I have to agree with Kevin Drum that John McCain's saying that terrorism is the gravest long-term threat to the US economy is pretty silly. For starters, it's non-responsive; in that sense, death by asteroid is probably the gravest long-term threat to the US economy, but that's not really very helpful in telling me what someone's domestic policy is going to be like. But more than that, it's not even vaguely true. Terrorism is just not an existential threat to the United States, even in the very unlikely event that a terrorist group gets a nuke. I can think of half a dozen more realistic candidates for causing mass economic suffering, like energy shortages, central bank malfeasance, environmental degradation of the food or water supply, resurgent global economic nationalism, or good old-fashioned overregulation. This is just an attempt to wave the bloody shirt and thereby avoid discussions of his economic policies. What makes this especially galling is that he has some pretty okay things to say about issues like trade.
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Yeah, but would any of those things cause huge Michael Bay-quality explosions? No? Then why should we care about them?
McCain has a lot of things to say. But bottom line he doesn't want to make it about Economics. For all the talk about Obama's policies (his website articulates better but overall he isn't detail oriented either) he can talk about economics without making it too boring or sounding like a jackass. McCain, well you've heard him speak. Does anyone else think his position on the Bush tax cuts is just a cover so he comes up +++ with supply side economists and the overall conservative ideology (there is no way he can't know that they will expire unless by an act of God the Republicans regain congress, thus really putting his true thoughts on the matter to the test). Also Obama is running a unionsist trade restrictive populism. McCain is only riding the opposite wave of free-trade big business populism. I suspect when either assumes office the movement will be right to the center. I hope that means they'll stop running deficits like its water and swiping China's Visa card to cover the utility bill.
In the end their economic policies are distinguishable only in that Obama seems to really want to improve infrastructure in this country on a large level. McCain seems to think that what we have is good and its continued moderate improvement is enough. And the money is better served returning to the individual business.
As a white, male Appalachian, I will of course do my duty to God and country, kith, kin and kind by voting for McCain. That said, I'm not thrilled about all of his policy talk, and the idea that terrorism threatens the US existentially might only be true if we started plopping H-bombs on presumed terrorist hideouts.
But give J-Mac a break. He's gotta make some kind of loud objectionable noises to get the media to take their ogling eyes off of Obama!
Ben is right. Both candidates do not enjoy economics, and are responding to the populist desire for gifts from the government. McCain is truly an internationally minded guy and recognizes trade as important. The big problem now is not infrastructure per se, but commodity prices for fundamentals of infrastructure such as steel/iron ore, cement, etc.
To replace and improve our infrastructure will require construction of industrial facilities on a scale not seen since the 1950's. The political will to get this done is not yet apparent. Drilling offshore is really easy compared to building the required on-shore stuff next to peoples beach houses.
Asteriods are passe; the cool kids are worried about the Yellowstone supervolcano (is La Palma done yet? I'm losing track of these existential threats...).
9/11 was $ 100 billion dollar or more hit to the economy, a sudden downward and trailing negative spike. Did he say 'gravest long term threat?' The things you mentioned may have less of a sudden spike in terms of disruptive influence. So I think you're arguing about an adjective for a graphed fuction. Bob Brinker, a financial analyst, said yesterday that 'rising oil prices had decimated the airline industry.' Well the Romans would 'decimate' by taking every tenth person in a gropup and killing them; so to me he didn't sound like a cogescenti of the (Roman) language. People differ in fixation on nuances.
"Terrorism is just not an existential threat to the United States, even in the very unlikely event that a terrorist group gets a nuke."
Certain vocal factions of the American right believe (or claim to believe) that terrorism is indeed an existential threat. How exactly this is is always left a bit unclear, but I know people who worry (or claim to worry) about just this, and the prospect of the Muslims taking over and putting our women in burkas.
The result of this is that literally any question can be avoided by returning to terrorism and chanting the mantra "9/11 changed everything!" No, it doesn't make sense. But if you haven't got anything better to say, at least it changes the subject and panders to some percentage of voters.
