Dear Decent American Citizen,

If you’ve read any of my articles on thinkbynumbers.org, you know that there are a lot of things going on in this world that don’t make any sense.  For a long time, I kind of thought that I must be crazy and everyone was just too polite to tell me. I was certain that there was something I was missing that could explain why we allocate society’s limited resources in such an idiotic fashion.

For instance, President Obama just announced that he wants to spend $100 million a year studying the brain. This is a wonderful thing.  The brain is the sole source of all joy and suffering in the universe.  However, while President Obama is busy patting himself on the back about this, world governments are spending $1.8 TRILLION each year finding ways to murder us and destroy our property.  I put these numbers in an excel spreadsheet.  I had to make the column representing military spending 17,000 pixels high in order to make the brain research spending even visible (1 pixel high).  It’s fucking ridiculous.

A little less than a year ago, I came up with an easy 3 step plan to start optimally allocating societal resources using a form of crowd-sourced democracy.  To my complete surprise, no one seemed to give a damn about it. Initially, I was completely baffled by this. “What could possibly be more important than this?” I asked myself. I mean, we spend $25.4 billion enabling a large number of grown men to do various things with various types of spheres for no reason. Shouldn’t we be spending even a little tiny fraction of that of a system that will optimally allocate resources in a manner that will minimize suffering throughout the world?  I was so confused.

However, since then, I have had an epiphany which can explain how a world that contains so much unnecessary suffering, will allow its governments to the squander bountiful resources on idiotic pursuits such as the war in Iraq and the War on Drugs.  The reason the world is so screwed up is because open-minded, thoughtful, self-critical people who possess an acute awareness of the importance of reducing suffering typically crippled by the scourge of the mind known as depression.  This leaves the levers of world power to the type A, alpha-male (often psychopathic) personalities that are supremely assertive and confident in their beliefs. Their myopic worldview has no conception of the severity of suffering that is going on all over the world. This is because they are generally psychologically very healthy and have never experienced true suffering themselves.  The result is that they posses a complete lack of empathy. However, they simply know what they want and are willing to do whatever they have to do to get it.

People often assume a causal relationship between power and corruption. However, there is only a correlation.  This correlations exists because the corrupt, psychopathic, type A personalities simply have a distinct advantage when it comes to acquiring power. They are not bound by rules of morality.  They do not suffer from the analysis paralysis malady that most introspective people do.

The reason the open-minded, self-critical, introspective people throughout the world remain in their psychological cages is because the field of modern psychiatry is not taking an aggressive, data-centric approach to curing their illness and maximizing their happiness. As a result the world is filled with the walking dead geniuses that are paralyzed by fear and self-doubt. Since I cured my lifelong depression, I feel like a zombie who just woke up but is still surrounded by a bunch of other zombies that are just stumbling around aimlessly.  I desperately want to wake all of them up so they can be happy and help me to eradicate suffering from the world.  That’s what I am trying to do with Quantimodo.

I feel we’re at an inflection point in history. If Quantimodo can help to wipe out depression, these thoughtful, self-critical, open-minded individuals will gain the confidence and assertiveness that is required to obtain positions of power.  Once we reclaim control from these psychopaths, I believe we’re going to see exponential declines in net world suffering as we begin implementing rational resource allocation policies.

If you would like to help me realize these goals please call +1.618.391.0002.  Thank you!

Love,

Mike

The post Governments Spend $1.8 Trillion Murdering Us and Destroying Our Property Annually appeared first on Think by Numbers.

I know you’re very busy, so I’m very sorry to bother you with this. However, I think what I have to say too important for you to ignore.  I appreciate that you are trying to make the world a better place. I respect you as a person. Against all adversity you have achieved some very amazing things.

I would also like to make it completely clear that I abhor the use of the majority of illegal drugs.  The adverse health effects and insidious addiction that comes along with drugs like cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin have destroyed countless lives.  I never want my daughter or anyone to do any of those drugs.  When I was a child, my grandmother and sister were killed and my back was broken as a result of someone’s irresponsible use of drugs.

So I am completely aware of the fact that there can be horrific and permanent negative consequences to the abuse of drugs.  However, imprisoning people for the possession of these substances does not erase this harm. The War on Drugs was in full effect when my sister and grandmother were killed, and it certainly didn’t protect them.

Every minute someone is arrested for simple drug possession in the United States.  In 2011, marijuana possession arrests totaled 663,032.  Despite your claims that going after recreational pot users in states where it is legal is not “a top priority”, your administration has continued to aggressively target dispensaries that are in compliance with state law. I and others have shouldered the $10 billion annual cost of arresting and incarcerating hundreds of thousands of people for the possession of marijuana. These arrests are often for small quantities for personal use.

I work 40 hours a week managing an industrial testing chemistry lab.  On top of that, over the last year I have been spending another 40 hours a week trying to build a web application that I hope will help the millions of people in the world who suffer from the emotional hell that is depression.  It is my sincere hope that through improving exercise, diet, sleep, safe pharmacological measures and other treatments in conjunction with disciplined self-tracking of treatments, outcomes and adverse events, we can and will eradicate mental illness from the face of the earth.

