Summer and Autumn Duck

With the exception of my Nobel entry here, it's been a long time since I mentioned my posts at the international relations (IR) group blog, Duck of Minerva.

Tuesday, November 10, I posted "Syria updates," which focused on news about the alleged Israeli bombing of a Syrian nuclear facility in September 2007.

October 29, I blogged "Nuclear news" about Obama administration changes in U.S. nuclear declaratory policy -- and in planned arms deployments.

September 23, I posted "The legitimacy of America's wars," comparing the status of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

September 15, you can find "Reading Fareed," which is my take on Fareed Zakaria's latest book The Post-American World. 

My August 17 post was about "The IR Analogy." Viewed from the perspective of international politics, American domestic politics is topsy-turvy -- placing vast power in the hands of small states and minimizing the importance of large affluent states with big populations. 

August 4, I posted a video highlighting the end of the Bush era -- "Better When French."

"Desertification between the rivers" was the topic of my July 30 post. It concerns an ecological crisis Iraq faces.

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Climate updates: fall edition

This personal blog has not been updated for a week, but that doesn't mean I have abandoned the blogosphere. These are the most recent entries on my Climate Politics: IR and the Environment blog hosted at e-IR. The last update covered late summer.


Brazil

November 16, 2009
Will a new climate agreement require developing countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (ghgs)? Will developing states agree to make reductions? In this post, let’s consider the prospects for Brazil agreeing to such reductions.

First however, keep in mind the history. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, signed at the Rio Earth Summit in 199…Read more

Interim Deal?
November 13, 2009
The Copenhagen climate summit is now less than one month away and observers are not optimistic that states will agree to a deal cementing either specific greenhouse gas emission reductions or increased environmental assistance to the developing world so they can meet the standards without threatening growth vital to fighting poverty.

Last month, Danish Prime Minister Lars Lo…Read more

Hidden costs of the status quo
November 1, 2009
In late October, the United States National Academy of Sciences released an interesting on-line “prepublication” edition of a report called Hidden Costs of Energy: Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use. The October 19 New York Times reported the key finding on the costs of air pollution from burning fossil fuels:

Burning fossil fuels costs the Unite…Read more

Copenhagen: Will a deal emerge?
October 24, 2009
This past week, the news related to the ongoing climate negotiations was quite confusing. On Monday the 19th of October, the BBC reported optimistically:

“It’s an uphill battle, but I just feel today it’s more do-able than (I did) yesterday,” Mr Miliband [UK climate secretary] told journalists in a briefing directly after the MEF meeting closed on Mon…Read more

ICE
October 15, 2009
Do you remember when I mentioned “Greenfinger” on this blog a couple of months ago? Greenfinger would be a rich master environmental criminal — perhaps pursuing climate geoengineering without international approval.

In the October Atlantic Monthly, representatives of the ICE Coalition wrote to the editors to offer a legal solution to the potential Green…Read more

Washington’s 2-level-game
October 6, 2009
This past weekend, Carol Browner, Director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy proclaimed that the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade climate bill (which passed the House this summer) is not going to become law prior to the upcoming climate negotiations. The NYT :

“Obviously, we’d like to be through the process,” Carol Browner said durin…Read more

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Senators against (Political) Science

Yesterday, the United States Senate voted down the so-called "Coburn amendment," which would have eliminated National Science Foundation support for research in the field of Political Science. Actually, I'm being polite. The resolution offered by the Republican from Oklahoma used this wording:

"Coburn Amendment 2631 – Prohibits the National Science Foundation from wasting federal research funding on political science projects."

Tough stuff.

The Senate defeated this amendment 62-36.

Locally, citizens are represented by Senators who side with Coburn. Mitch McConnell (a Political Science graduate of my Department) voted Yea, as did Jim Bunning and Indiana's Dick Lugar and Evan Bayh. All of those Senators are Republicans, except for Bayh.

John McCain, who is about to make an appearance at University of Louisville, voted with the losers to kill NSF funding to Political Science. Perhaps someone in the packed house can ask him about his vote.

