Well, the 2012 presidential debates have come and gone.
My gut level is that Romney has come off better than Obama.
Why?
First, he was able to hold his ground with the president. Not only was Mitt Romney able to hold his ground, but he also did it in a much more “civil” way than President Barack Obama. That has made Romney appear “more likeable” in many ways, and I read somewhere that the likeability factor goes a long way in these races.
Romney did not “attack” Obama “personally” as was not the case going the other way. Repeatedly, Obama attacked his challenger for his personal wealth, attacked him not for his policies as a former governor, but because of actions taken, all within the law and quite legal, by groups of investors who were seeking to rescue businesses from total financial collapse. The president, much to the delight of his supporters I imagine, was in his bully pulpit – quite literally. The Canadian half of my household was much disturbed by that behavior that was in such marked contrast to that of the challenger.
Second, at least to me, Romney also projected a more positive vision for the future. Words do matter and positivism, as was illustrated by Franklin D. Roosevelt, can do much to help a nation lift itself out of economic problems.
I don’t know if it will mean a lot in the overall scheme of things, but I personally like positivity more than negativity.
The problem I have with the President’s view is that he returns to the tired canard that only if the “wealthy” would pay more, then all the nation’s economic problems would be solved. Unfortunately, that is not true. You could confiscate all the billions and millions of people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, George Soros, the Waltons, the Koch brothers, Donald Trump and you would do only two things: 1. Not even eliminate the budget deficit from one year, right now, much less the $16 trillion in national debt that we owe; and 2. By confiscating all that wealth, you would, in essence, kill the golden goose because there would be no more wealth to confiscate.
You see, in my humble opinion, we ask far too much of our federal government and therefore it spends far more than it should. Education, really, is not a federal responsibility. It is not the federal government’s job to go out and hire teachers or set educational curricula. It is not the federal government’s job to build elementary, secondary and post-secondary schools.
It really isn’t the federal government’s job to decide what medical care is available where and for how much.
It is not the federal government’s job to decide what economic choices businesses and individuals should or should not be allowed to make.
I know that, among a lot of people, those are not popular positions, because they make solutions difficult … and outcomes different for different people.
As far as foreign policy between the two men, I see very little difference, except maybe in how they want America to be perceived. One (Romney), wants to see the U.S. strong and assertive in its leadership, while the other (Obama), seems to want to see the US deferential, cooperative and respectful, if not necessarily strong and assertive. These perceptions are definitely different; although exactly how that would play I have no clue.
I do know that the quest to be both loved and respected is a bit Quixotic. It is a wonderful romantic goal, but totally illusionary. I also know it is what Americans want and can’t understand why we aren’t.
As for the election in that essentially ends (we all hope) in about two weeks, I have no predictions. I have no grand suggestions. Heck, I don’t even have any recommendations to anyone. I can’t tell you how to vote, even if you have a vote (which considering how many non-Americans read this is considerable), but then I wouldn’t even to presume to tell you how to vote. That is an individual’s decision. Each of us has to make up our own minds as to whom we are going to vote for and why.
It comes down to what we expect from our government (at any level) and which candidate will work (and not necessarily accomplish) toward ends that we think are in our best interest, as well as those of our communities and our nation. We have to understand that neither of the candidates will be able to deliver on many of their “promises” because it really is not in their power to do so in the American federal republic. Presidents are not gods, nor absolute rulers. Presidents have to find compromise and common ground. The more you see done by executive order or fiat, the less you are seeing our republic at work.
In the end, our choices at the ballot box do have consequences and those consequences, good or bad, will reach far and wide. I know the world is watching Americans with bated breath, because the United States does play such huge role in not just the affairs of its citizens but for people around the world, good, bad or indifferent.
But Americans now have to consider their own counsels. They have to look to themselves and decide what, in the final accounting, which candidate will indeed serve their own interest … because in the end, whether you agree or not, it is the individual who counts and not the village, not the province or state, not the nation, not the world, but the individual.
Without the individual, with respect and dignity for all, then there is nothing. We all become slaves, compelled to live for others.
Showing posts with label debates. Show all posts
Showing posts with label debates. Show all posts
Monday, October 22, 2012
Friday, October 19, 2012
When did we all become so cynical?
I have an online acquaintance who asked me if I believe President Barack Obama when he says something.
I told him I did unless there was something in the facts on the ground that led me to think that I was going to have be willing to suspend my disbelief … or in other words, until the facts on the ground seemed to contradict the words coming from the mouth.
This came up in an online conversation where he contended that GOP candidate Mitt Romney was lying about how he got the infamous binders alluded to the second debate with President Obama. Apparently, the bulk of the “binders” came from an advocacy group called MassGAP that had prepared possible lists of appointment candidates for both candidates for Massachusetts governor in 2002. The non-partisan or bi-partisan group says it was the group that supplied Gov.-elect Romney with the binders.
The disagreement here, apparently, is over whether the group marched down, dropped the binders on Romney’s desk and said, “Take your pick.” Meaning that Romney made no effort to include women in the cabinet and was forced to do it by MassGAP and therefore he is lying about what happened. (My friend’s version)
Or did Romney look at the list of candidates given to him by his staff and say “is this the best you can do?” Then tell his staff to try again, and this time for political cover, include more women. Then the staff took advantage of the offer from MassGAP and accepted the binders they offered. (My view)
Now, I must point out that before this point, he basically accused me of blithely posting my view as just so much misinformation.
Here is the video clip: CBS News – Romney: I had binders full of women
You watch it and you decide which better fits the available facts.
My point being is that what we often see is colored by the prisms of our preconceptions and what we want to believe. This is natural and to be expected.
Now, I must admit: I have lots of problems with President Obama and his policies. I think his vision of the way the world is and the way America should be are wrong. However, having said that, I do not accuse him of lying or misleading people without some evidence to give me reason. I may disagree with what he says, but I am not going to say he is a liar.
Most of the time, as I see it, he or his staff are “spinning” the facts to have us accept a certain interpretation of the facts. Some of the times, one has to do a certain amount of suspension of disbelief to accept the party line, and other times it is much easier to swallow. The same holds true for the Republican candidates. They always are spinning the facts to fit the narrative that they want voters and constituents to believe.
As usual, the truth is somewhere in between.
For example, do I believe that the tax cut plans as reportedly put out by the Romney Campaign are all they are cracked up to be – pro or con? Not on your life. I sometimes think that Romney takes a more realistic view of what he might accomplish. (There being an old saying about Washington: The President proposes; Congress disposes) Basically, what I have heard him say at the first two debates is that “yes, I would like to cut certain tax deductions, close some loopholes and lower tax rates across the board, but until I can negotiate the particulars with Congress, I really don’t know how that will work out.” That sounds to me like an honest assessment of the situation.
On the other hand, what I hear President Obama saying is that we will raise the tax rates on the “wealthy” (leaving open exactly what being “wealthy” means) and that is going to solve our deficit as well as pay for all the new things coming under Obamacare. That absolutely is impossible. There ain’t enough money in the “wealthy’s” piggy banks to pull that off. Besides, that smacks of killing the golden goose before she lays her eggs.
Now, the question is: Is Obama lying or is Romney lying.
I don’t know. But as an article of faith, I am going to say that I think for the most part both men are honest and decent people. They are neither vicious, nor cruel nor evil. Their world views are just different. They see the world through different prisms and therefore see what needs to be done in different lights.
There is a good question: Are things better today than they were four years ago? Do you think the policies of the last four years, extended and broadened over the next four years are going to improve the situation or not? Do you think what plans Romney and Ryan have articulated, if implemented and however sketchy they are, will make a difference? Will that difference be better or worse?
Honestly, my jury is STILL out, but I know it is leaning heavily more in one direction that another.
And, just for the record, I didn’t vote for Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter in 1980. I voted for John Anderson and that is saying more about who I have voted for in 40 years because I really do believe in the sanctity of the secret ballot.
As for the binders’ discussion: It is a tempest in a teapot, as Pappy used to say.
I told him I did unless there was something in the facts on the ground that led me to think that I was going to have be willing to suspend my disbelief … or in other words, until the facts on the ground seemed to contradict the words coming from the mouth.
This came up in an online conversation where he contended that GOP candidate Mitt Romney was lying about how he got the infamous binders alluded to the second debate with President Obama. Apparently, the bulk of the “binders” came from an advocacy group called MassGAP that had prepared possible lists of appointment candidates for both candidates for Massachusetts governor in 2002. The non-partisan or bi-partisan group says it was the group that supplied Gov.-elect Romney with the binders.
The disagreement here, apparently, is over whether the group marched down, dropped the binders on Romney’s desk and said, “Take your pick.” Meaning that Romney made no effort to include women in the cabinet and was forced to do it by MassGAP and therefore he is lying about what happened. (My friend’s version)
Or did Romney look at the list of candidates given to him by his staff and say “is this the best you can do?” Then tell his staff to try again, and this time for political cover, include more women. Then the staff took advantage of the offer from MassGAP and accepted the binders they offered. (My view)
Now, I must point out that before this point, he basically accused me of blithely posting my view as just so much misinformation.
Here is the video clip: CBS News – Romney: I had binders full of women
You watch it and you decide which better fits the available facts.
My point being is that what we often see is colored by the prisms of our preconceptions and what we want to believe. This is natural and to be expected.
Now, I must admit: I have lots of problems with President Obama and his policies. I think his vision of the way the world is and the way America should be are wrong. However, having said that, I do not accuse him of lying or misleading people without some evidence to give me reason. I may disagree with what he says, but I am not going to say he is a liar.
Most of the time, as I see it, he or his staff are “spinning” the facts to have us accept a certain interpretation of the facts. Some of the times, one has to do a certain amount of suspension of disbelief to accept the party line, and other times it is much easier to swallow. The same holds true for the Republican candidates. They always are spinning the facts to fit the narrative that they want voters and constituents to believe.
As usual, the truth is somewhere in between.
For example, do I believe that the tax cut plans as reportedly put out by the Romney Campaign are all they are cracked up to be – pro or con? Not on your life. I sometimes think that Romney takes a more realistic view of what he might accomplish. (There being an old saying about Washington: The President proposes; Congress disposes) Basically, what I have heard him say at the first two debates is that “yes, I would like to cut certain tax deductions, close some loopholes and lower tax rates across the board, but until I can negotiate the particulars with Congress, I really don’t know how that will work out.” That sounds to me like an honest assessment of the situation.
On the other hand, what I hear President Obama saying is that we will raise the tax rates on the “wealthy” (leaving open exactly what being “wealthy” means) and that is going to solve our deficit as well as pay for all the new things coming under Obamacare. That absolutely is impossible. There ain’t enough money in the “wealthy’s” piggy banks to pull that off. Besides, that smacks of killing the golden goose before she lays her eggs.
Now, the question is: Is Obama lying or is Romney lying.
I don’t know. But as an article of faith, I am going to say that I think for the most part both men are honest and decent people. They are neither vicious, nor cruel nor evil. Their world views are just different. They see the world through different prisms and therefore see what needs to be done in different lights.
There is a good question: Are things better today than they were four years ago? Do you think the policies of the last four years, extended and broadened over the next four years are going to improve the situation or not? Do you think what plans Romney and Ryan have articulated, if implemented and however sketchy they are, will make a difference? Will that difference be better or worse?
Honestly, my jury is STILL out, but I know it is leaning heavily more in one direction that another.
And, just for the record, I didn’t vote for Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter in 1980. I voted for John Anderson and that is saying more about who I have voted for in 40 years because I really do believe in the sanctity of the secret ballot.
As for the binders’ discussion: It is a tempest in a teapot, as Pappy used to say.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Mountain out of a molehill
As Pappy would have said: Tis a mountain out of molehill.
Jeemney Christmas. What is with all the uproar about presidential candidate Mitt Romney saying he got “binders” filled with women’s resumes when he went looking for women to fill out his cabinet when he was governor of Massachusetts?
Hey, give the guy some credit. He did do the sexist thing and tried to do affirmative action for women. What was he supposed to say: I got a pile of resumes or a stack of applications? This has got to be the most senseless news story in … well at least a couple of weeks.
