Taleb and the "don't believe everything you read about Syria" line

I see via Jason Soon that Nassim Taleb is taking the "idiot journalists may well be being conned by anti-Assad propaganda" line regarding the apparent gas attack. 

Taleb, who strikes me as one of the strangest and unpredictable blowhards around, should be due for a turnaround of his own shrug-of-the-shoulders attitude to the Trump Presidency, then.  Here he was before the election:

Not only is a Donald Trump presidency very possible, it's also not all that much to worry about, scholar and author Nassim Taleb told CNBC's "Power Lunch."

Taleb said Trump is not as "scary" as people make him out to be.

"In the end, Trump is a real estate salesman," Taleb said. "When you elect real estate salespeople to the presidency, they're going to try deliver something."


Because of that, Trump probably won't do anything apocalyptic, Taleb said.

Um, people with common sense (something which Taleb seems to spend a lot of time complaining that other academics don't have) would have suspected long before Taleb may realise it that Trump's many years of idiotic promotion of conspiracy always meant that he was going to be an extremely gullible President when it comes to propaganda (and I say that without conceding anything about the Syrian gas attack.) 

How could Taleb not recognize that?

More anti-Trump

Jonah Goldberg in National Review:

...my National Review colleague (well, boss) Rich Lowry penned a widely discussed piece for Politico, “The Crisis of Trumpism,” in which he argued that Trump’s basic problem is that he has no idea what he wants to do or how to get it done. “No officeholder in Washington,” Lowry writes, “seems to understand President Donald Trump’s populism or have a cogent theory of how to effect it in practice, including the president himself.”...

Trump brings the same glandular, impulsive style to meetings and interviews as he does to social media. He blurts out ideas or claims that send staff scrambling to see them implemented or defended. His management style is Hobbesian. Rivalries are encouraged. Senior aides panic at the thought of not being part of his movable entourage. He cares more about saving face and “counterpunching” his critics than he does about getting policy victories.

 

In short, the problem is Trump’s personality. His presidency doesn’t suffer from a failure of ideas, but a failure of character. 

 

 For the last two years, when asked how I thought the Trump administration would go, I’ve replied, “Character is destiny.” This wasn’t necessarily a prediction of a divorce or sexual scandal, but rather an acknowledgment of the fact that, under normal circumstances, people don’t change. And septuagenarian billionaires who’ve won so many spins of the roulette wheel of life are even less likely to change.

How can anyone take Trump seriously?

I've said it before - Trump talking off the cuff doesn't even reach the eloquence of a smart primary school student:

TRUMP: It crossed a lot of lines for me when you kill innocent children, innocent babies, babies, little babies, with a chemical gas that is so lethal, people were shocked to hear what gas it was. That crosses many, many lines, beyond a red line, many, many lines. Thank you very much.

but more seriously, his ridiculous insistence that everything is always someone else's fault is at the forefront again, in hyper-hypocritical fashion:

Here's what Trump said:

Today’s chemical attack in Syria against innocent people, including women and children, is reprehensible and cannot be ignored by the civilized world. These heinous actions by the Bashar al-Assad regime are a consequence of the past administration’s weakness and irresolution. President Obama said in 2012 that he would establish a “red line” against the use of chemical weapons and then did nothing. The United States stands with our allies across the globe to condemn this intolerable attack.

First off, the statement reads like something that you would put out in the heat of the campaign. Half of it is devoted to what the past administration did and didn't do. Certainly the Obama administration took heat — and most would say deservedly so — for not holding to its “red line” policy on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad using chemical weapons. But two full sentences — out of four?

Second is the fact that Trump himself in 2013 urged Obama not to enforce that red line. To wit:

But even more conspicuous than that, the statement takes a harsh tone toward the Obama administration without saying what the Trump administration will do differently. The applicable Trump policy here, in fact, appears even less stringent than Obama's was: It's leaving Assad in power in the name of fighting the Islamic State (ISIS) first.

As recently as last week, both Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley both signaled that Assad would be left alone.

“Are we going to sit there and focus on getting him out? No,” Haley said.
 

That's better

Tonight, after a visit to the dog salon:

Stargazing at the ABC

I caught most of the much hyped (on the ABC) show Stargazing Live last night, and found it all a bit odd.

I liked that it was Siding Spring observatory, which I had only re-visited a few years ago;  I don't mind that Julia Zamiro was the co-host (I just find her extremely likeable on anything she does); and I did learn a thing or two.  (One thing is something I am embarrassed to say I had not already worked out for myself.)

