I have remained firmly “undecided” on the portion of the national debate on immigration reform known as “a path to citizenship” until I watched the debate between candidates for Governor of California the other night. The idea that this country would round up and deport millions of people is both ludicrous and horrifying, but the unfairness of allowing people who broke the law to benefit from that action is faintly repugnant. It’s also a bit of a slap in the face to people who went through the process, and it is not an easy one, of coming to this country legally. I would feel that way even if I did not have a family member in that group.
It’s sort of like telling a bank robber to pay a fine and permitting him to keep the proceeds of his robbery, and it’s insulting to all of the people who stayed within the law by putting money into the bank before taking it out.
Nonetheless, my reaction when I heard Jerry Brown say that he favors a “path to citizenship” and to Meg Whitman when she said that she does not, made me realize that I do favor such a component to immigration reform. Yes, I know, my opinion of Whitman is such that I react negatively to pretty much everything she says, but that’s beside the point. I react negatively to Jerry Brown quite a bit, too, so it tends to cancel out.
I do think that such a “path” needs to be tempered by verification that the person has committed no violations of law (other than illegal entry) either in the country of origin or this one, there needs to be a fine paid for the illegal entry, and the person should go through all of the steps required for proper and legal entry.
I also think that the same piece of legislation that grants this “path” should contain a statement acknowledging the many people who have entered this country through proper and legal means, acknowledge their willingness to adopt not only this country but its spirit of honor and rule of law, and commend them for their patience, endurance and integrity.
Saturday, October 02, 2010
Friday, October 01, 2010
"Always in the last 30%"
Watching an interview with Bill Clinton last night and he made the following comment very casually, citing it as good news, “…that we’ve recovered 70% of the income we lost from the recession.” He went on to compare us to some other countries, “Germany’s at 60% Japan’s at 50%, U.K’s at 30%.” He admitted we’re not there yet. “We don’t have the jobs yet, because they come always in the last 30%.”
There are a couple of ways in which I find that quote rather disturbing.
I find it disturbing that the men and women who roll up their sleeves and go to work every day for a paycheck make up less than 30% of this nation’s economy. That is, of course, a wildly inaccurate reaction to his statement, since a large portion of them are working and being part of the economy. It is only the unemployed who are in that 30%, which is unrecovered loss and not the economy as a whole. Still, there is a casualness and flavor the to nature of that reference to jobs, sort of tossed in as an afterthought, that bothers me. It seems to slight the importance of jobs.
And, why do jobs come last? Why is job recovery “always in the last 30%” anyway? Why do the bankers, investment managers, corporations and stock holders all get their money back before the working man and woman gets to participate in the “recovery?”
Maybe I’m just a ten-year-old pouting that the world is not fair. It is what it is. Still, whatever the economic trend is doing, I don’t think that anyone in the political arena should even use the word “recovery” until wage earners are participating in it.
There are a couple of ways in which I find that quote rather disturbing.
I find it disturbing that the men and women who roll up their sleeves and go to work every day for a paycheck make up less than 30% of this nation’s economy. That is, of course, a wildly inaccurate reaction to his statement, since a large portion of them are working and being part of the economy. It is only the unemployed who are in that 30%, which is unrecovered loss and not the economy as a whole. Still, there is a casualness and flavor the to nature of that reference to jobs, sort of tossed in as an afterthought, that bothers me. It seems to slight the importance of jobs.
And, why do jobs come last? Why is job recovery “always in the last 30%” anyway? Why do the bankers, investment managers, corporations and stock holders all get their money back before the working man and woman gets to participate in the “recovery?”
Maybe I’m just a ten-year-old pouting that the world is not fair. It is what it is. Still, whatever the economic trend is doing, I don’t think that anyone in the political arena should even use the word “recovery” until wage earners are participating in it.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
"Crack Down"
Meg Whitman says we should get tough with those who employ illegal aliens. I could not agree more. We could start by not electing them Governor of California.
Note to/from ESPN
If it's time for SportsNation and both Colin and Michelle are absent, just cancel the show, dude. The show really struggles with either one of them gone, but without both of them... It's just not the show. Blow it off.
Quote of the day from Scott Van Pelt, an email from an LSU college student. "Nobody wants to set (football coach) Les Miles on fire because that would be murder, but if he's on fire and staggering through the campus it might be quite a while before anyone turned the garden hose on him."