I will say one thing for the businessman-turned-politician at least he had his staff trained halfway decently. The boss asks for information and a good staff will organize it for him, so he doesn’t waste time. It seems to me that his staff did just that: Organized the resumes for his review. And for this he is getting blasted and blistered?
Methinks some people have their head in the wrong place.
No, it seems that some of our progressive and liberal friends are trying to make an issue out of something that isn’t an issue, or at least shouldn’t be in my estimation. I wish someone would explain to me ( as Pappy used to say) in words of one syllable or less so I could understand exactly what the problem is because I don’t see the problem. Ok, I am a male in my sixties, but I don’t see what the problem is hiring women to fill positions if they are qualified, pay them the same rate as any guy you would hire for the position (note: you are paying for the job being done, not for the person to fill it).
Still, we are three days after the debate, and we still are flapping our jaws about a non-issue.
To me the unanswered question was who pulled the security teams from Libya in August? Who denied the U.S. ambassador to Libya’s request for addition security and why? Why was the White House apparently clueless when the flunkies in the State Department knew pretty much what was going on? Was it really the Secretary of State’s fault that the real-time reports of the eight-hour gun-battle (including mortar fire, rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns) by an estimated-platoon-sized contingent of terrorist drove the Americans and their staff and guards into bunkers was not transmitted to at least the National Security Advisor, if not the Secretary of Defense, as well as the President?
Sorry, that seems to bear more on the job of being president then whether or not he reviews candidates for cabinet or staff positions by having their resumes presented to him in binders.
I am a retired journalist, actually a retired newspaper editor, and the current state of journalism absolutely revolts me when it comes to campaign coverage. Of course, I come from a different era, when you didn’t have to deal with the passions of the social media.
For example, I pointed out to one of the people whom I have considerable respect as a thoughtful person that a picture that she had posted on her Facebook page was factually incorrect … and she told me I basically was being an idiot because it didn’t matter. Everybody did it. Well, I guess, I have to apologize to her, but damn, I thought accuracy and the truth was more important than just tearing down people, places, organizations and things you disagree with.
At least when I differ with someone, I do try to at least explain why I think my observations are valid. But just to say: Well, that is how it is done of Facebook and everybody does it, appalls me. I guess personal integrity is passé and personal credibility is something no one cares about.
No wonder America is going to hades in the handbasket.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Small showing of leadership
I have to give President Barack Obama his due: Finally, at the second presidential debate, he said the words that he was responsible for the events leading up to the terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound at Benghazi, Libya, in September.
Of course, he did dodge the question as to who was responsible for declining the requests for additional security forces or why there was the charade about it being a protest against a stupid YouTube video that turned into senseless violence. The latter took a lot longer for the administration to admit, and had various members of his cabinet trying to fall on their swords to absolve him of said responsibility.
The interesting thing to me is that the president’s whole artificial construct about who knew what, where and when came crashing down in the testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Charlene Lamb before the House Oversight Committee in Washington on Oct. 10 (almost exactly a month after the events in Libya).
Assuming Ms. Lamb was giving honest testimony before the committee, then some people in the administration either are flat out lying or they really failed their jobs to keep the president in the loop.
The Smoking Gun
My jaw dropped when I read the first paragraph on page five of her prepared opening statement. How could she be saying that when the president, the vice president, the secretary of state, the U.N. ambassador, all had been saying they didn’t know what was happening at the time.
Ms. Lamb said:
“When the attack began, a Diplomatic Security agent working in the Tactical Operations Center (at the diplomatic facility) immediately activated the Imminent Danger Notification System and made an emergency announcement over the PA. Based on our security protocols, he also alerted the annex U.S. quick reaction security team stationed nearby, the Libyan 17th February Brigade, Embassy Tripoli, and the Diplomatic Security Command Center in Washington. From that point on, I could follow what was happening in almost real-time.”
Ok, alarms are going off all over the place and no one bothers to tell the president that the facility where an ambassador is under attack and there is an ensuing eight-hour running gun battle, complete with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and other heavy weapons.
Somehow, this seems to defy understanding. And yet, the president, his press secretary, the vice president, the secretary of state and the U.N. ambassador who is sent out to represent the face of the administration on the talking heads circuit on television, all disavow any knowledge of this being an “attack”. Even Candy Crowley, the moderator at the presidential debate had to walk back her defense of the president when Gov. Mitt Romney posed the question why it took the president so long to use the words “terrorist attack.”
It really draws into question the competence, not just of the president (who really is a captive to his advisors) but of the whole national security establishment. I mean, basically, it was like a re-run of the 1979 assault on the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran.
I know a whole lot of people have no memory of that debacle, and the ensuing 444-day standoff that basically ruined Jimmy Carter’s presidency.
It left me with a bitter taste in my mouth, and I felt it again, when I read the deputy’s testimony.
Of course, he did dodge the question as to who was responsible for declining the requests for additional security forces or why there was the charade about it being a protest against a stupid YouTube video that turned into senseless violence. The latter took a lot longer for the administration to admit, and had various members of his cabinet trying to fall on their swords to absolve him of said responsibility.
The interesting thing to me is that the president’s whole artificial construct about who knew what, where and when came crashing down in the testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Charlene Lamb before the House Oversight Committee in Washington on Oct. 10 (almost exactly a month after the events in Libya).
Assuming Ms. Lamb was giving honest testimony before the committee, then some people in the administration either are flat out lying or they really failed their jobs to keep the president in the loop.
The Smoking Gun
My jaw dropped when I read the first paragraph on page five of her prepared opening statement. How could she be saying that when the president, the vice president, the secretary of state, the U.N. ambassador, all had been saying they didn’t know what was happening at the time.
Ms. Lamb said:
“When the attack began, a Diplomatic Security agent working in the Tactical Operations Center (at the diplomatic facility) immediately activated the Imminent Danger Notification System and made an emergency announcement over the PA. Based on our security protocols, he also alerted the annex U.S. quick reaction security team stationed nearby, the Libyan 17th February Brigade, Embassy Tripoli, and the Diplomatic Security Command Center in Washington. From that point on, I could follow what was happening in almost real-time.”
Ok, alarms are going off all over the place and no one bothers to tell the president that the facility where an ambassador is under attack and there is an ensuing eight-hour running gun battle, complete with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and other heavy weapons.
Somehow, this seems to defy understanding. And yet, the president, his press secretary, the vice president, the secretary of state and the U.N. ambassador who is sent out to represent the face of the administration on the talking heads circuit on television, all disavow any knowledge of this being an “attack”. Even Candy Crowley, the moderator at the presidential debate had to walk back her defense of the president when Gov. Mitt Romney posed the question why it took the president so long to use the words “terrorist attack.”
It really draws into question the competence, not just of the president (who really is a captive to his advisors) but of the whole national security establishment. I mean, basically, it was like a re-run of the 1979 assault on the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran.
I know a whole lot of people have no memory of that debacle, and the ensuing 444-day standoff that basically ruined Jimmy Carter’s presidency.
It left me with a bitter taste in my mouth, and I felt it again, when I read the deputy’s testimony.
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Progressive hypocrisy is almost funny
I finding interesting, if not exceedingly hypocritical, when I read various critiques by liberal, progressives who make no pretense of their disdain for people of faith that fault those people for failing to adhere to the progressive’s image of what their faith should be.
Most liberals and progressives will admit that they basically are secular humanists who believe that religious faith is a mistake and belief in such dogma is leading individuals, if not societies, astray.
The thesis, as I understand it, is that there is good and there is bad, but only according to the definitions as provided by their secular viewpoint. To them, these values are absolutes, but everyone else’s is relative. I may be wrong in this analysis, but I don’t think I am far off.
So, it somewhat surprises me when they criticize followers a two-millennia-old Jewish rabbi, cum Christian messiah and prophet, by quoting their interpretation of that prophet’s doctrine as it has been handed down, interpreted, re-interpreted and re-re-interpreted over all those generations, which they don’t believe in, and expect to be taken seriously. That strikes me as being a stellar height of hubris.
And then, of course, if these people happen to hold what might be conflicting thoughts on what they think is right and proper, then the liberals and progressives call down all sorts of hell and damnation because these people might have a view that reconciles these differences and still cling to their faith.
It really is almost humorous, if it wasn’t so serious.
It is, almost by definition, an assault on individual liberty. You know, the kind that Americans have enshrined in the First Amendment to their Constitution.
I mean, if you don’t believe in the dogma as these progressives do, then you are condemned and chastised. You are, as it is said, “a bad person”. Some people might even go so far as to call you names like “lying bastards” who are out to subjugate women and the poor.
Now, that might be true, but I would be willing to bet that it is a false characterization. But then I remember, it is Election Time in America (Sorry, my Canadian relatives, but I had to borrow your line – It is Hockey Night in Canada) and this is what is to be expected from people on opposing sides of the political fence.
I hope everybody enjoys the next two presidential debates between President Obama and former Massachusetts Governor Romney. It will be so interesting to watch the vitriol spewing forth from each sides’ supporters … unless people shock me and actually talk civilly about the candidates.
An example of what I speak
Most liberals and progressives will admit that they basically are secular humanists who believe that religious faith is a mistake and belief in such dogma is leading individuals, if not societies, astray.
The thesis, as I understand it, is that there is good and there is bad, but only according to the definitions as provided by their secular viewpoint. To them, these values are absolutes, but everyone else’s is relative. I may be wrong in this analysis, but I don’t think I am far off.
So, it somewhat surprises me when they criticize followers a two-millennia-old Jewish rabbi, cum Christian messiah and prophet, by quoting their interpretation of that prophet’s doctrine as it has been handed down, interpreted, re-interpreted and re-re-interpreted over all those generations, which they don’t believe in, and expect to be taken seriously. That strikes me as being a stellar height of hubris.
And then, of course, if these people happen to hold what might be conflicting thoughts on what they think is right and proper, then the liberals and progressives call down all sorts of hell and damnation because these people might have a view that reconciles these differences and still cling to their faith.
It really is almost humorous, if it wasn’t so serious.
It is, almost by definition, an assault on individual liberty. You know, the kind that Americans have enshrined in the First Amendment to their Constitution.
I mean, if you don’t believe in the dogma as these progressives do, then you are condemned and chastised. You are, as it is said, “a bad person”. Some people might even go so far as to call you names like “lying bastards” who are out to subjugate women and the poor.
Now, that might be true, but I would be willing to bet that it is a false characterization. But then I remember, it is Election Time in America (Sorry, my Canadian relatives, but I had to borrow your line – It is Hockey Night in Canada) and this is what is to be expected from people on opposing sides of the political fence.
I hope everybody enjoys the next two presidential debates between President Obama and former Massachusetts Governor Romney. It will be so interesting to watch the vitriol spewing forth from each sides’ supporters … unless people shock me and actually talk civilly about the candidates.
An example of what I speak
Saturday, October 6, 2012
A puzzled person
What is it about this election that makes people hate so viscerally? I haven’t a clue, but I see it even in people that I hold in some respect.
I see it when individuals call political candidates “lying bastards” and other deeply offensive slurs. Why is it our language has become so coarsened that such pejoratives are acceptable … especially in public discourse? I see it when people attack others for disagreeing with them in terms that defy civility.
I watched the presidential debate on Wednesday night, and either I am totally blind or I didn’t see any flat out lying … and I certainly didn’t see any bastards. Oh, did they tell the absolute unvarnished truth? Give me a break. However, there was truth in everything that they said, depending on how you want to parse the facts. It was in the spin, rather than the facts, the mistruths were slung.
You see, I have become painfully aware that we all seem to view Plato’s shadows differently. We view things, I have come to realize, through different prisms and some of them are starkly different than others.
It makes me question my own reality and as hard as I can, I find it hard to find empirical evidence that disputes the perceptions I have gained over the six decades of my life.
Yes, politicians shade the truth to fit their cause. There was plenty of that on Wednesday night, on both sides. Maybe I hold a too high a standard to call out people on “lying” rather than telling the truth from a particular point of view.
So I look at what people say, and ask why? What is it that drives people to be so visceral in their hatred of their political opponents?
And then I step back and I look around the world at conditions in other countries and I realize that Americans are not any different. No, we are humans, just like everybody else. It would be nice to think we are “exceptional” but as humans we are not.
