The Revolution Circa 2010

Tonight's the night-----TEA PARTY!!!!!!!!

The first convention for this new party is being held in Nashville TN. At more than $500 a ticket it costs a lot more than those other revolutionary venues like Woodstock in 1969, Chicago's Grant Park in 1968, or John Lennon's Toronto or Paris hotel rooms. And the list of speakers and topics, and the workshops!!!!

But the keynote speaker---former Alaska governor, wolf slaughterer, and moose cleaner Sarah Palin. This time without a lead-in from Tina Fey. I'm sure her performance will be more than worth the price of admission. Or not.

Isn't it amazing how John Lennon foretold this movement in his song Revolution---"you tell me it's the institution/ well you know/ you better free your mind instead." The tea-partiers are so full of original, thoughtful slogans--Obama care is socialized medicine; If you think health care is expensive now, wait until it's free; Let's take back America for Americans. But my personal favorite is when those choruses of retirees all chant for the government to keep its hands off their Medicare.

Maybe John was wrong----he assumed they had minds that they could free.

Frustrated

Well, I almost managed to blow a long weekend. Finally got to The Owl on Tuesday for a couple green chile cheeseburgers. Also got hold of a realtor in central NM where we have been looking on our own to set up a tour of some properties.

I have followed the political doings in our capitol over the past couple of weeks. The elected representatives in Congress have basically tabled environmental legislation. Cap and trade only works if there's some payment and the special interests have convinced our representatives to represent them, not the people. So a lot of the caps are not traded but given away. Maybe, hoping against hope, the Congress will realize over recess that this idea stinks worse than a coal fired power plant and change the bill to allow and enforce a carbon tax with the proceeds going to provide affordable renewable clean energy.

Next is the Sonia Sotomayor hearings in which a bunch of old white men proved that a "wise Latina" is, in fact, smarter and wiser than them. Of course, some senators absolutely have to play politics so they will oppose the nomination not because of anything the nominee said or did during the hearings; nor are they in total disagreement with her record as a jurist. They even admit she'll be confirmed. So why are Cornyn and Hatch voting no if not for purely partisan reasons??

Finally there's health care. What the hell is Barack Obama thinking leaving the shepherding of this most important of all reforms in the hands of Pelosi and Reid!!!! At best these two are political hacks. At worst they are absolute proof that absolute power corrupts absolutely. They go out of their way to antagonize the minority---I would hope after their years of being out of power they might realize that allowing the opposition to inject a few ideas might make the bipartisanship that Obama seeks possible. But, oh no, these two dunderheads just keep ramming through their agendas and the poor citizens,as well as the G O P, be damned. I guess I'll be spending a lot of time watching "West Wing" dvds---at least when Jeb, Toby, Leo, CJ, Sam, and Josh screw up I don't pay for it.

Onto the Bandwagon

I've been refraining from putting my (last) two-cents into the latest blathering about bail-outs because I'm trying to see how they work---whether the economy starts to show some signs of positive movement or not.  But the latest bonuses at AIG really take the cake.  How do people who ran a company into the ground so far that it has required not 1 but 3 bailouts deserve jobs, let alone bonuses??  Since the US now owns something like 80% of AIG, maybe we ought to VOTE on bonuses and who should be running the company.  Isn't that what stockholders do?  AIG management says these are "retention" bonuses, necessary so they can retain the "best and brightest" people.  I wonder how the company would have fared with someone a little dumber---maybe they wouldn't have made such poor bets and lost so much money.  After all, wasn't it written about Enron that they were "the smartest guys in the room?"   So how do AIG and Enron compare?  Wonder where we'd be if they had bailed out Enron................Yeah, I'm more than a little afraid.  Aren't you???  

And we call our dogs "pirates".......

Sometimes you gotta sing....

"Here we go loop-da-loop/ Here we go loop-da-li...."  So it's OK for the new Secretary of the Treasury to "forget" a tax obligation but the nominee for the Dept. of Health has to quit??  Isn't that a little bass-ackwards or is it a message about how much health care reform is really gonna cost?

"Oh happy day/Oh happy day...."  Took Barack Obama 2 weeks to say "I screwed up."  We NEVER heard that from W in 8 YEARS!!!!!  And if one were to compile a hierarchy of mistakes, I believe the Iraq War, opening Guantanamo, eroding our constitutional rights, giving no-bid multi-million dollar contracts to cronies and business associates, allowing the recession/depression to begin---any of these rank higher than appointing Tom Daschle and Timothy Geithner to the cabinet.

