Charles Murray on Culture vs. Economics:  An interview

Tamar Jacoby:

It's an age-old debate between the left and the right. The left says poverty—inner-city poverty and working-class poverty—is mostly about economics. The right says culture has at least as much to do with it. You're a longtime proponent of the cultural explanation. Can you spell that out for us?

Charles Murray:

I believe—I've believed for 40 years—that the reforms of the 1960s and the sexual revolution combined to create a perfect storm. And that storm changed the rules of the game for poor people—especially young poor people. In 1960, if you were male, working age, and not physically disabled, you were in the labor force. You were either working or you were looking for work. If you were a woman in your 20s, you were probably already married and had children.

Now let's be clear—this is not the natural state of affairs. Your late teens are not the time you want to get up every day and go to work at the same time even if you don't feel like it. If you're a guy, it's certainly not the time when you naturally say, "I think I want to get married."

And yet, into the '60s, there were norms. And those norms held, almost universally.

But then, at some point in the '60s, the rules changed.

By 1970, it had become much easier if you were a guy to commit a crime, get caught for it, and still not go to jail. It was much easier to slide through school, even if you were a troublemaker, and end up with a diploma without having learned anything or having faced any pressure to learn something.If you were a young woman at the end of the 1960s, if you had a baby, you were not the only girl in your high school class who had one. There were probably half a dozen others. The stigma was pretty much gone. You could afford to take care of the child without a husband. And you could live with a boyfriend, which you couldn't have done before.

Meanwhile—the other element of the perfect storm—there was the sexual revolution. The pill was first put on sale in 1960. For the first time in human history, women had a safe, convenient way to have sexual intercourse even if the guy did nothing to protect against pregnancy. Naturally, this had a huge effect on family formation.

Jacoby:

So let me play devil's advocate. I say it's not an either/or. Okay, culture plays a huge role. But doesn't economics have at least as much to do with it?

The US lost 5.6 million manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2010—30 percent of manufacturing employment. The guy who used to make $25 an hour in a fabricating plant now has to work at Wendy's for minimum wage. And this in turn drives other changes—cultural changes.

When you can't find a job that pays what you're used to, you drop out of the labor force. And then the women in your community are much less interested in marrying you. And pretty soon, those women are raising kids on their own, etc., etc.

In this theory, economics and culture intertwine and drive each other. Is there anything to that?


Murray:

I'm not denying that these things have occurred. I'm not denying that they have interacted. But I wish people would take a closer look at the timing.

The problems we're talking about start in the last half of the '60s. That's when labor force participation started to decline, when out-of-wedlock births started to rise, when crime rose. But in the last half of the '60s, the jobs hadn't left.

The economy was red hot.

And as we've seen in the years since, things don't get much better when the economy improves. We had a natural experiment in the late 1990s. There were "help wanted" signs everywhere. You could work as many hours a week as you wanted, even if you had low skills and little education. Even then, employers were begging for welders and electricians and cabinetmakers—and they were willing to pay $25 to $30 an hour.

What happened? White male labor force participation stopped declining for a couple years. But it did not go back up. People did not flock back into the labor force. There was no turnaround.

Jacoby:

It's very hard to put Humpty Dumpty back together again?

Murray:

Exactly. Some of the most depressing research has to do with chronic unemployment. Once you've been out of the labor force for a while, getting back in is really hard.

Jacoby:

So this brings us to policy. What can we do about this? I guess that's one reason I cling to economic causality along with cultural causality. Culture is so hard to change.

Murray:

We've been trying 20, 30, 40 years—policy intervention after policy intervention. And most of what we've tried hasn't worked or worked only around the edges.

Jacoby:

What about reasserting the norms? Moral suasion—by government or civil society—could that work?

Murray:

I think there should be a lot more of it. As we know, the educated middle class has been doing better and better in recent years—economically and maintaining the old norms. But that new upper class has been AWOL in the culture wars.

They get married. They work long hours. They're engaged in their communities. But they don't say, "This would be a good idea for other people as well." They're nonjudgmental. They don't preach what they practice.

I don't mean people should get bullhorns and go down to working-class neighborhoods and yell. That's not how it worked in the 1950s.

But the norms were in the air. Values were promulgated by people at the top of society as a matter of course.

It's about policymakers and people who write TV shows and people who make movies. They need to start saying, "You know, it's really a good thing for kids if their parents are married. It's really important that guys get into the labor force and stay there."

Jacoby:

We do sometimes change cultural norms. In our lifetimes, society succeeded in creating a new norm around smoking—and a lot of people stopped smoking.

Murray:

That's right. I'm not sure it would be that simple. But I won't argue with you.

