Glass-Steagall II?

Okay, I certainly didn't see this coming:

Obama to Propose New Rules on Banks’ Size, Trading

Smart politically, not like you're going to get a lot of people angry going after banks these days. We'll just see what the weak-kneed and paid-for members of Congress do with this.

Here's Ryan Chittum's take:

Make no mistake about, this is a massive story. ...this is a major switcheroo by the administration and a throwing down of the gauntlet at Wall Street, which has so far shown the ability to block or water down any real change it doesn’t like—with the aquiescence of Obama and Co.

The lobbying battles to come over this will make the skirmishes we’ve seen so far look petty.

I'll just bet. But if the Dems fold vs. the Health Care lobby now - what chance do they have against the banking lobby?

Admitting a Bias

Yes, I am willing to believe bad things about large banks.

There, I've said it.

So when I read accusations of big banks asking for under the table payments to allow short sales of homes - I'm willing to believe that.

Since many second lien holders are getting very little, they are now allegedly requesting money on the side from either real estate agents or the buyers in the short sale. When I say "on the side," I mean in cash, off the HUD settlement statements, so the first lien holder doesn't see it.

"They are pretty clear and pretty upfront about the fact that if the first lender knows they are getting paid, the first lender will kill the short sale," says Brandt. "So these second lenders are asking for the payments off the closing documents, off the HUD statement, usually in a cashiers check prior to closing. Once they receive that payment, they will allow the short sale to go through, which according to RESPA laws and the lawyers that we have spoken to on the topic is not legal."

Reading Citi's lukewarm response doesn't go far to undermind that belief either.

(H/t to The Big Picture)

My New Favorite Travel Mug

For Christmas, thorn gave us a Contigo travel mug.

Can I just say... Yum?

It's pretty, but the real home run is the interface. Like every other travel mug, it has a cover with a sealable opening. Unlike most travel mugs - this is a mug you can fill with hot coffee, cover and then fling into your car like you don't give a damn. Not only does it seal perfectly, it does so easily in a quarter turn - with a satisfying amount of friction.

The button to open it is stylish, ambidextrous - and ergonomic as hell. Great heft, feels natural in your hand - solid. Dishwasher safe body and lid (although they recommend hand washing).

Finally, a travel mug I'll remember to bring. Thorn? You so rock.

E? I bought another one - because the uncertainty of who would use the one we had was killing me.

Truism

Every few years we hear the pundits declare that one political party or the other is dead and gone. Fortunately for both Republicans and Democrats, they have each other.
-Paul Soglin

Brownout

I'm not informed enough to add to the analysis of the Scott Brown election - but I can't help but agree with Glenn Greenwald's splenetic rebuttal of those who would blame the far left for this setback:

In what universe must someone be living to believe that the Democratic Party is controlled by "the Left," let alone "the furthest left elements" of the Party? As Ezra Klein says, the Left "ha[s] gotten exactly nothing they wanted in recent months." The Left wanted a single-payer system, then settled for a public option, then an opt-out public option, then Medicare expansion -- only to get none of it, instead being handed a bill that forces every American to buy health insurance from the private insurance industry. Nor was it "the Left" -- but rather corporatist Democrats like Evan Bayh and Lanny Davis -- who cheered for the hated Wall Street bailout; blocked drug re-importation; are stopping genuine reform of the financial industry; prevented a larger stimulus package to lower unemployment; refuse to allow programs to help Americans with foreclosures; supported escalation in Afghanistan (twice); and favor the same Bush/Cheney terrorism policies of indefinite detention, military commissions, and state secrets.

The very idea that an administration run by Barack Obama and Rahm Emanuel and staffed with centrists, Wall Street mavens, and former Bush officials -- and a Congress beholden to Blue Dogs and Lieberdems -- has been captive "to the Left" is so patently false that everyone should be too embarrassed to utter it. For better or worse, the Democratic strategy has long been and still is to steer clear of their leftist base and instead govern as "pragmatists" and centrists -- which means keeping the permanent Washington factions pleased. That strategy may or not be politically shrewd, but it is just a fact that the dreaded "Left" has gotten very little of what it wanted the entire year. Is there anyone who actually believes that "The Left" is in control of anything, let alone the Democratic Party?

Nate Silver has a rapid breakdown of the numbers that created Brown as Senator-Elect - and I'm sure more analysis will follow.

