News comes from the state of Georgia that a SWAT team looking for a Meth dealer tossed a stun grenade into a crib causing serious burns and unknown other injuries to a baby that is now in a coma.
And the Meth dealer wasn't there.
All this happened at 3 a.m.
You would think a these para-military police could have pursued some course of action other than one that requires the tossing of a stun grenade into a baby's room.
This is hardly the 1st time, SWAT police have raided the wrong house causing grievous harm to innocent people.
This is the United States of America. Innocent people should not be subject to violent para-military actions by policemen. The police have an obligation to be 100% sure they are after the right people and not to use excessive means when there may be innocent people around like a 19 month old baby in a crib.
A meth dealer is not someone who should be allowed to operate freely, but neither is he Osama bin Ladan. The police need to take care before they use equipment that harms people in a situation they are not sure of.
For example, why not roll a stun grenade into a room along the floor? Why fling it into a crib or bed?
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Why are Conservatives so Upset by Piketty's Work?
After I thought Conservatives would welcome Piketty's analysis that income inequality is a normal part of an economy, they are instead trying to discredit it.
I can only assume that is because it seems proof that trickle down economics does not work in a globalizing economy with expanding labor pools, which is the situation for the last 30 years and which will likely continue for another 20 years or so.
Conservative voices will have to come up with some new policies that at least pay lip service to improving the economic life of the lower half of the population.
That might include Universal Health Insurance which encourages labor mobility and immigration reform to bring 11 mm undocumented people into the formal economy and increasing our own labor pool.
I can only assume that is because it seems proof that trickle down economics does not work in a globalizing economy with expanding labor pools, which is the situation for the last 30 years and which will likely continue for another 20 years or so.
Conservative voices will have to come up with some new policies that at least pay lip service to improving the economic life of the lower half of the population.
That might include Universal Health Insurance which encourages labor mobility and immigration reform to bring 11 mm undocumented people into the formal economy and increasing our own labor pool.
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
The NRA and It's Supreme Court Supporters are a form of State Sponsored Terrrorism
My old headline which follows did not generate any hits.
Gun Control is Constitutional!!!!!
We will just have to wait for a different makeup of the Supreme Court that isn't interested in rewriting the law in a political way as Antonin Scalia and his brethren have.
This is a must read for those discouraged by the NRA's success in making automatic weapons freely available to every malcontent young man.
Link to "What the Framers Really Meant"
Gun Control is Constitutional!!!!!
We will just have to wait for a different makeup of the Supreme Court that isn't interested in rewriting the law in a political way as Antonin Scalia and his brethren have.
This is a must read for those discouraged by the NRA's success in making automatic weapons freely available to every malcontent young man.
Link to "What the Framers Really Meant"
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Angry White Men and the Danger They Pose to National Defense
Which is why in my heart I still identify with old fashioned Rich Guy Republican politics and I became a RINO in 1992 and left the GOP in 1998 to become a Democratic leaning independent. Of course, now the GOP has so alienated me that I am a mainstream Democrat.
Why has this happened and how does it pose a threat to National Defense?
A column in the NY Times today showed how immigrant citizens are very successful economically in Red States vs native born. "In the poorest states, foreign-borns are 24% less likely than native-borns to report themselves as divorced or separated. In the poorest states, foreign-born are 36% less likely than native borns to live in poverty.".....poor state native borns are "a battered working class suffering from a dearth of work, community and hope, with many people failing to form strong bonds and filling the void with escapist chemicals."
While such generalities are never true for all, they do represent what may well be the source of the anger that feeds the Tea Party, a predominantly lower income white citizen organization. If I lived in my hometown and was trapped in a house I could not sell without sufficient income for much beyond surviving, I would be angry too. Where is my American dream?
Link to Advantage Immigrant
Of course, decisions made by every individual during their lives, has an impact on their standing and happiness today and eventually we all run out of time to improve that standing. So that leads to angry older voters.
But what does this have to do with national defense. The only economic reason to not have a carbon tax (and/or cap & trade) is that it will unfairly place an economic burden on rural citizens who drive a lot. These are people who are already angry and don't have a lot of spare cash.
But meanwhile, our addiction to oil keeps the barrel price of oil high and feeds money to support Islamic fundamentalism, Iranian fanaticism and Putinism. These are the U.S.'s greatest national security issues.
A carbon tax and cap & trade, accompanied by tax code revisions to equate US corporate taxes with the rest of the world and reduce individual tax rates, so the overall effect is revenue neutral; would bring down the price of energy as consumption changes and improves our national security by reducing revenue to bad regimes.
It would also contribute to less than trend global warming, but that would be a side benefit, not the primary goal which is create market incentives to foster alternative energy consumption patterns and reduce the flow of funds to our enemies.