I know you'd like to hear something more optimistic, and I wish I could help you. But the one thing I'll say is that American history does seem to go in cycles.

We have a history of revivals—of what used to be called "reawakenings." In the past, they were religious. We had three or four of them. And each one had huge effects across the culture. The civil rights movement was also a kind of great awakening—an about-face in our values over just 10 years.

Jacoby:

And you think that kind of thing could happen again?

Murray:

Well, let's just say there's a lot less resistance today to some of the things we've been talking about—reasserting norms about marriage and family and work—than there was 20 or 30 years ago. Back then, I could not have said many of the things I've said today without getting hissed by the audience. So I think there is some potential for a cultural revival.

What are the odds? I don't know. But they're greater than zero. And given how little we know about how to effect change programmatically, with government interventions, I say we'd better go with the only game in town. I think that's culture.

SOURCE

********************************

States Look to Rein in Occupational Licensing Laws, Reduce Burden on Workers

The inability of the federal government to organize its affairs should not distract from progress at the state level. Even though an increasing number of Americans work in occupations subject to licensing requirements, from 5 percent of the workforce in 1950 to about 30 percent today, some states are fighting back.

A bill introduced in Florida would scale back licensing requirements for some professions and remove them completely for others. South Dakota Governor Dennis Daugaard recently proposed creating an interstate compact to facilitate people to continue working when they move to another participating state. Such reforms could improve the lives of many Americans by reducing barriers to work and mobility.

Overly-burdensome licensing requirements can limit the number of people that are able to work in licensed occupations. As I’ve written previously, a recent paper from the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty estimated that if licensing requirements for the ten occupations were equivalent to requirements in the least burdensome states, employment in some professions would increase by over four percent.

For some professions, such as hair braiders, policymakers may determine that the occupation can be removed from the licensing framework altogether. For others where such a move is not practical or the arguments in favor of a move are less clear cut, they can consider reducing the requirements to levels already in place in other states, whether by reducing the number of required hours, the number of tests, or scaling back other measures.

Policymakers in Florida are taking this approach. This is welcome news, because the most recent report from the Institute for Justice found the state had the 5th most burdensome licensing laws. On Friday, the Florida House passed a licensing reform bill 74-28. If it were to become law the bill would remove seven professions, including hair braiders, nail polishers, and my personal favorite, timekeepers and announcers, from the state’s occupational licensure framework.

For other occupations the bill would significantly reduce the number of hours of training required to get a license. Barbers would require 600 hours of training, down from 1,200. Restricted barbers, with a narrower scope of practice clarified in the bill, would require 325 hours.

By shrinking the number of occupations subject to licensing regulations, and lowering the burden for some other occupations, the bill would reduce barriers to entry and increase the number of opportunities available to Floridians. A similar reform effort passed the House last year, but did not ultimately become law. However, it is a positive sign that this bill was one of the first to be taken up in 2018, and makes enactment more likely.

South Dakota Governor Daugaard recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal about the introduction of legislation to establish a multistate “Compact for the Temporary Licensure of Professionals.” Under the compact, individuals living in one state who have been licensed in an occupation in another participating state can receive an in-state temporary license within 30 days of requesting one. The ability to obtain a temporary license quickly would allow people in these occupations to avoid disruptions in their ability to work if they move from one participating state to another. They could continue to work while they work on fulfilling the requirements for a permanent license.

Previous research concluded that the interstate migration rate for workers in state-specific licensed occupations was 36 percent lower than for people in unaffected professions. Occupational licensing can increase the costs related to moving, as people who move miss out on earnings and have their career trajectories derailed. The authors of that study found that the increase in occupational licensing since 1980 can explain 6 percent of the decline in interstate migration since then. The higher costs deter some people from moving, and make it harder for those that do end up doing so.

The compact would not go as far as a full reciprocity agreement, in which participating states would accept licenses issued in other participating states. However, the compact would go some way towards reducing the cost and disruption introduced by occupational licensing on interstate migration.

Florida and South Dakota offer an example to other states with their occupational licensing reforms. These efforts are a step forward in terms of reviewing the occupational licensing framework in place, and seeking to find practical, actionable ways to reduce the related burdens.

SOURCE

***************************

For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated),  a Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

***************************

Foundlings:  A pre-modern social welfare system

I actually knew a foundling once so it's really quite recent history. It reflected a time when food was much less abundant than it is now in a modern capitalist society.  Lots of people had to battle to feed their families.  There was even some real starvation. 

Under those circumstances, a father wanted to be sure that the kids he was feeding were all his.  And the only way he could achieve that was by forging all sorts of bonds which would ensure that his wife slept only with him.  Marriage was a public agreement that she would do that and he would provide for the resultant kids.  And the society generally co-operated with that.  There were all sorts of norms for female behaviour that made it punitively difficult for her to stray.