On October 19, the President of the American Political Science Association, Henry E. Brady, outlined his organization's case against the Coburn amendment:

Senator Coburn’s amendment stems from a mistaken belief that political science research is neither scientific nor contributes to the well-being of our nation and its citizens. Science does not come in degrees; it is not logically possible for one science to be “truer” than another. Political science is a “science” because like all the sciences its research methods are based on testable hypotheses and evidence collected according to well-tested criteria that are subject to peer review and verification. The National Science Foundation has led the way in ensuring careful peer review and in applying the highest scholarly standards to all areas of research, including political science.

Political science funding at the National Science Foundation is a remarkably modest amount of funds – just some $9 million. It generates transformative results vastly beyond this small investment. Basic political science research funded by the National Science Foundation has contributed to the nation in myriad ways. Just last week, Dr. Elinor Ostrom, a political scientist at Indiana University, was awarded a Nobel Prize for research funded by the National Science Foundation. She found that collective use problems such as the overuse of shared resources and the degradation of water quality can be effectively handled by local communities rather than by relying exclusively on the central government.

Similarly, 13 of the 17 National Science Foundation and Department of Defense co-supported projects requested by Secretary Gates that examine threats to U.S. interests in the world and identify effective responses, are being carried out by political scientists.

The U.S. National Election Study, also supported by the National Science Foundation’s political science program, has operated since 1948 and is the only reliable, sustained source of information about Americans’ participation in their own political system. The National Election Study has provided assistance to government agencies including the Department of Homeland Security and the Elections Assistance Commission. Pollsters of all political persuasions have supported the ANES over the years because it provides the only reliable baseline for long-term trends and for innovative thinking about how to measure political participation and involvement.

Other political science research is helping federal, state, and local authorities charged with developing effective evacuation plans understand decisions that citizens make in response to natural disasters.

Still other research has helped identify the causes of ethnic strife and civil wars, the impacts of different electoral institutions around the world, and the causes of international disagreements and wars.

Disclosure: I'm a member of the APSA -- and have participated in selection processes and events pertaining to the McConnell Center.


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College Athletic Costs: Louisville

The University if California at Berkeley, like many other universities, is facing a severe budget crisis. With a $150 million shortfall, the school has cut faculty salaries, closed the Library on Saturdays, and reduced course offerings.

Some members of the University's progressive faculty want to take another tough step -- cut spending on Athletics:

"With dozens and dozens of cuts to its academic programs, is it not obvious that UC Berkeley must cease putting millions into a program which isn't part of the core academic mission and is supposed to be self-supporting? It's just a matter of priorities," said Brian Barsky, a computer science professor who has been leading the "Academics First" camp.

He's among eight professors who will present a resolution tonight urging Chancellor Robert Birgeneau to stop campus subsidies immediately, or as soon as contractually possible.

Cal is currently slated to transfer nearly $14 million total to Athletics over the next two years.

That got me thinking about budget shortfalls at University of Louisville -- and potential cash transfers from the school to sports. The most recent Athletic Association Financial Statement is from 2008:

The University, during its annual budgetary process, agrees to transfer funds to the Association to assist with expense related to retention and gender issues. The University transferred $2.1 million and $1.8 million for the fiscal years ended June 30, 2008 and 2007. Additionally, the University collects certain fees from students designated for use by the Association. The University transferred $1.9 million of student fees collected for each of the years ended June 30, 3008 [sic] and 2007.

In 2008, it appears as if the University gave Athletics $4 million. A USA Today story from February 2004 reported that the University had imposed a tuition increase to provide $3 million to Athletics at the time, so the higher figure sounds about right.

Athletic supporters might note the "retention and gender" benefits the University is allegedly getting from half the money, but my guess is that UofL could get a lot more bang in those areas with bucks spent elsewhere. Also, the Athletic Department is mandated by law to produce gender equity -- and pressured by the NCAA to care about retention and graduation rates. They have to be paid to meet the standards?

I'm a fan of college sports, but I do not think the University should be paying millions of dollars to Athletics in a time of budget crisis. Basketball coach Rick Pitino makes $2.25 million annually. Reportedly, his salary will retroactively become $2.5 million/season if he stays until the end of his contract in 2013.

The University has an enrollment of about 21,000 students. Each and every one of them pays about $90 in annual tuition and fees to Rick Pitino and the rest of the Athletic Department every year. That accounts for $1.9 million of UofL spending.

