Yes, This Man Is Our Attorney-General.

President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all authorized electronic surveillance on a far broader scale.

-- Alberto Gonzales, testifying in a Senate Committee Hearing, February 6, 2006 (video here).

I'm sure they did, Mr. Gonzales. History Lessons:

1752 Benjamin Franklin does experiment with kite and lightning.
1775 George Washington named Commander in Chief of Revolutionary War.
1781 Revolutionary War ends when British surrender at Yorktown, Virginia.
1789 George Washington takes office as President of the United States.
1791 Bill of Rights ratified.
1797 John Adams takes office as the second President of the United States.
1798 Alien and Sedition Acts adopted.
1801 Thomas Jefferson takes office as the third President of the United States.
1801 Benjamin Franklin's grandson and others convicted under the Alien and Sedition Acts were pardoned, and the fines paid were reimbursed with interest.
1844 Telegraph invented.
1858 First transatlantic telegraph line completed.
1861 Civil War begins; First transcontinental telegraph lines opens.
1865 Abraham Lincoln Assassinated; Civil War ends.
1866 Lincoln's enemy combatant policy held unconstitutional in Ex Parte Milligan.
1867 Telegraph messages send during year nationwide approximately 5.8 million.
1869 First transcontinental railroad completed.
1876 Telephone invented.
1879 Electric light and radio invented.
1880 47,900 telephones in the United States.
1891 First automatic telephone exchange invented.
1901 Theodore Roosevelt takes office as President.
1913 Woodrow Wilson takes office as successor to Theodore Roosevelt as President.
1914 Fourth Amendment Exclusionary Rule adopted in Weeks v. United States.
1917 United States joins World War I.
1919 World War I ends.
1921 Woodrow Wilson leaves the Presidency.
1922 First radio station opened.
1927 First talking motion picture; first prototype television built.
1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt takes office as President.
1941 United States joins World War II.
1945 Franklin Delano Roosevelt dies in office; World War II ends.
1972 U.S. Supreme Court holds President is not above the law. U.S. v. Nixon.
1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) passed by Congress.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveilence Act was passed, at the request of President Ford's Administration, more than thirty years after the second President Roosevelt died in office (I presume that Mr. Gonzales meant Franklin and not Teddy). Some of Lincoln's wartime tactics were held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court even then. President Washington's wartime years preceded not only any communications use of electricity, but also the Bill of Rights.

We now know why he wasn't placed under oath. I wonder if Ken Salazar is still glad that he broke with his party to support this man's confirmation now?

Judge's Views Matter

Sentencing is an area where judges have more discretion than most other areas of law, particularly now that the U.S. Supreme Court has cast aside the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines (a fact that the Department of Justice had made it a matter of policy to ignore). Republicans and Democrats view the matter differently.

In a study of 365,000 sentences meted out between 1992 and 2001, the Republican appointees appeared to give about 10 percent more prison time for violent crimes, drug offenses and theft. . . .

The study by Northwestern School of Law professors Emerson Tiller and Max Schanzenbach will be published in the Journal of Law, Economics & Organization in 2007. . . .

"Sentence lengths for street crimes are between 7 and 9 months lower for Democrat-appointed judges."

Democrat-appointed judges tend to assign white-collar criminals higher "offense levels"--scores that reflect the seriousness of the crime--though the scholars said they couldn't detect any difference in prison terms due to statistical issues.

Notably, these differences arose while the United States Sentencing Guidelines were binding in the federal courts and the differences are likely to be even more stark now.

Hat Tip to the Sentencing Law and Policy Blog.

The Rise Of The Black Middle Class

Civil rights and racial equality haven't made a lot of headlines in the past couple of decades, and the recent ones have generally been bad news. The Civil Rights Acts were passed. We are reminded today with the death of Coretta Scott King of the civil rights movement leaders who passed. School desegregation has quietly been dismantled. And, affirmative action has faced pitched legal challenges, and has been dismantled in states like Texas and California.

But, school desegregation, affirmative action, bans on racial discrimination in the workplace and other contexts, and the benefits the children of the first post-segregation generation has received from growing up in the more prosperous households that their parents achieved has produced more results than most people realize.

The percentage of managerial and professional jobs in this country filled by blacks has gone from 5.6% in 1983, when blacks made up 9.3% of the workforce, to 8.3% in 2001, when blacks made up 11.3% of the workforce. This isn't perfect equality, but going from being 40% underrepresented to 27% underrepresented, in the managerial and professional sector, in an eighteen year period, despite the fact that many of these professions take many years to receive the necessary education to enter, is progress.

Gains have been even more pronounced in many high end managerial and professional posts. In many professions (and other relatively high end occupations), the proportion of people in the profession who are black has almost doubled in eighteen years.

Executive and Managers Overall 4.7% to 7.9%
Public Officials 8.3% to 14.5%
Financial Managers 3.5% to 6.6%
Personnel Managers 4.9% to 11.4%
Purchasing Managers 5.1% to 8.9%
Accountants 5.5% to 9.5%
Architects 1.6% to 3.1%
Engineers 2.7% to 5.5%
Operations Researchers 4.9% to 10.5%
Natural Scientists 2.6% to 4.8% (including Chemists 4.3% to 8.7%)
Physicians 3.2% to 5.6%
Respiratory Therapists 6.5% to 13.3%
College Professors 4.4% to 6.1%
Economists 6.3% to 9.6%
Clergy 4.9% to 10.7%
Lawyers and Judges 2.7% to 5.3%
Authors 2.1% to 5.0%
Musicians and Composers 7.9% to 14.7%
Painters and Sculptors 2.1% to 5.1%
Insurance Sales 3.8% to 8.1%
Real Estate Sales 1.3% to 5.2%
Securities and Financial Services Sales 3.1% to 6.9%
Protective Service Supervisors (Police and Fire) 7.7% to 17.3%
Firefighting 6.7% to 12.3%

The only large area of the economy that has seen a significant drop in the percentage of blacks employed is farming, foresty and fishing, where the percentage of black employees has gone from 7.5% to 5.0%. The proportion of farm operators and managers who are black is down 30%, and the proportion of lumberjacks who are black has fallen from 12.8% to 7.4%. No doubt blacks employed in those fields have gone onto bigger and better things, by and large.

Blacks and whites alike have made big gains in educational attainment in this time frame as well, with blacks closing the gap which does still exist. In 1980, 68.8% of adult whites and 51.2% of adult blacks were high school graduates (26% less). In 2000, 84.9% of whites and 78.5% of blacks were (8% less). In 1980, 17.1% of adult whites were college graduates, while 8.4% of blacks were (50% less). In 2000, 26.1% of white adults were college graduates, while 16.5% of blacks were (37% less). Indeed, essentially all of black underrepresentation in the managerial and professional class (although not necessarily in particular professions) is attributable to a deficit in blacks who have graduated from college.

Blacks in the United States are still more likely to have lower end jobs than whites. But, the gains made in less than eighteen years have been remarkable and widespread. The numbers also point the way towards closing that gap even further, which is to increase the percentage of black children who graduate from college.

The numbers also cast real doubt on the claims of those, like the authors of the book, "The Bell Curve", who identify claimed differences in intelligence between the races, as what is, on average, holding back black economic progress. If the problems were that innate, you wouldn't see such dramatic changes in less than a generation.

Flying Pig Warning

Conditions are ripe for observations of flying pigs. General Motors is cutting the pay of its top executives. Republicans in the Senate are showing backbone and outrage in questioning the Bush Administration's policy of ignoring the law to violate civil liberties in its war on terror, and have expressed grave doubts about his proposed budget. And, it is so warm in the Arctic village of Iqualuit, Canada that Airbus may be unable to conduct its planned cold weather tests there.

Presidentially Ordered Domestic Assassinations?

Can the President order an assassination in the United States? The administration thinks that he can. I don't. Here is a common counter-example that I'll use to explore what I mean when I say that (largely reprinted from a comment I made at Talk Left).

"Did they not already do this when Cheney ordered that a hijaked airplane be shot down over PA? It would have killed not only the hijackers but all the passengers as well."

The hijaked airplane was en route to crashing into a building and killing more people, who would die anyway if no action was taken. Bringing down that plane would have been just as lawful, under general principles of criminal law, if a private citizen, overhearing radio traffic, understood what was going on, rammed his own private plane into the hijacked aircraft causing it to crash and somehow escaped alive.

The use of deadly force in true self-defense (and the related defense of others) from an unavoidable deadly threat actually in progress is uncontroversial, particularly in a case like that where the choice of evils (everybody on the plane dies, or everybody on the plane and everybody on the ground where it hits dies) is clear.

But, FBI directors, judges, mayors and sheriffs almost never give orders to kill somebody within the U.S. The lawful and usual order is to use the force necessary to arrest a dangerous person, either someone who has committed a crime or someone who is attempting to commit a crime (which is itself a crime). Deadly force might be justified in making that arrest if necessary to prevent imminent harm to the person making the arrest or others, in the immediate circumstance, but this isn't something that is lawfully ordered up front.