But, it was a bit, I don't know, trying too hard to drum up enthusiasm for an audience that probably wasn't there in the first place.   I could understand if it was an educational show that schools were forced to show in science class, but the sort of people who didn't know some of the very basic stuff were almost certainly not watching it anyway.   And Brian Cox seemed a bit oddly uncomfortable, although it seemed at one point the producers told him to throw away the script, which he did, and it was perhaps for the better.   The worst participant was Josh Thomas in a pre-recorded piece in which he giggled his way pretty inanely, and pointlessly, at historical items at the Sydney Observatory.  (His fans already have me marked as the enemy for writing about the mystery of his non-Brisbane accent, and not caring for his dramady show, so I may as well double down.)

What I did enjoy more was the casual, unscripted, half hour after the main show on ABC 2, where a relaxed panel of highly qualified people (and Julia Zamiro) drank "space beer" and answered questions about the universe and astronomy.   It was like sitting in a group someone like me would love to talk to in a pub.

I'll be watching at least that part again tonight.

So, so easily distracted

The American Right has become ridiculously easily distracted.   I mean, you see it in everything from obsession about a throwaway line like "hide the decline", to pointless pursuit of Hilary Clinton over Benghazi, and now all Trump has to do is say that its terrible that Rice asked to know who legally tapped Russians were talking to on his team (when there was already an investigation going on), and it's meant to be the biggest political spying scandal since Watergate. 

Here's some reality based writing on the topic.  Fred Kaplan at Slate:

I asked retired Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, former director of the National Security Agency, whether it’s unlawful or even unusual for someone in Rice’s position to ask the NSA to unmask the names of Americans caught up in intercepts. He replied, in an email, “Absolutely lawful. Even somewhat routine.”

He added, “The request to unmask would not be automatically granted. NSA would adjudicate that, although I’m certain a request from the national security adviser would carry great weight.”

Hayden also said, “There are very plausible, legitimate reasons why she would request such information.” Though he didn’t elaborate on what those reasons might have been, the pertinent regulations specify that unmasking might be requested, and allowed, if the names in question are pertinent to foreign intelligence.

When Rice made her request, there were ongoing investigations of Russia’s involvement in the election, of the role Trump advisers might have played in this involvement, and of efforts by some of these advisers to undermine U.S. foreign policy, specifically on sanctions toward Russia.

It’s worth noting that we don’t know—or at least no news story about the incident has reported—whether the NSA granted Rice’s request and gave her the unmasked names. Even if she did, Hayden emphasized in his email, “the identities would be unmasked only for her”—and not for any other official who received the transcript.

“To summarize,” Hayden wrote in his email, “on its face, not even close to a smoking gun.”

And Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post:

The Trump obsession with “unmasking” names is a blatant attempt to distract and obviously irrelevant. It’s not even helpful to Trump’s case. There are many legitimate reasons for unmasking, and nothing suggests requesting information about the identities of those Russia was trying to assist was illegal or improper. Ironically, by focusing on unmasking, the Trump spinners just remind us that there was an extensive, serious investigation underway because of  a comprehensive Russian effort to manipulate American voters and because of unprecedented connections between one candidate’s team and Russia. McMullin exclaims: “If you are going to establish a secret channel with a hostile foreign power, you shouldn’t expect to have your name kept secret!”

It’s hardly out of the ordinary for a White House official like Rice, with high security clearances, to request unmasking. In Tuesday’s Washington Post, Glenn Kessler quotes Michael Doran, a former NSC aide under President George W. Bush, as saying, “I did it a couple of times.”

Another former NSC official, who asked not to be named, told me, “There is a well-established, well-used process for requesting that such information be revealed. You have to have a reason beyond simple curiosity that is tied to some legitimate national-security or law-enforcement purpose.” The intelligence agencies, the ex-official added by email, “take this requirement VERY seriously.” Though this ex-official knows nothing about the situation with Rice, he said that, since she was doing transition work with Trump’s team at the time, it would have been “highly relevant to know whether these people were talking with the Russian government as well.”

Listen, if you were the national security adviser and learned of this extensive Russian campaign of active measures, knew about all sorts of connections between Russia and one campaign, and found out associates of one candidate were picked up in monitored conversations with Russian agents, wouldn’t you demand to know the names of those involved? Any national security adviser who didn’t would be accused of burying his or her head in the sand. Nothing regarding alleged unmasking that we have heard or seen so far bolsters Trump’s “wiretapping” claim or suggests that anyone in the Obama administration did something illegal or wrong, nor does it tell us who revealed that Flynn was one of the people picked up in surveillance of Russians. What it does confirm is that there was so much evidence of a Russian disinformation scheme and of questionable connections between Trump associates and Russians that it warranted a substantial intelligence investigation.

