Mixed Feelings About UN Holocaust Remembrance Day
Posted by Joshua Sharf in History, Israel, Jewish on January 27th, 2013
Today is the UN’s annual Holocaust Remembrance Day. It’s commemorated on January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, and is generally pointed to, even by UN critics, as one of the few things that the UN gets right. For its admirers, the day pretty much absolves the UN of all sins.
I confess to having mixed emotions about it.
First, there’s the tendency towards universality that pervades everything Jewish-related that the UN does. The Holocaust has a specific, unique meaning to Jews that it doesn’t have to anyone else. This is a result of the special place that Jews held in Nazi ideology, and therefore the uniquely catastrophic results that the Holocaust had on the Jewish population and civilization of Europe. This point has been made before, but the need to draw universal lessons from a uniquely Jewish experience has the effect of lessening, rather than deepening, the lessons that we actually draw from it. It’s much easier, much more banal, to oppose “hate” in the abstract, than it is to look at the much more concrete way that a specific person or people is seen.
That universality has been the Trojan Horse by which, ironically, anti-Semitism has been given a new lease on life, when the Holocaust was supposed to have rendered it inert for all time. As British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has repeatedly pointed out, anti-Semitism is a virus, that mutates into whatever form the current zeitgeist finds most acceptable. Currently, racism is the one thing that can’t be tolerated. Therefore, it is convenient to condemn Israel – and Jews – for supposed racism vis-a-vis the Palestinians. Rebutting those charges is well beyond the scope of this blog post, and well-nigh impossible in the eyes of those who make them in the first place. But the charge of racism, accompanied by the de rigeur comparisons of 2013 Israelis to 1943 Germans, is what has allowed anti-Semitism to regain respectability within the Left. It will provide the cover for the very same diplomats shedding crocodile tears over the dead Jews of 70 years ago to condemn the living Jews of today for resisting a repeat of history.
In fact, there already is a Holocaust Remembrance Day in Israel, Yom HaShoah, and it celebrates life, vitality, resistance, and renewal, rather than the passive liberation and victim-status that the world prefers for its Jews. Two days were considered – first the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, 14 Nissan. That was rejected because of its proximity to Passover. Instead, Yom HaShoah is commemorated a week before Yom HaAtzmaut, Israeli Independence Day. Either one of those would be just fine for a UN Holocaust Remembrance Day, but either would make more difficult the UN’s current mission of demonizing and dispossessing the Jews of their national homeland.
If a Day of Liberation of the Camps were strictly necessary, perhaps the anniversary of the liberation of one of the camps by Eisenhower, who actually commissioned films to be made in order to perpetuate the awful memory of what happened. Instead, we get the liberation of Auschwitz, the Symbol of Symbols of the Holocaust, but one which was also liberated by the Red Army, which turned out to be in many ways, not much better than the Wehrmacht, and was servant to an ideology in every way the equal of Hitler’s.
Perhaps more ironically, there is a way to redeem this date specifically with respect to Jews. In 1945, as in 2013, it falls on Parshat Beshallach, the week where Jews read of the crossing of the Red Sea and the destruction of Pharaoh’s armies. Carrying the story a little further, we also read of the Amalekites attacking the Jews in their new sanctuary, with the intent of annihilating them, and the Jews’ success in fighting them off.
Don’t count on too many people pointing out those parallels.
UPDATE: As if to make the point, here’s a front-page cartoon from this morning’s Sunday Times of London:
Lowering the Hill
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Budget, Colorado Politics, PERA, PPC on January 23rd, 2013
Ultimately, large changes will be needed to keep PERA solvent. But little changes can have an effect, too. Today, the state House Finance Committee will be hearing HB13-1040 from Republican Rep. Kevin Priola:
Current law averages the 3 highest annual salaries of a member of the public employees’ retirement association (PERA) when calculating that member’s retirement benefit amount. The bill increases the number of highest annual salaries used from 3 to 7 for anyone who was not a member, inactive member, or retiree of PERA as of December 31, 2013.