If you ask me, out-of-control big government is the greatest long-term threat to American.
And since McCain isn't going to do anything whatsoever about that problem, I supported Ron Paul, and now I'm supporting Bob Barr.
I think this was an appropriate answer given the way that the question was worded.
Anyone who works in the business world knows that publicly you refer to any concerns you have as a “challenge” rather than “threats” because the word “challenge” implies something that you can overcome through innovation and perseverance or even transform into an “opportunity” whereas the word “threat” implies something that you have to go out and destroy before it destroys you.
So given the way that the question was worded, “Islamic extremism” is definitely more of a “threat” – not only because of the damage the last one caused but also the potential effects that it may have down the road in terms of destabilization of a key region of the world – than higher energy prices which are arguably more of an “opportunity” for those who favor reducing GHG emissions through conservation and alternative energy sources like nuclear power.
Richard-
I kind of agree, but McCain ought to understand this better than most. Fear doesn't work for a long term deterrent to behavior. People will jump out of airplanes or Kayak down class 5 rapids. So I'd say its more of a decision to run on what he feels he is good at: defense and international policy. Obama is running on a platform highlighting his perceived strengths as well: Getting out of Iraq period and a ... Well he doesn't really seem like he has any other stand out issue now does he? Other than "the future will be brighter" nothing else hits me.
Terrorism I think could cause serious long term harm, but because it is a kind of one-shot deal it all depends on where and how the US was hit. S
Richard-
I kind of agree, but McCain ought to understand this better than most. Fear doesn't work for a long term deterrent to behavior. People will jump out of airplanes or Kayak down class 5 rapids. So I'd say its more of a decision to run on what he feels he is good at: defense and international policy. Obama is running on a platform highlighting his perceived strengths as well: Getting out of Iraq period and a ... Well he doesn't really seem like he has any other stand out issue now does he? Other than "the future will be brighter" nothing else hits me.
Terrorism I think could cause serious long term harm, but because it is a kind of one-shot deal it all depends on where and how the US was hit. S
Ok, what the heck is an "existential threat"? (As opposed to a non-existential threat?) People have been using that word like that for months (years?) now and I feel stupid because I don't know what they mean.
(maybe it's my own da** fault but still.... George Carlin is dead and I'm feeling grumpy today so this is what I'm on about)
MarkG @ 4:07 probably just offered the biggest help to McCain and it has nothing to do with economic policy. The nickname: J-Mac. I think McCain can appropriate the it. It's young, hip. He can use it in the third person, "J-Mac doesn't play those populist games."
As to what the biggest threat is, terrorism in theory could be the biggest threat almost solely if they were able to get a nuclear bomb. Anything short of that leaves us woefully misfocused.
Going back to Mark G a moment, I think McCain has had some wonderful press, given his mistakes and senility. He is like the granddad nobody wants to send to the nursing home yet because he's fun to go fishing with. Unfortunately his time is past and his freshness date is a bit stale.
Just because you disagree with McCain, his view is not necessarily "silly".
September 11 demonstrated a failure of imagination among the US public. We simply could not fathom such a threat was even possible.
It is possible that you may be experiencing another failure of imagination (and McCain isn't).
A major terrorist threat could hobble our settlement & clearing systems. It could coordinate an attack of primary and backup systems (and data). It could bring down a few financial firms simultaneously, then we'll have 5 Bears happening concurrently... And the crippling fear of another shoe falling.
We could experience a major breach ala the terrible "Swordfish" movie.
The prospects of bio terror are truly horrific... If anti-biotic resistant killer bugs got into the food supply or drinking water, that would be a major mess.
I am not saying McCain's answer was great, or even that good...
But surely, bioterrorism is a bigger threat than "environmental degradation of the food or water supply"...
And terrorism would be the most likely trigger for the other risks that you mention, including "resurgent global economic nationalism" and "good old-fashioned overregulation".
Remember, terrorism was the proximate cause of shoe screening at airports.