Now that is a bit harsh. Admittedly there has been some risky play calling, but they are 4-0 against some pretty good teams, and they are ranked #12. They are at home against Tennessee this weekend. Geaux Tigers.
Alabama is at home against the abominable Florida. Roll Tide.
Quote of the day from Scott Van Pelt, an email from an LSU college student. "Nobody wants to set (football coach) Les Miles on fire because that would be murder, but if he's on fire and staggering through the campus it might be quite a while before anyone turned the garden hose on him."
Now that is a bit harsh. Admittedly there has been some risky play calling, but they are 4-0 against some pretty good teams, and they are ranked #12. They are at home against Tennessee this weekend. Geaux Tigers.
Alabama is at home against the abominable Florida. Roll Tide.
"She Filled Out A 1099"
Meg Whitman says that as far and she knew the housekeeper she hired was a legal resident because "she filled out a 1099" form. Interesting. I'm not sure that she helped her cause all that much with that statement.
A 1099 form is not something that a prospective employee fills out. The employer fills it out annually and sends it to the IRS to report payments made to a non-employee contractor, with a copy to the contractor. If the housekeeper was an employee, a 1099 would not be involved, and such a form certainly would not be filled out by the employee.
She may be thinking of the form I-9, which is a form confirming that the employer has verified eligibility for employment, but it is not filled out by the prospective employee. It documents that the employer has inspected and verified the validity of the prospective employee's identification, and in very specific format. It is filled out and signed by the employer, however, not by the prospective employee.
Meg Whitman is this high-powered business person, running for governor on the basis of her massive business acumen, and she doesn't know what forms 1099 and I-9 are? Really?
That sort of goes along with her record of not voting in past elections. She is campaigning for stronger employer verification requirements, but she doesn't even seem to know what the present requirements are.
A 1099 form is not something that a prospective employee fills out. The employer fills it out annually and sends it to the IRS to report payments made to a non-employee contractor, with a copy to the contractor. If the housekeeper was an employee, a 1099 would not be involved, and such a form certainly would not be filled out by the employee.
She may be thinking of the form I-9, which is a form confirming that the employer has verified eligibility for employment, but it is not filled out by the prospective employee. It documents that the employer has inspected and verified the validity of the prospective employee's identification, and in very specific format. It is filled out and signed by the employer, however, not by the prospective employee.
Meg Whitman is this high-powered business person, running for governor on the basis of her massive business acumen, and she doesn't know what forms 1099 and I-9 are? Really?
That sort of goes along with her record of not voting in past elections. She is campaigning for stronger employer verification requirements, but she doesn't even seem to know what the present requirements are.
Specious Argument
People should really think through the implications of their arguments. For instance, Democrats are refuting the claim of Republicans regarding “health care reform,” the ones about how it “is a government takeover” or that it “does too much.”
“No,” say the Democrats, “by a large margin people feel the reform should do more than it does, not less.”
Assuming that I am one who believes that, why should I vote to reelect the jackass who passed such a half measure? Why should I be madly in love with legislators who created a bill that does less than I want done?
Yes, I know, Republicans would not have done it at all, but that is really weak tea as an argument. Democrats are bragging about being half-assed as if it were a virtue. “We can pass half-assed bills.” This is pathetic.
I’m not going to argue about what “health care reform” actually does or doesn’t do. The truth is that it’s 7600 pages and nobody knows, or probably ever will know, what it does or doesn’t do. It doesn’t matter what it does or doesn’t actually do. My point is the argument itself.
At one and the same time supporters of those who passed the bill are making a point of saying that people wanted more than they got and that they should reelect the people who gave them less than they wanted. That’s just ridiculous.
“No,” say the Democrats, “by a large margin people feel the reform should do more than it does, not less.”
Assuming that I am one who believes that, why should I vote to reelect the jackass who passed such a half measure? Why should I be madly in love with legislators who created a bill that does less than I want done?
Yes, I know, Republicans would not have done it at all, but that is really weak tea as an argument. Democrats are bragging about being half-assed as if it were a virtue. “We can pass half-assed bills.” This is pathetic.
I’m not going to argue about what “health care reform” actually does or doesn’t do. The truth is that it’s 7600 pages and nobody knows, or probably ever will know, what it does or doesn’t do. It doesn’t matter what it does or doesn’t actually do. My point is the argument itself.
At one and the same time supporters of those who passed the bill are making a point of saying that people wanted more than they got and that they should reelect the people who gave them less than they wanted. That’s just ridiculous.