As for the other $2.1 million, faculty have not seen a salary increase in more than two years. If the University had used that money to raise faculty salaries, each of the roughly 1000 full-time tenured or tenure track faculty would have $2100 higher income this year, less taxes and benefits.

During that two-year period, Coach Pitino received a $600,000 annual raise.

I realize that Pitino is a family man with five children, and he led the men's basketball team to a great season and top seed in the NCAA hoops tournament, but football coach Steve Kragthorpe is making a $1.1 million base during a third consecutive mediocre (or worse) season.


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Arts at the White House

Check out Lin-Manuel Miranda's take on Alexander Hamilton (an important figure in American foreign policy too):

The Obamas were certainly entertained.



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Top-ranked Kansas

The pre-season college basketball polls agree that the Kansas Jayhawks are this year's team-to-beat for the national championship. The team is ranked #1 by both AP and ESPN/USA Today. It appears as if Kansas received 55 of 65 first-place votes in AP and 27 of 31 in the ESPN/USAT poll. I'm really looking forward to watching preseason All-Americans C Cole Aldrich and G Sherron Collins, as well as the rest of the team.

Michigan State and Texas are #2 and #3, respectively, in both polls. AP has Kentucky and Villanova rounding out the top 5, while the other poll has North Carolina and Kentucky. UNC is 6th in AP, Villanova is 6th in ESPN/USAT. Purdue is 7th in both polls, followed by West Virginia (8/9) and Duke (9/8), then Tennessee (10/11) and Butler (11/10).

Louisville is ranked 19th by AP and 23 by ESPN/USAT.

Maryland is 26th if both polls.

Rock chalk!!


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Coal state environmentalism

The University of Kentucky just approved construction of the second LEED-certified building on the Lexington campus. LEED means Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. The certification is designed to promote sustainable building and development. University of Louisville apparently has two such buildings completed and is working on more.

Guess what UK is going to name its new building? If you guessed "Wildcat Coal Lodge," then award yourself 10 bonus points for today.

The Board vote was 16-3. The negative votes came from faculty, staff, and student representatives -- the people who mostly work on campus.

The new construction project is a $7 million building designed to house the UK basketball program, which is a fairly high profile institution in this state.


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I need a new agent

Consider this a very special edition of UofL Today.

Lexington Herald-Leader, October 17, 2009:

The University of Louisville Foundation paid U of L President James R. Ramsey $1.9 million in 2007 to compensate him for state retirement benefits he forfeited, according to the foundation's most recent filing with the IRS.

Ramsey, who became president of Kentucky's second largest public university in 2002, had spent 17 years working for state government, including serving as state budget director under former Gov. Paul Patton between 1999 and 2002. While working for the state, he accrued time in the Kentucky Retirement System.

But because he left the state job without the necessary number of years of service to be fully vested, the U of L trustees inserted a provision in Ramsey's contract calling for him to be compensated for the retirement benefits he left on the table when he took the U of L job.

The foundation, which manages the university's private donations and endowment funds, paid Ramsey a $1,935,299 lump sum in 2007, the year he would have been eligible to retire with full state benefits, said Robert Gunnell, senior partner with Peritus Public Relations who serves as spokesman for the U of L Foundation.

"That was the amount that an actuarial firm calculated to make President Ramsey whole in his retirement account," Gunnell said.

Until today, most faculty and staff that I know hadn't heard about this.


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Guns?

Today, I received the following message in my email. The company name and phone number has been deleted:

[Deleted] Indoor Range would like to invite you to attend a free Handgun Familiarization Class on Sunday, November 8th, at 2:00 pm. This free information & training session is reserved for professors and administrators of local universities & colleges. The purpose of this event is to allow professors & administrators who have little or no experience with handguns to learn the basics about handguns and experience shooting them.

The session will be free, but limited to the first 20 professors or administrators to sign up. Those wishing to attend this event must reserve a seat by contacting [Deleted] Indoor Range (502-deleted). The event will consist of a 2-hour classroom session covering the below topics. The instructor will also take questions throughout the event. Following the classroom session, attendees will be invited to shoot on the range. Instructors will be available to assist those shooting. Everything needed to shoot (gun, ammunition, eye & ear protection, targets, etc.) will be provided.

