The Yin and the Yang

So what's the problem with having TOO much access to anecdotal evidence? Easy...everyone can prove their point so convincingly, there is little need to compromise or seek the middle ground. Here's a look at the Yin and Yang of Fallujah:

From Al-Jazeera, an unsurprising Yin:

But it was not just the scale of destruction that angered citizens. They were also unhappy about rules imposed before being allowed to enter their city and the almost total media black-out on their situation, journalists said.

Most complained of US soldiers pointing their weapons at them even in the simplest of situations, while others asked why they had been prevented from putting front doors back on to their homes.

"And everyone was demanding that US forces withdraw immediately, allow media teams into the city to document the destruction, compensate citizens for the loss of their homes, and help in reconstruction of the city," the programme reported.

[...]

One of the causes of major complaint were stringent and intrusive security measures.

US forces stationed around the city have to issue ID cards to those they allow back in, a document that has to be carried at all times.

[...]

Imperial behaviour

He points out that US troops, deployed in the Middle East for more than 62 years, have to recognise that their nation - that was once celebrated as a non-colonial power - has joined the imperial club, as Iraq's invasion and Falluja's destruction demonstrates.

"Things have changed fundamentally for the worse with the invasion and occupation of Iraq, particularly with the revelation that the core pretexts offered by the administration for the invasion were false.

"And particularly with growing Iraqi dissatisfaction with the occupation and with the images of the hellish chaos broadcast regularly everywhere in the world except in the United States - thanks to the excellent job done by the media in keeping the real human costs of Iraq off our television screens."

The Columbia professor concludes that the White House has proclaimed good intentions while refusing to acknowledge that Iraqis can only judge by what they see in places such as Falluja.

"It does not matter what you say you are doing in Falluja, what matters is what you are doing in Falluja - and what people see that you are doing."

And from the CS Monitor, an unexpected Yang:

Amid the ruins of Fallujah, white flags are emerging - alerting US and Iraqi forces to the presence of Iraqi families moving back home, clearing the rubble, and trying to renew hope.

Residents say that the insurgents who made the city a virtual no-go zone are gone. They were violently cut out of this former stronghold by US forces during a monthlong battle in November - the toughest urban combat for US forces since Vietnam - that pulverized this city of some 300,000.

[...]

An unexpected measure of success came on election day last week. Nearly 8,000 people here defied insurgent threats and voted, according to US military officials. That figure accounts for 44 percent of all votes cast in Anbar Province, which includes the Sunni triangle, where antielection feeling was so strong that less than 7 percent voted at all.

New sense of security

Iraqis say the result shows how secure Fallujahns are beginning to feel, and note with added surprise that more than a few said their ballot was for Iyad Allawi, the US-backed interim prime minister who ordered the Fallujah invasion.

"It's better that the Americans are here," says Abdulrahab Abdulrahman, a teacher who carries a folder containing a compensation claim for the damage to his house. "I have the freedom to be a student, or whatever I want to be."

The mujahideen "are gone," he says, clearly pleased, standing on a street strewn with rubble. "They are finished."

[...]

For some in Fallujah, the rigor of the new security measures, and even the destruction of much of the city, are more bearable than the suffocation they felt when insurgents controlled the city. "My water, OK. No electricity. Sleep is good, American army is good," explains Ali Kadhem, whose three children step out of the front gate behind him, to wave to passing marines. He speaks with a smile, then holds up his hands. "Money for building? No."

I'm left to wonder where all the dedicated reporters who follow the atrocities of the insurgents are. Where have we seen a portrayal of life in Fallujah under the "mujahideen?" Where, for that matter, were the stories from Najaf when local officials were begging Coalition forces to push Sadr's gang of thugs out of town...?

Update:

Praktike's comment sent me scrambling to find this article from the New Yorker documenting Fallujah and the 'rule of the insurgents' following the end of the April '04 seige. Interesting article...but what I'd like to see is a more nuanced piece that gathers the stories from people who couldn't or wouldn't speak out while the insurgents were running their town. The stories provided by residents of Kabul AFTER the fall of the Taliban were a far cry from the stories one could gather by walking the streets during their reign. I'm curious if that was the case in Fallujah as well. For another example of this, look at the voter turn-out in Sadr City despite Moqtada's attempts to short-circuit the election. Once his militia's grip on the area loosened, opinions became much more diverse.

The Al-Jazeera and Monitor pieces above are both skewed toward one perspective or the other (which, of course, is why I chose 'em...). The Monitor piece shows a BIT of nuance in talking to some of the current residents who are angry with the U.S. - but I would imagine that most of the people who have been willing to move back into Fallujah since the seige (while it's still occupied by Marines) lean more toward support of the U.S. to begin with. In other words, a skewed sample to draw objective data from - as skewed as the sample offered in the New Yorker story.

Fallujah
Iraq
Media

Critical Mass

I haven't really been following the Eason Jordan case particularly closely...mostly just catching brief glimpses while perusing blogs that cover his story in the midst of others. What actually caught my attention, however, was this:

And if you want to track the thing in real time, just do the Google News search. Of note: Google news is now pulling blog posts. The first cite that came up with my search: this post at PoliPundit.

