The Airline Surprise

Hey-oh! I'm back!

It has been a hectic start to the year with internship search in full swing. Coupled with school resuming, I was lucky just to read along with all the posts and comments. But things are nearly back to normal so I thought I'd jump back in the fray.

Last week I had a really early flight to catch, and a connection to make, in order to make it to a final round interview. As I ran off one plane and checked for my gate assignment, I saw the dreaded word that is all too common these days -- CANCELLED.

Sweeeeeet.

So I go to the counter and they are expecting me. They have me booked for a new flight. Or should I say flightssss. Their propsed connection put me in two hours after my interviews were scheduled to start. Minor problem. But they quickly found another set of flights that would get me in 55 minutes before interview start time. Doable. Done.

Made the first flight. Had to run all the way across the airport (and if you know Philly airport, that's a good mile run) to catch my next flight. Was one of the last to board, but made it.

Interviews went well, yadda yadda yadda, and on my return flight the next day, my connecting flight sits at the gate for an hour as we wait for 'an oxygen valve'.

My story is not unique. This happens nearly every flight, for every flier, right?

How can this be? How can we pay hundreds for a service or a product and get 1 out of 10 things we paid for? Ok, you got me here alive. Thank you.

These days, more than ever before, it's a complete surprise if you have a flawless flight.

Imagine if every market worked like that.

What if it were a huge relief that your snickers bar actually had peanuts in it? Or that your that the 3D movie you go see actually is 3D? Or that the concert you attend actually has the musician playing that you paid to see play/sing? I could go on.

Is this all we're going to get from the airline industry now? Just a now-and-then surprise that all goes flawlessly?

And while they can cancel a connecting flight while I'm in the air, and pay me nothing, I have to pay them $150 to change my flight. Seems reasonable, no?

Time for some innovation and fresh blood in the airline industry.

But until then, maybe we bump the highway speedlimit to 100mph.

On the bright side, the trip made for a great story. And it made me a memorable interviewee - I got the job offer.

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Obushma

During the 2008 Campaign Mr. Obama hammered home the point that electing John McCain would be like electing George W. Bush to a third term. It would seem, however, that that is exactly what we got at least in terms of rhetoric and platitude. Obama is no Bush. In fact, he'd do well to learn from that man. If indeed America is still angry about those eight years, perhaps Obama would want to change course from the massive spending, the fruitless investments into corn and other hocus-pocus "alternative energy" and instead focus on actual economic principles that are historically proven to invigorate economies, generate wealth, and cure the problems of unemployment. Something that, despite being a well evolved chimpanzee, GWB was able to do quite well – despite his insistence on government largess.

I really do have a hard time seeing why liberals detest GWB so much. I mean, other than pure partisan hatred.

Anyway, the Cato Institute has compared SOTU speeches from The One and GWB side by side. They are remarkably similar. Which proves one of a few points:

• That SOTU speeches are pointless displays of meaningless feelgoodism.
• That Obama ignores everything Bush said, and ends up inadvertently sounding like him.
• That Obama has failed to learn anything from his predecessor.
• That Bush was, at least rhetorically, as obsessed on growing the government.

One example:

The idea here is simple: instead of rewarding failure, we only reward success. Instead of funding the status quo, we only invest in reform – reform that raises student achievement, inspires students to excel in math and science, and turns around failing schools that steal the future of too many young Americans, from rural communities to inner-cities.
---
When it comes to our schools, dollars alone do not always make the difference. Funding is important, and so is reform. So we must tie funding to higher standards and accountability for results.

Who said which? (hint: "status quo")

This is not particularly flattering to a man who won a nation-wide election based on his ability to speechify, and who won those votes from a base who believed Bush was an amoeba with a suit. Nor is it entirely surprising. Many of his famous campaign speeches were blatant "borrowings" of the words of others.

But here is my main argument: These men can stand and promise us the moon. And ponies. And ponies we can ride to the moon. In the end they will only look after themselves - which often means leaving us with lighter bank accounts and more rules to follow. Which is why the influence of the federal government needs to be drastically scaled back. Our politcal energies ought to be focused in our own states, our own cities, and in our own neighborhoods. Or, as John Stossel put it when speaking of the corporatism and corruption so rampant in the United States today, "get the government out of our lives and economic affairs. If government has no favors to sell, no one will spend money trying to win them."

If only.

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Thoughts on Perry v. Schwarzenegger

I came across this article in the New Yorker by way of my professor in a class called Social Change Lawyering. I thought it was a pretty good follow-up to my post last week discussing Theodore Olson's involvement in the California case and wanted to pass it along.

Since it's the New Yorker, it slants left, but it's a good attempt to give an overview of what's going on. The first part discusses the issue as it stands and the second part is quite a long history of how the plaintiffs became the plaintiffs in this instance.

What I found particularly compelling was the discussion of whether Olson's involvement is really a good thing for the movement in favor of gay marriage. The consensus among activist groups is that, while slow, the legislative process is working and that they'd rather see a legislative solution than a judicial one. For example, since Hawaii's supreme court found bans on gay marriage to be illegal, 29 states amended their constitutions to legalize such prohibitions, where there is no indication that they would have felt it necessary to do so if they didn't fear judicial ruling to the contrary. You can take this as a legislative victory if you're anti gay marriage, or as a defense of incremental, gradual progress if you're for it.