You and George Bush have taken tens of thousands of dollars out of my paychecks over the last 10 years to pay for your corporate welfare, foreign military occupations and to imprison people for simple non-violent, drug possession.  The result is that I may run out of money before I achieve my goal.

In your 2012 National Drug Control Strategy you admit that “the War on Drugs is an utter failure”.  Here is a graph from an infographic touting your “Record of Reform” which your drug czar, Gil Kerlikowske, has provided us.  This graph breaks down how you wasted my money in 2012.

Source: 2012 National Drug Control Strategy

 

That graph suggests that you are spending more on prevention and treatment than you are on law enforcement and incarceration. However, to produce this appearance, it seems that you have to engage in some statistical trickery by separating out “Interdiction” and “International Programs” from the “Law Enforcement and Incarceration” bar.  In reality, you are still spending 50% more on law enforcement and incarceration than you are on prevention and treatment.  Here is a less deceitful version of your graph.

Source: http://topnug.com/blog/tag/president-obama/

 

What’s worse, the money you are stealing from me isn’t even having any impact on the level of illicit drug use.  You are just tearing apart thousands of families for no reason. Addiction rates are at exactly the same level that they were before we spent $1.5 trillion dollars on “drug control measures”.  This fact is illustrated in the graph below.

Addiction Rate and US Drug Control Spending

Source: http://www.mattgroff.com/questions-on-the-1315-project-chart/

As a constitutional scholar, you are aware that the 10th Amendment states that powers not granted to the federal government by the Constitution, nor prohibited to the States, are reserved to the States or the people.

Here are the powers granted to the federal government by Article 1, Section 8 of the constitution:

1. The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
2. To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;
3. To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
4. To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;
5. To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
6. To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;
7. To establish Post Offices and post Roads;
8. To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
9. To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;
10. To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;
11. To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
12. To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
13. To provide and maintain a Navy;
14. To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
15. To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
16. To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
17. To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of Particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards and other needful Buildings
18. To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

You will note that the ability to restrict what materials individuals choose to put in their bodies is not on that list.  I presume that you would cite the commerce clause when trying to justify your actions. However, you know perfectly well that it is possible to produce and consume a substance without engaging in commerce or transporting it across state lines.  If one does this, I would admit that the federal government could have jurisdiction.  However, you are continuing to spend my money to imprison people who are not engaging in interstate commerce and merely possess restricted substances.  I don’t even think the states should be incarcerating people for nonviolent drug possession.  However, if someone is going to engage in such totalitarian activities, it should be state or local governments. The federal government absolutely no right to do any of this.

I further presume that you would defend your unconstitutional actions by claiming that the Constitution is not a static document, but a living one that must be read in the context of an ever-changing world. To that, I would say to look again at this graph that represents the reality of our ever-changing world.  Even if you twist the constitution into a pretzel to try to justify your actions over the last 4 years, the reality remains that these prohibitionist policies are not achieving their intended aims.

People with mental illness self-medicating themselves is the number one cause of illegal drug use. In Dreams From My Father, you admitted that this was the reason you turned to drugs when you stated, “Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it.”  The failure of the mental health community to take a rigorous, data-centric approach to diagnosis and treatment is the reason that mental illness, and by extension illegal drug use is so pervasive in this country. If I had 0.1% of the $10 billion that you spend on law enforcement and incarceration, I could prevent more illegal drug use with my application then you can with the entire $10 billion.

If you have any respect for democracy, you should at the very least end the federal prohibition of marijuana.  55% of Americans agree with me on this issue as is illustrated by this infographic.

http://blogs.lawyers.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/MJ-Infographic.jpg

 

To be fair, I would like to thank you for the progress you have made in reducing drug possession sentencing disparities.  I appreciate your true and good intentions.  I know that you want to reduce suffering in the world.  However, I would still like to politely request that you request $0 for federal incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders, interdiction, and “international programs” in your next budget proposal to congress.

Please stop wasting my goddamned money on this idiotic Drug War. Thank you!

Sign this petition if you want the government to stop wasting your money, too!

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/stop-wasting-my-money-war-drugs/shzxk8ks

The post NEWS FLASH: US Government Wastes $1.5 Trillion on Devastating Drug War appeared first on Think by Numbers.

The reason GDP matters is that it is directly correlated to a reduction in human suffering. Economic growth is the primary differentiating factor between a life lived in the US and a life lived in North Korea. Economic growth is the primary differentiating factor between a life lived in the 11th century and the 21st century. Economic growth has cured countless diseases which would have otherwise imbued countless lives with unimaginable suffering. Economic growth has prevented billions from dying of starvation. If governments will get out of its way, economic growth will eventually eliminate human suffering from the planet. Also, according to the most recent income/happiness study, the lower a person’s annual income falls below $75,000 a year, the unhappier he or she feels. But no matter how much more than $75,000 people make, they don’t report any greater degree of happiness. The strong correlation between happiness and GDP is illustrated below.

