Kevin Drum 🕸

California has been experimenting with reading education lately. To simplify a bit, the state chose several dozen of its worst schools and introduced a phonics-based reading program in third grade. Here are the results: The authors say that the gain from the program is equal to 0.14 standard deviations, which is about a quarter of ...continue reading "In California’s worst schools, phonics works"

I haven't looked at the traffic on my blog for a long time, but tonight I got curious. After a bit of fiddling around, I came across this: What happened in August? And it's even stranger than it seems. Traffic didn't drop off a cliff on a single day, but gradually over a week: Monday, ...continue reading "A blog traffic update"

The New York Times has a pretty good piece today about the recent history of AI development among Silicon Valley techbros. (With the exception of a couple of brief asides, not a single woman is mentioned in the story.) I enjoyed reading it even though I'm already fairly familiar with this stuff. My favorite anecdote ...continue reading "Killer robots on Mars"

Tyler Cowen points today to a post from Robin Hanson expressing alarm at declining fertility rates: I’ve recently come to estimate that the world population and economy will suffer a several centuries fall, with innovation grinding to a halt, ended by the rise of Amish-like insular fertile subcultures.... As a result, I’ve been watching many ...continue reading "I don’t think the Amish are the future of America"

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin must be doing something right. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R–LetGodSortItOut) has lost confidence in him. Amazingly—even for Graham—all Austin said was that Israel should do more to protect civilians in Gaza or else risk driving Palestinians "into the arms of the enemy." That's it. You'd think even Graham would acknowledge the pragmatic ...continue reading "Lindsey Graham wants more civilian casualties in Gaza"

Paul Graham posted a list of Yale majors yesterday sorted by how easy the grading was in each one. Economics was the toughest: only 52% of all grades were A's. History of Science clocked in as the easiest with 92% A's. This got me curious: does easy grading attract more students? Apparently not: There are ...continue reading "Do Yale students congregate in easy majors?"

When Ron DeSantis was a week away from being sworn in as governor of Florida, aides asked him what Bible he wanted to use for the ceremony: DeSantis, who is Catholic, told them his family did not own a Bible.... Staff members for DeSantis had to buy a Bible for $21.74 on Amazon and have ...continue reading "Ron DeSantis doesn’t own a Bible"

Have you been keeping up with the latest COVID variants? Let's review: January 2023: Omicron XBB 1.5 becomes dominant. July: Two variants, EG.5 and FL.5.1, dubbed FLips because of their specific mutations, become prominent. October: HV.1, a mutation of EG.5, becomes prominent. Now: JN.1, nicknamed Pirola, starts to appear. It isn't prominent yet, but it's ...continue reading "Keeping up with COVID"

The federal government's fiscal year began two months ago and Congress still hasn't passed a defense appropriations bill. But it's not too late: Lawmakers in both parties contend that, as speaker, Johnson is committed to passing a final bill and continuing the over six-decade streak of defense legislation becoming law each year, even if it ...continue reading "BREAKING: Congress funds the military every single year"

Adolf Hitler was famously voted into power and then appointed chancellor of Germany in 1933. There would not be another German election for more than a dozen years. We all know how this went: Germany started a war in 1939 which the Allies eventually won, killing about 3% of Germany's civilian population in the process. ...continue reading "Israel and its enemies"

Boxes come and go around here. Some get used for a while and some are one-hit wonders. Who knows why? But through it all, this box is everyone's favorite. It's been sitting next to the sofa for many years and will probably stay there for many more.

Over at the Washington Post, Philip Bump questions Sean Hannity's claim that both California and Florida have suffered about the same death rate from COVID-19: “Both your states, with such different approaches, which is pretty fascinating, were both lower, significantly lower than the national average,” he said. “These numbers come straight from the [Centers for ...continue reading "Who did COVID better, California or Florida?"

You don't have George Santos to kick around anymore. But at least we can still throw his ass in jail.

I watched the first half hour of tonight's debate between California governor Gavin Newsom and Florida governor Ron DeSantis, but that was all I could take. So I have no idea who "won" or "lost." But just to set the record straight on something I think Newsom didn't make clear enough, it really is true ...continue reading "Raw data: Taxes in California and Florida"

MSNBC canceled Mehdi Hasan's weekly show today. Twitter is alive with accusations that this was done because Hasan is outspokenly progressive and pro-Palestinian. Or did it happen because of low ratings? You decide: Hard to say, isn't it? Hasan's ratings over the past half year have been fairly steady, although he's lost a good chunk ...continue reading "Why was Mehdi Hasan canceled?"

If you want to see the difference between Democrats and Republicans in action, just consider the issue of congressional subpoenas. In the House, Republicans have subpoenaed Hunter Biden to provide testimony in a case where there's no evidence whatsoever of any wrongdoing. Nonetheless, Biden has agreed to testify and has asked only for the hearing ...continue reading "Republicans apparently think Republicans can never be subpoenaed"

Palm trees silhouetted against a rainbow near John Wayne Airport.

Kevin McCarthy has long been a loyal foot soldier for Donald Trump, but when House Republicans were preparing to oust him from the speakership Trump was nowhere to be found. McCarthy called Trump to ask why he hadn't offered any support: During the call, Trump lambasted McCarthy for not expunging his two impeachments and not ...continue reading "Trump knifed Kevin McCarthy over obsession with expungement"

Today's inflation news is all good: On a monthly basis, core PCE inflation was down to 2.0%, which is the Fed's target rate. Headline inflation was even better, clocking in close to zero. On a year-over-year basis, headline inflation came in at 3.0% and core inflation at 3.5%. POSTSCRIPT: Now that inflation is going down ...continue reading "Inflation cools to near zero in October"

From Elon Musk, asked what he thinks about companies that have stopped advertising on Twitter in response to antisemitic comments—including one of his own—posted a couple of weeks ago: Go fuck yourself. Musk is once again demonstrating his keen understanding of the business world here. Advertisers don't like having their ads appear next to hate ...continue reading "Quote of the day: Twitter and its sponsors"