As another example, it mentions how Roe v. Wade was really a terrible moment for pro-choice activists. The Court was way ahead of science and in front of public opinion in Roe, and the result was a sloppily defended opinion which really polarized the two camps even further. In fact, funding and support for pro-life activism boomed after Roe and abortions are generally less available and/or are more restricted and regulated than they were previous to it. Again, take that how you will.

I bring this up only to point out that although many criticize the liberals' penchant for using the courts to circumvent the legislative process and thwart democracy, the fact is that in honest moments it's often not that good of a thing for their cause. This is part of why I've always defended the judiciary as being more prone to exercise restraint than most people give them credit for and is why I believe that even if Perry v. Schwarzenegger gets to the Supreme Court they'll opt not to decide on it or will decide to uphold it (It'll depend on what the District Court and later the Appellate Court have to say on the subject). They've learned from Roe that deciding at the wrong time only further polarizes the issue and doesn't necessarily put them on the right side of history.

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Campaign Finance Regulation and Free Speech

So I was going to attempt to weed through the recent Supreme Court decision regarding the validity of certain provisions of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law, but that just sounded like more homework. I got through the gist of it, but that should be sufficient for the purposes of this discussion.

Here's a quick summary of the law that's most disputed:

-Whether it's okay to regulate "soft money" contributions. Donations made to federal candidates are regulated and must be reported. Donations made to state parties wasn't previous to McCain-Feingold. State parties would then take that money and campaign for federal candidates. Now that's not okay.

-Issue advocacy: Here's the sticky one. So, if a campaign advertisement is clearly a campaign, it'll say things like "Vote for Hillary" or "Don't vote for Obama." That's fine. It's regulated, it's disclosed, it's capped, etc. Sometimes, though, it's sticky. It'll say things like "Bush voted for X," or "Kerry said this." It'll have sinister motifs or patriotic, upbeat motifs as the case may be, but that's it. Typically it can and does occur outside of the control or direction of the candidate. If you're a conspiracy theorist kind of guy, you probably don't acknowledge that, but it's at least a concern behind the legislation.

You can see where the Issue Advocacy situation can create some free speech problems. Mind you, most free speech arguments are by purists one way or the other. So, there's little or no argument about what a reasonable abridgment of absolute free speech might be. You hear things like, "I should be able to say whatever I want, whenever I want, under whatever circumstances, regardless of effect on others or other concerns that may or may not be legitimate." This becomes a particularly vehement argument as political speech like campaigning is one of the most protected kinds of speech under the law.

So, you've got two parallel lines of argument happening while trying to make and interpret a law: 1) Is political speech subject to any kind of regulation in the abstract? 2) If yes, under what circumstances, what's reasonable, etc.?

My answer to number 1 is yes, of course. Recognizing the inherent danger of regulating free political speech, we're not talking about incumbents restricting the opposition's ability to campaign, nor are we talking about repressing a disgruntled populace seeking to speak out against the government. We're talking about existing Congressmen seeking to in some way level the playing field across party lines to ensure that campaign speech and spending is controlled and monitored. At the very least, we'll never have to wonder, as a matter of public record, who bought whose election.

As for 2, I'm not sure. This is a brutal question. This is a good instance, though, of how people tend to run away with fears of judicial lawmaking. The recent case's decision basically says that certain key aspects of the law aren't constitutional. That's fine. Really, all that means is that when there's a dispute, the language of the law is inadequate to give courts the means to enforce it without raising important Constitutional concerns. That doesn't mean that the court "made" law. It means that the court said, "This law doesn't give us enough guidance as to how to apply it without violating the Constitution. Feel free to come up with something better."

Check out a summary of McCain-Feingold here and let's hear what you think.

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Nerd Chills

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Wait...What?!

I don't know what planet Howard Dean is from. This is probably the most laughable explanation for the Scott Brown win I have heard. Not even Chris Matthews can figure it out.

The real fun starts at about 1:50 into the video.

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Prompted

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The Left Sees The Light

Great read from our friends on the left.

Barack Obama has now, in just a year's time, become the single most inept president perhaps in all of American history, and certainly in my lifetime. Never has so much political advantage been pissed away so rapidly, and what's more in the context of so much national urgency and crisis. It's astonishing, really, to contemplate how much has been lost in a single year.

We could use a President that is a little better about making decisions, even if they are sometimes wrong or misguided. We need a true decision-maker, not a decision weigher.

But that isn't even the entertaining part of the essay. It is the list of failings. It is refreshing to hear people on the left realizing what many of us were warning about a year ago.

* Even more importantly, if you're trying to run your presidency into the ground you'll definitely want to avoid mobilizing the general public behind your agenda. To make sure that you don't repeat the great legislative victories of FDR or LBJ or (unfortunately) Reagan or (really unfortunately) Little Bush, never use their method of appealing directly to the people. Never express your legislative program as a moral imperative, a great calling to the nation. Never attempt to rally the public behind your cause. Never express any urgency. And never call upon them to demand that Congress pass your bills. Then, you can rest assured they won't!


* Another great trick for crashing a presidency is to pick all the wrong priorities to ‘fight' for. Imagine, for example, if FDR had substituted for his ‘Day of Infamy' speech right after Pearl Harbor a ringing call for an American revolution in cobbler technology! Yes, that's right, in response to the devastating surprise attack by the armed forces of the Empire of Japan, what if the president urgently called upon us all to start making really amazing shoes?! Before it's too late, and we all get blisters on our feet! Similarly, Mr. Obama, your spending the last year on (jive) health care and jetting around the world dipping your toes into foreign policy problems while Americans are losing their jobs and their houses is a fine way to kill your presidency. Guaranteed to work every time.

