then it is up to him to prove it. The weakest link in this whole AGW science has been the use of statistics. Even simple things as the measurement of climate change is a statistical exercise, so if there are many ways to “tease” the signal out of the data, then prove one is better.
Bruce – Considering Obama is following exactly the same play-book as Bush, except for upping the ante in Afghanistan, I’m not sure what your gripe is. Its your guys doing it.
BTW, Where are all the GITMO protestors?
Where are all the anti-war demonstrations?
Or was it all just a protest becuase the current President had a ‘R’ as teh party versus a ‘D”. Sure looks like everyone on the left is quite happy with the current wars and GITMO etc now that a Dem is running them…
Islam will change
Obama in Ohio.
I see diminished confidence in the video. At some points he starts speaking using clipped sentences. Other points he gets stuck looking for words. It’s not a meltdown but it’s less than what we have come to expect from him.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5Gw8EvElV4
Since last Tuesday we’ve heard a lot of nonsense about how Brown’s win in Mass. will force Obama to “deal” with Republicans. The example that know-nothing talkingheads hold up is what happened to Clinton when the GOP trounced the Democrats in 1994. The problem is that the 1994 experience is irrelevant here for some fairly obvious reasons. When the GOP took control of Congress in 1994, that gave the GOP a strong incentive to actually see legislation pass. In 1994 both parties had an incentive to accomplish various objectives, so there was an incentive to compromise. The GOP was not a minority out-of-power party after the 1994 election. This meant they could not be obstructionist. But that’s not true in 2010. And it won’t be true after the 2010 election. The GOP will still be a minority party. That means their incentive structure is a lot different than it was after 1994. Tuesday’s election result changed nothing in terms of the GOP’s incentives. The goal will still be to bring down Obama at all costs (ensure his “Waterloo” to use Sen. DeMented’s term). The GOP will still lie about wanting to deal in good faith. Hey…Sen Grassley was even caught on tape bragging about how he hoodwinked the Administration and pretended to support mandatory coverage even though he opposed it. The only thing that Tuesday’s election did was embolden the GOP. The lesson learned was that lying, obstructionism and bad faith are the keys to making Obama look bad. It’s not about accomplishing anything; if it were, then the GOP would not have put out a four page cartoon with no numbers and tried to pass if off as a serious budget proposal. (I at least give Eric Cantor credit for telling John Boehner that this was stupid idea.)
CoRev,
You recommended the article, so evidently you agree with it. Now that you’ve been challenged on the technical stuff you’re trying to run away from it. This isn’t the first time you’ve done that.
I saw the code. Jeff Id is treating time series data as what is called a “degenerate regression”. This isn’t a matter of arguing about one statistical approach being better than another. We’re not arguing in the footnotes here. What he is doing is just wrong. Plain old wrong. The math is wrong. Time Series 101 wrong. The slope term in a AR(1) model is not a trend term. The trend variable is deterministically extracted before you do the AR(1)…okay, technically software programs do this simulatenously as part of a maximum likelihood estimate….but conceptually you detrend before you apply the ARIMA filters. The intuitive meaning of a slope parameter for an AR(1) model is that it tells you the speed with which serial autocorrelations die out. For example, a slope parameter of 1.00 means that 100 percent of the residual from the previous observation is carried over to the next observation…this is called a unit root. So when this guy tries to pass off the slope of an AR(1) coefficient as some kind of trend variable, then I know that he’s just some hack with programming skills.
This is what I mean when I rant about amateurish eyeball analysis. That’s why I asked you about this chart (see attached). If Jeff Id had looked at the data behind this chart using an AR(1) model he would have wrongly concluded there was a strong and obvious trend. If he had done it right and first deterministically detrended and then used and ARIMA(0,1,0) model instead of an ARIMA(1,0,0) model, then he would have known that this was just a unit root process with a determinisitic trend.
correction….then he would have known that this was just a unit root process with a POSITIVE determinisitic trend
CoRev,
We’re not talking about having two “experts” hashing it out. The guy obviously doesn’t know diddly squat about ARIMA modeling.