It's a funny thing about politicians and their constituents. John McCain says the transcendent challenge of our time is the fight against islamic fascism. I think the transcendent challenge of our time is to understand that the fight against islamic fascism is not the transcendent challenge of our time. And yet, I support him because I think the second most important challenge for our nation in this time is to understand that there is no available protection from or scapegoat for competition. So the freer trading, immigration reforming, deregulating candidate remains my preference even though we disagree on the fundamental question of the fundamental question.
Of course he's lying - the biggest threat to the economy is the elderly, but nobody who wants to hold an elected office is actually going to say it.
Stephen-
I agree that there is a distinct possibility that terrorism can impact the US in the long run. However, as you've pointed out it requires specific skill sets with specific targets. I'm not saying a terrorist with a degree in bioengineering couldn't manufacture something nasty. I would point out that manufacturing anything genetically is quite difficult. And that the best bet would be an already available biological disease. I think you'd agree its a difficult step and a long way from flight school. They have not demonstrated that level of attack yet, they focus on bombs bombs and weaponry make up that 99.9999% everyone always talks about. In that respect they are conventional by default.
"the biggest threat to the economy is the elderly." Thats one way to look at it. I'd say it has more to do with what they've been promised and therefore expect. I don't see Grandma out there planting bombs at oil refineries in order to bring about the revolution.
I suppose you have to see this in the context of the current presidential race. The position of the Obama supporters has been, 'Na naw nanona, you are supporting a losing war which is immoral (as all aggression which might support our culture would be).' Now that Iraq doesn't look like a loser, it's, 'Well it doesn't matter anyway. There isn't and wasn't, nobody bit me, any existential threat.' Now, if Obama was saying that the use of pencillin threatened biological diversity; then McCain might say that syphillis was our biggest existential threat. Instead, Obama is saying just waltz away from Iraq; so terrorism and Iran are bigger potential issues.
So terrorism "is just not an existential threat to the United States" but "good old-fashioned overregulation" is? Come on.
Michael-
I honestly thought the outcome for Iraq had been decided. In a way I was wrong, now if Iraq fails its not due to the US failing the new government. But the new government failing itself and everyone else.
Iraq could take a whole page, but somehow I do wonder: has Iraq's relevancy disappeared? Did the American people decide that its a cost overrun to be rectified immediately upon the next president's assumption of command? Has the outcome in the US already been decided?
Right now if Iraq continues its current trend there will be a troop drawdown in the fall (the math will shift to Afghanistan with maybe a two brigade increase in reserves). If it continues then whoever is president will draw troops down because its the smart thing to do. But lets say security improves but politics stays the same? The Sunni's and Shiite's still can't sing cumbaya? What then are our options?
As you say Michael Iran is definitely pacing the floors of these townhall meetings. But I don't think that it is reactionary politics I think that McCain honestly believes Islamic terrorism is the threat. But if trends continue, it won't be fought in Iraq it will be in Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan. How would McCain or Obama handle a shifting counter-insurgency conflict? Now that I think is a good question to ask the candidates.
Ok, what the heck is an "existential threat"?
The Soviets having many thousands of nukes aimed at us.
In fact, the Russians still reportedly still have >10,000, maybe 6,000 "strategic". If they were to get really mad at us some day ... well, let's see terrorists match that.
Paleoprof-
An "existential" threat is a threat to the existence of something. In this case, it's something that would destroy the United States as we know it (the system of government in particular). A non-existential threat is something that may harm us, but the country as a whole would continue its existence.
For an historical example: Lincoln viewed secession as an existential threat to the United States (how can you have united states when the states can leave the union at any time?)
If a nuclear weapon goes off in NYC or Washington D.C. I think you will find the modern world will collapse very quickly. I think people greatly underestimate the fragility of a society in which almost no one grows their own food.
Megan seems unable to see (or unwilling to admit) that politics and economics are interconnected. There are a few serious long-term threats to our standard of living: one is the unsustainable growth of entitlements, another is the deterioration of primary and secondary education and a third is the threat posed by terrorism (which has imposed enormous costs already, even without any nuclear material in Al Quaeda's hands).