So you might be smiling and nodding upon reading that. But then here comes the 'solution' the author proposes.

The obvious solution, of course, would be a sharp turn to the left. Go where the real solutions are. Fight the good fight. Call liars ‘liars' and thieves ‘thieves'. Do the people's business. Become their advocate against the monsters bleeding them dry. Create jobs. Build infrastructure. Do real national health care. End the wars. Dramatically slash military spending. Produce actual educational reform. Launch a massive green energy/jobs program. Get serious about global warming. Kick a** on campaign finance reform. Fight for gay rights. Restore the New Deal era regulatory framework and expand it. Restore a fair taxation structure. Rewrite trade agreements that undermine American jobs. Rebuild unions. Fill the spate of vacancies in the federal judiciary, and load those seats up with progressives. Rally the public to demand that Congress act on your agenda. Humiliate the regressives in and out of the GOP for their abysmal sell-out policies.

There seems to be a disconnect.
Call liars ‘liars' and thieves ‘thieves'. What is name calling supposed to produce? Hasn't he already been doing plenty of that anyway? Is this really first on your list of things to do to improve O?

Do the people's business. Become their advocate against the monsters bleeding them dry. These people that you call "monsters" are likely the very people that need to hire workers to get us back to business.

Build infrastructure. Ok... How, when, and where? Isn't there a ton of money in the stimulus bill for building infrastructure but the main problem is finding good places to spend it and getting it through red tape? So is this a plea for Stimulus 2? That should be popular.

Do real national health care. In bizarro world this is an easy proposition. The magical national health care solution that ignores all the problems with taking some idea that works for a country of 30 million and imposing it on a country of 300 million.

End the wars. Dramatically slash military spending. You can end wars immediately by losing them. Or you can try to win them. Is the suggestion that we declare defeat and walk away? That should help the democrats come across as strong on defense.

Produce actual educational reform. Again, how? By throwing more money at the problem? By paying teachers more? I hope not. How about charter schools, which seem to be working so well around the country?

Launch a massive green energy/jobs program. Get serious about global warming. Isn't this what you just criticized him for doing? The whole FDR doing the shoe speech? Global Warming is not the fight we should be fighting today, especially with all the controversy surrounding the basic science behind it. Just this week it came out that the data on the glaciers in the Himalayas was falsified. More fraud coming I'm sure.

Restore a fair taxation structure. Yes, I would like that. One that taxes all people fairly. Please get on that. It is outrageous that people and companies that provide all the jobs in this country are required to pay so much more relative to their income.

Rewrite trade agreements that undermine American jobs. Yes, we need to get all the horse and buggy companies back in business! We also could use support for our typewriter industry. (sarcasm) If you want American companies to have to pay twice the market price of steel while all of our competitors are running laps around us, then rewriting the trade laws in the manner I imagine you want will go to that end.

Rebuild unions. This seems to be working for California, New York, and New Jersey. 3 states with heavy public union populations. By working I mean making them bankrupt.

Rally the public to demand that Congress act on your agenda. Every single thing that congress has pursued in 2009 was top of Obama's agenda. The difference is that they had done some work to understand the issues and framed them to benefit their own constituents. The job of the President is to look after the good of the country, not just the party. Obama doesn't seem to understand that.

Reading the first half of the post I was concerned because it seemed like the author had a good grasp of why Obama is a failure. Reading this last paragraph is refreshing because it tells me that the "Left" still doesn't understand basic economics and how the real world operates. They seem envious of the minority position, they'll be there soon enough.

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Sometimes We Make it Too Easy

I'm one of those people. You know, the guy who's not content to just say, "I like this TV show," or "I don't like that TV show." I have to have a reason that transcends normal taste. I follow the business of media as much as I follow media. I'm riveted by Dan Patrick's departure from ESPN to "do something a little different," only to watch him do...The Dan Patrick Show (granted, he thought long and hard about doing the Price is Right) with his incessant need to lightly bag on what he dubs "The Mothership."

So with the Conan/Jay debate, I'm pretty interested in the business end of things. My take on Jay has always been that I dig his monologues but his interviews suck. Simple solution: watch Jay's monologue and then see who's on Letterman. I never could make heads or tails of why NBC did what it did to Conan this year. I get that Jay's a narcissist who agreed to leave and then didn't want to, and I get that the impression around town is that nobody really likes him in the biz. I think Conan's pretty funny, but think the relentless bagging he's done to NBC is, while funny, a little silly.

But that's neither here nor there, though if it sparks some comments, give me a why you like one or the other that's a little more than, "Jay's just not that funny."

What I really wanted to point out was the ludicrousness of a clause in Conan's exit contract with NBC forbidding him from disparaging the network as part of his $45 million settlement. So Conan of course brings up that there's nothing in the contract to forbid him from singing disparaging commentary, which he's done and will do.

Here's the funny part and here's what my title means. The Journal, in covering this particular angle to the divorce, brings in a lawyer from super-firm Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld to give the following expert commentary regarding Conan's singing:

"I would think that it would still be disparaging."

Thanks. Glad you were able to help us with that.