Funny world, this blogosphere. Eason Jordan, welcome to the future.

Welcome to the future indeed. Google news is pulling blog posts...? It seems like only a few days ago that LGF and Michelle Malkin were posting copies of the letters they had received from Google News poo-pooing their requests for inclusion. While I couldn't find stories from either of their sites, I DID find entries from Power Line and Polipundit. Could blogs such as these...and stories such as the Eason Jordan spin-a-thon...serve as the foot in the door? Consider also the recent addition to the "My MSN" page allowing the display of RSS feeds - yes, even Microsoft the monopoly recognizes the value in offering access to the so-called "long tail" of blogs.

And as if all that weren't enough, Ask Jeeves has purchased Bloglines:

The acquisition stems from a widening interest in Web logs, or "blogs" - a term used to describe the online journals that have morphed from mundane personal diaries into increasingly influential hubs of news and commentary.

Redwood City-based Bloglines, formed in 2003, has established itself as an important player in the field with a searchable index of nearly 285 million articles posted on blogs.

Critical mass:

1. The smallest mass of a fissionable material that will sustain a nuclear chain reaction at a constant level.
2. The amount of matter needed to generate sufficient gravitational force to halt the current expansion of the universe.
3. An amount or level needed for a specific result or new action to occur: “The sudden national uproar over drugs and drug abuse has reached politically critical mass in Washington” (Tom Morganthau).

Update:

Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine has this to say to the MSM:

And, by the way, you're no longer the gatekeeper.

: And this is about the death of off-the-record at any event citizens attend. The WEF is now trying to decide whether the event was or wasn't off the record. Doesn't matter anymore, folks; that's irrelevant. The citizens in the room haven't agreed to play by your rules the way journalists have. If they hear something, they'll repeat it. If Jordan had, in fact, said that journalists were targeted as journalists by soldiers -- which he didn't; just speaking in the hypothetical here -- then how can anyone expect the citizens, the citizen journalists, the bloggers in the room to remain silent? They shouldn't.

The off-the-record gate has also fallen.

Update 2:

This article from the Financial Times (hat tip to PDF) describes the power of a connected community's complaints:

It started with a simplegripe posted on a weblog - the blogger was unhappy that his new mobile phone did not work as advertised.

It was not long before other angry bloggers chimed in with their own stories, flooding the "blogosphere" with a stream of complaints that culminated last month in a class action lawsuit against the second-largest wireless network operator in the US.

The lawsuit against Verizon Wireless - and the way it came about - highlights the challenges that weblogs pose to corporations.

Update 3:

Winds of Change discusses the editorial review role of the blogosphere:

Blogs haven't removed editorial review from the news dissemination process, they've just distributed it to whole blogosphere and its critics. The marketplace of ideas is dynamic and Hugh is right - individual bloggers gain credibility (or not) based on how they approach stories like Easongagte.

Media
Blogosphere

...but that was MY line....

Reason Online has published an article bearing a passing resemblance to one of my own from last year.

In mine, I discuss what I chose to label a "Consumer Revolution," tying together an increase in personal contributions to campaigns via the Internet with consumer efforts to spend their money on companies and products more in line with their political beliefs:

For many who believe our current political system has sharply limited individual choice at the polls, the opportunity to express political and social beliefs through consumer choice has gained considerable appeal. This quest for greater personal responsibility has been met by a combination of savvier marketing and (occasionally...) genuine social consciousness (although the two can be hard to distinguish at times...) among politicians, producers, and retailers.

[...]

This past election year, politicians from across the spectrum stumbled upon a new funding source that showed surprisingly deep pockets and little of the political backlash associated with large donations from interest groups or corporations. Instant web transactions, available for anyone with a credit card, and sharp advertising by web-savvy political campaigns created a surge in individual political contributions. Grass roots supporters, looking to back their candidate with more than a single vote, began taking advantage of the e-commerce revolution....

[...]

Outside of traditional politics, Amanda Paulson wrote of her "quest to enjoy her dinner without guilt" in the Christian Science Monitor.... She described these consumers' choices as "a market-based way of expressing" their beliefs.

[...]

The crowds of consumers willfully paying $3000 above average vehicle costs for hybrid cars such as the Toyota Prius have received much more media coverage than ethical eaters. Even with current high gasoline prices and tax credits, few of these buyers expect to recover those three thousand dollars. They are paying that price to satisfy their conscience....

[...]

In all of the above cases, one trend predominates: the free market has, ironically, often shown greater flexibility in meeting the demands of progressive-minded citizens than government action. Are you sick of watching special interest groups dominate campaign fund-raising? Fire off an Internet contribution to your favorite candidate. Do you think the minimum wage is unlivable? Shop at Costco. Are you concerned with government catering to the auto and oil industries? Buy a hybrid vehicle. While many of these choices may seem small in the grand scheme, this new breed of consumer feels strongly that Americans can best express their beliefs every day through what can best be called consumer democracy.

