Olivier Blanchard on Stan Fischer; Niccolo Soldo assesses the Ukraine War; Heather Heying's idealism about education; Rory Sutherland on bureaucracy; James F. Richardson on elite overproduction
I doubt that the sterility of macroeconomics is correlated with the dominance of Stan Fischer. In my experience Stan has always been far from being doctrinaire and from mathiness. Two examples: 1. In the middle 1980s I was an RA for Stan on an inflation model which assumed adaptive expectations, not rational expectations. Simple and practical. 2. In 2009, Stan gave the main address to the annual Israel Economic Association conference. (Generally the Bank Governor gives this address.) Stan emphasized that while textbook models tend to view the Central Bank as helpless in a zero-interest-rate environment, in fact central bankers have many tricks up their sleeves and are able to adequately control the money supply. Definitely a practical, salt-water approach.
I attribute the sterility of academic macro to an over-reaction to the Lucas critique. It was right to seek micro foundations, but the particular paradigms adopted for those foundations (e.g. SGE) were proven after a few years to be sterile and mathy, yet were not put aside.
Soldo is partially wrong- everyone is a big loser in the Ukraine War, Ukraine's young men are just the biggest losers since it is them that are getting conscripted by force and sent to their graves.
This is like claiming, while it was occurring, that the British were minor losers, the French were the big winners, and the Americans were the biggest losers in the American Revolution.
The price of freedom isn’t cheap, to use the cliche, and the Ukrainians may be the biggest losers but also potentially biggest winners.
Is there any evidence that Ukrainians are fleeing their country in droves to avoid the war or draft?
2) yes, there is a draconian law to prevent any adult male citizens from leaving. Recentely they tried to tighten it to include not being able to leave your city of residence
3) yes, conscription efforts have become ever more draconian. It’s not hard to find videos and stories of men walking along the street only to have a van pull up and a bunch of men get out, beat them up, and throw them in the van to bring to enlistment.
It turns out hat nobody actually wants to be cannon fodder for kamikaze charges in the donbass.
4) the number one “recruiter” for Ukraine has gotten rich selling 7,000 euro exemptions to fund a vacation mansion in the EU amongst other loot
5) yes elections have been suspended and rival parties outlawed indefinitely
We don’t have a clue what Ukrainian soildiers want. They don’t have a choice.
1) indeed, as they should. Obviously not many male of drafting age. Russia: Those men fled Russia in large numbers, if they could.
2) It is a law, naturally. And it is enforced. Nothing "draconian" about it. - Any source for your "city-claim"? Not really practical for the work of truck drivers and many others.
3) Have seen conscript-hunting-videos like that from Russia -sure you are not mixing them up? - Same applies for kamikaze-charges.
4) who would that be?
5) Based on Ukrainian Constitution, elections for Ukraine's parliamentary body the Verkhovna Rada and for the presidency cannot be held when martial law is imposed. Conclusion: PTN PNX and his trolls, too.
None of this is all that convincing as a response to the original question, and it’s largely all anecdote. I could highlight similar anecdote about Ukrainians returning to assist in the war.
The objection is to the American armchair quarterbacking about what is good or not for Ukraine. It’s not a zero sum game between America and Ukraine, and if they want to fight and want our assistance hard to say that’s worse than the available alternatives.
The very fact that Ukraine has such laws and conscription means they can’t fill out their ranks through volunteers. That’s not an anecdote, it’s a fact. Their actions show they don’t trust their own people to fight without enslaving them.
I don’t think that what’s going on in ukraine is good for Ukraine, but I don’t necessarily care. I would have course prefer good outcomes to bad outcomes, but If you people want to charge on to Russian minefields to liberate a bunch of people that don’t want to be liberated that is your own (probably stupid) choice. Whether you are slaves or fools and outcome is the same.
