Ten Years Of Hell

When the crash (and then possibly, the revolt) finally gets here, maybe it won't be so bad that the mob just burns everything down - but that's not how it usually plays out.

If any system of government/economy is to sustain itself over time, there has to be a broad appreciation for a kind of Societal Extortion.  The top tier (where all the money and power is) has to figure out a good way to buy the cooperation and the acquiescence  of the lower tiers.  The mob below has to be pacified somehow.  The Tsars and the Caesars and Kings and Emperors tried various things - sometimes they just hanged a bunch of peasants and burned out their settlements to keep them bottled up, but the really  smart ones built roads; or they put on elaborate shows; or they portioned out grain directly to the people; or they allowed some freedom of commerce.  They knew that even as absolute rulers, if they wanted to stay in power, they had to have the rabble's approval to some extent.

We've evolved a different system here in the US.  We use a lottery system to determine whether or (usually) not someone else is allowed to move up a rung or two.  We call it "The American Dream", but it's set up as the same very exclusive club as any previous system of ruling class(es).  It's just that here you get to pretend that if you work really hard, and if you adhere to a strict code of self-reliance and rugged individualism, then you can rise out of your lowly station and take your place among the Ruling Elite.  It may have been more possible not all that long ago, but in the last 30 years, the transfer of wealth to the upper echelon has been accelerating, and is approaching a point where the Great American Middle Class could actually be in danger of collapse.  From here on out, it's all just a shot in the dark.

And here's the kicker:  Most of us have accepted the notion that what we have here is a Meritocracy.  ie: "If I earn it, then I get it", which morphs into, "I have it, therefore I've earned it".

And the flip side is "If you don't earn it, then you don't get it"; which then morphs into "Your life is shitty, therefore you've earned a shitty life".

The Newness Of It All

I picked a different look for the blog because I wanted the wider aspect.

If it doesn't work for you, lemme know - not that I intend to do anything but ignore your complaints, but hey.

Just pretend you're in one of those meetings at work where The Suits say they're soliciting your input on this important issue, but you know deep down that they're just giving you a chance to agree with decisions they've already made.  Yeah, like that.

Crock Of The Week

Tro Da Bums Out

Since the beginning of 2009:
-we've averted a true economic catastrophe by stabilizing the banks.
-the economy has posted positive growth for 4 quarters in a row.
-we were losing 700k jobs per month, and now we're adding 100k.
-the car-making industry (and all the ancillary businesses) are coming back.
-green business is beginning to take hold and expand.
-troop levels in Iraq are being drawn down.
-DOW is up 3,000 points in the last 12 months.
-American prestige and public image have improved a jillion percent.
-32 million more Americans have a chance to get health insurance, and insurance companies can longer engage in some of their most egregious practices.
-the scope of the world's most destructive weapons is being rolled back.
-taxes for 95% of all Americans are down.

So of course there's only one thing to do - we need to find the assholes who did nothing but fuck everything up and put 'em all back in charge!  Yeah, we should do that.

Don't get me wrong - we still need to clear out a whole big bunch of moldy old politcos who've been around way past their freshness dates.  Let's just try to remember how we got to this dance, and who brung us.

Bring The Stupid

Lots of talk about cutting back on "government spending".  Whenever some politicians want to score a few points, they start screamin' about spending - even tho' by this time, everybody not living in caves has to know that the guys doing the loudest screaming are the ones who ran up the tab in the first place.

I've said it before - what EXACTLY do you want to cut?

Here's a look at what big bunches of people in this country think we should carve down.

At what point do we realize just how misinformed we are, and start to demand better?

Sucks To Be Them

There's a coup or a rebellion or a full blown revolution or something going on in Kyrgyzstan and nobody noticed.

There's no mineral wealth to get excited about; the country occupies no big-deal strategic space; there are no important roads or other lines of communication; and if the US hadn't established an air base at the capital city's airport (using it as a big staging area for our efforts in Afghanistan - and overpaying for it as usual BTW), we wouldn't know anything about anything going on there.  But the really big thing that they don't have is - Twitter!  Which is why we're not getting much in the way of "reporting".

If the News Poodles want the story, they'll have to work to get it;  so of course, that means we'll hear practically nothing about it.

