Employment etc

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, government accounts for about 8% of jobs in the United States. Here's the breakdown using numbers easily accessible on the BLS website (all numbers from 2006 or 2007):

1,774,000 Federal government civilian employees, excluding Post Office
615,000 Post Office
1,172,913 Military enlisted
230,577 Military Officers
2,424,000 State government (excluding education and hospitals)
5,594,000 Local government (excluding education and hospitals)
That's a total of 11,810,490 government jobs.

The total number of jobs in the U.S. in 2006 was 150,600,000, so government employment makes up 7.84% of all jobs.

In 2007, the U.S. population (according to the Census Bureau) was 301,621,157, so about 4% of Americans are employed by the government.
According to a study by Paul C. Light, a government professor at New York University, the Federal Government also employed 14.6 million contractors in 2006. This was an increase of 2.5 million since 2002, and the study attributes the increase directly to contractors hired as part of the war on terror. (reported in the Washington Post)

So the logical next step is to see what the numbers are for other countries.  If I ever get that together, I'll let ya now.

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Nostalgia

The term nostalgia describes a yearning for the past, often in idealized form.  From the late 1600's thru about 1875, it was a recognized clinical condition; a mental illness.  It fell from grace as Clinical Psychology grew into a real thing.

In light of some of the cultural and political developments over the last 20 years or so, it seems maybe we'd do well to bring it back as a diagnosis.

Bill Boyarski has a great piece at truthdig a while back that hit a couple of chords:

What the tea party, the House Republicans and Noonan have in common is something very simple: They believe the United States should not be led by Barack Obama and that we should not accept the change and progress that his election represented. This belief goes beyond arguments over the debt and the deficit. It is deep and irreconcilable. It is the reason why the right won’t compromise.

But when I look at the Tea Partiers playing their little games, and TheoCons who bomb women's clinics and shoot doctors, and the Islamic idiots who insist on operating under 10th century rules, and now this Breivik dipwad in Norway, what I see is a major spasm of panic that a lot of people experience as they get more desperate to maintain their positions of privilege and power.  In "the west", we get to add the complicating factor of people trying to maintain the supremacy of white folks.

Trends of the last few years indicate Tom Friedman is indeed the wrongheaded douche his reputation says he is. So maybe once we wake up and realize we're all 3rd-worlders now, we'll start to see that we're more similar than different after all.  It's possible that the economy forces this reality on us.  The study of Economics (and the management of an economy) are more art than science, but "the economy" is reality itself.

Cultural struggles and political games get us caught up in a lot of wishful thinking.  We start to believe that slogans and bumper stickers will somehow change the law of supply and demand.  Or that by voting for a particular candidate, we can actually get something for nothing.  Or that the natural business cycle of expansion and contraction can be negated if we adopt a particular economic ideology.  But guess what - that up and down business cycle?  That's the economy breathing - and it's generally considered a bad idea to stop breathing.

I don't know how to tie this up in a neat little package - I'm just making some observations right now.

(Re)Stating Some Of The Problems

Fix yourself a sandwich and let the awesomeness wash over you like the warm autumn sunshine.

This is kind of a golden oldie now, but it seems never to grow stale - I guess I'm a hopeless wonk with a shameless crush on Elizabeth Warren.

Part Of The Problem

A complaint that I find fairly typical on the part of a lot of Americans who consider themselves "regular folk" is that Government is filled with people they disdain as elitist, while at the same time, they spout the virtues of evolving an elite class of leaders in the private sector.

Why is Darwinism commendable and preferable in Business, but dangerous and damnable in Government?

You can try to argue that Government has the power to coerce thru the threat of violence, but I think it's obvious that as Business captures control of Government, then it acquires the coercive powers of Government and you end up with the same effect.

Again: If your basic premise is false, then your conclusion cannot be true.

Mile Post(?)

Almost 40 years ago, this was a huge hit for Stories. Here's the original from Hot Chocolate - which I think is a lot more straightforward and honest. The Stories cover seemed to be a little bit sanitized for consumption by a white middle-class audience. So we've come a long way - but we ain't there yet. Still plenty to do.

Jace Everett

Been neglecting my music a lot lately.

Reasons

One important reason why our economy is fucked up.

One very important reason why our political system is fucked up.

What's A Church For?

We always hear what a great place it is - I find it oddly reassuring to discover there are hard-ass Christian jagoffs in Canada too.

From Friendly Atheist:

Political Labels

More like Content Labeling, but I think it's a reasonable expectation.  Politicians are  packaged and sold to us like any other commodity - we should know what we're getting.

The New Apostolic Reformation

If you believe in the need to "get back to that old time religion" because God lost control of the world when Adam and Eve discovered knowledge, then I must quote St George of Carlin (with not so much as a pro forma apology): "What're ya, fuckin' stupid?"

Posted at Little Green Footballs:
The New Apostolic Reformation: Evangelicals Engaged In Spiritual Warfare

A Little Impulse Control, Please

People like Steve Chabot are just too typical.  Their instincts are always paternalistic; always leaning towards the authoritarian and anti-democracy mindset of the autocrat.

Less than three days after Chabot prohibited the use of cameras at a supposed “town hall” meeting in North Avondale and used the services of a Cincinnati police officer to stop offenders, the congressman is rescinding the rule for future sessions.

CityBeat reported on Chabot's Big Brother-style tactics in this week's issue, even though the Chabot staffer who enforced the rule never responded to our request for comment. We also criticized the congressman for not letting residents directly ask him questions, instead only accepting queries that were written in advance on paper.

