Martin Luther King Jr. and Barack Obama

The links between Martin Luther King Jr. and Barack Obama are hard to miss. Obama's historic election as the first African American President of the United States seemed to echo the stirring words of King's 1963 speech at the Lincoln Memorial:

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

Obama's inauguration took place on Tuesday, January 20th 2009, the day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This Monday—one year later—Martin Luther King Jr. Day will again be celebrated, and with the one-year mark of Obama's presidency imminent, connections between the two men will again be drawn—including the fact that both were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. But an examination of Obama's December-10th acceptance speech suggests some striking differences.

The Nobel committee's selection of Obama so early in his presidency was controversial. Fuel was added to the fire when, just nine days before accepting the prize, he announced that he was sending 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. His acceptance speech was unapologetic:

We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth: We will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes. There will be times when nations -- acting individually or in concert -- will find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified.

Yet he went on to say:

I make this statement mindful of what Martin Luther King Jr. said in this same ceremony years ago: "Violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones." As someone who stands here as a direct consequence of Dr. King's life work, I am living testimony to the moral force of non-violence. I know there's nothing weak -- nothing passive -- nothing naïve -- in the creed and lives of Gandhi and King.

Can you feel a "but" coming?

But as a head of state sworn to protect and defend my nation, I cannot be guided by their examples alone. I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people.

So there it is. King and Gandhi had great "moral force", but, apparently unlike them, Obama faces "the world as it is". This strikes me as a shocking distortion: King and Gandhi were deeply involved in practical action, and indeed were instrumental in bringing about change.

The rhetorical pattern we see here is repeated throughout Obama's speech. Moral principles are praised (as long as they remain principles), but "hard truth" is emphasized. Carefully crafted oratory is used to sell the Orwellian idea that "War is Peace". But the awkward fact remains that Martin Luther King Jr. was a proponent of non-violence. What does Obama make of that?

The non-violence practiced by men like Gandhi and King may not have been practical or possible in every circumstance, but the love that they preached -- their fundamental faith in human progress -- that must always be the North Star that guides us on our journey.

It would appear that non-violence can be dispensed with when required. What is apparently fundamental is something rather vague and comforting: "love" and "faith in human progress". Of course Martin Luther King Jr. did talk above love, but as a basis for moral decisions rather than a distraction from them.

King's 1964 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech is strikingly different from Obama's, as this excerpt suggests:

After contemplation, I conclude that this award which I receive on behalf of [the civil rights movement] is a profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time - the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts. Negroes of the United States, following the people of India, have demonstrated that nonviolence is not sterile passivity, but a powerful moral force which makes for social transformation. Sooner or later all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Martin Luther King Jr.'s words apply to the world as it is in 2010, just as they did in 1964.

Update (18-Jan-2010): Jeff Nall has written an excellent piece on "How Obama Betrays Reverend King’s Philosophy of Nonviolence".

War is bad for your health

U.S. health care spending per capita is the highest in the world. Yet, as The Economist notes, "America lags behind other wealthy countries in the overall performance of its medical system". It might seem ironic then, that the same magazine has stated that the U.S. "offers the best health care in the world." But keep reading:

If you are lucky enough to have proper insurance and be admitted to the Mayo Clinic, the UCLA Medical Centre or Johns Hopkins, you will enjoy outstanding treatment. Unfortunately, as the tens of millions of uninsured and underinsured have discovered, America offers some of the most unreliable, costliest and least equitable health care in the world too.

The U.S. spends around 17% of its GDP on health care. This compares to Canada where we have a publicly-funded system, and spend around 9%.

Now there are lots of complexities here and I don't mean to oversimplify. The Canadian health care system is far from perfect, although I think most Canadians are bemused by the outlandish depictions some American demagogues present. In any case, the fact is health care costs have been spiralling here just like in the U.S. As President Obama struggles to enact health care reform, people wonder, "Where will we get the money?" Canadians are asking the same question.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Asia ...

... we have some nasty little wars going on. According to the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, the U.S. spends $771 a second on Afghanistan and $3973 a second on Iraq. Oh, that's $2 billion/month and $10.3 billion/month respectively. Canada isn't involved in Iraq, but the total projected costs of the Canadian involvement in Afghanistan are "up to" $18.1 billion. (Those quotes express a certain skepticism on my part.)

And how are things going in Afghanistan?

Overall security conditions throughout much of Afghanistan continued to deteriorate during the quarter. In May and June, the frequency of insurgency attacks nationally was higher than in any month since the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001.

The CBC reports that, to date,

Since 2002, 131 Canadian soldiers have been killed serving in the Afghanistan mission. One diplomat and two aid workers have also been killed.

There is no mention of Afghans. Nor—and this raises another point—is there any mention of soldiers who were wounded. Soldiers who may well require ongoing medical care. And how do you measure the costs of post-traumatic stress disorder?

Diagnosis

We are pouring money down the drain on unnecessary, unwinnable wars, all the while wringing our hands about where we'll get the money to pay for decent health care.

Al Gore defies the laws of probability

As if the huge success of An Inconvenient Truth followed by winning the Nobel Peace Prize wasn't enough, now Al Gore is defying the laws of probability! At least in terms of probable outcomes of the U.S. Democratic nomination and the presidential election itself.

Intrade, the leading commercial prediction market lets you bet on political outcomes. For example, "Barack Obama to win 2008 US Presidential Election" is currently trading at 47.5, meaning the market believes there's a 47.5% chance Obama will be the next president.

What's the probability that Al Gore will win the Democratic nomination? As I write this, the market believes it's 1.7%. Seems fair enough ...

... until you look at the probability that Al Gore will be the next president. Curiously, the market believes that's 2.1%. How could that be? Don't you have to win the nomination before you have a chance of becoming the president? (My 13-year-old daughter points out that perhaps Gore could run as an independent, but hey, we're Canadians, so this is a great mystery to us. So for now, let's leave this possibility aside.)

Let's do a few probability calculations (note that the vertical bar | means "given than"):

Prob(Gore pres.)
= Prob(Gore pres. & Gore nom.)
= Prob(Gore pres. | Gore nom.) * Prob(Gore nom.)

Therefore

Prob(Gore pres. | Gore nom.)
= Prob(Gore pres.) / Prob(Gore nom.)

So

Prob(Gore pres. | Gore nom.)
= 2.1%/1.7% = 123.5%

Therefore, if Gore is nominated, the probability he'll be elected president is 123.5%!

Of course there's no such thing as a probability above 100%, which suggests that something is amiss. Perhaps there is a belief that Gore might run as an independent, which would invalidate my assumption that he would have to win the Democratic nomination in order to become president. Or perhaps at any given time the prediction market isn't strictly coherent in the Bayesian sense that it should be consistent with the axioms of probability.

My interpretation is that Gore remains sufficiently attractive as a presidential candidate that if he were nominated, the chances of him winning the election are very high. But not quite 124%.