I care about the fact that my government is supporting such actions. I get no pleasure or gain from this carnage, I don’t like playing a role in it, and I don’t like my money being squandered on it. God forbid it ever escalates my family and I may well pay the price with our lives, the whole world could. And to the extent that my government has actively blocked peace (as seems to be the case) it’s tragic.
Understand that I don’t consider ukraine a superior society to Russia. I don’t think one side or the other winning will make life better for the people on the ground. Even if some people on the ground disagree with me, I could just as well call them delusional (the japanese in ww2 were more willing to fight and die then Ukrainians today, and it was stupid of them to want that).
I don’t consider its fate to be a matter of my countries national interest either, if anything the opposite.
I think all of these justifications are propaganda generated for political and financial gain by the same sort of interests I constantly see him the American people up for foreign wars.
“The very fact that Ukraine has such laws and conscription means they can’t fill out their ranks through volunteers.”
Another interpretation is that it is a reasonable law to make sure everyone chips in rather than having some citizens shoulder the entire burden of defending the country and others free loading.
I’m not really sure if I’d favor such a law, but it doesn’t seem unreasonable to me to demand all citizens chip in when it’s an existential threat to the country.
Either way, it is not ipso facto proof that most citizens object to what is going on there and would prefer to thrown in the towel and accept Russia control.
1) I can defend conscription in some instances as a precommitment mechanism to a just cause, but it's still a black mark that should cause suspicion. The history of conscription is a dark and mostly pointless one.
2) "What people want" is important and meaningful, but not the entire story. Sometimes people want dumb shit for a variety of human but flawed reasons.
It's also hard to tell what people want because "what they want" is dependent on circumstances. People who don't have a choice often invent reasons for their prison, it's easier they admitting their own slavery an futility.
3) At the moment Ukranians are launching offensives that are most likely doomed to fail without purpose and even if their purpose was fulfilled they would "liberate" a bunch of people that don't want to be part of their country and defiantly don't want to be part of a war zone. Seems a really fucking dumb way to die.
4) The Kool Aid is that Ukraine had these massive counter offensives last summer. Let's examine them.
A) Captured a bunch of unpopulated farmland west of Kharkov with a prewar population no greater than the Donbass shitholes Russian conquered at the same time. Needed 10:1 force ratio and Russia mobilized to solve this.
B) Conquered tiny city of Kherson by HIMARSing the crossing on the Dniepor including the dam. Russia withdrew because Ukraine was planning to destroy the dam to trap them. Dam ended up getting destroyed anyway (probably by Ukraine but at a minimum due to war damage). I'm sure the people in Crimea are waiting to be liberated by the ones that took their water and electricity away out of spite.
What great victories. It was totally worth turning down a peace for the status quo ante bellum one month into the war. Remember how the west promised is wonder weapons would destroy the Russians with ease. oops, you the cannon fodder.
As an American I certainly don’t feel like I’m a winner.
Maybe American defense contractors are winners. Everyone else is a loser (as usual).
P.S. I don’t follow Elon musk on twitter but the other day someone retweeted something of his and looking at the timeline the guy is incredibly based about what a pointless slaughter this all is.
I don't have access to the whole post, but I can't imagine a strong argument that would support Russia being winners of any kind in this conflict. It took decades to build up the stores of ammunition and equipment which have been used in this conflict and they have hampered or outright destroyed their ability to replace them.
If there is anything revealed by this conflict, it is that Russia isn't having any trouble replacing the ammunition and equipment used in this conflict. Even DC think tank CSIS finally acknowledged (in an article posted on June 28, 2023) that "Russia Isn't Going to Run Out of Missiles." It is the NATO countries that have hampered or outright destroyed their ability to replace the ammunition and equipment used in this conflict (the Russian military has posted dozens of videos of German Leopards, US Bradleys and other NATO vehicles being blown up by Russian drones, missiles and other ammunition since the start of Ukraine's so-called counter-offensive) by deindustrializing and, in the case of Europe, by cutting themselves off from cheap Russian gas. The huge defense industrial capacity that the Russians built up during the Soviet period remains intact, and by all indications is firing on all cylinders. And the Russians have no plans to replace their gas with windmills and solar panels.