We do have an exceptional form of government and an exceptional (well, less now that at other times, maybe) economic system, but as a people, there is little different from others around the world. The dogmas may be different, even the ideologies, but the essence of our human nature is not different.
As I watched the debate, it was obvious that the challenger was beating the incumbent badly. It seemed such a mismatch. Mitt Romney came across as the civil individual, while President Barack Obama came across as angry and offended that anyone would challenge him. That bothered me a lot.
Now, I don’t know what issues the president was dealing with that night, but he definitely wasn’t cool, calm and collected.
Now, I know that Romney impressed me, but I could also see how he was parsing his facts in ways that could be construed in various ways as to make him seem like he was not telling the truth.
The classic being the difference between tax rates and tax revenues, profits and profit margins, tax credits and tax deductions, and if you don’t understand the differences between those terms, please look them up. Educate yourselves.
Tax Rate vs Tax Revenue
Profit vs Profit margin
Tax Credit vs Tax Deduction
So, when Romney said he was going to lower tax rates but keep them revenue neutral, it really isn’t an oxymoron. Economists will tell you something about what is called the Laffer Curve which is the point that Romney was trying to make. (Laffer Curve explained.) While it is difficult to chart exactly how the curve will be under any given tax rate situation, it really is not hard to understand how it works. Most people don’t understand.
Most people think, that the higher the rate, the more the government will get in taxes, and history has shown that to be false in the 1960s, the 1980s and again, in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Still, it bothers me that people I respect very much somehow see the world through such different prisms.
I joked with one of them, who was saying that the very rich should pay so much more in taxes, that since he made more than I did, would he send some of his money to me. I mean he is richer than I am, or so it seems. (Well, since I now have rent a two-bedroom apartment and he apparently owns a small farm and has access to a condominium in a very expensive building – at least by my standards as I would never been able to even consider owning either, while acting as the COO for a software gaming company that has the rights to a few of the top selling games of the 1990s and at least one or two of the top rated games for the latest IPODs in the 2010s, would make him appear to be more wealthy than I am, living as I do.) He got very upset with me, for making such a suggestion, since his company is a restart of the 1990s version, and said I was “enjoying my retirement.”
Again, we probably are making asses of ourselves – you know the old cliché that when we ASSUME you are making an ASS of yoU and ME.
However, my point was what gives him the right to demand that others pay higher taxes to transfer their wealth to others, if I don’t have the same right to make that demand of him. However, I think it all got lost in translation.
And maybe that is what puzzles me the most: We all seem to have lost any sense of humor. Hey, given my life, one has to look back at it and laugh. Otherwise, you probably would either be crying or committing suicide – neither of which option appeals to me right now.
Still, if you push me really hard, I would have to say I know who I am not voting for … now if I just could figure out who to vote for that will most effectively represent what I believe. I still am left puzzled.
I see it when individuals call political candidates “lying bastards” and other deeply offensive slurs. Why is it our language has become so coarsened that such pejoratives are acceptable … especially in public discourse? I see it when people attack others for disagreeing with them in terms that defy civility.
I watched the presidential debate on Wednesday night, and either I am totally blind or I didn’t see any flat out lying … and I certainly didn’t see any bastards. Oh, did they tell the absolute unvarnished truth? Give me a break. However, there was truth in everything that they said, depending on how you want to parse the facts. It was in the spin, rather than the facts, the mistruths were slung.
You see, I have become painfully aware that we all seem to view Plato’s shadows differently. We view things, I have come to realize, through different prisms and some of them are starkly different than others.
It makes me question my own reality and as hard as I can, I find it hard to find empirical evidence that disputes the perceptions I have gained over the six decades of my life.
Yes, politicians shade the truth to fit their cause. There was plenty of that on Wednesday night, on both sides. Maybe I hold a too high a standard to call out people on “lying” rather than telling the truth from a particular point of view.
So I look at what people say, and ask why? What is it that drives people to be so visceral in their hatred of their political opponents?
And then I step back and I look around the world at conditions in other countries and I realize that Americans are not any different. No, we are humans, just like everybody else. It would be nice to think we are “exceptional” but as humans we are not.
We do have an exceptional form of government and an exceptional (well, less now that at other times, maybe) economic system, but as a people, there is little different from others around the world. The dogmas may be different, even the ideologies, but the essence of our human nature is not different.
As I watched the debate, it was obvious that the challenger was beating the incumbent badly. It seemed such a mismatch. Mitt Romney came across as the civil individual, while President Barack Obama came across as angry and offended that anyone would challenge him. That bothered me a lot.
Now, I don’t know what issues the president was dealing with that night, but he definitely wasn’t cool, calm and collected.
Now, I know that Romney impressed me, but I could also see how he was parsing his facts in ways that could be construed in various ways as to make him seem like he was not telling the truth.
The classic being the difference between tax rates and tax revenues, profits and profit margins, tax credits and tax deductions, and if you don’t understand the differences between those terms, please look them up. Educate yourselves.
Tax Rate vs Tax Revenue
Profit vs Profit margin
Tax Credit vs Tax Deduction
So, when Romney said he was going to lower tax rates but keep them revenue neutral, it really isn’t an oxymoron. Economists will tell you something about what is called the Laffer Curve which is the point that Romney was trying to make. (Laffer Curve explained.) While it is difficult to chart exactly how the curve will be under any given tax rate situation, it really is not hard to understand how it works. Most people don’t understand.
Most people think, that the higher the rate, the more the government will get in taxes, and history has shown that to be false in the 1960s, the 1980s and again, in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Still, it bothers me that people I respect very much somehow see the world through such different prisms.
I joked with one of them, who was saying that the very rich should pay so much more in taxes, that since he made more than I did, would he send some of his money to me. I mean he is richer than I am, or so it seems. (Well, since I now have rent a two-bedroom apartment and he apparently owns a small farm and has access to a condominium in a very expensive building – at least by my standards as I would never been able to even consider owning either, while acting as the COO for a software gaming company that has the rights to a few of the top selling games of the 1990s and at least one or two of the top rated games for the latest IPODs in the 2010s, would make him appear to be more wealthy than I am, living as I do.) He got very upset with me, for making such a suggestion, since his company is a restart of the 1990s version, and said I was “enjoying my retirement.”
Again, we probably are making asses of ourselves – you know the old cliché that when we ASSUME you are making an ASS of yoU and ME.
However, my point was what gives him the right to demand that others pay higher taxes to transfer their wealth to others, if I don’t have the same right to make that demand of him. However, I think it all got lost in translation.
And maybe that is what puzzles me the most: We all seem to have lost any sense of humor. Hey, given my life, one has to look back at it and laugh. Otherwise, you probably would either be crying or committing suicide – neither of which option appeals to me right now.
Still, if you push me really hard, I would have to say I know who I am not voting for … now if I just could figure out who to vote for that will most effectively represent what I believe. I still am left puzzled.
Friday, September 7, 2012
Redefining freedom?
Travis Smiley on redefining Freedom in America
I read this commentary by Travis Smiley and immediately some warning bells went off in the old brain.
First, we need to be careful when we start to redefine what “freedom” and “liberty” mean. It puts us on a tricky slope that could get dangerous really fast.
Second, while President Franklin D. Roosevelt was a really smart politician and a first-class statesman, he also was a propagandist. His four freedoms are an example of his skill at the latter. If you want another example, view Frank Capra’s “Why We Fight” series of films from World War II (they are the epitome of the art). Trying to appeal to the higher feelings of people, FDR framed the fight in World War II as the fight for the Four Freedoms:
Freedom of Expression
Freedom of Religion
Freedom from Fear
Freedom from Want
Well, two out of four is not bad. You can have freedom OF things, but you never really can promise anyone freedom FROM anything. Too many people also think that because you should have a freedom that means it is a right given by our Creator and that freedom is absolute. Wrong answer.
Our Creator granted us only freedoms of, not freedoms from. Freedoms from are really a secular concept that has nothing to do with rights.
We don’t have any freedom from fear, and never will. Sorry, but I am afraid of spiders sometimes (like the one that just crawled out from behind my monitor on the wall – oops, bad move spider, you’re dead now) … nobody is going to grant me a freedom from that fear. There are too many fears and fear is a part of human existence. Now, I would agree that we should be as free as possible from the fear of government running our lives or banging on our doors, but we should always be afraid of government’s ability to do just those things and attempt to restrain it at every opportunity.
We will never be free from want because “want” is an elastic concept that defies definition. IF you cannot define something, then you can never be free of it.
When you call something a freedom, then that implies it is a right, but rights, unlike Mister Smiley’s position, do not come from government. What government gives, government can take away and rights are not like that. You either have rights or you don’t have rights, at least in country that professes that its government strives to treat each of its citizens equally and that they are equal under and before the law.
Of course, government can grant you some legal rights, but remember the government can take away those rights just as fast or slow as it granted them.
Even then, it is wise to remember that all freedoms are not unlimited. Sorry, but even freedom and liberty cannot be unrestricted. Unrestricted would mean anarchy and unfortunately, we have to have some social order. It would be nice if people would without prompting interact with each other with respect and dignity, as well as respect individuals’ rights to own property, including their own labor. However, people are not that way and so we, as a society (in every society in every country), implement rules and taboos that we delegate to our government to enforce. Note that government’s power comes from the consent of the governed and not the other way around.
We have freedom of expression, but that freedom is not absolute. There are some things you can’t say or do (as I outlined in an earlier post) and you do have a responsibility for what you say and do. There are consequences and you need always to bear that idea in mind.
We have freedom of religion or of conscience, but even that is not absolute. For example, in our society, the use of human sacrifice is not included among the freedoms for a religion’s adherents. Sorry, can’t go chopping people up to appeal to your God. In some areas, even animal sacrifices will run you afoul of animal abuse laws. Usually, the use of mind-altering drugs is not protected by religious freedom, although there are some exceptions to that.
Now, Mister Travis wants to redefine what freedom means. If it means freedoms of choices (even there, there are some tough calls and freedom of choice is never absolute – without consequences), I will be right there with him. However, if he means freedom from things, then he is barking up the wrong tree and I would hope you would agree with me on this and not him.
I read this commentary by Travis Smiley and immediately some warning bells went off in the old brain.
First, we need to be careful when we start to redefine what “freedom” and “liberty” mean. It puts us on a tricky slope that could get dangerous really fast.
Second, while President Franklin D. Roosevelt was a really smart politician and a first-class statesman, he also was a propagandist. His four freedoms are an example of his skill at the latter. If you want another example, view Frank Capra’s “Why We Fight” series of films from World War II (they are the epitome of the art). Trying to appeal to the higher feelings of people, FDR framed the fight in World War II as the fight for the Four Freedoms:
Freedom of Expression
Freedom of Religion
Freedom from Fear
Freedom from Want
Well, two out of four is not bad. You can have freedom OF things, but you never really can promise anyone freedom FROM anything. Too many people also think that because you should have a freedom that means it is a right given by our Creator and that freedom is absolute. Wrong answer.
Our Creator granted us only freedoms of, not freedoms from. Freedoms from are really a secular concept that has nothing to do with rights.
We don’t have any freedom from fear, and never will. Sorry, but I am afraid of spiders sometimes (like the one that just crawled out from behind my monitor on the wall – oops, bad move spider, you’re dead now) … nobody is going to grant me a freedom from that fear. There are too many fears and fear is a part of human existence. Now, I would agree that we should be as free as possible from the fear of government running our lives or banging on our doors, but we should always be afraid of government’s ability to do just those things and attempt to restrain it at every opportunity.
We will never be free from want because “want” is an elastic concept that defies definition. IF you cannot define something, then you can never be free of it.
When you call something a freedom, then that implies it is a right, but rights, unlike Mister Smiley’s position, do not come from government. What government gives, government can take away and rights are not like that. You either have rights or you don’t have rights, at least in country that professes that its government strives to treat each of its citizens equally and that they are equal under and before the law.
Of course, government can grant you some legal rights, but remember the government can take away those rights just as fast or slow as it granted them.
