Counterfactuals

Tiny moments can be “Thomian.”

René Frédéric Thom was a French mathematician most famous for his development of Catastrophe Theory which sought to formalize how continuous systems could undergo sudden, dramatic shifts. Thom noted that things that seem to be moving along in a systematic manner often become discontinuous. The shift could be instigated by some outside force (e.g., a friendly dog attacks at a provocative movement) or they could result from internal factors that were undetected (e.g., an earthquake is triggered by deep seismic pressures).

The theory, first published in 1972, enjoyed considerable success in mathematics as it seemed to provide a foundation for not only understanding how seeming stability became unstable but for possibly laying the basis for predicting the points or moments of discontinuity.

It wasn’t to be, as Thom himself acknowledged in his 1997 autobiography, “Catastrophe theory is dead. For as soon as it became clear that the theory did not permit quantitative prediction, all good minds … decided it was of no value. “

But as a metaphor for examining the world about us it looms large. It invites counterfactual speculation imploring us to look back at moments where the usual became unusual, where the lugubrious was brightened or the derivative became original. And when we do we wonder “what if?”

A short list (it is easily made longer … and from any perspective):

a. John Wilkes Booth is spotted with a pistol in the hallway

b. FDR sticks with Henry Wallace as VP

c. Lee Harvey Oswald misses

d. John Hinckley doesn’t

e. O’Conner votes to continue the recount

Of course, the only place this kind of exercise leads is to science fiction but it’s a fun way to kill some time waiting for the ‘Hawks game to begin.

A Puzzling Paradox in Kentucky

Kentucky recently elected a Republican governor who made the rolling back of the Medicaid component of the Affordable Car Act (aka Obamacare) a central tenet of his campaign. Kentucky is (currently) the only southern state that signed onto this element of the ACA. Through it some 425,000 (yes, you read that right; close to a half of a million people) were enrolled in medical insurance plans that were paid for 100% by the government (yes, you read that right, the Feds pick up the entire cost of the Medicaid expansion).

What will happen if Governor elect Bevin goes through with this? Those 425k poor folks will lose their coverage. But, of course, they’ll still use health providers, clinics and other facilities. They will go to public hospitals when in trouble. The hospitals will have to treat them. They won’t be able to pay and the Commonwealth of Kentucky will have to pick up the bill. The overall health of residents will drop. The costs to the state will go up.

No one wins but the ideologues on the far right who have deluded themselves into thinking that Obamacare is, in Ben Carson’s immortal phrase, “the worst thing to happen to this country since slavery.”

Now, here’s the weird part. Right now the hospitals, clinics and private practices in Kentucky are seeing a flood of poor patients. They’re streaming into the ERs for procedures like having potentially cancerous growths removed, to MRI centers to have various symptoms that suggest that something internal may be amiss, to GP’s offices for checkups, to pediatricians to have their children’s ills taken care of.

Who are these folks? They are precisely the ones who are being targeted by Bevin’s plans. They know they are about to lose their coverage and be tossed back on the slag heap of the poor and destitute who didn’t have access to health care before the ACA and won’t have it again post Bevin.

But we’re just getting started in the insanity game: According to all the analyses of voting patterns in Kentucky (they’re reviewed in this piece in the NY Times) these poor folks, the ones who depend on Medicaid, just didn’t vote. In fact, practically no one voted in this election. The turnout was a miniscule 31% of the eligible meaning that some 17% of the voters in Kentucky brought about Bevin’s electoral victory.

We are left with a deep paradox. The poor couldn’t get their butts into the voting booth to stop this insane assault on their health care but they’re focused enough to make sure they get the last dribbles of decent health care which they are about to lose because they couldn’t bother to vote.

More Thoughts on Electric Vehicles

It’s surprisngly tough to buy an electric car (other than a Tesla — and that’s tough too but for a different reason. They’re expensive!) There’s a long piece in the NYTimes that goes over all the many reasons and describes the frustrations of buyers who go into Nissan, BMW and other dealers who offer fully electric vehicles (EVs). They find salespersons who know little to nothing about the cars or who, if they do, tried to slide them over to the traditional ICE (internal combustion engine) models.