The idea that some far left wing has led the Dems to defeat is too stupid for words. We've grown too accustom to the attack rhetoric from the right - which only speaks of the Dems in terms of far left ("socialist" "Marxist") but the straw man conservative pundits owe their incomes to has yet to leave a tangible mark on this administration.

We're on Crack

...at least with regards to our belief in the stock market, that is.

Here's the WSJ's Intelligent Investor laying it out:

What are we smoking, and when will we stop?

A nationwide survey last year found that investors expect the U.S. stock market to return an annual average of 13.7% over the next 10 years.

Robert Veres, editor of the Inside Information financial-planning newsletter, recently asked his subscribers to estimate long-term future stock returns after inflation, expenses and taxes, what I call a "net-net-net" return. Several dozen leading financial advisers responded. Although some didn't subtract taxes, the average answer was 6%. A few went as high as 9%.

...in order to earn 6% for clients after inflation, fees and taxes, these financial planners will somehow have to pick investments that generate 11% or 13% a year before costs. Where will they find such huge gains? Since 1926, according to Ibbotson Associates, U.S. stocks have earned an annual average of 9.8%. Their long-term, net-net-net return is under 4%.

All other major assets earned even less. If, like most people, you mix in some bonds and cash, your net-net-net is likely to be more like 2%.

Read the whole thing. I don't think anyone's terribly bullish these days - but as we dig out, it's good to think in realistic terms.

(H/t to Felix Salmon)

Netbooks Are Unlike Smart Phones (And Thank God)

Coding Horror is all up in a twist defending the concept of a NetBook computer against the likes of Joey DeVilla.

It's an interesting rant either way. I can't say I'm without an opinion - I got E a NetBook for Christmas & so far, so good. I don't know that they are revolutionary, but I have to agree with this observation by Dave Winer:

But the netbook is not just a new product. It exposes something pretty ugly about the computer industry. They've been controlling prices. There must have been price collusion before netbooks came out. It's clearly possible to build notebooks for much less than they manufacturers are charging.

I don't want to come off all conspiratorial, and I hardly think the revolution is nigh - but the stats speak for themselves. I bought a new netbook with better stats than many full size laptops out there for well under $300.

Yes, it does not have a disk drive. And the screen is only 10".

But it was less than $300. Smaller size used to come with a premium price - not so much these days.

It will be interesting to see what emerges from the initial market confusion - but I have to say, if I was going to get another machine - I'd seriously consider getting another netbook and an external drive.

-------------------

Another gem that came out of drilling into this post was this quote:

Space scientist says texting is four times more expensive than receiving scientific data from space

“The maximum size for a text message is 160 characters, which takes 140 bytes because there are only 7 bits per character in the text messaging system, and we assume the average price for a text message is 5p. There are 1,048,576 bytes in a megabyte, so that's 1 million/140 = 7490 text messages to transmit one megabyte. At 5p each, that's £374.49 per MB - or about 4.4 times more expensive than the ‘most pessimistic’ estimate for Hubble Space Telescope transmission costs.”

Love that.

I mean, I've griped about text messages rates before - but it's nice to have a home run anecdote like this one.

I could send text messages to space for less!!!

I am a Barnes & Noble Franchise of One

This past Christmas, mom gave all the grownups in the family the Barnes & Noble Nook.

Yeah. Pretty cool.

So having mucked around with it since Christmas, here's what I have to say about it.

The good:

Its easy to read. Easy on the eyes to a surprising degree. People concerned about getting eye strain from staring at a screen should relax. It's no more difficult to read than a printed page. Plus, you can change the font size when you do get tired.

It uses exactly the same E Ink technology as the Kindle. If you like that, you will like the Nook's reading screen. It's been reviewed to death by more demanding critics than I - so I'll leave it at that.

It makes the impulse buy ridiculously easy. I used to think of e-readers as personal media devices aimed at text. After using the Nook, I now look at them as a Barnes & Noble store you buy so you can invite it into your home. The Nook connects to the interweb cellularly or by WiFi. Translation: your personal B&N franchise is always waiting to capitalize on your next moment of weakness.

It's very pretty. Clean lines and it comes with attractive pre-loaded wallpapers like cityscapes and nature.

It allows you to change the battery and add memory. The merest hint that an ebook seller would allow its customers to (y'know) maintain the device is a good step. It's a very small step, but a good one.