"Yo soy un hombre sincero/De donde creche la palma..." The Pirate Dogs and I still think we got it right on 11/4/2008.  I find the honesty emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave so refreshing.........And, unfortunately, so different from any of the predecessors in the Oval Office the last 30 or so years.

Of Pirates and Spinners

Captain 'Roid is really pissed off. When last seen, the intrepid Captain was begging her mother to make a new flag for the CPS Nargle proclaiming the "End of the United Nations." According to a report on tonight's BBC America newscast, the UN has signed some declaration allowing countries to pursue the pirates onto Somalian land. Now admittedly, Somalia is a failed state and its sovereignty is open to debate. But to allow other countries, including Iran, China, Great Britain, and the US (talk about politics and pirates making strange bedfellows!!!!) to invade in pursuit of the pirates?? Hopefully all those military men will review Blackhawk Down before doing the same foolish thing.....And why does the US, beacon of religious freedom and defender of the right to democratic processes, so fear an Islamic government in Somalia?? Isn't Islam one of the "Great Religions" alongside Christianity, Judaism, Taoism, Buddhism, etc?? Or is all this "Islamic terrorists are radical extremists" just a smoke screen and the US is really at war with Muslims-----shades of Richard the Lion-Heart and the Crusades...........

Do you remember The Spinners from the '70's and that massively "great" song "Rubber Band Man"?? Actually, I detest that song but all the "oldies" stations seem fixated on it.

But those aren't "the spinners" I'm writing about. I'm thinking about the auto-bailout/union busters and whether the Kennedys are more deserving of power as a dynasty than the Clintons, if MSNBC be believed.

GM and Chrysler are doing worse than Packard did in the 1950's. They hemorrhage cash, blowing through billions a month. Their management has been about as in tune to the needs of the average buyer and the concerns about the deleterious effects of automotive emissions on the decaying of the Earth's atmosphere as Bush and Cheney have been to telling the truth about Al-Qaeda in Iraq, let alone the total misinterpretation of the WMD intelligence.
Now, depending whom one reads, we are either headed for, or are already in, the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. The government has bailed out the financial fat-cats but balks at doing the same for the auto-making fat-cats. The problem is that there are a lot of not-so-fat-cats that would be a lot more hurt by the death of the Big 3. About 1 in 10 American jobs is tied to the auto industry---from parts providers to transportation firms to the workers at the car plants themselves. If we want to see Great Depression type unemployment numbers (like around 25%), then let's allow the Big 3 shut down and add that 10% who lose their jobs to the present 11% without jobs. (I realize the current "official" unemployment rate is about 6% but that does NOT include part-time employees who'd like full-time jobs or those who have stopped trying to find work. That number is over 11%.) That's 21% unemployment. Wouldn't take many, if any, more Citibank job cuts to put us well over that 25% threshold.

But some Senators blame all the failings of the auto industry on the wage disparity between the union workers up north and the non-union laborers in the foreign plants south of the Mason-Dixon line. Taking a real crisis and scapegoating people who will lose their livelihoods to avoid taking action while changing the focus of the argument to something totally non-related is major SPIN!! Even if a UAW member makes $71.00 an hour, that's only $150,000/year!!! And that's nowhere near what an executive at either an auto maker or a financial firm makes!!!! As a matter of fact, it's 1.5% of the 10-million dollar paychecks and bonuses common in executive suites or a Major League Baseball locker room. So let's not blame the union. Deny the bail-out if you don't think management can turn around these companies but let's stop the b.s.

So Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg threw her hat into the ring for the US Senate seat formerly warmed by former first-lady Hilary Clinton (all this assumes she gets confirmed for Secretary of State and resigns). Caroline has a lot going for her. First, her maiden name is Kennedy. She's the only surviving child of JFK and Jackie. She's a major upgrade in looks from Mrs. Clinton and I think she's also better looking than Sarah McPalin (remember her??). So give her the job already. But first we need to watch interminable hours of every Clintonista with an axe to grind and all the MSNBC "analysts" and commentators who need to justify their salaries since the election is over stir up controversy. Who cares if Andrew Cuomo is divorced from one of Caroline's cousins?? What possible effect does it have on her qualifications for the Senate, which are about the same as Hilary's when she was first elected----a member of a family that was in the White House as well as being a lawyer. And Caroline even had a pony at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue!!!!
So enjoy "Rubber Band Man" when you hear it and wish we only had to deal with the musical Spinners instead of the bozo spinners masquerading as learned gentlemen. Hang on to your money and hope January 20 comes faster. But keep your shoes handy just in case...........