But, this is war, you say. The AUMF (authorization of use of military force [against Al-Queda passed shortly after 9-11]) makes it legal. Not so fast. The AUMF authorizes necessary force. It is very, very hard to imagine any scenario where an assassination ordered by the President in advance is necessary in a place where the courts are functioning in the United States, in circumstances which would not be lawful in the absence of a Presidential order.

Does the President assert the right to, for example, assassinate someone acquitted of terrorist conduct in a court of law, because he thinks he know that the person is guilty and will commit another terrorist act, because the legal system is unavailable for vindicating the past offense? Could the President order the assassination of one of a proposed terrorists three innocent infant children to show that he is serious and will kill the others if the alleged terrorist doesn't comply? Do we want to not only negotiate with terrorists but negotiate like terrorists? You can spin hypotheticals all you want, I don't think that there is ever a legitimate siutation when it is necessary for a Presidential assassination of a terrorist suspect (which is all that has been claimed so far) ordered in advance on U.S. soil.

The United States (and indeed, most of the civilized world) is not currently a battlefield, no matter how paranoid national security official might get. It was, in certain places, during the Civil War, it isn't now. Orders to kill are made by military offiers, against well defined enemies, in places where killing is necessary because there is insufficient law and order to try and arrest someone. Obviously, it is impossible for Marines to arrest German soldiers in a pillbox with a machine gun atop the cliffs of Normandy. Obviously, arrests can turn bad when the subject of the arrest pulls a gun and prepares to fire back, instead of surrendering. Obviously sailors in one boat can't arrest the soldiers in another boat that is firing upon them (or that they know would fire upon them if it knew they were there). But, these necessities either can be foreseen in advance as certain to happen, or don't come up at all, in places where law and order prevail and the courts are functioning.

Shining Light On Judgment Calls

Does the president, in your opinion, have the authority, acting as commander in chief, to authorize warrantless searches of Americans' homes and wiretaps of their conversations in violation of the criminal and foreign intelligence surveillance statutes of this country?

GONZALES: Senator, the August 30th memo has been withdrawn. It has been rejected, including that section regarding the commander in chief authority to ignore the criminal statutes.

. . . And so what we're really discussing is a hypothetical situation that...

FEINGOLD: Judge Gonzales, I've asked a broader question. I'm asking whether, in general, the president has constitutional authority -- does he at least in theory have the authority to authorize violations of the criminal law when there are duly enacted statutes, simply because he's commander in chief?

FEINGOLD: Does he have that power?

GONZALES: Senator, in my judgment, you phrase it as sort of a hypothetical situation. I would have to know what is the national interest that the president may have to consider.

What I'm saying is, it is impossible to me, based upon the question as you've presented it to me, to answer that question.

I can say is that there is a presumption of constitutionality with respect to any statute passed by Congress. I will take an oath to defend the statutes.

And to the extent that there is a decision made to ignore a statute, I consider that a very significant decision and one that I would personally be involved with, I commit to you on that, and one we would take with a great deal of care and seriousness.

FEINGOLD: Well, that sounds to me like the president still remains above the law.

GONZALES: No, sir.

From here.

The President is also fond of signing statements in connection with legislation basically stating that he will not follow it.

How about this for a law?

The President (and all other members of the executive branch) is only entitled to act contrary to a law passed by Congress on the grounds that it is unconstitutional, either as applied, or on its face, by applying for a declaratory judgment in a federal court, that the law is unconstitutional. Any official who ignores a law on the grounds that it is unconstitutional, in the absence of the pendency or favorable determination of such an action, is subject to both criminal prosecution and to liability for civil damages for any harm resulting to any person from such violation. This could be enacted with a basis, among others, of the Congress's enforcement power under the 14th Amendment. Any statute of limitations for criminal prosecution would be stayed until a new President has taken office.

This serves two purposes. First, it forces decisions to ignore the law to be made public, and second, it forces those decisions to be made by the judicial branch, which is charged with interpreting legal disputes, and any case in which a President chooses to ignore a Congressionally enacted statute is ipso facto a dispute regarding the interpretation of the law.

Private Bit Taxes

When the government doesn't tax something, private industry will. AOL has introduced its own bit tax on mass e-mailings to stop SPAM.

God and Marriage

Colorado Springs is home to Focus on the Family and other nationally known evangelical Christian groups. It is in El Paso County, Colorado. Does the moral influence of these institutions impact the locals? Apparently, their negative moral influence does have an impact:

[T]he divorce rate in El Paso County is as high as 70 percent. That's—more than anywhere in Colorado, which has the fifth-highest divorce rate in the nation. . . .
[D]espite our well-established reputation as Scripture Central, we actually are a city of heathens. Only 21 percent of us actually go to a house of worship on any given weekend, well below the national average of 35 percent. . . "The notion that Colorado Springs is a religious city is a mega-misnomer. We have a ton of religious organizations, but we do not have a very spiritual city."

Focus on your own damn family.

Hat Tip to SoapBlox Colorado.

Another Take On The QDR

Thomas P.M. Barnett on the QDR:

It is unsustainable to buy a Big War force in a Small War world. It is unsustainable to expect the Chinese to pay for a Big War force directed primarily against them. It is unsustainable to deny ourselves the aid of major allies, to include China most of all (that body shop of a military). It is unsustainable not to do a better job gaining acceptance of our new security rule sets in this Long War because we’re so highhanded and arrogant in our application. . . . When the Navy brags how its huge destroyers are justified because they can also insert SEALs, you know strategic logic has left the building.

Hat Tip to Defense Tech.

Many more views here.

Who Is In Guantanamo?

The administration hasn't been honest about who it has held at Guantanamo Bay. The National Journal magazine sums up some of the facts:

A high percentage, perhaps the majority, of the 500-odd men now held at Guantanamo were not captured on any battlefield, let alone on "the battlefield in Afghanistan" (as Bush asserted) while "trying to kill American forces" (as McClellan claimed).

Fewer than 20 percent of the Guantanamo detainees, the best available evidence suggests, have ever been Qaeda members.

Many scores, and perhaps hundreds, of the detainees were not even Taliban foot soldiers, let alone Qaeda terrorists. They were innocent, wrongly seized noncombatants with no intention of joining the Qaeda campaign to murder Americans.

The majority were not captured by U.S. forces but rather handed over by reward-seeking Pakistanis and Afghan warlords and by villagers of highly doubtful reliability. . . . [W]ell over half . . . are not even accused of fighting the United States or its allies on any battlefield in post-9/11 Afghanistan or anywhere else.

Indeed, only 35 percent of them . . . were seized in Afghanistan; 55 percent were picked up by Pakistanis in Pakistan. . . . The tribunal hearings, based largely on such guilt-by-association logic, have been travesties of unfairness. The detainees are presumed guilty unless they can prove their innocence -- without help from lawyers and without being permitted to know the details and sources of the evidence against them. This evidence is almost entirely hearsay from people without firsthand knowledge and statements from other detainees desperate to satisfy their brutally coercive interrogators. One file says, "Admitted to knowing Osama bin Laden," based on an interrogation in which the detainee -- while being pressed to "admit" this, despite his denials -- finally said in disgust, "OK, I knew him; whatever you want." . . . . [Many] detainees who had no information -- because they had no involvement in or knowledge of terrorism -- have been put through "humiliating acts, solitary confinement, temperature extremes, use of forced positions" in a systematic effort to break their wills that is "tantamount to torture," the International Committee of the Red Cross complained in a confidential report to the government, excerpts of which The New York Times obtained in November 2004.

Guantanamo Bay is un-American. George W. Bush, and those who helped him set into motion the abusive techniques that his administration has used have tarnished our nation, damaged our national security and committed war crimes.

Hick Out

The Rocky Mountain News has announced that John Hickenlooper, Mayor of Denver, will not be running for Governor. This contradicts strong rumors reported Saturday at Colorado Pols.

With the elephant now out of the living room, any other contenders for the Gubinatorial race on the Democratic side, now the sole province of former Denver District Attorney Bill Ritter, will have to step up to the plate. Alice Madden and Gary Lindstrom have both talked about filling the pro-choice void in the Democratic Party Governor's race, but both are far behind Ritter is rounding up support, and a recent speech from Ken Salazar urging Democrats to clear the field for one candidate also suggests that he himself isn't running (given Ritter's determination not to leave the race voluntarily).

Colorado's Boundaries Should Change

Coyote Gulch notes that:

Explorer John Wesley Powell recognized 150 years ago the need to organize the West along the lines of watersheds, rather than the state and county divisions of the East . . . He knew water would drive politics. Unfortunately, nobody listened...

Ed Quillen at the Post also recently noted that in Colorado "our county boundaries were not carved in stone" noting numerous examples from our history as background for the sensible notion of creating a unified City and County of Aurora, along the lines of the governments already established in Denver and Broomfield. He also notes the tangle of boundaries the exist in the mountains, although he doesn't on this occassion note the inequities this has causes by failing to match the tax revenues generated by tourism in the mountains with the service needs of the workers in the tourism industry who often reside in neighboring jurisdictions because they can't afford to live in resort real estate on their incomes. He states:

Let's hope the Aurora movement starts something that extends statewide and brings our map into alignment with today's Colorado.

Once again, Quillen is on the right track.

Nothing To Hide?