This is a backwards reading of the situation based on partisan hackery. The first point is that Russia is not replacing its ammunition and equipment with new production, they are drawing down stores and we can see in their artillery usage continual decline in the number of shells fired per day over the entire conflict. This is them running out, we can also see from confirmed losses the steady increase in the age of equipment being lost which is them running out.
The second point is that NATO is running out of artillery shells because their doctrine is air and naval superiority and Russian doctrine is artillery superiority. If NATO actually got directly involved in the conflict then Russia would be thrown back, or would launch nukes, within a few weeks. Possibly a few days. If NATO gets in a real conflict along with this proxy conflict there will be some awkwardness in adjusting tactics but the expected outcome will be air and naval superiority dominating that conflict. Right now NATO is only sending aid from roughly 1/3rd of their capabilities because that is what Ukraine can use. To highlight this the US '23 defense budget request had $177 billion for the army, $230 billion for the Navy and $234 billion for the air force. That is 73% to the Air force and Navy, and 27% to the army.
Or to put it another way 1/4th of NATO spending (not even, but rounding way the hell up) is fighting Russia to a standstill.
Since support for Ukraine is bipartisan, it doesn't make sense to dismiss my comment as 'partisan hackery.' My comment was based on alternative media sources, plus my own background. NATO isn't fighting Russia to a standstill -- it is obvious that, had Russia chosen to, it could have obliterated Ukraine with a bombing campaign in short order. US defense spending is no more a reliable indicator of capabilities than US spending on health and education are reliable indicators of health outcomes or education quality. Your claim that Russia is relying exclusively on preexisting stockpiles of ammunition and equipment is absurd. Even the mainstream media and Ukrainian sources have debunked that (for example, by revealing that Russian missiles used in the conflict were produced after the introduction of sanctions). If Russian factories produced these stockpiles in the first place, what exactly is stopping them from replacing them as the existing shells and equipment are used up?
The US doesn't purchase F-16s anymore, and have moved on to the F-35 for the very reasons that old F-16 pilots wouldn't want to fly in Ukraine. This is just another variation on a bad argument- this one thing won't do well in Ukraine therefore the air force as a whole won't do well. If you are arguing against the air force having a role you have to argue against the F-35, not the F-16*.
Further 'partisan' has a definition beyond 'Democrat or Republican in the US'- it means taking a side and finding arguments for that side based on your beliefs. Using 'alternative media' means you are using media which has the same or worse level of biases as the legacy media- media is a narrative selling machine, that's the purpose and the profit motive. Reading alternative media doesn't make you more informed, its just a different level of misinformation.
'NATO isn't fighting Russia to a standstill'
No it isn't- its much worse than that for Russia- Ukraine- with a limited supply of NATO equipment- is fighting Russia to a standstill.
'Your claim that Russia is relying exclusively on preexisting stockpiles of ammunition and equipment is absurd'
Your absurdities are absurd. Russia has been using more ammunition that it has the capability to produce in this war by a large margin. The US and their allies are ALSO producing some new ammunition at the same time- the question is not is production occurring, its 'can Russia prosecute another war or this or near this intensity with production + whatever stockpiles remain after the major fighting slows down'. The answer here is clearly no, and estimates for Russia replenishing their stockpiles run into the 10-20 year range, while NATO estimates are in the 2-5 year range.
'US defense spending is no more a reliable indicator of capabilities than US spending on health and education are reliable indicators of health outcomes or education quality'
Both of which are MASSIVELY better than Russian education and healthcare (which wasn't the point either, it was to highlight the shortsightedness of using something like artillery shortages to judge a military that primarily focuses on air and sea power is just ridiculous, and shows either bias or ignorance.
'If Russian factories produced these stockpiles in the first place, what exactly is stopping them from replacing them as the existing shells and equipment are used up?'