A Case In Point

In a previous post, I said I think all the politicking and all the media attention are aimed at boosting ad revenues and/or contributions to a candidate or a cause.  In the last several days, it's come out that Sean Hannity and Ollie North are in some trouble because of the way their "charity", Freedom Alliance has been very lucrative for somebody, but hasn't managed to distribute much of their revenue to the people they say they're trying to help.

Details are still a little fuzzy as to how closely Hannity and North are to the everyday operations.  But when your charity delivers less than 10% of the proceeds to your intended beneficiaries, you might have a serious problem.  The benchmark for reputable charities is a split of about 25% for overhead and 75% of the collections paid out to the donees.

According to their  2006 Tax Return, they pulled in almost $11 Million, but they doled out less than $400k (about 3.8%).  The rest was spent on a variety of "admin" things, some of which were all about taking really REALLY good care of Hannity and his entourage.  ie: "a fleet" of high-end SUVs for transportation, several hotel suites, Gulfstream V airplanes, etc.

Freedom Alliance defenders claim that the money not paid out has been going to establish an endowment, but the tax records for any of that stuff haven't surfaced yet.

For me, this has the same kind of mild stench that goes along with what we've seen from Ollie North before.  Back in the early 90's (as I recall), North needed to make bunches of  money in a relative hurry because he'd been booted out of his semi-cushy government job at the White House, and wanted to get into politics.  He became the front man for a body armor manufacturer, which apparently put out a really good product, but it was something like twice the price as the nearest competitor's gear.  The market for this product is pretty well limited to government entities, and as hard as it seems to believe, there are actual rules about spending tax dollars carefully, so these purchases are put out to bid.  Well, Ollie's company doesn't really stand a chance in a straight-up contest, so they hit on a truly brilliant plan: Fund Raising!

Part of the deal that you propose in your bid is to do a charity fund drive in support of the local police department that you're trying to get to buy your body armor. (BTW - it's important for you NOT to mention that one thing making body armor necessary for the local cops is that your Fund Raising/Consulting firm is also doing a lot of work for the NRA to make sure the bad guys have plenty of weapons and ammo; but that's another story, and of course one thing has nothing to do with the other - doesn't everybody know that?)

Anyway, here's how it works.  Ollie's bulletproof vest costs $2000 and the other guy's vest costs $1000.

Ollie's bid says he'll sell his vests at $1000 each, but the customer agrees to hire Ollie's   Marketing Team to conduct a fund raising campaign that will not only make up the difference in his unit price, but also put a bunch of dollars into the Widows & Orphans Fund.  So The project kicks off, and when it's done, Ollie's made his $250k profit on the body armor, but that's just the start.  He's also pumped another $1 Million or so into the cops' charity, and taken a slice of that for himself as well - probably close to another million bucks.  It seems everybody got something good, but in fact, the tax payers actually volunteered to get hosed.  Don't get me wrong, the people got some value for their money, but where they could've paid $1,000,000 for 1000 bulletproof vests, they "chose" instead to pay closer to $3,000,000.

If you offer to make a donation to the Widows & Orphans Fund in exchange for a sweetheart deal, they call it Bribery and sometimes you go to jail.  But if you work it so the average citizen makes the donation, well - then they call it civic-minded and noble.

Attract the crowd with a political or charitable pitch, and then soak 'em.  Bait Ball.

The Rhetoric

A little something's been rollin' around in my brain for a while.  Whenever somebody proposes some new policy, or a new law, or a change in the way we've been doing things, it attracts all manner of wackos who lately have seemed always to state their opposition in stark and apocalyptic terms.

"This Healthcare Reform thing will kill your grandma."

"This bill will mean that tens of thousands of new IRS agents will descend upon us to collect the crushing new taxes."

"Regulation on the banking sector will drive up the cost of credit and make it impossible for small business entrepreneurs to get the capital they need."

"The changes in the student loan programs will mean the loss of thousands of good paying white collar jobs."

Here's a point:  My crystal ball hasn't worked since I got it; and if theirs works a lot better than mine, then why the fuck didn't they see some of this shit comin'?

These are basically the same guys who told us almost 10 years ago that emptying out the US Treasury thru multi-trillion-dollar tax cuts would usher in a period of prosperity that would rival the golden-est of the golden ages.  Oops.

Some of these same guys told us that invading Iraq would stabilize the entire region, prove that Saddam had WMD, show the world we were the good guys, cost a few billion dollars, be over in a year or two, etc, etc.  Oops.

Their track record sucks - why should I take their word for any goddamned thing now?