The Reason article takes a somewhat different approach, but arrives at a similar conclusion:

Even more unsettling than the creeping tide of political engagement, however, is the growing taste for hyper-suffrage. It's completely understandable, of course. This is the era of cultural proliferation, where every year brings a new strain of Pepsi, another NBA franchise, additional cable channels. We want more choices. We tire of our favorites quicker. When the People's Choice Awards allows us to vote for something as trivial as "Favorite Celebrity Hair" on an annual basis, does it make sense that we only get to choose our Commander-in-Chief once every four years?

Hardcore balloteers aren't waiting for Congress to correct this flaw in the system: Having spent their only opportunity to vote with their vote until 2006, they're going to vote…and vote…and vote with their pocketbooks in the interim. Thanks to sites like Choosetheblue.com and Buyblue.org, you can now determine the ideological bent of sports teams, bedsheet manufacturers, airlines, grocery stores—and "vote" accordingly....

[...]

Voting with your pocketbook is hardly a new phenomenon, of course, but in the past, the practice tended to have a narrower focus. Colonists in New England didn't like the tax on tea, so they didn't buy tea. Farm-worker supporters in the 1970s didn't like the grape-growers' resistance to unionization, so they didn't buy grapes. Certainly there's an upside to upgrading the most trivial instances of commerce to principled acts of political engagement: It's a lot more fun to splurge on a Carribean cruise or a new computer than it is to finance some professional hand-shaker's latest deployment of state-of-the-art yard signs. Even better, the FEC has no power to squelch this form of political expression—you can spend as much as you want. You also don't have to worry about voting roll purges, provisional ballot challenges, or any of the other inconveniences of modern voting. Making your voice heard is as simple as whipping out your Visa card and charging up a little democracy.

At this point, Mr. Beato and I strike somewhat divergent paths. He chooses to highlight the limitations of applying political beliefs to consumer choice by exposing the "Us or them" mentality of organizations such as Choosetheblue.com and Buyblue.org:

Extending the calcifaction of contemporary politics to commerce is a stroke of genius—if you happen to be a voluntary simplicity advocate. If we can make shopping as unsatisfying as choosing between the top two candidates in just about any election, then maybe 78 million Americans will stop going to the mall too. But even if that doesn't come to pass, you have to marvel at the irony on display here: Instead of critiquing our oppressive corporate monoculture, these grassroots activists are doing their best to turn consumer choice into a strictly binary phenomenon.

And, thus, an effort to bring political expression to commerce actually inhibits it. The marketplace doesn't just offer more opportunities to vote; it also offers more issues to vote on, and more candidates from which to choose. Every day, you can cast your ballot for the bank that has the strongest ties with the community it serves, the discount retailer that treats its employees most fairly, the Christ-centered locksmith. Not every consumer is so engaged, of course—price, service, and convenience still win most of the elections where money changes hands. But why cede the power we consumers already have to make finer distinctions than contemporary politics typically allows?

Which isn't to say that Buyblue.org and Choosetheblue.com aren't perfectly calibrated for these times. The rise of the Internet has meant the death of plausible deniability: It's nearly impossible now to insist you had no idea that, say, your favorite fast-food chain was such a terrible corporate citizen, because the evidence is never more than a click or two away. Still, who's got time for a click or two? We want to be well-informed consumers, yes, but we're also really busy. A truly useful website would track the environmental records of companies, their affirmative action policies, their stances on same-sex unions—everything, in short, that might influence your vote at the cash register. But staying informed like that would take a lot of time, which means there's a huge opportunity for infomediaries willing to dumb down the process....

I would call Mr. Beato's article a critique of top-down efforts to control what should, instead, be a bottom-up, grass-roots movement among consumers. As he says, the information to make wiser consumer choices is available to a much larger audience than ever before. Now it's just a matter of that audience seeking answers for themselves. Having visited both Buyblue and Choosetheblue, I understand the concern he expresses. Choosing to purchase a product based solely on how much money its manufacturer (or marketer) contributed to a political campaign is, indeed, turning "consumer choice into a strictly binary phenomenon."

More than imagination...?

I found myself caught up in the enthusiasm shortly after the elections in Iraq on the 30th. That sense of enthusiasm was conveyed here, bolstered by stories immediately after the election describing a stiffening among Iraqi security forces.

Today, the WaPost (via MSNBC), released this story regarding Iraqis beginning to rally to the cause of the security forces:

BAGHDAD, Feb. 6 - With a hero who gave his life for the elections, a revived national anthem blaring from car stereos and a greater willingness to help police, the public mood appears to be moving more clearly against the insurgency in Iraq, political and security officials say.

In the week since national elections, police and Iraqi National Guardsmen say that they have received more tips from the public, resulting in more arrests and greater effectiveness in their efforts to weaken the violent insurgency rocking the country.

Such increased enthusiasm (hat tip to Free Iraqi) - and greater cooperation between civilians and security forces - may be difficult to track from MSM sources, buried beneath reports of continued violence in Iraq.