Graph Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/business/16leonhardt.html

Filip Spagnoli identifies an array of positive and negative correlations between per capita GDP and the following metrics:

1. Corruption
2. Poverty
3. The Resource Curse
4. Economic Freedom
5. Rule Of Law
6. Democracy
7. Infant Mortality Rates
8. Life Expectancy
9. Education
10. The Environment
11. Happiness
12. Unemployment
13. Land Distribution
14. Charity
15. Individualism
16. Inequality
17. Election Outcomes
18. Civil War
19. Belief In The Theory Of Evolution
20. Crime
21. World Population
22. Fertility Rates
23. Taxation
24. Spending On Christmas Gifts
25. Casual Sex
26. Equality Before The Law
27. CO2 Emissions
28. Campaign Spending
29. Tax Revenue
30. Urbanization
31. Military Spending
32. Government Spending
33. Innovation
34. Religion
35. Social Spending
36. Competitiveness
37. IQ
38. Adult Literacy Rates
39. Unionization
40. Employment Share Of Agriculture
41. Stock Prices
42. The Salary Of Political Leaders
43. Risk Tolerance

The post GDP and You! appeared first on Think by Numbers.

Ranked by the number of victims, heart disease comes in as the number one threat. It’s responsible for 700,000 deaths a year. This coronary malady keeps food on the tables of funeral directors nationwide. And, like a perpetual motion machine, this very food fills their arteries with cholesterol leading to even more heart attacks.

On to number two. Cancer kills 550,000 people a year. But ironically, some futurists see it as a potential key to immortality. It removes the limit on the number of times that a cell can replicate itself. Thus, if properly harnessed, this disease could be used to defy aging by allowing eternal tissue regeneration. This would enable Joan Rivers to continue enchanting Americans with her iconic brand of celebrity commentary for generations to come.

Runners up for the best solution to overpopulation include strokes with 160,000 casualties a year, respiratory disease with 120,000 casualties annually, diabetes at 70,000 , pneumonia at 60,000 , Alzheimer’s disease at 50,000 , and vehicular accidents at 40,000.

As previously stated, averaged over the last decade which contained the worst terrorist attack in our nation’s history, terrorism still only killed about 300 people a year. Compare this to the 1000 people who are struck by lightning every year. Hopefully, by putting storm clouds on the federal no-fly list we’ll be able to reduce this number in the future. But until then, based on current trends you’re three times more likely to be struck by lightning than to be killed in a terrorist attack.

 Sources: Unless otherwise noted, all accidental death information fromNational Safety Council. Disease death information from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Lifetime risk is calculated by dividing 2003 population (290,850,005) by the number of deaths, divided by 77.6, the life expectancy of a person born in 2003. *Shark data represents number of attacks worldwide, not deaths.

Screwed Up Spending Priorities

Now that we’ve compared the risks, let’s examine how the government chooses to allocate our limited resources to combat these threats. To the least likely means of death I’ve mentioned, terrorism, the federal government devotes about $150 billion annually. On the other hand, to combat the most likely cause of death, heart disease, the government contributes only $2 billion. And just $300 million is devoted to research on the third most likely cause of death, strokes.

So looking at it another way, we spend $500 million for every death from terrorism and only $2,000 for every death resulting from strokes. That means we spend 250,000 times more per death on terrorism. I’m sure all of this is very flattering to Osama bin Laden, but this disparity might leave some stroke victims scratching their heads, assuming they’ve retained full motor control of their arms.

Why is the government response so disproportionate to the threat?

EVOLUTION

Evolutionary psychology may be able to explain this phenomenon. The human brain has been around for 200,000 years.   More than 99% of that evolution has been characterized by starvation and general scarcity of resources typified the environment in which humans evolved.  In this situation, violent acquisition of resources from other groups was often a necessary survival technique. Hence, human brains most hyper-vigilant and aggressive toward human threats (i.e. terrorists) were most likely to survive and propagate these characteristics.

On the other hand, throughout evolutionary history medical science was almost non-existent.  Hence, there would be no survival value added by a tendency to focus on more likely health-related causes of death. We just weren’t designed for these times.

Anxiety Fatigue

One possible reason is anxiety fatigue. When an individual is subjected to a stimulus for an extended period of time, such as the aroma of a hospital room, the sound of a fan, or the endless nagging of the mother-in-law, their mind eventually just filters it out. Mortality risks such as heart disease and cancer extend farther back in time than even the existence of our current civilization. Our society now more or less accepts these unfortunate facts of life as another cost of doing business.Thus, they’re filtered out of our collective consciousness to some extent. On the other hand, consider the SARS virus scare a few years ago. Despite the absence of a single American fatality, the newness of this airborne illness allowed it to occupy headlines for weeks. Similarly, the Islamic terrorist menace is also a relatively new phenomenon to the US. Maybe threat fatigue for terrorism just hasn’t set in yet.