But the sex drive being what it is, women did sometimes stray. The woman and her lover of course did the utmost to hide her lack of virtue but that became difficult when a baby popped out.  The social disgrace was enormous and even the woman's family would not support her lest they to fell into disgrace.

So how was she to support herself and the babe?  She could hardly go to work with a new baby and the poorhouse would close its doors to her.  The poorhouse was the Victorian social support net for those who could not support themselves.  So on many occasions the baby had to be disposed of in some way.  A common way was for the mother to wrap the baby up warmly and leave it on the doorstep of one of the great houses.

When one of the servants opened the door of the house next morning, the babe was found.  And there was generally some sympathy for it among the servants.  The cook (who had access to food) or some other kindly person would informally "adopt" the babe and see to its needs. It became a foundling. 

The master of the house would not always be told imediately but, when he was, he would generally accept it as a fait accompli and wash his hands of the matter.  As long as his dinners were not interrupted and the cleaning was done, he could allow the servants the occasional folly. But he would not acknowledge the baby in any way.

But babies grow up eventually and the legitimate children in the house would sometimes notice another child in their environment and might even get to play with it. So if the child had some virtue -- a clever brain or a pleasant manner, say -- this would become generally known to all -- eventually even to the master.  And for the inculcation of virtue, the foundling would quite often be included in the children's lessons. 

Children of a great house were not sent to a school.  They were taught at home by a tutor or a governess.  A tutor mainly taught Latin and a governess generally taught French but there was some general education included.  So foundlings often got a better education than children brought up in a poor household.  And there were occasions, when the foundling displayed some talent or other, that the master of the house would give some acknowledgement to the foundling -- taking personal credit for having taken in the foundling.

So it was a very hit-and-miss social safety net but its results for the child would fall within the range of what many legitimate children experienced at the time.  That it didn't starve was a significant achievement.

Having a great house nearby was not always available so an embarrassing babe would be left on the doorstep of what was apparently a prosperous couple -- with uneven but not too terrible results.  The foundling I knew was actually unaware for most of her life that she was a foundling.  She was brought up no differently from the other children of the family.  It is normal for babies to be treasured.

There are of course still foundlings of a sort in the Western world today.  A babe is left at a hospital by a distressed mother and modern social welfare measures grind into gear.

In history and in literature there are many stories about foundlings, starting with Moses.

*********************************

Don Lemon really is a lemon

After news broke that a Michigan man threatened to carry-out a mass shooting at CNN’s headquarters, Don Lemon placed the blame for the domestic terrorist threat on President Donald Trump’s rhetoric against the press.

The man in question, reported Hitler-fan Brandon Griesemer, allegedly called CNN 22 times this month before his arrest claiming he was “coming to gun you all down” and referring the network as “fake news.”

In response to this incident, Lemon said the following:

“There’s nothing random about this. Nothing. This is what happens when the president of the United States, Donald Trump, repeatedly attacks members of the press simply for reporting facts he does not like. I’ve heard from a number of very credible sources from within the White House that you watch this show. So, Mr. President, I’m going to speak directly to you: The caller who threatened to kill CNN employees made his threat using these words: ‘Fake news.’ … I wonder where he got those words.”

Of course, the term “fake news” has been Trump’s go to slam against the press for the past two years — particularly CNN. He used the attack against them as recently as yesterday morning, calling them “Fake News CNN,” and famously shouted, “You are fake news” at the network’s White House reporter during a presser.

SOURCE

So by this logic, is Don saying that he and his party are responsible for the Democrat Bernie supporter who shot at a bunch of congressmen on a ball field nearly killing Scalise? This was after their rhetoric of GOP killing everyone.

*******************************

Trump was right -- again

Donald Trump recently got in trouble with liberals for referring to one of the most impoverished third world countries, Haiti, as a s*******. Port-Au-Prince, the biggest city in Haiti, doesn’t have a sewer system and crime is out of control but apparently, that’s not enough for liberals to classify it as a bad place to live.

Now, some videos have emerged that prove Trump was absolutely correct. Narrative shattered. From Conservative Tribune:

Despite all the grief President Donald Trump recently received for allegedly referring to Haiti as a “s***hole” nation, the fact remains the island does suffer from some serious sanitation problems — primarily because it lacks a conventional trash disposal system.

As a result, Haiti is teeming with trash everywhere — on the streets, in rivers and even along the coast. According to Deutsche Welle, it’s so bad there that sadly many Haitians literally live “in (and around) garbage.”