It uses the ePub file format. Meaning content producers do not have to put their publications into a proprietary format. This is good for lots of reason - but unfortunately, this is a benefit that takes a long time to realize.

If you boil all that down - what's right with the Nook is what's right with all eReaders: A convenient way to buy, store and read publications.

The ePub format is a step up - but will not wow any new user because the immediate result looks identical to what you see on other eReaders.

Being able to access WiFi and cellular internet is a plus - but since the cellular access is free (and your average ePub file is not terribly large) there's not a big wow factor there either.

WiFi access will allow the Nook to do cool things that it couldn't do otherwise - but those features don't exist yet. I doubt you'll end up with actual web browsing - but in theory, you could.

Much is made of the Nook's lending ability - but the ability to lend a book to another user for 14 days (once) is unimpressive. When you realize publishers have veto power over this ability (publishers can designate their books as "non-lendable") you realize this feature isn't just limited, it's endangered.

Here's what's wrong with the Nook:

1. The Touchpad The response time for the controls is sluggish. Users can double click in the time it takes for a single click to register. This may be by design - but anyone used to the iPhone's screen will be underwhelmed by the Nook's performance. The scrolling function does a nice job except the visual cue is the opposite of most UI. You don't drag the current screen towards the offscreen content, you drag the offscreen content towards your current screen. Workable, but odd.

2. Search Users familiar with advanced search features on the web will be mystified by the search experience of the Nook.

For example. I typed in

fred anderson

into the search - and here are the first items displayed:

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Life of Frederick Marrat Free
John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

The Book of Fred $21.95
Abby Bardi

The Dominion of War $9.99
Fred Anderson

Adventures of the infallible Godahl Free
Frederick Irving Anderson From Google Books

There are so many things going wrong here:

a) "The Book of Fred" This tells me that all searches appear to be global. Meaning if you type in an author's name, their name will be used to search book titles, keywords, even summaries. I should be able to isolate a search to a subset of fields.

b) "Life of Frederick Marrat" x7 Why does this book appear seven times in my search results? I should see a single search item:

Life of Frederick Marrat (7 different versions) Free

John Parker Anderson and d... From Google Books

Selecting that line item would give me the ability to select the specific version I want. As it is now - I don't know if those versions are identical, but given the sluggish display, I'm not eager to select each in turn to find out.

c) You cannot filter a search by category. Those search results you see above? You will get them if you search "fred anderson" at the root of the bookstore, in US History, in Asian History or presumably anywhere else. Having drilled down to the the category I'm interested in, the search will include items I've already told B&N I don't want.

3. Bookmarks are cumbersome and unintuitively labeled. I'm reading Tony Horwitz's A Voyage Long and Strange. Like most history books - there are maps that you like to refer back to as you go through the text. In a printed book, this is easy - you leave a finger on that page and flip back and forth. With an eReader - you need to bookmark the page.

So, I'm on page 239 where the book shows a map of De Soto's 1540 route through Alabama and Georgia.

I select Bookmarks>Add Bookmark

So far so good. But here's the label that's added to my bookmark list:

17,OPS/xhtml/part02chapter09.html#point(/1/4/38/3)

Seriously. That's the label of the bookmark I just created.

If I create more than a few bookmarks, I'll forget which is which and the automatically generated label is absolutely no help.

Here's what a useful bookmark label could have been

Page 239 "...(Image)..."

If the ePub had bothered to put something like an ALT tag, you could expand that to

Page 239 "De Soto's route (2 of 3)"

That would be useful. Not some URL gobbletygook.

The good news is that these are all solvable issues that don't require physical changes to the device. firmware upgrades and database refinements can correct them without the user having to be part of the solution.

But they need to be fixed.

No, You Haven't Paid Us Back

Not that you'd know it from the current meme push of "Wall Street has paid us back with interest."

Slate does us a solid and points out other federal payouts are still outstanding.

ZeroHedge put together a chart for the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program back in 2008, showing outstanding federal loans to everybody's favorite free market capitalists.

See any names you recognize?

(Amounts are in thousands).

These are low interest loans by the government to corporations to get them through a rough patch. The missing piece is what this chart looks like now. I'd be very impressed if Citi, BoA or Goldman have paid in full as of today.

Somehow I think they've been putting the money to other uses.

Then there was the Home Affordable Modification Program, where according to Slate's Daniel Gross:

...the government writes checks to lenders who made reckless loans so that they can modify them and keep people in their homes. Funds issued under the HAMP are not expected to be paid back.