I think tho' that these people aren't all that interested in the law that passes or doesn't pass; they're not terribly concerned about the unintended consequences or the legal ramifications of anything they do - they care about being able to use the issue for raising money.  Because money keeps them in front of our eyeballs, and staying in front of us is what keeps them in power.  Marketing works.

They spout some shit - it could be crazy or it could be profound; it doesn't matter as long as it draws a crowd.  Then the Eyeball Wranglers (marketing departments, programming execs, news poodles, bloggers, etc) swarm to the scene to see if they can grab a few bucks by selling something to the rubes.  Whenever I see a political rally or a protest or whatever, it always makes me think of the nature shows where the predators herd the school of fish into a tighter and tighter group - until it's easy pickin's for the dolphins and the sea birds and the seals; then the whale comes thru and snaps up a giant mouthful.  When you see people flocking to a politician or a cause, think "Bait Ball".

And here's something else.  As a result of having given ourselves over to the Market Predators, our standards really are lower than they used to be.  40 or 50 years ago, the average guy had a better shot at being able to keep up with most of what the politicians were trying to do.  I think maybe because politicians were still at least trying to be Citizen Legislators - people who interrupted their 'regular careers' to serve a few terms, or who really didn't intend to make a career out of holding a particular political office.  Over time, the world gets more complicated; the problems get more complex; the solutions get thinner because they have to cover a wider range of interests; everything is so intertwined, whoever wants to take a policy position has to know his shit.   In the meantime, the average guys who aren't in office have to stay pretty damned busy to make the money they need just to keep up with whatever market they're chasing, and they don't have the time or the energy it takes to dig into the issues and figure out for themselves which way they want their candidates or representatives to go.  Politicians and their Operatives get more sophisticated and better at what they do, and the voters get less sophisticated, and before you know it, we have people voting for candidates and policies that are diametrically opposed to their own interests because they get sold on the idea that it should all be easier.

Eventually, we'll look back and we'll be able to see clearly that the emergence of candidates like George W Bush and Sarah Palin was no accident.

Wingnuts

Gotta love 'em.

Political Parties

Hummer Drivers Are Greedy

Also kinda stupid.

Creationism And Climate Change Denial

GOP Games

This is why I never send money to political parties.  If I think a particular candidate is worthy, I'll contribute directly.

Privatization

Privatizing certain things is a good idea. Building roads, dams, bridges, etc. Some operations within other government departments. Maintenance or Concessions and other people businesses in parks; subcontractors for a variety of services where it makes good fiscal or fiduciary sense.

One place privatization is NEVER a good idea is Law Enforcement. This might as well be a story about the Sheriff of Nottingham.

Tea-bonics

The creative spelling used by Tea Baggers on their protest signs.
See it all right here.

Spring

Windy and little cold today, but at least it stopped rainin'.

The lady Cardinal was too shy to pose for me - maybe another time.

These Changes

I worried that the bust in Michigan (Hutaree Militia) could be seen as another Waco; with all the usual sturm und drang from the drama queens on "conservative" Clown Radio.  But one aspect is emerging that I find pretty interesting: this Hutaree outfit is considered by most of the 'militia community' as a bunch of nuts.  Let's try to set aside the patent Pot-Meets-Kettle  and just consider the fact that the other militias dislike the Hutarees to the point they've been working with the Feds to help nail these freaks.

Let that one soak in for a bit.

Now suppose for just a moment that Obama pulled the trigger on this particular bunch of coconuts because it's a perfect setup for him to sink a wide-open 3-pointer from way downtown.

1) he bags a dangerous group determined to attack us; demonstrating that law enforcement is sometimes the best way to combat terrorism - no matter where that terrorist threat originates. (and BTW, these asshats ARE terrorists)

2) he co-opts the 'militia movement' by enlisting their help - which kinda takes them away from the Repubs and brings them back over to the side of law and order...

3) ...which means that at least some of these other militia groups will help - purposefully or otherwise - but will help to "re-legitimize The Government".

Look for signs of fracture within the militia movement.

US War Dead

In Iraq = 4,385
In Afghanistan = 1,029

Was That A Shot?

I can't believe I missed such a ripe opportunity.

Included in the Healthcare Reform Bill is a new tax on indoor tanning salons.  Do you think that's an attempt by evil Democrats to make John Boehner pay for the whole thing himself?

Turnaround