This is where those angry white men come in. They don't believe in global warming and they sure as hell don't want a higher gas tax even if it is needed to fix roads and bridges. They want to keep those marginal funds in their wallet. (follow the $ as always)
Democratic candidates need to challenge these voters. Would they rather send their children and grandchildren off to war or pay higher gas taxes? Climate change, whether or not man causes it, will generate threats to national security and the military will have stuff to do. That is why the Defense Department considers climate change to be a national security issue. Most climate change antagonists are only denying that humans are causing it, not that it is happening.
So as Thomas Friedman writes this morning, we can either get going on trying to do something positive or we can continue down this same path that poses risks to our national security. And it is the angry white men Tea Party that is preventing Rich Guy Businessmen GOP from supporting reasonable actions to improve the U.S. carbon foot print.
Link to Friedman column
Finally, I read Michael Lewis's review of Timothy Geithner's book. I agree with his lack of anger toward Geitner's (Obama's) policies towards the banks and appreciate his view that Geithner had little choice in his actions. I also agree that the one trait Geithner exhibits is honest analysis, which is so rare in political D.C.
Link to Book Review
My one personal encounter with Geithner was in 2000 when the Emerging Market's Creditor's Association had a meeting with him seeking his support for our view that Creditors have rights. He listened politely and then told us exactly why the U.S. government would not support our view. He didn't try to appease us or convince us that his view was correct, he simply told us the truth which was the U.S. government could not take a position contrary to what was best for the U.S. government. And we were then ushered out of his office and back onto Amtrak for our return trip to NYC with no false illusions about his position.
Why has this happened and how does it pose a threat to National Defense?
A column in the NY Times today showed how immigrant citizens are very successful economically in Red States vs native born. "In the poorest states, foreign-borns are 24% less likely than native-borns to report themselves as divorced or separated. In the poorest states, foreign-born are 36% less likely than native borns to live in poverty.".....poor state native borns are "a battered working class suffering from a dearth of work, community and hope, with many people failing to form strong bonds and filling the void with escapist chemicals."
While such generalities are never true for all, they do represent what may well be the source of the anger that feeds the Tea Party, a predominantly lower income white citizen organization. If I lived in my hometown and was trapped in a house I could not sell without sufficient income for much beyond surviving, I would be angry too. Where is my American dream?
Link to Advantage Immigrant
Of course, decisions made by every individual during their lives, has an impact on their standing and happiness today and eventually we all run out of time to improve that standing. So that leads to angry older voters.
But what does this have to do with national defense. The only economic reason to not have a carbon tax (and/or cap & trade) is that it will unfairly place an economic burden on rural citizens who drive a lot. These are people who are already angry and don't have a lot of spare cash.
But meanwhile, our addiction to oil keeps the barrel price of oil high and feeds money to support Islamic fundamentalism, Iranian fanaticism and Putinism. These are the U.S.'s greatest national security issues.
A carbon tax and cap & trade, accompanied by tax code revisions to equate US corporate taxes with the rest of the world and reduce individual tax rates, so the overall effect is revenue neutral; would bring down the price of energy as consumption changes and improves our national security by reducing revenue to bad regimes.
It would also contribute to less than trend global warming, but that would be a side benefit, not the primary goal which is create market incentives to foster alternative energy consumption patterns and reduce the flow of funds to our enemies.
This is where those angry white men come in. They don't believe in global warming and they sure as hell don't want a higher gas tax even if it is needed to fix roads and bridges. They want to keep those marginal funds in their wallet. (follow the $ as always)
Democratic candidates need to challenge these voters. Would they rather send their children and grandchildren off to war or pay higher gas taxes? Climate change, whether or not man causes it, will generate threats to national security and the military will have stuff to do. That is why the Defense Department considers climate change to be a national security issue. Most climate change antagonists are only denying that humans are causing it, not that it is happening.
So as Thomas Friedman writes this morning, we can either get going on trying to do something positive or we can continue down this same path that poses risks to our national security. And it is the angry white men Tea Party that is preventing Rich Guy Businessmen GOP from supporting reasonable actions to improve the U.S. carbon foot print.
Link to Friedman column
Finally, I read Michael Lewis's review of Timothy Geithner's book. I agree with his lack of anger toward Geitner's (Obama's) policies towards the banks and appreciate his view that Geithner had little choice in his actions. I also agree that the one trait Geithner exhibits is honest analysis, which is so rare in political D.C.
Link to Book Review
My one personal encounter with Geithner was in 2000 when the Emerging Market's Creditor's Association had a meeting with him seeking his support for our view that Creditors have rights. He listened politely and then told us exactly why the U.S. government would not support our view. He didn't try to appease us or convince us that his view was correct, he simply told us the truth which was the U.S. government could not take a position contrary to what was best for the U.S. government. And we were then ushered out of his office and back onto Amtrak for our return trip to NYC with no false illusions about his position.