Even then, it is wise to remember that all freedoms are not unlimited. Sorry, but even freedom and liberty cannot be unrestricted. Unrestricted would mean anarchy and unfortunately, we have to have some social order. It would be nice if people would without prompting interact with each other with respect and dignity, as well as respect individuals’ rights to own property, including their own labor. However, people are not that way and so we, as a society (in every society in every country), implement rules and taboos that we delegate to our government to enforce. Note that government’s power comes from the consent of the governed and not the other way around.
We have freedom of expression, but that freedom is not absolute. There are some things you can’t say or do (as I outlined in an earlier post) and you do have a responsibility for what you say and do. There are consequences and you need always to bear that idea in mind.
We have freedom of religion or of conscience, but even that is not absolute. For example, in our society, the use of human sacrifice is not included among the freedoms for a religion’s adherents. Sorry, can’t go chopping people up to appeal to your God. In some areas, even animal sacrifices will run you afoul of animal abuse laws. Usually, the use of mind-altering drugs is not protected by religious freedom, although there are some exceptions to that.
Now, Mister Travis wants to redefine what freedom means. If it means freedoms of choices (even there, there are some tough calls and freedom of choice is never absolute – without consequences), I will be right there with him. However, if he means freedom from things, then he is barking up the wrong tree and I would hope you would agree with me on this and not him.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Initial reaction
I watched President Obama’s speech to the Democratic National Convention and I was impressed. He is a very good speaker and I should hope that he really believes in the things he said.
Having said that, I was left with my doubts. Why would I doubt? There was a dichotomy in his speech that left me wondering, “Does he really believe in what he saying?” because his rhetoric is not consistent, either within his speech or in his actions.
My question is this: Does he really believe in the law? Does he really believe in equality before the law? Does he really believe in contracts?
Unfortunately, both his rhetoric and his actions over the past few years lead me to question whether he really believes in the law, or that it be applied equally to all that come before it.
For example, if he really believed in equality before government, then all would pay the same rate of taxes to the government on the same kinds of income and wealth. That is not the case now. If you think it is, then you would be wrong.
No, we have decided to have a “progressive” system of taxation that increases the rate of your taxes as your income increases. We have decided to encourage certain behaviors by rewarding those who comply with our wishes with exemptions and deductions from their tax burden.
In addition, those who for whatever reason fail to achieve a certain income level, we have exempted them not only from paying federal income taxes, but we have agreed to give them other benefits and subsidies. That is not equality. That is discrimination, no matter how you describe it. Government is not in any way treating all citizens either fairly or equally.
Another example: I have no problem paying for education of young people or law enforcement or fire protection, but it is not the role of the federal government to provide those services.
Another example: This country has a law, called the bankruptcy code, and it applies to private companies – no matter what industry, no matter what size – the same. The president ignored that law because he said he wanted to save jobs. What gave him that right to ignore that law?
You see, I opposed the bailouts of Wall Street and Detroit. I thought at the time it was beyond the powers of the federal government to do what it did. I still think that is the case. Granted, it would have been a very serious situation and possibly thousands or millions would have been hurt. Guess what, thousands and millions of people were hurt. But, we would have survived it, just like America did in the Great Depression.
Note, Franklin Roosevelt did not end the Great Depression; World War II ended it. FDR did do some things, most notably restoring the outlook of the American people. It was not what he did that was right, but his positive outlook that was right. You can do wrong things with the right outlook and you will be surprised that things actually turn out better than you expected.
I agree that we should often act as a team, because in synergy there often is greater strength, but it should be a coalition of the willing and not the coerced. If we punish those for doing better than others then we discourage them from doing better.
Then there are contracts. Yes, I think all parties should abide by the articles of their contracts. Yes, often times groups try to shave those articles to their own benefit. That not only is to be expected but will happen, every time, all the time, no matter who is involved.
Yes, I think greed is wrong, but what one person defines as greed others define as righteous reward. Who has the right to define greed because it has to be defined before it can be punished. I am not qualified, and I know no one alive who is qualified to say what greed, or need or enough is.
I understand the rationale that the law should not apply to some people, particularly if they were not responsible for the circumstances they are in, but that is not my decision to make. It is not the federal government’s decision to make. Its job is to apply the laws as equally and equitably as humanly possible. If it doesn’t, then the law no longer reigns and we become a nation of men, governed by men and not by the principles that made this nation what it is and can be.
I don’t know how I am going to vote in November. I really don’t. There is a lot that can happen in the next two months. I do know that the Democrats have not sold me on their view of the world … but then again, neither have the Republicans, for that matter.
Having said that, I was left with my doubts. Why would I doubt? There was a dichotomy in his speech that left me wondering, “Does he really believe in what he saying?” because his rhetoric is not consistent, either within his speech or in his actions.
My question is this: Does he really believe in the law? Does he really believe in equality before the law? Does he really believe in contracts?
Unfortunately, both his rhetoric and his actions over the past few years lead me to question whether he really believes in the law, or that it be applied equally to all that come before it.
For example, if he really believed in equality before government, then all would pay the same rate of taxes to the government on the same kinds of income and wealth. That is not the case now. If you think it is, then you would be wrong.
No, we have decided to have a “progressive” system of taxation that increases the rate of your taxes as your income increases. We have decided to encourage certain behaviors by rewarding those who comply with our wishes with exemptions and deductions from their tax burden.
In addition, those who for whatever reason fail to achieve a certain income level, we have exempted them not only from paying federal income taxes, but we have agreed to give them other benefits and subsidies. That is not equality. That is discrimination, no matter how you describe it. Government is not in any way treating all citizens either fairly or equally.
Another example: I have no problem paying for education of young people or law enforcement or fire protection, but it is not the role of the federal government to provide those services.
Another example: This country has a law, called the bankruptcy code, and it applies to private companies – no matter what industry, no matter what size – the same. The president ignored that law because he said he wanted to save jobs. What gave him that right to ignore that law?
You see, I opposed the bailouts of Wall Street and Detroit. I thought at the time it was beyond the powers of the federal government to do what it did. I still think that is the case. Granted, it would have been a very serious situation and possibly thousands or millions would have been hurt. Guess what, thousands and millions of people were hurt. But, we would have survived it, just like America did in the Great Depression.
Note, Franklin Roosevelt did not end the Great Depression; World War II ended it. FDR did do some things, most notably restoring the outlook of the American people. It was not what he did that was right, but his positive outlook that was right. You can do wrong things with the right outlook and you will be surprised that things actually turn out better than you expected.
I agree that we should often act as a team, because in synergy there often is greater strength, but it should be a coalition of the willing and not the coerced. If we punish those for doing better than others then we discourage them from doing better.
Then there are contracts. Yes, I think all parties should abide by the articles of their contracts. Yes, often times groups try to shave those articles to their own benefit. That not only is to be expected but will happen, every time, all the time, no matter who is involved.
Yes, I think greed is wrong, but what one person defines as greed others define as righteous reward. Who has the right to define greed because it has to be defined before it can be punished. I am not qualified, and I know no one alive who is qualified to say what greed, or need or enough is.
I understand the rationale that the law should not apply to some people, particularly if they were not responsible for the circumstances they are in, but that is not my decision to make. It is not the federal government’s decision to make. Its job is to apply the laws as equally and equitably as humanly possible. If it doesn’t, then the law no longer reigns and we become a nation of men, governed by men and not by the principles that made this nation what it is and can be.
I don’t know how I am going to vote in November. I really don’t. There is a lot that can happen in the next two months. I do know that the Democrats have not sold me on their view of the world … but then again, neither have the Republicans, for that matter.
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Threats and threatening situations
Occupy Threats
Definition of assault / Another definition of assault
Tea Party threats 1 / Tea Party Threats 2 / Tea Party threats 3
Census data 1 – Oregon / Census data 2 – California
Census data 1a – Ohio / Census data 2a – Georgia / Census data 3a - South Carolina / Census data 4a - North Carolina / Census data 5a – Texas /Census data 5b – Texas
I apologize for all the links above, but this posting took more than a little research and consideration.
First, my progressive friend out in Oregon, seems to be a bit agitated about the polarization and potential for racial violence in the United States. I am less so.
Granted, the potential is there and if you just go by the comments you read on the internet, then – I suppose – there would be some cause for concern. However, I take most of the comments on blogs and stories on the internet with a whole bunch of salt. I do this mainly because it is easy in the relative anonymity of the internet chat rooms and threads to say a lot of things that really are never going to come to pass. Sorry, while there are threats that you should take seriously, usually those on the internet are the least of your worries.
Now, the first link above, a video of a group of Occupy RNC protesters in Tampa heckling Republicans leaving their national convention shows a rather obnoxious man, among others, being as offensive as possible. Now, he comes dangerously close to breaching the line when it comes to assault (which is why he does the hand in the camera lens bit when he realizes what he said. Hand in the camera lens, I learned as a public affairs officer for the military is a really bad move. It makes you look guilty of something that you are trying to cover-up). See the definitions of assault, and you can make the call.
Note that he is African-American, although others in his group are Euro-Americans, which lends a bit to the racial aspect of his threats. Also note that many in this group are either covering their faces or at least their heads. This could lead to a feeling of unease that would indicate that a minority person is threatening open warfare against the predominately white or Euro-American people who are passing in front of him.
Personally, I take it as rhetoric and bluster because the guy is trying to get attention and trying to get a reaction (hopefully violent against him) that he can use to make his case. Sorry, it didn’t happen. Good try though.
Then, I posted three links to various and sundry alleged threats from people in the Tea Party (which progressives seem to love to hate). Again, most of the alleged threats are not really documented with video, etc., but can also be balanced by similar threats that have been made to Republican lawmakers in the same time frame. The same can be said about the alleged violent incidents.
The most “damning” threat is the sign threatening “gun violence.” That I would contend is far less than the vocal threat from RNC demonstrator. That sign is pure rhetoric. In addition, note that none of the “protesters” in that photograph are making any effort to hide their identity. I mean if you are going to start threatening violence at people, you would think you would have the sense to at least make it somewhat difficult for the authorities to figure out who you are (as was the case in Tampa).
Ok, so we are having rhetorical violence on both sides of the political spectrum. I think that is a pretty accurate statement.
Now, as for his concern about racial violence breaking out: I guess I look at it from a different perspective. You see, I have lived a long time among significant populations of minorities, particularly African-Americans and I think that gives me a little better perspective than someone who hasn’t. I list the census data for the two areas that I know he has lived in (as well as six places I have lived in for comparison) and the thing that leapt out at me was the lack of African-Americans living in those areas.
Now, I have to say, that both he and I were really good friends in high school with one of the few African-Americans at our school (who actually got himself elected president of the Student Body Association – this being in the mid-1960s), so I am not accusing him of having any racial prejudices.
Still, having lived in integrated and not so integrated communities, having covered the news in those communities for a very long time, I think I have a somewhat more accurate perception what the average person in those communities thinks and feels.
I can tell you, when they are not watching the nightly news, they are very stable, sane, honest, hardworking people who just want to live their lives and pursue their dreams. There really isn’t more than a whit of difference between most people, regardless of their ethnic background.
The sad thing is that is not the story that you get from watching the national news outlets. In my little corner of the world, which includes (basically) eight town homes, we have one Hispanic family, three African-American households and four Euro-American households. If any of us are planning to man the barricades, it has eluded me and since I am basically homebound most of the time, I spend a lot of time looking out the window and (when it is not too hot) sitting on the patio interacting with my neighbors. All of them are pretty much working stiffs working regular day jobs and trying to stay afloat in a really tough economy. One of my former neighbors was a small business owner who took it on the chin, although he had a good idea and excellent merchandise. It was just the wrong time for him and his wife to try to launch it.
I guess my point is that despite what you see and hear, the U.S. is not about to collapse into civil war (in my humble opinion). Yes, there are a lot of angry people out there, but that is nothing new. It has been that way for a long time, it seems to me.
I think even though we are “polarized”, if this election goes smoothly (and no one tries to get hinky by trying to overturn the ballot box results in the courthouse), most Americans will accept the results (whoever wins) and the country will go on.
Those who throw temper tantrums will be the one to lose and, in a sense, they will only have themselves to blame.
Granted, I would like to see the country go in one direction and I suspect my progressive friend would like to see it go in another, but that doesn’t mean I plan on taking up arms against him if it doesn’t go my way. I hope he feels the same.