Of course, anecdotal evidence (such as that listed above) provides fuel for both sides. We need to look for signs of a sea change among the general population. Gregory at the Belgravia Dispatch takes a look at this report from the NY Times:

Last week, as the euphoria of nationwide elections washed over this country, a remarkable thing happened: Iraqis, by and large, stopped talking about the Americans.

With the ballots still being counted here, the Iraqi candidates retired to the back rooms to cut political deals, leaving the Americans, for the first time, standing outside. In Baghdad's tea shops and on its street corners, the talk turned to which of those candidates might form the new government, to their schemes and stratagems, and to Iraqi problems and Iraqi solutions.

And for the United States, the assessments turned unfamiliarly measured.

More American troops are not the solution to the insurgency in Iraq. Iraqis must continue to step forward and take responsibility for their own future. If this trend continues, fence-sitting supporters of the insurgency will continue to question what they hope to accomplish. A return to dictatorship? Endless bloodshed? Continued American attacks on insurgents' infrastructure? All-out sectarian civil war (which Sunnis CANNOT win...)? If withdrawal conditions can be established by the interim government, then what does continued violence against other Iraqis accomplish?

Iraq

Making the case for national health care.

A reader responds to my entry on HSAs with a detailed discussion on the benefits of a national health care system:

I am for a national healthcare system. However, maybe not for the same reasons that most people are…. I have a very informed position, but understanding takes a lot of background in economics and the healthcare sector….

First, healthcare (HC) and Healthcare insurance (HCI) costs are not high because of greedy HCIs. Many HCIs are not-for-profit (like the Blues). They operated on margins of less than 2%. Many for profit companies are in the same boat. Many are sinking financially.

Second, HCI is a litle different than other types of insurance. Coverage is bounded by wealth/income (eg a if you can afford a $150k house you can generally afford to insure it *and you can only insure it up to its appraised value*. You cannot insure a $150k house for $300k. That is a "moral hazard".

With HCI everyone is paying the same rate, but the amount of coverage is not bounded by normal economic limits (on the upward side). Thus, rate/premium setting in HCI insurance very much is like making book or projecting finances for a casino. It's like gambling.

How do we (HCI) do this? We use statistics. Now, it's a law of statistics that precision of analysis increases with size of sample (or population). The bigger the risk pool (the set or subset of consumers in question for a HCI plan) the more precisely we can calculate our risk and the more precisely our premiums can be set to match expected benefits incurred (claims). This need for larger risk pools speaks to an advantage of a pool consisting of the entire nation, but, more immediately to other issues - specifically, market segmentation.

Any time you segment a market, say to introduce a new HCI product or to offer some experience rated premiums, you are playing with fire. Caution is advised. Market segmentation decreases the size of your risk pool; making risk harder to calculate with accuracy. Market segmentation also introduces opportunities for adverse selection problems to creep into your system.

Adverse selection involves a skewing (often unexpected) of the characteristics of those in a risk pool such that they have a tendency to cost significantly more (or less) than expected.

Example: An HCI co. wants to capture the 18 to 30 yr old market. It figures out this group is healthy and could be insured for very low cost...so the HCI co. creates a product only for that age group. The original product for all ages cost $400/month. The new youth product costs $100/month. Great! What a deal!

But what happened to the product for those 31yr and over? The premium now rises to over $700 to keep pace with claims. The older group is being priced out of the market.

**A fundemtal law of HCI is that the healthy must subsidize the sick**.

HSAs and those things will attract certain market segments like the healthy and wealthy. You get the rest. Another point in favor of, in my opinion, national health. One system fits all without market segmentation.

Though supplemental policies would be pricey because of adverse selection. Those most likely to buy the supplemental would be those most likely to use it.

Moving along the spectrum of HCI issues we arrive at information. As you have probably gathered, HCI is an intensely information driven sector. Every time HCI cos. merge there is an information crisis. It seems as though no two companies use the same database technology, nor the same informational terminology, etc. Hospitals do not either. Nor do other providers. The entire HC system is informationally fragmented.

HCI cos. do not share information, meaning HCI cos go into new market territory "blind" as to risk. This costs money. The lack of sharing also decreases the size of risk pools being analyzed. This costs money.

This state of affairs costs all stakeholders. And not just dollars, but quality as well. A national system would, presumably, have standardized IT and terminology. I see the resulting savings from this one aspect of HCI alone as being in the hundred billion $ per year range (some say much more).

Finally, I see national HCI as decreasing some of the market failure aspects of the sector (re: skewed incentives). The main reason HC costs are increasing is that consumption (utilization) is increasing. More people can be treated for more conditions (expansion on the intensive and extensive margins). This because science/medicine keeps cranking out more and newer technology.

This is a good thing to some extent. It can be bad because much of what's new does not involve marginal benefits equal to the marginal cost (the benefit is less, eg drug brand X cost ten times the amount of the old generic, but it only provides 1.5 times the pain relief).