Sometimes I'm proud to be entering the profession.

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Conservative Case for Gay Marriage

The recent challenge to California's Prop. 8 in federal court has an interesting plot twist: the attorneys representing George W. Bush and Al Gore in 2000 have joined forces to represent the plaintiff homosexual couples challenging the California law. Theodore Olson, counsel for Mr. Bush, makes his case in support of gay marriage from his conservative point of view in Newsweek here.

It's an interesting read. His viewpoint is not a particularly conservative one though he is a Republican and worked for the Reagan and the second Bush administrations. I find two major fault in his premises:

1) He gives far too much credence to the scientific evidence that homosexuality is an immutable trait. To my knowledge, the consensus on that issue within the scientific community is the same species of consensus that existed regarding global warming until 2009: one of questionable legitimacy, nowhere near understood with the degree of certainty with which it is advertised by its proponents.

2) He makes two assertions regarding the nature of marriage with which I continually take issue.

First, he says regarding marriage that, "At its best, it is a stable bond between two individuals who work to create a loving household and a social and economic partnership." While I agree that it is that, it is not uniquely that. Nor is the government's interest in providing a civil legitimacy to that relationship to promote such an arrangement between two consenting individuals just for the heck of it.

Second, he makes reference to the Supreme Court in striking down laws barring interracial marriage characterizing marriage as being "part of the Constitution's protections of liberty, privacy, freedom of association, and spiritual identification." While it is that, there is nothing to indicate that the Supreme Court in so defining marriage conceived of it in any terms other than marriage between a man and a woman.

I do encourage proponents of gay marriage to read the article and shout "Hear, hear!" and those who are against it to hiss and boo. But it is always worth analyzing our position to ensure that we're at least attempting to make logical sense.

In my view, the courts are at a legal impasse regarding how to handle gay marriage. Supreme Court rhetoric aside, there is not a strong legal basis for making marriage as Olson and others define it a fundamental right protected by the Constitution. Nor is there a strong reason for a government to so solemnify and add a particular government protection to a union as its described.

Most of the origins of family law are geared to two ends: 1) protecting divorced women from the limited means, self-determination, and protections that they were once left with after a divorce, and 2) protecting and ensuring the safety and security of children in a marriage or following its dissolution.

The courts are further at an impasse due to the scientific uncertainty regarding the nature of homosexuality. It's not unlike Roe v. Wade's controversial analysis of the nature of life and viability of a fetus. An honest reading of the opinion in Roe can be summarized thus:

"It's really not possible for this or any court to make the type of scientific and theological determination on the viability of a fetus, nor is it probably appropriate. But for the sake of argument, we'll make one anyway."

In my view, the reason Roe has yet to be overturned is because there is no good way to reconcile the paradox of the decision other than to come up with an opinion that basically says,

"It's really not possible for this or any court to make the type of scientific and theological determination on the viability of a fetus, nor is it probably appropriate. But for the sake of argument and because we didn't like what the court came up with in Roe, we'll make up another one."

There's more, but I'll leave the rest to your comments.

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Let Me Get This Straight

From Yahoo! News covering Senator-elect Scott Brown's victory:

The president suggested the same forces that elected Brown "swept me into office" in 2008. People are frustrated "not just because of what's happened in the last year or two years, but what's happened over the last eight years."

So, wait. People in Massachusetts, as a part of their frustration with GWB, elected you, President Obama. And that frustration swept you into office and then elected your opposition party candidate to replace one of the biggest institutions in your party as part of, here's where I'm not clear, CONTINUED frustration with GWB.

No, Mr. President. Senator Brown was elected as a referendum of your politics and that of your cohorts. Make no mistake.

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Permanent Majority

I guess the tales of the demise of the Republican Party were a little premature. Has a so-called "Permanent Majority" ever lasted for such a short time?

Going back to what Dennis Miller said when Obama was elected, I cannot get over how on point he was. He said that Obama should be smart enough to know that when Pelosi and Reed come sauntering up to him with their ideas on how to govern that he should kick them down and remind them that HE is responsible for the party being in power not them.

Oh well, maybe Obama can refresh that advice. Listening to Pelosi and Reed is career limiting.

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Read My Lips

Keeping on the subject of taxes, and all the myriad of alternative names President Obama has for them, I thought I'd re-post the following in its entirety. The author is David Boaz from the Cato Institute (the original contains several source links):

Last year I tried to compile a list of all the taxes President Obama and his allies were maneuvering to impose. But each week brings new ideas. Just recently we’ve heard about a bank tax, applying the Medicare tax to capital gains and other “passive” or “unearned” income, raising the Medicare tax rate, raising or broadening the capital gains tax, an income tax “surtax,” a tax on tanning – and of course the tax on private health insurance to pay for the expansion of government insurance has moved to the top of the list.