And according to environmental activist Rosaly Byrd, there’s so much trash that it’s virtually impossible to go swimming anywhere in Haiti without encountering some.

All Trump did was ask a question that not enough politicians have asked. Why are we importing a lot more unskilled and impoverished workers from places like Haiti than we are people from places like Norway? A normal person can think about that question rationally. Liberals aren’t capable of seeing beyond race.  It’s really pathetic. They can’t accept reality.

It has really been remarkable watching how badly liberals were triggered over Trump’s comment.

SOURCE

*******************************

Why evangelicals stand by Trump: Those calling out the hypocrisy of Christian conservatives ignore the scars of recent history

Evangelicals don't see Trump as the embodiment of Christian values but as a protector of their right to live by them

By S.E. Cupp

It was one of President Trump’s most supportive voting blocs in 2016: 80% of white evangelicals voted for him, according to exit polls. Just 16% voted for Hillary Clinton.

Many on the left and in the media were shocked then by Trump’s evangelical support, and they are shocked now, after some faith leaders have brushed off credible new allegations that the President had an extramarital affair with a porn star years ago, then paid her to stay silent.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins told Politico, “We kind of gave him — ‘All right, you get a mulligan. You get a do-over here.’ ” Franklin Graham, son of the Rev. Billy Graham, told CNN that Trump is a “changed person.” He rationalized, “These alleged affairs, they’re alleged with Trump, didn’t happen while he was in office.”

There are two ways to view this: Either evangelicals like Perkins are rank hypocrites or, in the spirit of their faith, are simply very, very forgiving.

Many lean toward the former interpretation, and I get the temptation.

But it willfully leaves out a lot of recent history. As the left and liberal media try to “figure out” Christian America during this latest, complicated moment, it’s instructive to understand where they’ve recently been.

Two years into Barack Obama’s first term, I wrote a book on the liberal war on Christianity. When “Losing Our Religion” came out, folks on the right got it immediately. “Of course the left is attacking Christians,” was the general refrain.

Many on the left, however, were incredulous. One far-left radio host had me on to tell me he had no plans to read the book, but that my premise was absurd on its face. Christianity’s the biggest religion in the country; it can’t possibly be an oppressed class, they insisted.

OK, ask one — just one — evangelical Christian why they voted for Trump.

Perkins spelled it out. Evangelical Christians, he says, “were tired of being kicked around by Barack Obama and his leftists. And I think they are finally glad that there’s somebody on the playground that is willing to punch the bully.”

It wasn’t just Obama’s condescension toward the faithful, who he famously said “cling to guns and religion” when angry or scared. It was eight years of policies that trampled on their religious values, from expanded abortion rights and decreased regulation, even in the face of horrific cases like Dr. Kermit Gosnell’s, to continued efforts to chip away at religious employers’ rights.

It was a smugness from the liberal media, which talked about Christian America as if it were a vestigial organ of some extinct, diseased dinosaur.

Liberal television hosts mocked Sarah Palin for banal things like praying, and reporters wrote that her faith — Pentecostalism — was fanatical, kooky and bigoted. Liberal networks and newsrooms were windowless cocoons of secularism that only deigned to cover Christianity to dismiss its relevance or spotlight its perceived backwardness.

And it was decades of concerted cultural elitism that marginalized Christians as not cool enough to cater to. Movies like “The Passion of the Christ” and “The Chronicles of Narnia” were blockbuster hits in spite of dismissive Hollywood film critics who refused to believe there were enough Christians to go see them. Celebrities called them fanatics; comedians made fun of them.

Many evangelicals I talk to say they grew tired of turning the other cheek. In Trump, they finally found someone who was willing to voice the anger and resentment they had been holding in.

They could overlook his personal foibles — after all, let he who is without sin cast the first stone — and his evangelical illiteracy, in exchange for getting someone who would tell off all their past tormentors.

It’s worth noting, there’s also Trump’s record. From tapping Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court to acknowledging Jerusalem is the capital of Israel to following through on his pro-life rhetoric, the President has delivered on a number of promises he made to evangelicals. But that’s not why they voted for him.

So while the willingness to forgive and even defend Trump’s alleged sins seems anathema to many, the fact is evangelicals, like many Trump voters, had good reason to pull the lever for him — and now to stand by him.

SOURCE

***************************

For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated),  a Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

***************************

Politics as unusual: why America's 'forgotten citizens' stick by their champion

During the dizzying first year of Donald Trump's presidency, Americans and the world at large witnessed a political personality in a state of perpetual war. To the delight of his core supporters, but to the dismay of many others, this pugnacious approach defined Trump's image. But what can we expect from the persistent battler in the future?