This Modern World aptly notes that this administration, while feeling free to invade our privacy, is very jealous of its own secrets.

2007 Federal Budget Proposal

For all you policy wonks out there, Tax Profs Blog has links to all the key original documents related to the President's 2007 federal budget.

For the non-policy wonks out there, the big picture is:

* A record budget deficit in excess of $400 billion
* A record high defense budget (which excludes funding for Iraq or Afghanistan)
* Hefty cuts for Medicare providers
* Scads of cuts in other domestic spending (mostly social programs)
* The President still seeks to make his tax cuts permanent

Given the fact that this is an election year, I'd be surprised to see the adopted budget look very similar to the President's budget.

Chaos Manor Wash Park

One of my dad's old computer magazines, Byte, had a column called Chaos Manor by Jerry Pournelle that described the trials and tribulations of life, a healthy portion of which involved trying to keep a set of computers running, and life hasn't changed that much in twenty years or so of computing. The rest of the magazine was utterly incomprehensible to a layperson (and quite frankly, I don't think my dad read those stories with much comprehension either), but the Chaos Manor column did ring true every time. (Pournelle still runs a blog based on the column which takes voluntary contributions and is syndicated through some online versions of the magazine.) My generation's do it yourselfers fix computers instead of cars and face essentially the same challenges. They did oil changes. We root out computer viruses.

Here in Washington Park, the challenge is to keep my laptop, two desktop computers, a Wi-Fi network running off a DSL connection, three printers (a laser, an inkjet and a photoprinter), two digital cameras from different companies, a web cam, and several kinds of storage media and displays operating harmoniously. On occasion, one or more of these computers needs to interact with other people's computers, generally via e-mail or the web.

Over time, I've made a number of strategic decisions to move this along. At one point we had a Mac, a Windows 2000 machine and a Windows XP machine. This was too hard. Now, all three computers run Windows XP, which isn't necessarily the best operating system. Windows XP is far less reliable than Macs or Linux, and is more prone to evil software (and has numerous annoying features and hogs memory), but it is consistent across all of the computers in the house and is also what I use in the office. I've also stuck with the genuine Microsoft Office programs, rather than open source alternatives or Microsoft Works or Wordperfect, for the same limited brain power reasons -- I need to use MS Office at work, and don't want to have to do something different at home. Open Office or Microsoft Works would be free, and Workperfect is actually much easier to control formatting in, but compatibility and the desire to learn only one program are hard masters.

We've essentially banished 3.5" disks from our system (along with the VCR tapes that were obsolete when we replaced our dead VCR machine with a DVD player), and the residual Zip drive will probably be the next to go, even though the Zip drive interface and data writing speed are far superior to CD-ROMs, which are on all of the computers in the house. The Zip drive has been superseded by a USB drive which has comparable performance and doesn't require us to purchase a separate Zip drive for every computer in the house.

This weekend, after weeks of frustration with the speed of the internet connection on one of the desktops, we upgraded the wireless network from the "b" version which transmits at 11 megabytes per second, to the "g" version which transmits at 54; established a password in an effort to control any speed loss due to poaching (after spending considerable time trying to figure out what passwords were allowed in a hexidecimal key); installed a free anti-spyware program recommended by Microsoft (which didn't appear to find any spyware); did a virus scan using updated virus definitions (which didn't find any viruses); emptied all offline content and temporary internet files; uninstalled a number of promotional programs that we've never used that came with the computer; and emptied the recycling bin. We have also recently changed DSL providers from Earthlink (which charged too much and failed even after receiving a couple of complaint calls to honor the deal we were signed up for originally) to Qwest, and this was the weekend we officially installed the software that stated that it was activating our new account and called Earthlink to shut down the old one. Which of those steps helped, I have no idea. Maybe, the frequent restarts of the problem computer as various programs and hardware were installed was the key. But, by the end of the weekend the recalcitrant computer was working and the lightbulb in the room with the computer which had burned out as I was working on it had been replaced as well.

The world of digital photography has proven less promising in the past week or so. On the good side, we have figured out how to print from both of our cameras, despite their differing memory card formats, directly to the photoprinter, and can also upload photos from the cameras to two of the computers in the house. On the down side, printing from photos on a computers to the photoprinter is more problematic. The photoprinter, the web cam, and each of the cameras come with their own set of photo managing software, in addition to the software built into Windows XP to start with, and getting them all to cooperate has proven to be more of a chore than expected. So, that's next weekend's project.

Still, at the moment, the home system has fewer glitches than the work in progress which is the office system which everyone who works there collectively shepherds, so I can't complain.

What Is Wrong With The Legal System?

Rebecca Love Kourlis, who recently retired from the Colorado Supreme Court to serve as founding director of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System based at the University of Denver, recently offered some cogent observations, mostly well within the mainstream of people who have seen the legal system at work up close, on what is wrong with the system now, on the radio interview program Colorado Matters (February 2, 2006).

The QDR and the Alternatives

You may want to review the text of the Quadrennial Defense Review (113 pages) and a "progressive" alternative (108 pages) from the Center For American Progress. (I use scare quotes around the word progressive, above, because I don't see the issues raised by the alternative report as terribly partisan, for the most part).

The main recommendations of the alternative:

* Add 86,000 soldiers to the Army. The Army's share of the "baseline budget" should grow from 24% to 28%.
* The Marine Corps should have 185,000 soldiers and 40,000 reserves.
* There should be ten carrier battle groups (down from 11).
* There should be eighteen Air Force Tactical Fighter Wings (down from 19).
* "Back door drafts" through stop loss orders and "selective reserve" recall should be curtailed.
* "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" should be repealed, with gays treated equally.
* The ban on women in combat should end.
* Funding should continue for the F-35, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), the B-2 bomber, the Army's Future Combat System, the Stryker Interim Armored Vehicle, the CVN-21 Aircraft Carrier, and the Littoral Combat Ship.
* Development and production should end for the F-22 Raptor fighter jet, the Virginia class submarine, the DD(X) destroyer, the V-22 Osprey, the C-130J transport, offensive space based weapons and the National Missile Defense System.
* Nuclear forces should be limited to 600 combined warheads plus 400 in reserve and arms talks with Russia should resume. Research on nuclear bunker buster weapons should end.
* First responders should be kept out of the selected reserves. Funding on homeland defense should double to $20 billion, and the National Guard's role should shift from being a backup to the active duty force to being "a protector of the homeland in case of a large scale natural or man-made disaster." The National Guard should focus on light infantry, military police and combat support, rather than roles such as armor or artillery. The command and control of the National Guard should be improved.
* Defense Intelligence services should be better integrated with the Direction of National Intelligence. Department of Defense covert operations should be conducted in accordance with United States law.

I wouldn't make exactly the same recommendations as the "alternative report" but it is closer to the mark. In particular, recognizing that the Army needs more personnel, that the blue sea Navy and the fighter wings of the Air Force can afford to be slimmer, that both the "back door draft" and "don't ask, don't tell" are bad policies, that the Virginia submarine program is too large and too expensive per unit (although I'm not sure that eliminating it entirely and immediately is the best call), that the Littoral Combat Ship should continue development and production, that the DD(X) needs to be cancelled, that National Missile Defense needs to be curtailed (again I'm not sure I would kill the entire program, but it needs to be trimmed materially), that the National Guard needs to be refocused on a light homeland defense role, and that covert operations should be conducted in accordance with U.S. law, are all good starting points.

My Proposal

What would I propose?

Army

The Army is heavily taxed and needs to be expanded. But, an increase of 250,000 soldiers is closer to the mark. Why? First, because the demands placed on the Army require that kind of increase simply to keep up with the current pace of operations, and second, because it reflects the likelihood that future military operations will involve peacekeeping, counterinsurgency missions, and asymmetric warfare with opponents who do not have massive conventional military forces (why would anyone, short perhaps of China, take on the U.S. military in that kind of fight?).

About a division's worth (about 50,000) of the new forces would be rapid reaction forces serving a role similar to the 82nd and 101st Airborne divisions, that could be deployed entirely by aircraft, because those units have consistently been the most frequently called upon in the Army. But, this unit would be designed to enter via field airstrips rather than airdrop, and would outfitted with the heaviest armaments possible for completely air deployed forces (as both the 82nd and 101st Airborne divisions are sometimes not entirely inaccurately viewed as "speed bumps" in the face of serious opposition). This would give the Army a combined rapid reaction force comparable in size to that of the Marines, who are also rapidly deployable.

Another 50,000 troops worth ought to be designed to provide a core of linguistically trained and culturally aware troops for every region in the world. In peacetime, they would serve as embassy guards and skeleton crews of "Lily Pad" bases with caches of equipment ready should a real conflict arise in the area. In times of war, they would be dispersed throughout other units providing as many officers as possible with a loyal, linguistically able, and culturally savy aid all the way down to the Platoon or Company level, if possible. Rather than being "special forces" designed to operate in small units autonomously, these would be primarily "modular forces" which would augment the capabilities of conventional units with which they deploy.