In 2010, SB1 changed some rules to make it more difficult for employees to suddenly spike their salaries and other compensation at the ends of their careers, in order to game the system and maximize their PERA benefits. For instance, for benefit calculation purposes, raises and other increases in compensation – like saved vacation being cashed in – were limited to 8% in any given year. Employees could receive larger raises, but benefits could only be calculated on the first 8% of the increase.
This bill would make it even harder to game the system by averaging the highest seven years’ compensation instead of the highest three. It’s a reasonable measure, and it would only apply to employees who join PERA after the end of this year. The Democrats enjoy a large majority on the Finance Committee, so they may well kill the bill. But the fact that it got assigned to the Finance Committee at all, rather than relegated like SB13-055 to the State, Veterans, and Military Affairs Committee, makes the outcome less certain.
Democrat Sen. John Morse Follows Familiar Pattern On PERA Reform
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Budget, Colorado Politics, PERA, PPC on January 23rd, 2013
The state Democrats, led by State Senate President John Morse (D-Colorado Springs), are continuing their deeply unserious approach to Colorado’s massive unfunded PERA liability this session. Incoming Speaker of the House Mark Ferrandino (D-Denver) had already indicated as much, first by characterizing those who would seek to deal with the problem as wanting to use the economic situation as an excuse to take away public employee’s pensions, and then by appointing Lois Court (D-Denver) as Chairman of the House Finance Committee.
The latest sign comes with respect to a bill proposed by Republicans Sen. Kent Lambert of Colorado Springs and Rep. Lori Saine, a freshman Republican from Dacono. The bill, SB13-055, would require PERA to use the state’s long-term borrowing interest rate as the discount rate for its liability, and would require that the CAFR be released by May 31 of each year. It would also require that contribution and/or benefit levels for any individual fund be adjusted when the amortization period for that fund climbs beyond 30 years.
All of these are eminently reasonable proposals. For reasons discussed before, the discount rate should be the required rate of return of PERA’s investors, the members. There is also no real reason why PERA can’t produce a CAFR within five months of the end of the calendar year; those dates have been slipping in recent years, but the fact is, the bulk of the CAFR is boilerplate or easily-written text, and the same financial statements and charts each year. And since the stated goal of PERA is to be within a 30-year amortization window, requiring them to be so would simply put teeth into an existing target.
Yet Sen. Morse has chosen to assign the bill not to the Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over PERA oversight, but to the State, Veterans, and Military Affairs Committee. That committee, often referred to as the “kill committee,” is traditionally staffed with the most partisan members of both parties, and used to kill inconvenient bills. Often that’s because “no” votes on the bills might be embarrassing to the majority, perhaps sufficiently embarrassing that some members wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation to vote for them.
That Senate President Morse has chosen to put this bill in front of the kill committee is practically an admission of its common sense, and his lack of it, but it does make clear the two halves of the Democrats’ full-court defense of their public employee clients’ pension plans.
First, they’ll protect them from any votes they might lose, and also protect the House and Senate Finance Committee members from having to cast “No” votes they’ll later have to explain.
Second, both Ferrandino and Morse have claimed that 2010’s SB1 “solved” the PERA problem for good, though tremendous liabilities remain, even given the plan’s own overly-optimistic assumptions and accounting practices. That will be their explanation for dodging these votes, but even if true, it’s a non sequitur. If PERA is truly fixed, surely members of the committee charged with its oversight would not only be the best-informed of that fact, but also best able to explain it to constituents. Putting the bill in front of a committee whose actual charter has nothing whatsoever to do with PERA, and whose reputation is one of chief enforcer, can’t inspire much confidence that the Democrats will be dealing with the state’s financial problems in good faith in the next two years.