I’m all for a robust debate to improve the statistics. For example, M&M had a meaningful contribution to the debate when they pointed out the error in Mann’s principal components analysis. That was a useful exercise. But M&M have made some big mistakes of their own and one of them was incorrectly selecting ending points in the data, which is how they arrive at some of those unusual warming trends in the late Middle Ages. And what M&M didn’t tell you was that after correcting for the principal component error the bottom line results were essentially unchanged.
CoRev,
Thank heavens we are still warming since the Little ice Age!
The data only goes back to 1880, so we can only say that the last decade is the warmest since 1880.
CoRev,
In case you haven’t noticed, 2slugs is not a good debater. If he can’t refute your point, he OBFUSCATES it, no matter how simple the point is, and usually with a lot of arcane language to give himself credibilitly. This accomplishes his goal of diverting focus on a point he has lost, but it adds nothing to the pursuit of truth.
coberly,
It’s the Oregon DMV!
cobs,
It’s my story. I went to the DMV yesterday.
2slugs, stop trying to impress me and the AB readers. Take it up with Jeff and/or Bob Tisdale. As I have said, I am truly unimpressed with statisticians, as well as climatologists and economists. There are too many ways to get an answer that confirms an original assumption.
So after you’ve redone Jeff’s work, are we warming and/or cooling. And, how does that apply to the overall variability for the past millenium, 100 millenia, 10 million years?
If you are so bent on splitting hairs, please do it in fora where it will be added to the existing work.
One final question, just what is your opinion of AGW, and what’s your evidence?
Bruce,
Sammy tells the ‘inept DMV’ story for what is collectively the 10 billioneth time thinking he is making some fucking point about the inherent ineptitude of bureaucracy
Sorry Bruce. I was trying to do you a favor by explaining why the voters slam Government run health care. Now I realize that the truth hurts, and you are already hurting badly today.
BTW, I just went to the Post Office to pick up a registered letter and to mail my brother’s license plates. It was closed. This is in spite of the fact that the slip they left in my mailbox said that I could pick it up Saturday 9-12, and despite the fact that the sign on the lobby said they were open Saturday 9-12. So I went to Postal Annex (they were open) to mail the plates, and I will have to find some way to make it back to the Post Office M-F 9-5.
So you have a tough road to hoe there, convincing the people to turn health care over to the Government.
2slugs, sigh!!! At lreast you have given a grudging acknowledgement of M&M’s contribution. That is an improvement. The rest is NYAH, nyah, nyah, my opinion is that my approach is better than their documented an reviewed findings.
Buffpilot. Bush surrendered Iraq when he bent to Maliki’s demands to remove combat troops. His Administration and supporters like you were citing the 60 year occupations of Germany and Japan to suggest that a similar occupation of Iraq was in the cards and the constructution of the largest Embassy Building in the world (totally out of scale for a country of 26 million) plus construction of what were clearly intended to be permanent US Airforce and military Bases show that withdrawel by 2010 was certainly not in the plans. Bush surrendered and in so doing gave up the clear plans being advanced in his Administration to launch a ground invasion of Syria (using purportedly buried Iraq WMD as an excuse) as well as to facilitate/support an Isreali nuclear attack on Iran. For some reason Bush took the burden of surrendering his war aims on himself thus allowing Obama to simply carry out the terms of that surrender. Of course twenty years from now you will be “explaining” why liberals lost Iraq. In any event the notion that Obama is following the Bush playbook only works if you ignore all the events between Sept 2002 and late 2006 where the only plays they seemed to know were “Double Down” or “All In”
Obama is committed to get out of Afghanistan, after fixing Bush’s clusterfuck if possible, but out, and GITMO is slowly being addressed. Bush promoted and then put in place a policy of permanent agressive war with the aim of establishing a Cheney/PNAC New American Century, Obama for all his faults from the perspective of the Left is being given a chance, but if you don’t think that there is some anti-Obama anger brewing on the Left it is only because I suspect you don’t spend much time over where the outrage is building, those street protests may be closer than you think.