The balance would be divided into 8-10 Brigade combat teams equipped and trained primarily for peacekeeping and counterinsurgency work, the most common task that modern military forces are called upon to carry out, but on that very few U.S. units are designed from the ground up to address. Commanders developing the new units should be given considerable lattitude to procure new kinds of vehicles or armaments to serve the needs of their units. Each would have some limited regional specialty, for example, for tropical or desert or mountain environments, although all would be capable of deploying anywhere.

The Army also needs a weapons development program that is less speculative than the Future Combat System, whose usefulness is impaired by the long time lines and high cost involved in developing revolutionary systems. Less ambitious programs, like improved rifles, improved side arms, improved body armor, sub-C-130 sized short takeoff and landing transport aircraft to improve upon transport helicopters in range and reliability where field airstrips are available, more rapid deployment of armored trucks, and greater use a UAVs for reconnaisance and light attack roles are more important than a grand plan.

Particularly attention should be given to developing Army point defense systems which intercept mortar rounds, artillery rounds and light missiles, which are starting to come into their own.

The Army should also be given control over development programs for high speed sea lift ships and airships, both of which are crucial to filling the logistics gap between expensive, low capacity airlift, and cheap, high capacity sealifts. The Army as the main user of these new resources, rather than the Navy or Air Force, should guide this development, to insure that their capabilities are well integrated with the forces that they will transport.

Navy

One the George H.W. Bush replaces the Kitty Hawk, there will be ten Nimitz class aircraft carriers in the United States Navy, the first of which is not planned for decommissioning until 2025. We should retire the Enterprise and John F. Kennedy as well, leaving us ten aircraft carriers, and defer until 2017 or so, the question of how those ten should be replaced, when we will be in a better position to evaluate evolving technologies and military threats. The F-35C replacement of the F-18 carrier aircraft should also continue. Military experts continue to express strong support for the value of these supercarriers and this support should be respected. Thus, only a modest reduction in the size of the carrier fleet is proposed. The Navy should also continue development of a UAV replacement of manned carrier based fighter aircraft.

The U.S. Navy already has plenty of surface combatants to escort these ten carriers. In 2007, it will have 22 Ticonderoga class cruisers (the first of which is scheduled to be decommissioned in 2026), and at least 43 Areligh Burke class destroyers (by my calculations there are 17 additional members of this class under construction), none of which are due to be decommissioned until 2026 either. This is more than sufficient for a ten carrier force, even with the last of the Spruance class destroyers scheduled to be decommissioned this year and all of the Navy's the Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates being decommissioned, and the DD(X) being cancelled, while leaving a couple of cruiser/destroyer class ships free to escort ships each amphibious assault ship group, and a handful free to roam the seas detached from a larger unit. Again, there is no reason to build or even start development on another blue sea surface combatant prior to 2017. The U.S. Navy is unrivaled in this regard and the technologies and threats need to mature so that the Navy purchases what it really needs when the time comes.

The U.S. has, at least, one Virginia class nuclear attack submarine, three Seawolf class nuclear attack submarines, and fifty Los Angeles class nuclear attack submarines, although one or two Virginia class nuclear attack submarines may have been built since I last looked into the issue. I share the view of critics who argue that the Virginia, like its predecessor, the Seawolf, is still too big, too costly and insufficiently tailored to the threats we face and needs to be cancelled soon, probably, at least by the time we have four of them, with the construction pace slowed to one every couple of years (with the program ending by 2009). Not all Los Angeles class submarines that are decommissioned, starting in 2009, would be replaced. A modestly smaller nuclear attack submarine force makes sense in light of the limited Naval opposition faced by U.S. forces worldwide and the immense cost of new Virginia class submarines. The U.S. should instead, look into adding a modest number of much smaller diesel power submarines similar to those used by Sweden, perhaps a dozen submarines of about 1,500 tons each to its fleet, to diversify the force and add a niche resources to the fleet at a modest cost. In the meantime, the Navy needs to do more soul searching regarding the future of the nuclear powered submarine fleet. It may want to consider an attack submarine smaller and less expensive than any of our existing classes, and it may also want to consider roles other than attacking ships and submarines for nuclear powered submarines. Existing plans to convert four of the nation's Ohio class nuclear missile submarines to conventional weapons also make sense.

The real decision point for the U.S. Navy, however, involves its amphibious forces. The Navy's five Tarawa class amphibious assault ships (read mini-carriers) are 26-30 years old and we are on the verge of committing to a very expensive program, called the LHA(R) (whose very name and the lack of development work to date, shows the service's limited excitement about the program). At the end of this year, the Navy will have eight other mini-carriers, of the Wasp class, and whether the Navy really needs more is in doubt.

The Navy has four amphibious force command ships, which carry neither significant numbers of troops nor other offensive capabilities, that range of 34-42 years old, whose usefulness in the age of telecommunications is doubtful, and which are not currently scheduled to be replaced.

The Navy is in the process of replacing its Austin class amphibious landing ships (troop and gear carriers with landing craft) with a dozen San Antonio class ships, the first of which was delivered last year, six more of which are on order, and five more of which are planned. But, the first San Antonio class ship delivered has been seriously flawed.

I would favor downsizing the Navy's amphibious fleet from 12 amphibious assault ships to eight, cancelling the LHA(R) program entirely, and in connection with that cancellation, cutting the buy of San Antonio class ships from twelve to four. This would leave the Navy with two amphibious ships for each amphibious assault ship (the current ratio), while downsizing that part of the fleet by a third (and in addition eliminating the command ships). Instead, the resources that might have gone into further amphibious assault ships would be divided to the new airborne division in the Army, in recognition of the fact that amphibious assaults against heavily defended coasts are no longer the mainstay of the Marine's mission.

The development of the Littoral Combat Ship would continue with an eventual buy of 48-60 of the ships, in order to develop the nation's brown water Navy capabilities, being in order.

The other capability that bears research and development effort is the notion of building perhaps eight to twelve ships whose purpose is to serve in a missile defense role, as tests of Naval systems have been much more succesful than those of the Air Force, whose missile defense efforts have been so dismal that they should be cancelled entirely. But, the Navy should not try to fit these ships into the CG(X) framework currently proposed. If it can achieve its objective by converting existing destroyers, cruisers or submarines, it should do so. If it needs to start from scratch, it should build the ship that best serves a missile defense role.

Overall, this plan calls for a major reduction in ship building. All but half a dozen non-LCS ship orders would be cancelled. while the only new ships in the near future would a dozen small diesel powered submarines. This reduction in the size of the Navy that reflects the limited Naval threat that the United States currently faces. I would anticipate a reduction in Naval personnel on the order of 70,000-80,000 under this plan. The Department of Defense should also investigate the possiblity in the medium term of decommissioning even more surface combatants, whose principal weapons are their cruise missiles, with aircraft based cruise missiles, perhaps on some form of transport bomber, which could take over much of the anti-ship and anti-ground roles served by cruise missiles on the existing fleet.

Air Force

The current plan to cap the F-22 force at about 182 planes is reasonable. This is a good replacement for the existing F-117 and F-15 force, in the air to air combat and critical target strike roles.

It also makes sense to replace much of the aging F-16 fleet with the F-35A, a similar plane, which is modestly more capable and built to be cheaper to maintain. But, it isn't clear that the full proposed buy of F-35As is appropriate. On one hand, the F-35A was originally proposed to replace not only the F-16 multipurpose fighter, but also the A-10 close air support attack plane, and it is a poor replacement in that role. So, some of the F-35A buy should be cut to free up funds for a couple hundred next generation replacements for the A-10 and AC-130 in the close air support role. Another role commonly served by the existing F-16 is to patrol the skys above major American cities to protect them against errant civilian aircraft (from hijacked airliners or helicopters, to crop dusters, to general aviation aircraft used for terrorist purposes). This role would be better served by replacing F-16s in Air National Guard service not with F-35As, but with a couple hundred much cheaper (to buy and maintain) Homeland Defense Interceptors, with less aerobatic capability, lighter armaments, sensors less enhanced to overcome sophisticated jamming efforts and less peak speed, which would still be more than sufficient to overcome any civilian aircraft, even if modified for terrorist purposes.

Also, as it becomes clear than unmanned combat aircraft are technologically viable and in some respects may be more capable than manned fighter aircraft, it may also be appropriate to replace a significant share of the planned F-35A buy with unmanned combat aircraft that serve a similar purpose. The exact numbers for this replacement depend to a great extent on how capably the unmanned vehicle performs.

Finally, it simply isn't clear that the United States needs quite as many fighters as it did when it was preparing to fighter the Cold War, and a modest reduction in the size of the fighter force, as well as a shift in its character would be appropriate.

The Air Force has been trying to cut the size of its B-52 fleet for some time, and it is one of the oldest set of aircraft in military service. But, they have also proven very effective in every recent military campaign, dropping a large proportion of the total ordinance loads despite making up only a tiny part of the total number of planes flying sorties. They are also the one of the few kinds of planes that treaty obligations and capabilities make available for carrying nuclear weapons and cruise missiles. A cruise missile carried on a B-52 can much more quickly be shifted from one theater to another, while putting far fewer U.S. military personnel in harm's way, than the other main vehicles for carrying them Naval destroyers, cruisers and submarines. Thus, while it may be time to downsize the B-52 fleet, this fleet, which has provided more combat effectiveness than most of the rest of the Air Force, despite being underutilized to some extent, needs to be replaced with an alternative bomber designed for high volume, low risk missions. The net number of planes might be similar, but the replacements would likely have larger payloads and greater fuel efficiency.