The Hill Gets A Very Little Less Steep – For Now
Posted by Joshua Sharf in PERA, PPC on January 22nd, 2013
One of the main points of contention about PERA has been the expected rate of return. Up to 2001, PERA used an expected rate of return of 8.75%, but lowered that to 8.5% from 2002-08, and again to 8% in 2009, where it now stands.
So how has PERA done since 2001, when it stood at a 100% funding level? The chart below shows the annual return over those 11 years for which they’ve reported, plus an estimated return based on a similar portfolio from CalPERS, the California pension plan. CalPERS has a .99 correlation with PERA, which is about as close to metaphysical certainty as anything human gets. In 2012, CalPERS reported a 13.26% return, which would project a 13.9% return from PERA, so just for grins, I’ve plugged that into the 2012 spot.
The red line is the running CAGR from 2001, or Cumulative Average Growth Rate for 2001 through the current year.
As you can see, over time the red line becomes less volatile, as more years are factored into the average.
The green and purple lines are where it gets interesting. Those lines are the return that PERA would have to see over the remainder of the 30-year window from 2001-2030, in order to meet the 8.75% and 8% targets. So, for instance, after 2007, in order to have a CAGR of 8.75% from 2001-2030, PERA would have to have returns of 9.3% from 2008-2030.
Note that using the 8% return from 2001 basically gives hindsight credit to PERA, since in 2001 they were projecting 8.75%, not 8%. Let’s blow up that part:
As you can see, PERA started out with poor 2001 and 2002 returns, which put it in an immediate hole. Even good returns from 2003-2007 only got the required returns down to 9.3% and 8.3%, respectively. Then 2008 happened. By now, we’re 12 years into that 30-year window, and even a good year like 2012 will only push the required return down a little bit, about 0.3%. For instance, it would take 7 years of 15% returns to get the required return for the 8.75% line down to below 8.75%, in effect, to catch up to the 8.75% projection, and it would take 5 more years to catch up to the 8% projection. It’s highly unlikely that even 5 years will pass without a normal, cyclical recession, and attendant lower returns.
The average return is 6.28%, the CAGR is lower, just over 5%. In fact, any set of returns with an average of 8%, but which are not actually 8% each year, will compound to less than 8%, making it that much harder to make up ground. Bear that in mind when someone talks about how easy it is to make up for a couple of bad years.
All of this argues for using a Monte Carlo simulation to determine solvency, rather than a simple rate of return. Such a model is a little more expensive to run, but will give a far more accurate picture of the health, or lack thereof, of any defined benefit plan.
PERA – It’s All For The Kids
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Education, PERA, PPC on January 20th, 2013
Not all school spending is for the kids. A lot of it is for the teachers, at the expense of the kids. Over the last five years, even as school districts and teachers unions complain that per-student spending has been “slashed,” “cut to the bone,” or “eviscerated,” per-student spending on the PERA School Division has been growing well beyond inflation. Here are the per-student contributions by the major local school districts (minus Denver, which has its own PERA division), and statewide:
Over the least 5 years, this has translated to growth rates well in excess of inflation:
And who’s been picking up the tab? The Employer contribution has been growing far in excess of the Employee contribution in absolute terms. The employer contribution has been growing at 10% per year from 2006-2011, while the Employee contribution has grown at a 3% rate over the same period. The overall per-student increase has been just under 8.5%.
Not only is PERA taking money from the classroom, it’s taking taxpayer dollars from the classroom at a wildly disproportionate rate. Is this what the teachers unions mean by “shared sacrifice?”
Daily Glimpse January 17, 2013
Posted by Joshua Sharf in PPC on January 17th, 2013
Daily Links From Glimpse From a Height
- The Moral Case for Conservatism
Arthur Brooks, President of the American Enterprise Institute, is the most articulate advocate out there for the moral and community case for capitalism and fiscal responsibility. In Tuesday’s Coffee and Markets podcast, he presents the case about as succinctly as I’ve heard it made, perhaps as succinctly as it can be made. Key to his worldview […]
- Benford’s Law Wins Another Round
There are more quantities that start with 1 than start with 2. Those that start with 2 in turn outnumber those that start with 3, and so on. This is true for just about every measurement – from the size of asteroids to financial ledger entries to economic statistics. Why? Because there are more small […]
Dems Try to Tar Republicans With…Slavery?!?