Saturday, May 24, 2014
The Problem With Aggregate Demand: Debt and there is no easy answer
For sure it over indebtedness from housing by which 30 to 50 year olds transferred to much wealth to certain older people who in turn transferred it to even older people who are spending it on healthcare in their retirement and offsetting their investment losses in the Great Recession.
Everyone lost by there being too much credit available for investment in housing and reducing the resulting debt is going to be a continuing drag on the economy. Instead of people in their 30's spending money on consumption and services, they are directing spare cash to debt reduction.
But it is not just mortgages, it is also student loans which pay for the cost of providing an education via increases in debt. Now, I know that for most of these people, the outstanding debt burden at graduation relative to income in that 1st job is not too much different then mine was when I graduated from business school.
What is different is the extensiveness and breadth of this student loan debt. Millions of graduates (20 to 30 year old's) now have debt and when you add that to the mortgage debt, millions of people are dedicating their financial life to debt repayment.
Previously most of the debt was concentrated in those who got professional degrees. People who got professional degrees could expect rapid increases in income 20-30 years ago. They used that increased income to repay the debt and then spend/save/invest. And the blue collar workers and college graduates who did not have debt had money from their jobs to spend/save/invest.
Now, the factory jobs are reduced in number because of globalization, the jobs that people with college degrees used to be able to attain now require Master's, which in turn requires debt. And many of these jobs today do not offer the same prospects for wage increases over time. So it will take longer to repay the debt and move into the spend/save/invest stage. And there are no defined benefit pension schemes anymore, so these people will also save more (hopefully) for their retirement. In short, they will not be adding to aggregate demand in the same way the baby boomers did.
My niece is going to attend one of the best programs in environmental management and it is going to cost her $50,000 (Tuition, room, books, food, health insurance, utilities) for the 1st year of a 2 year program. Hopefully, she will get a job paying her $35,000 or $40,000 a year when she is done.
$100,000 investment to get a job paying $40,000 a year. I know she is following her passion but something seems terribly wrong.
Why do so many jobs requires Master's degrees? What happened to on-the-job training? Why aren't colleges controlling costs better?
Speculating on an easy summary of those issues is probably a book. The only point I wanted to make is that no amount of tax cuts is going to create the aggregate demand necessary to create employment if the money is simply going to debt repayment. You need spending on useful things by the government (infrastructure) to increase aggregate demand, generate economic growth and increase the total amount of employment. That will increase wages and make the repayment of all this debt easier.
Trickle down economics does not work in a timely manner because the wealthy are neither numerous enough nor does their spending in the aggregate increase economic growth sufficiently to create a shortage of labor.
We are in for a very long period of slow growth due to inadequate aggregate demand.
Everyone lost by there being too much credit available for investment in housing and reducing the resulting debt is going to be a continuing drag on the economy. Instead of people in their 30's spending money on consumption and services, they are directing spare cash to debt reduction.
But it is not just mortgages, it is also student loans which pay for the cost of providing an education via increases in debt. Now, I know that for most of these people, the outstanding debt burden at graduation relative to income in that 1st job is not too much different then mine was when I graduated from business school.
What is different is the extensiveness and breadth of this student loan debt. Millions of graduates (20 to 30 year old's) now have debt and when you add that to the mortgage debt, millions of people are dedicating their financial life to debt repayment.
Previously most of the debt was concentrated in those who got professional degrees. People who got professional degrees could expect rapid increases in income 20-30 years ago. They used that increased income to repay the debt and then spend/save/invest. And the blue collar workers and college graduates who did not have debt had money from their jobs to spend/save/invest.
Now, the factory jobs are reduced in number because of globalization, the jobs that people with college degrees used to be able to attain now require Master's, which in turn requires debt. And many of these jobs today do not offer the same prospects for wage increases over time. So it will take longer to repay the debt and move into the spend/save/invest stage. And there are no defined benefit pension schemes anymore, so these people will also save more (hopefully) for their retirement. In short, they will not be adding to aggregate demand in the same way the baby boomers did.
My niece is going to attend one of the best programs in environmental management and it is going to cost her $50,000 (Tuition, room, books, food, health insurance, utilities) for the 1st year of a 2 year program. Hopefully, she will get a job paying her $35,000 or $40,000 a year when she is done.
$100,000 investment to get a job paying $40,000 a year. I know she is following her passion but something seems terribly wrong.
Why do so many jobs requires Master's degrees? What happened to on-the-job training? Why aren't colleges controlling costs better?