Wells Fargo's gotten over $3 billion under that program, CitiMortgage (of CitiGroup) just over $2 billion, and BoA's subsidiary CountryWide tops the list with a revised cap of over $6 billion.

That money by design, is never coming back.

CJR's Ryan Chittum points out the missing part of the public dialog about banks:

I’d like to see from the press is a full accounting (as much as is possible) of the total direct and indirect subsidies the banks have received from taxpayers. Let’s see those numbers.

Yes, lets. Bloomberg? ProPublica? Anybody?

What's was the tab and where are we really at now?

Aerial Views of Haiti

(Via Danger Room)

National Cathedral in Port-au-Prince

Presidential Palace in Port-au-Prince

The AIG Deal Keeps Smelling Worse

(Via CJR and RealClearMarkets)

The Goldman Sachs-AIG scandal may be worse than we think. Former New York Fed President and current Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is being castigated for paying off AIG's counterparties - Goldman foremost among them - 100 cents on the dollar and then keeping these payments secret. But it seems likely that Goldman actually got much more than 100%. What is worse, Goldman may have received this windfall by trading on information that was deliberately withheld from the public.

The short version of the story is that Goldman Sachs had a 2.5 billion dollar I.O.U. from A.I.G. Being careful trading types, they had bought insurance (via a Credit Default Swap) on this I.O.U. with other banks - meaning Goldman pays these other banks so that if A.I.G. went under, the other banks would pay Goldman 2.5 billion dollars.

James Keller is saying that when the government announced it's A.I.G. loan - it was giving off all the signals that A.I.G. was going to be liquidated. And liquidation = default on Goldman's I.O.U.

In that scenario, A.I.G. can't pay - so the other banks will cough up $2.5 billion to Goldman.

But Keller alleges that Goldman was part of a very select circle that knew that the government wasn't going to liquidate AIG. In that scenario, the Government props up A.I.G., so A.I.G. pays Goldman $2.5 billion of taxpayer money.

But here's the bonus round:

Goldman is paying for insurance on that $2.5 billion - this is money that Goldman now knows is wasted. They cannot collect on the CDS "insurance policy" because the A.I.G. is going to survive.

But the rest of the world thinks A.I.G. is going to default, so the market for CDS insurance against AIG is skyrockting. The prevailing wisdom is (if you can get somebody dumb enough to sell you their swap) is that you would make a few payments, A.I.G. would go under, and you'd get paid the full value of the swap.

In this market, (again, according to Keller) Goldman offers to sell their $2.5 billion dollar swap at a whopping markup. They don't tell their prospective buyers what they know (that the CDS "policy" is worthless), they just charge as much as they can and sell.

Keller's estimating that the CDS rates for AIG between September 2008 and March 2009 (when Goldman sold their protection) would net Goldman another $1.5 billion dollars.

So, not only are Goldman getting federal dollars directly - not only are they getting their A.I.G. bets covered to the tune of 100 cents on the dollar by taxpayers, but they are using their inside access to federal officials to pull another $1.5 billion out of customers, without disclosing what they know.

That Goldman works for itself is no surprise, but the extent to which Treasury works for Goldman is just mind-boggling.

Lies His Teacher Told Him

(H/t to Bad Astronomy)

I wish I had a professor in college that was as unbelievably brilliant as the one Kai Peter Chang had:

“Now I know some of you have already heard of me, but for the benefit of those who are unfamiliar, let me explain how I teach. Between today until the class right before finals, it is my intention to work into each of my lectures … one lie. Your job, as students, among other things, is to try and catch me in the Lie of the Day.”

...

This was an insidiously brilliant technique to focus our attention – by offering an open invitation for students to challenge his statements, he transmitted lessons that lasted far beyond the immediate subject matter and taught us to constantly check new statements and claims with what we already accept as fact.

But the technique only gets better as it goes on, read the whole post from Zen Moments.

Speed to Market vs. End User Needs: Homeland Security Edition

(Via Good Experience)

I remember Sen. Trent Lott once crowing about bringing federal dollars to a Mississippi military base. With the money, the military would be able to build two new buildings and Sen. Lott was there for the ribbon cutting.

I remember wondering what the buildings were for. And none of the news accounts went into a lot of detail. I assumed it was something classified or at least for general consuption. Mississippi has communications units on the coast - and it doesn't take a lot for that kind of gear to be something that is kept out of press releases.

