RIP George McGovern

My 1st losing Presidential vote until Al Gore and I will admit that after the election I went on to ignore Mr. McGovern because he was irrelevant to anything I cared about.  And he ran a terrible campaign with the Eagleton mess.

However, as reader of history, I discovered over time what a hero and brave soul he was during WWII flying the maximum number of bomber missions over Germany.

And he was a politician who believed in family values having been married to the same woman for ever and not desiring to be in the limelight for any purposes of self satisfaction.  In his obituary I found the following quotes from him in 2011 on the importance of this election to the country and what the Democrats stand for.

“We are the party that believes we can’t let the strong kick aside the weak,” Mr. McGovern wrote. “Our party believes that poor children should be as well educated as those from wealthy families. We believe that everyone should pay their fair share of taxes and that everyone should have access to health care.”

With the country burdened economically, he added, there has “never been a more critical time in our nation’s history” to rely on those principles.

“We are at a crossroads,” he wrote, “over how the federal government in Washington and state legislatures and city councils across the land allocate their financial resources. Which fork we take will say a lot about Americans and our values.”

Thursday 10/18 musings

Why didn't either of the 1st two Presidential debates address medicare, medicaid and social security in some detail?

As for the economy, there is an interesting commentary in the 10/13/12 Economist on the differences in productivity measures between those working in urban settings vs  those working in rural settings.  It has real implications for what government policies should be in place and what people in rural settings should be thinking about for their own life choices and expectations.

And someone should ask Candidate Romney and the GOP Congressmen if they intend to close the Food and Drug Administration.  I think they do and I would like to know who would be dealing with this meningitis outbreak caused by a private pharmaceutical company if not for the FDA and the public health services throughout this country.  Government oversight is critical to protecting the trusting population from people who will take shortcuts to turn a profit for themselves.  There is a 200+ year history of scoundrels trying to make money off of fraudulent medicines and the population needs protection.

Obama 1 Romney .25

The totals are now Obama Biden 1.75 Romney Ryan1.5

Romney gets a 1/4 point for some legitimate digs at Obama and for being in favor of affirmative action.  That was a beautiful moment when Romney said "get me some female candidates for my jobs so we can have a balanced administration".  Will Romney appoint Supreme Court justices who believe likewise?

Obama held Romney's feet to the fire and showed his numbers do not add up.  How do you cut tax rates for everybody, eliminate taxes on interest and dividends and capital gains, increase defense spending and pay for it by limiting deductions to $25,000?  That does not add up and Romney had no rebuttal for it when pressed.  He just said it adds up!  This is a guy who knows how to run a business?  or was his business asset stripping which doesn't take as much skill.

Also, how does repealing Obamacare reduce the cost of health care to employers and create jobs?  Health costs and the cost of health insurance are steadily rising in the current system, the uninsured are still not getting preventive or early care in the current system; Obamacare tries to control these costs and may or may not be successful, but the one thing I know is that there is nothing in the current system that even tries to control these costs.  No one who is not hiring because of Obamacare would be hiring without Obamacare.  Anyone who says otherwise is not telling the truth.

Obama gets the full 1 point for pointing out what he has accomplished, the challenges he faced upon coming into office and promising to protect the things he cares about.

I may have missed it, but I don't think I heard any questions about Medicare (I tuned in 3 or 4 minutes late)

The Importance of the Democrat Republican Difference

On this slow Sunday when all three NY teams may well go down to defeat and I may or may not be screaming at the TV  (although if I watch one more Curtis Granderson strikeout I may commit hari kari), I am reminded about the real difference between Romney and Obama.

First, Nicholas Kristof highlights the importance of everyone being compelled to buy health insurance.  This long time friend of his did not and now his $500,000 plus cancer treatment bill is being absorbed by the system.  Romney refuses to say how he will control costs but he is bound and determined to end Obamacare and not try to find a way to end the problem of the uninsured.  We cannot control health care expenditures without ending the problem of the uninsured.  The uninsured get sicker because they don't go to the Dr sooner.  Early treatment of cancer might cost $100,000 and be successful so the individual returns to a productive life and pays back some of that expense through their health insurance premiums.  Late treatment costs as much as $500,000 and more potentially and likely results in death with no repayment from the individual.  And when such expensive treatment is not paid for, somewhere else in the system prices are raised and we all pay for it.

Link to Kristof article

There is also an article in the Times about how the 1%'s focus on preserving their wealth through a focus on lower taxes is destroying upward mobility.  And there is an article about a hard working woman who finds her profits going down because her city's economy is in a long term decline and she doesn't know what she can do to reverse it.  Both stories reflect political realities, but neither brings into the discussion the real issue at play here.

Link to "The Self Destruction of the 1%

Link to 2nd story

The real issue is globalization of everything.  The cost of doing business in the U.S. is too high relative to the rest of the world.  Costs are rising in the rest of the world and eventually, this will reverse and jobs will come back to the U.S. but it will not help today's workers who cannot compete in the Global Economy.  So what can be done for these people?

There is no magic bullet.  But universal health care would be a good start.  If we control the cost of health care, there will be more $ left over in employed people's wallets to spend on something else.  That will create jobs through the multiplier effect.