Speculating on an easy summary of those issues is probably a book. The only point I wanted to make is that no amount of tax cuts is going to create the aggregate demand necessary to create employment if the money is simply going to debt repayment. You need spending on useful things by the government (infrastructure) to increase aggregate demand, generate economic growth and increase the total amount of employment. That will increase wages and make the repayment of all this debt easier.
Trickle down economics does not work in a timely manner because the wealthy are neither numerous enough nor does their spending in the aggregate increase economic growth sufficiently to create a shortage of labor.
We are in for a very long period of slow growth due to inadequate aggregate demand.
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Jessie Eisinger is simply wrong
1st, I apologize for auto correct typos that appeared in yesterday's post. I have fixed them if anyone cares to reread it.
Jessie Eisinger blasted the Obama Administration and Timothy Geithner for a plethora of failings in revamping the economy from a liberal point of view in a column today in the NY Times.
Link to Column
I cannot begin to tally all the ways in which I disagree with his desires and will simply focus on certain key points.
It starts with his headline. Consensus is bad. Well, it might seem that way when you are battling Tea Party conservatives who have pushed all the moderates out of the GOP. But the fact remains that the middle still determines state wide and national elections. And the middle does not support a New York City style liberal agenda. The success the Democrats have had since 1992 is completely based on middle of the road balancing, developing consensus, and accepting conservative ideas while advancing policies that help people. Consensus is the only way while being true to policy direction.
When a country is in crisis as the U.S. was in January 2009, the 1st priority is to stabilize the system. That means focusing on stabilizing demand and making sure the environment is safe for peoples savings and the allocation of credit. That means a stable banking system, which is a must for economic growth at all times. You can't destroy the banking industry.
The banks that conducted the most heinous activities have failed. The mortgage originators who committed the heinous activities have lost their jobs and hopefully suffered a great deal. The only ones who continue to suffer are the shareholders as the banks that picked up the pieces, stabilized the system, and continue to allocate credit, are paying billions of dollars to various levels of government for activities that were conducted by the failed predecessor companies. Of course, the shareholders benefit from these monies reducing the budget deficit and raising the P/E of industrial companies as investors avoid the banking system.
Mr. Eisinger ignores reality when it doesn't line-up with his view just like the GOP does much of the time. If the liberals are not cognizant of the center, they will not appeal to the center and then we will have GOP administrations doing all kinds of damage to advance the conservative policies.
Mr. Eisinger states a lost opportunity for a host of theoretical solutions that would have had to been paid for by someone. While he focuses on a hatred for the banks, he drags in the ACA. Now I do support a single payer plan but the reality is that a few hundred thousand people work in the health insurance industry. When the unemployment rate is above 10% and the long term unemployment rate is sky rocketing, you don't regulate the layoff of few hundred thousand people, who are probably unemployable. You don't regulate the hiring of tens of thousands of people by Medicare. You don't make the country intrude upon the private sector with a sudden shift. Bad stuff happens and you lose the voters in the middle.
Just look at the angst in the middle the ACA has caused without changing anything other than the rules that the health insurance industry must comply with! To believe that a single payer plan would have gone more smoothly is poppycock.
But Mr. Eisigner is really off base with his desire to put bank executives in jail. I am as appalled as anyone by the anarchy in the mortgage origination market between 2004 and 2008. It has cost me personally over a million dollars in lost income and investments and with that the certainty of being able to continue to live in the NY metro area forever.
But Mr. Eisinger is simplistic in his belief that you can prosecute people for general bad business decisions. You have to prove fraud, deception and other things that specifically illegal. Someone in the ivory tower who approves a broad business direction without approving specific acts down in the branches is guilty of only bad management which is not a crime.
If you really wanted to convict people who brought all this down on us, you would have to jail every real estate broker who helped someone buy a house they could not afford, you would have to jail every real estate loan broker who passed the paperwork on, you would have to jail everyone in the chain that processed that mortgage, you would have to jail everyone in the securitization business who sent those bad mortgages onto investors, you would have to jail the people in the rating agencies who rated the securities investment grade, you would have to jail the investment managers who bought those bonds and cost their investors money.
Real estate is a systemic issue and needs systemic regulation. Putting people in jail is not the issue. Good regulation is the issue. And I do not understand why the new FHFA regulator is loosening standards at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Jessie Eisinger blasted the Obama Administration and Timothy Geithner for a plethora of failings in revamping the economy from a liberal point of view in a column today in the NY Times.
Link to Column
I cannot begin to tally all the ways in which I disagree with his desires and will simply focus on certain key points.
