Russian Officials Raid BP Office - WSJ.com
Isn't it strange that this happens after the deal with Exxon is signed. Certainly elucidates the advantages of doing business with gangsters.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Exxon In Multibillion-Dollar Russian Arctic Deal : NPR
Exxon In Multibillion-Dollar Russian Arctic Deal : NPR
OK! Now, consider that in the eyes of the Supreme Court Exxon is considered to have the same rights as a citizen of the United States. If Exxon is allowed to dump unlimited money into political campaigns what is to keep them from financing people who support their alignment with Russia? It is more than obvious that this corporation is not concerned with the welfare of the United States, only its bottom line.
OK! Now, consider that in the eyes of the Supreme Court Exxon is considered to have the same rights as a citizen of the United States. If Exxon is allowed to dump unlimited money into political campaigns what is to keep them from financing people who support their alignment with Russia? It is more than obvious that this corporation is not concerned with the welfare of the United States, only its bottom line.
Cheney: Iraq War Did Not Hurt Reputation Of U.S.; Was Sound Policy : The Two-Way : NPR
Cheney: Iraq War Did Not Hurt Reputation Of U.S.; Was Sound Policy : The Two-Way : NPR
What planet does this guy live on? Surely not the same one that I do. Maybe he just dropped in from an alternate reality in which Germany won WWII.
What planet does this guy live on? Surely not the same one that I do. Maybe he just dropped in from an alternate reality in which Germany won WWII.
Chicago blues great David ‘Honeyboy’ Edwards dies at 96 - Chicago Sun-Times
A link to the past is broken. Honeyboy appeared at our Master Musician's Festival once or twice. Most recently just a couple of years ago.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Budget politics clouds hurricane aid - Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer - POLITICO.com
Budget politics clouds hurricane aid - Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer - POLITICO.com
For all you folks on the East Coast. Tough!! You're just going to have to go it alone. Is that what we want from our country?
For all you folks on the East Coast. Tough!! You're just going to have to go it alone. Is that what we want from our country?
Cantor: Hurricane Disaster Relief Will Have To Be Offset With Program Cuts (VIDEO) | TPMDC
Cantor: Hurricane Disaster Relief Will Have To Be Offset With Program Cuts (VIDEO) | TPMDC
this is why a balanced budget amendment will not work.
this is why a balanced budget amendment will not work.
Rick Perry: Social Security Is, In Fact, A Ponzi Scheme | TPMDC
Is this the best that the GOP can do? If this guy can be elected then we deserve to suffer the consequences. The GOP is having trouble coming up with a candidate who can keep his or her shoes out of his or her mouths. That's OK. It paints in stark contrast the options before the people.
Obama praises Georgia jobs program to train the unemployed - Aug. 29, 2011
I can think of a few kinks but the idea that we can support employment with governmental assisted benefits is a hopeful track.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Newport Folk 2011: Mavis Staples, Live In Concert : NPR
Her first appearance at Newport was in 1960. You do the math.
Newport Folk 2011: The Civil Wars, Live In Concert : NPR
Most of you never heard of them but some of the best vocals in a uniquely Americana style.
Friday, August 26, 2011
What do we expect our country to do?
Mission Strength
Last year when the President sent some 30,000 troops to Afghanistan it seemed to be quite a large number. What most people don't know is that that number only provided for some 5,000 to 6,000 men and women engaged in combat. Why? Because of the numbers of people required to provide logistical support for those fighters. No one questions these numbers because it is the Generals and nobody wants to be accused of not supporting our fighting men and women. The Pentagon gets what it wants.
Fooled you!! I'm not going to talk about military policy and wars. I am, however, going to talk about logistical support and troop strength. My point will be that the same holds true for other things that require front line people. Those front line people require the logistical support to accomplish their mission. If we understand that it will require a given number of troops to accomplish the mission then we can also understand that it will require a given number to accomplish another mission, military or not.