It's hard to know which of these three is the most serious threat (that really depends on one's subjective estimations of the associated probabilities). Thus, any of the three would be a plausible answer to the question.
So, in sum, McCain's answer was reasonable and Megan's criticism is just plain wrong.
9/11 was $ 100 billion dollar or more hit to the economy, a sudden downward and trailing negative spike.
That's a pretty sweeping statement. Richard Perle and Blackwater and Dick Cheney's old employer did pretty good as a result.
Hear that Megan your WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. How dare you discount the imminent terrorist threat. They may already have a nuclear weapons in NYC ready, waiting to be detonated. Our only option Megan is to live in a constant state of Fear, I mean vigilance. So don't go pretending your not afraid of your cab driver. Spy on the neighbors!! You do it anyway. Boooooooo...m!! Its the sound of a suicide bomber's ghost be afraid. They can do anything, they'll make that crappy movie "The Happening" a reality.
Damn I'm tired. Needless sarcasm like this can only come from a day of watching political and economic blogs because I'm trapped in a postage stamp. Anyway I'm signing off its sleep time.
Yancey nails it, as usual.
And there's no need for a nuclear weapon, or even a biologically engineered bug. Mustard gas is trivial to make. It's harder to make a good martini. Dilute it in an inert solvent, portion it out to like-minded lunatics, who then fetch up at various public venues, and voila! A terrorist attack that will necessitate full pat down searches before entry into any public venue in America. (Metal detectors would, of course, be useless.) A sporting event, a concert, a bus, a plane flight, a workplace or two, and a retail store or two is all it would take to trash the economy, because one could never know where the next attack might take place.
Mustard gas burns horribly, and doesn't produce any symptoms until hours after exposure. So you won't know whether or not you've been exposed until long after it's too late to do anything about it. (Exposure has to be treated within minutes; after that, you're wasting your time.)
Think that would cause galloping paranoia? It should, and it would. Any little itch, the way the blistering begins, could mean you at a minimum were in for agonizing burns (I speak from experience, unfortunately; one synthesis simply necessitated use of this and related vesicants) that take months to heal, and curdle the skin like a blowtorch burn. (One drop will do this.) If you're not that lucky, and inhale the stuff, or get it in your eyes...you'll either die or wish to God you had.
So McCain's absolutely correct. In fact, he understated the case. Terrorism is an existential threat not only against our economy, but against our entire way of life. A few attacks such as that alluded to above and we could kiss civil liberties goodbye, along with the economy, and say hello to be living in the remake of Mad Max.
Asteroids, indeed.
There are a few serious long-term threats to our standard of living: one is the unsustainable growth of entitlements, another is the deterioration of primary and secondary education and a third is the threat posed by terrorism
While you are correct that corporate welfare and jackass educational decisions like Intelligent Design and Abstinence Only are indeed costly, you forgot another factor: Starting Unnecessary Wars. That's, far and away, the single most expensive (on so many levels) issue facing Our Great Nation.
This is the kind of thinking that led the terrorists to destroy the WTC. Ours is not a centrally planned economy. We don't "end" because one of our centers of trade is removed. Fundamentally, trade and economic relationships occur between people, not buildings or cities (except insofar as they contain people).
Almost no food is grown in NYC or Washington D.C. The "real" power in this country is fairly decentralized. Now NYC or DC may be effective at directing this power towards specific goals, and NYC creates a lot of wealth, but they're not necessary for the undirected continuation of existence of the rest of the country. In short time, the types of relationships that make NYC and DC useful can be built anew.
That's a pretty sweeping statement. Richard Perle and Blackwater and Dick Cheney's old employer did pretty good as a result.
An only slightly-roundabout example of the broken windows fallacy.
Ben-
Regarding Iraq (and Iran), in the voices of Iraqis:
WSJ June 17, 2008
It seems to me a serious error to look only at the most immediate impact of the terrorist attacks. Aside from the buildings destroyed and the lives lost, there has been a susbstantial increase in risk premiums. There have also been large costs associated with increased security. And of course we are fighting two very costly wars because of the terrorist attacks. And then there's the rapid rise in oil prices, which is due in part to the geopolitical uncertainty caused by terrorism.