The Afghanistan Payoff
This is the way our government has worked since 2001. If the citizenry begins to get too restless, begins to show signs that is might not tolerate the way it is being treated, the government trots out the discovery of an Islamic terrorist plot with which to freak out the public and distract people from things that the government does not really want voters to be talking about. If anyone thought that a Democratic-controlled government was going to do anything differently with respect to the Global War On Terror than the Republican one did, this should put that little illusion to rest.
This one was nicely crafted, too, because the “inside guy” who gave the plot away was captured in Afghanistan, no less, and to make things even more lurid CNN reports that "al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden himself signed off on the latest plan," and it seems that the plotters have been attending the same mosque in Germany that was attended by the 9/11 hijackers.
What’s interesting is that this time the standard plan is not working very well. NBC Evening News seems to have made a rather big deal out of this, and all three networks played the government-released clip of a explosion showing what the Times Square bomber “was trying to achieve,” but other than that the media is still talking about unemployment and the failure of Congress to pass tax cut legislation.
Perhaps the “boy has cried wolf” once too often?
This one was nicely crafted, too, because the “inside guy” who gave the plot away was captured in Afghanistan, no less, and to make things even more lurid CNN reports that "al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden himself signed off on the latest plan," and it seems that the plotters have been attending the same mosque in Germany that was attended by the 9/11 hijackers.
What’s interesting is that this time the standard plan is not working very well. NBC Evening News seems to have made a rather big deal out of this, and all three networks played the government-released clip of a explosion showing what the Times Square bomber “was trying to achieve,” but other than that the media is still talking about unemployment and the failure of Congress to pass tax cut legislation.
Perhaps the “boy has cried wolf” once too often?
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Great Governator Debate
I swear I actually did watch the Great Governator Debate last night, and I did stay awake through the whole thing. It was reported today as being “contentious,” but I don’t think the writer of that article and I have quite the same definition for that word.
I took almost nothing away from it except that Meg Whitman is not trying to “buy the election,” she is merely using her money to “get her viewpoints out there.” I guess that means she doesn’t want anyone to vote for her. If, however, she is elected as governor she does not feel it would be her job to “boil the ocean.” I think I’m glad to hear that, but it’s not really consistent with her intention to suspend environmental regulation laws.
Jerry Brown says that he could have not done anything about the schools as Mayor of Oakland since the School Board is not under the Mayor but didn’t explain why, that being the case, he promised when running for that office to make the schools better. Nor did he explain how that was consistent with his boast that, as Mayor, he created a whole bunch of charter schools.
Meg Whitman, asked about her ads which FactCheck.org has labeled as “factually inaccurate,” replied that she does not accept the premise of the question and not only repeated the “facts” cited within the ads in question, but expanded on them. Take that, FactCheck.org.
Meg also is really sorry that she has never voted in any election since she has lived in California, and admits that “it was the wrong thing to do.” She did not go so far as to offer any explanation as to why she has never voted. She seems unclear on the whole election thing, actually; voter, votee…
Jerry Brown was asked to assure voters that he would really focus on the office if elected and assured us that he is too old to run for president again and that, since he is now married, he would not be hanging out in bars. Well, okay then, that gets my vote.
I took almost nothing away from it except that Meg Whitman is not trying to “buy the election,” she is merely using her money to “get her viewpoints out there.” I guess that means she doesn’t want anyone to vote for her. If, however, she is elected as governor she does not feel it would be her job to “boil the ocean.” I think I’m glad to hear that, but it’s not really consistent with her intention to suspend environmental regulation laws.
Jerry Brown says that he could have not done anything about the schools as Mayor of Oakland since the School Board is not under the Mayor but didn’t explain why, that being the case, he promised when running for that office to make the schools better. Nor did he explain how that was consistent with his boast that, as Mayor, he created a whole bunch of charter schools.
Meg Whitman, asked about her ads which FactCheck.org has labeled as “factually inaccurate,” replied that she does not accept the premise of the question and not only repeated the “facts” cited within the ads in question, but expanded on them. Take that, FactCheck.org.
Meg also is really sorry that she has never voted in any election since she has lived in California, and admits that “it was the wrong thing to do.” She did not go so far as to offer any explanation as to why she has never voted. She seems unclear on the whole election thing, actually; voter, votee…
Jerry Brown was asked to assure voters that he would really focus on the office if elected and assured us that he is too old to run for president again and that, since he is now married, he would not be hanging out in bars. Well, okay then, that gets my vote.