Nothing does, but the stockpiles were built up over decades, and so decades should probably be expected to replenish them.
*and the article linked is far from conclusive or even strong evidence, its just that even assuming its correct its a bad argument.
Soldo seems much more than 'partially' wrong - but mostly and obviously. 1. Maybe "Jimmy Carter’s National Security Advisor" would have been right in Carter's time and still only "mostly wrong" in 1997. But not in 2022. With Ukraine's population down 20% (with a bad structure on top) - with Russia having turned fully into a kleptocracy eunning a "fuel station with nukes". - "The refusal, or inability, of Russia to effect regime change in Kiev in 2014-15 placed Moscow in check" Sorry??? Putin let his stooge Yanukovich fire on protester, later invaded Crimea and Donbas. Soldo considers that "refusal"? He calls his wild claims "undeniable", twice. - No idea, how he even wants to prove such claims "the Americans ... are more dominant in Europe than they have ever been". Ever. Sure. - Dear Dr. Kling, there are better analysts around. May I suggest this historian: https://acoup.blog/2023/07/07/collections-the-status-quo-coalition/
I admit my first reaction was that you are wrong. Maybe it's that we often disagree but more likely I was locked into a view similar to Soldo''s. Anyway, it took about 5 seconds for me to realize you are almost certainly right. We would surely all be better off if Russia had not invaded. The winnings are small compared to the loses all around.
But that raises the question of whether Soldo refers to before or after invasion. He isn't clear about that. If the invasion is a given then US is indeed the biggest winner and Ukraine the biggest loser. At this point it's unclear to me how he could argue Russia is a small winner and EU a small loser. Seems reverse to me.
Random thought - maybe one could argue that Volodymyr Zelenskyy gained the most.
Re: Sutherland on Bureaucracy. It seems to me that in most of the professions that Sutherland laments, it may be that mergers, private equity, and the data-fication of everything are bigger influences on bureaucratization than government.
The trend started a long time ago, before “big data” became the watch word, for instance. Likewise, one must ask why mergers made so much sense at the time they started, considering that bigger institutions are so rarely better at serving their roles. What’s the edge that big organizations have over small ones? Compliance dollars spread over a larger revenue base is a likely answer.
Negotiating power is part of it, but I don't think it is the main driver. In some cases like Walmart (and I presume Amazon, though one doesn't hear it as much) it definitely is a big deal, but for many businesses it doesn't seem to matter as much how big a particular customer is when it comes to price or service levels. A firm has to represent a large percentage of another's sales before they have a ton of bargaining power (so like Walmart size) but very few manage to dominate an industry to that point. Off the cuff, if you can name 3-4 different businesses in an industry, it is pretty safe to say they don't have much more bargaining power than the 5-10 you never heard of. Not that it is zero, mind you! Just that I don't think it fully accounts, or even mostly accounts, for the size of many firms considering the many inherent inefficiencies that go with size.
Agreed, but is it also a broader story of complexity, specialization and scale? Like, if a hospital is basically a conglomerate of specialized experts in various sub-fields, it arguably takes managerial expertise to coordinate the parts. Maybe with less regulation the managerial adaptations would work better, but they may still struggle.
Sounds much like sour grapes. It would seem you were never a runner but if Fischer had danced instead, would that have made you a suckup? Never mind that. Unless Fischer was unpleasant to be around, why would anyone pass up the opportunity to learn from him along with other benefits (exercise)?
I doubt that the sterility of macroeconomics is correlated with the dominance of Stan Fischer. In my experience Stan has always been far from being doctrinaire and from mathiness. Two examples: 1. In the middle 1980s I was an RA for Stan on an inflation model which assumed adaptive expectations, not rational expectations. Simple and practical. 2. In 2009, Stan gave the main address to the annual Israel Economic Association conference. (Generally the Bank Governor gives this address.) Stan emphasized that while textbook models tend to view the Central Bank as helpless in a zero-interest-rate environment, in fact central bankers have many tricks up their sleeves and are able to adequately control the money supply. Definitely a practical, salt-water approach.