2slugs, I actually hope both parties operate as you expect, which appears to be no change. Recent electoral history has shown us a potential result.
BTW, still believe all the misinformation re: the Tea Partiers?
The Republican Health Care Bill was scored by CBO as reducing the deficit by S54 billion (ironically by income taxes on doctors for malpractice premium savings) while covering exactly zero more uninsured people, and effectively removing all state insurance protections for everyone by lowering the regulations to that of the lowest denominator, which under their rules didn’t even have to be a state.
And now they claim the answer is to work seriously with them.
Sorry there is not enough room in that particular clown car for any more riders.
I’m not a climatologist. I’ve read some books on the physics of climate…including the standard reference text of that name, but I’m not a scientist. My dad was a physicist and mathematician. I have a nephew who is a physicist at Cambridge (UK). The pure science is their thing, not mine. But I do understand econometric techniques. A simple bivariate VAR model tells me that after 1880, CO2 has a statistically significant impulse/response effect on temperature. There is evidence of Granger causality. And I’m hardly the only one who has found the same thing. And I also know enough about risk modeling (afterall, I’m an ORSA/econ guy by profession) to understand that the best public policy is to provisionally assume manmade global warming is approximately true.
Before talking about China I think it would be wise to read Martin Jacques’ book, When China Rules the World. I caught part of a talk he gave at Harvard and found it fascinating. Two points that stuck in my mind were (1) ideas that China will break apart are very wrong. 90% of Chinese citizens regard themselves as Han and the nation does not have or admit the diversity of culture that the US, Brazil, India, etc. do. Tibetans and others are treated as folklorish anomalies, not really disruptive of Chinese unity; and (2) the Chinese government has more legitimacy with the population without elections than does that of the UK or US or more Western “democracies” do with elections. In short, all the wishful thinking in the West that China will break apart or that it will lose popular support is nonsensical. Interesting indeed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Jacques
warprofiteers=warmongers
Han Chinese constitute about 92% of the population of the People’s Republic of China (mainland China), 98% of the population of the Republic of China (Taiwan), 78% of the population of Singapore, and about 20% of the entire global human population……………from Wikipedia article.
Han also form the economic elite in Indonesia and in general throughout SE Asia. This means in effect that China and Chinese who identify with China control most of the economies of all of SE Asia, not merely that of mainland China.
CoRev,
The Kaiser/Harvard poll shows that those Massachusetts voters 75% of BROWN voters felt that he should work with Democrats to try and incorporate “some” Republican ideas into legislation. That’s not what Brown seems to believe. He interpreted his mandate as one of defeating Obama. Seems to be the way you see it as well. But only 19% of BROWN’s own voters believe he should try and do what he has announced he will do.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/polls/WaPoKaiserHarvard_MassPoll_Jan22.pdf?sid=ST2010012203176
I just checked the CIA world statistics site and found the following:
Chinese (Han) are 23.7% of the population of Malaysia.
They are 76.8% of the population of Singapore.
They obviously dominate the economy of these two nations.
I would suggest that a US equivalent might be the Jewish domination of Wall Street and the higher echelons of major US financial institutions. In all these cases they probably view themselves as citizens of where they live and work but still have intense ethnic ties to other places..
Bruce said: “those street protests may be closer than you think.” Are you suggesting the right and left will sandwich the “O” with ongoing protests? Nah!! Can’t happen.
Even if it does happen, we will have the coolest organization name. I betcha crowd count and coverage goes up for the left’s demonstrations. Won’t matter, your ideas are being rejected. More importantly, the silent (not) majority will dominate the polls.
BTW, who the heck are you, the left, going to vote for?
2slugs, so you can compare the temp data that is now seriously in question, and as a nonscientist make assumptions about the relations of CO2 to those questionable temps to conclude…. what?
And saying: “…the best public policy is to provisionally assume manmade global warming is approximately true.” But, then who has said it is not (assumed to be approximately true)? We have many public policies to counteract manmade impacts on climate, some even on temps.