It starts with his headline. Consensus is bad. Well, it might seem that way when you are battling Tea Party conservatives who have pushed all the moderates out of the GOP. But the fact remains that the middle still determines state wide and national elections. And the middle does not support a New York City style liberal agenda. The success the Democrats have had since 1992 is completely based on middle of the road balancing, developing consensus, and accepting conservative ideas while advancing policies that help people. Consensus is the only way while being true to policy direction.
When a country is in crisis as the U.S. was in January 2009, the 1st priority is to stabilize the system. That means focusing on stabilizing demand and making sure the environment is safe for peoples savings and the allocation of credit. That means a stable banking system, which is a must for economic growth at all times. You can't destroy the banking industry.
The banks that conducted the most heinous activities have failed. The mortgage originators who committed the heinous activities have lost their jobs and hopefully suffered a great deal. The only ones who continue to suffer are the shareholders as the banks that picked up the pieces, stabilized the system, and continue to allocate credit, are paying billions of dollars to various levels of government for activities that were conducted by the failed predecessor companies. Of course, the shareholders benefit from these monies reducing the budget deficit and raising the P/E of industrial companies as investors avoid the banking system.
Mr. Eisinger ignores reality when it doesn't line-up with his view just like the GOP does much of the time. If the liberals are not cognizant of the center, they will not appeal to the center and then we will have GOP administrations doing all kinds of damage to advance the conservative policies.
Mr. Eisinger states a lost opportunity for a host of theoretical solutions that would have had to been paid for by someone. While he focuses on a hatred for the banks, he drags in the ACA. Now I do support a single payer plan but the reality is that a few hundred thousand people work in the health insurance industry. When the unemployment rate is above 10% and the long term unemployment rate is sky rocketing, you don't regulate the layoff of few hundred thousand people, who are probably unemployable. You don't regulate the hiring of tens of thousands of people by Medicare. You don't make the country intrude upon the private sector with a sudden shift. Bad stuff happens and you lose the voters in the middle.
Just look at the angst in the middle the ACA has caused without changing anything other than the rules that the health insurance industry must comply with! To believe that a single payer plan would have gone more smoothly is poppycock.
But Mr. Eisigner is really off base with his desire to put bank executives in jail. I am as appalled as anyone by the anarchy in the mortgage origination market between 2004 and 2008. It has cost me personally over a million dollars in lost income and investments and with that the certainty of being able to continue to live in the NY metro area forever.
But Mr. Eisinger is simplistic in his belief that you can prosecute people for general bad business decisions. You have to prove fraud, deception and other things that specifically illegal. Someone in the ivory tower who approves a broad business direction without approving specific acts down in the branches is guilty of only bad management which is not a crime.
If you really wanted to convict people who brought all this down on us, you would have to jail every real estate broker who helped someone buy a house they could not afford, you would have to jail every real estate loan broker who passed the paperwork on, you would have to jail everyone in the chain that processed that mortgage, you would have to jail everyone in the securitization business who sent those bad mortgages onto investors, you would have to jail the people in the rating agencies who rated the securities investment grade, you would have to jail the investment managers who bought those bonds and cost their investors money.
Real estate is a systemic issue and needs systemic regulation. Putting people in jail is not the issue. Good regulation is the issue. And I do not understand why the new FHFA regulator is loosening standards at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
What Conservatives Do Not Like to Discuss
The only interesting articles in The New Republic last week were book reviews both of which prompted the Headline.
1st, the Constitutional backdrop to Tea Party thought was discussed in a review of The Classical Liberal Constitution: The Uncertain Quest for Limited Government by Richard Epstein. Epstein is not a Constitutional Lawyer but rather an expert on Torts, Property and Contracts who developed an interest in the 5th Amendment's Taking Clause, which forbids the federal government from taking people's property except for public use for which proper compensation must be paid.
Now Epstein is no slouch intellectually. He is professor at my Alama Mater, the University of Chicago. But the U of C encourage intellectual thought without requiring a basis in reality or consequences in the belief that reality and consequences should only be brought into a discussion once a concept is being vetted. In other words, it should not preclude the development of a thought.
Epstein believes that the principles of common law should be honored. This includes respect for contracts, protection of private property and an individual right, but no collective right, for compensation for injuries. When in doubt, the law should uphold the sanctity of contracts and privateness. This is the basis of the Tea Party's constitutionalism.
What it ignores is the harm that such respect places on society and how society has evolved to protect both itself and the rights of individuals who are harmed by other's exercising their individual right. When conflict between basic rights occurs, the law (both legislative and judicial) has the Constitutional basis to resolve such conflicts. That is why the Constitution is allowed to change and be interpreted. We cannot live simply with the laws of 1789.