The Trump spin squad appears so desperate to create confusion — Trump now reverts to airing old campaign canards about Hillary Clinton — that it has confused itself about what is helpful and what is not.

The thing is, though, the confusion is lapped up by dimwitted Trumpkins - I'm sorry, but there is no way of avoiding not calling them out as easily fooled.    They are already primed to believe in conspiracy nonsense - on everything from climate change, Obama is a Muslim from Kenya, Hillary being on her death bed, to massive fraudulent votes.   They are putty in the small, orange hands of their hero.

And the Republican Party  as a whole has to take the blame for this terrible situation.

Update:  The Vox explainer on this is very good, too.

Inelegant

At home, last night:

What an upsetting accident

Accidents that kill families happen every day, but the way some happen, they really make it terrible to imagine the heartbreak:  Police recover three bodies from Tweed River at Tumbulgum

Hi monty...

I see you've been trying to engage with Catallaxians re the Trump/Russia matter.

I know I've said it before, but I just like repeating myself:  you're dealing with a group that includes outright nuts, the emotionally fragile, those with obvious personality defects, the chronically immature, and those so gullible that they believe any Right wing spin on any topic.

To the extent that they fight within themselves, it is more a matter of stupid fighting stupid:  there is no prospect that out of that, a correct answer will be victorious.  

Sure, you can go on goading them, but it just seems so pointless to me....

Badgers get around

I assumed, when I read the headline:

A badger can bury a cow by itself: Study observes previously unknown caching behavior 

that the cow burying badger in question was in England.

But no - it was in Utah.

Just as I was surprised recently to learn that there are tropical water otters (in Singapore, in particular), I had no idea that badgers roamed North America.

I have clear inadequacies in my knowledge of mammal distribution...

Frost fairs examined more closely

That's interesting - the Thames River "frost fairs", when the river froze and all those cheery Londoners rushed out to have fun on it - is not as accurate an indicator of the Little Ice Age as you might imagine.  

Bad review

Sabine Hossenfeld really did not like a new book by Brian Cox, who is about to turn up on ABC with a live stargazing show tonight.  (I am curious about how they are going to deal with the possibility of clouds - but I will try to remember to watch it.)

Furry litigants

Prairie dogs win major victory in court

Stiglitz, Krugman..

The always readable Stiglitz and Krugman have items of interest up:

1. JS has an article in the Guardian entitled Putin's illiberal stagnation in Russia offers a valuable lesson

I liked the sarcasm (well, I think it is intended as such) in the last line:

They sell their system of “illiberal democracy” on the basis of pragmatism, not some universal theory of history. These leaders claim they are simply more effective at getting things done.

That is certainly true when it comes to stirring nationalist sentiment and stifling dissent. They have been less effective, however, in nurturing long-term economic growth. Once one of the world’s two superpowers, Russia’s GDP is now about 40% of Germany’s and just over 50% of France’s. Life expectancy at birth ranks 153rd in the world, just behind Honduras and Kazakhstan.

In terms of per capita income, Russia ranks 73rd (in terms of purchasing power parity) – well below the Soviet Union’s former satellites in central and eastern Europe. The country has deindustrialised: the vast majority of its exports now come from natural resources. It has not evolved into a “normal” market economy, but rather into a peculiar form of crony-state capitalism.

Yes, Russia still punches above its weight in some areas, such as nuclear weapons.

Can't say I know about the corruption scandal he refers to here:

Fifteen years ago, when I wrote Globalization and its Discontents, I argued that this “shock therapy” approach to economic reform was a dismal failure. But defenders of that doctrine cautioned patience: one could make such judgments only with a longer-run perspective.

Today, more than 25 years since the onset of transition, those earlier results have been confirmed, and those who argued that private property rights, once created, would give rise to broader demands for the rule of law have been proven wrong. Russia and many of the other transition countries are lagging further behind the advanced economies than ever. GDP in some transition countries is below its level at the beginning of the transition.

Many in Russia believe the US Treasury pushed Washington consensus policies to weaken their country. The deep corruption of the Harvard University team chosen to “help” Russia in its transition, described in a detailed account published in 2006 by Institutional Investor, reinforced these beliefs.

The only thing I would comment on about this, though, is that it is curious that there seems to be one huge exception to crony capitalism not working - South Korea.   Mind you, it seems a very peculiar, somewhat turbulent country in a couple of respects (political and religious), and maybe its success won't continue indefinitely.  Or maybe it just shows that if you capture a huge market share in TVs and phones you'll always do well...