What the total cost of this is, I don't know, but it's substantial. Does anyone really think it isn't?
And then there's the prospect of more terrorist attacks. "Right-wing scare tactics" some will cry. Well, Warren Buffett, who has some experience with risk-asessment and is hardly a right-winger or McCain flunky, said that a nuclear attack on the United States is "virtually a certainty."
Perhaps he's overstating the case. Again, reasonable people can disagree about the exact probabilities here. But it's clear that the threat of future terrorist attacks is a serious one, and that such attacks would add significantly to the already high costs associated with terrorism.
When it comes to candidates and economics, I find it's most useful to be a pessimist.
A president can't create a booming economy out of thin air, but he can make us all quite a bit poorer if he picks his policies right.
Now I like Obama; I voted for him. But I'm starting to worry that his anti-competitive instincts (like his ties to ethanol) mean that he could help this recession last a long, long time. McCain would rather talk about war than money, but I'm wondering if we wouldn't be safer with his policies. Any thoughts on this?
By the way, the terrorism question is probably empirical. It's a lot like global warming in that the worst-case outcomes are economically devastating but also less likely than the medium-case outcomes. Are there probability models for this like there are for climate?
Nelson, objectively you're absolutely right, but I believe you're overlooking the psychological fragility of our society. People are in a tizzy over global warming (we're doomed!), neurotic housewives on Long Island fret about cell phones and power lines causing cancer.
That's how wound up people get over threats that don't even exist. Imagine seeing people walking around with faces burned into congealed masses, like those of WWII fighter pilots who were trapped in burning planes. (See this for the early stage of a mustard gas burn. This poor guy would have had several months of those blisters breaking, oozing, and then reforming, over and over again, ultimately leaving nasty scars).
Given people's reactions to the above non-existent threats, I think it's fair to say that the American public would not calmly rebuild the economic and political infrastructure, consoling themselves with the thought that we have a decentralized system.
I'm not saying any of this to be alarmist or melodramatic. I'm saying it because if even a few people fetch up like the poor guy in the link, Americans will think twice before doing anything - such as going to work, going out in public, traveling - that might put them in the same boat. And that will clobber both the economy, and in reaction to it, civil liberties.
Wait till Angelo Mozilo pulls off the mask to reveal that he's actually Osama bin Laden. Then you'll be convinced that terrorism is the greatest threat to the U.S. economy.
Messrs Ward and Beard make salient points about the potential for calamity from B and C weapons, the poor man's nukes. These threats come from enemies foreign and domestic. And it's hard to deny that we move closer to some sort of subversive attempt to set off any of these WMDs in the country every day.
Yet there's also the potential for greater surveillance of us all practically around the clock to make sure no one's furtively up to making mass mischief. There was some sci-fi author who argued for us giving up our expansive ideas of having private spheres so that we could all potentially catch such planning ahead of time. The guy also argued for applying the ever cheaper, ever smaller surveillance technology to our own leaders and rulers as part of the bargain. (I can't think of good terms to feed The Google, but I think I read about the guy and his ideas first at reason.com.)
Technological progress produces risks and offers ways to minimize it at the same time. And people who otherwise suffer from bunched-up knickers at the mere mention of more surveillance (a threat to our civil liberty of privacy!) actually buy easy-to-locate cell phones, shop at stores with surveillance cameras, and appreciate CCTV at other public arenas might have to reconsider which they value more: Being able to pick their noses in public when they assume they're not being watched or being able to go out in public at all due to terrorist threats, security lines and curfews set after the next catastrophic, manmade "mass casualty event."
Are there probability models for this like there are for climate?
Yes, but it's mostly function of how stupid the ostensibly President is. For example if the ostensible President got a personally delivered message that religious lunatics were hell bent to "strike in U.S." would he or she
a. look into it
b. go bass fishing
If the answer is b., the probability skyrockets.