The truth was considerably less impressive. The military had no idea what to do with the buildings. They hadn't asked for them, they didn't want them - but an act of congress had ordered them to build two buildings. The order was duly followed and the base was going to relocate some operations there to keep the buildings occupied and maintained - but they had no pressing need for additional structures.

Nobody had asked them, and yet a few million dollars of taxpayer money went into unnecessary buildings. Then the base had to absorb the additional cost of maintaining them.

If the military had been asked, they would have told congress to spend the money somewhere else. In fact, the military would likely have told congress to close the base in question - or at least dramatically scale back its function.

But Sen. Lott and congress knew better.

60 Minutes tops this story in spades with a discussion of how the US/Mexican border is supposedly being secured with an "electronic fence." Some brainiac had the idea that existing security equipment could be mounted in the desert and still be reliable.

It can't.

They also had the great idea that border agents could carry laptops around and connect to border surveillance feeds via cellular modem.

But the border is 1,200 miles long and doesn't get good cellular reception. Not only that, but the border agents have pointed out that operating laptops in hot cars in the dusty desert ensures that equipment will fail and fail often.

The parallels to I/S development are classic. The vendor (Boeing) promised that it could meet the specifications and the timeline easily.

Then their assumptions about their system were proven horribly wrong. Then their initial 28 mile setup was delayed by years. Then the costs went up.

It's too much of a simplification to say that end user research would have solved the current mess, but when the man in charge of the project is saying they should have done iterations and refined it based on what they learned.

But the client wanted it fast - so they've lost billions and years.

Go figure.

Ukelele Smile

So this morning - I'm in a foul mood. I was working yesterday until 9pm. I'm up to my eyes in work, having been utterly screwed by my Outlook refusing to send my email for two days - meaning half my clients think I've skipped out on them

- and I'm about halfway to a migrane.

Enter my team leader.

They plop down their iPhone on my desk and say they are going to YouTube bomb me.

*incoming bomb whistle*



The song he's singing is Jason Mraz's, I'm Yours. Say what you like, the boy's got stage presence.

(Yeah, I know - it's ridiculous, but this morning I needed a grin... and I suspect other people out there do, too.)

Road Trip, Congo = Bad Idea

(Via the BBC)

File under WTF: Togo's World Cup team endured 20 minutes of machine gun fire shortly after entering the Republic of the Congo.

Gunmen have fired on a bus carrying Togo's football team to the Africa Cup of Nations in Angola, wounding players and reportedly killing the driver.

The attackers machine-gunned the vehicle in Angola's oil-rich territory of Cabinda, where rebels have been fighting for independence.

The main rebel group, the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (Flec), said it carried out the attack.

The government called the incident an "act of terrorism".

There are reports of serious injuries.

Togo is due to play its first cup game in Cabinda on Monday.

Manchester City striker Emmanuel Adebayor was on the bus but is unhurt. In a statement, Manchester City said Adebayor had been "shaken by the terrible events" but was "unharmed".

Togo is reportedly not going to go ahead with their scheduled match.

I'm not sure who had the bright idea to drive to Angola, but I'm betting they're buying plane tickets next time.

Ye Gods.

The Dow You Thought You Knew

(Via CJR)

Here's a great parallax:

That's the Dow Jones Average adjusted for inflation.

Audit Reader Edwin Hamilton also notes that the Dow has performed miserably over long investment horizons. He calculates that a dollar invested in the stock market in January of 1966 was worth—you guessed it—a dollar in real terms in September of 1995. Worse, that dollar invested in 1966 was worth only about 33 cents in real terms if you happened to cash out in October 1982, just before the great bull market began.

Of course, that (like the WSJ’s 1929 to 2009 number) is measuring from a peak to a trough, which isn’t exactly fair. But even if you measure from the very nadir of the Depression-era Dow, which hit 651 in 1932 (in 2009 dollars. The nominal number was 41.22), you still end up with a real annual return of just 3.7 percent over the last seventy-seven years. You’re not going to get rich on those kind of returns.

Yow.

AIG, OMFG (yet again)

(Via CJR)

This time, it's the Fed.

They redact references in a public filing to conceal AIG's payment to big banks like Goldmann Sachs and SG.

Then they (apparently) got AIG to slowroll their disclosures to the SEC.

And it gets worse.