However, in a free market where HCI divorces consumers from price at the point of consumption, decisions are not made based on value. I believe that a national system (like in Australia) would rein in costs by not covering new products where marginal benefit is not equal to cost.

Such products could be purchased out of pocket. The system could encourage development of true cost saving technology.

HC costs will continue to rise because of expanding consumption on the intensive and extensive margins. Even cost saving technology may raise costs because the volume of consumption increases. A surgery that used to be deemed to risky/not worth the complication for most people may now be performed for most people because new surgery techniques make it safe, quick and cheap. Good news, yet still cost increasing overall.

No one is in control of these processes right now. I'd like to see some guidance. There is too much asymmetry of information for the private sector to work this out alone. Again, nationalized system could be more efficient.

I am for national as opposed to state programming. I strongly urge you to research the Tiebout economic modeling theory. Tiebout was concerned with - among other issues - how the mix of services provided effects the re-location decision making of populations.

I am very suspicious of state based programming in place of federal. Federal can spread revenues. State based can lead to development of worsening poverty pockets; especially in the poorer states. A phenomenon much, on an even more localized level, like the plight of the inner cities/urban decay.

I do have a concern that I don't see often discussed. That is the politicking of HC under a national system. Example: The system denies coverage of a certain procedure becuase it is not found to be cost effective. Maybe only a small percentage of the population receiving the treatment gets a benefit (and that benefit is small). However, the producers of the technology and/or physicians want to use the treatment. Consumers start to bellyache.

Some politician runs on a platform of increasing HC coverage to include this (and other) denied treatments. Ill informed consumers vote for the politician.

I see politicians as causing cost increases in this way. Also, good old fashioned campaign funding schemes by producers, etc could have an impact. I don't know if this is endemic to the American lifestyle/politics. Other systems in other countries seem to manage....

I haven't had the chance to look too deeply into the Australian system he mentions above…but I will share my immediate concern regarding standardized IT and terminology. The federal government, time and again, has shown an alarming inability to master IT programs and the flow of information.

Exhibit A:

After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Mueller made improvement of the agency's computer systems a priority. Members of Congress and the independent Sept. 11 commission said the overhaul is critical to enabling the FBI and intelligence agencies such as the CIA to "connect the dots" in preventing attacks.

[…]

But Fine noted that each phase of the Trilogy project "has been plagued by delays." Even when Congress provided an extra $78 million to rush completion of the first two parts of the project, the FBI managed to beat the original target date by just a month, he said.

Trilogy has so far cost taxpayers $581 million, $200 million more than originally budgeted. The FBI has yet to say how much more money will be needed to put an up-to-date case management system in place.

Exhibit B:

Experts blame poor planning, rapid industry advances and the massive scope of some complex projects whose price tags can run into billions of dollars at U.S. agencies with tens of thousands of employees.

"There are very few success stories," said Paul Brubaker, former deputy chief information officer at the Pentagon. "Failures are very common, and they've been common for a long time."

[…]

The bureau's mess -- the subject of an investigation by the Justice Department and an upcoming congressional hearing -- was the latest black eye among ambitious technology upgrades by the government since the 1990s.

The Internal Revenue Service sought $388 million last year for its $1.7 billion "Business System Modernization" program, which congressional investigators said continues to be over budget and 15 months late. The plan will modernize the IRS systems for collecting taxes, auditing returns and helping taxpayers with questions.

The Federal Aviation Administration has doubled its cost estimates to $1.69 billion for its "Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System" since 1996, according to the Transportation Department's inspector general. The new system would replace the outdated computers that control air traffic within five to 50 miles of airports.

How do we take advantage of the larger pool discussed above without layering the system in so much bureaucracy that it fails to address the problems a national system is meant to alleviate?

Healthcare

Sunni second thoughts

From the WaPost (via MSNBC) further news that Sunni leaders are reconsidering their initial attempts to frustrate the creation of a new constitution:

Influential Sunni Arab leaders of a boycott of last week's elections expressed a new willingness Friday to engage the coming Iraqi government and play a role in writing the constitution, in what may represent a strategic shiftin thinking among mainstream anti-occupation groups. The signs remain tentative, and even advocates of such change suggestthat much will depend on the posture the new government takes toward theinsurgency and the removal of former Baath Party officials from state institutions. But in statements and interviews, some Sunni leaders said the sectarian tension that surged ahead of the vote had forced them to rethink their stance.

[...]

The Association of Muslim Scholars, one of the most influential groups, sent mixed signals this week — saying it would respect the election results, while arguing that the new government will lack the legitimacy to draft a constitution. But the sermon Friday at the association's headquarters, the Um al-Qura mosque, was decidedly conciliatory. Directing most of his words at the new government, the preacher called Iraq its "trusteeship" and said the people's welfare was "a great responsibility on your shoulders."

A meeting Thursday at the home of a Sunni elder statesman that brought together some largely Sunni groups, including those that boycotted theelections, produced an agreement to participate in drafting the constitution, "without condition," said Nadhmi, one of those in attendance.