I attribute the sterility of academic macro to an over-reaction to the Lucas critique. It was right to seek micro foundations, but the particular paradigms adopted for those foundations (e.g. SGE) were proven after a few years to be sterile and mathy, yet were not put aside.
Soldo is partially wrong- everyone is a big loser in the Ukraine War, Ukraine's young men are just the biggest losers since it is them that are getting conscripted by force and sent to their graves.
Re: Soldo—
This is like claiming, while it was occurring, that the British were minor losers, the French were the big winners, and the Americans were the biggest losers in the American Revolution.
The price of freedom isn’t cheap, to use the cliche, and the Ukrainians may be the biggest losers but also potentially biggest winners.
Is there any evidence that Ukrainians are fleeing their country in droves to avoid the war or draft?
1) yes, millions have fled ukraine
2) yes, there is a draconian law to prevent any adult male citizens from leaving. Recentely they tried to tighten it to include not being able to leave your city of residence
3) yes, conscription efforts have become ever more draconian. It’s not hard to find videos and stories of men walking along the street only to have a van pull up and a bunch of men get out, beat them up, and throw them in the van to bring to enlistment.
It turns out hat nobody actually wants to be cannon fodder for kamikaze charges in the donbass.
4) the number one “recruiter” for Ukraine has gotten rich selling 7,000 euro exemptions to fund a vacation mansion in the EU amongst other loot
5) yes elections have been suspended and rival parties outlawed indefinitely
We don’t have a clue what Ukrainian soildiers want. They don’t have a choice.
1) indeed, as they should. Obviously not many male of drafting age. Russia: Those men fled Russia in large numbers, if they could.
2) It is a law, naturally. And it is enforced. Nothing "draconian" about it. - Any source for your "city-claim"? Not really practical for the work of truck drivers and many others.
3) Have seen conscript-hunting-videos like that from Russia -sure you are not mixing them up? - Same applies for kamikaze-charges.
4) who would that be?
5) Based on Ukrainian Constitution, elections for Ukraine's parliamentary body the Verkhovna Rada and for the presidency cannot be held when martial law is imposed. Conclusion: PTN PNX and his trolls, too.
None of this is all that convincing as a response to the original question, and it’s largely all anecdote. I could highlight similar anecdote about Ukrainians returning to assist in the war.
The objection is to the American armchair quarterbacking about what is good or not for Ukraine. It’s not a zero sum game between America and Ukraine, and if they want to fight and want our assistance hard to say that’s worse than the available alternatives.
The very fact that Ukraine has such laws and conscription means they can’t fill out their ranks through volunteers. That’s not an anecdote, it’s a fact. Their actions show they don’t trust their own people to fight without enslaving them.
I don’t think that what’s going on in ukraine is good for Ukraine, but I don’t necessarily care. I would have course prefer good outcomes to bad outcomes, but If you people want to charge on to Russian minefields to liberate a bunch of people that don’t want to be liberated that is your own (probably stupid) choice. Whether you are slaves or fools and outcome is the same.
I care about the fact that my government is supporting such actions. I get no pleasure or gain from this carnage, I don’t like playing a role in it, and I don’t like my money being squandered on it. God forbid it ever escalates my family and I may well pay the price with our lives, the whole world could. And to the extent that my government has actively blocked peace (as seems to be the case) it’s tragic.
Understand that I don’t consider ukraine a superior society to Russia. I don’t think one side or the other winning will make life better for the people on the ground. Even if some people on the ground disagree with me, I could just as well call them delusional (the japanese in ww2 were more willing to fight and die then Ukrainians today, and it was stupid of them to want that).
I don’t consider its fate to be a matter of my countries national interest either, if anything the opposite.
I think all of these justifications are propaganda generated for political and financial gain by the same sort of interests I constantly see him the American people up for foreign wars.
“The very fact that Ukraine has such laws and conscription means they can’t fill out their ranks through volunteers.”