1,100% Interest

Seriously. From a New Mexico payday loan company.

Maybe We Do Want To Be Like Iceland...

(Via the BBC)

Iceland's president has refused to sign a controversial bill to repay $5bn (£3.1bn) to the UK and the Netherlands.

President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson said he would instead hold a referendum on the bill, following public protests.

The legislation was designed to compensate governments forced to bail out their savers with Icesave accounts following Iceland's banking crisis.

Landsbanki, which ran the Icesave accounts, collapsed and was nationalised in 2008.

Legislation to repay the money was approved by Iceland's parliament in December, but the approval of the president is also required before it can be passed into law.

...

On Saturday, the president received a petition calling for the bill to be vetoed, signed by almost a quarter of the country's population.

Campaigners against the bill say that the Icelandic public are being forced to pay for the mistakes of banks.

Witness the idiocy of John R. Guardiano

In a brilliantly stupid post, TAS contributor John Guardiano trots out the GOP's greatest hits on the subject of terrorism:

• Has the Obama administration's ban on enhanced interrogations, and its pledge to investigate and prosecute past enhanced interrogations, resulted in lax counterterrorism efforts, which might otherwise have prevented Abdulmutallab from boarding the plane?

• Did the Obama administration opt to cede Abdulmutallab to the courts and his ACLU-loving lawyers vice interrogating him about his terrorist connections and knowledge?

• How much actionable intelligence was lost -- and how many terror plots might have been averted -- because the Obama administration opted to treat the Christmas Day terrorist attack as a law enforcement matter rather than an incident of war?

• Does the Obama administration truly recognize that America is at war with al-Qaeda and the terror masters; or does it still view terrorism as an issue best delegated to the courts and the criminal justice system?

Yes, those are deep and probing questions - let's dive into them a bit.

The ban on torture - has it led to lax counterterrorism efforts? I don't know - but neither does Guardiano. He offers nothing in support of this question, he just waves it around in the hopes his readers will uncritically accept his speculation as fact.

Think of the breadth of information you would need to even begin supporting that hypothesis - and then recall that torture has been repudiated by professional interrogators many, many times as ineffective - even counter productive.

This is my favorite though:

How much actionable intelligence was lost -- and how many terror plots might have been averted -- because the Obama administration opted to treat the Christmas Day terrorist attack as a law enforcement matter rather than an incident of war?

Exactly how does one treat the underwear bomber as an act of war? Invade Nigeria? The idea that we cannot use our criminal justice system to dispose of this man has been so thoroughly debunked you wonder if Guardiano spent the last week living under a rock.

Or that we somehow lost intelligence because AbdulMutallab is in the custody of civilian courts instead of the military. Is there any doubt that the man will be interrogated while in custody? More importantly, Is there any liklihood that Al Qaeda in the Arabian Penninsula entrusted this man with their deepest secrets? We're talking about a young man depressed enough to literally blow his balls off.

Yes, Abdul, we should tell this one everything. Give him Usama's home number. What could it hurt?

Please.

"Does the Obama administration truly recognize that America is at war with al-Qaeda and the terror masters?"

Yes, I believe they do. Not only do they know there's a war going on, they know where it is happening better than the previous administration did.

The C.I.A. has launched 53 [Predator] strikes in Obama’s first year in office, more than during Bush’s entire presidency, according to data compiled by Peter Bergen and Katherine Tiedemann at the New America Foundation. In part, that strategy owes to increasingly precise technology that has made it easier in the last couple of years to hit a desired target with fewer civilian casualties. And in part, it underscores the ability to redirect resources away from Iraq now that the war has subsided there; when the Obama administration came into office, it learned that dozens of drones were devoted to operations in Iraq and Afghanistan but just five or six in the tribal areas of Pakistan where Al Qaeda’s leadership is mainly holed up, according to officials who declined to be identified discussing a classified program. Obama has authorized doubling the number of drones in the Pakistani border area, as well as increasing the presence over Yemen and Somalia, officials said.

You can doubt the efficacy of such strikes - or the moral costs incurred by them - but their intent is plain. We are now trying very hard to kill high value targets along the Afghanistan and Pakistan border.

The idea that we cannot simultaneously pursue war on a battlefield and prosecute crime as crime is one of those ideas that seem to incubate only in morons.

I have an inconvenient question for Guardiano: Do you really believe what you are saying? or are you just saying what your audience will buy?"