Spending $ to update our decaying infrastructure would also be a good start to employ construction workers who are not working.  This will create job through the multiplier effect.

Making sure our schools educated people to compete in the Global Economy is critical as well.  Support community colleges.  They are the market answer to control the ever rising price of college.

But the fiscal deficit must be cured over the intermediate term or debt will swamp the ability of the government to meet its obligations.  This means some form of Simpson Bowles must be passed.  This means revenues must be raised.  Romney has said he will not raise revenues.  Obama will raise revenues in a fair manner.  The 1% are competing in the Global Economy and doing fine.  They can afford to pay more.  In fact, the top 10% or 20% of the population is competing in the Global Economy and doing well enough to pay more in taxes.  But there must be expenditure control as well.  Simpson Bowles suggest a mix of 1/3 revenue 2/3 expenditure cuts.  Something in that neighborhood is the right answer.

Romney's policies will be heartless.  When people do not have health insurance, they make poor decisions.  Only by preserving Obamacare will we proceed down a productive path to finding balanced economic growth and preserving the social mobility contract that is so important to the psychology of the country.

NIMBY's Please Be Realistic

After the modern Republican Party, nothing gets my dander up more than NIMBY's.  Now I am not referring to all things here; as even I will agree that a nuclear power plant 30 miles from 12 mm people does not make sense and even I will agree that the environment needs to be looked after.  I am an environmentalist.  But we need energy and we need economic development.  Without either, we do not have employment opportunities for those who need work.

This means we need to drill for energy, not say no to everything as some do.  Just make sure they drill cleanly and safely.  Responsible drillers do that.  If you take the highest royalty check from some no name outfit, you have only yourself to blame for not dealing with a reputable firm.

We need pipelines to transport that energy, not say no to a pipeline that will be underground somewhere near you.  Oh boo hoo to the family somewhere in upstate New York where their bucolic horse pasture was going to have a gas pipeline buried underneath it.  Move the bloody horses during construction, make them replant grass, and move the horses back and get over it.   You are being paid for your trouble.

You can not be against drilling and pipelines and against wind farms on ridges or solar panels in your neighborhood.  Some greens are against all of this.  What do they want to do?  Ride horses and live by candle light at night huddled around a wood fire in the fireplace for warmth in the winter.  That economy ceased to exit 100 years ago and there is no going back.  If you want that, buy a farm and live however you want to.

Finally, what set this off today.  There is a closed golf course in White Plains, NY.  Like all Westchester golf courses, it is a lovely natural setting that the local wild life can frolic on.  The golf course failed because the economy for golf courses changed and no wanted to buy it as a golf course.  The City of White Plains thought about it, but a minority of its citizens golf and there is already a county owned golf course in White Plains, so it was not seen as a pressing need for city expenditure.  Particularly, when the French American School of New York wants to buy the land, build their school needs on it and preserve the rest as open space.  Now some people want the city to buy the land and build a park.  It would be nice to have this as a park, but the City really doesn't have the money to buy the land and the owners would like to get what they can for the land and the FASNY is offering a nice sum for the land.

Yes, fans of this blog, some residents of White Plains do not want the FASNY to get this land and operate their school on this fabulous property for a school.  Who in their right mind would not want something like FASNY to take over a vast property and maintain most of it as green space?  The alternative is a developer buying it and building estates on 1 to 2 acres.  That would add to the property taxes (which every municipality needs), but the green space would be eliminated.  These NIMBY's are not being realistic and they should be.  We all need to be realistic.

Go FASNY and Boo to the No FASNY sign holders.

Biden .75 Ryan .25

I would have given Joe a 1 but neither RSL nor I could stand his smirking.  Come on, you are over 60 and can't you control that sort of thing.  Now I will admit both RSL and I laughed out loud immediately upon Ryan's statement that the GOP Congress tried to be non-partisian.  That deserved more than a smirk upon reply.

But all in all, I thought Biden did a good job of describing how the Democrats would conduct themselves over the next 4 years and what they would try to accomplish.  I was glad Biden went into the importance of the Supreme Court appointments over the next 4 years.  I think I will bump him up to a .75 for that  (he was a .50 before I wrote that).

I give Ryan a .25 because he clarified Romney's "if you are around 60, you will get your medicare" to include 59 year olds like me.  (actually he returned to the standard of 55 year olds).

Actually, RedStateVT, maybe you should think about a vote for Obama so you can get to the right side of 55 before anything changes.

The GOP Has No Clothes On Embassy Security

"The purpose of the pre-election hearing, presumably, is to embarrass the administration for inadequate diplomatic security. But Issa seems unaware of the irony that diplomatic security is inadequate partly because of budget cuts forced by his fellow Republicans in Congress."

"For fiscal 2013, the GOP-controlled House proposed spending $1.934 billion for theState Department’s Worldwide Security Protection program — well below the $2.15 billion requested by the Obama administration. House Republicans cut the administration’s request for embassy security funding by $128 million in fiscal 2011 and $331 million in fiscal 2012. (Negotiations with the Democrat-controlled Senate restored about $88 million of the administration’s request.) Last year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Republicans’ proposed cuts to her department would be “detrimental to America’s national security” — a charge Republicans rejected."

From the Washington Post