Economic Consequences

The economic consequences of terrorism would, at first thought, seem like a justification for the level of concern. There was a huge financial cost associated with the 9/11 attacks. Total related insurance claim payments are estimated at $32.5 billion. However, there’s been no definitive proof that the attacks lead to a significant decline in GDP. In fact, a GDP which had been falling due to recession in the quarter prior to 9/11 actually started growing again in the quarter following 9/11.

It’s conventional wisdom that military spending is good for the economy. However, most macroeconomic models show that, in the long term, military spending diverts resources from productive uses, such as consumption and investment. This ultimately slows economic growth and reduces employment. So if one thinks they’re protecting our economy by taking trillions of dollars away from other productive uses to fight the so-called global war on terror, they should consider upgrading their abycuss to a calculator.

Nuclear Bombs

Another seemingly more justifiable reason for a magnified response to terrorism is the potential for a nuclear attack that could result in a far greater number of casualties than the typical terrorist attacks have to date. According to many experts on nuclear proliferation, the possibly insurmountable technical challenges of building or acquiring a thermo-nuclear weapon are enormous. Including the requirement that the weapon be portable, makes the likelihood of acquisition dramatically more remote. However, there is a real threat that highly enriched uranium could be aquired from a former Soviet state and used to make a crude bomb. This is a serious risk and needs to be addressed by either securing or downgrading the 1000 tons of yellowcake remaining within Russia and her neighbors. The government currently spends about a billion dollars on this effort annually. Compare this to the two billion we spend in Iraq every week and one might assume we have a bonobo setting our national security priorities in exchange for bananas.

Human Psychology

Finally, the psychological makeup of our species could also be a contributing factor to this risk amplification. Just look at the plot structure of a work of fiction. The vast majority of conflicts are between a human protagonist and a human antagonist.We seem to maintain an inherent attraction to interpersonal or, on a larger scale, inter-societal conflict. It’s only natural that this affinity translates to our media diet as well. Many studies have shown that the media sets the public policy agenda.So, the point is that interpersonal and societal conflicts like that between Western civilization and Muslim extremists are simply better able to maintain our attention than conflicts between man and complex, abstract medical threats.

In addition, sociologists and psychologists have determined that society amplifies the danger of risks imposed upon them, such as terrorism. Conversely, society finds risks resulting from voluntary behavior, such as car accidents, more acceptable.

 Graph Source: http://www.federationofscientists.org

 Graph Source: http://calamitiesofnature.com

The post Anti-Terrorism Spending 50,000 Times More Than on Any Other Cause of Death appeared first on Think by Numbers.

The financial sector receives more of the average paycheck than any other sector of the economy.  Its share of the economy totals $2 trillion dollars.

From 1973 to 1985, the financial sector earned less than 16 percent of domestic corporate profits. In the 1990s, it oscillated between 21 percent and 30 percent, higher than it had ever been in the postwar period. This decade, it reached 41 percent.  in the 1960s, finance and insurance accounted for only 4% of GDP, whereas in 2007 finance and insurance accounted for 8% of GDP.

The purpose of the financial services industry is basically to transfer money from savers to entrepreneurs. It primarily consists of using a computer to shift money from one bank account to another. This service requires virtually no physical labor and very few material resources.

Yet, this relatively simple service cost our country more than $2 trillion in 2007. That was more than the country spent on health care, construction, food, utilities and transportation.

The post Financial Sector Costs Us More than Any Other Sector In Economy appeared first on Think by Numbers.

It is commonly claimed that government spending is good for the economy, but the statistics show the opposite.  Most recent studies find a negative correlation between total government size and economic growth. Why is economic growth important?  Because wealthier societies are generally happier societies.

No matter how good things get for us, we always want more. Human beings want better:

A certain level of government spending is necessary to maintain an economy that can provide and improve these things. A well-functioning economy requires government to:

Graph Source: http://theuklibertarian.com/2010/07/12/paul-mckeever-on-why-libertarians-love-economic-arguments/

However, when government spending exceeds these mandates, it takes the country’s human and material resource allocation decision-making power away from society’s massive collective of individual intelligences. This is a bad idea because individuals are just better at deciding how allocating resources to satisfy their own desires since:

• They cumulatively have access to infinitely more detailed and specific information than any small group of politicians and bureaucrats do.
• Satisfying as many desires as possible (by maximizing productivity) is their sole incentive.

Politicians, on the other hand, do not allocate resources as productively (satisfy fewer human desires) because they:

• Only have access to general demographic data
• Are primarily incentivized to obtain campaign contributions to get re-elected

The ability to obtain campaign contributions is primarily dependent on the candidate’s ability to divert the nation’s resources to corporations and special interest groups. Hence, resources are not specifically allocated to maximize their productivity, but are allocated in the pursuit of political goals.

This graph presents data on the relationship between size of government and economic growth for the twenty·three long-standing members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Graph Source: http://www.oecd.org/eco/economicoutlook.htm

The data show that a 10 percent increase in government expenditures as a share of GDP reduces the annual rate of growth by about 1 percent. The data also imply that the size of government in these countries is beyond the range that maximizes economic growth.