If you had a government of the Tea Party, we would still have dirty air and water because there would be no right to inhibit private business for uncompensated pollution control equipment. But it is compensated because these regulations are passed onto the public in pricing. There is a non-legal basis for compensation and the EPA has a constitutional right and a practical societal role to play in keeping our environment as clean as possible. The GOP hates the EPA.
Laissez-faire government would be one where there are few rules, discrimination against anyone would be legal and anarchy because of the lack of rules which inhibit individual freedom. No safety net because Ayn Rand thinks that makes people lazy. No inhibition on any drugs. No standards for anything.
But of course, Conservatives stand for the status quo. The other book review examines The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Emancipation by David Brion Davis. Slavery was thought of as normal even in Judeo-Christian thought until there was a sea change in cultural values and moral perception. "The slave had to be seen as fellow human being no longer subject to animalization." Most conservatives of the 1st half 19th century in the U.S.A. did not want to rock the boat on slavery because that would be bad for business. Given the view that slaves were property, for which no compensation would be paid, the same principles that the Tea Party believes in were used by the South as justification to continue slavery and start the Civil War.
So when the Tea Party and other conservative GOP factions support various things to suppress voters against whom the GOP practices economic discrimination by refusing to support a livable minimum wage; by refusing to support affordable access to routing health care; by refusing to acknowledge science is a fact based analysis of our universe; they are continuing to practice the principles that supported slavery in a different time and place.
But all this is complicated and the GOP does not need to discuss such things with most voters. They just need to get them riled up about something. So they focus on anything they can that makes the Democrats look bad, and ignore anything that might improve the lives of Americans and make our government truly more efficient.
Fox News and other GOP media outlets will raise hell over a $15 muffin paid for by government budgets for breakfast meetings, but ignore Northrup Grumman, overcharging the Defense Department over $100 mm for improper charges. They ignore the fact that the Defense Department lost $6.6 bn of cash in Iraq. No wonder there is so much killing going on in Iraq. There is literally billions of dollars in play for nefarious activities.
The GOP is not interested in consistent government, they are only interested in gotcha government and only when it suits them. I don't think they are particularly interested in competent government as they only want to shrink the government in some belief that if government is run incompetently people will want less in government services. That will never happen.
People like their rules, they don't like anarchy. They like to be safe and they like their entitlements. The GOP cannot win if they advocate what they really believe in so they don't talk about it.
1st, the Constitutional backdrop to Tea Party thought was discussed in a review of The Classical Liberal Constitution: The Uncertain Quest for Limited Government by Richard Epstein. Epstein is not a Constitutional Lawyer but rather an expert on Torts, Property and Contracts who developed an interest in the 5th Amendment's Taking Clause, which forbids the federal government from taking people's property except for public use for which proper compensation must be paid.
Now Epstein is no slouch intellectually. He is professor at my Alama Mater, the University of Chicago. But the U of C encourage intellectual thought without requiring a basis in reality or consequences in the belief that reality and consequences should only be brought into a discussion once a concept is being vetted. In other words, it should not preclude the development of a thought.
Epstein believes that the principles of common law should be honored. This includes respect for contracts, protection of private property and an individual right, but no collective right, for compensation for injuries. When in doubt, the law should uphold the sanctity of contracts and privateness. This is the basis of the Tea Party's constitutionalism.
What it ignores is the harm that such respect places on society and how society has evolved to protect both itself and the rights of individuals who are harmed by other's exercising their individual right. When conflict between basic rights occurs, the law (both legislative and judicial) has the Constitutional basis to resolve such conflicts. That is why the Constitution is allowed to change and be interpreted. We cannot live simply with the laws of 1789.
If you had a government of the Tea Party, we would still have dirty air and water because there would be no right to inhibit private business for uncompensated pollution control equipment. But it is compensated because these regulations are passed onto the public in pricing. There is a non-legal basis for compensation and the EPA has a constitutional right and a practical societal role to play in keeping our environment as clean as possible. The GOP hates the EPA.
Laissez-faire government would be one where there are few rules, discrimination against anyone would be legal and anarchy because of the lack of rules which inhibit individual freedom. No safety net because Ayn Rand thinks that makes people lazy. No inhibition on any drugs. No standards for anything.
But of course, Conservatives stand for the status quo. The other book review examines The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Emancipation by David Brion Davis. Slavery was thought of as normal even in Judeo-Christian thought until there was a sea change in cultural values and moral perception. "The slave had to be seen as fellow human being no longer subject to animalization." Most conservatives of the 1st half 19th century in the U.S.A. did not want to rock the boat on slavery because that would be bad for business. Given the view that slaves were property, for which no compensation would be paid, the same principles that the Tea Party believes in were used by the South as justification to continue slavery and start the Civil War.
