Eastern European Jews and Communism referred to from an Economist blog.

David Bernstein had a blog-post in part on Freud which led me to comment with some thoughts I had been wanting to put on my blog:

There is a study that looks at hospitalized adolescents diagnosed with Borderline Personality treated with psychoanalytic (Freudian) methods vs. a control group that does better over 2 years in rates of rehospitalization over 2 years or other quality of life measures. Those sorts of things are possible. Also is ‘David Bernstein’ unscientific because he can’t scientifically prove that his name should be ‘DB?’ I mean how can you prove that his mother got the name right? In part, Freud developed a language. Ego and Mechanisms of Defence by his daughter who signed her name ‘Annafreud’ is very useful in that regard. Take a clinical thought example. You see the ads where the drug Seroquel or Abilify added to antidepressants helps with depression. These drugs were first of all indicated for schizophrenia which might be said to be characterized by the person not knowing what was happening inside or outside themselves, a loss of (ego) boundaries. Well David finds some threat to his self esteem by Brian Leiter’s attacks but he is able to set up a wall and say, ‘Well, you know that’s Brian (that’s not me). And, just to further establish that, let’s cite evidence as to what an odd monkey Brian is (case closed).’ OTOH, we may have a young man whose fiance’ broke up with him. There is, at least, some, probably more than implied, criticism of him. He can’t however regulate his self esteem within his own ego; that (image of) other person has become part of him and he has a narcissistic injury as well as an object loss. The antipsychotic drug Invega, ultimately, is given on the hypothesis that it will help him establish an ego boundary and rescue him from being suicidal. And it works.
Now one might say that Kraepelin, who systematized diagnosis in the early twentieth century is usually more relevant and correct than Freud or that Freud’s excluding Alfred Adler and his ‘will to power’ that may be a predecessor to Cognitive Therapy was incorrect. But there is the model of the mind and other things, but if that’s the sort of thing you like you’ll probably want a different explainer, that have contributed to the clinical science of psychiatry. However it might also be pointed out that psychoanalysis may appear to be like case law. It is built on the success in one reported case starting with certain previous findings from case law and going on to some successful outcome; the rules uncovered along the way may be applied to another similar case and so the ‘case law’ is expanded and refined. (Quote)

Been kind of an exciting political week. I like Perry's opening statement and boy has he raised some controversy. I enjoyed the debate over at Volokh. Jon Huntsman looks like he needs to learn to have empathy for forces in the American electorate. I thought he might be a good candidate. Greg Mankiw has a good recorded discussion of officials with or formerly with the fed. And of course it's bye-bye Qaddafi and will Parkland still have Medicare money.

Am really enjoying Dallas Public and Private: Aspects of an American City, a book by a, then, Neiman Marcus executive, on Dallas, it's development and social psychology at the time of the Kennedy assassination. Kind of fun for me, one of the first individuals he mentions in explaining Dallas, Robert Glenn, M.D. is someone I knew. He mentions him in the context of his moving to town and leasing an apartment at a swank address, 3525 Turtle Creek, that address sign curled the numbers on itself snake or Art Deco like. About arriving there on moving to Dallas, Dr. Glenn said, 'I didn't know any better.' A quarter century later he told me buying country property which was later bought for the new DFW airport area turned out to make him some money, a good preppy boy who stumbled blindly into money it seems.

Books on the Vietnam War including one looking at the effect on the Vietnamese. Also The Vietnam War: An Assessment by South Vietnam's Generals (Modern Southeast Asia)

Enjoying The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War
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Nice post on the political science of 'The Deficit Mess' by Judge Posner.

The Norway Murders

I thought Claudia had the best comment, #41, in a very unfortunate situation.

It's all Greek to me

RE: the Euro crisis, there is an obvious at least partial solution that I have not seen discussed. The problem is the stickiness of wages and prices on the downside. To take the previously discussed example of Greece, were it not in the Euro, the Greek currency would be devalued and Greeks would work for less. This would keep them employed though their labor would be less valuable in world currency terms. As our language gives evidence, '2-4-6-8 who do we appreciate,' pieces of 8, the Spanish currency, were once legal tender in the US as was British currency. Why can't the Greek government pay its workers and pensioners in drachmas and make the drachma a legal tender in the country along with the Euro. It could be floated relative to the Euro, started at a useful conversion rate. A 'useful rate' that the Greek government and employers could see continuing employment at a lower pay scale.