The graph contains four dots (observations) for each of the twenty-three countries (one for each of the four decades during the period 1960-1999). Each dot represents a country’s total government spending as a share of GDP at the beginning of the decade and its accompanying growth of real GDP during that decade. As the plotted line in the exhibit shows, there is a clearly observable negative relationship between size of governments and long-term real GDP growth. Countries with higher levels of government spending grew less rapidly. The line drawn through the points indicates that a 10-percentage-point increase in government expenditures as a share of GDP leads to approximately a 1-percentage-point reduction in economic growth.

The reason GDP matters is that it is directly correlated to a reduction in human suffering. Economic growth is the primary differentiating factor between a life lived in the US and a life lived in North Korea. Economic growth is the primary differentiating factor between a life lived in the 11th century and the 21st century. Economic growth has cured countless diseases which would have otherwise imbued countless lives with unimaginable suffering. Economic growth has prevented billions from dying of starvation. If governments will get out of its way, economic growth will eventually eliminate human suffering from the planet. Also, according to the most recent income/happiness study, the lower a person’s annual income falls below $75,000 a year, the unhappier he or she feels. But no matter how much more than $75,000 people make, they don’t report any greater degree of happiness. The strong correlation between happiness and GDP is illustrated below.

Graph Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/business/16leonhardt.html

Here is a graph from Politics & Prosperity. Look at the historical relationship between government spending and GDP growth:

  (Source notes for this graph and those that follow are at the bottom of this post.)

The post Get Society Rich Quick: The Ideal Level of Government Spending appeared first on Think by Numbers.

FACT 2: 0% of suicide terrorist attacks have been directed at countries not militarily involved in geopolitical disputes.

Robert Pape at the University of Chicago, with funding from the Department of Defense, has created the first comprehensive database of every suicide terrorist attack in the world from 1980 until today.  The data reveal important truths that must be realized before there can be any hope of minimizing this threat.

Every suicide terrorist campaign has had a clear goal that is secular and political: to compel a modern democracy to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland.

From the The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism by Robert Pape:

As Table 1 indicates, there have been 188 separate suicide terrorist attacks between 1980 and 2001. Of these, 179, or 95%, were parts of organized, coherent campaigns, while only nine were isolated or random events. Seven separate disputes have led to suicide terrorist campaigns: the presence of American and French forces in Lebanon, Israeli occupation of West Bank and Gaza, the independence of the Tamil regions of Sri Lanka, the independence of the Kurdish region of Turkey, Russian occupation of Chechnya, Indian occupation of Kashmir, and the presence of American forces on the Saudi Arabian Peninsula. Overall, however, there have been 16 distinct campaigns, because in certain disputes the terrorists elected to suspend operations one or more times either in response to concessions or for other reasons.

Every suicide campaign from 1980 to 2001 has had as a major objective—or as its central objective—coercing a foreign government that has military forces in what they see as their homeland to take those forces out. Table 2 summarizes the disputes that have engendered suicide terrorist campaigns. Since 1980, there has not been a suicide terrorist campaign directed mainly against domestic opponents or against foreign opponents who did not have military forces in the terrorists homeland. Although attacks against civilians are often the most salient to Western observers, actually every suicide terrorist campaign in the past two decades has included attacks directly against the foreign military forces in the country, and most have been waged by guerrilla organizations that also use more conventional methods of attack against those forces.

Even Al Qaeda fits this pattern. Although Saudi Arabia is not under American military occupation per se and the terrorists have

political objectives against the Saudi regime and others, one major objective of Al Qaeda is the expulsion of U.S. troops from the Saudi Peninsula and there have been a tacks by terrorists loyal to Osama Bin Laden against American troops in Saudi Arabia. To be sure, there is a major debate among Islamists over the morality of suicide attacks, but within Saudi Arabia there is little debate over Al Qaeda’s objection to American forces in the region and over 95% of Saudi society reportedly agrees with Bin Laden on this matter (Sciolino 2002).

The popularity of suicide terrorism is growing as a result of ground operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. 89 percent of all suicide terrorism around the world since the Iraq war is the direct result of troops on the ground.

Below is a graph I made using Global US Troop Deployment Data and data from the Chicago Project on Security and Terrorism.  The rise in US troop deployments in the middle east temporally precedes the rise in suicide terrorist attacks. This fact suggests[1. Conditions Necessary to Infer Causation (Kenny, 1979):
Time precedence: For 1 to cause 2, 1 must precede 2. The cause must precede the effect. The time precedence condition is satisfied since the troop increase occurs prior to the increase in attacks.

Relationship: The variables must correlate. To determine the relationship of two variables, it must be determined if the relationship could occur due to chance. Lay observers are often not good judges of the presence of relationships, thus, statistical methods are used to measure and test the existence and strength of relationships. The relationship condition is obviously satisfied because the magnitude of the upward trend completely dwarfs any random variation exhibited prior to the US invasion.