So when the Tea Party and other conservative GOP factions support various things to suppress voters against whom the GOP practices economic discrimination by refusing to support a livable minimum wage; by refusing to support affordable access to routing health care; by refusing to acknowledge science is a fact based analysis of our universe; they are continuing to practice the principles that supported slavery in a different time and place.
But all this is complicated and the GOP does not need to discuss such things with most voters. They just need to get them riled up about something. So they focus on anything they can that makes the Democrats look bad, and ignore anything that might improve the lives of Americans and make our government truly more efficient.
Fox News and other GOP media outlets will raise hell over a $15 muffin paid for by government budgets for breakfast meetings, but ignore Northrup Grumman, overcharging the Defense Department over $100 mm for improper charges. They ignore the fact that the Defense Department lost $6.6 bn of cash in Iraq. No wonder there is so much killing going on in Iraq. There is literally billions of dollars in play for nefarious activities.
The GOP is not interested in consistent government, they are only interested in gotcha government and only when it suits them. I don't think they are particularly interested in competent government as they only want to shrink the government in some belief that if government is run incompetently people will want less in government services. That will never happen.
People like their rules, they don't like anarchy. They like to be safe and they like their entitlements. The GOP cannot win if they advocate what they really believe in so they don't talk about it.
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Report From the Road II
Yes, I am a busy traveler. This time to Virginia for some family college graduation celebrations. I 81 is now as busy as I 80.
On Monday, I was cut from from my desired career reinvention (after being told Friday to update my Linked-In page). They did this on the basis of an assessment that my personality was not of the type that successfully builds a group. They said I was formal and inflexible.
I could disagree with that, but they don't know how I relate well with blue collar workers and professionals of all persuasions. They don't know what a master networker I became when I was unemployed 13 years ago. They don't know how I fit in and motivated my staff with an informal style that was much appreciated at my last two real jobs. They obviously don't appreciate that a marketing company that has a personality driven business must be accepting of personalities of varying types. They are obviously not as great a company as I thought they were when I agreed to proceed with them. C'est la Vie!
On some other points. I noted that the U.S. Defense Department considers climate change to be a grave risk to U.S. interests. I doubt the GOP will notice which is strange given their propensity to believe whatever the DOD says is real.
I have been silent on Putin because he has taken a grave turn for the worse and any good solutions need Europe to adopt different energy consumption patterns and that is not easy.
Science denial is as dangerous on the left as it is on the right. GMO grains have been consumed for at least 15 years and no one is the worse for it. The only way we are going to feed 9 or 10 billion people which is the likely plateau level for global population is to use GMO foods.
NYC should not be surprised, the laws of economics (supply/demand and clearing prices) work. When you have rent control and building restrictions collide with affluence, the poor and lower middle class get pushed out and you end up with a shortage of affordable housing.
On Monday, I was cut from from my desired career reinvention (after being told Friday to update my Linked-In page). They did this on the basis of an assessment that my personality was not of the type that successfully builds a group. They said I was formal and inflexible.
I could disagree with that, but they don't know how I relate well with blue collar workers and professionals of all persuasions. They don't know what a master networker I became when I was unemployed 13 years ago. They don't know how I fit in and motivated my staff with an informal style that was much appreciated at my last two real jobs. They obviously don't appreciate that a marketing company that has a personality driven business must be accepting of personalities of varying types. They are obviously not as great a company as I thought they were when I agreed to proceed with them. C'est la Vie!
On some other points. I noted that the U.S. Defense Department considers climate change to be a grave risk to U.S. interests. I doubt the GOP will notice which is strange given their propensity to believe whatever the DOD says is real.
I have been silent on Putin because he has taken a grave turn for the worse and any good solutions need Europe to adopt different energy consumption patterns and that is not easy.
Science denial is as dangerous on the left as it is on the right. GMO grains have been consumed for at least 15 years and no one is the worse for it. The only way we are going to feed 9 or 10 billion people which is the likely plateau level for global population is to use GMO foods.
NYC should not be surprised, the laws of economics (supply/demand and clearing prices) work. When you have rent control and building restrictions collide with affluence, the poor and lower middle class get pushed out and you end up with a shortage of affordable housing.
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Report From the Road
I was struck by one overriding awareness during a trip to San Diego for a week. While I was flying and eating at restaurants, I was struck by the diversity of our population. When I first started flying in 1977, almost every passenger was caucasian.
On my airplanes, waiting at O'Hare for my connection, and even at my hotel, the mix of people put the caucasian percent in the area of 50% - 60%, in my estimation. That is not precise, but when you are eating an Indian Restaurant and the table next you is a Japanese American family speaking English like Southern Californian's, you know assimilation is still at work.
This is something the GOP ignores at it's peril. If you promote policies that hurt one minority, you poison the well with other minorities.