Why, you might wonder, don’t they want to make a sale? Yes but they’re under pressure from management to downplay the EVs and promote the ICE cars. The reason? “Dealers make three times as much profit from service as they do from new-car sales.”

We discovered this a long time ago. I had become friends with the sales manager of our local Infiniti dealer (we were both horse players and bonded over this fascinating game). When we bought our first Infiniti he sat down with us and pulled up the software that structured their sales. We saw what each car cost him and what he made from a sale. We hit on what seemed reasonable, a $300 profit on a $30k car.

“How,” I asked, “can you possibly keep a dealership like this afloat if you’re only making $300 a pop? That’s only 1%.”

“Well,” he said, “we typically make a bit more on each sale but the truth is, it’s the service center that makes it all happen. Our profit is in maintenance and repairs, not sales.”

Dealers don’t like selling EVs because they don’t need service. There’s nothing to service. No engine, no spark plugs, no oil changes, no belts to fray, no radiator fluid, no transmission, no muffler, no exhaust system (there’s no exhaust!), no gas tank, no filters of any kind. EVs go in once a year for a quick check and tire rotation. Heck, even the brake pads last for damn near ever because the regenerative breaking system means you don’t use them till you’re going 5 mph.

Tesla, the most successful EV car company, understood this economic dynamic from the outset. They do not use dealerships. They sell directly to the customer. Most major cities do have Tesla showrooms where consultants will take you out for a test drive, answer questions and provide advice but they don’t actually sell you a car. You do that yourself, online. A Tesla rep will walk you through the process if you like but it’s just part of the company’s way of doing things.

You can buy a Tesla anytime you want. Just go online, Google “Tesla” and follow the links that pop up. There is, no course, no bargaining. You can’t do what we did with our Infiniti — and what every savvy car buyer has always done, haggle. The price is the price.

I am a huge fan of EV’s. If your daily commute is less than 90 miles or so take a look at the BMW, Nissan, VW, Mercedes, Ford or Honda models. If you routinely take longer trips Tesla, with its 275 mile range, is the obvious choice (though it is a lot more expensive). That NYTimes article says that recharging spots are not all that common. This is not quite true and, anyway, is changing rapidly. Tesla is installing “SuperChargers” around the country and local businesses are quickly discovering that a good way to bring in customers is to have a charger on site

There are several apps (PlugShare, Green Charge and Open Charge) that list all chargers. They are dotted along most of the major highways and soon will be everywhere. We’re at the beginning of  revolution here. When motor cars first appeared you really had to worry whether you had enough gas in the tank to get to the next station. Now they’re on every other corner. Soon we’ll see this same distribution for chargers but with a huge difference: virtually all are free! Yes, it takes longer to charge an EV than to fill up an ICE. Life’s filled with tradeoffs. This is just one more.

As noted in an earlier post our 750 mile, five-day winery trip didn’t cost us a penny in fuel.

How will the old-school auto dealers handle this? I honestly do not know but life moves on, innovation cannot be stopped. Back in the ’90s the ICE-embracing gang managed to derail the first wave of EV’s. But that was then and this is now. The future will arrive whether you’re ready for it or not.

Canada's Immigration Program: A Lesson in Humanitarianism

We live a stone’s throw from the border with Canada. Rhiannon is a Canadian citizen and all our children were born there. Our grandson recently got his Canadian citizenship papers and is a 2nd year student at UBC in Vancouver. Point Roberts, where we live (Google it for some fun), is sometimes jokingly described as “nearly paradise, nearly Canada.” I’ve been paying attention to how Canadians, in particular the new Liberal government, are handling the refugee crisis.

The first thing to realize is that Canada’s general demographics have similarities with America’s; it’s a country of immigrants. The proportion of those with African ancestry is less (no slavery in their history) as are the number of Latinos (no border). They have a higher percentage of Native Peoples (not as efficient in genocide as we were) and relatively larger South Asian and East Asian populations. But the balance between those of European extraction and everyone else is about the same.

The second thing to note is that the population is about one-tenth that of the US and the vast majority of them live within a hundred miles of the border.