Wow, Michael, them's some pretty damning words for Democrats in a Wall Street Journal opinion column. You don't see that every day. I wonder if those guys are cab drivers. They say the dadgumdest things. Shame Iraqis can't vote in the U.S. Then we definitely wouldn't be stuck B. Hussein Obama, a Muslim, as President.
If a nuclear weapon goes off in NYC or Washington D.C. I think you will find the modern world will collapse very quickly.
Considering how continental and eastern Europe was obliterated during WWII (apart from Sweden), how Tokyo and the cities of Japan were firebombed into ashes, etc., etc., all with millions dead -- and then how soon they all surged right back to all-time record prosperity, I really doubt that any such one incident today would cause the collapse of the modern world. (I say this as a person sitting in your NYC target zone.)
Terrorists without state support can never do to nations anything like what nations have done to each other.
OTOH, those 10,000 nukes still in Russia seem to have been largely forgotten for some reason.
Moreover, there are reports that a real-life semi-doomsday machine has recently been activated by the Russians (not Soviets) ... and that US missile silo personnel have figured out how one guy can turn both launch keys using a spoon and a piece of string. So civilization may not be safe yet.
Uh, that's nice, except that those countries were rebuilt by investments from ...uh...the US. If it's the US that suffers that kind of devastation, who exactly will pony up to help us rebuild?
I think there are not too many existential threats to the USA. Even WW II was not really an existential threat. The Cold War was, due to nukes, but we see now that Iran may end up with nuclear weapons. (not to mention North Korea, Pakistan, etc.)
If a nuke goes off in NYC, the physical and economic hit would be survivable. But people need to consider what happens next. We would have to retaliate by nuking whoever we thought provided the weapon.
You don't think that will end it do you? Okay, we've bombed Islamabad or Tehran, now they will have learned their lesson. Nope.
It won't be like a natural disaster, which is a one-off.
We would have to retaliate by nuking whoever we thought provided the weapon.
You would think so, wouldn't you. After 9-11, we attacked Al-Queda and their allies, the Taliban. Then ditched that effort to attack completely unrelated (well, they're also pretty swarthy, I guess) Iraq. How'd that work out, anyway?
Re: my earlier post. The guy's name is David Brin (feed The Google!) and he wrote a book, The Transparent Society, about his ideas back in 1998. I've only read reports about reviews of the book, or something quite removed, but he makes pretty good sense.
It'll be seven years soon, and there have been zero acts of Islamic terrorism in the United States and zero credible threats. All of the "plots" that have been discovered have been ludicrous in the extreme, e.g. the pizza delivery boys who fantasized about attacking Ft. Dix.
If a nuclear weapon goes off in NYC or Washington D.C. I think you will find the modern world will collapse very quickly.
The next day's weather forecast for Mecca: sunny, low humidity, temperature 5,000 degrees.
Oh, we all get the commenters we deserve.
Anyway, I find it more than a little disturbing that anyone would think that terrorism is an actual long term threat to the economy.
I think a good question is: What if the equivalent of 9/11 happened again?
Another good question is: What if something 10X worse than 9/11 happened?
My answer to both of these questions is that the outcome would be far, far less catastrophic than what happened on 9/11. We are prepared in ways we were not before - and we know that we survived without any real economic effect.
There would be no 5X Bear Stearns - this idea shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what the problem was at Bear.
Terrorism in Israel is far, far worse and much more persistent than it is in the U.S. We would have to have those mustard gas bombs going off weekly for months and years (without any stopping them!! yeah, right) before it would have a significant long term impact on the U.S. economy.
People here are overestimating by many orders of magnitude how effective terrorism is and has been in the past. For persistent terrorism to exist, there has to be a substantial population who essentially supports that terrorism. We simply don't have anything like that population in the U.S.
A few mustard gas bombs might kill 20K people, or about 2 years of car accidents in the U.S.