Bring Out The Big Guns
I was watching a film clip of Obama addressing a crowd at the University of Wisconsin last night, waving his fist as he was yelling at the top of his lungs about how “We can have change if we are willing to fight for it,” and I realized that he has completely lost me at an emotional level. I was totally unmoved by his words and, more importantly, I simply did not believe one single word he was saying. I did not believe they were true, and I did not believe that he believed they were true. He was saying them strictly for furtherance of the power of the Democratic Party.
"Fight for it?" When has this president ever fought for anything?
Where was all this fist waving and yelling when health care reform was in danger of not passing? He made a few intellectual speeches, but he never went out and waved his fist in the air and yelled about how we needed it.
Where was the fist waving and yelling on behalf of the “public option” that 80% of Americans wanted in “health care reform?” The best he could do was a lukewarm comment to the effect that it “would be nice to have.”
Where was all this fist waving and yelling when the revocation of DADT was failing? He stood silent and let it fail, and after it failed he remained silent except to tell the people who suffer under that policy to “be patient.” He’s not going to fight for that change, he wants people to be patient and “hope” that it happens when the magic pony rides into town.
Where was all the fist waving and yelling about closing Guantanamo? He “gave the order” to close that horrible blot on America’s honor and then has stood on the sidelines, silent and impotent, as the military and Congress have thwarted him on that issue.
The fist waving and yelling comes out only when the Democratic hold on power in Congress is threatened; then and only then he comes out in the full fury of his mastery of campaign rhetoric and sloganeering. This he will “fight for.” This is a cause worthy of battle. Principles be damned; this is power, man the cannons.
"Fight for it?" When has this president ever fought for anything?
Where was all this fist waving and yelling when health care reform was in danger of not passing? He made a few intellectual speeches, but he never went out and waved his fist in the air and yelled about how we needed it.
Where was the fist waving and yelling on behalf of the “public option” that 80% of Americans wanted in “health care reform?” The best he could do was a lukewarm comment to the effect that it “would be nice to have.”
Where was all this fist waving and yelling when the revocation of DADT was failing? He stood silent and let it fail, and after it failed he remained silent except to tell the people who suffer under that policy to “be patient.” He’s not going to fight for that change, he wants people to be patient and “hope” that it happens when the magic pony rides into town.
Where was all the fist waving and yelling about closing Guantanamo? He “gave the order” to close that horrible blot on America’s honor and then has stood on the sidelines, silent and impotent, as the military and Congress have thwarted him on that issue.
The fist waving and yelling comes out only when the Democratic hold on power in Congress is threatened; then and only then he comes out in the full fury of his mastery of campaign rhetoric and sloganeering. This he will “fight for.” This is a cause worthy of battle. Principles be damned; this is power, man the cannons.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Nicely Put
I didn't watch the game, so I can't vouch for the accuracy, but I love the writing, and I totally agree with Lynn Zinzer's opinion of ESPN.
ESPN is why I no longer watch Monday Night Football. Ever.
Usually in the N.F.L., the numbers add up, winners looking better than losers, but it was possible to watch the entirety of Monday night’s game between the Bears and the Packers and have no idea how the Bears won. (This is only partly because of the brain-scrambling analysis of Jon Gruden, who is living proof that ESPN hates us and who does things like spend an entire Packers touchdown drive lauding the Bears defense.) The Packers did everything better, apparently leading the officials to believe they were cheating, and they were penalized for everything including, we believe, being from Wisconsin.
ESPN is why I no longer watch Monday Night Football. Ever.
Absurdity in Congress
I like Jon Stewart of The Daily Show; not enough to watch the show regularly, but I watch it once in a while. I do not like Steven Colbert of The Colbert Report, and I never watch him at all. Jon Stewart does satire, which is usually funny but becomes tiresome rather quickly. Colbert does sarcasm, which is almost never even slightly amusing.
Yes, I sometimes use sarcasm in this column. I do not intend it to be funny, but rather to express the fact that I am royally pissed off.
For Steven Colbert to use a Congressional hearing as a platform for his “comedy” routine is arrogant, rude, and totally inappropriate. Colbert is a performer, and a star performer at that, so his ego is without limit and his sole purpose in life is self aggrandizement, so is hardly reasonable to expect him to decline such an invitation. That a Congresswoman would issue such an invitation, and that the members of the committee would sit and listen to his performance is bizarre beyond comprehension.