A spokesman for the Iraqi Islamic Party, which withdrew from Sunday's vote but still was listed on the ballot, said that its members would not enter parliament but that the party would not object if independent candidates who were included on its list took seats.

The article also mentions "grass-roots" grumbling among those who followed the guidance to boycott the elections and now feel they have damaged their own legitimacy rather than that of the election:

The shift in thinking appears to have arisen from a calculation that the election may have created a new dynamic in Iraq, as the country slowly moves past an emphasis on the U.S. occupation and more toward the blueprint of a future state. The groups do not speak for the insurgency, but the Association of Muslim Scholars, in particular, holds great sway in the Sunni Arab community in central and western Iraq, where there are signs of grass-roots discontent over the boycott.

[...]

In part, the Sunni and nationalist groups may be playing to their own constituencies. By all accounts, the Sunni turnout was far lower than that of Shiites and Kurds, although Sunni leaders debate whether that was a result of intimidation or adherence to calls for a boycott. But some residents in such Sunni towns as Ramadi and Tikrit have suggested there may be regrets over the choice. The disappointment seems strongest in urban areas, which have proved less sympathetic to the insurgency than the countryside.

The insurgents "made fools of us," said Mahmoud Ghasoub, a businessman in Baiji, a restive northern town. "They voted to disrupt the elections but failed. Now we have lost both tracks. We did not vote, nor did they disrupt the elections."

I would imagine there are moderate Sunni leaders who believe that an interim government demand for a withdrawal timetable from the U.S. has more chance for success than continued insurgent attacks that primarily kill other Iraqis and foment sectarian tension.

Also in the news today: an article from the NY Times discusses Shiite thoughts on the role of Islam and Shariah within the constitution.

From the U.S. perspective, the best outcome likely involves a compromise agreement between devout Shiites, secularists, respected Sunnis, and the Kurds. It needs to reflect Iraqi concerns much more than international (or U.S.) concerns at this point in order to gain enough legitimacy. I would imagine some sort of framework for the U.S. withdrawal will emerge as well. Such a withdrawal framework will (hopefully) reduce the appeal of the insurgency without pushing the U.S. out before Iraqi government forces are capable of dealing with hardline insurgents.

Update:

Greg at the Belgravia Dispatch offers a similar analysis of this Sunni change of heart.

Also, check out this insightful take on al-Sistani and his powers if influence within Iraq from Steve at the Red Zone:

But the important point is this: the Pope and the Ayatollah both represent freedom. Not just abstract bromides about "religious freedom," but active, political, muscular freedom--freedom standing up and thrusting its fist in the face of tyranny. Lech Walensa, who initiated the revolution that toppled the Soviet Union, and has described how the Pope's first pilgrimage to his native country forged a sense of solidarity among the Polish people. In the same way, when Sistani in October declared it the "religious duty" of Iraqis to vote, he, too, provided a spiritual context--if not sanction--for the yearnings of millions of people to rise up and demand control of their destinies.

Iraq
Elections

Word begins to trickle out...

MSNBC has this story documenting the release of the first partial results from Iraq's 30 Jan election:

The United Iraqi Alliance, which has the endorsement of Iraq’s top Shiite clerics, including the widely revered Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, won more than two-thirds of the 3.3 million votes counted so far, the election commission said. Allawi’s ticket was running second, with more than 579,700 votes.

The partial figures from Sunday’s contest for 275 National Assembly seats came from 10 of Iraq’s 18 provinces, said Hamdiyah al-Husseini, an election commission official. All 10 provinces have heavy Shiite populations, and the alliance had been expected to do well there. So far, 45 percent of the vote has been counted in Baghdad, with varying percentages tallied in the other nine provinces.

Similar to U.S. elections, it can be hard to determine the final percentages we'll see because the bulk of this reporting comes from the heavily Shiite regions. Perhaps most interesting in these numbers is the contrast between the UIA and Allawi's ticket. A poll released by IRI prior to the election seemed to indicate a growing degree of support for Allawi that many thought might translate into better-than-expected electoral results for his ticket. Allawi may get more votes from Shiites already living in mixed communities as well. I would suspect many Shiites with more Sunni and Kurd neighbors fear that a ticket too heavily dominated by strongly religious Shiites could prove more divisive than empowering.

Allawi's ticket has proven surprisingly weak among expat Iraqi voters:

The Alliance also won a plurality among the 265,000 votes cast by Iraqis abroad, with 36 percent, compared with 29 percent for the main Kurdish coalition and 9 percent for Allawi, according to a complete count released by the International Organization for Migration, which organized the vote in 14 countries.

Allawi, who lived in exile in Britain under Saddam’s rule, had been expected to draw support from many voters outside Iraq.

Buried within MSNBC's newsbot, I also found this heartening piece regarding Sunni willingness to work with the National Assembly in forging the nation's new constitution. This cooperation is considered key to winning moderate Sunni support for the newly-elected government:

After months of strident rejection of the elections in Iraq, two top groups from the minority Sunni Muslim population said Friday that they'd join in drafting the nation's constitution.