There are two classes of planes for which the Air Force faces acute shortages. These are airlift planes and electronic warfare planes (AWACS, electronic countermeasures, and electronic intelligence).

The Air Force needs scores of additional C-17s to meet its obligations (and will need even more if a new air transportable division is created in the Army). It also needs more intratheater transports, and the C-130J has proven to be a technological flop. Ideally, a plane with more capacity than the C-130 (perhaps 40 tons v. 19 tons on a C-130 and 70 tons on a C-17) and a little shorter takeoff and landing requirement than a C-130, so that it could carry just about any Army vehicle other than an M1 tank off a crude field airstrip, would replace the venerable C-130. Ideally, this new transport would also come in a seaplane version which could deliver Marine Expeditionary Vehicles (armored personnel carriers able to function as fairly high speed boats) to lakes or coasts, to deliver Marines to amphibious assault fleets just in time for the invasion (without having to have sat on the ships for weeks getting there) and to serve in a search and rescue function for ranges much longer and much larger rescue capacities than helicopters. Hundreds of new conventional intratheater airplanes and dozens of the seaplane version should be purchased.

The Air Force also needs a large number of new tanker aircraft, both to replace aging ones, and to serve the shorter range transports added to the air fleet.

As noted before, the Air Force role in missile defense should end for the time being, until the relevant technologies (such as airborn lasers and ground based interceptor missiles) can mature.

The real QDR anticipates 40,000 layoffs in the Air Force. I suspect that the net effect of my proposals would be similar. Most reductions in fighter and older bomber aircraft would be matched by additional new bombers and transport planes.

Marines

Military planners have generally given the Marines a light touch. Increasing the size of the force would harm its elite character, shrinking the force would reduce the size of a military resource that has been called upon time and again. This basic reasoning is sound. Unlike the planners in the "alternative" QDR noted above, I think that the V-22 Osprey has gotten most of the kinks worked out of it, although the cost of the program makes a buy as large as originally planned probably unworkable. Instead, the Marines should buy, perhaps half as many V-22s, and supplement it with small intratheater STOL planes (similar in size to the Army Sherpa plane now) which would be cheaper and more reliable and could be developed jointly. The V-22 fills a useful niche with its long range and verticle landing abilities, but the niche isn't as large as the proposed buy of very expensive and tempermental V-22s.

The F-35B, a verticle landing fighter plane for use in close air support and mini-carrier landings is also a reasonable replacement for the Marines' current AV-8B Harrier force.

The Marine Expeditionary Vehicle, which would eliminate the need for landing craft in amphibious operations, also appears to be making solid technological progress and should continue to be funded, as should a small wheeled vehicle designed to be carried on the V-22 or Marine helicopters (so Marines don't have to hoof it once they arrive at their destinations).

As noted above, however, the need a Cold War sized amphibious assault Naval fleet no longer exists, and this should be trimmed by at least a third. Modern Marines will more often arrive by air than sea.

National Guard

The National Guard, as noted above, should be converted to a primarily homeland defense/disaster response role, and should serve in light infantry, military police and combat support roles (supplementing Army units created for that primary purpose in this plan) rather than in heavier conventional combat roles. They would be available to be called up only after other reserve forces were exhausted.

Much of the existing Air National Guard would be transferred to the Air Force Reserves, with the Air National Guard integrated into the Army National Guard and limited primarily to transport, reconnaisance, and protecting metropolitan areas from errant civilian aircraft.

The U.S. military should also be willing to expend considerable procurement dollars to develop military systems and vehicles designed for a homeland defense role, rather than having the National Guard simply serve as a dumping ground for the hand me downs that the active duty forces no longer want or need.

Overall Impact

Overall, my vision of the military calls for a somewhat larger force (perhaps increasing it in size from about 1.4 million active duty personnel now to 1.5 million activity duty personnel), but with a 50% larger Army, and a 20% smaller Navy and a 10% smaller Air Force. Pay and benefits for military personnel might have to be increased to meet these goals. But, this still would remain a far smaller force than the Cold War military which had about 2.1 million troops.

But, this proposal would also reduce the military budget, with the bulk of the cost reductions coming from Naval ship and submarine purchases, a reduction in the size of the F-35A budget, termination of the Air Force part of the National Missile Defense program, and a reduction in the size of the V-22 budget, offset to a meaningful extent by increased purchases of transport aircraft, transport bombers, tanker aircraft, electronic warfare aircraft, and an A-10 replacement, as well as other smaller programs such as diesel submarine purchases and new Army and National Guard equipment.

Suburbs + Megachurches = Malaise

[T]he religion of the suburbs - and of conservative Protestants in general - is a roadblock in the evolution of spiritual development.

according to David Goetz, author of "Death by Suburb: How to Keep the Suburbs From Killing Your Soul."

The main indictments? Materialism and shallowness.

Health Notes

Stem cells are successfully treating lupus and are the only plausible new cure in sight (which is important since not everyone continues to respond to current treatments). The Bush Administration aparently would prefer that people with lupus sufferer, because the Bush administration opposes stem cell research. Lupus affects 1.5 million Americans, 90% of them women, and about 80% of cases first strike women from age 15-45. While it rarely kills, the autoimmune disease does greatly impair the lifestyle of those who suffer from it and is very expensive to treat (the average is $6,000-$10,000 a treatment per year, and in some cases costs exceed several thousand dollars per month). The proposed treatment would be targetted at those who are unresponsive to drugs, the most likely type of lupus sufferers to die from the disease.

New vaccines stop 85 percent or more of rotavirus infections, an infection that causes a diarrhea that kills more than half a million children each year worldwide.

An experimental vaccine may protect people from ricin, a castor seed based poison that is a prime biological weapon candidate.

Hat tips to Science News.

Bill Clinton v. George W. Bush: The Military

Bill Clinton will be remembered in the history books as a peace and prosperity President who balanced the budget. George W. Bush has made clear that he is a war president, the economy has struggled during his tenure, and the federal budget deficit has soared.

One would expect to have seen a huge difference between in the size of the military between the two administrations, as one has in every other significant war fought in the history of the United States. Compare the number of active duty military personnel in 2001, the last year impacted by Bill Clinton's policies, and the number of active duty military personnel in 2005.

The overall number has increased, but by only 0.6%. The Army's personnel levels are up 2% from 2001. The Air Force personnel levels are up 2% from 2001. The Navy personnel levels are down 3.5% from 2001. And, the Marines personnel levels are up 2.6% from 2001. Moreover, both 2004 and 2005 have seen reductions in active duty personnel levels from the preceding year. The difference of course, is that since the 2001 figures, Bush was commenced two wars, one in Afghanistan and another in Iraq.

It appears that these numbers do not include reserve and guard troops called up on active duty. The figures available to me show about 221,300 reserve and guard troops called up at any one time to fight in Iraq (or replace troops that are doing so), an increase of about 15.9% over the size of the force without them. The additional personnel has come almost entirely from the guard and reserves, despite the fact that the President refuses to talk about a withdrawal schedule, the Department of Defense is talking about "the Long War", and that one admiral has told troops to hunker down for a thirty year conflict (hyperbole, perhaps, but also hardly the words of an official who thinks this is a temporary drain on military resources). There is a disconnect between the time frames in administration rhetoric which talk about being in Iraq for years or even decades, and the administration's actions, which has been looking to sources available for only brief time, to fight the conflict.

The word on the street is that the Quadrennial Defense Review does little to change this state affairs, defeating expectations that the size of the Army would be increased, through corresponding decreases in the size of the far less stressed Navy and Air Force. It is gearing up to fight a major war with China, not extended counterinsurgency missions in the Middle East.

Spending has not been so stable. In 2001, the Defense budget was $307.9 billion. In 2005, it was $400.1 billion, excluding expenses for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is an increase of 30%. Again, this is not spending for the wars (the administration estimates that war expenses will be $120 billion on top of the regular defense budget in 2006). This is largely spending on some very expensive high tech weapons systems irrelevant to the troops fighting in the Middle East right now. There is no sense in hte administration's budgets and planning that the nation needs to sacrifice, either domestically or in the military itself, to make resources available for the most urgent priority of the moment, which is managing the Iraq conflict.

One could imagine theoretically how an expensive, smaller, high tech military could be good policy. But, it doesn't appear that this is the reality that U.S. troops are facing. Does it really make sense to start a major ship and submarine building push when you are fighting two wars in virtually landlocked countries? Saber rattling at Iran and Syria also doesn't appear to justify this kind on investment. Aren't there more urgent needs? Like retaining skilled non-commissioned officers, and insuring that every soldier in the warzone has absolutely everything that he (or she) needs? It will be interesting to see if Congress can make any more sense of the administration's approach than I can. I suspect that Congressional meddling, in the face of a less than clear plan for either the Iraq War or long term planning for the military, will be at a high point in 2006.

Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road?

Skeptico considers how many non-skeptics might answer the eternal question, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" in honor of the first anniversary of his blog. It is worth the read.