Another interpretation is that it is a reasonable law to make sure everyone chips in rather than having some citizens shoulder the entire burden of defending the country and others free loading.
I’m not really sure if I’d favor such a law, but it doesn’t seem unreasonable to me to demand all citizens chip in when it’s an existential threat to the country.
Either way, it is not ipso facto proof that most citizens object to what is going on there and would prefer to thrown in the towel and accept Russia control.
1) I can defend conscription in some instances as a precommitment mechanism to a just cause, but it's still a black mark that should cause suspicion. The history of conscription is a dark and mostly pointless one.
2) "What people want" is important and meaningful, but not the entire story. Sometimes people want dumb shit for a variety of human but flawed reasons.
It's also hard to tell what people want because "what they want" is dependent on circumstances. People who don't have a choice often invent reasons for their prison, it's easier they admitting their own slavery an futility.
3) At the moment Ukranians are launching offensives that are most likely doomed to fail without purpose and even if their purpose was fulfilled they would "liberate" a bunch of people that don't want to be part of their country and defiantly don't want to be part of a war zone. Seems a really fucking dumb way to die.
4) The Kool Aid is that Ukraine had these massive counter offensives last summer. Let's examine them.
A) Captured a bunch of unpopulated farmland west of Kharkov with a prewar population no greater than the Donbass shitholes Russian conquered at the same time. Needed 10:1 force ratio and Russia mobilized to solve this.
B) Conquered tiny city of Kherson by HIMARSing the crossing on the Dniepor including the dam. Russia withdrew because Ukraine was planning to destroy the dam to trap them. Dam ended up getting destroyed anyway (probably by Ukraine but at a minimum due to war damage). I'm sure the people in Crimea are waiting to be liberated by the ones that took their water and electricity away out of spite.
What great victories. It was totally worth turning down a peace for the status quo ante bellum one month into the war. Remember how the west promised is wonder weapons would destroy the Russians with ease. oops, you the cannon fodder.
+1
As an American I certainly don’t feel like I’m a winner.
Maybe American defense contractors are winners. Everyone else is a loser (as usual).
P.S. I don’t follow Elon musk on twitter but the other day someone retweeted something of his and looking at the timeline the guy is incredibly based about what a pointless slaughter this all is.
I don't have access to the whole post, but I can't imagine a strong argument that would support Russia being winners of any kind in this conflict. It took decades to build up the stores of ammunition and equipment which have been used in this conflict and they have hampered or outright destroyed their ability to replace them.
If there is anything revealed by this conflict, it is that Russia isn't having any trouble replacing the ammunition and equipment used in this conflict. Even DC think tank CSIS finally acknowledged (in an article posted on June 28, 2023) that "Russia Isn't Going to Run Out of Missiles." It is the NATO countries that have hampered or outright destroyed their ability to replace the ammunition and equipment used in this conflict (the Russian military has posted dozens of videos of German Leopards, US Bradleys and other NATO vehicles being blown up by Russian drones, missiles and other ammunition since the start of Ukraine's so-called counter-offensive) by deindustrializing and, in the case of Europe, by cutting themselves off from cheap Russian gas. The huge defense industrial capacity that the Russians built up during the Soviet period remains intact, and by all indications is firing on all cylinders. And the Russians have no plans to replace their gas with windmills and solar panels.
This is a backwards reading of the situation based on partisan hackery. The first point is that Russia is not replacing its ammunition and equipment with new production, they are drawing down stores and we can see in their artillery usage continual decline in the number of shells fired per day over the entire conflict. This is them running out, we can also see from confirmed losses the steady increase in the age of equipment being lost which is them running out.