Nuclear weapons are far more dangerous. Its criminal that the Bush administration has done so little to help secure the nuclear secrets and material from getting into the wrong hands. All of those old Soviet weapons - wtf were they thinking. It is almost as though they like having incredibly dangerous weapons fall into the wrong hands. But the question wasn't, will the U.S get bombed, it was what is the greatest long term threat to the U.S. economy? I don't even think a nuke would make a substantial difference. Its just a one off event.
And finally, the answer of terrorism shows that McCain could give a fuck as to what was being asked, and was pulling a typical political bullshit answer, where you answer the question you want, not the one that was asked.
Because, even if he believes that terrorism is an existential threat that could harm the economy in the most profound manner, the question was aimed at global macro economic situations that should be handled by monetary and economic policy, not political policy. He needs to answer the question, what grave economic threats face the economy and what are you going to do about them? By pulling this bullshit answer out of his ass, he makes a mockery of his straight-shooter persona. Instead of answering a genuine question with a genuine answer, he gave a bullshit answer. So the question still remains, what are you going to do with the grave threats to the U.S. economy? Start another war in Iran, maybe? What a dick.
Or the assorted demented clowns who planned to hijack a bunch of planes and crash them over the Pacific. Ha ha! What a joke!
Next thing you know, they'll be proposing to ignite shoe bombs on airplanes! Ha ha! How ridiculous can you get? Monty Python couldn't do better than that.
Except neither of those things sounds so ludicrous now, does it?
Terrorism is just not an existential threat to the United States, even in the very unlikely event that a terrorist group gets a nuke
Megan I can't even believe you would say this.
9-11 was what, a $500 billion dollar hit to the GDP? Maybe more? A nuke goes off and we might see 10% unemployment.
I don't like John Mac but you are gravely mistaken here Megan.
Occam's Beard: Terrorism is an existential threat not only against our economy, but against our entire way of life.
Well, I would qualify that to say that how we respond to a terrorist act could pose an existential threat to our way of life. One way to better respond is to realize that the terrorist act itself does not pose such a threat. After all, the terrorists are counting on the irrational fear and paranoia to do the heavy lifting for them.
Quite right, but considering that neurotics are already frantic over threats that don't even exist, I don't think there's much hope of a more measured response to one that demonstrates that it exists.
After all, anyone who now worries about polar bears (Linnean name: Ursus maritimus) drowning is going to go batshit crazy over a real threat, as demonstrated by an actual attack.
Consider that neurotics are now worried about the threat posed by the PVC of shower curtains. Put in that context, how do you think they'll react to a real threat, one that they see on TV?
Turn the situation around. Suppose such an attack took place on, say, NY, and Bush said, "Take it easy. Only a few thousand were killed out of a population of 300 million, no biggie. Walk it off, America. Don't engage in irrational fear or paranoia. More than 99.99% of us are just fine." How many liberals would support that policy?
mickslam, thank you for your closely reasoned and beautifully written analysis.
Global Warming is NOT an existential threat to the United States. Sure, we might take an economic hit, and have to modify our lifestyles a little bit, but if we just pretty much ignored it and got on with life, it would easy to deal with. Treat it like crime, a chronic problem, rather than trying to defeat it like war.
Do you think any of the commenters will agree with this statement?
Keep in mind that your worst case scenarios for global warming are no more realistic than the worst case terror scenarios.
How about if terrorists got 12 bombs and blew up the following cities: LA, NYC, DC, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Miami, Seattle, SF, Philly, Boston, and, uhhh, London just for good measure.
That's equivalent to Gore's 30 feet rises in ocean levels (or was it 30 meters?)
Or, could I claim, as Gore did, that we have to exaggerate to get action. Maybe that's what McCain is doing.
and just to be clear, I don't think terrorism is an existential threat, and I don't think global warming will be either. A little perspective helps in both cases.
For the question about what grave economic threat faces the nation, he should have answered "Obama's policies."
Because seriously, beyond inflation control and the looming benefits crisis, it will be up to the markets and the individuals who make them to handle the economic issues.
And for inflation control its not exactly a presidential power, and congress controls the purse.