That is the essence of living in a democracy. You tolerate those you disagree with and try to convince enough in your community that your vision is better than theirs.
Anyway, just some more fodder for the brain.
Definition of assault / Another definition of assault
Tea Party threats 1 / Tea Party Threats 2 / Tea Party threats 3
Census data 1 – Oregon / Census data 2 – California
Census data 1a – Ohio / Census data 2a – Georgia / Census data 3a - South Carolina / Census data 4a - North Carolina / Census data 5a – Texas /Census data 5b – Texas
I apologize for all the links above, but this posting took more than a little research and consideration.
First, my progressive friend out in Oregon, seems to be a bit agitated about the polarization and potential for racial violence in the United States. I am less so.
Granted, the potential is there and if you just go by the comments you read on the internet, then – I suppose – there would be some cause for concern. However, I take most of the comments on blogs and stories on the internet with a whole bunch of salt. I do this mainly because it is easy in the relative anonymity of the internet chat rooms and threads to say a lot of things that really are never going to come to pass. Sorry, while there are threats that you should take seriously, usually those on the internet are the least of your worries.
Now, the first link above, a video of a group of Occupy RNC protesters in Tampa heckling Republicans leaving their national convention shows a rather obnoxious man, among others, being as offensive as possible. Now, he comes dangerously close to breaching the line when it comes to assault (which is why he does the hand in the camera lens bit when he realizes what he said. Hand in the camera lens, I learned as a public affairs officer for the military is a really bad move. It makes you look guilty of something that you are trying to cover-up). See the definitions of assault, and you can make the call.
Note that he is African-American, although others in his group are Euro-Americans, which lends a bit to the racial aspect of his threats. Also note that many in this group are either covering their faces or at least their heads. This could lead to a feeling of unease that would indicate that a minority person is threatening open warfare against the predominately white or Euro-American people who are passing in front of him.
Personally, I take it as rhetoric and bluster because the guy is trying to get attention and trying to get a reaction (hopefully violent against him) that he can use to make his case. Sorry, it didn’t happen. Good try though.
Then, I posted three links to various and sundry alleged threats from people in the Tea Party (which progressives seem to love to hate). Again, most of the alleged threats are not really documented with video, etc., but can also be balanced by similar threats that have been made to Republican lawmakers in the same time frame. The same can be said about the alleged violent incidents.
The most “damning” threat is the sign threatening “gun violence.” That I would contend is far less than the vocal threat from RNC demonstrator. That sign is pure rhetoric. In addition, note that none of the “protesters” in that photograph are making any effort to hide their identity. I mean if you are going to start threatening violence at people, you would think you would have the sense to at least make it somewhat difficult for the authorities to figure out who you are (as was the case in Tampa).
Ok, so we are having rhetorical violence on both sides of the political spectrum. I think that is a pretty accurate statement.
Now, as for his concern about racial violence breaking out: I guess I look at it from a different perspective. You see, I have lived a long time among significant populations of minorities, particularly African-Americans and I think that gives me a little better perspective than someone who hasn’t. I list the census data for the two areas that I know he has lived in (as well as six places I have lived in for comparison) and the thing that leapt out at me was the lack of African-Americans living in those areas.
Now, I have to say, that both he and I were really good friends in high school with one of the few African-Americans at our school (who actually got himself elected president of the Student Body Association – this being in the mid-1960s), so I am not accusing him of having any racial prejudices.
Still, having lived in integrated and not so integrated communities, having covered the news in those communities for a very long time, I think I have a somewhat more accurate perception what the average person in those communities thinks and feels.
I can tell you, when they are not watching the nightly news, they are very stable, sane, honest, hardworking people who just want to live their lives and pursue their dreams. There really isn’t more than a whit of difference between most people, regardless of their ethnic background.
The sad thing is that is not the story that you get from watching the national news outlets. In my little corner of the world, which includes (basically) eight town homes, we have one Hispanic family, three African-American households and four Euro-American households. If any of us are planning to man the barricades, it has eluded me and since I am basically homebound most of the time, I spend a lot of time looking out the window and (when it is not too hot) sitting on the patio interacting with my neighbors. All of them are pretty much working stiffs working regular day jobs and trying to stay afloat in a really tough economy. One of my former neighbors was a small business owner who took it on the chin, although he had a good idea and excellent merchandise. It was just the wrong time for him and his wife to try to launch it.
I guess my point is that despite what you see and hear, the U.S. is not about to collapse into civil war (in my humble opinion). Yes, there are a lot of angry people out there, but that is nothing new. It has been that way for a long time, it seems to me.
I think even though we are “polarized”, if this election goes smoothly (and no one tries to get hinky by trying to overturn the ballot box results in the courthouse), most Americans will accept the results (whoever wins) and the country will go on.
Those who throw temper tantrums will be the one to lose and, in a sense, they will only have themselves to blame.
Granted, I would like to see the country go in one direction and I suspect my progressive friend would like to see it go in another, but that doesn’t mean I plan on taking up arms against him if it doesn’t go my way. I hope he feels the same.
That is the essence of living in a democracy. You tolerate those you disagree with and try to convince enough in your community that your vision is better than theirs.
Anyway, just some more fodder for the brain.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Is perception reality?
Pew Poll finds majority think rich don't pay enough taxes
Sometimes the majority is wrong, unless it really doesn’t want equality before the law but only equality of outcome. It seems the Pew Institute did a public opinion survey that found that a majority of Americans believe that the “rich” do not pay enough taxes. Interesting concept is “enough.”
I wish I had bookmarked the page (but I didn’t and at the moment I am too lazy to go find it) but it was either a General Accounting Office or a Congressional Budget Office report that had a breakdown by income of which group paid how much. It revealed that the US federal income tax was indeed very progressive (if you can pay more you do, as a percentage of your income). Now, if that is true, then whatever happened to equality?
No, perception sometimes is about other things. For the last few years we have had pounded into our brains that equality means everybody gets the same, rather than everyone is treated the same by the government.
Now, I suppose, that if I am not getting enough, then I should be getting more. However, the concept of enough, like the concept of need, is quite elastic, wouldn’t you say?
To put it in plain perspective, when you sit down at the table to eat: Does everyone get exactly the same meal? Is that a requirement? Do you need the same meal as everyone else? Do you think the same portions given to everyone else are enough for you? What if you don’t like one of the foods on your plate? Must you eat all on your plate?
I could go on and on like that but I think I am making my point. Each of us is an individual. Our needs and our wants and what is “enough” are defined by our own perception and not by someone else. Oh, yes, we can be influenced by society and our learned value system, but it still comes down to what we perceive and how we, as individuals, define “enough.”
Now, we can accept that each of is an individual and try to cope with the problems that presents; or we can try to give each person an equal share of the pie. Granted, equal shares seem to be fairer, but are they always truly fairer? Again, our individual perception colors how we view that question. You see if you want to be “fair”, then government – at whatever level you choose – has to treat each individual equally, otherwise it discriminates by some arbitrary standard. Does government do that? Don’t be silly, of course it doesn’t treat people equal. Not if some people pay more than others and others receive more than others.
How do you reconcile this dichotomy? Well, you can ignore it or you can try to justify it. We in this day and age are trying somewhat ineffectively to accomplish the latter. We do that by trying to figure out a system that gives each individual what they need or what they want. I say ineffectively because as always with humans some are “gaming” the system to their own advantage.
The system tries to codify how government can dole out its largess to a very large, and therefore impersonal, population. The question then becomes should government (as representative of society) be responsible for providing for the needs and wants of individuals or should individuals be left responsible for that chore themselves?
Good question. Should the choice of whether to assist others be left to the individual or should it be compelled by the community? It depends, I guess, on how you view property (and I include labor as property). You see if an individual can “own” property, then that creates one set of problems. If all property is “owned” by the community, then that creates another set of problems. The question then becomes which system is “right” and which system meets the needs of the individual best.
Again, that brings us back to the question: Are we individuals? Do individuals have rights? Can individuals be free to make their own choices? Are individuals responsible for those choices? When are individuals not responsible? When is it right for others to take responsibility for individuals?
I firmly believe that as individuals, we are – for the most part – responsible for our own decisions; that we have to take responsibility for our own lives. And having said that: I also believe that we should make the choice to help others when we can; not because we have to or are compelled to do so, but because we choose to do so. I also believe that it is our own self-interest to choose to defend and protect our community and our society. Yes, it is an “obligation” but it not an obligation that you can force a person to accept. It must come from within the person.
I don’t agree with those who say it is right for the government/society to compel anyone to do anything or make a certain choice. They should be free to make whatever choice they want, with the proviso that they also are willing to accept the consequences of that choice, whatever they may be. That means that if they make bad choices, then they have to live with those bad choices. Yes, that means that maybe they will be harmed. Yes, that may mean that others might be harmed by association. We can try, if we choose to ameliorate that harm to the others, but even that should by choice rather than compulsion.
I know I could be very wrong in these beliefs. I know that there are a lot of people who might condemn me for lacking in compassion for these beliefs, but they would be ignoring that I, too, have a choice and that choice is when and where and how I assist others.
So, back to the original thesis of this essay: Do the rich pay enough in taxes? Well, it depends on how much you mean when you say “enough.” We should not be like bank robbers who rob banks only because that is where the money is. If we plan to take money – taxes – from people, then it would seem to me that equity should be the rule and not the exception. By equity, I mean that if we decide that people should pay at a given rate, then that rate should be the same for all people. If we decide that people should pay a certain amount, then that amount should be the same for all people. That is what government owes us: Equality.
If there are those who can’t – for whatever reason – can’t “pay” the fee, then I would hope that it would be the choice of others to help. Not because they are forced to do it, but because they choose to do it.
As for taxes, if they are based on a percentage of income, or wealth or whatever, then that rate should be the same for all persons. I realize that is not a popular concept, but it is the one I believe is most fair to all people. I believe in that case we are all contributors to society and not divided into two groups: Those from whom things are taken and those upon who benefits are bestowed.
When you look at our society, or any society, as we go into the future, keep those thoughts in mind. I hope that you would consider their merits and act accordingly.
In the end, as always, the choice is yours, yours as an individual and no one else’s.
Monday, August 27, 2012
Medicaid: One size fits all?
Ryan plan sparks Medicaid debate
Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin representative/Republican vice presidential nominee, has brought up a good topic for debate: Should the states or the federal government administrate the Medicaid programs that pay for health care for the poor and the indigent.
That is a good question.
Is it better that the states decide the extent of the Medicaid program and who it helps or doesn’t help, or should that decision be a decision made by Congress, or a federal regulatory agency like the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services/Health Care Financing Administration? Who is the CMMS/HCFA?
Most democratic-socialists will tell you that it needs to be a national program, while most federal-republicans will tell you it needs to be in the hands of the state governments which lie closer to the people. Where you fall out in that debate is the choice you have to make according to what you see the role of government being at each level.
I, for one, tend toward the traditional democratic-republican view point of Thomas Jefferson, even though I dearly love James Madison (and he is one of my personal heroes – even if this is the 100th year of his disastrous War of 1812 when he shouldn’t have tried to play commander in chief in the field, but that is a whole other story), that government works best when it is closest to the people. In other words, the lower the level of government, the better it works for the benefit of the people.
This is especially true for communities. Communities and their governments, usually municipal or county/parish governments are far more responsive to the needs and desires of their constituents than state governments … and far more responsive than the federal government in Washington. This usually is because the constituents are neighbors to the people running the schools and city halls and let them know their views on their front lawns or over their back fences.
State governments, for similar reasons, usually are little more responsive to the needs of their states than the federal government, but that is partially by design … or malice aforethought, as I put it. Still, state governments can be more reflective and responsive to the demographic makeup and desires of its communities, something that is difficult, if not impossible, at the national/federal government level.
At the national level, in order to avoid being quite arbitrary and capricious in its law and rule making, the government must, basically, make everything “one size fits all.” That, I contend, is a recipe for disaster because problems come in all shapes and sizes and one size definitely doesn’t fit all.
The plan, by those really smart guys way back when, was for each state to be sort of a laboratory of solutions. Each state would try to solve the problems facing its residents, which may or may not be the same or even similar to the ones facing another state. Great idea, but the revolution in telecommunications may have doomed it.