The second point is that NATO is running out of artillery shells because their doctrine is air and naval superiority and Russian doctrine is artillery superiority. If NATO actually got directly involved in the conflict then Russia would be thrown back, or would launch nukes, within a few weeks. Possibly a few days. If NATO gets in a real conflict along with this proxy conflict there will be some awkwardness in adjusting tactics but the expected outcome will be air and naval superiority dominating that conflict. Right now NATO is only sending aid from roughly 1/3rd of their capabilities because that is what Ukraine can use. To highlight this the US '23 defense budget request had $177 billion for the army, $230 billion for the Navy and $234 billion for the air force. That is 73% to the Air force and Navy, and 27% to the army.
Or to put it another way 1/4th of NATO spending (not even, but rounding way the hell up) is fighting Russia to a standstill.
Dream on: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/former-f-16-pilot-says-he-would-not-want-to-fly-missions-over-ukraine-right-now-arguing-there-is-no-fighting-chance/ar-AA1aHwQF?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=2334d0756a564022a63b702ccecd77fa&ei=28#image=AA1aHupw|2.
Since support for Ukraine is bipartisan, it doesn't make sense to dismiss my comment as 'partisan hackery.' My comment was based on alternative media sources, plus my own background. NATO isn't fighting Russia to a standstill -- it is obvious that, had Russia chosen to, it could have obliterated Ukraine with a bombing campaign in short order. US defense spending is no more a reliable indicator of capabilities than US spending on health and education are reliable indicators of health outcomes or education quality. Your claim that Russia is relying exclusively on preexisting stockpiles of ammunition and equipment is absurd. Even the mainstream media and Ukrainian sources have debunked that (for example, by revealing that Russian missiles used in the conflict were produced after the introduction of sanctions). If Russian factories produced these stockpiles in the first place, what exactly is stopping them from replacing them as the existing shells and equipment are used up?
The US doesn't purchase F-16s anymore, and have moved on to the F-35 for the very reasons that old F-16 pilots wouldn't want to fly in Ukraine. This is just another variation on a bad argument- this one thing won't do well in Ukraine therefore the air force as a whole won't do well. If you are arguing against the air force having a role you have to argue against the F-35, not the F-16*.
Further 'partisan' has a definition beyond 'Democrat or Republican in the US'- it means taking a side and finding arguments for that side based on your beliefs. Using 'alternative media' means you are using media which has the same or worse level of biases as the legacy media- media is a narrative selling machine, that's the purpose and the profit motive. Reading alternative media doesn't make you more informed, its just a different level of misinformation.
'NATO isn't fighting Russia to a standstill'
No it isn't- its much worse than that for Russia- Ukraine- with a limited supply of NATO equipment- is fighting Russia to a standstill.
'Your claim that Russia is relying exclusively on preexisting stockpiles of ammunition and equipment is absurd'
Your absurdities are absurd. Russia has been using more ammunition that it has the capability to produce in this war by a large margin. The US and their allies are ALSO producing some new ammunition at the same time- the question is not is production occurring, its 'can Russia prosecute another war or this or near this intensity with production + whatever stockpiles remain after the major fighting slows down'. The answer here is clearly no, and estimates for Russia replenishing their stockpiles run into the 10-20 year range, while NATO estimates are in the 2-5 year range.
'US defense spending is no more a reliable indicator of capabilities than US spending on health and education are reliable indicators of health outcomes or education quality'
Both of which are MASSIVELY better than Russian education and healthcare (which wasn't the point either, it was to highlight the shortsightedness of using something like artillery shortages to judge a military that primarily focuses on air and sea power is just ridiculous, and shows either bias or ignorance.
'If Russian factories produced these stockpiles in the first place, what exactly is stopping them from replacing them as the existing shells and equipment are used up?'
Nothing does, but the stockpiles were built up over decades, and so decades should probably be expected to replenish them.
*and the article linked is far from conclusive or even strong evidence, its just that even assuming its correct its a bad argument.
The F-35 exemplifies everything that is wrong with US military procurement:
https://www.takimag.com/article/the_golden_dodo_bird_in_the_sky/#axzz1wsORwRip
https://scottlocklin.wordpress.com/2017/01/20/shooting-down-stealthy-planes/
The Ukrainian military is getting slaughtered.