If the groups participate - there have been many past reversals - it would be a significant step toward bringing Sunnis into the political process and stemming sectarian divides that could cause civil unrest.

[...]

Shiite leaders have reached out to the Sunnis in an attempt, many believe, to reduce the chances of civil war. Major Shiite political leaders have asked the Sunnis to participate in writing the constitution.

The largest Sunni political party, the Iraqi Islamic Party, said it was responding to that outreach. Aila al Maki, a member of the party's political office, said the elections and crafting the constitution were two different processes.

"We will participate actively in the writing of the constitution," Maki said. "It is our right because we are all Iraqis."

Ahmed al Samaraee, a senior leader for the Sunni Muslim Scholars Association, said his organization would meet with the United Iraqi Alliance for talks about the constitution.

"We're with any list chosen and supported by the Iraqi people, but we want this list to ensure the unity of this country, to see this country as one family and not to listen to the occupiers," he said.

Iraq
Elections

The sun sets over North Korea 

Reform on the sly.

The LA Times published a fairly lengthy piece today on Administration efforts to advance the cause of separating health insurance from employment. For conservatives, the answer to this separation (of course) rests on personal responsibility and "ownership" of one's own plan as opposed to third party control of the system. Thus, the Health Savings Account has been born:

Emboldened by their success at the polls, the Bush administration and Republican leaders in Congress believe they have a new opportunity to move the nation away from the system of employer-provided health insurance that has covered most working Americans for the last half-century.

In its place, they want to erect a system in which workers — instead of looking to employers for health insurance — would take personal responsibility for protecting themselves and their families: They would buy high-deductible "catastrophic" insurance policies to cover major medical needs, then pay routine costs with money set aside in tax-sheltered health savings accounts.

The idea appeals to me - as an individual (I actually hunted around for an Archer Medical Savings Account a few years ago - but they were hard to find and difficult to establish in NC at the time). Why did it appeal to me? Because I am healthy, confident in my own ability to research both health and insurance issues, and I have a number of friends in the medical field on whom I can rely for guidance. Is that the case for those most urgently in need of health insurance, however? There's the rubbing point. The information society is a wonderful thing...if you're part of it. There are still plenty of people out there who either don't know how, don't have the time, or don't have the tools to access enough information to take advantage of something like this. Viewed from this perspective, I would call it a useful step forward - IF it is coupled with other measures. I don't know what those measures should be - it's something I haven't really looked into very deeply.

The articles continues, interviewing those who support HSAs:

Supporters of the new approach, who see it as part of Bush's "ownership society," say workers and their families would become more careful users of healthcare if they had to pay the bills. Also, they say, the lower premiums on high-deductible plans would make coverage affordable for the uninsured and for small businesses.

"My view is that this is absolutely the next big thing," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose consulting firm focuses on healthcare. "You are going to see a continued move to trying to get people involved in the process by owning their own health accounts."

...and the critics:

Critics say that Bush's vision represents wishful thinking at best, and at worst, a perilous new direction in national health policy.

"One danger with this is that people will not get needed care because they want to save a few thousand bucks," said Rep. Pete Stark (D-Hayward), a leading lawmaker on healthcare.

"Healthcare isn't like buying a Chevrolet," Stark added, disputing Bush's assertion that individual patients can be empowered to control costs. "You can go to Consumer Reports and read about the new Malibu, but if I asked you to describe a regimen of chemotherapy for someone who has colon cancer, you'd be out of gas.

"We are talking about highly technical services that 99% of the public doesn't even know how to spell the names of," he said. "Secondly, there is no uniformity within the medical community as to what services ought to be used. It's a 'by guess and by gosh' sort of practice."

The article concludes with a few notes on my favorite subject of late: using the information revolution to empower the consumer. However, market-based systems only work if consumers have the tools they need to make informed decisions:

In a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine, Frist called for what would amount to a healthcare information revolution. Within the next decade, he said, patients should be able to gain online access to performance rankings and prices for doctors and hospitals.

"Increased access to more accurate information about care and pricing will make possible … the transformation of the healthcare system," Frist wrote. "Whether selecting their physician, hospital or health plan, consumers must be able to choose what best meets their needs."

[....]

His vision of an empowered patient calling the shots may stand little chance without a new information infrastructure.

Gingrich acknowledged: "You can't have an informed marketplace in a setting where you don't have any information."

Here are a couple of the suggestions for a national system, as presented by Physician's for a National Health Program and Just Health Care. Both offer programs on the opposite end of the spectrum from HSAs.


Update:

In the NY Times today, a new study reviews the connections between personal bankruptcy and health costs:

Policy analysts say these findings underscore the limitations of the
nation's current system of providing health insurance largely through employers.
Some argue that even for those with insurance, benefits can be
ephemeral.

"You can lose it because it's tied to employment," said Joseph
Antos, a health policy researcher with the American Enterprise Institute, who
said people were also at risk if their employers went out of
business.

Healthcare

Casting an eye toward North Korea.

