Speaking of interests and threats at RealClearDefense Bonnie Kristian argues that we don’t have much interest in Syria and the best thing we can do is get the heck out of the way there:

The United States’ military intervention in Syria is a dangerous game indeed, creating a real risk of great power conflict with Russia and her allies. If that hazard was not obvious before last week, it is glaring now.

It is also unnecessary, for the United States has no vital national interest at stake in Syria. View the situation without the world police glasses the Washington establishment has worn for decades, and this becomes evident. The conflict in Syria is a monstrous fight, but that does not make it our fight, a point President Trump once realized. “What will we get for bombing Syria besides more debt and a possible long-term conflict?” he asked on Twitter in 2013 with insight that seems to be missing today.

Nor is there a plausible path to anything resembling “victory” for the U.S., even the unlikely best-case scenario—a tidy defeat of ISIS and ouster of Assad achieved without tipping into war with Russia—would come at enormous human and financial cost; produce a new, debt-funded nation-building commitment of massive proportions; and, if recent misadventures in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya are any guide, settle into a destabilizing morass of power vacuum, proxy fighting, insurgency, and surge.

Turkey and our other NATO allies do have vital interests in Syria and I wish them well in pursuing them. Our present course of action which largely consists of trying to prolong the agonizing Syrian civil war is immoral, illegal, and against our national interest not to mention increasingly risky.

At The Conversation Ronald Suny assesses the threat that Russia poses to the United States:

In reality, the most powerful country in history and on the globe at the moment, the United States, faces a considerably weaker adversary in Russia.

The Kremlin spends about 10 percent of what the United States spends on defense (US$600 billion). The United States spends more on defense than the next eight countries combined.

Putin slashed military spending a few months ago by 25.5 percent, just as Trump plans to increase American defense spending by more than $54 billion.

Russia’s economy pales in comparison to America, Europe, Japan and China. It has an economy roughly the size of Italy’s, but must provide for a larger population, territory and defense budget.

It’s true that a somewhat weaker power can annoy, pressure or even harm a stronger power. And while Russia has a huge nuclear arsenal and impressive cyber capabilities, it is seriously outmatched by the United States in terms of influence and power. Obama referred to Russia as “a regional power,” and Putin thinks of America as a “global hegemon.” There are important truths in both of their statements.

The primary threat that Russia poses is to that American global hegemony which the United States has repeatedly abused over the period of the last 25 years. If we stopped interfering in Russian elections and behaving aggressively towards Russia, perhaps Russia would stop interfering in ours. At the very least we’d have a less mealy-mouthed basis for complaints about bad Russian behavior.

That’s the awful thing about trying to complain from the moral high ground. To do it credibly you’ve got to behave morally which does limit your freedom of action.

Another Win – Trump and India PM Modi Speak At The White House 

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Julian Assange: “Why The Democrat Party Is Doomed” 

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 At a University of California campus, learning a life lesson about socialism 

California travel ban: Blatant hypocrisy about LGBTQ (etc.) rights  

At NRO Jonah Goldberg declaims:

Meanwhile, the Democrats know that Obamacare has been a huge albatross for their party and understand that the best thing that could happen for them is if the Republicans agreed to keep Obamacare in name (i.e., abandon the rhetoric of “repeal”) but do whatever is necessary to make the thing work. But the GOP is doing the opposite. It’s largely keeping Obamacare in terms of policy (at least the really popular parts) but rhetorically its claiming to destroy Obamacare utterly. So, both the Democrats and the Republicans end up claiming this is a repeal of Obamacare when it’s not. It’s all a war for the best spin, not the best policy.

to which Kevin Drum responds:

Would Democrats be willing to support some conservative priorities—tort reform, HSAs, block granting Medicaid—in return for this? Beats me. But Democrats have sure made it clear that keeping Obamacare and fixing it is what they want. If Republicans truly have any interest in this, they shouldn’t have any trouble finding willing listeners.

which would sound as though they’re in material agreement. Except for one small detail. Does Kevin have any proposal for “fixing” the ACA that doesn’t involve shoveling ever-increasing amounts of money at it? It seems to me that’s a basic problem. The system as constructed (not as envisioned but as constructed) isn’t stable.

In the bitter controversy (again) over health care reform I am constantly reminded of George Santayana’s observation that fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.

Does anyone want health care insurance? Or is it, as I suppose, merely a means to an end? For that matter does anyone other than a few mentally ill people want health care?

I believe that what is wanted is more health not more care or more health care insurance and we’re failing miserably at that. That more insurance will lead to more health is an article of faith the rational basis for which is dwindling. And we haven’t even talked about iatrogenic death.

We are devoting enormous resources to health care. We should be getting a lot more for our money.

At the Washington Post Jackson Diehl laments the lack of attention that famine in Nigeria, Yemen, South Sudan, and Somalia is receiving from the rest of the world:

Still, it’s shocking that so little heed is being paid to what the United Nations says is the worst humanitarian crisis since 1945: the danger that about 20 million people in four countries will suffer famine in the coming months, and that hundreds of thousands of children will starve to death.

Not heard of this? That’s the problem. According to U.N. and private relief officials, efforts to supply enough food to stem the simultaneous crises in South Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Nigeria are falling tragically short so far, in part because of inadequate funding from governments and private donors. Of the $4.9 billion sought in February by the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) for immediate needs in those countries, just 39 percent had been donated as of last week.

Let’s turn to a NPR feature on the famines. What is famine?

A famine is when levels of malnutrition in the population have passed 30 percent, where people are actually starving and dying. And it is a sign of failure because in all these cases famine can be predicted. So if you kick in with aid early enough, you can prevent famine. Drought you can’t prevent, but famine you can prevent.