So which policy are you considering? Cap & Trade is a dead political possibility. And, for what purpose? Do you wish to make us even more cool? Change the current trend? You see I am having a hard time translating your insistence on attacking the nits and seeing how it impacts the bigger picture of your reality.
Have you yet gone over to Jeff’s or Bob’s blogs? You might add some value.
The issue with DMV’s or equivalent depends upon where you live even in a given state. In Texas you will wait in the big cities (at least you did in Houston) but could buy license tags at the grocery store, but in a small town in a small counties (in TX the tax assessor collector, does the DMV function) its in and out. Partly this may be because the tax assesor is an elected position in the county so service is important. This is actually also true at the drivers license bureau you will wait in the big city but its one or two persons in line in the country.
2slugs, I can’t predict what will happen in the short term for the HC bill. Clearly, the current version is dead. I suspect the Repubs will, even again, document a version for discussion purposes ( a trial balloon). I’m not sure there is enough blood left (after the recent blood letting) in the Dem Congress to even try another run at it.
I am convinced the voters would accept a truly bipartisan bill. I’m just not sure the current Dem leadership are capable of starting and following through on that effort.
CoRev,
and as a nonscientist make assumptions about the relations of CO2 to those questionable temps to conclude…. what?
I can conclude that the post-1880 relationship between CO2 concentrations and global temperatures cannot plausibly be explained by pure chance. And exogenous shocks to CO2 levels impact temperaturs, but the relationship does not work the other way around.
So which policy are you considering? Cap & Trade is a dead political possibility.
It’s dead for now…at least in this country. That doesn’t mean the problem goes away, it just means that you’re doing what conservatives always do…kick the problem down the road to the next generation. And it will be more expensive for them, but it won’t be your problem. Other countries might still pass something like cap & trade, which means that our exports will become very expensive. That will make us poorer.
I’m not arguing for a cooler plan. Just stabilizing things would be fine with me.
I have not posted anything at Jeff’s or Bob’s sites, although I have read stuff there. My experience at a lot of similar sites has not been good. By that I mean the near immediate deletion of contrary comments.
Just as I’m not a scientist, you are not an economist. So why do you keep saying that cap & trade would be an economic catastrophe? Real economists have actually studied the economics here. The CBO has studied it. A large team of economists at MIT have studied it. Economists at Yale have studied it. Agricultural economists from hither and yon have looked at the economic costs of global warming. The verdict is nearly unanimous. The cost of cap & trade is not trivial, but it’s not crushing either…somewhere around 2 percent of GDP. And the cost of not stabilizing global temps will far exceed that cost for future generations. I think this is morally indefensible because you are literally giving zero regard for the welfare of future generations. All so you don’t have to be inconvenienced.
ammy,
2slugs is not a good debater
You must be right because I obviously didn’t get my point across. I thought I was refuting CoRev’s points. That’s why I went into the details behind the math that was used to build those charts.
And I didn’t think the language was all that “arcane.” You can’t even get an undergrad degree in econ at most American universities today unless you’ve taken at least an intro course in time series analysis and ARIMA models.
Re China I might had added that China does not suffer from the political infighting and confusion that the US has and that tends to block the government from getting much of anything useful done. The GOP is delighted to have made a mess of Obama’s first year and kept him from achieving any of his goals. As if this were good for us. China doesn’t have this problem and is probably the better because of it. The government there enjoys the support and respect of the population and can do what is needed when necessary.
Slugs,
Don’t forget that Clinton hired Dick Morris. Do you think Obama will hire Dick Morris? Do you think Obama will tell us the age of big government is over? Do you think Obama is going to be rescued by another Timothy McVeigh?
Greg,
Cantab
You’re like the DB who has given up 4 TDs and in the 4th qtr you knock the chinstrap off a receiver, stand up, taunt and strut around for the camera.