It has been noted that similar acts have been presented before, but that is beside the point. People have screamed obscenities in church more than once, too, but that does not make it proper behavior.
Colbert went to the fields to explore the nature of the work and he had testimony to make that, it turns out, was valid and powerful. It would have served him well to make that testimony. Using the halls of Congress as a stage for his performance was, at best, in poor taste.
A point which seems to have been missed by all forms of the media is that his invitation to perform at this “hearing” actually reveals the true nature of the Congressional hearing process. Hearings are supposedly held for the purpose of discovering facts and, hopefully, truth but that is a sham and a farce. They are in actuality stagecraft, and a nothing more than a platform for the members of Congress and their invitees to perform.
Yes, I sometimes use sarcasm in this column. I do not intend it to be funny, but rather to express the fact that I am royally pissed off.
For Steven Colbert to use a Congressional hearing as a platform for his “comedy” routine is arrogant, rude, and totally inappropriate. Colbert is a performer, and a star performer at that, so his ego is without limit and his sole purpose in life is self aggrandizement, so is hardly reasonable to expect him to decline such an invitation. That a Congresswoman would issue such an invitation, and that the members of the committee would sit and listen to his performance is bizarre beyond comprehension.
It has been noted that similar acts have been presented before, but that is beside the point. People have screamed obscenities in church more than once, too, but that does not make it proper behavior.
Colbert went to the fields to explore the nature of the work and he had testimony to make that, it turns out, was valid and powerful. It would have served him well to make that testimony. Using the halls of Congress as a stage for his performance was, at best, in poor taste.
A point which seems to have been missed by all forms of the media is that his invitation to perform at this “hearing” actually reveals the true nature of the Congressional hearing process. Hearings are supposedly held for the purpose of discovering facts and, hopefully, truth but that is a sham and a farce. They are in actuality stagecraft, and a nothing more than a platform for the members of Congress and their invitees to perform.
Confusion Abounds
Subtitled, "These people are really, really fubar."
Wall Street Journal at 9:16am EST, "U.S. stock futures rose Tuesday following data showing U.S. home prices rose in July from a month earlier, while investors were also encouraged by the U.K. economy's fastest pace of expansion in nine years in the second quarter."
CNN Money at 9:46 am EST, "U.S. stocks fell early Tuesday, as investors digested a report showing home prices rising for the fifth straight month but the growth rate slowing."
I haven't looked to see whether stocks actually did rise or fall, and it really isn't pertinent to my point here nor, really, to my confusion. I finally noticed that one was reporting on stock futures while the other was reporting current stocks, but note that one is focused on the "British fastest pace of expansion" while the other dwells on "American growth rate slowing."
So the same people who are thinking that stocks will be worth more in the future, because the British are growing, are selling them off now as being worth less because the United States is slowing down. Certainly, if I had something that I thought was going to be worth more in the future, I would sell it now if I thought its present value was... Whatever.
Meanwhile in politics, the President is excoriating the Republicans for wanting to extend tax cuts to the wealthy using $700 billion in borrowed money, but he is not batting an eyelash at extending tax cuts to the middle class using $3.5 trillion in borrowed money. Of course, he tries to make that sound logical by not admitting that his tax cut money is borrowed, while ranting endlessly about how Republican tax cut money is borrowed.
Republicans and Democrats both say we have to cut taxes because "you don't raise taxes in the middle of the recession," but the OMB says the recession ended more than a year ago and Obama and company says we are "in recovery" even if they admit it's a bit slow.
Sort of reminds me of the alcoholic who says that, "Other than that one time I got drunk last month, I've been sober ten years." There's something of a lack of contact with reality.
Obama accuses Republicans of giving deals to business and screwing the people and then stands there and says, "We've cut taxes for small business eight times." That could still manage to sound pretty friendly to the "little guy," except that Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, among others, have been ranting all last week about how "small business" actually means major, multi-billion-dollar corporations.
Finally, we had Joe Biden on The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell last night saying that we we are going to take the $700 billion that Democrats won't let the Republicans spend on tax cuts for the wealthy and we'll use it to pay down the debt. He was straight faced and utterly sincere as he told us that he is going to pay down the debt using borrowed money.
Wall Street Journal at 9:16am EST, "U.S. stock futures rose Tuesday following data showing U.S. home prices rose in July from a month earlier, while investors were also encouraged by the U.K. economy's fastest pace of expansion in nine years in the second quarter."