To win the White House, Trump attacked opponent after opponent, first during the nominating process against 16 other foes and then in the general election against Hillary Clinton. Radioactive nicknames, including the relentless repetition of 'Crooked Hillary,' became part of his arsenal of insults, and he turned Twitter into a verbal grenade launcher to assault enemies and to defend himself.

What worked for a candidate who'd never sought elective office carried over to Trump's governing. At every turn, when a challenge to his stature or power arose, he punched back with as much force as he could muster.

No matter whether it was his perception of 'fake news' (a phrase he didn't start using until after his election), the investigation of Russian involvement in the campaign (in his opinion "the single greatest witch-hunt in American history") or North Korean missile tests authorised by the country's leader Kim Jong-un (dismissed as 'Little Rocket Man'), Trump didn't turn the other cheek. No direct shot or apparent slight went unanswered.

Trump's combativeness appeals to his base of political support - generally between 38 and 40pc of US voters who approve his leadership. Though on average 55 to 57pc disapprove, the fluctuation in his core following is relatively small, given the enormous attention - both negative and positive - he's received the past year.

Winner of 45.9pc of the popular vote in 2016, his current support largely comes from a coalition of conservative Republicans and independents or former Democrats whom Trump frequently calls the "forgotten men and women" of America.

A two-pronged support base

Interestingly, the reasons of the two main groups for backing him differ. Traditional party members - and Trump's approval among just Republicans stands at over 80pc - applaud the strength of the economy, the soaring stock market, the recently enacted tax-cut legislation, the reversal of government regulations and a multitude of conservative (and lifetime) judicial appointments.

The "forgotten" citizens, mostly members of the working class and instrumental in delivering Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin to Trump's Electoral College triumph, take note of what's happening economically and governmentally, but they also enthusiastically endorse the president's social and cultural stands.

They admire that he's willing to keep attacking the traditional news media, to defend retaining controversial Civil War monuments and to denounce professional athletes who refuse to stand for the National Anthem to protest racial inequality. In their opinion, Trump is fighting for causes they embrace. He's a word warrior (if you will), and his outbursts of full-throated criticism cheer them.

That Trump took 57pc of the white vote (to Clinton's 37pc) - including a whopping 62pc of whites between the ages of 45 and 64 and the same percentage of white men - helps explain why the president targets so many messages to working-class whites. These men and women are nostalgic for an earlier time in the US.

You might even say that many committed to "Make America Great Again" - Trump's signature slogan - long for a national past markedly different from the present.

In general terms, they tend to be less multicultural, less secular, less globalised and less environmentally sensitive. Most of them, frankly, weren't offended the other day when the president referred to "shithole countries" - like Haiti, El Salvador and African nations - for sending immigrants to the US. These newcomers often compete with white working-class men and women for jobs.

To be sure, there's undeniable irony of a billionaire business mogul serving as the tribune of the struggling blue-collar class, but Trump methodically sought their votes. Other candidates, including Clinton, didn't.

"I have visited the laid-off factory workers and the communities crushed by our horrible and unfair trade deals," Trump told the Republican National Convention in the summer of 2016. "These are the forgotten men and women of our country. People who work hard but no longer have a voice. I am your voice."

The Twitter factor

During recent months, Trump's voice has been heard at campaign-style rallies in key states, but it's most often expressed via his thumbs through Twitter, where he currently boasts about nearly 50 million followers.

His tweets report on his activities and travels, with many trumpeting economic trends for which he - as with every other president - takes credit. But the messages that take on a perceived ­opponent or a potential danger to his standing become news stories on their own, receiving enormous amplification in the media's global echo chamber.

Last month, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a Democrat, called on Trump to resign on the basis of what she said were "very credible allegations of misconduct" by more than a dozen women before he entered the Oval Office. Trump lost no time reacting.

"Lightweight Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a total flunky for Chuck Schumer and someone who would come to my office 'begging' for campaign contributions not so long ago (and would do anything for them), is now in the ring fighting against Trump," he tweeted.

The sexually suggestive phrasing ("would do anything") raised eyebrows, while the boxing reference reinforced his self-identity as someone ready to do battle whenever confronted by man - or woman.

A new 'diplomacy'

What's simultaneously fascinating and worrying about Trump's use of Twitter is his consistency in formulating messages with haymaker impact. Potentially sensitive international matters are rarely couched in diplomatic language.

He's harshly taken on UK prime minister Theresa May for her objections to him retweeting anti-Muslim videos from the far-right organisation Britain First, and even the prospect of launching nuclear weapons can provoke a scary response.