Having seen some recent news reports lately vaguely hinting at unrest within North Korea (an ongoing theme, I've discussed here and here), I decided to do a little browsing on my own to see what I could come up with.

From the Marmot's Hole on 28 Jan, this disturbing piece on the possibility of a Pakistani-North Korean nuclear deal:

Someone was kind enough to email me this piece in Pakistan’s Daily Times citing a piece in Friday’s Seoul Shinmun claiming that North Korea may have obtained a nuclear weapon (or nuclear weapons) from Pakistan. The Korean paper quoted a source in Washington as saying the U.S. has gotten hold of intelligence that North Korea acquired nuclear weapons from outside the country in order to avoid having to conduct very detectable high-explosive tests and to save time in building its nuclear arsenal. The source said the U.S. was in the process of confirming theintelligence.

From the London Times Online on 30 Jan (hat tip to NKZone), a story of chaos within the regime:

In interviews for this article over many months, western policymakers, Chinese experts, North Korean exiles and human rights activists built up a picture of a tightly knit clan leadership in Pyongyang that is on the verge of collapse.

Some of those interviewed believe the “Dear Leader”, Kim Jong-il, has already lost his personal authority to a clique of generals and party cadres. Without any public announcement, governments from Tokyo to Washington are preparing for a change of regime.

The death of Kim’s favourite mistress last summer, a security clampdown on foreign aid workers and a reported assassination attempt in Austria last November against the leader’s eldest son, Kim Jong-nam, have all heightened the sense of disintegration.

If you have the time, read the whole article. It's compelling. NKZone also links to this story from the NY Times ref: Kim Jong-Il's plans for his successor:

"I will uphold Father President's instructions," a South Korean newspaper, JoongAng Ilbo, said North Korea's state radio quoted Kim Jong Il as saying. His father, the founder of North Korea, had "stressed that if he falls short of completing the revolution, it will be continued by his son and grandson," the commentary said. Neither South Korea's National Intelligence Service, which monitors North Korean radio, nor the Unification Ministry would make available a transcript of the Jan. 27 broadcast, Reuters said.

Also note these reports from late last year ref: Chinese troops being placed on the North Korean border.

Japan Today published this short blurb regarding the continuing tensions between Tokyo and Pyongyang (something I addressed here), highlighting the latest North Korean propaganda campaign against Japan:

North Korea has launched a fresh campaign against Japan since last week, with political and social groups issuing statements denouncing Japan for its past militarism and its position on the issue of Japanese abducted to the North.

The statements by four organizations, including a youth league and a women's group, were issued one after the other from Thursday and carried by the official Korean Central News Agency. (Kyodo News)

From the Chosun, rumors of a new U.S. proposal to North Korea:

A senior member of the White House's National Security Council said Monday that the U.S. has a "serious proposal" for North Korea and is ready to discuss it at the six-party talks, Reuters reported.

After visiting the Japanese prime minister's office on Monday, Michael Green, the council’s senior director for Asia, told reporters, "We are ready to go. We have a serious proposal. And we are ready to discuss it without preconditions." He did not mention specifics.

And I'll wrap up with a more nuanced report from early January:

In South Korea, there are calls to update the government's classified contingency plan - code-named Chungmu 3300 after a 16th-century military hero - to deal with a possible collapse of the North's regime. The leading government think tank here is dusting off old social-science models designed for Eastern Europe in an attempt to predict how much longer Kim can last.

The Japanese media have been full of breathless rumours - most of which have proved untrue - of mass defections by the North Korean military and the circulation of anti-Kim brochures in the North.

Continuing:

The speculation may have less to do with political forces inside North Korea than outside.

In particular, President Bush's re-election has emboldened critics of the North Korean regime in the United States and in Asia who want Kim ousted. The North Korean Human Rights Act, passed in October, allocates up to $24 million to promote better conditions for North Koreans, and has revitalized an activist movement made up largely of Christian missionaries.

The activists have flooded the Internet with unsubstantiated rumours about instability inside North Korea.

"We are seeing a lot of fabricated tales going around lately," said Woo Jung Chang, an editor of the Chosun Monthly, an influential Seoul-based magazine. "There is a lot of wishful thinking when it comes to predictions of North Korea's collapse," agreed Nicholas Eberstadt, a North Korea expert with the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington.

I noticed in reading the story from the London Times a very heavy influence from Christian groups. That seems to be an issue raised by this last article. I've highlighted the relevant pieces.


Update:

The NY Times published this story today ref: possible North Korean sale of nuclear material to Libya:

The determination, which has circulated among senior government officials in recent weeks, has touched off a hunt to determine if North Korea has also sold uranium to other countries, including Iran and Syria. So far, there is no evidence that such additional transactions took place.

Nonetheless, the conclusion about Libya, which is contained in a classified briefing that has been described to The New York Times, could alter Washington's debate about the assessment of the North Korean nuclear threat. In the past, some administration officials have argued that there is time to find a diplomatic solution because there was no evidence that the government of Kim Jung Il was spreading its atomic technology abroad.

Korea