Month: June 2007

Those bloggers can be so mean!

John Quiggin5 Comments

Following the conviction of Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby for perjury in relation to the Plame case, pleas for clemency have been pouring into the courts from the great and good, including Bolton, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz. But the great and good have become a little shy lately, and its all because of those beastly bloggers. According to the New York Times, Libby’s lawyers argued against the release of the letters to the media on the grounds that

the real possibility that these letters, once released, would be published on the Internet and their authors discussed, even mocked, by bloggers

Judge Reggie B. Walton appears to be well aware of the fun bloggers can have when high-powered advocates of the unfettered power of the executive turn out to be soft on crime. He refused the application. Then he granted the petition of twelve leading lights of the legal profession to submit an amicus curiae brief, noting, in a footnote

It is an impressive show of public service when twelve prominent and distinguished current and former law professors of well-respected schools are able to amass their collective wisdom in the course of only several days to provide their legal expertise to the Court on behalf of a criminal defendant. The Court trusts that this is a reflection of these eminent academics’ willingness in the future to step to the plate and provide like assistance in cases involving any of the numerous litigants, both in this Court and throughout the courts of our nation, who lack the financial means to fully and properly articulate the merits of their legal positions even in instances where failure to do so could result in monetary penalties, incarceration, or worse. The Court will certainly not hesitate to call for such assistance from these luminaries, as necessary in the interests of justice and equity, whenever similar questions arise in the cases that come before it.

Somehow I think Judge Walton thought bloggers might want to quote that statement, and I’m not going to disappoint him (via a comment in Unfogged, via BitchPhD).
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What I’m reading

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Sophie’s World which my son received as a present and enjoyed (I read it when it came out a few years back and thought it might be good to refresh my memory). An introduction to philosophy (roughly along the lines of Russell’s History of Western Philosophy) presented as a story in which a young girl receives a series of mysterious messages.

Higher Ground – an analysis of the Project Hope scheme run in Wisconsin with the aim of improving outcomes for the working poor there. I’ll be writing a review some time.

Happiness, income and status

John Quiggin8 Comments

Lots of people (including Kevin Drum, Brad DeLong and Tyler Cowen have jumped in on this post by Will Wilkinson about this NBER study of habituation to changes in income and status. Wilkinson and most commentators focus on the findings regarding the subgroups on the right and left of the political spectrum, which I’ll come to, but it’s worth mentioning the general findings first.

Most people (in the German sample population) initially react more, as regards self-reported happiness, to a change in income than to a change in occupational status, but gradually get habituated to changes in income. This is consistent with the standard view of the happiness literature, that income changes don’t have a big effect on happiness, so that people in rich countries aren’t on average much happier than those in poor countries. Moreover, by looking at the same people over relatively short periods of time the analysis overcomes, to a significant extent, the objection I’ve made previously, that the scale on which happiness is measured is inherently relative to some notion of what is reasonable to expect.
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G8 and APEC

John Quiggin5 Comments

The deal on climate change announced at the G8 conference is, in practical terms, a face-saving compromise rather than a substantive agreement. But it does have some real implications.

First, barring some last-minute pullout by China or India, it locks everyone who matters into the UN’s post-Kyoto process ending in 2009. As far as I can tell, no-one at G8 noted Australia’s world-leading initiatives or suggested that it would be a good idea to wait until September when the issue could be discussed at APEC in Sydney. Maybe there’s some wiggle room to reopen the topic, but as far as I can see the idea of a Sydney declaration is dead on arrival. Bush’s initial proposal, similar to Howard’s idea, got no support from anyone and was dropped.

Second, although Bush’s promise to “consider” a 50 per cent cut by 2050 is worthless, the deal makes it clear that this will be the focal point for future discussions, at least as far as developed countries are concerned. The idea that Australia might be able to announce its own lower target is just silly. The remaining sticking point is the starting date from which the cut is to be calculated. The EU wants 1990. The government would obviously prefer to calculate from 2012, but as I’ve observed previously, our failure to ratify Kyoto leaves us without a leg to stand on here.

Finally, while Bush didn’t give a lot of ground, he certainly didn’t gain any. Canada and Japan sided with the EU, and they all committed to the 50 per cent cut. Bush’s concessions may have been mainly rhetorical but they will provide political cover for his successor to follow through with some real action.

Howard rolls the dice

John Quiggin16 Comments

I was surprised to see, in today’s papers, that Howard has committed himself to the idea of a “Sydney declaration” on climate change, coming out of the APEC meeting in September. It seems to me that there are an awful lot of potential traps for Howard here, and relatively long odds against producing something that will stand up to scrutiny over a month-long election campaign. In particular, any understandings Howard may have with either Bush or Canadian PM Harper might turn out to be obsolete in a couple of days when (and if) the G8 meeting produces a statement on the topic. More when this happens.

In the meantime, my piece in today’s Fin (over the fold) covers some related topics
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Weekend reflections

John Quiggin13 Comments

Weekend Reflections is on again. Please comment on any topic of interest (civilised discussion and no coarse language, please). Feel free to put in contributions more lengthy than for the Monday Message Board or standard comments.

Elsevier buckles

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Over at the RSMG blog, Nanni points out that Reed Elsevier will no longer host arms fairs. This has followed a long campaign by academics and others. The case raised a bunch of questions about boycotts. My general feeling was that moral suasion should be tried first, but that if that failed, boycotts should follow. It’s not clear whether the outcome was purely the product of suasion or whether increasingly loud noises about possible boycotts prompted Elsevier to move.

World’s Greatest Shave update

John Quiggin5 Comments

I’ve just returned from a thankyou event held by the Leukaemia Foundation of Queensland for participants in the World’s Greatest Shave, for which my son and I shaved our beards (here’s the result, and many readers of this blog gave generous donations. Together we raised over $6000, which was in the top ten efforts for the entire state.

The thankyou event was both interesting (I’ve never seen so many women with the identical haircut in one place) and inspirational (talks from leukaemia patients, family members and fundraisers really brought home how much this effort means). The $3.6 million raised this year has enabled the Foundation to clear the debt on this new accommodation facility for families of leukemia patients. This is a huge boon. Thanks again to everyone who contributed.