Let's take Child Welfare. We know that there are thousands and probably millions of children out there who are not being properly cared for. If we define our mission as being one of ensuring that those children are properly fed and clothed and not mistreated then we understand that it will take a given number of Social Workers to accomplish the mission. How many children can we expect a single social worker to supervise? How many children will be protected by one person. Is it 10, 50 or more. Would it surprise you to know that a social worker will sometimes have hundreds of open cases to oversee. Would it surprise you to know that we often have to rotate front line people out because of the stress of dealing with the overload. Do you think the mission can be accomplished with these inadequate numbers any more than it was not possible to accomplish the mission in Afghanistan without more troops? And if we require more front line troops doesn't it follow that we need many more for logistical support? People to ensure that food is in the pipeline, education is occurring so that the cycle of abuse is broken, training and education for parents who either won't or can't provide what the child needs. It seems obvious but we don't do that. Instead we find it cheaper to just send a check and work our social worker into a nervous breakdown. But it is not cheaper because it ignores the long term reality of dealing with a person who is more prone to drug addiction, crime and a life that also requires support rather than contributing to society.
What about teachers? We ask them to prepare our young to take our place in the world and to ensure that we are cared for in our advanced years. We ask them to ensure that we have educated and prepared people that can carry our country's economy and vision into the future and to protect the values we hold dear. We often ask them to provide parenting and counseling to children who do not receive it at home for the aforementioned reasons. By every calculation we are failing to complete the mission and yet instead of sending in more troops we are cutting deployments. It is a strategy CALCULATED to fail. The budgets for education are some of the first to go when government fails to properly fund the services demanded by its citizens. Now we have those who say that our teachers are coddled, paid too much and receive benefits well out of reach for most people. Would it surprise you to know that our teachers are often paid less than they would be paid in the private sector? Would you be surprised to know that when you are sitting down to dinner there are many teachers who are still at school for extra-curricular activities? Yes, teachers are sometimes provided with good health care plans and good retirement benefits. Is that too much for people who are relied on to fulfill such a crucial role in our society? Or is it just possible that we don't pay them enough nor do we have enough of them?
When a person completes his or her education is it the best use of that investment to just toss him or her into the potential work force to sink or swim? Or could we provide some logistical support by partnering with businesses and other potential employers to see that that person's skills are given a chance to take root?
Here is my point. Just as it is in the military there are societal missions. They can be defined and the troop strength requirement can be calculated. If we can calculate the troops necessary to accomplish the mission then we can calculate the support troops we need to ensure that the front line people have the materiel to do their jobs.
This is not rocket science. If you decline to send enough front line troops, social workers, etc. then the mission will fail. If you do not provide logistical support for the front line troops, social workers, etc. the mission will fail. Then you have the costs of dealing with failure of the mission which is usually much more than ensuring success would have cost. Societies have missions and they require funding. Just as we have spent trillions in tax cuts and wars we have not adequately supported the missions of our government and we are experiencing the costs of failure and it is calculated to get worse if we don't turn it around.
We can ensure that waste and fraud do not exist in Medicare, Social Security and other missions but it requires logistical support to police. What we can't do is to continue to bray about being taxed too much when government is simply doing what we asked it to do.
My take on the lack of planning and logistical support for our societal missions.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Alabama Alligator Hunting Season 2011 | al.com
This is a gator I would not like to meet without heavy weaponry and more nerve than I usually have.
When Right-Wing Extremism Moves Mainstream : NPR
strategy to destabilize government to defeat Obama in 2012. Some of these groups are just plain scary. In my home area if you have friends then a lot of them are conservative but I don't think any would dive off the deep end.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Proof of Natural Selection. Let nature take its course.
This just in from a friend in Alabama.
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Shhh!
A Little Silence, Please.
I have been a student and observer of the political process for most of my adult life. The governmental process has always interested me and often confounded me. I can still recall the first time I realized that people either holding or seeking political office did not always do the right thing for the right reasons. Sometimes they would even do the wrong thing for the wrong reason which usually was political preservation. I have even been a sometime participant in the political process in the form of campaigning and such and it takes a lot out of a person to run for office and for someone to actively campaign for someone for office. I can understand why we see people resigning from office and choosing to not seek office.