Schedule for College Day:
Classroom Session 2-4 pm
Handgun safety
Ammunition
Types of handguns (revolvers & semi-automatics)
How to load & unload
How to shoot
Options to secure (lock up) a handgun
Concealed Carry (CDWL procedure)

Range Session 4-5 pm
- Shooting (for those wishing to shoot)

University of Louisville bans firearms on campus -- though local politicians recently tried to tweak the law by allowing guns in cars.

Personally, I'd ban all handguns.

I wonder if any of my colleagues accept this offer?


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Back in the USSR

Saturday night, my daughter unexpectedly invited me to join her for the Louisville Orchestra's performance of Haydn's Symphony No. 82 and Shostakovitch's Tenth Symphony.

Predictably, the Haydn literally put me to sleep. In my family, I'm notorious for dozing off at various choral, orchestral, or operatic events. Haydn was like a lullaby to me.

The Shostakovitch piece, however, was terrific and I didn't miss a note.

Conductor Daniel Hege introduced the piece by telling the audience about the composer's personal history -- and about the four movements to come. He described a classic struggle between an artist and a brutal regime and made the audience eager to hear the artist's personal description of the tale.

My ears heard a resounding critique of the Soviet state -- emphasizing the brutality and illegitimacy of Stalin's rule, the composer's personal misery under that state, and the (somewhat tentative, but hopeful) elation at Stalin's death. It's hard to imagine that anyone in the west listening to this piece during the cold war ever doubted the inevitable demise of the Soviet state.

A couple of weeks ago I watched the far more popular Dr. Zhivago, which addressed some similar themes. Shostakovich's 10th symphony, however, told the tale much more efficiently -- and effectively, to my mind.


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The Ecological Costs of Low Prices

This is from Jefferson Decker's review of Nelson Lichtenstein's The Retail Revolution: How Wal-Mart Created a Brave New World of Business in The Nation on October 5:

Today, Wal-Mart's world buying headquarters is in Shenzhen, a bustling industrial city along the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong Province. In 1979 the Chinese government designated Shenzhen a "special economic zone" with low corporate taxes and few environmental regulations. Guangdong now produces a third of China's exports, 10 percent of which end up on a Wal-Mart shelf somewhere in the United States.

While I've previously mentioned the large economic bond between Wal-Mart and China, the numbers still surprise me.

This particular quote emphasizes the way that Wal-Mart, like many other businesses, manages to evade environmental standards imposed in the United States (and in other affluent western nations).

Shenzhen is a very large city these days, with over 10 million residents. The people there are relatively wealthy as the per capita GDP exceeds US $8500 -- one fruit of 20% growth rates for 20 years.

However, the UNEP's 2007 report Shenzhen Environment Outlook emphasized the growing environmental burden of unsustainable development. Under the "business as usual" model, which the report calls "Scenario A," disaster looms in the next two decades (p. 157 of Chapter V):

In a short term, the economy will retain a fast growth pace but in a long run the resources and energy can hardly meet the demand of the influx of population and surging industrial development, and water and land resources are in tight supply. Massive sea filling projects have great impacts on coastal ecology and urban expansion has reached the extremity. Pollutant discharge is more than doubled and serious pollution is threatening urban ecology. As the impact of resource depletion and environmental destruction loom large, the economy falls into recession after experiencing fast speed development. Various contradictions emerge as a result. In a word, Scenario A presents a picture of a deteriorating society.

This is a very high cost of "Always Low Prices."


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Baseball wrapup

I really enjoyed the Tigers-Twins game Tuesday that reflected a prolonged regular season. My sympathy goes out to the Detroit fans among my group of friends. I've also seen long stretches of several post-season games and many of those have been fairly exciting too.

As a Royals fan, however, this was a difficult and somewhat depressing year. The team was very bad and the post-season is populated by long-time rivals -- including the cross-state Cardinals ('85 World Series foe), Phillies ('80 World Series opponents), Yankees (ALCS opponent in '76-'77-'78-'80), and former AL West competitors Twins and Angels. People from Kansas grow up predisposed to dislike teams from NY and LA (Dodgers), meaning that my post-season choices are basically the Rockies (the AA farm team is now in Tulsa, near where I completed high school; at that time, Tulsa was a Ranger farm team) or Red Sox (who were briefly my home team in 2005, but are already down 0-2 in their first round divisional series). Ugh.