Ha ha ha. Very good analogy! But you have to consider, R’s are like the Detroit Lions – we don’t win very often. So we might over-celebrate when we do 🙂
2slugs, you need to go to better sites. The only sites I see that kind of action is on the pro-AGW sites. I have yet to see it on Jeff’s or Bob’s site. The few times I have seen someone banned on WUWT is when they act like MM and ILSM here, taking over a thread with OT comments and then continuing those comments thread after thread and warning after warning. Banning and/or deleting and even changing comments is common at RealClimate, banning and deleting comments is common at Climate Progress, Deltoid, and even LGF. All are left leaning blogs.
So how would you go about stabilizing the temps? Say for the last two years when we have shown lower temps? Or how about the past 12 years where the temps have been stable. Since Global Average Temps are a calculated temp, how would you lower those temps? What would be your target temp? Moreover, what range would you try to maintain? Within 1C? 2C? 3C? More? Less?
Which one of the sinks would you attack first Oceans, 70% of the planet’s surface? Land? Or are you proposing taking some of ILSM’s Gazillion nuclear bombs off line in the Sun? If you think it is just CO2 that dominates temp change, then you have obviously missed the reality-based world of climate.
Once you have your control system in place how do you propose to measure the effects? And, finally, why?
There is so much more in your last comment to discuss, but that will just get us further offbase.
2slugs said: “You must be right because I obviously didn’t get my point across. I thought I was refuting CoRev’s points. ” so what was my point by providing a link to Jeff Id’s article and a couple of his graphs? Raw data does not come close to matching the “adjusted” data, and the NOAA and NASA adjustments are not well documented making us think they are arbitrarily made to support the warming theory by lowering older data and raising newer.
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps. IIRC, the GISS temps were taken from NASA. So, the best you can tell us is that Jeff Id’s temps may be better calculated. Remember his data show some warming. With data this poor are you on a quest for false precision? OK, since you think your approach is superior go over and tell him that.
Notice, none of the points were refuted! They were not even discussed! If you did touch on them your points were so clouded by the diversion to the better approach argument they were indiscernable.
2slugs, you did it again! How does your comment relate to my quote?
2slugs,
You can’t even get an undergrad degree in econ at most American universities today unless you’ve taken at least an intro course in time series analysis and ARIMA models.
I must admit I missed out on the ARIMA model class. Sounds fun though.
Now here’s one for you: Do you know what the acronym G.I.G.O. stands for?
CoRev,
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps.
No, that was not what I did. The issue isn’t one approach versus another approach. The issue is whether or not Jeff Id understands what his own output actually means. He doesn’t understand that a slope coefficient in an AR(1) model does not have anything to do with whether or not there is a deterministic trend.
Here’s a good primer on simple ARIMA models. Note that if you don’t include an explicit trend variable as a dummy, then it’s really the constant term that drives the trend.
http://www.duke.edu/~rnau/411arim.htm
And here’s an example of how you incorporate a deterministic time trend.
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/etsug/60372/HTML/default/etsug_forecast_sect013.htm
You then provided commentary on a different approach to calculating Jeff id’s comparable temps.
Again, this isn’t a question of competing approaches; it’s a question of understanding what the output actually means. Jeff Id failed to demonstrate that the data was incorrectly adjusted. His entire argument hinged on comparing AR(1) slope coefficients and saying that the adjusted slopes were 4 times higher than the raw data slopes. Sounds impressive, and it would be if the slopes actually meant what he seems to believe they mean. He misunderstands them to be synonomous with trend, and I suspect he thinks this because he is interpreting an AR(1) model as a kind of degenerate regression.
“The GOP is delighted to have made a mess of Obama’s first year and kept him from achieving any of his goals. As if this were good for us.” MM
Margie, That’s giving far too much credit to a gang that can’t shoot straight. The Democrates made little effort to forge a united caucus in the Senate. The President didn’t make much of any effort to communicate with the public in a leadership manner. He was obsessed with his concept of bi-partisan government in spite of facing a radical obstuctionist cabal. Obama gave not a hint of political strength. The Democratic leadership in the Senate may as well have joined the centrist wing of the Republican party.