Today, whether it is the Internet or television over cable and satellite, communications are nearly instantaneous, with all problems that are associated with information overload.
One of the complaints in the above article is that advocates for the poor don’t have the resources to go to 50 state capitals to make their cases for greater benefits for the poor and find it much more efficient to take their lobbying to just one place: Washington. But is that not the problem with our national government? Isn’t in the pockets of too many special interests and not looking out for the “general welfare” of the nation?
Of course, the problem with having 51 solutions instead of 1 solution is that it is time consuming and Americans are a notoriously impatient lot. We want our problems solved yesterday, if not sooner, and we don’t like debating over what ought to be done. Just do something, do it now, and make the problem/distraction go away. No need discussing it. No need to come to any compromises. Just do what I want and do it now.
Except sometimes what gets done isn’t what I want, or what my neighbors want, or what might work in some other place but isn’t going to work too well here. Hmmm. Maybe there is a better answer.
As I have said before, government governs best when it governs least, and the best way for that to happen is to leave in the hands of the level of government closest to the people.
Don’t look for that to happen anytime soon, however; the special interests in Washington have no interest in having to work any harder for their causes than they have to.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Who really does have a say?
Poor have no say in government
A Princeton University academic, a sociologist with a doctorate, says according to his research that the poor and the middle class have no say in government policy. No say? That is an interesting construct and a very interesting allegation.
First of all, I have not read his book; merely the above article about his book. Woe unto me, for I know I am venturing into unstable ground here, but it makes me wonder about what policies he is talking about.
According to the article, it quotes him as saying:
"If federal policy more equally reflected the preferences of all Americans we would see a more progressive tax structure, higher unemployment benefits, stronger regulation of business and industry, a more protectionist trade regime, more prayer in public life, and less access to abortion."
Ok, but my question would be is that what the federal policy should be? You see, the problem I have with that basically is that it looks on the government as not only a protector but as a purveyor of government largess to the benefit of this group or another. Is that what the federal government is supposed to be in the United States? Is it supposed to be protecting this group or that group or any group? Is that what government has come to mean to people?
The author of the study seems to think so. Obviously the wealthy have too much influence on federal policies, like the progressive tax structure? Is that true? I may be wrong but I have read somewhere in government documents that nearly half of Americans pay very little if anything in federal income taxes. The vast majority of these people, according to the demographics accompanying that statement are people who come from the lowest and lower levels of income (at or below the median income of somewhere around $45,000 a year. I don’t know about you, but that seems pretty progressive to me. It also seems to me that the “poor” benefit a lot more from the federal government than the wealthy seem to be, but I could be wrong.
You see, one of the things those really smart guys who framed the constitution that outlines what the federal government is supposed to be really, really feared was the “tyranny of the mob.” You see, being revolutionaries, they knew the power of mobs and how they can swing quickly into tyranny of the majority.
Since we all agree that there are a lot more poor people than there are rich people, it would seem that they do have a large influence on public policy. Is that not “representative democracy”? Well, I suspect it isn’t if you think that there should be no wealthy.
I am not arguing that “rich” people don’t have more influence than one person one vote, because obviously they do. But then that is what the founders wanted. They wanted “minorities” to be protected from the tyranny of the masses. Granted, we never really have done all that good of a job protecting all minorities all the time, but still it is what we should be trying to do.
The reason we want the “wealthy” to pay more is the same reason that bank robbers rob banks instead of stock brokers: That is where the money is. So, if you want to get the money and give it to someone else, then you have to take it from the people who have it. That seems to be a simple enough concept, but then you have to ask yourself is that really the right thing to do?
Well, there are those people who do think that it is. These people are those who honestly believe that a human society can function under the precept that you give to each according to their needs and you take from each according to their ability to give. It is a really utopian concept. However, if you look at history … it doesn’t work. It seems that people are just not made that way. I guess it is a fault in the human genome (something like the old religious concept of “original sin”) but I don’t know. However, I do know that it doesn’t work.
Behavioral specialists will tell you flat out that the best way to get people behind a project is to give them a personal stake in it. That is why democracy usually works, because the “people” have a stake in it, or at least think they do. I think that is because, deep down, each one of us thinks that we have a right to own our own labor. We have this funny belief that it belongs to us as individuals and not necessarily the group, or community or society or the state.
Those same behavioral specialists will tell you that individuals don’t always work just for the sake of working, In fact, very few people work just for the sake of working. Usually, they want a return of some sort on their investment, and if possible they want to maximize that return. In other words, we want a reward for our behavior.
Now, in this case, according to the academic, the reward people get from government is directly linked to their wealth. The more you have, the more you get from government, or so it would seem the argument would go. But is that really true? It seems that the social safety net that we have pays out considerably more to individuals who fall more into the “have not” category than the “have” category.
Which then leads to the interesting question of why is it in the society’s interest to rob from the rich to provide from the poor? Why is it that we allow government to do that?
Again, I thought the whole idea was that the government would be neutral and we all as individuals would be equal before the law. I know, it is a foolish utopian concept, but I find it much more appealing than the to-each/from-each utopian concept. I realize I may be in the minority here, but it is my humble opinion.
You see, the reason special interest groups (regardless of political bent) spend lots of money on political races is because they believe that there will be a large monetary benefit (or maybe just an ego boost) that they will get in return. The money is invested to influence the “government” to spend whatever largess it has to spend to that special interest group’s benefit. It doesn’t matter if it is a labor union or a corporation, or economic group or any of the plethora of other special interest groups that we can (and do) divide ourselves into, the point of the objective is how much money or benefit can we get for us.
You want to take the big bucks out of politics? It is really easy: Take away the power of government to give big bucks to special interest groups. It is just like drugs. You want to take the crime out of the war on drugs, then decriminalize drugs, legalize their use, tax them and regulate them. Guess what, there goes the biggest reason for crime.
You see, there are only two things that really motivate people: Power or rewards (usually in the form of money). Give individuals a feeling of power, and that helps make them happier. Give individuals rewards for the investment of their time and labor and they feel better.
Unfortunately, what we are seeing here in the U.S. is the subdividing of the culture into competing blocs for what always was and always will be a limited government pie. We have, as I have said before, done let the cat out of the bad and the people have realized they can vote themselves money out of the common treasury.
This a sad state of affairs.
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Voting right or Voting privilege
With all due respect to Juan Williams, a commentator for whom I have (surprisingly enough) a lot of respect, but I would take issue with the premise here. Not from a partisan point of view, but one that would question the statistics that he uses to bolster his talking points.
I am sorry, but when some think tank/polling group says X numbers of people are going to be affected by Y, it immediately raises my suspicions, especially when they say this group is going to be more affected. Now, they may be right, but then again, I just question the accuracy of their figures.
Granted, ballot box stuffing is more prevalent now than chain voting – an old practice where a person provided a voter with a pre-marked ballot to use in place of the one given at the polling station, which then was passed on pre-marked to another voter – or even serial voting – which is where a voter goes from precinct to precinct to vote, which is what identification requirements are designed to prevent.
Now, it would seem obvious that every citizen should have the right to vote in elections, but what is obvious is not always really the truth. You do not, in the United States, have an absolute right to vote in any election, even if you are a citizen. You see, before you are eligible to vote in this republic (remember it is not a “democracy”), you have to establish “residency” in a particular voting precinct. How you do this is outlined in various state laws, but usually requires that you have an address that is good for a specified length of time. That is qualification requirement number 1.
Then you have to register with the local board of elections – usually run at the county level – to put you on the voter rolls. There is any number of ways to do this, including, in most states, doing it online or through the mail. This is qualification requirement number 2.
Now, if you are a felon and currently serving a sentence, then you are not allowed to vote, although in most states, it seems, once you have completed your sentence, the state offers forgiveness and lifts the ban. So, in essence, that is qualification requirement number 3.
Then, in one way or another, you have to either present yourself to the voting precinct on the day of the election or – in states where early voting is allowed – the county election office to cast your ballot. You also can request an absentee ballot that you can submit by mail, but that requires a sworn statement from the voter. This is requirement number 4.
So, an individual just doesn’t have the right to cast a ballot. It is more like a privilege.
However, saying that a person needs to present a valid photo identification does not seem to me to be really that undue a burden, but then I have always presented one in the six states that I have been present and able to vote.
But then again, I have tried to vote absentee a couple of times, but being that I was deployed in the military at the times of the election, I suspect that my efforts were in vain.
Here, in Ohio, however it disappoints me to read that the campaign organization for President Obama and the Democratic National Committee have filed lawsuits to block allowing service members three extra days to use the state’s early voting system. I guess it is right that they should not get the three extra days, but it seems to me that they deserve it.
Still, when it comes down to it … it really is important that you have to want to vote because it is up to you to make sure it happens.
Sunday, July 22, 2012
Insurance costs in more ways than one
Where car insurance costs least ... and why
"It's a balancing act," he says. "Insurance is all about pricing risk fairly so that those with higher risk are paying what they should."
--- A quote from way down at the end of the article.
When we are talking about insurance – car, health, life, travel, business, unemployment, bank – we should make sure that statement is kept most prominent in our minds. Unfortunately, we don’t … at least in the U.S. of A.
Take health insurance, a favorite whipping boy these days, where health insurers are compelled to accept people who not only are a high risk, but a sure thing, that they will accrue costs to the insurer. How can they balance that absolute certainty with what they insure so that those with higher risks pay more than those who have risks of a lower order? They really can’t but isn’t that the point? If we burden these private entities that attempt to make a profit (ooo … bad word) off trying to price the risk of paying out by balancing it against the risk that they won’t have to and can invest the money elsewhere then we make it impossible to make that profit (ooo … bad word) and stay in business. Then I suppose we can all depend on “government” to provide that all the risks that we take will be paid for by “society” at large and at no increased penalty or consequence to the individual. Better yet, we can make it progressive: The more you have, therefore the more you are able to pay, then the more you have to pay. That is fair, isn’t it?
In the shipping industry, it is a simple transaction. You are moving cargo through a dangerous area, the rates go up. IF the danger is high enough, you may have to pay as much as the entire value of the cargo in order to have underwriters touch it, or in some cases, underwriters – the people who assess the risk and set the price of insurance – may refuse to insure your cargo at all. Is that not unfair? It seems to be with health insurance. I guess government should ensure all cargoes against all damages at 100 percent.
That means everybody in the country should have to pay into the fund to pay off whenever there are damages, even if they never have anything to do with the cargo. Of course they have a tangential involvement in that they are affected by the prices those cargoes bring on the market, which has effects on other commodities that are remotely tangential to the affected, insured cargo. So, since “society” is paying the price, does it not make sense that everyone … well, at least those who can afford it … has to pay into the pot so people can be compensated.
Take life insurance: Should we not all get the same amount of coverage from the government so that our families and children … or just heirs … can be assured to benefit from our deaths? Is that not a responsibility of society to ensure that we are all taken care of? We don’t have to make our own arrangements; somebody in the government will take care of it for us.
Of course, it matters not that a) we are the government. It is not some separate entity out there hovering over us to make sure that we are taken care of, but it is us, or people like us, making decisions for us. The individual doesn’t have to worry about taking care of themselves. They can just focus on what makes them feel good; what makes them feel fulfilled. They just can focus on themselves in the moment in time. Nothing else really matters anyway.
And b) somebody has to pay for it. Of course, those who have “wealth” can always cover for those who don’t have wealth. That is the answer. So those who have more just have to pay more and those who don’t have enough, don’t have to pay anything.
Oh joy! How simple this all is.
Only problem is that this “solution” already has been tried, repeatedly and it works on the small scale, but when it is “scaled up” to large numbers of people, it doesn’t. In fact, it fails rather abysmally.
Why has it failed? For two reasons:
The first is that when you remove reward or incentive for being good at something, or successful, or just doing more (which removes the equality, oftentimes referred to as fairness, of the reward), then you tend to stifle the willingness for people to do good, be successful or do more. People, I contend, when given the option, usually will chose the option that involves less work, less effort on their part. Not all people, but the vast majority, will take this option. I am not saying it is bad. It has given people around the world a standard of living that was unthinkable a century or two ago. People have been so busy inventing things to save labor and effort that today life is much easier than say in most of our own grandfathers’ time.