Nonspuriousness (spuriousness- not genuine): “The third and final condition for a causal relationship is nonspuriousness (Suppes, 1970). For a relationship between X and Y to be nonspurious, there must not be a Z that causes both X and Y such that the relationship between X and Y vanishes once Z is controlled” (Kenny, 1979. pp. 4-5). that violently invading and occupying a country will increase animosity among the population that is being invaded. This animosity tends to manifest itself in the form of terrorist attacks perpetrated against the violent invader. The nonspuriousness condition can be assumed to be satisfied unless some other causal factor that better fulfills the relationship and time precedence conditions is identified.] that violently invading and occupying a country will increase animosity among the population that is being invaded. This animosity tends to manifest itself in the form of terrorist attacks perpetrated against the violent invader. 

The desired end as defined by the Bush administration would be the elimination of terrorism. They attempted to achieve this using the means of military invasion and occupation. The above graph suggests that the means used did not achieve the desired end. In fact, the means produce the opposite of the desired ends.

The Public Believes that the Government Has Effectively Reduced Terrorist Capabilities But It Doesn’t Believe that Terrorist Capabilities Have Been Reduced

According to Pew polling, a majority of the public (61%) believes that the ability of terrorists to launch a major attack is about the same (44%) or greater than (17%) it was at the time of the 9/11 attacks. So the public doesn’t think the hundreds of billions spent on the War on Terror are producing any reduction in capabilities.  Yet, somehow the  the majority of the public (71%) continues to say the government has done very (22%) or fairly well (49%) in reducing the threat of terrorism.  It’s hard to understand how one can think the government is doing a good job at reducing the threat of terrorism when one believes that it hasn’t been reduced.

How to Reduce the Terrorist Threat

The data clearly indicate that increasing the degree of US military occupation in majority-Islamic countries, will only serve to increase the threat of terrorism.  I’d never accuse the American public of being quick, but they do seem to learn over time.  Half of Americans (50%) now believe that decreasing the U.S. military presence overseas would be the more effective policy, while just 31% say an increased presence would be more effective.

Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

Footnotes:

The post What Really Causes Terrorism? It’s Not Your Freedom. appeared first on Think by Numbers.

The massive increase in the level of consumer debt prior to the recent financial crisis bears a striking resemblance to another period in economic history.  That other period of unprecedented borrowing occurred just before 1929.  Twin Peaks didn’t make it very clear who killed Laura Palmer, but they make it pretty obvious who killed the US economy. The murderer is debt.

The Household Debt to GDP Ratio reached 100% in 2007.  That means the average family owed as much on their mortgages, auto loans, and credit cards as they earn in a year. For a most of the 20th century, this ratio’s been under 50%. The last time it reached 100% was 1929. Note the twin peaks in the graph.

In both crashes, the primary reason for the increase in debt is the Federal Reserve’s artificial lower of interest rates.  Initially, the lower rates cause people to borrow more to buy more.  This behavior serves as a signal to business that they should hire more people and expand their production capacity by building more factories and stuff.  This leads to short-term economic growth known as the “Boom”.

This Boom period is analogous to the first few weeks of a heroin addiction.  We’ve all been there.  Ben Bernanke hooks you up with some killer junk for the first time.  You slide in the needle an pretty soon you’re a quivering mound of oozing pleasure.

Those were some crazy times.  Anyway, the Fed’s artificially low interest rates lead to over-borrowing.   Eventually, people borrow so much that they can’t take on any more debt so all this buying suddenly stops. Additionally, many people declare bankruptcy when they find they can’t make their payments.  According to the graph, this “Bust” period typically initiates when the average household debt to GDP ratio reaches 100%.

When the buying slows down, businesses don’t need so many employees anymore.  This leads to layoffs and more bankruptcies.  All this new unemployment leads to even lower consumer spending. Lower consumer spending leads to even more layoffs and bankruptcies.  Hence, the cycle just feeds on itself.

This suggests that our current crisis is about something much simpler than credit default swaps, derivatives, or toxic assets. It’s all about borrowing more than we can pay back.   This is the view of the Austrian economists who accurately predicted the impending disaster.  If the government would just let the market set the interest rate you wouldn’t have this unsustainable accumulation of debt and the inevitable resulting crash.

The only problem with that solution it that it makes sense.  Hence, it’s not really a feasible public policy option.  Naturally, the government’s solution was to do even more of what caused the problem in the first place.

President Obama reappointed Ben Bernanke, the person who’s policies helped created the initial bubble. The Federal Reserve created trillions of more dollars in new loans in order to stimulate even more borrowing and debt.

Graph Source: http://research.stlouisfed.org

Why would the government behave so irrationally? The reason is that the majority of people with enough expertise and money to influence the system profit from the status quo. Financial institutions like Goldman-Sachs make trillions of dollars in interest by loaning the money the Fed creates.