And all of these on top of these ideas proposed or publicly floated by President Obama and his aides and allies:

• Raise the top income tax rates from their current 33 percent and 35 percent rates to 36 percent and 39.6 percent in 2011
• Limit itemized deductions for people paying high rates
• Increase capital gains and dividend taxes by 33 percent for people paying high income tax rates
• Impose a value-added tax (VAT) on all goods and services
• Raise the Social Security tax by lifting the cap
• Raise a variety of business taxes by $353 billion over 10 years, including repeal of LIFO rules, restoring Superfund taxes, seven tax increases on energy companies, and more
• Tax employer-provided health benefits
• Implement a cap-and-trade system for emissions permits, the functional equivalent of a massive new tax
• Tax drivers on their mileage
• Change rules to raise gift taxes
• Restore the estate tax at 45 percent
• Raise cigarette tax by 62 cents a pack
• Raise taxes on beer, wine, liquor, and soda
• Eliminate health savings accounts and flexible savings accounts
• Tax employer-provided cellphones
• Tax AIG employee bonuses
• Raise taxes on overseas corporate earnings

Back in July the Wall Street Journal reported:

President Barack Obama’s health-care plan is in jeopardy because of serious concerns that costs will spin out of control. As much as anyone, it’s White House budget director Peter Orszag’s job to save it…

After his TV appearances, he went straight to the Senate Finance Committee, where he spent three hours with committee aides brainstorming about how to pay for the trillion-dollar legislation. At one point, they flipped through the tax code, looking for ideas.

Flipping through the tax code, looking for ideas on how to relieve us of more of our money. That’s a great visual of Obama’s Washington. President Obama and his allies look at the vast abundance in America, and all they see is wealth that they don’t yet control. It annoys them. They could do so much good with that money. How dare bankers and businesses, farmers and entrepreneurs, widows and foundations hold tight to their wealth, when government has so many plans to fund? “Let’s go and get it from those who’ve got it,” they cry, in the immortal words of Sen. Barbara Mikulski.

But perhaps Thomas Jefferson’s words are even more immortal and equally applicable: “He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.”

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New Bank Tax errrrr "Fee"

There is outrage to be found here

“My determination to achieve this goal is only heightened when I see reports of massive profits and obscene bonuses at some of the very firms who owe their continued existence to the American people,” Obama said at the White House. “We want our money back, and we’re going to get it.”

From almost all the banks to Obama, "YOU GOT YOUR MONEY BACK." Many of us were forced to take the TARP funds and now you're telling us after we repaid you plus interest that you weren't paid back properly?

Let me restate for those that don't know the true timeline. In the fall of 2008, many financial firms were told that only the strongest banks would qualify for TARP, so if you wanted to prove to the world and the market that you were a strong bank you needed to submit to TARP standards and get money from it. Strong banks did that, only a month later when the public soured on TARP the banks were all made to look like GM or Chrysler as feasting at the public trough. We therefore rushed to payback the "loan" from the government and most banks did as soon as they were allowed to.

This is not about "getting your money back." This is raising taxes in the form of fees so the 1.5 TRILLION deficit the fed will be running, without including Obamacare, in 2010 won't seem so bad.

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In 8 Months and 20 Days

Fast forward to November 3, 2010. The election results are in. The GOP won a great deal of seats from either the previous months of rabid self-destruction by the Democrats who, once in power, did not know how to wield it or the Republicans’ efforts to highlight that self-destruction. The GOP maybe even won the 40-odd seats it needs to get a majority in the House.

Champagne corks pop in the beltway and in home offices with the historic victory for the Republicans.

Now what?

What does the GOP look like in November 2010?

Does Republican leadership know? Does anyone know?

Will it be the party who rabidly fought against Obama’s domestic policy in 2009 and 2010 while maintaining a hawkish position on National Security? Will it be the party who rolled over its own country?

As the Journal’s Daniel Henninger asked, will the right find a way “to separate the daily anti-Obama domestic policy wars (the front on which the 2010 election should be fought) from the hard complexities of the war on terror”? Because, after all, “[the] price of not giving this president more support than he gave George W. Bus is to let all the stone killers the jihadis can create over the next three years think they’ve got a shot.”

If GOP leadership doesn’t think this through and if conservatives quit circle-jerking each other about how wrong the current administration is instead of having tough discussion over our own strategy and identity, we’ll be unworthy of the victory that we’ll hardly have to work for in this year’s elections.

I go again to the Journal, but this time to Peggy Noonan who called this phenomenon “The Risk of Catastrophic Victory.” After spending some time discussing why a win on health care will be a catastrophic victory for the current administration, she expresses this same concern that I’ve long felt about the GOP’s status on November 3 of this year.

Ms. Noonan tells of a conversation she had with a “respected Republican congressman” who told her excitedly about a bill that addresses the growth of entitlements and long-term government spending, with little to no efforts by the GOP to get behind the bill. Ridiculous. She quotes the congressman as saying, in explanation for his party’s apathy, “They’re waiting for the Democrats to destroy themselves.”

Politico reports that GOP leaders have privately settled on a strategy to win back the House by putting the vast majority of their money and energy into attacking Democrats, what they call “the 80-20 strategy” (80% of the time whacking Democrats and the remainder talking about their own ideas). Please. This from House Minority Whip Eric Cantor.

Going back to Ms. Noonan:

“Republican political professionals in Washington assume a coming victory. They do not see that 2010 could be a catastrophic victory for them. If they seize back power without clear purpose, if they are not serious, if they do the lazy and cynical thing by just sitting back and letting the Democrats lose, three bad things will happen. They will contribute to the air of cynicism in which our citizens marinate. Their lack of seriousness will be discerned by the Republican base, whose enthusiasm and generosity will be blunted. And the Republicans themselves will be left unable to lead when their time comes, because operating cynically will allow the public to view them cynically, which will lessen the chance they will be able to do anything constructive.”
Let’s think hard about what 2010 will mean. For those of you who slant left, do a better job of justifying why health care should take priority over jobs and national security if you want to have a prayer of staying in power. Those of you in the right, think hard about whether your leaders have answers to the questions we’ll all be asking on November 3 of this year, principally:

Now what?