But there are also rewards other than the obviously narcissistic ones. Some seek office believing they are uniquely qualified to bring about some desired result. The fact of the matter is they may be qualified but not uniquely so. For a person to assume otherwise is the beginning of hubris and eventual downfall. As with many things, some of our leaders have not had extraordinary talents but have had perseverance and a vision while those of obvious talents have become ineffective. It is largely a matter of chance I think.
We have become a nation of voyeuristic prisoners held captive by a 24 hour news cycle that rushes to stay ahead of the next headline. There must be a new one each day or people will tune somewhere else to get the fix for their addiction. The pressure on the news outlets such as Fox News, CNN, MSNBC and others to continually be drawing attention to their programming is essential if they are to be able to sell time on their networks for the promotion of products. That is the essence of broadcast journalism. Don't get me wrong. There are still some great journalists in broadcast journalism but even they will acknowledge that they are subject to the pressures of the Neilson Ratings. We are seeing on the news networks the trend toward creating their own news. We see journalists, and I use the word broadly, trying to catch someone in an error of speech or just something that they can make a 30 second spot out of or the parading of the same scenes of some horrible happening that we just can't tear our eyes away from. I don't want to allow the responsibility to fall on the journalists alone because the truth is that those things would not be getting the time if we didn't watch them.
The debt ceiling, Casey Anthony, the Norwegian Killings, tornadoes in Missouri and Alabama, floods, oil spills, Katrina and the list is endless. Of course, we want to know the news but do we really need to be inundated with it repetitively until the next lead story comes up?
Our political process is hamstrung by the constant attention and the ability of interest groups to bring an intense focus on someone or something. While we wish our representatives would have the courage of their convictions we insist that theirs be the same as ours or we will have their heads. It is plain to see that some respite from the glare of the lights might actually have a cooling effect on tempers and allow cooler heads to prevail.
We are caught in a crossfire of verbiage hurled at us incessantly. The words are cleverly constructed to enhance an emotional response for the greatest effect. The wordsmiths know well their craft. If they have not had years of experience then they can augment their craft with the knowledge of sociologists and other experts in human behavior. Don't be lulled into thinking that what you are watching repeatedly during the day is unscripted, breaking news. The large portion of it is not and you can tell the difference if you choose to do so.
I have made a great many mistakes in my life. I have been absolutely certain of things only to find I was mistaken. I have always held the opinion that more information is good and less only hinders our decision making process. I am rethinking that proposition. As with many good things it seems that we have drank a little too deeply and foundered on the excess. Jefferson always held that an educated populace was essential to the survival of the republic but there seems to be a difference between education and inundation. Education requires some time of silence to consider the prospect while inundation seeks to instill precepts without the benefit of thought. Simply hearing more does not educate more.
These are dreary times indeed but we are inundated with that message. We may be dreary but the times are not as dreary as the times of my parents and grandparents. Now those were hard times. Now we are rich but perhaps just not as rich as we thought. Times are difficult but we still have the wherewithal to make it better.
I was looking for something to write about other than the same he said-she said and name calling. I would like to say to the news outlets, as if I mattered, to just shut up for a while. You are not as important as you think you are. Play music or something. Let's let the heavy hitters try to work something out without us screaming at them and breathing down their necks. And I would like to say to you, lighten up. In spite of what the talking heads say it is not the end of life as we know it. them. Try to enjoy life and friends even if you don't agree. Try to find something to agree one.
That is my take on the continual barrage of noise, not that I think it will make any difference.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Weyants World: August 10, 2011 - TheHill.com
http://thehill.com/images/stories/weyants/2011/cartoon---08-10-11.big.jpg
CHART OF THE DAY: *Government* Jobs Led To Perry's Economic Boom | TPMDC
It is too bad that it takes more than 10 seconds to explain this which is why it won't get airplay on Faux News. If the Prez can encapsulate this in a 15 second sound byte maybe he can run with it.