9-11 was what, a $500 billion dollar hit to the GDP? Maybe more? A nuke goes off and we might see 10% unemployment.
Do you have any proof that it was a $500 billion dollar hit? Sure some airlines went out of business, but 9/11 was just a convenient excuse for many of the already failing airlines. From looking at the Dow average, there was a fairly short-term dip followed by a strong rally and return to normal levels. I know you people in NYC and DC think you're so important that the entire country just can't survive without you, but you're wrong.
Occam's Beard: considering that neurotics are already frantic over threats that don't even exist, I don't think there's much hope of a more measured response to one that demonstrates that it exists.
Oh, I think there's hope. There will always be neurotic people paranoid over stupid things, but they are not the majority, or else our economy would have already ground to a halt over stupid things.
And I think it's more helpful to write things like Megan's above post than to remind people about the scariness of terrorism.
If a nuclear weapon were detonated in a US city, every ounce of food and other essentials in the production and distribution pipeline would vanish into hoards within a couple of days. Most new production of such items would end within a single payday cycle, or earlier. Most cities would likely be empty within a week. Cash would be nearly impossible to use to purchase anything of immediate value.
The need to gather/grow food would dominate most every single person's day. The economy as you know it would no longer exist, and it would be quite an effort, and take significant time to recover to the level of labor division we have today.
McCain didn't say "terrorism," he said "Islamic extremism." If that includes the risks of hostile regimes launching a war in the Middle East, as well as the risk of Boston Harbor being nuked, then I would say that McCain's statement is debateable but not crazy.
My guess is that Communism was an existential threat to the West, but was unlikely to win, that Facism was unlikelier still, and that Islamic extremism is the weakest of the three, but time may tell.
Ok, so what would qualify as an "existential threat", and how could our resources be better directed to prepare or counter such threats?
What past threats would qualify for our attention under this metric? The War of 1812, maybe? The secession of the Confederate states didn't actually threaten the existence of the USA as a whole, and at the time there was considerable debate all around about whether it was even a bad thing. Both World Wars were European affairs far from our shores, Pearl Harbor was a fluke, and I suspect that Fortress America could have survived the consequences no matter who controlled Europe. Even if the USSR had started lobbing multiple nukes our way (something many were very skeptical would ever happen) the US government itself would probably have held together.
Anyway, I've heard this argument before and I'm not really sure what the point is supposed to be. Are we supposed to evaluate threat levels and then ignore the "non-existential" ones until they become serious enough to deserve our attention?
Anyway, I've heard this argument before and I'm not really sure what the point is supposed to be. Are we supposed to evaluate threat levels and then ignore the "non-existential" ones until they become serious enough to deserve our attention?
Probably not, but in this specific context, McCain IS a politician and a presidential candidate during an election year, so he's a fair target for sniping.
That said, there's nothing about the word "existential" that assumes the existence of the United States is at stake (although the Bush Administration was probably using it that way). The word simply means that something is of, related to, or grounded in the experience of, existence. An "existential threat" might just as well be a threat that has the capacity to continue and persist for the forseeable future.
Hence, a Timothy McVeigh is a terrorist but not an existential threat, while violent Islamic fundamentalism is both.
Or maybe we could coin the word "persistential" to keep a clear distinction. The other one has been around for 315 years according to Merriam-Webster, though, so there's some catchup work to be done here.
I think some have been taking the term "existential" a little too literally. It doesn't mean that North American land mass will cease to exist, or even that the U.S. will cease to exist.
It means that the U.S. as it now is will cease to exist. Was Caesar an existential threat to the Roman Republic? Of course, even though Rome continued to exist. I would submit that having to undergo an airport-style screening before entering any public venue would mark the end of our present way of life.
As for those who pooh-pooh the terrorist threat, I certainly hope you're right, and that it doesn't come to pass, or if it does, we laugh it off. OTOH, if it does happen, promise me that you won't be among those whining about why "something wasn't done."
Occam, I'll take that vow.
Doug, fair enough. I admire intellectual honesty!