It’s not too extreme to suggest that the efforts of the Democratic party to effect some form of change is little more than a cynical ploy at maintaining the status quo of the past twenty years.
CoRev,
You never argue with me.
Me off topic?????
That is the thread above!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100123/ap_on_re_us/us_oregon_tax_vote;_ylt=AnvFzGZmi0oPcGVmNpFEZmms0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTNtbWlmaXNrBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMTIzL3VzX29yZWdvbl90YXhfdm90ZQRjY29kZQNtb3N0cG9wdWxhcgRjcG9zAzQEcG9zAzEEcHQDaG9tZV9jb2tlBHNlYwN5bl9oZWFkbGluZV9saXN0BHNsawN0YXh0aGVyaWNob3I–
The python will not like this if it passes and will have to get busy to do something about it. Wouldn’t it be amusing ir Oregon slips out his coils?
warprofiteers=warmongers
ILSM, I answered your question on the other thread. You didn’t have anything here.
2slugs, why do you continue to try to disprove Jeff Id here? If he doesn’t know what he is talking about go there and tell him. The failure to do so after these many weeks is beginning to make we wonder why
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100124/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians
An exercise in complete futility. The only half way decent “solution” would be for Palestine to become one state with equal votes and rights for all, both Zionist and Arab. In short the S. Africa solution. The white overlords in S. Africa were dethroned by the abolition of apartheid and this came about only because draconian sanctions were applied to the regime. The US needs to organize a similar set of sanctions, tell the Zionists we will not support them at all unless they do what we order them to, and push it through. But….silly fantasy. The Israel Lobby runs our policy and there is not a chance in Hell for a S. African solution to be imposed. So Unkie Sam keeps at his silly stupid exercise in futility.
Oh I think that is not correct at all. The GOP has become purely a party of obstruction as even not very bright pundits on TV have noted. Instead of proposing any solutions of its own it has just shouted down, as it were, Obama’s. The Democrat leadership in the Congress is not immensely bright, but under normal circumstances I think their intiatives would have passed.
Having the US arrange a peace between the Pals and Israel is rather as if Hirohito or Mussolini had been asked to arrange a peace between Stalin and Hitler. The whole idea is preposterous from the get go.
cantab,
I kind of doubt that Obama will hire Dick Morris. But Sarah Palin might since both work at Fox News. Better yet, Sarah Palin might hire Karl Rove. They also both work at Fox News and Karl Rove could use the extra income now that the “family values” guy has dumped his wife and special needs kid.
CoRev,
Your argument is going in circles. You’re using Jeff Id’s analysis as a basis for concluding that the GISS data is garbage when the issue at hand is whether or not Jeff Id’s analysis is even right. If his analysis is wrong because he has misinterpreted what the ARIMA output means, then you can’t claim that the GISS data is GIGO. It’s completely circular.
What “misinformation” regarding Tea Partiers are you referring to?
Has anyone ever suggested that 25-30% of the population isn’t significant? Has anyone ever suggested that they are unable to force a change in conversation?
The major “misinforming” has been FROM the right I would say. Fox News blowing up the numbers at their rallies, Dick Armey acting as some sort of “populist” leader and talking heads assuring us that every fall in Obamas approval rating is directly related to the Tea Party platform swaying the independent voter.
The question isnt whether the Tea Partiers are significant or even effective but whether they are a positive force. Change is good, you better view it as such because its going to happen but to the Tea Partiers change has to be cataclysmic. They are not conservative they are RADICAL and REACTIONARY. They remind me of the Ohio St fans that want to fire Jim Tressel any time the Buckeyes lose a game. Tea partiers dont want increments they want wholesale throw the bums out. Problem is they aren’t all bums. I dont like the tea party movement because I dont think many of the adherents have a grounding in reality.
When you have people over the age of 65 at health care rallies carrying signs saying “I dont want the govt in my health care”……………………….Houston we have a problem. When you have people who are suddenly “shocked” by the debt level of this country and now want to do something about it. ……………. in the middle of the greatest downturn in 70 yrs…………. morons.
