View From Down Under

Is smoking a leading cause of lung disease?  Do El Nino episodes cause weather changes?  Did widespread use of DDT cause major reduction of bird and fish populations in affected areas?

If a survey asked these questions today, the results would show an overwhelming majority of people in agreement.  Among scientists, there would be almost no doubters.  However, each of these propositions was initially met with strong, vocal, and emotional reactions from skeptics – many of whom owed their livelihoods and reputations to denying them.

Today, there is virtual unanimity among scientists about global warming.  The National Academy of Sciences, American Chemical Society, Crop Science Society, and many other scientific organizations have issued public statements confirming that global warming is occurring and is the result of human activity.

In spite of this, a recent survey by the Pew Research Center shows the number of Americans who believe there is solid evidence of global warming has actually dropped in the last three years.  A majority of Americans simply do not believe the scientific organizations.

Here is the data by political affiliation.  Belief in global warming has declined across the board, but the decline has been dramatic among Republicans.  Nearly half of the Republicans who in 2006 believed the earth was warming no longer believe so.

Just shows what can happen when a scientific issue becomes a political and emotional one.  It is clear there are a number of highly effective communicators in the US whose livelihood and reputation depend on debunking global warming.  As Upton Sinclair wrote:  ”It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it”.

In the midst of the Copenhagen climate change meetings, I’ll be posting a few thoughts on climate change.  Next post will be fairly heavy on data.  In the meantime, I encourage you to look at some data yourself.  A couple of good places to start are the IPCC Summary and the National Academy of Sciences climate change report.

Worthwhile reading from Douglas Elmendorf, the Director of the Congressional Budget Office.

Key sentences come at the end:

“The country faces a fundamental disconnect between the services the people expect the government to provide, particularly in the form of benefits for older Americans, and the tax revenues that people are willing to send to the government to finance those services. That fundamental disconnect will have to be addressed in some way if the budget is to be placed on a sustainable course.”

The accompanying slides of his speech highlight two converging trends.  The first is the rising cost of health care, particularly for those over 65.  No end in sight for this trend.

The second trend is demographic.  At the moment (according to his slides) the population age 65 or older is about 20% of the population aged 20 – 64. In 20 years, this grows to nearly 40%.  With a labor force participation rate of about 65%, this means there are now about three workers for every person over 65.  In 20 years this will be less than two workers for every person over 65.

In my view, the US has four options:

• less spending (particularly on health care for seniors);
• more taxes (falling heavily on the young);
• increase the number of working age residents (which means much higher immigration); or
• further expansion of public debt (which at some point simply becomes unsustainable).

Unfortunately, if you are a member of Congress today, the first three options carry significant personal career risk.

The White House is learning the lesson I learned as a boy at summer camp – you can’t win a fight with a skunk.

“The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.” (Quote from official press release).

Iran, the Taliban, and Fox News condemned the decision.

In justifying the award, the committee emphasized the multilateral basis of the President’s foreign policy, which it believes is “founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population”.

What they’re talking about is soft power. Soft power (a phrase coined by Harvard Professor Joseph Nye in 2004) is the ability to get what you want by attraction. Hard power is the ability to coerce (primarily military and economic power). In foreign policy terms, soft power includes the attractiveness of values, culture, and foreign policy, and critically, the way the country lives up to its own values, culture, and policy. When a country is widely seen to live up to its own values, and those values are widely shared, it creates legitimacy for foreign policy initiatives. The reverse is also true. For example, China has abundant hard power, but does not have the ability to lead global policy on, say, environmental regulation, because its own track record on both legislation and enforcement has been relatively poor.

When a country has a great deal of hard power, it is tempting to use it. However in today’s world, military and economic strength have the most value when they are not deployed. The United States lost a great deal of soft power through things like Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and unilaterally deploying hard power – actions that were seen to contradict the US values of humane treatment, due process, and constructive engagement. Values only carry weight when they are adhered to.

What the Nobel committee is recognizing is the amazing shift in US soft power as a result of President Obama’s initiatives. The outcomes of that are not yet complete, and the goal of a world free from nuclear weapons will never be achieved, but the ability of the United States to lead has been greatly enhanced. The Nobel committee obviously sees this as important to world peace.

One measure of this comes from a recent survey of over 26,000 people in 25 countries. On average, less than half the people surveyed in 2007 viewed the United States favorably (44%), but in the most recent survey, 57% have a positive view. The change is particularly marked amongst the US allies in Western Europe. France moved from 39% favorable opinion to 75%, with similar moves in Germany and Spain.

I know that many Americans have no care or interest in what the rest of the world thinks, but this is both short sighted and dangerous. If the US is to have a positive impact on world affairs, it needs effective soft power just as much, if not more, than effective military and economic power.

I agree with Fox News that the prize is premature, but the committee is highlighting to both Americans and the rest of the world the profound implications of returning to the high ground.

Public Policy Polling released the results of their recent poll yesterday. Amidst the normal questions on approval ratings and health care, they asked four other questions which I found interesting.

Nearly a quarter of all respondents – and 42% of Republicans – do not believe Obama was born in the US. This despite the fact that the state of Hawaii has confirmed the original birth certificate (you can see photos of it here).

One in seven respondents – and one in four Democrats – believe Bush intentionally allowed the 9/11 attacks so that we would go to war in the Middle East. Although this can’t be disproven by producing a document, there is certainly no evidence to support it.

The poll also asked people if they thought George W. Bush is the Anti-Christ, and the same question about Barack Obama. On this one, I think the respondents were having a bit of fun. Surely 8-10% of Americans do not seriously believe that either of these men are the Anti-Christ. Do 10% of Americans even know what the Anti-Christ is? (Have to admit I’m a little shaky on that myself.)

But perhaps I shouldn’t be so naive about it. Apparently one in five Americans believe they have been reincarnated – in this case about the same percentage for both Republicans and Democrats.

Watched an interesting segment on CNN the other day with two economists – one supposedly left wing (Justin Wolfers) and one supposedly right wing (Reihan Salam) – discussing the stimulus package with Lou Dobbs.  Meant to be a debate, but they ended up agreeing on most things.  Worth watching.

 The thing that struck me was when Mr Dobbs challenged them both to “Name an economic stimulus package that has ever worked?” with the clear implication that they could not.  Mr Salam responded with “I think that there actually are some stimulus plans that have worked pretty effectively”, and started to give an example of a stimulus plan in Singapore.   Lou Dobbs cut him off with a quick “No, no, no .. Thank you very much for the global tour, but I’m talking about the American economy.”  Mr Salam then praised the WPA in the 30’s and 40’s.

Surely Mr Dobbs is smart enough to know that economic principles work in other countries in the same way they work in the US?  It’s a bit like discounting experiments on gravity because they occurred in Europe!

But at least he had the grace to let Mr Salam discuss American stimulus plans that had worked.

Just goes to show what Rupert Murdoch learned many years ago – it’s not about news, it’s about entertainment.