Texas Job Growth Trend Stretches Back For Decades : NPR
The story about the Texas job growth touted by Governor Perry.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Just Think About It
Think About It
The idea of it being a good practice for government to take action to stimulate the economy by increasing federal spending is under attack by some who think we should never spend beyond what our revenues are. However, exactly what constitutes government stimulation is the subject of much discussion.
Suffice it to say that anytime government takes money and directs it into private hands then government stimulation has occurred. As a matter of fact, the defense industry and other entities spend millions, if not billions, of dollars to lobby the members of Congress for legislation favorable to their specific causes. The money that flows to their coffers from the taxpayer is federal stimulation just as much as was the money delivered through the “Cash for Clunker” plan. Last year my business profited from the deduction offered to people who replaced their inefficient heating and air conditioning equipment with newer more efficient equipment. I can tell you that I was glad to get it. The nation profited from the decreased reliance on fossil fuels and foreign energy sources.
The “entitlements” as people are currently fond of calling them are federal stimulation also. They have real names and serve real purposes. Social Security, Medicare, Veteran's Benefits, Tricare, and Medicaid are a few of them. I think when we refer to “entitlements” we should call them by name. I suppose that every one of us either has received or knows someone who has benefited from those programs. It's a lot different when we make it more personal. Some will say that we worked for those benefits and paid into them our entire lives. Yes, we did. But the amount that we paid into funding those programs will not come close to funding what many of us receive. The sustainability of Social Security depends on some of us dying before we get old enough to collect or, if we collect then dying before we withdraw all we put in. Of our social programs it is the ones that provide medical care that are the biggest problem due to the escalating cost of providing care, especially as we age. I think the question is whether or not we want those benefits for our parents, daughters, sons, and grandchildren. I don't think there will be many of limited means who will reject them.
We spend from 1/3 to ½ of our budget on military expenditures. It depends on whether or not you count the disabilities and veteran's care in those expenses. Or interest on the debt we have incurred to fund those military efforts. During previous eras we enacted taxes to pay for the wars and for the military budget but for the wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan we did not do so. We put them on the credit card. I'm not sure what people think we do with the money we spend on wars and such but we don't take the bulk of it to Afghanistan and just dump it out. We pay for guns, ammo, bombs, aircraft and other war materiel. We buy almost all of it from domestic industries who have stockholders and make a good profit on the sales. That is federal stimulation also.
We use federal dollars to build roads, bridges, airports and so on. Does anyone think that those dollars are ill spent? How does the public benefit other than being able to get in a traffic jam anywhere? We benefit from the increased commerce conducted at those places and from the taxes and jobs that commerce generates. Should we not do that. It is federal stimulation designed to induce certain outcomes.
The fact that federal stimulus has been used to generate commerce is not questioned. The question is whether or not it is the role of government to do that and the uses of that stimulation. There is what many are calling an existential debate going on in our country right now. It is the same one that we had at the founding of the republic and the period before our civil war. It has never gone away and is the source of disagreement in political parties. It is nothing new.
So, when you grumble over having to pay taxes are you saying that we don't need social programs or a military or are you saying you just don't agree with how the money is being used? There is a great difference. The first is an existential argument that severely limits the size and ability of government. The other reflects a general agreement with our form of government but thinks that perhaps we need to not spend that money that way. There is a difference. One is ideological and one is practical.
Oh, here are a few more methods of federal stimulation. The Earned Income Credit that supplements low income families with dependents, the Home Mortgage Interest Deduction that allows you to deduct the amount of interest you pay on your mortgage even if it is a second mortgage, a home refinance or for a second home. The personal deduction that each of us gets and the deductions for dependents. The amount that businesses can deduct for various things such as providing health care for its workers. Each is designed to induce a certain thing that someone feels benefits the nation. These are called the Tax Expenditures and result in almost ½ of the American people not paying any tax at all. Will you give back your tax deductions? I didn't think so.
I am going to end this with a reference to something I used in a previous column said by Robert Rubin. The deficit is the difference between what we ask government to do and the funding we generate to accomplish those purposes. Think about it.
My take on government stimulation. Write me.
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