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Some Vids Just for Fun

If you didn't catch Sir Charles on SNL last week you missed out on some good stuff. Here was my fav'. SNL's take on the Hank Haney Project to fix Barkley's swing:




And then, with a customarily irreverent take on a delicate subject and in lieu of our recent thread, here's the Onion on abortion:


New Law Requires Women To Name Baby, Paint Nursery Before Getting Abortion

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ObamaPoor

Barack Obama declared "let me perfectly clear...if your family earns less than $250,000 a year, you will not see your taxes increased a single dime. I repeat: not one single dime."

He was right. He won't raise taxes by "one single dime". Instead, he will raise them by several thousand. Especially if so-called ObamaCare becomes law, as Michael F. Cannon points out: "Suppose you’re a family of four at or near the federal poverty level. Under current law, if you earn an additional dollar, you get to keep around 60-70 cents.Under the House and Senate health care bills, however, you would get to keep maybe 38 cents. Or 26 cents. Or maybe just 18 cents."



You may notice that both proposed bills impose the highest tax hikes on those making the least amount of money.

Meanwhile there are reports, denied by the AFL-CIO of course, that the massive union has struck a deal to that will exempt its employees from the so-called Cadillac tax on high end insurance plans. Now, why would that be a bad thing? Oh that's right: so unions and the government (but I repeat myself) can continue to bully and coerce companies into unionizing, which ultimately strips control of private companies out of the hands of its owners and into that of the government and union bosses. See General Motors for one, fairly prominent example.

Isn't it odd how everything coming out of Washington D.C. is designed to enact more control over individuals and corporations?

Is there anyone who still believes "health care reform" is actually about health care?

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Deadly Force?

As you may recall, in May 2008 George Tiller, an abortionist, was shot to death while at church. The trial of the man who pulled the trigger begins this week. I found this article by Jacob Sullum to be very interesting. It raises a fair point, namely that:

Obeying the law is generally a good idea, but there are exceptions. When the law blesses the murder of babies, it is hardly worthy of respect, any more than laws blessing the enslavement of Africans or the gassing of Jews were, and violent resistance against such enactments surely can be justified. A pro-life position does not require pacifism in the face of a murderous assault; it allows and arguably demands the use of force in defense of oneself and others.

Do you agree? Was the use of deadly force justified in the killing of George Tiller?

(The author is not advocating, nor calling for the deaths of abortionists. He is, I think, rather raising an interesting argument because it is the defense that the accused is trying to use in court.)

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Care Vs. Delivery

Brother Harry Reid, the prominent Senator from Nevada ought to take care about the delivery of his words. However, according to his logic, Barack Obama and myself have much in common: we are both "light skinned, with no Negro dialect" unless of course, we want one.

Perhaps it was Brother Reid's Mormon upbringing that instilled in him such misconstrued racial insensitivity? Perhaps. But that theory does little to explain the racism of Bill Clinton.

Moving on.

What I really intended to post about was health care. For the sake of argument, I will concede that the so-called health care reform that Harry Pelosi is constructing will actually reduce costs and increase coverage. It won't do either of those things, but again, for the purpose of this post, I will assume that what Barack O'Barney is telling me is true.

Fine. Everyone is covered, and it costs nothing. Fantastic.

But what does that do to increase the quality of care?

The United States has the best health care in the world. Our R&D is unsurpassed. Our drugs the most effective, our physicians and medical schools top of the line. The US has the best cancer survival rates in the world. 18 of the last 30 winners of the Nobel Prize in medicine have been US Citizens (For what that is worth).

But the politickers on Capital Hill never mention the already unsurpassed quality of American health care. We only hear that it's broken, and discriminatory, and inferior to European models.

The truth is that the American system of delivery is broken. The third-party payer system, the government intervention and the large bureaucratic mess created by both insurance companies and Uncle Sam have indeed "broken" the health insurance model.

The fix for that however is not more bureaucracy. Only the upside down logic of a lobbyist or politician would prescribe the cause of a problem as the solution. And yet, that is precisely what we are being presented with as tonic for this illness.

Will government control and delivery of health insurance cause:

• chemotherapy to improve?
• the occurrences of heart disease to drop?
• the quality of medical education to increase?
• an increase in healthy lifestyles?
• a decrease in obesity?

No. Of course not. The reverse is probably true (see; Poverty, War on). That is, all those things and more will most likely suffer when the government controls health care delivery, and makes actual care decisions. Instead of a market that creates incentive for R&D and fierce competition within medical schools, the government will create a blase environment of mediocrity, in both the professional and educational worlds. Why be excellent, when a government funded job is inevitable? Why live a healthy lifestyle when there is no financial incentive (never mind the actual, physical benefits) for doing so? Why worry? Uncle Sam has got it covered!

The delivery of health care is hampered and hindered by government mandates, large bureaucratic leviathans, and an ignorant consumer base that has no idea what certain procedures actually cost, and what they ought to cost.

But the care itself, is the best in the world.

So, before you clamor and crow for "health care reform" it might be wise to consider what effect such legislation will have on that care.

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Thinking of Grad School?

Fascinating read on becoming a "scholar".