Second, the only way, unfortunately, if people try to take the easy way out, is to force them to work. Yes, you have to have some people with means of coercion (guns, food, water, bats, knives) go around and tell people that either they do what the government says, the ruler says (as this usually has devolved into some form of dictatorship) or you will suffer.
Of course, the alternative is to let individuals take responsibility for their own actions and let them be allowed to make their own choices. Radical idea, I know, and fraught with risks. What if they fail? What if they don’t do enough? Won’t they get hurt? Won’t they miss out feeling fulfilled? Aren’t we rich enough to protect them from these ills?
Well, in answer to the last question, it is simple: No, and we never will be.
It is not that such people won’t be assisted, but that choice will be left up to other individuals. It won’t be compelled. Others can and will assist (because it is in their own interest to do so, but that is another treatise).
Still, when you follow the debate in the U.S. this fall on health care insurance, you will see stories of all these people who either will be saved or their lives have been destroyed by the presence or lack thereof of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. And at the bottom of this debate will reside the question: Who am I responsible for? Who are YOU responsible for? Only we, as individuals can provide that answer.
Must you be your neighbor’s keeper and can government compel you to be?
"It's a balancing act," he says. "Insurance is all about pricing risk fairly so that those with higher risk are paying what they should."
--- A quote from way down at the end of the article.
When we are talking about insurance – car, health, life, travel, business, unemployment, bank – we should make sure that statement is kept most prominent in our minds. Unfortunately, we don’t … at least in the U.S. of A.
Take health insurance, a favorite whipping boy these days, where health insurers are compelled to accept people who not only are a high risk, but a sure thing, that they will accrue costs to the insurer. How can they balance that absolute certainty with what they insure so that those with higher risks pay more than those who have risks of a lower order? They really can’t but isn’t that the point? If we burden these private entities that attempt to make a profit (ooo … bad word) off trying to price the risk of paying out by balancing it against the risk that they won’t have to and can invest the money elsewhere then we make it impossible to make that profit (ooo … bad word) and stay in business. Then I suppose we can all depend on “government” to provide that all the risks that we take will be paid for by “society” at large and at no increased penalty or consequence to the individual. Better yet, we can make it progressive: The more you have, therefore the more you are able to pay, then the more you have to pay. That is fair, isn’t it?
In the shipping industry, it is a simple transaction. You are moving cargo through a dangerous area, the rates go up. IF the danger is high enough, you may have to pay as much as the entire value of the cargo in order to have underwriters touch it, or in some cases, underwriters – the people who assess the risk and set the price of insurance – may refuse to insure your cargo at all. Is that not unfair? It seems to be with health insurance. I guess government should ensure all cargoes against all damages at 100 percent.
That means everybody in the country should have to pay into the fund to pay off whenever there are damages, even if they never have anything to do with the cargo. Of course they have a tangential involvement in that they are affected by the prices those cargoes bring on the market, which has effects on other commodities that are remotely tangential to the affected, insured cargo. So, since “society” is paying the price, does it not make sense that everyone … well, at least those who can afford it … has to pay into the pot so people can be compensated.
Take life insurance: Should we not all get the same amount of coverage from the government so that our families and children … or just heirs … can be assured to benefit from our deaths? Is that not a responsibility of society to ensure that we are all taken care of? We don’t have to make our own arrangements; somebody in the government will take care of it for us.
Of course, it matters not that a) we are the government. It is not some separate entity out there hovering over us to make sure that we are taken care of, but it is us, or people like us, making decisions for us. The individual doesn’t have to worry about taking care of themselves. They can just focus on what makes them feel good; what makes them feel fulfilled. They just can focus on themselves in the moment in time. Nothing else really matters anyway.
And b) somebody has to pay for it. Of course, those who have “wealth” can always cover for those who don’t have wealth. That is the answer. So those who have more just have to pay more and those who don’t have enough, don’t have to pay anything.
Oh joy! How simple this all is.
Only problem is that this “solution” already has been tried, repeatedly and it works on the small scale, but when it is “scaled up” to large numbers of people, it doesn’t. In fact, it fails rather abysmally.
Why has it failed? For two reasons:
The first is that when you remove reward or incentive for being good at something, or successful, or just doing more (which removes the equality, oftentimes referred to as fairness, of the reward), then you tend to stifle the willingness for people to do good, be successful or do more. People, I contend, when given the option, usually will chose the option that involves less work, less effort on their part. Not all people, but the vast majority, will take this option. I am not saying it is bad. It has given people around the world a standard of living that was unthinkable a century or two ago. People have been so busy inventing things to save labor and effort that today life is much easier than say in most of our own grandfathers’ time.
Second, the only way, unfortunately, if people try to take the easy way out, is to force them to work. Yes, you have to have some people with means of coercion (guns, food, water, bats, knives) go around and tell people that either they do what the government says, the ruler says (as this usually has devolved into some form of dictatorship) or you will suffer.
Of course, the alternative is to let individuals take responsibility for their own actions and let them be allowed to make their own choices. Radical idea, I know, and fraught with risks. What if they fail? What if they don’t do enough? Won’t they get hurt? Won’t they miss out feeling fulfilled? Aren’t we rich enough to protect them from these ills?
Well, in answer to the last question, it is simple: No, and we never will be.
It is not that such people won’t be assisted, but that choice will be left up to other individuals. It won’t be compelled. Others can and will assist (because it is in their own interest to do so, but that is another treatise).
Still, when you follow the debate in the U.S. this fall on health care insurance, you will see stories of all these people who either will be saved or their lives have been destroyed by the presence or lack thereof of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. And at the bottom of this debate will reside the question: Who am I responsible for? Who are YOU responsible for? Only we, as individuals can provide that answer.
Must you be your neighbor’s keeper and can government compel you to be?
Saturday, July 14, 2012
Other Presidential Choices
I know I said that in the United States we had only a binary choice, but that really isn’t true. We have a binary choice between Democrats and Republicans because, by and large, those are the only two candidates that you hear about. But they are not the only candidates many people will see on the ballot on Nov. 6, 2012.
Unfortunately, only two of these “other” candidates even comes close to having a chance at capturing enough electoral votes to win residency at the White House. Those are the candidates from the Libertarian Party (whose candidate will appear on the ballots in all 50 states) and the Green Party (whose candidate will not appear on the ballot in all 50 states but will appear on the ballots in enough states that – if they won all those states’ Electoral College votes – the party’s candidate could win the election).
Sidebar here: What is the Electoral College? It is a uniquely American institution that meets every four years after a presidential election. You see, when you vote for president in each state in the November election, you really are not voting for president, but rather a slate of delegates (usually picked by the state party as an honorary position) who pledge themselves to vote at a state meeting of delegates for the candidate that you are voting for on your ballot. Interestingly enough, constitutionally, they are not bound to their pledges, but they rarely break ranks. The purpose of the Electoral College is to force candidates to represent more than a few cities. They have to win states instead. In most cases, the electoral votes in a given state go to the person who gets a plurality – not the majority (major distinction) – of the votes in that state, but not in all cases … there is a huge debate going on if that should be changed and some people want to do away with the Electoral college all together and just go with who wins the most popular votes (not necessarily the majority). In few states, the electoral votes are apportioned in proportion of the percentage the candidate took in the statewide ballot, and in at least one state (if memory serves me correct) the candidate who get the most vote in a congressional district gets that delegate and the one who gets the plurality of votes in the state gets two delegates (Note: the number of delegates a state has is equal to the number of its Congressional representatives plus two for its senators). The District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam and American Samoa (I think) all get one vote each. If it wasn’t for the Electoral College, candidates would be decided by the few megalopolises in the US and everybody else could just stay home. As it is, you can win just 10 states and capture the White House, but it usually takes more because those 10 often don’t go for the same candidate. Anyway, however you count electoral votes, the winning candidate has to get at least 270 electoral votes, or the election is thrown to the House of Representatives. (Which would be a big mess and I don’t think has happened since 1800 when it took like 103 ballots in the House to decide Thomas Jefferson beat Aaron Burr). Also, it means that the winning candidate may not get the most popular votes (see 2000) or definitely not a majority of votes … in fact, the winning candidate rarely gets 50 percent of the vote and, in my lifetime has gotten as low as only 40 percent of the popular vote. So much for today’s civics lesson. If you already knew all this, go to the head of the class.
Ok, for the Libertarians (remember he will appear in all 50 states), their candidate is a guy named Gary Johnson, a former governor of New Mexico; and their vice-presidential nominee is Jim Gray, retired state court judge, from California.
The Green Party (who will not appear on the ballot in all 50 states but will be in states with more than 300 electoral votes) offers as their presidential candidate Jill Stein, medical doctor from Massachusetts, and their vice-presidential nominee is Cheri Honkala of Pennsylvania.
Of course, Ron Paul and his supporters might try again to mount an independent or write-in campaign, but that probably would be worse than futile.
Now, the point of all this is illustrate that, yes, if you are eligible to vote in the presidential election in November, you most likely do have a choice to vote for someone other than President Obama or Mr. Romney. Only, if you just watch TV or listen to the radio, you probably won’t know this. In addition, if you only read the major on-line news sources, you probably will not hear much about the two “other” party candidates.
Unfortunately, this is a decision each of those media dissemination outlets will make and it will be not to cover the “minor” party candidates. Since both candidates are relatively unknown to the mass of American voters, they will remain so. I doubt Mr. Johnson or Dr. Stein will appear in any, if any, presidential debates. So the choice made not to cover them, because they won’t get very many votes, becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. But that is politics in America and the GOP and Dems like it like that.
So, in the end, an awful lot of voters will troop to the polls with heavy hearts … and vote for the candidate they think a) might win and b) represents the lesser of all the evil choices offered.
Not a cheery notion, but it the way politics and the art of the compromise are played out in America.
References:
http://news.yahoo.com/mass-doctor-wins-green-partys-presidential-nod-214514799.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/06/us-usa-libertarians-idUSBRE8440BZ20120506
http://news.yahoo.com/ron-pauls-delegate-insurgency-ends-nebraska-221812268--abc-news-politics.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/06/us-usa-libertarians-idUSBRE8440BZ20120506
Ok, I have been politic and at least tried to let some people know how the process really is supposed to work.
Austerity
Background reading
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/12/austerity-measures-a-thousand-cuts_n_1666309.html
The problem with austerity is that it hurts. It requires sacrifice and sacrifice always hurts (that is why it is called sacrifice, but anyway).
Today, it seems that we are attempting to live our lives without pain, without sacrifice, and I wonder if that is even possible. It seems to me that life in our real world is full of hurts and pains, and things that will bring us hurt and pain and discomfort. It is not how we avoid these things that make us, but how we accept and deal with them.
When I read tragedies such as described in the above article, I am struck by the fact that I, too, have paid a price. Granted that price was practically entirely of my own choosing when I sit down to analyze it, but, still, I figure that I am not all that unique in this world. I could sit down and list all the bad things that have happened to me in my life, but to what end? It might act as a warning to others not to do as I have done, but then again, people being people, I doubt it.
I agree that austerity is not the nicest concept, but what alternative is there? By that I mean that we have to understand that absolutely nothing in life is “free”. Sorry, everything comes with its own “cost” like it or not. Even those things we take for granted as free come with a cost, whether it is in the effort to achieve them or the mere fact that our survival always has a price tag on it.
You may not agree with that concept, but I would say that you are denying reality.
So, if you cannot pay the price, then what happens? You, as an individual, have to adopt your own austerity policies. Can’t afford that house? Then you have to give it up? Can’t afford that lobster and steak dinner? I guess it is another macaroni and cheese dinner night.
That is what life is all about: Choices. Sometimes we have to make some pretty grim choices because life deals us opportunities in the form of illnesses or other medical problems, or shortages of this resource or that resource or any of a myriad of other things. We can either chose to face these things, or we can try to ignore them. (The latter doesn’t work very well, as I can personally attest to)
So, if we can’t afford something, then we have to do without; that is a basic truth.
Which brings me to the next question: Why can’t we afford it?