So how they handling matters? The Trudeau government has pledged to admit 25,000 refugees. If we matched that proportionally it would mean taking in a quarter of a million. Obama’s effort to admit 60,000 looks pretty pathetic — but it doesn’t matter since he’ll never even that tiny number.

This isn’t an “open door” program. The Trudeau government is approaching the issue with care and caution. Individual Premiers have been working with towns and cities in their provinces, with charitable, community- and church-based organizations, with schools and health-care providers to set up processing centres and find homes for the new arrivals. Plans are being developed that allow refugees to be distributed so that there are critical masses in locales so that the new arrivals don’t feel isolated and fearful but not so large that they might form enclaves in which to hide from the larger culture. Large cities will take many; smaller communities fewer.

English (and French where appropriate) as a second language classes are being set up and other programs are being put in place to smooth the shift into Canadian culture.

They are being very careful with who comes in. Intact families with no history of violence or anti-social behaviour are favoured along with single women with children. Young single men are at the bottom of the hierarchy and very few will be admitted. The first wave of roughly 10,000 will come in over the next month or two and the remaining 15.000 during the first several months of 2016.

Everyone will come from the camps in the Middle East that have been housing refugees and where they have had the opportunity to vet them before considering them for immigration.

The whole country is going to profit from this exercise in decency and humanitarianism. Canadians are, rightfully, feeling very good about themselves. They are also bringing in people who will be deeply and eternally grateful for the opportunity offered — as has every other immigrant population that has arrived there (and, for that matter here in the US). They will contribute significantly to the growth in the economy in the next decade and beyond.

And there are other hidden benefits. Canada, like every industrialized nation, has a low birth rate. As populations age imbalances in sectors of the economy emerge. The elderly are expensive. The require more medical care, more financial support, social security and government pensions. When the number of young declines it puts a serious financial strain on the nation’s economy. The solution that works best is immigration. Bring in new people. Bring in young, healthy workers and grow the economy from below.

Then there’s culture. The new immigrants are coming from a culture quite different from the many varieties in Canada. They’ll bring new foods, new music, dress, literature and art forms. It will add to the country’s already diverse culture and enrich it further.

Are there downsides? Possibly. There will likely be a few cultural clashes in places. There will probably be a few instances of anti-immigrant sentiment from Canadians who feel threatened by newness. But the long term impact seems to be one that all Canadians will applaud.

Imagine what we could gain here in the US if we weren’t so frightened, so xenophobic, so terrified of anything that smacks even remotely of another culture. Sad.

Bolton and the Half-Baked Neo-Con Thinking

John Bolton, the most hawkish of hawks in the Bush-Cheney years (and one-time UN rep) has an op-ed in the New York Times. It is an example of the John Bolton that progressives have come to dispair over. It epitomizes the half-baked thinking of the neo-cons. 

In classic “half-bakedness” the writer gets the first half right and then goes down the rabbit hole (David Brooks is the absolute best at this). The thing to pay attention to in these policy recommendations is the reasons for the second-half flame-out.

In this essay Bolton gets the first half right: only a Sunni state can function effectively once ISIS is gone (as if that were a given). He identifies the key problem facing everyone: the current cock-up in the Middle East is at the deepest level a battle between the Sunnis and the Shia. ISIS is Sunni; Syria, Iran and Iraq are Shite. The only coherent outcome is a Sunni state. 

But then he does the classic neo-con “thing.” He assumes that the ultimate arrangement can be brought about by Western intervention when the alternate move is to support and nurture the non-violent Sunnis who are as horrified at the actions of ISIS as the rest of the world. But not Bolton. He still clings to that horrific strategy that got us in this fucking mess in the first place. We need to take charge of the situation — just like we did when we invaded Iraq and that worked out well, didn’t it.

Bolton’s a classically “half-smart” guy. And the smart he’s missing is the social psychological smart, the kind that understands ethnic identity, that realizes that imposing “solutions” on people just pisses them off. He is totally lacking in empathy and never asks himself, “how would we feel if some big, alien power forced their vision of life on us?”

I’ve long felt that foreign policy can’t be made by people without serious psychological chops. Reading this crap and seeing how persuasive it could be to the untrained is deeply worrisome.

Bozos…