Here is a sampling:

I have found that most prospective graduate students have given little thought to what will happen to them after they complete their doctorates. They assume that everyone finds a decent position somewhere, even if it's "only" at a community college (expressed with a shudder). Besides, the completion of graduate school seems impossibly far away, so their concerns are mostly focused on the present. Their motives are usually some combination of the following:

They are excited by some subject and believe they have a deep, sustainable interest in it. (But ask follow-up questions and you find that it is only deep in relation to their undergraduate peers — not in relation to the kind of serious dedication you need in graduate programs.)
They received high grades and a lot of praise from their professors, and they are not finding similar encouragement outside of an academic environment. They want to return to a context in which they feel validated.
They are emerging from 16 years of institutional living: a clear, step-by-step process of advancement toward a goal, with measured outcomes, constant reinforcement and support, and clearly defined hierarchies. The world outside school seems so unstructured, ambiguous, difficult to navigate, and frightening.
With the prospect of an unappealing, entry-level job on the horizon, life in college becomes increasingly idealized. They think graduate school will continue that romantic experience and enable them to stay in college forever as teacher-scholars.
They can't find a position anywhere that uses the skills on which they most prided themselves in college. They are forced to learn about new things that don't interest them nearly as much. No one is impressed by their knowledge of Jane Austen. There are no mentors to guide and protect them, and they turn to former teachers for help.
They think that graduate school is a good place to hide from the recession. They'll spend a few years studying literature, preferably on a fellowship, and then, if academe doesn't seem appealing or open to them, they will simply look for a job when the market has improved. And, you know, all those baby boomers have to retire someday, and when that happens, there will be jobs available in academe.

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Stock Market Gone Wild

I have no idea where this stock market is going. I thought it would top out long ago, but it seems to still want to go up and up. Rather than discuss why I think it is approaching bubble levels (maybe this one can be called the Obama-bubble), we should take this time to review our current retirement investments and make sure they are properly allocated for the coming year.

This means selling some of your big winners.

I know it hurts to do, these trusty funds/stocks have given you 100%+ returns over the past year (all you holders of AmEx stock know what I'm talking about). It is absolutely essential at this point to take some money out of your big winners and put the winnings into something else. It is the nature of the stock market, yesterdays big winners are tomorrows lackluster performers and next week's dogs. There is no better time then the start of the year to review and adjust your holdings.

To review (this is where some of our reader's choose to skip my post). This is an example of an easy portfolio that can be maintained through Vanguard Index funds. Most company 401(K) plans should have funds that look and behave similarly.

Review your performance for the past year. Pat yourself on the back for having chosen so wisely (pretty much everything did extremely well in 2009). Now rebalance things to look how you want it to for the coming year.

My view? I'm gearing up for inflation. The bond portion of my account is shifting mostly into TIP (Inflation Protected Treasuries). Junk bonds and high yield corporates are going to get hit hard in an inflationary environment. I'm also moving some of my stock holdings into XME which is a metal and mining ETF which gives me exposure to gold, silver, and steel.

I'm even shifting money out of my stock portfolio and into my bonds because I don't like the prospect of 10% unemployment and rising inflation.

The most important thing that I'm doing though is setting up an automatic monthly deposit into my Roth IRA. Automatic deposits are the surest way to get rich. I setup an automatic deposit for my son's college 529, he is almost 3 and now has $2,000 saved away. Do yourself and your children a favor this year and start automatically saving for the future. Chances are you won't notice the missing 50 or 100 dollars, but in January of 2020 you'll be glad you set off on this path.

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Hall of Famer?

Listed below are the career stats of two players. Both of whom just happened to be two of my favorite players as a kid. Both were outfielders, and both had careers that were played during the same era, and in the same league (National). One is a Hall of Famer, and one is not. Which is which?

Player A:

Seasons: 21 (RoY, 1 MVP, 8 All-Star selections, 6 Gold Gloves)
Games: 2627
Hits: 2774 (162 game average: 171)
Home Runs: 438 (27)
RBI: 1591 (98)
Stolen Bases: 314
Batting Average: .279
On Base: .323
Slugging .482
OPS: .806
OPS+: 119 (100 is a hard average for OPS+)
Total Bases per 162: 295

Player B:

Seasons: 18 (2 MVPs, 7 All-Star selections, 5 Gold Gloves)
Games: 2180
Hits: 2111 (162 game average: 157)
Home Runs: 398 (30)
RBI: 1266 (94)
Stolen Bases: 161
Batting Average: .265
On Base: .346
Slugging: .469
OPS: .815
OPS+ 121
Total Bases per 162 Games: 335

In summary: We have two players that both averaged very productive seasons and played solid defense. Both were "character" players, meaning they did not have a lot of off-the-field problems like say, Barry Bonds. Neither won a World Series. Both were considered to be among the MLB's elite offensive players during the prime of their careers.

Any ideas yet?

There is another interesting metric we can look at. These are what can be called the "Hall of Fame" numbers. These are based on a point system that Bill James created that calculate the likelihood of a player being elected to The Hall. Or, at the very least allow a somewhat objective way to compare potential HoFers (as well as current) to one another and with those already in the Hall. And, just like their respective career stats, both players A and B come out very similar in those scores. For details about how these scores are created click here.