2.  Paul Krugman writes about Trump wimping out on his trade rhetoric, and recounts one incident I might have missed on TV:

So on Friday the White House scheduled a ceremony in which Mr. Trump would sign two new executive orders on trade. The goal, presumably, was to counteract the growing impression that his bombast on trade was sound and fury signifying nothing.

Unfortunately, the executive orders in question were, to use the technical term, nothingburgers. One called for a report on the causes of the trade deficit; wait, they’re just starting to study the issue? The other addressed some minor issues of tariff collection, and its content apparently duplicated an act President Obama already signed last year.

Not surprisingly, reporters at the event questioned the president, not about trade, but about Michael Flynn and the Russia connection. Mr. Trump then walked out of the room — without signing the orders. (Vice President Mike Pence gathered them up, and the White House claims that they were signed later.)

Cyphers and codes of early America

A good, short article at The Atlantic, talking about methods used or invented by the Founding Fathers (and by Thomas Jefferson in particular) to encode communications.

I had heard about this before - I think it might get a mention at Monticello, his plantation home, which I was lucky enough to visit in the 1980's.

They don't muck around

China Uighurs: Xinjiang ban on long beards and veils

I'm guessing that this may make Trumpkins feel somewhat conflicted.  It's the country they're not supposed to like being extraordinarily tough on a religion they like to see under tight control.   If their man Putin had done it, well, that would be OK.

Sunshine Coast noted

Just had the first weekend at the beach since I don't know when.  (We had a Christmas stay at Noosa in December 2015 - but we might have gone to the beach after that?)

This time - Maroochydore.

I still quite like the place - some early memories are of beach holidays there in a great smelling canvas tent along the strip of camping that seemed to run from Alexandra Headlands right up to Maroochydore - but maybe the camping grounds weren't quite that long?   By the way, do other people love the smell of canvas?  I always have, but if you have not enjoyed camping in childhood, do you still like it as an adult?

It also makes me feel a bit old to be able to tell my teenage kids that when I was a child, you could walk right up to Pincushion Island - the rocky outcrop on the other side of the river you can see here:

But now that I check, it was only in the 1990's that the river mouth moved from the north of that spot to the present south side.  So it's not so ancient a change after all.

Anyway, despite somewhat dirty looking beach water due to the recent heavy rainfall water coming out of the Maroochy and Mooloolah Rivers,  we managed an enjoyable surf swim at Alexandra Headlands on Saturday;  fished in the fish empty Maroochy River that day too, and then fished in the much more productive Noosa River at Noosaville on Sunday.   Caught a couple of whiting that were at least nearly legal size to keep - next time I've got to have one of those measures from a tackle shop so we can feel certain of legality and actually keep them.  They are an attractive fish, whiting...  

The Noosa River was a bit brown too, but it runs through more sand than does the Maroochy River, so it always looks cleaner than the latter, even after rain.  It remains my favourite river in the country.

As for your basic, and very cheap, pub food for lunch, you can't go past the Irish pub at Noosa Junction, which for some reason is called the Sogo Bar.   (There is another Irish pub up the hill, which I have never been to, but I see Sogo is a much bigger favourite on Google reviews.)  If you're just after a $12 burger and chips, or a $10-12 9 inch pizza for one, or a "breakfast burger" available all day with an egg, heaps of crispy bacon and some bbq sauce for $7.50, it will suit you perfectly.  I always feel it should be very popular with backpackers, but I never see them there at lunch.

As regular readers can tell, I do love the Sunshine Coast and Noosaville in particular.  The only reason for not wanting to live there permanently, in retirement (which seems very far off, given that the 50's are the new 40's), is that I did live there for a couple of years in the 1990's, and you can just get too used to beauty and beaches such that you can't be bothered walking down to the beach because you know it will still be there the next day.   I really like the effect of only being there for short stays, and reminding yourself each time how much you like it.

Suffering on the Right

Gee, the Australian culture war fighting Right is having a bad time of it:  the only cartoonist in the land sympathetic to their gripes and obsessions died;  their anti-PC for the sake of being anti PC little cable show has gone down the drain after Mark Latham got the sack; and (in news only noticed by them), the Federal government didn't get the change they wanted to s18C Racial Discrimination Act.  (I can safely say that, due the cyclone, absolutely no one in Queensland was paying attention to that little sideshow.) 

