Tougher DUI Laws?

New York State would make it a felony to drive while intoxicated with a child in the vehicle and would require first-time convicted drunken drivers to buy a device that prevents them from driving their cars if they have been drinking, under a bill passed by the State Assembly on Tuesday.

Even libertarians agree that DUI laws make sense. I fear, however, that these particular enhancements to New York's laws are driven mainly by emotion:

The push for harsher drunken-driving penalties follows two recent crashes in New York in which children were killed while traveling with adults who had been drinking.

My guess is that the felony charge will often be bargained down, or police will let violators off with a warning because the felony charge seems excessive.


The provision for locking devices may again have little impact in practice, as those affected disable them, or use other cars.


I do not have an obviously better alternative to offer, but I am not convinced these enhancements to the DUI laws will change much.

Higher Tuition at the University of California

The University of California's Board of Regents agreed yesterday to raise undergraduate tuition by 32 percent. This had a predictable effect:

Hundreds of students from campuses across the state demonstrated ... More than 5,000 students demonstrated outside Sproul Hall at Berkeley

The increase is exactly the right thing to do, of course; the only problem is that it does not go far enough.

No good argument exists for state colleges or universities; the private sector does an excellent job.

A reasonable although oft-exaggerated argument exists for helping low-income students afford college, but this implies means-tested vouchers, not state-run higher education.

So California's tuition increase is a step in the right direction; its universities should mimic elite private universities by setting a high official tuition rate, while discounting that rate for those of limited means. Better yet, California should simply privatize the entire university system.

The Headline ...

... says it all:

US wealthy should pay for health care overhaul, poll finds

That is the essence of the debate over health care. Nothing in existing bills constitutes "reform." Rather, these bills are just transfers from some people to others.

Global Warming Silliness

Buried in the text of Tuesday's joint declaration between the President Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao was a significant climate announcement: The Obama administration will offer concrete emission reduction targets as part of next month's negotiations, as long as the Chinese offer a climate proposal of their own.

This is such nonsense. The agreement is not enforceable, so each side will do nothing and say it is waiting for the other side to go first. Then each can claim the other side is the problem.

Everyone knows that any policy toward global warming that has any chance of adoption will in fact have no effect. Everyone also knows that any policy that would actually reduce emissions to a signifcant degree would be incredibly costly.

So what's the answer? Repeal existing policies - like energy subsidies - that contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and that do not make sense in the first place. This makes sense no matter what one belives about global warming science.

The Jobs Summit

The Obama administration announced plans Monday to hold a forum on jobs and economic growth at the White House on Dec. 3, after which the president will go on the road to demonstrate his concern about the nation's rising jobless rate. ...

"During these difficult economic times, we have a responsibility to consider all good ideas to encourage and accelerate job creation in this country," Obama said in a statement.

We will see whether the administration is really willing to consider "all good ideas." The two that make the most sense are reductions in employment taxes and reductions in the corporate income tax. Yet I suspect those two are exactly the ideas that will get little or no attention.

Health Reform and Drug Prices

Even as drug makers promise to support Washington’s health care overhaul by shaving $8 billion a year off the nation’s drug costs after the legislation takes effect, the industry has been raising its prices at the fastest rate in years. ...

Drug makers say they have valid business reasons for the price increases. Critics say the industry is trying to establish a higher price base before Congress passes legislation that tries to curb drug spending in coming years.

Both the drug makers and the critics are right, of course: the only difference is that critics do not accept profit maximization as a legitimate goal for the drug makers.

The bigger problem posed by health reform is not just these increases in drug prices; it is the reduced incentive for innovation implied by spending controls going forward.

Was the Iraq War Worth It?

Samarra, where the U.S. military closed a key base this fall, in many ways embodies the Iraq that American forces are leaving behind as the troop drawdown begins in earnest. The fighting here, as in much of the country, has ebbed. Iraqi troops are indisputably in charge. Sectarian and ethnic divisions remain deep, but political feuds and fights for power are, by and large, not being waged on the street.

As the American military footprint thins out in places such as Samarra, many U.S. soldiers are returning home making a strong case that they are leaving behind a country with a fighting chance. Just how good Iraq's odds are remains an open question ...

Depending on whom you ask, this phase is the preface of peace -- or a prelude to the fight.

"If it doesn't somehow reach an equilibrium, those who are have-nots could find themselves with no alternative except for violence," said Lt. Col. Samuel Whitehurst, an infantry battalion commander whose unit departed Samarra a month ago.

My forecast for Iraq's future: renewed violence between Sunni and Shiite as the U.S. funding that has temporarily bought peace dwindles. And any pretense of democracy will vanish. In the end we will have replaced one authoritarian state with another, at enormous cost.