As 2018 began, Trump tweeted: "North Korean leader Kim Jong-un just stated that the 'Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times'. Will someone from his depleted and food-starved regime please inform him that I too have a nuclear button, but it is a much bigger and more powerful one than his, and my button works!"

Weaponising Twitter, which disturbs many Americans and others as being unpresidential, is a deliberate strategy to provide continuous, direct communication with core supporters. For no cost, and without much effort, Trump can go around the traditional media and deliver his message exactly as he wants.

Twitter, in effect, becomes a stream-of-consciousness script tapped out by the narrator-protagonist occupying the most significant government office in the US, if not the world. The most fervent Trump followers - who hate politics as usual and enjoy punch-in-the-nose outbursts aimed at adversaries - take delight in the social media fisticuffs.

Riding a rollercoaster

As Trump's first year in the White House ends, drama and combat have been pre-eminent hallmarks of this president. But most impartial observers wonder whether the citizenry, beyond the core voters, can stay tuned day-after-day without wanting to turn the channel? How long can any nation ride a rollercoaster?

The recent publication of Michael Wolff's tell-all-and-more portrait, Fire and Fury, lays bare an administration in disarray and an easily distracted president unwilling to tackle complex details of the office.

A flawed book, littered throughout with factual mistakes, Fire and Fury nonetheless raises serious questions about Trump's process for making judgments and decisions.

Whether from genuine grievance or gnawing insecurity, Trump took particular umbrage that his mental fitness deserved anyone's scrutiny. Twitter became his medium of self-assessment, and he pronounced himself "a very stable genius."

Personal testimonials of intellectual acuity might seem out of place in high electoral office, but the past year has brought a succession of jaw-dropping statements and actions, which produced a large question mark that hangs over the White House.

Back in May, Trump admitted to NBC News that the investigation of possible Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign served as a principal reason for firing FBI director James Comey because "this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story."

Trump's own Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, and the Justice Department proposed the removal of Comey for other causes, but the president publicly pointed elsewhere.

After the violent demonstrations in Charlottesville, Virginia, pitting white supremacists against groups opposed to the Neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan, the president told a news conference that "you had some very bad people in that group [the supremacists], but you also had people that were fine people on both sides."

Interestingly, Trump's approval from core supporters stayed almost exactly where it was for several days after Comey's firing and "the very fine people" comment, according to the Gallup organisation's tracking surveys of opinion. He paid no price with his backers.

Thus far the impact of the Wolff book - with a remarkable 1.4 million copies in print - has also been negligible among Trump's base. To be safe, however, the president on Twitter and in talking with reporters keeps defending himself in no uncertain terms.

The Fake News defence

Back in October, Trump remarked during an interview, "one of the greatest of all terms I've come up with is 'fake'." He's certainly liberal invoking it - nearly 200 times on Twitter alone attacking 'fake news' this past 12 months - and hatred of the mainstream media is so high among his followers that repeatedly making the charge guarantees applause.

What's baffling to some White House watchers, however, is Trump's duality, if not duplicity, in his handling of the communications outlets he attacks with such abandon.

Late last March, when he decided not to put a healthcare bill up for a vote in Congress, he personally called reporters at both The New York Times and Washington Post to explain the decision. Other interviews with so-called 'fake news' sources have followed since then, including one with The New York Times this past December 28.

Down in Florida for the holidays, Trump assured reporter Michael Schmidt that "no collusion" occurred between his election campaign and the Russians. Indeed, the president repeated his two-word denial of any complicity 16 separate times in the half-hour session.

Reiterating the same phrase over and over is revealing in itself, but, then, Trump's last recorded statement in the exchange made readers wonder what he really thinks about traditional news institutions.

"We're going to win another four years for a lot of reasons, most importantly because our country is starting to do well again and we're being respected again. But another reason that I'm going to win another four years is because newspapers, television, all forms of media will tank if I'm not there because without me, their ratings are going down the tubes. Without me, The New York Times will indeed be not the failing New York Times, but the failed New York Times. So they basically have to let me win. And eventually, probably six months before the election, they'll be loving me because they're saying, 'Please, please, don't lose Donald Trump'."

Trump's ability to joke about himself is one of his least conspicuous traits. His assurance of re-election and the media's role in it might be an attempt at humour, but even if it is, the speaker's self-regard tends to overshadow everything else.

Does he persistently assail the news media to curry favour with his core followers, or are his attacks the volleys of someone with very thin skin who wants attention and the last word? It's difficult to tell.

What's definitely known is that Trump will seek a second term in 2020. He officially filed formal papers with the Federal Election Commission on the day he was inaugurated last year, even going so far as to trademark a new slogan for his re-election bid.