DOD Plans To Keep Status Quo

The Department of Defense's major planning document is the Quadrennial Defense Review and it will be released next week. The New York Times has an advance copy. At one point, this plan was expected to be a major transformation of the U.S. military.

Donald Rumsfield has been very poor in his conduct of the Iraq War and "war on terrorism," but has distinguished himself, until now, in long term planning for the military's future, shifting the military from a Cold War oriented service fiefdom approach to procurement, to a major rethinking of the military's capabilities, major weapons systems and personnel policy. Major weapons system like the Comanche reconnaisance helicopter and the Crusader mobile howitzer have been cancelled. Other new systems like the DD(X) destroyer and F-22 fighter have been greatly scaled back in terms of number of units to be purchased. The Army's Future Combat system purchase plan was slowed down, but pushed very hard. Some Army units like artillery, air defense and armored units, have been scaled back, to make way for more infantry, more intelligence offiers and more Special Forces. New weapons system initiatives have begun, like the Littoral Combat Ship, and others that were in their infancy when Bush took office like unmanned aerial vehicles and the Stryker Armored Personnel Carrier have received major boosts. The Army has been slated to have its divisional structure scraped and replaced with a structure that uses a Brigade, which is about a third smaller, as the primary command and support resource nexus, and has also adopted a policy of keeping people together in the same unit for extended period of time rather than incessantly suffling people from one unit to another. A complete replacement of all existing small arms used by the Army with more modern, lighter and more reliable models was planned (but just recently delayed indefinitely). Given this track record, more major initiatives were expected in 2006. But, bogged down in trying to manage the Iraq War, this ambitious agenda stalled in the face of opposition from more cautious military officers and analysts.

The 2006 QDR does "expand the number of special operations troops trained in psychological warfare and civil affairs by 3,700." and it "calls for doubling the procurement of attack submarines, from one a year to two, by 2012, and arming submarine-carried Trident missiles with conventional warheads." The plan would "reduce the number of National Guard combat brigades from 34 to 28", but this may not fly politically. A plan to require the Air Force and Navy to buy the same version of the F-35 fighter plan crashed and burned. But, it makes few other bold changes according to the Times. As one writer for the Washington Monthly sums it up:

Is America actually at war? We have a war president, war hawks, war planes, war correspondents, war cries, even war crimes — but do we have war?

....Iraq is not a war, because, though we have savage assault, we have no enemy. The war on terrorism is not a war because, though we have an enemy, the muscle-bound Pentagon offers no authentic means of assault.

It would be easy to dismiss this as pedantry if it weren't for one thing: it seems as though the Pentagon pretty much agrees. In this year's Quadrennial Defense Review there are no terminations of major weapons programs and, apparently, no serious changes planned in the way the military operates.

It is also worth recalling that while the Reserves and National Guard have been called up regularly, that the overall armed forces active duty personnel size remains virtually unchanged from the levels set by President Clinton at the end of the Cold War as part of the "peace dividend", despite the fact that the Army, and to a lesser extent the Marines, are deeply stressed. Indeed, the Navy and Air Force both plan to lay off tens of thousands of soldiers over the next several years.

UPDATE: The Denver Post has more specifics.

The bottom line is "a 2007 budget that seeks a nearly 5 percent increase in Defense Department spending to $439.3 billion."

The plan calls for an increase in special operations forces by 15 percent, including the establishment of the first Marine Corps commando unit.

And there will be a one-third increase - a jump of 3,700 - in troops assigned to psychological warfare and civil affairs units.

That would include efforts to communicate better with people in countries where the military is deployed, said Ryan Henry, principal deputy defense secretary for policy.

There also will be a new five-year, $1.5 billion program to develop medical countermeasures for bioterrorism threats.

The plan, called the Quadrennial Defense Review, will reduce the number of Minuteman III land-based nuclear missiles from 500 to 450, and calls for the conversion of a small number of nuclear missiles aboard Trident submarines to non-nuclear ballistic missiles. . . .

As part of the effort to focus the military more toward handling terrorists, the plan calls for doubling purchases of unmanned aircraft, particularly for surveillance; developing a new long-range bomber force; and building strong partnerships with other nations and other U.S. government agencies.

While no major programs are eliminated, the review would scale back the number of B-52s to 56; reduce the number of Navy aircraft carriers from 12 to 11, a proposal rejected by Congress last year; and cut the Air Force by 40,000 jobs.

The defense budget, meanwhile, would include $84.2 billion for weapons programs, a nearly 8 percent increase, including billions of dollars for fighter jets, Navy ships, helicopters and unmanned aircraft. The total includes a substantial increase in weapons spending for the Army, which would get $16.8 billion in the 2007 budget, compared with $11 billion this year.

In short, a plan more notable for what it doesn't say than for what it does.

Commercial Airline Flights Lead To Colds

The common cold has yet to be beaten by medical science. But, a new journal article shows that commercial airline flights dramatically increase your risk of getting a cold. The risk of getting a cold is conservatively estimated at sixty times as great as it is on the ground. Analysis of the data revealed that this was most likely due to low humanity and an absence of outside air, rather than from recirculation of air in the cabin. Providing outside air would cost about 33 cents per passenger per hour. Humidity would also not necessarily be very expensive. As a stop gap, face masks like those worn by surgeons and nasal sprays look likely to be effective (although their efficacy was not tested in this study).

Hat Tip to NewMexiKen.

Fair Share Health Care Considered in Colorado

Colorado legislators are considering a bill to require companies with at least 3,500 employees to pay at least 11% of payroll towards health insurance, so that they don't end up being subsidized by the Medicaid program.

In Colorado, there are 27 companies that would be impacted under this measure. Businesses like Wal-Mart, Coors, Frontier Airlines, United Airlines, Vail Resorts, King Soopers and Safeway. Many, like the grocery stores, already comply with the terms set out, but supporters say there is uncertainty about the remainder.

Wal-Mart, which receives a heavy subsidy from health care provided to its workers through government programs and county hospitals, opposes the bill. About 99% of employers of this size nationwide provide health care to their employees.

What are the deatils on Wal-Mart in particular?

Wal-Mart’s Health Care Plan Fails to Cover Over 600,000 Employees
Wal-Mart reports that its health insurance only covers 48% of their employees. Wal-Mart has approximately 1.3 million US employees.

Wal-Mart’s Health Insurance Falls Far Short of the Industry Average
On average, large firms (200 or more workers) cover approximately 68% of their employees. If Wal-Mart was to reach the average coverage rate, Wal-Mart should be covering an additional 260,000 employees (Kaiser Family Foundation & Health Research and Educational Trust, 2004).

Wal-Mart’s Health Care Eligibility is Restrictive
Part-timers—anybody below 34 hours a week – must wait 2 years before they can enroll. Moreover, part-time employees are ineligible for family health care coverage. Full-time hourly employees must wait 180 days (approximately 6 months) before being able to enroll in Wal-Mart’s health insurance plan. Managers have no waiting period. (Wal-Mart 2005 Associate Guide)

Nationally, the average wait time for new employees to become eligible is 1.6 months. For the retail industry it is 2.8 months. (Kaiser Family Foundation & Health Research and Educational Trust, 2004)

Wal-Mart’s Most Affordable Health Plan is Costly
According to Wal-Mart, “We insure more than 500,000 associates, including many family members, who pay as little as $17.50 for individual coverage and $70.50 for family coverage bi-weekly.”

Wal-Mart’s most affordable plan includes a $1,000 deductible for single coverage and a $3,000 deductible for family coverage ($1,000 deductible per person covered up to $3,000). An average full-time worker earns $17,114 a year.

If a full-time Wal-Mart hourly employee elects for single coverage, the employee would have to spend on average 9% of their earnings before the health insurance provided any reimbursement.

If a full-time employee elected for family coverage, an average employee would have to spend 27% of their average earnings before the health insurance covered any costs. (Wal-Mart 2004 Associate Guide and UFCW Analysis).

Wal-Mart Admits Public Health Care Assistance is a “Better Value”
Despite $10 billion in profits, President and CEO Lee Scott said, "In some of our states, the public program may actually be a better value - with relatively high income limits to qualify, and low premiums." (Transcript Lee Scott Speech 4/5/05)

Wal-Mart’s Health Care is Only Getting Costlier
Since 2000, the cost of premiums has risen 169 percent for single coverage and 117 percent for family coverage. (UFCW analysis of annual Wal-Mart Associate Guides).
In comparison, premiums for family coverage in the U.S. have increased only by 59%, since 2000. (Employer Health Benefits: 2004 Annual Survey, Kaiser Family Foundation & Health Research and Educational Trust, 2004)

Wal-Mart Employees Pay More for Health Care Costs
In 2003, Wal-Mart employees, in total, covered approximately 40% of the plan costs (5500 Filings). Nationally, on average employees at large firms (over 200 employees) cover only 16% of single coverage costs and 24% of family coverage costs (KFF, 2004).

In a state analysis, the Massachusetts Department of Health and Human Services found that in 2003, Wal-Mart covered only 52% of total health care premium costs compared to K-Mart which covered 66%, Target which covered 68%, and Sears which covered 80%.