It works like this:

During the financial crisis, the Fed routinely made billions of dollars in “emergency” loans to big banks at near-zero interest. Many of the banks then turned around and used the money to buy Treasury bonds at higher interest rates — essentially loaning the money back to the government at an inflated rate.“People talk about how these were loans that were paid back,” says a congressional aide who has studied the transactions. “But when the state is lending money at zero percent and the banks are turning around and lending that money back to the state at three percent, how is that different from just handing rich people money?”

To make even more money they loan it to consumers at an even higher rate in the form of mortgages, credit card loans or other forms of lending.

That is why the country’s wealth is continuously being transferred to the relatively non-productive financial sector.  The purpose of the banks is basically to facilitate the loaning of money from savers to borrowers and collect interest from the borrower.  Most of this amounts to a financial executive sitting at the top of a skyscraper moving numbers from one account to another with a computer.  Yet for this simple task many of these financial executives are paid hundreds of times more than the construction worker who built the skyscraper gets paid.

Here’s a link to an excellent easy-to-understand radio program on the causes of the collapse:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1285

Please share your thoughts in the comments section!

The post US Financial Crisis: Who Killed the Economy? appeared first on Think by Numbers.

Juggalo’s Corner By George “Ghost F**ker” Will    A plurality of Americans believe that Iran is an irrational, suicide-bound regime that would use nuclear-weapons up in this bitch, given the chance. But is this belief supported by an Iranian history of violence?  Is Iran really a bunch of stone-cold killaz or, alternatively, are these bitchez just yanking our nizzos?    If Iran is truly as wicked hardcore as Americans claim, they should have a history with a serious mutha f***in’ body count. However, when you examine Iran’s history, it becomes painfully obvious that Iran, in fact, has a p***y for ballz. Despite the incendiary rhetoric of its leaders, Iran, when comparing their body count to that of the United States, just be lookin’ like some candy-ass bitchez. Conversely, a serious examination of American historical interaction with Iran reveals the US actually possesses grenades for balls that will indeed get your mouf blowed up when you suck them.  Let’s look at the numbers.

IRAN VERSUS THE US:  Will the real HARD CORE gangstas please stand up?

Civilians Killed

NUMBER OF AMERICAN Civilians KILLED IN IRANIAN ATTACKS ON THE US = 0

NUMBER OF IRANIAN CIVILIANS KILLED IN US ATTACKS ON IRAN = 290

Civilian Deaths (Indirect Involvement)

NUMBER OF AMERICAN Civilians KILLED IN IRANIAN-SUPPORTED ATTACKS ON THE US = 0

NUMBER OF IRANIAN Civilians KILLED IN US-SUPPORTED ATTACKS ON IRAN = BETWEEN 11,000 AND 400,000

Government Overthrowals

Number of Times Iran has Overthrown the US‘s Democratically-Elected Government = 0

Number of Times the US has Overthrown Iran‘s Democratically-Elected Government = 1

1. The 1953 Iranian coup d’état (known in Iran as the 28 Mordad coup) was the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh on 19 August 1953, orchestrated by the intelligence agencies of the United Kingdom and the United States under the name TPAJAX Project. The coup saw the transition of Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi from a constitutional monarch to an authoritarian one who relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979.

ROUND 5: Military Invasions – US WINS!!!!!

Number of Countries Bombed by Iran SINCE WWII = 0

Number of Countries BOMBED by the US SINCE WWII = 32

1. China 1945-46
2. Korea 1950-53
3. China 1950-53
4. Guatemala 1954
5. Indonesia 1958
6. Cuba 1959-60
7. Guatemala 1960
8. Belgian Congo 1964
9. Guatemala 1964
10. Dominican Republic 1965-66
11. Peru 1965
12. Laos 1964-73
13. Vietnam 1961-73
14. Cambodia 1969-70
15. Guatemala 1967-69
16. Lebanon 1982-84
17. Grenada 1983-84
18. Libya 1986
19. El Salvador 1981-92
20. Nicaragua 1981-90
21. Iran 1987-88
22. Libya 1989
23. Panama 1989-90
24. Iraq 1991
25. Kuwait 1991
26. Somalia 1992-94
27. Bosnia 1995
28. Iran 1998
29. Sudan 1998
30. Afghanistan 1998
31. Yugoslavia – Serbia 1999
32. Afghanistan 2001
33. Libya 2011

1953 Under orders from President Eisenhower, the CIA organized a military coup that overthrew Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh.  Britain, unhappy that Iran nationalized its oil industry, came up with the idea for the coup and pressed the United States to mount a joint operation to remove Mossadeqh.

1953 to 1979 Following the coup, the U.S installed Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi , and the thriving democracy that existed in Iran was crushed.  The Shah led 25 years of tyrannical rule (supported by the CIA) that resulted in the killing of thousands of Iranians who opposed the U.S. puppet government.  On the economic front, the Shah denationalized Iran’s oil industry, 60% of which went to American firms.