Step Up Or Step Aside

There's lots to be disappointed in and frustrated about when considering Obama's first term. That said, I think It's still a "better the devil you know" proposition - at least for now.

It bugs the shit outa me tho', when it looks like Obama is switching from Governance Mode (Mr Reasonable, giving away an awful lot in the name of compromise and pragmatism) over to Campaign Mode (yes we can; fired up ready to go rah rah).  If that's what it ends up being, then I'll be holding my nose and heading to my polling place in disguise.

Reconstruction Update

Outa jail today.  Yesterday was a really good day, with the PT lady telling me I'm good to go for outpatient treatment now, and then the doc lifted my driving restriction, and finally my visiting nurse person called to tell me I can stop taking Warfarin.  All excellent news, and a full 2 weeks ahead of schedule.  Further evidence (as if any was needed) that I ain't normal.

Dry cleaning, groceries, pick up Sadie and Luke (at friends' for a last hurrah before school starts), gas, last minute school-related shopping.  Ah, the freedom of Parental Servitude.  Ain't it grand?

Reconstruction Update

I graduated from a single crutch to a cane last week (Thursday was day 21 post op), and there's a good part of the day that I can move around fairly well with no help and just a bit of a weird limp.

I made a jail break last week too, and drove to the grocery store - got yelled at pretty good for that one.  I'm gonna ask for the driving restriction to be lifted.  With Nick back at school, there's nobody to help Irene until I can get back up on my hind legs.

Not much pain on the operative hip unless I push things too much.  Still have to be conscientious about the joint restrictions for another 2 1/2 weeks.  I tried sleeping on my left side, but putting the weight on the incision site is still really uncomfortable.  It'll be a big relief when I can sleep in my normal position again

My main complaint now is that the right hip gets pretty sore.  Huge probability that I'm headed for a replacement on that one two, but I'm trying to push it back by working the muscles to compensate for the narrowing joint space.  The problem with that plan of course, is that there's not much the exercising can do to stop either the deterioration of the joint or the ossification around the joint capsule, but strengthening the musculature will help some.

Today's Cartoons

Fellow Travelers

Can you say Strange Bedfellows? Both are from public appearances in 1964. It just makes me wonder about coincidence, and how two people we would assume are diametrically opposed might have something very important in common.

Starting at 5:30


And then this:

The Tax Swindle

Middle Class Americans have to be distracted while the Ownership Class continues to pick their pockets.

A good way to keep them from noticing how badly you're fucking them is to scapegoat some other group (in this case the poor and the working poor), which makes them think you're actually on their side, which enlists their help in your efforts to fuck them over even more.

It's classic.  People of a particular authoritarian bent, who are in positions of privilege and power are always advocating the most severe remedies "for the good of the country"; and those remedies somehow always end up being imposed on (and to the detriment of) the very people who should benefit from those remedies the most.  And lately, all this self-sacrifice for the common good is being sold to us under the guise of Ayn Rand-type philosophy.  Guess what?  Rand HATED the notion of self sacrifice; and she especially HATED the rationale of sacrifice in service to the collective.  Rejection of all things communal, and a complete disdain for sacrificing the Self are at the very heart of Rand's construction of Objectivism.

I'm off the point a little, so let's bring it back to the bullshit currently being peddled by DumFux News and their network of echo chamber media lizards.

via The Atlantic:

There is no question that the wealthy pay a higher overall tax rate than any other group. That is an American tradition. But there is also no question that their tax rates have fallen more than any other group’s over the last three decades. The only reason they are paying more taxes than in the past is that their pretax incomes have risen so rapidly — which hardly seems a great rationale for a further tax cut.

Logic Will Out

(with a hat tip to Balloon Juice)

There is a sick feeling of perverted satisfaction in stories like this.  I guess it comes from thinking that this is where all their Free Market shit ends up.

So far this year, at least 180 drugs that are crucial for treating childhood leukemia, breast and colon cancer, infections and other diseases have been declared in short supply — a record number.

-snip-

Executives at Premier, a hospital buying cooperative, said that in April and May its members received hundreds of offers from obscure drug wholesalers to sell drugs in short supply at vastly inflated prices. Of the 636 offers that included a price, 45 percent were at least 10 times the normal rate and 27 percent were at least 20 times normal.

Such sales offers are legal as long as suppliers prove that they bought the drugs appropriately. Some wholesalers buy certain drugs in large quantities because they are betting there will be a shortage. The excessive buying can help make their predictions come true. “We never like to see a situation where people can profit off of a national crisis and engage in price gouging,” Mike Alkire, Premier’s chief operating officer, said in an interview.

If you think for a minute these guys won't look for opportunities to create a shortage, then you're just fuckin' stupid.  I knew Mike Alkire when he was a lowly drug rep - the guy's a shark.  He would have no qualms at all about taking advantage of these situations.

We Are So Fucked

...with our pants on.

First, Matt Taibbi talking about Too Big To Jail




Then, from Democracy Now, talking with Dean Baker about the Super Congress, and the continuing all-out assault on the middle class.

What They Wished For

I think the conversation inside the Republican Party is getting pretty heated, and grows more public all the time.

Here's Michael Tanner (Cato Inst), asking 5 questions, which I think betray a real fear among the old guard that the Tea Partiers represent nothing less than the disintegration of the GOP.