That’s true as far as it goes. Like defining smallpox as a bad rash that develops into fluid-filled blisters. You can’t define it adequately without talking about what causes it.

Famine is always and everywhere a failure of government. Either by action or inaction the government prevents food from getting to hungry people or people from fleeing the area of the famine. In all four of the countries mentioned there is civil war fomented by Islamist insurgencies. Either there is no government (as in Somalia) or the governments’ priorities are in fighting the Islamists rather than helping the victims of famine.

The Saudis’ fingerprints are everywhere in all four countries. Rich Saudis have supported radical imams who have preached violent jihad to their congregrations. They’re actually making war in Yemen. In Somalia their anti-terrorism activities are probably doing more harm than good. The Sudanese president who has fomented the famine in South Sudan has received substantial aid from the Saudis. And so on.

Actually fighting famine will require some hard realizations and harder decisions. We can’t end the famines in those countries just by supplying food aid. That would be like applying calamine lotion to smallpox pustules.

A detailed study of the biomechanics of the muscles of chimpanzees has found that they’re about a third stronger than we are in climbing and jumping, as reported at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:

Since at least the 1920s, it has been reported that common chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) differ from humans in being capable of exceptional feats of “super strength,” both in the wild and in captive environments. A mix of anecdotal and more controlled studies provides some support for this view; however, a critical review of available data suggests that chimpanzee mass-specific muscular performance is a more modest 1.5 times greater than humans on average. Hypotheses for the muscular basis of this performance differential have included greater isometric force-generating capabilities, faster maximum shortening velocities, and/or a difference in myosin heavy chain (MHC) isoform content in chimpanzee relative to human skeletal muscle. Here, we show that chimpanzee muscle is similar to human muscle in its single-fiber contractile properties, but exhibits a much higher fraction of MHC II isoforms. Unlike humans, chimpanzee muscle is composed of ∼67% fast-twitch fibers (MHC IIa+IId). Computer simulations of species-specific whole-muscle models indicate that maximum dynamic force and power output is 1.35 times higher in a chimpanzee muscle than a human muscle of similar size. Thus, the superior mass-specific muscular performance of chimpanzees does not stem from differences in isometric force-generating capabilities or maximum shortening velocities—as has long been suggested—but rather is due in part to differences in MHC isoform content and fiber length. We propose that the hominin lineage experienced a decline in maximum dynamic force and power output during the past 7–8 million years in response to selection for repetitive, low-cost contractile behavior.

Basically, they’ve selected for arboreal or semi-arboreal habit and we, like dogs, have evolved to be cursorial hunters.

The Supreme Court of the United States has upheld portions of President Trump’s March 6 executive order, known as the “travel ban”. More from SCOTUSBlog:

Today the Supreme Court agreed to review rulings by two lower courts blocking the implementation of President Donald Trump’s March 6 executive order, popularly known as the “travel ban.” Citing national-security concerns, the order imposed a freeze on new visas from six Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen). But the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit had put the order on hold last month, concluding that – although it did not specifically say so – the order likely violated the Constitution because the president intended to discriminate against Muslim travelers. Earlier this month, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit also blocked the order, but on a different ground: It concluded that the order exceeds the authority that Congress has given the president to regulate immigration. The court’s announcement today means that the justices will review both of those decisions. The justices also granted the Trump administration’s request to allow the ban to go into effect, at least for would-be travelers who don’t already have some connection to the United States.

I’m sure this action by the Court will be disappointing to just about everybody. Opponents of the president or fans of unlimited immigration will be upset that the Court didn’t leave the appellate courts’ injunctions in place. Supporters of the president or opponents of immigration from the countries name above will be disappointed that the Court’s order was not broader.

We’ll need to wait until the next session for a decision. Who knows what the composition of the Court will be then?

There’s has been quite a bit of controversy over raising the minimum wage to $15 per hour. It’s even spawned a movement: “Fight for 15”. Proponents insist that employment effects are nominal and wage effects largely positive. My position, consistently, has been that we should be cautious that we don’t hurt more people than we help. While in some places the labor market will readily absorb a $15/hour minimum wage, in others it could be disastrous. Five Thirty Eight reports a study of Seattle’s rising minimum wage:

As cities across the country pushed their minimum wages to untested heights in recent years, some economists began to ask: How high is too high?

Seattle, with its highest-in-the-country minimum wage, may have hit that limit.

In January 2016, Seattle’s minimum wage jumped from $11 an hour to $13 for large employers, the second big increase in less than a year. New research released Monday by a team of economists at the University of Washington suggests the wage hike may have come at a significant cost: The increase led to steep declines in employment for low-wage workers, and a drop in hours for those who kept their jobs. Crucially, the negative impact of lost jobs and hours more than offset the benefits of higher wages — on average, low-wage workers earned $125 per month less because of the higher wage, a small but significant decline.

That’s a sizeable decrease. It may be the case that other ways for helping low wage earners, like eliminating onerous zoning ordinances that prevent the building of inexpensive housing, should be considered.

Update

Kevin Drum suggests that Seattle’s minimum wage should be $12/hour:

There’s a mountain of evidence that modest increases in the minimum wage have little effect on low-wage jobs, but the key word here is modest. We’ve never tested how high the minimum wage can go before it starts to have a serious impact on low-wage jobs, because no one has ever raised the minimum wage more than modestly. This means that the question of how high the minimum wage can go is an empirical one—and there’s no special reason to think it’s $15. It could be higher or lower. And if this study holds up, the answer at the moment is around $12.

That will vary from place to place. In some places “modest” will be more than $13. In others it will be less than $11.