Wal-Mart Spends Less to Provide Health Care
Wal-Mart’s spending on health care for its employees falls well below industry and national employer averages. In 2002, as reported in the Wall Street Journal, Wal-Mart spent an average of $3,500 per employee. By comparison, the average spending per employee in the wholesale/retailing sector was $4,800. For U.S. employers in general, the average was $5,600 per employee, Therefore, Wal-Mart’s average spending on health benefits for each covered employee was 27% less than the industry average and 37% less than the national average. (Bernard Wysocki, Jr. and Ann Zimmerman, “Wal-Mart Cost-Cutting Finds a Big Target in Health Benefits,” WSJ September 30, 2003 p1)

Wal-Mart Only Spends 75 Cents an Hour Per Employee for Health Benefits
In 2003, Wal-Mart spent $1.4 billion on its health insurance. This amounts to an employer contribution of around only $0.75 an hour per employee. This accounts for approximately a half-percent of Wal-Mart's $259 billion in sales in 2003. (Wal-Mart 5500 Filings, Wal-Mart Annual Report). . . .

One Out of Seven Wal-Mart Employees Has No Health Care Coverage At All
This is nearly double the national percentage for large firms (firms with over 100 employees). In fact, we estimate that Wal-Mart accounts for more than 1 out of every 40 uninsured workers, who are employed at a large firm. (walmartfacts.com; Wal-Mart Annual Report; “Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance Coverage: Sponsorship, Eligibility, and Participation Patterns in 2001,” Bowen Garrett, Ph.D., released by the Kaiser Family Foundation September 2004).

Corporate Tax Cuts Don't Save Jobs

Case in point: Ford Motor Company.

Quack Pleads Guilty

A Wheat Ridge naturopath pleaded guilty today during jury selection in Jefferson County District Court. Brian O'Connell pleaded guilty to criminally negligent homicide, theft, assault, perjury, practicing medicine without a license and other charges in the death of Sean Flanagan, 19.

He faces up to 15 years in prison. More details here and here.

Hurray For Miami University Hockey

I took a number of classes at Miami University of Ohio (although I graduated from Oberlin College in Ohio), and grew up in Oxford, Ohio, where the university is situated. I learned to ice skate on their rink on the other side of town, although it will soon be torn down and replaced with a new and improved one about two blocks from the house where I grew up in the very near future. The new digs are well deserved.

The truth of the matter is that I never even saw a Miami University hockey game (although my brother saw a number of them) and don't follow the sport at all. But, Miami University still deserves kudos for having the best college hockey team in the entire nation, a first in the university's 197 year history in any sport. (My alma mater, Oberlin College, in contrast, was known for having one of the ten worst college football teams in the entire nation at one point.)

More Laser Guns

Don't take this idea to the bank.

The military plans to test the Advanced Tactical Laser, a laser weapon mounted on a C-130H air transport that could destroy any weapon system without collateral damage. . . . Under the program, Boeing would test the aircraft in July 2006. The aircraft would have all subsystems on board except the high-energy laser. Officials said a low-power surrogate laser would be used instead of the kilowatt-class, high-energy laser. . . . The ATL was deemed as complementary to the Airborne Laser program for the Missile Defense Agency. ABL was meant to mount a megawatt class chemical laser on a Boeing 747-400 freighter aircraft.

A C-130 is a 1950s technology, and both low powered lasers and C-130s with weapons on them are 1970s technologies. But, efforts to built high energy lasers have not been very successful. The existing efforts have been over budget and produce massive amounts of toxic waste and are hard to get small enough.

Also, for clarification purposes, the idea, apparently, is to heat enemy ammunition, causing it to explode on its own, rather than to have a science fiction style laser gun. The obvious countermeasures would be to start using railguns, which can have inert ammunition, or to create some form of artificial fog which would diffuse laser light.

The War on Werewolves

"Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit . . . creating human-animal hybrids."

- George W. Bush, State of the Union Address, January 31, 2006.

Clearly, the President was deeply affected by watching the recent Sony Pictures release of Underworld Evolution in the White House theater (frightening resemblances to the 2000 release of the movie X-Men, featuring a political campaign against mutants, also come to mind). Or maybe he's just been responding to the main concerns of Colorado's Republican caucus. It's hard to tell.

Liberals know better. We are pro-werewolf. A more sympathic portrayal of werewolf lifestyles in contemporary North American can be found in the writings of an author from our more sensible neighbor to the North. This is not surprising because, as a general rule, Canada usually has better public policies than the United States. We are also, unlike the President, pro-Spider Man. This also figures. Spider Man, a prominent member of the human-animal hybrid community, lives in the city, and cities tend to be safe Democratic constituencies. But, the pro-human-animal hybrid community also isn't exclusively a liberal secular humanist one. Another prominent member of the human-animal hybrid community is Jesse Helms, who is part pig (True!). And, noted Christian apologist C.S. Lewis, for example, included numerous not unequivocally negative portrayals of human-animal hybrids in his writings. (More seriously, almost all diabetics rely on human-animal hybrids to stay alive on a daily basis.)

But, the truth of the matter is that, unlike Republicans, Democrats don't really see the whole human-animal hybrid threat as a legislative priority. As Andrew Romanoff, the current Democratic Speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives put the matter so presciently last year: "We're talking about the budget, and they're talking about bestiality."

For A Limited Time Only

A classmate I grew up with will having open heart surgery in a few days. A condition initially diagnosed as pnemonia turned out to be more serious. Her recent child birth, involving a very long labor, pushed the situation to its breaking point. The procedure is, obviously, very serious and carries with it no guarantees.

Another woman, whom I don't know at all, but someone in my office does, just died in a vacation home fire, despite the fact that she was in good health.

A few weeks ago a relative of one of my aunts was suddenly diagnosed with a cancer so aggressive and advanced upon first discovery, that he has decided not to treat it. He will probably die in a matter of weeks.

We live for a limited time only. Grave peril doesn't always provide much warning. Life expectency is merely an average. You never know when you won't be able to do something you had dreamed of doing in life. If live your entire life postponing what you really want to live for in life, you may never get it. The clock stops for no one.

And, Arrests For Non-Existent Crimes.

Charges against antiwar protester Cindy Sheehan, who was arrested after an incident involving a T-shirt she wore to the State of the Union address, will be dropped, officials told NBC News Wednesday.

U.S. Capitol Police took Sheehan away in handcuffs and charged her with unlawful conduct, a misdemeanor, when she showed up to President Bush's address Tuesday night wearing a shirt that read, "2245 Dead. How many more?" -- a reference to the number of soldiers killed in Iraq.

But Capitol Police will ask the U.S. attorney's office to drop the charges, NBC News' Mike Viqueira reported Wednesday.

"We screwed up," a top Capitol Police official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He said Sheehan didn't violate any rules or laws.

Sheehan, whose son Casey died in Iraq, was not the only one ejected from the House gallery. The wife of a powerful Republican congressman was also asked to leave, but she was not arrested.

Beverly Young, wife of Rep. C.W. Bill Young of Florida -- chairman of the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee -- was removed from the gallery because she was wearing a T-shirt that read, "Support the Troops -- Defending Our Freedom."

The Capitol Police official said officers never should have approached Young.

MSNBC via Daily Kos.

There are police whom I could believe don't understand the difference between free speech and criminal disturbing the peace. But,if anyone is drilled to death regarding what is and is not legal, it is the U.S. Capitol Police. "We screwed up" is entirely implausible.

The far more likely scenario is that the Capitol Police, who report to the Republicans who control the capital right now (not the Democratic Party controlled city government), intentionally arrested Sheehan, knowing perfectly well that the arrest was bogus. But they also knew that the arrest would prevent her from expressing her message at the State of the Union address, at which they deeply desired to avoid any embarassment to the President or the Republican leadership to whom they report, and that their bogus arrest would not be resolved until the speech was over. They also were well aware that if she was released without charges being brought, rather than prosecuted, that any money damages she could claim in a civil action attempting to vindicate her rights would be nominal. A night in jail does not produce a million dollar jury award. And, the fact that the wife of a Republican congressman was hassled, but not arrested, was very likely a cover to make their claim that they were stupid, rather than intentionally acting unlawfully, seem plausible.

Cynical? Perhaps. But, I explained precisely what I thought would happen in this case the moment that my paralegal noted it this morning, and it did. It is a relatively common police tactic that is a particular favorite of another political savy body of law enforcement officers, the Secret Service (whose power to engage in similar conduct the Republicans in the House want to authorize in a Patriot Act renewal, even though the law is likely unconstitutional, see below).

Prison For A Non-Existent Crime.

Convictions of people for conduct that isn't criminal doesn't just happen in Colorado for a few months. It also happens in Nevada, where a woman was sentenced to five life sentences for allegedly writing five insufficient funds checks, which the bank was legally obligated to pay anyway because of its overdraft protection arrangement (thus, the merchants lost no money), and then released on lifetime parole after having spent twelve years in prison.

The 9th Circuit begins: "Petitioner spent 12 years in prison for conduct that is not a crime."