Radical solutions dont mean radical activity. The tea partiers have waaaayy too many talking about watering the tree of liberty with blood, waaaayyy too many who cite founding fathers the way they cite the bible, by pulling five word phrases out of the middle and missing the coherency of the document. We dont need more unthinking activism we need way less. The tea partiers think Sarah Palin would be a good choice simply because she is NOT an insider. It is this type of reactionary drivel that will not make our fragile democracy (all are fragile no?) stronger but weaker.
2slugs, it’s time to stop the BS. Refute the points: “Raw data does not come close to matching the “adjusted” data, and the NOAA and NASA adjustments are not well documented making us think they are arbitrarily made to support the warming theory by lowering older data and raising newer.” If you do not wish to, that’s OK, but stop the diversion and obfuscation. Either do the analysis and show us your work and results, or talk to those who are and improve theirs.
Here is just one reason the points are imprtant. http://climateaudit.org/2010/01/23/nasa-hide-this-after-jim-checks-it/
For those who need the Cliff notes version, it is an article tracking the email trail at NASA, not CRU, which explains the reasoning why arbitrary adjustmenst were made to the temp data after Stephen McIntyre noted an error in the post-2000 data. At that time the hottest year in the US was 1998. After correcting the pre-2000 data the hottest year was 1934. Over time we have seen the data shifting back so the hottest years are now the current set.
Questions arise over why correcting the pre-2000 records? Why are they shifting back? Why do nearly every adjustment lower older data and then raise newer? How much can we really trust the temperature calculations? And, finally, why does 2slugs attack the independent reviewers’ analysis process while ignoring the official agencies’ data collecting/handling/processing processes? Official agency processes are needed to be cleaned up before we can confidence in the analysis, whoever does it.
We need to get individuals negotiating and trying to find better health care deals for themselves. This is where the answer lies but the democrats will never take us there since there weak on individual empowerment.
Greg, it’s been a bad week I see, and you choose to blame someone. Anyone with views other than mine? I guess you were surprised by the MA election.
A question was this in the big city or a small town? I suggest that the main difference in service may well be there, looking at the drivers license offices in TX. (Hint may be if there is a small town not to far away it may be worth going for a drive to the office) (It would be a time versus time tradeoff). In Tx they will let you charge your license plates but charge you the credit card fee in addition to the license fee. It used to be cash on the barrelhead period, but now they will take checks. I suspect that the info was actually on the web site of the DMV.
Surprised? Not really.
First off the quality of my weeks have NOTHING to do with the outcome of elections in MA nor Obamas popularity rating. This is so typical of our American right, short termism. “Yep, we’ve turned it around now, next thing you know we’ll impeach Obama throw Pelosi in jail and appoint Sarah Paln president because the American people HAVE SPOKEN!!!!!” See my football analogy above in response to Cantab. This is just like someone snickering when we have the coldest week in history down here, “YEAH!! Whats that you say about that GLOBAL WARMING BULLSHIT??!!” While on the other side of the globe (you know where its SUMMER) they are having record heat waves.
Do you care to actually address my points? Whom is it exactly that you think I am letting off the hook? Whom should I be assigning blame to?
I wasnt blaming anyone merely calling things as I see them from here.
Why was this MA election so indicative of the Tea Partys influence while two and a half months ago an election in a NY disrtict that hadnt gone democrat in over a hundred years REJECTED the Sarah Palin team is NOT viewed as a smackdown of Tea Party tactics.?
If you think I’m “blaming” the tea partiers for something (other than their own ignorance) or not properly blaming democrats for their failures, say so. Be specific. Give me a point to have a contention with.
If you want to argue that the tea party is a thoughtful, well intentioned group present your points. I’d like to have that discussion.