Instead of "Make America Great Again," the emphasis will shift to continuity by looking ahead: "Keep America Great!" Note the exclamation mark, Trump's own flourish. Before then, though, the mid-term Congressional elections loom this November. If the Democrats win control of the House of Representatives or the Senate - or both chambers - investigations of the administration will proliferate, including almost certain consideration of presidential impeachment.

But the actions and distractions, the ups and the downs, of Trump's first year have kept his core followers together in nearly unwavering fashion. His constant war against the mainstream media, the Washington establishment and globalist elites caters to his base - but doesn't expand his universe of potential voters to a coalition with broader appeal.

SOURCE

***************************

For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated),  a Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

***************************

IQ: Matzo with sauce get it nearly right

The journal abstract:

The paradox of intelligence: Heritability and malleability coexist in hidden gene-environment interplay.

Sauce, Bruno; Matzel, Louis D.

Abstract

Intelligence can have an extremely high heritability, but also be malleable; a paradox that has been the source of continuous controversy. Here we attempt to clarify the issue, and advance a frequently overlooked solution to the paradox: Intelligence is a trait with unusual properties that create a large reservoir of hidden gene–environment (GE) networks, allowing for the contribution of high genetic and environmental influences on individual differences in IQ. GE interplay is difficult to specify with current methods, and is underestimated in standard metrics of heritability (thus inflating estimates of “genetic” effects). We describe empirical evidence for GE interplay in intelligence, with malleability existing on top of heritability. The evidence covers cognitive gains consequent to adoption/immigration, changes in IQ’s heritability across life span and socioeconomic status, gains in IQ over time consequent to societal development (the Flynn effect), the slowdown of age-related cognitive decline, and the gains in intelligence from early education. The GE solution has novel implications for enduring problems, including our inability to identify intelligence-related genes (also known as IQ’s “missing heritability”), and the loss of initial benefits from early intervention programs (such as “Head Start”). The GE solution can be a powerful guide to future research, and may also aid policies to overcome barriers to the development of intelligence, particularly in impoverished and underprivileged populations.

SOURCE 

Comment:

The above article is in the Psych. Bulletin, a top journal in psychology which is devoted to surveying the research literature on a particular subject and attempting a theoretical integration of it.  Sauce & Matzel, however, don't come up with much. Their concept of gene–environment (GE) networks is really just a rehash of the well-known finding that to maximize your  final IQ you need good environmental influences on top of your genetic given. 

Considering that the article is a research summary, it is however interesting how high the genetic given is rated.  They say that measured IQ is 80% genetic. Around 70% is the figure that has mostly been quoted in the past and people who hate the idea of IQ have on occasions put the figure as low as 50%.

The authors are aware that an enriched (stimulating) environment from early childhood on can bump up IQ but they are also aware that the gain is not permanent once the enrichment fades out. Headstart kids, for instance, test as brighter while in the program but revert to an IQ similar to their peers when they get into normal schooling.

But what the authors conclude from that is, I think, too optimistic.  They seem to think that the environmental enrichment should be kept up into much later life.  What they overlook is that all environmental influences tend to fade out  as maturation goes on and by about age 30 environmental influences seem to zero out entirely.  Identical twins reared apart will have very similar IQs at whatever age that is measured but the greatest similarity occurs when it is measured around age 30.

So growing up is a process of your genetics coming to the fore and the advantages/disadvantages of your environment fading out.  So enriching the environment throughout childhood is pissing into the wind.  What you are trying to manipulate will have less and less influence as maturation goes on and it will have NO final influence.

******************************

Trump’s enemies blunder

Schumer chose illegal aliens over the American people, and it BACKFIRED

IN THE staring match that gripped Washington DC over the weekend, it was the Democrats who blinked first.

Senate Democrats chose to push the US government into a shutdown — smack bang on the anniversary of Donald Trump assuming the presidency. The hope was that the move would embarrass the commander-in-chief, and strongarm Republicans into protecting the Dreamers, more than 700,000 illegal immigrants who came to the country when they were children.

Forcing a shutdown is a risky political move. Last time it happened in 2013 over Obamacare, the Republicans copped the blame. This time around, it’s not yet clear who voters will punish.

Regardless, the Democrats have given in just three days after taking the nuclear option — and they’ve got next to nothing to show for it.

They wanted a deal on the Dreamers. All Republican Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has pledged is that it is his “intention” to deal with immigration issues in the Senate over the next three weeks. They received no commitment on whether House Republicans would get on board

The Republicans would have been forced to deal with the Dreamers soon enough, because Mr Trump gave the Congress a March 5 deadline to resolve their status once and for all.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the Democrats’ position was “indefensible” and that, in the end, they agreed to everything that was in the original continuing resolution.