Player A:

Black Ink (league leader in major offensive categories) 11 (Avg. HoFer: 27)
Grey Ink: (same as above, but different categories) 164 (144)
HoF Monitor: 118 (100 is "likely" 130 is a "lock")
HoF Standards: 44 (This attempts to quantify a players entire career, and not just the peak seasons, Avg. HoFer is 50)

Player B:

Black Ink: 31 (27)
Grey Ink: 147 (144)
HoF Monitor: 116
HoF Standards: 34 (50)

So, which is the Hall of Fame career? And can anyone name Players A and B?

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Creating the Inalienable

I love when a Progressive politician speaks plainly. Senator Harkin (D) from Iowa recently revealed the warped mindset (no, I don't mean YOU are warped) behind the entire political attitude of health care reform. He said:

...this bill is not complete. I've used the analogy of a starter home in which we can add additions and enhancements as we go into the future but like every right that we've ever passed for the American people, we revisit it later to enhance and build on those rights, and we will do that here surely.

The emphasis is mine. "Every right that we've ever passed"? What rights has Congress ever passed? What rights have they ever created? None. (And no, the "Civil Rights Act" does not count. It simply protected existing rights.) Rights are not "passed" nor are they created. They simply exist. They are, as Jefferson said, self-evident truths. People have been endowed with them by their Creator. They are not doled out by a benevolent Congress who decides from afar how each of us ought to live our lives. And yet, that is how our elected representatives act. That is the warped mindset so many of them posses – that they can create rights. It is, quite frankly, the same mindset that has lead to oppression and tyranny throughout the world.

He continued:

What this bill does is we finally take that step. As our leader said earlier, we take that step from healthcare as a privilege to healthcare as an inalienable right of every single American citizen.

It all sounds so benign does it not? So well intentioned? How can we not support health care for all?

Remember this: Anyone who claims the power to create inalienable rights, will also claim the power to eliminate them.

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Review: Avatar

Happy New Year everyone!

I finally got around to seeing James Cameron's 500 million dollar condemnation of Western Culture. It was predictable, cliched, insufferable, unoriginal (even the title is ripped off), and beautiful. That is, from an animatic point of view, it is very engaging, perhaps even overly so. I left the theater feeling as if I had watched a cartoon, rather than a movie.

But special effects can only go so far in propping up what is an otherwise pathetic bit of storytelling.

I won't go into the semantics of the plot, because you already know what happens. It would be no use writing spoilers because there is nothing to spoil. The end is apparent in the films opening 30 seconds – the only suspense coming from exactly how many anti-Western stereotypes will be hammered home with an iron bludgeon. Indeed, one feels as if they are being harangued and chastised throughout the entirety of the film. And for what? Well, for one, being white. (The film even features "token" blacks...) But mostly for not being a nature loving, overtly sensitive, ambiguously spiritual noble savage.

And that is where more stereo-types are handed down to the (presumably moronic) audience with ham handed, obvious deliberateness that only someone in the back corner fast asleep would fail to miss: that is, despite being spiritually superior, environmentally more unified, and culturally more sophisticated, the Na'vi (laughable rip-offs of World of Warcraft Trolls, incidentally. No, really...) are naive simpletons, helpless and hapless, ignorantly blissful children who, without the intellectual superiority of the far seeing, strikingly athletic (despite being paralyzed) white, American, former marine, would have never realized the full depth and scope of that vague and distant god of nature.

It really is that ridiculous.

From the militant military commander (private army, hired by an evil corp. of course) that sips his coffee while gunning down children, to the bloodthirsty hired guns who somehow lost any ethical compass or love for liberty and life when they left Earth, to the Jane Goodall-esque scientists who try to integrate and educate the native population, only to find out (of course!) that it is only they who can educate "us", every character is a one-dimensional cliche void of any inner conflict about their course of action. There are no character twists, no surprises, certainly no subtle inner arguments, and nobody in the film more interesting than the visual effects used to create them. I am somewhat surprised that the villainous Earthlings, who are strangely all Americans, did not have curled mustaches and black hats.

The Na'vi are a culture free of any conflict (unless of course it's those bastard "Sky People" causing such). The various tribes do not war one with another. And within the tribe itself there is no contention or disagreement or struggle for power. They hunt apologetically, and exist in a Utopian vacuum where hatred, jealousy, bitterness, and any other "human" emotion and reality are painfully absent. I found it curious that the other tribes were content to let our particular characters live happily in the heart and soul of Na'vi culture (such as it is). One would assume that such a place would be one of conflict, and sacredness, either becoming neutral territory, or ground fiercely fought over, a sort of Pandoran Jerusalem. Instead, it's Disneyland.

Avatar is melodrama at its very worst.

Am I being overly critical? Perhaps. But at nearly the cost of the American Reinvestment and Redistribution Act, one would think a film of this scope would try a little harder to contain some actual drama, substance, subtlety, and conflict beyond the popular checklists of current Hollywood activism and stereotype.

Activism that for Cameron appears to be, unlike the one dimensional film he created, fraught with moral complexity, given the massive marketing partnership with McDonald's (one of the world's most "non-green" companies, if you believe such metrics) he is using to push his pro-Utopia, anti-capitalist cartoon. I'm just certain he must be terribly conflicted...

Bottom Line: Worth seeing for some interesting, if hyped, special effects and some quality rolling of the eyes. Just don't groan too loudly, there may be more sensitive and enlightened sophists sharing Plato's Cave with you.

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