1979 U.S.-backed Shah of Iran forced to leave the country after widespread demonstrations and strikes. Islamic religious leader Ayatollah Khomeini returns from exile and takes effective power.  Sixty-six hostages taken by students at the U.S. embassy in Tehran.  The students justified taking the hostages as retaliation for the admission of the Shah into the U.S., and demanded the Shah be returned to Iran for a trial. The new Iranian regime believed the Shah was in the U.S. so that the U.S. could carry out another coup d’etat in Iran; the U.S. claimed he had come there only to seek medical attention. The Shah was given refuge and Iranians demanded his extradition to Iran to face justice.  The U.S. rejected Iran’s request and the hostage taking ensued. The hostage crisis at the U.S. embassy in Tehran lasted 444 days.

1980 Iraq invades neighboring Iran with the approval of the United States.  The war lasts eight years and kills hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Iranians.  Iran suffered heavy casualties from Saddam’s chemical weapons, many of which were provided by the U.S.

1981 Last 52 U.S. hostages freed in January after intense diplomatic activity. Their release comes a few hours after U.S. President Jimmy Carter leaves office. They had been held for 444 days.

1982 to 1983 As Iranian forces gained the upper hand on the battlefield with Iraq, the U.S. launched another covert operation to arm and aid Saddam.  It began clandestinely to supply Saddam with satellite intelligence on Iran’s deployments.  Weapons were also sent via CIA fronts in Chile and Saudi Arabia directly to Baghdad. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy of President Ronald Reagan, in Baghdad on December 20, 1983.

1985 to 1986 Iran-Contra Affair: U.S. holds secret talks with Iran and makes weapons shipments, allegedly in exchange for Iranian assistance in releasing U.S. hostages in Lebanon. With revelations that profits were illegally channeled to Nicaraguan rebels, this creates the biggest crisis of Ronald Reagan’s presidency.

1987 Following the mining of a U.S. Navy frigate, U.S. forces engage in series of encounters with Iranian naval forces, including strikes on Gulf oil platforms. The engagement was code named “Operation Praying Mantis”.  The battle, the largest between surface forces since World War II, sank two Iranian warships and as many as six armed speedboats.  The Iranian Frigate, IS Alvand, attacked by U.S. Navy forces.

1988 On patrol in the Persian Gulf, the USS Vincennes shot down an Iranian passenger jet that it had mistaken for a hostile Iranian fighter aircraft. U.S. Navy Captain Will C. Rogers III ordered a single missile fired from his warship, which hit its target and killed all 290 people aboard the commercial Airbus.

1986 to 1989 Some seventy-three transactions took place that included bacterial cultures to make weapons-grade anthrax, advanced computers, and equipment to repair jet engines and rockets.

The post Iran US Foreign Relations: A History of Violence appeared first on Think by Numbers.

2013 Budget Plans

New Look! Same Great Waste!

Obama’s 2013 budget is $3.80 Trillion. Romney’s will be $3.79 trillion.

Budget Changes Specified by Candidate Romney™:

1. Eliminate Obamacare (which is ironically very similar to Romneycare aside from the fact that Romneycare also covered abortions) - Estimated Savings = $122 billion annually
2. Increase Military Spending – Estimated Cost = $45 billion annually
3. Increase Medicare Spending – Estimated Cost = $71 billion annually
4. “Deep Reductions” in funding for the National Endowment for the Arts – Estimated Savings = $0.15 billion annually
5. Eliminate Amtrak Subsidies – Estimated Savings = $1.6 billion annually
6. Eliminate Title X Family Planning Programs – Estimated Savings = $0.3 billion annually

Add it up.  Romney’s Total Savings = $0.01 trillion less than Obama’s budget! With a national debt on the order of $16.2 trillion, you’ll barely even notice the difference!

Past Spending Records

Are you tired of all that money cluttering up your home?  Try NEW PRESIDENT™!

Governor Romney™ has been scientifically proven to increase spending faster than the President Obama™! Obama has only increased government spending a disappointing 5.5% annually over his term.

Under Governor Romney, Massachusetts state spending went from $22.3 billion to $28.1 billion,  an amazing 6.5% per year! That’s faster than most other leading governors (6.2%)! And if we’ve learned anything from the vast disparity between George W. Bush’s fiscal rhetoric and fiscal record, it’s that Romney’s gubernatorial record might be a better indicator of what we could expect from a Romney federal budget.

Campaign Contributors

The Wall Street bankers that brought you President Obama™ love NEW PRESIDENT™!

The same Wall Street recipients of TARP bailout money that were top Obama donors in 2008 are top Romney donors in 2012. Why?

Just like the Original President, New President

1. Supported TARP Wall Street bailout program.
2. Opposes immediately balancing the federal budget.
3. Has a track record of being a big spender and a big-government advocate while in office.
4. Opposes a full audit of the Federal Reserve.
5. Supports taxpayer-funded bailouts of corporations.
6. Wants to keep personal income tax rates at the exact same levels for the vast majority of Americans.
7. Will increase defense spending
8. Believes the President can take the country to war without approval from Congress.

The post From the Bankers Who Brought You President Obama Comes NEW PRESIDENT™! appeared first on Think by Numbers.