I’m exasperated with the ignorance in this country on all sides. Obamas ignorance in thinking that he needs to frame everything in centrist jargon, thinking that our national debt is a problem, thinking that health care reform WITHOUT a viable public option will be popular (60+ % of Scott Brown voters SUPPORT a public option) and thinking that his current financial team represents anything good. However I do believe that whatever the tea partiers have to offer right now (although Warren Mosler seems to be making a little headway with them so maybe there is hope) would be much much worse. They are just slinging poo and have no ideas for real reform. Their idea of reform is to get rid of EVERYONE. Not very constructive. Ive seen nothing that shows me they are nothing more than plain ANTI government. Whatever the hell that means.
Greg and your last comment answers your first question re: misinformation. “ Ive seen nothing that shows me they are nothing more than plain ANTI government. Whatever the hell that means.“
Here’s the basic view from the trenches, a card carrying member of the Tea Party movement. The economy is in the tank and we are bleeding jobs. Why did we concentrate on a healthcare reform bill that only ~5% of the electorate thought was important in 2008? Why did we have a stimulus bill passed that had major parts of the stimulus delayed for year two and three of the administration?
A politician that can answer these questions, make it understandable and believable to the masses, and proposes solutions to solve the jobs/economic problems will win in Nov.
To conclude, I’m not sure debating point(s) is the best approach. I do, however, think exchanging views can help expand our personal knowledge.
Slugs,
I kind of doubt that Obama will hire Dick Morris.
Then how is he going to pivot to be more like America. He comes across as a phony when he tries acting like a populist. He’s an elitist, or at least in relation to those in the community he used to try to organize. I don’t see his ticket out of Dutch. Remember your beloved Bill Clinton only got reelected with the help of Dick Morris, Timothy McVeigh, and a total lack of commitment to principled behavior. Obama is decent guy with some minor foibles but born from a fatally flawed idiological base. He’s in a lousy place with no way out.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100124/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_okinawa_election
The rise of China is drawing Japan into its orbit and out of the US orbit. The process is just beginning, but in due time Japan will be a satellite of China, not an American dependency. When we no longer occupy Japan with our military our Far East position will pretty much collapse.
warprofiteers=warmongers
http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/news/697182/Golden-couple-Brad-Pitt-amp-Angelina-Jolie-see-top-divorce-lawyer.html
Plutotrash…..for sure.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/24/china-us-iran-online-warfare
Interesting that China would aggressively defend Iran vs. the USA. This should cause some consternation in Washington. Iran appears to have a very powerful friend.
Your view from the trenches offers nothing new. Who DOESNT know the economy is in the tank and isnt upset? Who DOESNT want the job hemorrhage to stop?
Your comment on health care reform shows how ignorant most of the tea party movement is about how the economy functions. The economy is tanking largely because over 70% of bankruptcies are related to OUT OF POCKET INSURANCE COSTS! Funny thing is most of these people have fricking health insurance. So to act like measures to stop insurance companies from denying coverage or rescinding coverage does not affect the economy is stunningly ignorant. It is this kind of noise coming from the tea parties that is as stupid as it gets. Acting like you can “fix” the economy without fixing health care is laughable. Your comment about less than 5% caring about healthcare reform now is the grossest lie ever uttered. They may not like the form it has currently taken but that is another issue entirely. Over 60% of people still want a public option.
Why did we have the stimulus bill that we did? Good question. Most of it has to do with our entire political spectrum having this irrational fear of govt debt and deficits. Why? Because they dont understand them. We can blame most of the economics profession for that because they either intentionally mislead or grossly misunderstand what tools we have as a monopoly currency issuer in a floating exchange rate environment.
Debating points is really the only approach. That is the only way one can understand each others views. People dont like being wrong but we must realize that we may be. I wrote a rant a year or so ago that actually got printed as a post here. In it I remember that I commented on how ridiculous the idea of creating more debt (govt debt) to solve our debt problem was. Well if I could I would go back and totally erase that post because I was totally ignorant of what govt debt was, thanks to most of our esteemed economists. Knowing what I know now I feel a veil has been lifted from my eyes, and I have a tea bagger to thank for it Warren Mosler.
Individuals have no negotiating power with health insurance companies, only GROUPS do. Standing around and yelling “No government”, Individual responsibility” and “Freedom” is not a solution.