Well, if we don’t have something to trade with other people to exchange resources for those that we want; then we can't afford it. But then what if we think we need those things: Whose responsibility is it to satisfy those needs? That, I suggest is the great debate of today’s societies, pretty much around the world.
Does society (your community/nation/etc.) owe it to you as an individual to provide you with satisfaction of your needs? Or do you owe it to your society to provide for your own needs the best you can by trading the only things you own – your labor and intelligence – for the resources needed for your survival as well, if possible, for making your life easier.
That leads to yet another question: What are needs? Are needs merely things necessary for survival? Or, as seems to be the case in my country, needs have an every expanding definition. Is it necessary to have a cell phone? Is a G1, G2, G3 or G4 networked phone needed and which level? Is a television set necessary and how big and what format? Is a computer necessary? How about a stove (gas or electric?), a refrigerator, running water, waste disposal, heating, air conditioning, a microwave oven, a fireplace, a couch, a bed, a roof, a house (or an apartment or even just a room)? The list can be almost endless.
What does society owe us and what do we owe society? I have my own views on that, but I will save them for later. To me, that is the basic debate we are having this year in our presidential campaign.
My question to you, dear reader, is: What do you think? You have a functioning brain. You obviously can read (at least one of the languages that this rant can be translated into). Believe it or not, it is my belief that what each of us thinks is important. For what we think affects those around us, which affects those around them, and on, and on, like ripples in a pond.
So, if you think we have to accept austerity as part of life, you might want to pass that thought on to others. I do and I have just done that.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Women in the Infantry
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/story/2012-05-13/women-combat-military-marines/54942550/1
http://www.mca-marines.org/gazette/article/get-over-it-we-are-not-all-created-equal
Women in the infantry? Some want to see it, others don’t … count me with the others, at least not in mixed gender units.
It is an interesting argument and one that the US will have to wrestle with over the coming years as it tries to level the playing field, especial for women officers in the military.
There has been some (in my opinion, not enough) debate about what role women should play in the military. Should they be allowed in fighting roles or not? Well, I guess that depends on the service. Having not had experience in the air services, I cannot comment with any experience on that issue. But I have had experience both afloat and on the land (with on the land having had women in my unit) and those experiences have definitely brought me down on the side of those who say that women should not serve in infantry units.
Now, I am not saying – nor have I ever said – that women cannot make outstanding combat fighters. They can, without a doubt. In fact, I suspect that women can be far more ruthless killers than men but I can’t prove that or document it. I would just rather not have them in my unit, thank you, as it creates too many distractions and potential problems.
The Marine captain, in her article says women should get over it, “we are not all created equal.” That’s for sure, in so many ways.
The point I always argued was a) standards have to be uniform and b) how do you deal with basic biology and primal instincts. You see, at least in my experience, standards are not uniform because allowances “have to be” made for the differences in feminine physiques from the male physique. While in cardio fitness this may have some validity, but when it comes right down to it, if you have to hump 30 pounds of personal gear and ammunition, plus at least 70 to 100 pounds in a rucksack, then it doesn’t matter if you are a man or a woman … if you want to do the job, you have to do it, period … no slacking.
That is life in the infantry, and as the captain pointed out, history shows that women, for the most part, are not able to do it over time physically.
But it is the other half, part b, which I have found to be really problematical. I am sorry, but to hijack an old cliché: Men are men and women are women and ever the twain shall meet. I don’t care what you do, or how you try to do it, hormones win every time. To think otherwise is to be incredibly naïve … if not stupid, but at least silly. You absolutely have to find a way to deal with the taboo subject of the sexual dynamic.
Granted, I grew up in a time when the male-female roles were fairly well defined and that is changing. Part of me always says “women and children first” and the guys take the hindmost and their chances. Sorry, I was well conditioned as a child and a young man.
As part of my observations, I noticed that a whole bunch of hue and outcry was made over the execution of an Afghan woman on video. Her crime, apparently, was she was sleeping with both of the rivals for the leadership of that particular Taliban group. That sums up my argument against women in my unit in a nutshell. No matter what happens that conflict is going to happen. Not might happen, it WILL happen.
Having been the non-commissioned officer in charge of taking care of 10 to 35 soldiers, I can tell you that it is a tough enough job without having to factor in allowances for the different genders. Nope, don’t want to go there, ever again. Been there! Done That! Lord, I wish I could lose the T-Shirt!
Having served on US Navy destroyer with a crew of little more than 225, I can attest that adding the sexual dynamic to that equation would have just made what was difficult at times, down right impossible. You pack 200-plus people on something that is maybe a football field long, about the width of maybe a four-lane street, with two or three decks, crammed with power-plants, workshops, living spaces and weapons systems (make a mistake in the first or the last and you definitely risk shortening not only your life span but everybody else on board) for extended periods of time and I guarantee you: Bad things will happen. Again, it is not a case of might happen. Bad things will happen.
When bad things happen in military formations, well, bad things happen at the sharp end of the stick and people die. You may not want them to die, but they will. Even when things are going swimmingly down in the trenches, people will die. It is what happens in war, which is what the military formations are designed for.
Ok, I will grant you, there are many roles for women in the military, but being in the infantry, or armor or on a small warship like a destroyer or a submarine is not one of them.
A Matter of perspective
Background reading:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/11/world/europe/nireland-dog-death-sentence/index.html?hpt=wo_bn6
http://world.time.com/2012/07/11/yemen-suicide-bomber-attacks-police-cadets/
http://news.yahoo.com/mali-seek-icc-probe-rebel-crimes-north-132152653.html
http://news.yahoo.com/masked-gunmen-kill-9-police-pakistan-city-lahore-043305206.html
http://news.yahoo.com/dozens-burned-nigeria-petrol-tanker-blaze-111541832.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-18829052
It is interesting the things that spur emotions in people. Sometimes, it makes one shake their head in amazement … or amusement, I am not sure.
For example, my step-daughter, who truly is a wonderful young woman who holds passionate beliefs (even if her step-father thinks some of them are more than a bit out there, if you understand the reference). She works as the manager of a pet supply/pet store and as one would expect is passionate about animals and their treatment, or lack thereof, or mistreatment, as the case may be.
Recently, on her Facebook page, she took up the case of a dog in Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK, that was a pitbull-lab mix and, since owning pitbulls happens to be illegal in Belfast, was slated to be put down. After several years of legal wrangling, the dog was put to death recently and there now is an effort to punish the dog catcher person for obeying the law.
Couple points here: One, my stepdaughter is Canadian and this was happening in Northern Ireland. I mean, if you don’t like a law, then move to the place and change it. (But that is an entirely different argument). Second, it is a dog, however loveable, or not, but still a dog.
In a world where hundreds (if not thousands) of people are dying every day (the sample of news stories above taken from roughly one 24-hour period), to me, there would seem to be a much larger issue to take up. It is, however, a matter of perspective.
But then I am struck by something Josef Stalin was alleged to have said:
One death is a tragedy; thousands (or was it millions) are just statistics.
And yet, where is the passion? Where is the anger? Where is the action? Nowhere.
Why is that? Why is it that we can get all that worked up over the deliberate death of one dog, when there are so many deliberate deaths of human beings every day? To me that is more than a tragedy, it is an obscenity.
I understand that in war people die, that is why Robert E. Lee’s observation always seems so appropriate:
It is well that war is so terrible; otherwise we should grow too fond of it.
(If you don’t know who Bobbie Lee was, please look him up, he was a great American)
There are times for war, just as there are times for peace, but in every conflict/war/battle every death is a tragedy. We see far too much tragedy these days. Part of that is a product of the telecommunications revolution that allows us to be aware of events happening all around the planet within seconds of it happening, but even then it seems that there is a lot of violence being done to relatively innocent people every day that far outweighs the fate of a simple dog. I am not really criticizing my stepdaughter, just pointing out that that it is a matter of perspective … a matter of what is important.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Beware the Bogey-persons
Backgrounder
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/09/karl-rove-speech_n_1656013.html
I have long wondered exactly why people like Sarah Palin and Karl Rove elicit such Pavlovian responses from progressives and denizens of the so-called left-hand side of the political spectrum.
I mean both are just human beings, not particularly good nor evil – at least as far as I can tell. Both are to some extent articulate (to their own audiences) and knowledgeable people who seem to inspire in their opponents this vision that they are totally evil beings. Why is that? Heck, if I know.
And then, I got to thinking about the old political saw: If you want to unify the masses, create a devil for them to hate. Usually, this is used in international politics to justify nationalism, so the “leaders” select some nation and they become the “empire of evil” or something similar.
Now, in Germany in the 1930s, and in Arab Muslim countries today, that devil is the Jews/now Israelis.
In the US today, those devils are Karl Rove, Sarah Palin and now to a lesser extent, George W. Bush.
On the right, of course, they have created the devils of President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Barney Franks … and maybe Harry Reid … and most certainly, George Soros
My contention is that none of these “bogey-persons” really is an evil or bad person. I may disagree with them (all of them) politically, but that does not make them bad enough to elicit some Pavlovian response from me.
In the case above, I suspect that Karl Rove’s appearance at the luncheon was vetted by some appropriately high-powered political lawyers and was not, as implied by the author of the article, some illegal, nefarious, disingenuous, circumlocution of his interpretation of what is, or what he feels should be, federal law concerning political campaign activities.
The problem, as I see it, in this country is not that we have too much political debate, but rather not enough. GASP! What am I talking about?
To begin with, political speech begins with and ends with money … individual’s money and how they spend it. Unfortunately, in this country (as pretty much everywhere around the world, given the condition of human nature), all political parties see it as being in their best interest to somehow muzzle their “opponents”. This is why the power of incumbency is so immense. Incumbents get loads of free advertising just by being incumbents.
Still, there are those who would shackle the power of money, which is about as totalitarian as you can get: Using the law to suppress dissident speech.
I would counter those who wish to limit political speech by telling them if you really believe there is a tit-for-tat in between the spenders and politicians then prove it and make stricter laws on bribery … and enforce them with all equal before the bar of justice. But if you are just claiming influences, then that is a red herring. Yes, money does buy influences, so does personality. So do words. So do numbers of people behind your case. That, in case you didn’t realize it, is what politics is all about.
You want to remove the power of money to influence government, I have a simple solution: Eliminate government largess. That is right: Limit what government can spend its money on. Throw away all the tax breaks, subsidies, inducements, supports that, for the most part, are designed either to reward supporters or attempt influence behavior in one direction or another.
Government needs money? It levies a tax, a tax that EVERYONE pays the same into. If it is based on a percentage, then everyone pays the same percentage on everything. If it is a simple fee, then everyone pays the same fee. No favoritism, No helping one side or another. Everybody is equal before the law. Anything else is simple and straightforward discrimination, which in any form needs to be resisted and rejected.
Government spends too much money, or spends it in the wrong place? Then limit the areas that government has a role. Limit where government can spend money. Limit money coming from the government and you will limit the money spent trying to gain government influence. It is simple economics. It is simple human behavior. Remove the reward, remove the incentive, and the behavior will stop, post haste.
But back to my original thesis: Why make devils out essentially non-entities, like Palin, Rove or Soros. These people hold no office. Their influence is only what we consent to give them. But in a sense, they are targets of opportunity. They are people who can be cast into whatever demonological category you want to make and therefore sway large numbers of people with whatever portrait of them you want to paint. As a symbol, they become easier to lie about, easier to distort and much easier to manipulate to further your agenda.
The problem is, or maybe it never was before, that we are unable to debate ideas, concepts, theories, without making it personal.
I can sit here at my keyboard and computer screen, and rant on whatever topic I want, but I doubt very seriously if I will influence those few who read these words, because – in the words of Pappy: Don’t bother me the facts (or ideas, or questions), my mind is made up.
All I am asking is that people open those minds. Listen to what others say. Weigh what they say against what you believe to be true and the values that you hold. Think about what they are saying. Don’t be afraid to listen. Don’t try to shut them down or drown them out.
Don’t make bogeymen (oops, bogey-persons) of those you disagree with. Fight them with ideas. Prove, if you can, that your ideas, concepts better describe the reality of the world than theirs do. Don’t be afraid of money, it is merely an illusion that we give greater credit to than it deserves.
Besides, there is none stashed under my bed, nor are there any bogey-people.
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