Soldo seems much more than 'partially' wrong - but mostly and obviously. 1. Maybe "Jimmy Carter’s National Security Advisor" would have been right in Carter's time and still only "mostly wrong" in 1997. But not in 2022. With Ukraine's population down 20% (with a bad structure on top) - with Russia having turned fully into a kleptocracy eunning a "fuel station with nukes". - "The refusal, or inability, of Russia to effect regime change in Kiev in 2014-15 placed Moscow in check" Sorry??? Putin let his stooge Yanukovich fire on protester, later invaded Crimea and Donbas. Soldo considers that "refusal"? He calls his wild claims "undeniable", twice. - No idea, how he even wants to prove such claims "the Americans ... are more dominant in Europe than they have ever been". Ever. Sure. - Dear Dr. Kling, there are better analysts around. May I suggest this historian: https://acoup.blog/2023/07/07/collections-the-status-quo-coalition/
I admit my first reaction was that you are wrong. Maybe it's that we often disagree but more likely I was locked into a view similar to Soldo''s. Anyway, it took about 5 seconds for me to realize you are almost certainly right. We would surely all be better off if Russia had not invaded. The winnings are small compared to the loses all around.
But that raises the question of whether Soldo refers to before or after invasion. He isn't clear about that. If the invasion is a given then US is indeed the biggest winner and Ukraine the biggest loser. At this point it's unclear to me how he could argue Russia is a small winner and EU a small loser. Seems reverse to me.
Random thought - maybe one could argue that Volodymyr Zelenskyy gained the most.
Zelensky is the biggest winner in ukraine (he was a disgraced failure before the war).
Problem is, he’s the one with the most to lose in peace. And he knows it, “we’re stuck with him.”
Re: Sutherland on Bureaucracy. It seems to me that in most of the professions that Sutherland laments, it may be that mergers, private equity, and the data-fication of everything are bigger influences on bureaucratization than government.
The trend started a long time ago, before “big data” became the watch word, for instance. Likewise, one must ask why mergers made so much sense at the time they started, considering that bigger institutions are so rarely better at serving their roles. What’s the edge that big organizations have over small ones? Compliance dollars spread over a larger revenue base is a likely answer.
The edge is negotiating power. Payers and providers have been in an arms race for a long time to bully one another.
Negotiating power is part of it, but I don't think it is the main driver. In some cases like Walmart (and I presume Amazon, though one doesn't hear it as much) it definitely is a big deal, but for many businesses it doesn't seem to matter as much how big a particular customer is when it comes to price or service levels. A firm has to represent a large percentage of another's sales before they have a ton of bargaining power (so like Walmart size) but very few manage to dominate an industry to that point. Off the cuff, if you can name 3-4 different businesses in an industry, it is pretty safe to say they don't have much more bargaining power than the 5-10 you never heard of. Not that it is zero, mind you! Just that I don't think it fully accounts, or even mostly accounts, for the size of many firms considering the many inherent inefficiencies that go with size.
Having the "n" next to the "b" on the keyboard claims another victim.
Goddamnit... you'd think autocorrect on the phone would catch that! Thanks for the heads up, man.
Should we cancel him?
Agreed, but is it also a broader story of complexity, specialization and scale? Like, if a hospital is basically a conglomerate of specialized experts in various sub-fields, it arguably takes managerial expertise to coordinate the parts. Maybe with less regulation the managerial adaptations would work better, but they may still struggle.
Dont forget that ukraine itself is ready to fight to the last ukrainian .. and the us support is just very much appreciated there....
Getting invaded by your wannabe superpwoer neighbour is pretty much always going to be a "big loser" situation. What is Soldo's alternative?
Sounds much like sour grapes. It would seem you were never a runner but if Fischer had danced instead, would that have made you a suckup? Never mind that. Unless Fischer was unpleasant to be around, why would anyone pass up the opportunity to learn from him along with other benefits (exercise)?