What can be salvaged from this baseball season? On September 26, the KC Star had this nugget about my team's young power-hitting first baseman:

Billy Butler became just the seventh major-leaguer to hit 50 doubles in a season before turning 24....

Player Season, team Age HR RBI Avg. OBP SLG 2B Hank Greenberg 1934 Tigers 23 26 139 .339 .404 .600 63 Alex Rodriguez 1996 Mariners 20 36 123 .358 .414 .631 54 Enos Slaughter 1939 Cardinals 23 12 86 .320 .371 .482 52 Albert Pujols 2003 Cardinals 23 43 124 .359 .439 .667 51 Stan Musial 1944 Cardinals 23 12 94 .347 .440 .549 51 Miguel Cabrera 2006 Marlins 23 26 114 .339 .430 .568 50 Billy Butler 2009 Royals 23 21 93 .301 .362 .492 51

Grady Sizemore also hit 50 doubles in 2006, but he turned 24 midseason (August 2) that year. Also, I edited Butler's totals to reflect his final seasonal numbers.

Greenberg, Slaughter and Musial are in the Hall of Fame, A-Rod and Pujols seem destined for Cooperstown, and Cabrera is off to a very good start.

Basketball practice starts next week.


Hat tip: I'm fairly certain that Brian Wood's post, which brought Butler's historic accomplishment to my attention, can only be viewed by SABR-L members.


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Nobel

Yesterday, at Duck of Minerva, I blogged "Peace Prize" about Barack Obama winning the Nobel award. I noted my surprise since nearly all of his many peace and disarmament initiatives remain in the discussion or implementation stages. At this point, I argued, he has generated far more hope than change and the gap between them is wide.

As I thought more about it through the day, and talked to friends and colleagues, I became convinced that the Nobel committee decided to reward certain norms of behavior and process that they must think promote peace. Obama the Non-Bush has obviously changed the way the US behaves in world politics and altered the image of the US.

As a Habermasian, I can certainly appreciate the decision to reward procedural norms. However, it still feels like a form of recognition that could have waited another year or two. Most Bush critics hoped for new results as well as new processes.


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Sustainability Report Card 2009

Many local administrators are pleased that the Sustainable Endowments Institute has awarded the University of Louisville a grade of B+ in its 2009 report card.

The University has improved its grade for four straight years. In 2007, for example, I noted the C+ that the school was awarded.

In the intervening years, the university has created a Sustainability Council (I'm a member), completed a greenhouse gas audit, participated in the preparation of a climate action plan, committed to reducing emissions via that plan, etc.

This is real progress, but there's still a long way to go.


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Real Food Challenge

This year, I'm heading up the Arts & Sciences "Green Team," which has mostly focused on energy conservation issues in the two previous academic years. Last week, however, I had a conversation with a colleague who emphasized the importance of buying (and eating) locally-grown food. We had just concluded a meeting that featured delicious food grown and prepared locally.

Later that same evening, I read Anna Lappé's piece in September 21 issue of The Nation on student efforts on campuses nationwide to change food purchasing for their dining halls. The campaign is called the Real Food Challenge. Lappé:

The concept is simple, really. Students, some who pay as much as $100,000, or more, for four years at a private college, should have a say in what grub their schools serve--and that food should reflect shared values of fairness and sustainability. The Real Food Challenge provides an organizing tool to empower students to persuade their schools to make the move. Schools that join the challenge pledge to shift at least 20 percent of school food to "real food"--sustainably raised, grown with fairness, and from local and regional farms--by 2020.

Unfortunately, Louisville doesn't have dining halls in dorms. Instead, students purchase food from vendors based in locations scattered throughout the campus.

Most are chains: Papa Johns, Wendy's, Subway, Einstein Bagels, etc.

Apparently, hundreds of schools have embraced the challenge. I'd like to see University of Louisville and other schools in the region meet the standard.


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