Mr Trump said he was “pleased” the Democrats had “come to their senses” but added that “we will make a long-term deal on immigration if, and only if, it is good for our country”. He tweeted at the weekend that the shutdown was a “nice present” on his one-year anniversary.

SOURCE

*******************************

The most unpopular president on record - but here's why Trump could win again in 2020

Donald Trump ends his first year as the most unpopular president on record.

He is the only US president since Harry Truman to have a negative net approval rating after 12 months in the White House - some 24 points below Barack Obama at the same time in his presidency.

The year since Mr Trump's inauguration has been packed with controversy and intrigue - during which there have been persistent allegations over Russian connections. He has fired the head of the FBI, launched tirades against the media, failed to push through healthcare reform and has escalated his rhetoric surrounding North Korea.

All of this led to a slump in approval ratings, with Mr Trump achieving a majority disapproval rating in a record of just eight days since his inauguration.

In the run-up to this year's US mid-term elections, this might be enough to worry him - particularly after Trump-backed Roy Moore faced a shock defeat in Republican-leaning Alabama last year.

But this overall unpopularity may not matter that much - after all, Mr Trump was unpopular when he was elected America's 45th president.

When we dig into the figures, few people seem to have really changed their minds about him - and this is how the president still stands a chance in 2020.

While there has been an overall drop in public opinion, the president's approval ratings have remained relatively stable since July, even experiencing a small uptick following his handling of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, and Hurricane Irma. The polarisation of America's politics is so extreme that his popularity among Democrats can't really drop any further, while Republicans seemingly refuse to desert him, no matter what he does.

Mr Trump's approval rating hasn't dropped much among those who voted for him

Back in January 2016, Mr Trump claimed that he could shoot somebody and not lose any votes. He seems to have largely been correct in this estimation, with his approval rating among those who voted for him last November standing at 90pc.

Among those who self-identify as being conservatives - although not necessarily Republicans - his approval rating is actually marginally higher than it was at the start of the year while, importantly, he is liked better by people who are registered to vote. His approval rating among registered voters hasn't dropped below 40pc all year.

Concern

This doesn't mean that there isn't cause for concern for Mr Trump among these ratings. Although his electoral college victory was significant, he lost the overall popular vote, and his election was secured by around 100,000 voters in key swing states.

It is therefore potentially significant that the demographic that has gone off Mr Trump most since the start of the year is of those who self-identify as being moderates.

Among these middle-ground voters - who make up 29pc of the population - Mr Trump's approval score slipped from a three-poll average of 40.5pc in January 2017 to 30.7pc this January.

Could he in again? Given that Mr Trump managed to win last year despite being unpopular among swathes of America, the impact of his waning popularity on his chances of a second term are not clear-cut.

Additionally, a US presidential election isn't conducted on a national level, so national polling is only of limited use when assessing his chances.

In a race for electoral college votes, a presidential election is essentially divided into 50 separate votes in each of America's states - a lesson Hillary Clinton bitterly learned as last year's results trickled out.

Consequently, we must look at state-level data to gain a full picture of how he is performing compared to this time last year, especially in the states that turned red in 2016.

Mr Trump had a positive net approval rating in 17 states during 2017, all of which he won in the 2016 presidential election.

Some 33 states had a negative net approval rating. This includes all six states that swung to him in the 2016 election. He had an average negative approval rating in each of these states in 2017. A negative net approval rate in these states may not bode too well for a potential 2020 run for the Republican president.

SOURCE

*******************************

Feds planning massive Northern California immigration sweep to strike against sanctuary laws

U.S. immigration officials have begun preparing for a major sweep in San Francisco and other Northern California cities in which federal officers would look to arrest more than 1,500 undocumented people while sending a message that immigration policy will be enforced in the sanctuary state, according to a source familiar with the operation.

Officials at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, declined to comment Tuesday on plans for the operation.

The campaign, centered in the Bay Area, could happen within weeks, and is expected to become the biggest enforcement action of its kind under President Trump, said the source, who requested anonymity because the plans have not been made public.

Trump has expressed frustration that sanctuary laws — which seek to protect immigrants and persuade them not to live in the shadows by restricting cooperation between local and federal authorities — get in the way of his goal of tightening immigration.

The operation would go after people who have been identified as targets for deportation, including those who have been served with final deportation orders and those with criminal histories, the source said. The number could tick up if officers come across other undocumented immigrants in the course of their actions and make what are known as collateral arrests.

Under the Trump administration, ICE has repeatedly warned that if the agency can’t detain people from local jails, it will be forced to arrest them in the communities that hold such policies.

SOURCE

***************************

For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated),  a Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

***************************