CNN Money at 9:46 am EST, "U.S. stocks fell early Tuesday, as investors digested a report showing home prices rising for the fifth straight month but the growth rate slowing."
I haven't looked to see whether stocks actually did rise or fall, and it really isn't pertinent to my point here nor, really, to my confusion. I finally noticed that one was reporting on stock futures while the other was reporting current stocks, but note that one is focused on the "British fastest pace of expansion" while the other dwells on "American growth rate slowing."
So the same people who are thinking that stocks will be worth more in the future, because the British are growing, are selling them off now as being worth less because the United States is slowing down. Certainly, if I had something that I thought was going to be worth more in the future, I would sell it now if I thought its present value was... Whatever.
Meanwhile in politics, the President is excoriating the Republicans for wanting to extend tax cuts to the wealthy using $700 billion in borrowed money, but he is not batting an eyelash at extending tax cuts to the middle class using $3.5 trillion in borrowed money. Of course, he tries to make that sound logical by not admitting that his tax cut money is borrowed, while ranting endlessly about how Republican tax cut money is borrowed.
Republicans and Democrats both say we have to cut taxes because "you don't raise taxes in the middle of the recession," but the OMB says the recession ended more than a year ago and Obama and company says we are "in recovery" even if they admit it's a bit slow.
Sort of reminds me of the alcoholic who says that, "Other than that one time I got drunk last month, I've been sober ten years." There's something of a lack of contact with reality.
Obama accuses Republicans of giving deals to business and screwing the people and then stands there and says, "We've cut taxes for small business eight times." That could still manage to sound pretty friendly to the "little guy," except that Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, among others, have been ranting all last week about how "small business" actually means major, multi-billion-dollar corporations.
Finally, we had Joe Biden on The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell last night saying that we we are going to take the $700 billion that Democrats won't let the Republicans spend on tax cuts for the wealthy and we'll use it to pay down the debt. He was straight faced and utterly sincere as he told us that he is going to pay down the debt using borrowed money.
Monday, September 27, 2010
I'm Not Gone
I'll be right back. I have a client with a serious website problem. No, I didn't cause it, but it's beginning to look like I get to fix it. I love my work.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Chargers v. Seahawks
Well, it was entertaining, but I'm not certain that it could properly be called "football." The Chargers continue to illustrate why the first string should get more playing time in preseason. If they did they might not spend so much time early in the regular season displaying such a complete mastery of the fine art of ineptitude.
I must say that the play of the defense was, as it has been all season, admirable. And with Philip Rivers passing for 455 yards it is clear that one player we did not miss was Vincent Jackson.
I must say that the play of the defense was, as it has been all season, admirable. And with Philip Rivers passing for 455 yards it is clear that one player we did not miss was Vincent Jackson.
CA-53 Susan Davis
I really want to vote incumbents out of office, but Democrat Susan Davis is messing up that plan for me. Not only can I not vote against her, I really cannot in good conscience fail to vote for her. Her voting record in Congress is just pretty much flawless, or I should say, it is too consistent with populist principles. I don't agree with every vote she has cast, but I cannot see that any single one of them has been influenced by corporate interests. Her speeches are remarkably free of meaningless cliches, and she not only seems to mean what she says, she actually seems to know what she is talking about.
Between her and the Boxer/Fiorina race, I'm just not going to be able to "practice what I preach." All this time of screaming to "vote against the incumbent no matter what" and I'm going to vote for two incumbents. Shit.
Between her and the Boxer/Fiorina race, I'm just not going to be able to "practice what I preach." All this time of screaming to "vote against the incumbent no matter what" and I'm going to vote for two incumbents. Shit.
Alabama at Arkansas
I never doubted that Alabama would win that game. Not for a minute. Never. Not at all. Not the slightest moment of fear or indecision. Never any doubt.
Well, maybe just a little bit, at times.
LSU won, too. Geaux Tigers.
Update: Wait a damn minute or two here. "Mallet collapsed." "The Hogs gave it away." Mallett threw the ball away because he was about to get killed by two members of the Crimson Tide who had demolished the offensive line of the Arkansas Hogs. Alabama hammered and hammered and they wore the Arkansas Hogs slap out, because that's what Alabama does. Alabama beat a very good team. Arkansas did not give up and nobody collapsed. Arkansas walks off that field with their pride fully intact. They met the number one team in college football and, while they didn't win, they certainly made the big dog sweat.