As for the airplanes, they were full and smaller than they used to be. Coming home non-stop, I was on a 737 for a cross country flight.
And for one other miscellaneous thought. I have decided people who read the news on-line and comment/participate in polls are a decidedly more conservative group of people. Examples are too numerous to cite, but today's version was a poll in the Daily Star (near my hometown) which asked if the minimum wage should be increased. My hometown is GOP oriented and a non-growing minimum wage economy (it is rural) so I sort of expected the poll to be at least 50/50. Instead, it was 65% against an increase, thus prompting me to comment on it here.
On my airplanes, waiting at O'Hare for my connection, and even at my hotel, the mix of people put the caucasian percent in the area of 50% - 60%, in my estimation. That is not precise, but when you are eating an Indian Restaurant and the table next you is a Japanese American family speaking English like Southern Californian's, you know assimilation is still at work.
This is something the GOP ignores at it's peril. If you promote policies that hurt one minority, you poison the well with other minorities.
As for the airplanes, they were full and smaller than they used to be. Coming home non-stop, I was on a 737 for a cross country flight.
And for one other miscellaneous thought. I have decided people who read the news on-line and comment/participate in polls are a decidedly more conservative group of people. Examples are too numerous to cite, but today's version was a poll in the Daily Star (near my hometown) which asked if the minimum wage should be increased. My hometown is GOP oriented and a non-growing minimum wage economy (it is rural) so I sort of expected the poll to be at least 50/50. Instead, it was 65% against an increase, thus prompting me to comment on it here.
Saturday, May 3, 2014
Friday, May 2, 2014
Build the Pipelines in Return for Cap & Trade & "Network" shows us why we are where we are
We re-watched "Network" last night, the 1976 movie on how the pressures of capitalism create the forces that produce what the masses will watch and the lengths people will go to preserve their path to economic success. Providing products that a greater number of people will buy is what capitalism is all about.
So when RedStateVT complains about the trash in movies and games, he is correct, but also fighting a futile war just as I am when I detest talk radio bullish*t. All this stuff sells and short of censorship, which no one is advocating, you just have to deal with all this.
David Brooks today muses about where this age of electronic entertainment has taken us. I can personally add to that because I have noticed how my addiction to card games on my iPhone has shortened my attention span. Turning 60 might also have something to do with that, but I don't know about that. David is disappointed with this because he thinks people who don't study culture are missing one of the meanings of life. It is a philosophical point that I agree with, but also one that has always found a limited audience in the masses.
Link to David Brooks column
I must reiterate that I hate NIMBY's. If you don't build pipelines, economic necessity will force the products to travel by other means. Clearly, it is not safe to ship liquid energy raw materials by train. It is not economic or environmentally efficient to ship them by road. If you don't want the risk of train cars exploding in someone's neighborhood, you have to build some pipelines. It is both environmentally and economically sound. As a trade-off, perhaps the GOP could support Cap & Trade in return for as many pipelines as are needed.
How many exploding trains do we need to convince environmentalist's that we need pipelines? There is dangerous water pollution from leaking rail cars. Meanwhile, the Sierra club opposes new pipelines in NY State that eliminate surface transport. Do they think 13 million people can live somewhere without using any energy? I know the Sierra Club is hopeless because they are just as bad as the Koch Brothers only coming from the other direction.
So when RedStateVT complains about the trash in movies and games, he is correct, but also fighting a futile war just as I am when I detest talk radio bullish*t. All this stuff sells and short of censorship, which no one is advocating, you just have to deal with all this.
David Brooks today muses about where this age of electronic entertainment has taken us. I can personally add to that because I have noticed how my addiction to card games on my iPhone has shortened my attention span. Turning 60 might also have something to do with that, but I don't know about that. David is disappointed with this because he thinks people who don't study culture are missing one of the meanings of life. It is a philosophical point that I agree with, but also one that has always found a limited audience in the masses.
Link to David Brooks column
I must reiterate that I hate NIMBY's. If you don't build pipelines, economic necessity will force the products to travel by other means. Clearly, it is not safe to ship liquid energy raw materials by train. It is not economic or environmentally efficient to ship them by road. If you don't want the risk of train cars exploding in someone's neighborhood, you have to build some pipelines. It is both environmentally and economically sound. As a trade-off, perhaps the GOP could support Cap & Trade in return for as many pipelines as are needed.
How many exploding trains do we need to convince environmentalist's that we need pipelines? There is dangerous water pollution from leaking rail cars. Meanwhile, the Sierra club opposes new pipelines in NY State that eliminate surface transport. Do they think 13 million people can live somewhere without using any energy? I know the Sierra Club is hopeless because they are just as bad as the Koch Brothers only coming from the other direction.
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