The woman had a prior criminal record, and so was sentenced as a habitual offender. But, the 9th Circuit observes that under the plain language of Nevada law, writing checks on insufficient funds is not a crime if you have overdraft protection that obligates the bank to make the checks good. The seven courts that considered her case failed to make the subtle, but elementary, distinction between fraud by using a check to obtain goods for which the merchant would not be paid, since the person writing the checks knew that they would not be honored, and the non-criminal breach of contract involved in not repaying an overdraft loan extended by a bank. Indeed, the 9th Circuit notes that it is illegal under the 13th Amendment and Nevada Constitution to make failure to repay a loan a crime. Nevada's courts and prosecutors are soundly criticized in the opinion.

What is the proceeding that ultimately exonerated this woman called? A federal habeas corpus petition. Republicans hate them. It lets people who have been wrongfully convicted of crimes (or non-existent crimes) go free, and they don't like it when that happens. They seem to prefer the faith based, "let God sort 'em out" approach.

Hat Tip to "How Appealing".

PATRIOT Act Change Limits Habeas Corpus

Republican Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona inserted little-noticed language that could make it harder for state death-row inmates to appeal their cases in federal court.

The provision is one of a handful that neither the House of Representatives nor the Senate has voted on but which Republican lawmakers crafted during closed-door negotiations last year after Democrats had been excluded from the talks.

Another obscure addition, never debated in Congress, would broaden existing laws that prohibit disturbances at any event - such as those involving the president - at which the Secret Service is providing protection. . . . The House has voted for the amended Patriot Act, but the Senate hasn't yet. The death penalty changes would make it easier for states to benefit from faster federal-appellate procedures in capital punishment cases. Under a law that passed in 1996, states that take steps to ensure that poor murder defendants are represented by competent counsel can ask for a fast-track system in which inmates have shorter deadlines to file their appeals.

Under current law, federal courts of appeals decide whether states can speed up processing capital cases. Kyl's change would give that power to the U.S. attorney general.

From here.

The 1996 law (AEDPA) should be repealed, not strengthened. It has turned a process designed to vindicate injustices in state court criminal proceedings into a procedural maze, in an area of law mostly dealt with by pro se prisoners, that even attorneys and judges struggle to apply. They also don't just impact death penalty cases. And, of course, new power for the Secret Service to deal with political protestors is the last thing this country needs.

7th CD Campaign Finance

The 7th Congressional District in Colorado is an open race in a district more evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans than almost any other in the nation. The last campaign finance reports of 2005 provide a good opportunity to weigh the respective campaign's strength:

Rick O'Donnell (R)
Money Raised: $650,000+ (35% PACs, 65% private individuals)
Cash On Hand: $517,000

Ed Perlmutter (D)
Money Raised: $519,546 (89% from private individuals)
Cash On Hand: $401,061

Peggy Lamm (D)
Money Raised: $244,419 (100% from private individuals)
Cash On Hand: $139,370

Herb Rubenstein (D)
Money Raised: $40,000+ ($24,000 is a loan)
Cash On Hand: $ 939.25

I have to doubt the veracity of the Denver Post report I relied upon above, simply because I have a hard time fathoming the notion that Peggy Lamm has not received any contributions from private individuals. SECOND UPDATE (other changes reflecting this news below are not specifically noted): Indeed, a look at Lamm's report, linked above shows that the Denver Post was 100% wrong. She has gotten no PAC money in the entire campaign, not 100% PAC money as the Post reported.

A few points are worth noting.

First, as we all knew, Herb Rubenstein is not a serious candidate, even if he may be a nice guy in debates and Drinking Liberally functions. He is not even going to make it onto the primary ballot in all likelihood.

Second, more funds were raised on the Democratic side, by Perlmutter and Lamm combined, and the two have more cash on hand, than the Republican side does. Going into the caucus and primary process, the Democrats are divided, but they will come together when the general election arrives. Moreover, usually, the existence of a contested primary keeps some donors who don't want to take sides in an intraparty fight out of the fund raising equation until the primary is over. O'Donnell has no such impediment, and yet still is lackluster in his fund raising (and far more reliant on PAC money). This is likely due in large part to the fact that he has never held elected office before, and thus doesn't have a well honed campaign organization in place on day one. Obviously, he's politically well connected (Vice President Dick Cheney held a fund raiser for him in October of last year and he is the Governor's protege) and he has worked on campaigns before, but that isn't the same as developing the network of personal allegiances from politically active people that you do when you run for public office. Also, it is worth remembering that until mid-January there was a real chance that Mark Paschall, a conservative darling but something of a maverick, might have entered the race and created a primary fight on the Republican side.

Third, Lamm's total fundraising is not great. All politics is local. With or without EMILY's List, a viable candidate has to have genuine grassroots fund raising ability to succeed. Private individual donations are a good proxy for the size of your committed volunteer campaign organization. For better or worse, to run a successful Congressional campaign in 2006 you must be able to inspire many thousands of private individuals to open their pocketbooks and write you checks, and you must as a candidate be willing to spend a great deal of time on the phone and at fundraisers interfacing with "the donor class" of committed members of your party to make that happen. The loyalties that develop when people give you private contributions also often translate into even larger, unreported, gifts of time and create informal buzz about your campaign with politically active people. Furthermore, if you fail to secure enough contributions from private individuals within a reasonable period of time, the supply of PAC money and EMILY's List money will slow to a trickle. Both Lamm and Perlmutter received significant private individual contributions, but Perlmutter's much stronger performance in this area isn't good news for Lamm. If Lamm was the only Democrat in the 7th CD race, every Democrat in the state would flood her with grassroots support almost without her even asking. But, as it stands, Lamm is going to have a tough time turning around the grass roots deficit that she is starting out with in this primary race.

Perlmutter is a lifelong resident of the 7th CD. He built the political organization that he used to win the seat that he held in the State Senate in the District. Lamm didn't live in the 7th CD when it was created (for the record, the law requires only that candidates be resident of Colorado, not the specific Congressional District, so this is a political issue, not a legal one), although I believe she has now found a residence in the 7th CD. While she built a political organization to win her state representative seat and knows politics well, she is to a great extent starting from scratch in the 7th CD this year.

The next big test of political strength in the race for the 7th CD Democratic nomination will come in the caucus process. This is another measure of grassroots support within the Democratic party base, and since neither Perlmutter nor Lamm are running as moderates in the mold of Ken and John Salazar, volunteer support from the base is absolutely crucial to both of them. There is no doubt that Perlmutter will make a respectable showing in this process. He has been on close terms with the long time party muckity mucks who dominate the caucus process for decades. But, a weak showing for Lamm in the caucuses would cripple her candidacy, because it would show that she has a weak campaign organization. Of course, a strong showing for Lamm in the caucuses might give her campaign wings, by showing a base of support that hadn't yet been evident. We'll see what happens in March.

The Dead Governors at Colorado Pols are going to need to look at these reports and tilt the odds much more heavily in Perlmutter's favor than they have so far in the race, in part on the assumption that EMILY's List would bring in lots of money for Lamm in the 4th Quarter. It is early and Perlmutter certainly hasn't cinched it yet. O'Donnell, Perlmutter and Lamm are all viable candidates who have made respectable fundraising showings in 2005 and are actively working to win the 7th Congressional District race. For O'Donnell, this is largely a matter of biding his time and marshalling his resources through August when the general election race takes off. For Perlmutter, the task is largely one of continuing to cultivate his grassroots edge while strengthening his performance in debates, on TV, and in the newspapers where political outsiders judge him as a candidate and his performance thusfar has been lackluster. For Lamm, her task is to pour quickgrow on her grass roots as fast as she possibly can so that she can make a strong showing in the caucuses, while polishing her own public image which also hasn't registered very strongly with political outsiders so far.

UPDATE: If you want to hear a case that Lamm is better off than I suggest above, despite her weak fundraising, I suggest that you read this comment at SoapBlox Colorado which argues that Lamm's strong name recognition (almost double that of Perlmutter in the 7th CD among registered voters) and that Perlmutter's voting record support for the oil and gas industry and developers will hurt him. It also argues that a political "machine" is not as important as it once was (and while the poster doesn't mention it, the strongest case in point for that argument is the election of Mayor Hickenlooper in Denver whose campaign was very media based). There is something to be said for the argument that political machines are obsolete, but, I think it only works if you have enough money in the bank to get on radio and TV and spend it on ads that are actually effective, as Hickenlooper did.

I'm also not sure that the voting record distinctions will matter much. When I looked into the voting records of Democrats in the state legislature a couple of years ago (strictly for free as a favor to help the candidates who might get the money) when asked by an out of state donor for advice on who would be the most progressive candidates for him to support, the conclusion that I came away with was that the Democratic delegation in the state house is remarkably homogeneous when it comes to a liberal-conservative scale despite most having some issue or another where they are less wonderful than others in the delegation. Very few Democrats in the Colorado legislature are full fledged progressive caucus class liberals (most are members of the state DLC, for example), and only a handful are as conservative as members of the blue dog caucus in Washington. Hard core progressives have a great deal of trouble getting elected in Colorado. And, since Colorado is a purple state where both the Republican and Democratic parties are viable, there is little incentive for genuine liberals to run as Republicans or for genuine conservatives to run as Democrats, indeed, if anything, the former is true in many more places than the later in this state.