Well, maybe just a little bit, at times.
LSU won, too. Geaux Tigers.Update: Wait a damn minute or two here. "Mallet collapsed." "The Hogs gave it away." Mallett threw the ball away because he was about to get killed by two members of the Crimson Tide who had demolished the offensive line of the Arkansas Hogs. Alabama hammered and hammered and they wore the Arkansas Hogs slap out, because that's what Alabama does. Alabama beat a very good team. Arkansas did not give up and nobody collapsed. Arkansas walks off that field with their pride fully intact. They met the number one team in college football and, while they didn't win, they certainly made the big dog sweat.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Nutjob Coverage
I don’t quite get the media’s and political blogosphere’s fascination with Christine O’Donnell. So she’s a nutjob; so what? She’s running for the Senate in one of the three smallest states in the nation and trailing by a large margin. Even if she won, she would be 1% of the Senate. How much impact would she have as 1% of a barely functional legislative body?
You want me to vote against Carly Fiorina (which I’m going to do anyway) because a nutjob is running in Delaware? (And losing.) What does my California vote have to do with Delaware? What does a Delaware race have to do with me? Does O’Donnell’s behavior mean that Fiorina is crazy? She’s not crazy, she’s merely repulsive.
I sort of get the media’s fascination. They don’t actually do news, and they don’t care about influencing opinion; they go for anything that is spectacular or eye-catching. The political blogosphere refers to the “lamestream media” as crippled and corrupt, and then copies its behavior. Yecch.
You want me to vote against Carly Fiorina (which I’m going to do anyway) because a nutjob is running in Delaware? (And losing.) What does my California vote have to do with Delaware? What does a Delaware race have to do with me? Does O’Donnell’s behavior mean that Fiorina is crazy? She’s not crazy, she’s merely repulsive.
I sort of get the media’s fascination. They don’t actually do news, and they don’t care about influencing opinion; they go for anything that is spectacular or eye-catching. The political blogosphere refers to the “lamestream media” as crippled and corrupt, and then copies its behavior. Yecch.
"Growing Out Of Debt" Again
Paul Krugman is still at it. On a blog post today he refers to, “a period of moderate inflation that reduces the real burden of debt; that’s how World War II cured the depression.” World War II did not cure the depression. World War II was stimulus spending that marked time until market conditions created by the aftermath of World War II cured the depression.
The growth of GDP that Krugman touts as having “reduced the real burden of debt” did not occur during World War II, in fact, that’s when we incurred that debt. The growth which “reduced the real burden of debt” occurred in the 50’s and 60’s, and it occurred largely because we were producing the goods to rebuild a world devastated by war, and we had no competition in that process.
Let’s make a hypothetical; Krugman is fond of hypotheticals. Suppose World War II ended and the entire rest of the world was fully and totally intact. All of the European, British and Russian factories were in full working order, all of the German and Polish oil fields were producing and shipping oil, etc. What, in that event, would be our economic advantage over the rest of the world, and what would be the basis for our economic expansion?
In the absence of that devastation, and with a whole functioning world competing with us, what would all those millions of demobilized soldiers have done? The world market for guns and tanks, which is what we were building, was pretty limited at that point. Our conversion to producing consumer goods and the creating the wherewithal to build the factories for producing those goods would have been a small fraction of what did occur, so they would mostly have become unemployed.
So, what would have happened in our hypothetical; when the government spending that was World War II ended was what always happens when government stimulus spending ends, the economy would have slowed down. What prevented that from happening was a very unusual event; a world destroyed by war that needed to be rebuilt.
Paul Krugman is pathologically incapable of seeing the lack of similarity between that condition and the conditions which exist today. The world does not need what we make, as it did then; to the contrary, we need what the world makes and are borrowing to import it.
We ran up a huge debt in World War II and “grew out of it” by rebuilding a devastated world. We cannot do that again unless we duplicate the conditions that allowed us to do it the first time. We can certainly duplicate the running up of debt, but we cannot duplicate the conditions that allowed the growth that Krugman believes will shrink that debt to insignificance.
Karl Denninger at Market Ticker claimed yesterday that the Keynesian theory is “a fraud” because the theory includes that in good times the government is supposed to run a budget surplus and pay down the debt and that has never happened.