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Civil War, History, National Politics, PPC on January 17th, 2013
Gawker seems to think it has a scoop of some kind, trumpeting the fact that the Republicans are meeting in the Burwell Room of the Kingsmill Resort (named for a formed slave plantation) to discuss – ta da! – minority outreach. The irony, the sheer hypocrisy of such a thing is apparently too much for them to bear. And local DU polisci professor Seth Masket, on Twitter, is equally enthralled.
Let’s remember that the GOP is the reason that neither Burwell Plantation nor the location of the resort are slave plantations any more. Masket knows this, but still thinks that somehow the GOP is tarred by association with slavery.
Of course, the Democrats have been holding retreats there for years (1998, 2007, 2008, 2009 – where President Obama spoke), and President Obama did his 2nd debate prep there this past year, without anyone commenting on the location. There’s a good reason for that – it doesn’t matter. Many fine resorts in the south are located on former plantations; it’s a good use for the land. That it was a plantation 150 years ago should be cause for celebration.
If anyone has reason to be embarrassed about holding meetings there, it’s the party of slavery and secession, not the GOP.
Daily Glimpse January 16, 2013
Posted by Joshua Sharf in PPC on January 16th, 2013
Daily Links From Glimpse From a Height
- The Libya Fallout Spreads
Walter Russell Mead notices that the French may have bitten off more than they can chew in Mali: France needs US help, and the US should give it. Just as France’s Libyan intervention failed because the country ran out of military supplies, France’s Malian adventure could collapse without our support. But the situation nevertheless raises alarms. I […]
- So Much for Red Lines
Chemical weapons used in Syria? United States diplomats in Turkey conducted a previously undisclosed, intensive investigation into claims that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons, and made what an Obama administration official who reviewed the cable called a “compelling case” that Assad’s military forces had used a deadly form of poison gas. The cable, […]
- A Debt Ceiling Negotiating Strategy
Keith Hennessey has some suggestions for how the Republicans should approach the debt ceiling: He is afraid of getting jammed by small short-term debt limit increases (as I have recommended). Really afraid. This path would keep fiscal issues front-and-center when he wants to punt them, and it would force him to pay a price every […]
Daily Glimpse January 11, 2013
Posted by Joshua Sharf in PPC on January 11th, 2013
Daily Links From Glimpse From a Height
- Will Gutenberg Laugh Last?