The only thing they have to hold onto is the Trump presidency which, try as they might to pretend otherwise, is a complete shambles of Right wing infighting, lies and distortion.   (They don't see it that way, but they are dimwitted and it will get through to them, eventually.)

I suppose they still have Andrew Bolt to cling to, too.  If ever he disappears in a scandal of some kind or other, we'd have to put them on suicide watch....

Disaster coverage

Has anyone else noticed how coverage of cyclones seems to go now?

The media sends up a heap of people to a scattered area where a cyclone may hit, and they stand in front of the cameras waiting for the wind to pick up and buildings to start getting blown away around them.

When that doesn't happen on screen, and yet they keep coverage going on for hours on end, trying to talk up how bad it is when there is no real destruction behind them, you start to get people elsewhere in the country doubting that it is all that bad.  (Particularly Right wing culture warriors who want to counter any suggestion of climate change having made any bad weather worse.)

Then, the next day, you start to get some images of damaged buildings, but not too many, because the roads are blocked or flooded, so the TV crews can't get around much anyway.  Again, some viewers are starting to think "not so bad".

Then, by day 3 or 4, when you actually do start getting some more detailed images of ruined resorts, homes, and commercial premises, you get the feeling that people are sick of the coverage and don't care much about they're seeing anyway.

The people around the Whitsunday area have been without power for days now, and I saw, but only on Twitter, that many electricity pylons had been bent over in the cyclone, presumably meaning that some areas will have no power for quite a while yet.   Coverage also indicated that a huge storm downpour in the area caused a lot of flood damage the first or second night after the cyclone.

Daydream Island looks extremely smashed up; Hamilton Island less so, but in both cases, there has actually not been that much video evidence.  We don't even know what some of the other islands look like.

The few locals I have seen interviewed do seem to have considered it to have the worst experience they have had, especially given that the cyclone seemed to be very slow moving, causing them many hours of distressing high wind and rain.

It's been said that there had been damage of a lot of buildings at the inland town of Collinsville, but I don't think I have seen any news video of that at all.

My point is - the way television coverage of cyclones work now, it seems to give a very misleading impression of what has gone on.   Less live coverage of the type we have just seen would actually help correct that.

One other point:   I get the impression, from watching people in the area talking about lack of information, and how they can't communicate because mobile phones can't be charged, that some have sort of forgotten about listening to the local radio station during emergencies (and having plenty of batteries for their AM radio.)  Maybe that's not fair, but I just had the feeling that people are so used to using the internet for information, they seem to now feel there is no other way to get messages if they can't access it.

Not your average UFO sighting

I see, via The Anomalist, that a mainstream maritime worker forum/information site has run a report of a UFO arising out of the Gulf of Mexico:

A crew member of an offshore supply vessel in the Gulf of Mexico claims he saw a UFO ‘fives times’ the size of his vessel and UFO trackers are now looking for more witnesses to come forward with any information possibly related to the sighting.
The UFO sighting reportedly occurred on Tuesday in the Gulf of Mexico approximately 80 miles southeast of New Orleans.

The sighting was submitted to the National UFO Reporting Center, which apparently tracks UFO sightings and data, by the chief engineer of an OSV working the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday afternoon. According to the eyewitness report:

“Close to 7:00 pm on March 21st, just before dusk, myself and 4 of the crew members aboard our vessel saw a craft that appeared to be five times our 240 ft vessel in length. My line of sight was about 1/4 mile from our vessel. There was a rig behind the craft about a 1/2 mile. i used this to help gauge size of craft. Sighting was approximately 80 miles SE of New Orleans, Louisiana.

The scene lasted about 40 seconds. The craft rose up out of the water (Gulf of Mexico) about 40 feet, no water was dripping from the craft. Within a split second the craft disappeared at a 30 degree angle into the sky. Speed appeared to faster than speed of a light turning on in a room. Within seconds it had disappeared completely.
I can say for sure that the craft was dark colored, oval in shape and made no sound whatsoever.

The NUFORC has even highlighted the sighting as being of particular interest among the 246 reports of UFOs received in March alone. And after speaking with the witness by phone, the NUFORC said the report seems legit and has urged more witnesses to come forward. 

“We spoke via telephone with this witness, and he seemed to us to be unusually sober-minded,” NUFORC wrote in a note added to the original report. “We suspect that he is a very capable, and very reliable, witness. He estimates that upwards of perhaps 50 people, who were aboard nearby vessels, may have witnessed the event, as well. We would urge those other witnesses to submit reports of what they had witnessed.”

Hate to say it, but if no one else comes forward to back this guy up, you would have to put it down to something mental going on...