He’s right that it has never happened, I think, but I don’t agree that proves fraud. It merely proves that our government has never complied with the Keynesian theory. Of course, based on the evidence that Paul Krugman posits above, I do happen to think that the theory is total crap, so I may be splitting hairs.
The growth of GDP that Krugman touts as having “reduced the real burden of debt” did not occur during World War II, in fact, that’s when we incurred that debt. The growth which “reduced the real burden of debt” occurred in the 50’s and 60’s, and it occurred largely because we were producing the goods to rebuild a world devastated by war, and we had no competition in that process.
Let’s make a hypothetical; Krugman is fond of hypotheticals. Suppose World War II ended and the entire rest of the world was fully and totally intact. All of the European, British and Russian factories were in full working order, all of the German and Polish oil fields were producing and shipping oil, etc. What, in that event, would be our economic advantage over the rest of the world, and what would be the basis for our economic expansion?
In the absence of that devastation, and with a whole functioning world competing with us, what would all those millions of demobilized soldiers have done? The world market for guns and tanks, which is what we were building, was pretty limited at that point. Our conversion to producing consumer goods and the creating the wherewithal to build the factories for producing those goods would have been a small fraction of what did occur, so they would mostly have become unemployed.
So, what would have happened in our hypothetical; when the government spending that was World War II ended was what always happens when government stimulus spending ends, the economy would have slowed down. What prevented that from happening was a very unusual event; a world destroyed by war that needed to be rebuilt.
Paul Krugman is pathologically incapable of seeing the lack of similarity between that condition and the conditions which exist today. The world does not need what we make, as it did then; to the contrary, we need what the world makes and are borrowing to import it.
We ran up a huge debt in World War II and “grew out of it” by rebuilding a devastated world. We cannot do that again unless we duplicate the conditions that allowed us to do it the first time. We can certainly duplicate the running up of debt, but we cannot duplicate the conditions that allowed the growth that Krugman believes will shrink that debt to insignificance.
Karl Denninger at Market Ticker claimed yesterday that the Keynesian theory is “a fraud” because the theory includes that in good times the government is supposed to run a budget surplus and pay down the debt and that has never happened. He’s right that it has never happened, I think, but I don’t agree that proves fraud. It merely proves that our government has never complied with the Keynesian theory. Of course, based on the evidence that Paul Krugman posits above, I do happen to think that the theory is total crap, so I may be splitting hairs.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Stop The Presses, Yet Again
I don't usually comment on this kind of trivial bullshit, but I found this piece to be truly awesome. A bit over twenty-eight years away from my last drunk, I'm hugely unimpressed by people going to AA meetings before their court dates when they are expecting jail terms for drug/alcohol probation violation, especially when they make a public spectacle out of it and stop to pose for the photographers on their way out of the meetings. I also find it remarkable that the media seems to regard two days in a row as some sort of "sustained effort" or notable achievement.
Update: Well, that worked out really well for her. The judge ordered her to jail today, where she will be held without possibility of bail until the formal hearing on Oct 22nd. Seemingly, the judge was about as impressed by the AA meetings as I was. I think I like that judge.
Update again: Well, for a moment there I had the fond thought that we might have "equality under the law." I forgot what huge wads of money can do in American courts. The rich are treated differently in every respect in this country than are people who do not carry around filthy amounts of cash. We have actually become, formally, a class society with one set of laws for the upper class and a different set for the lower class. This is utterly disgusting.
I want to see photos of that judge's new yacht.
Update: Well, that worked out really well for her. The judge ordered her to jail today, where she will be held without possibility of bail until the formal hearing on Oct 22nd. Seemingly, the judge was about as impressed by the AA meetings as I was. I think I like that judge.
Update again: Well, for a moment there I had the fond thought that we might have "equality under the law." I forgot what huge wads of money can do in American courts. The rich are treated differently in every respect in this country than are people who do not carry around filthy amounts of cash. We have actually become, formally, a class society with one set of laws for the upper class and a different set for the lower class. This is utterly disgusting.
I want to see photos of that judge's new yacht.
Idiots Abound
The stock market jumped early today “as investors were encouraged by readings on housing and capital spending” and decided the economic recovery is proceeding. This is the same stock market that took a dump yesterday because unemployment claims rose to 450,000 and investors decided that the recovery had taken a nosedive.
I’m beginning to think that the only people more idiotic than our elected officials are our freaking "investors."
I’m beginning to think that the only people more idiotic than our elected officials are our freaking "investors."
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