Don’t assume not. Among the reasons: 1. We may be discovering that e-books are well suited to some types of books (like genre fiction) but not well suited to other types (like nonfiction and literary fiction) and are well suited to certain reading situations (plane trips) but less well suited to others (lying on the […]
- 3D Cameras Bringing That Minority Report Screen Closer
Yes, the premise of Minority Report is creepy – using telepaths to predict criminal behavior and lock up the malefactors before they do anything wrong. But the things that everyone remembers are Tom Cruise manipulating a wall-sized screen with his hand like a conductor, and his being relentlessly bombarded by personalized ads. The second would get […]
- Partners For Peace
“Eschewing the traditional snowman, sculptors utilized Jerusalem’s snowfall to fashion a replica M-75 rocket on the Temple Mount, causing a flurry of activity on the social media network Facebook on Thursday. The large replica of the missile, of the sort fired by Hamas at Tel Aviv and Jerusalem during the November 2012 mini-war Operation Pillar […]
- With Friends Like These…
…Hagel may not need any enemies: Iran’s Foreign Ministry dumped more fuel on the fire of former Senator Chuck Hagel’s (R–NE) nomination for Secretary of Defense by announcing its approval for President Obama’s pick. It’s no secret that Hagel, an outspoken critic of sanctions on Iran, has preferred a policy of engagement and direct talks […]
- Golden State Exodus
Not exactly news to many of us, but explained well: The number 1 topic of conversation amongst the despised 1% in California today is when you are leaving California or whether you can leave. Property owners who cannot move their apartment building or office complexes can move their homes and change their residency. On a […]
- Innovation Decline
Feeling smug about our innovation compared to the Chinese? Don’t: In short, the United States does not have a tech sector. It has mature consumer businesses operating under the technology label. They walk like mature consumer businesses, quack like mature consumer businesses, and fly like mature consumer businesses. They are run by patent lawyers rather […]
- New York and Fracking
As Gov. Cuomo considers his fracking options: Oil and gas drilling companies are increasingly finding it more economical to recycle drilling water for future jobs rather than disposing of it in the injection wells, which has enraged environmentalists. More than 16 percent of water used in Marcellus Shale fracking operations is being recycled, up from […]
- Papayan Politics
And empty Golden Rice bowls: In the absence of access to Golden Rice and similar nutritionally enhanced foods, the world’s poor are suffering and dying unnecessarily, but not because of the failure of intellectual property. A far more critical factor is the gratuitous regulation demanded by activists and created and maintained by bureaucrats. This is […]
- Who Really Cares?
That’s the title of an excellent book by AEI’s Arthur Brooks showing the baleful effects of trying to replace friends, family, and community with government services. Melanie Phillips shows how far Britain is down this path: Another example occurred at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust, where over three years from 2005 between 400 and 1,200 patients died […]
- India Slowing Down?
It certainly looks that way. It could be cyclical, of course, but these growth economies are supposed to slow their growth, not actually slow down. Cars, housing, and now, investment: India has a number of structural problems, mostly a dysfunctional political class that makes our look efficient, and corruption that makes Maxine Waters look honest. […]
Daily Glimpse January 10, 2013
Posted by Joshua Sharf in PPC on January 10th, 2013
Daily Links From Glimpse From a Height
- Going South By Southwest?
OK, maybe it’s not that bad. But their oil-price hedging strategy really isn’t an advantage for them: This situation should be easy to visualize because the hedges are on oil rather than jet fuel and because they are settled for cash rather than physical delivery. But even if the hedges were denominated in physically delivered […]
- Laptop Touchscreens Make Inroads
I’m not in the market for a new laptop yet, moslty because I really don’t want to re-install a whole helluva lot of server software, but these look tempting: Starting now, all of its all-ones and Thin + Light laptops will come standard with touchscreens and quad-core processors, including some from AMD (a first for […]
- Game of Drones
China and Japan escalate confrontation over islands using drones…for now. Tensions over the islands – called the Diaoyu by China and the Senkaku by Japan – have ratcheted up in past weeks. Chinese surveillance planes flew near the islands four times in the second half of December, according to Chinese state media, but were chased […]
- See Asteroids From Both Sides
This is getting a little too close for comfort: On February 15, a 57-metre (185-feet) asteroid, 2012 DA14, will skim the planet at just 34,500 kilometres (21,600 miles). In other words, it will spookily fly by inside the orbit of geostationary satellites. “It’s going to be the closest predicted flyby of an asteroid,” says Mark […]
- London Underground 1932-33
An oldie, but goodie: I’ve always read how well designed HC Beck’s 1933 version of the London underground was. It only occurred to me the other day that I never had seen the old version for comparison. There are definitely significant improvements (…improvements that have proven very useful as the system grew further), but I […]
- 50 Vintage Bathroom Sinks — New Old Stock — lots of color — in Denver
Mid-century modern plumbing, for sale locally here in Denver, in case you’re into that sort of thing.
- Mind-Bending Illustrations by Oscar Ramos
A modern-day Escher, with a twist.
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