Pirates Redux

So some Indian Man-of-War zapped a Somali pirate "mother ship." Do you believe this stuff??? They actually had a meeting in the White House---W and the National Security Council---to discuss these high seas hijackings. And some Pentagon spokesman had a press conference and said it was incumbent on shipping companies to provide their own protection, like hiring armed security contractors. So our government can no longer protect our interests on the high seas from SOMALI PIRATES!!!!!!!!!!!!! The level of incompetence just gets more astounding daily. No wonder the economy resembles a Russian nuclear reactor.
January 20 cannot come soon enough.

Bail---in or out????

How about them Somali Pirates?????????? 12 ships in 7 days from an area of the ocean patrolled by the US Navy, Her Royal Majesty's Navy, the EU, the Emirates, and Kingdoms of the Gulf!!!! YeeHAW!!!!!!!!!!! The Pirate Dogs hope they get to keep their loot and that they use it to improve the standard of living in the Horn of Africa, one of the poorest and most badly governed places in the entire world.
I need to correct the last post---There were a couple of inconsistencies in the sources. Apparently the ship was taken in the Gulf of Aden and is now anchored in the Indian Ocean some 450 miles from Mombasa, Kenya. Capt. 'Roid apologizes for the misinformation.
Now that the Somalis have bailed out their ships, how about the bail-out in DC of the BIG 3? I thought this was a capitalistic nation, not a welfare state. If I ran my business with as little forethought and lack of planning as that exhibited by the CEOs of the Detroit mega corporations, I'd deserve to be fired or run into bankruptcy. Now I fully appreciate that we cannot allow the auto industry to go the way of the airlines. There's always places to go and someone to take the risk and fly there. No sane person would buy any major asset from a company in Chapter 11. Cars last years and anyone purchasing one wants to make sure he can keep his investment on the road. But a free ride out of their hole is the last thing we should support as taxpayers or citizens.
I believe that successful people should get the fruits of their hard work. And executives who can't formulate a decent forward-looking business plan should go back to the business correspondence school they came from for a refresher course.
Memo to our representatives----
NO BAILOUT!!! No LOANS to the auto Industry without STRINGS!! WE THE PEOPLE need to see how OUR money will be used to sustain the industry and IMPROVE the performance of its products----MORE MPG, MORE environmentally friendly, NO MORE loans or taxpayer dollars after this ONE time.
After all, if a bunch of Somali pirates can outperform the navies of the allegedly advanced economies, our congress, senate, and captains of capitalism should be able to give us some bang for our buck in a car that gets 50-plus MPG, is safe and fun to drive.
Let's get our people in WaWa DC this message!!!!!

Economics PD3

Most of the attention the Pirate Dogs pay to economic issues consists of sitting in the kitchen whenever a person goes there, hoping for food to be either given them or dropped on the floor where they can scarf it up. Pretty simplistic and operating at a very basic level.

Now the three of them, joined by my wife and I, watched the President-elect and the stage full of economic heavy hitters do a press conference. We liked the part about the shelter dog the best---the Obama girls really deserve a Sharprador (even if Leny would out-cute them) and wouldn't the Humane Society so benefit from the exposure!!! But the serious issue of the economy did get us thinking......


The auto industry gets a lot of attention. It did in Mr. Obama's remarks before the media. It is probably, after the financial sector, the most needy segment of the manufacturing sector. But a bail-out or loan package MUST be tied to the long-term environmental needs of not only the country but the planet. There were autos that could get 30MPG twenty years ago. This is no longer a goal but an attainable standard. It's our belief that any aid package to the car makers have at the very least a fleet fuel economy standard of 50MPG or more and that this standard be attained within two years!!! Also the car makers should be encouraged to dedicate themselves to improving their core competencies, i.e, building efficient,competitive automobiles, and discouraged from ventures into mortgages and banking. GM Bank and Ditech (mortgages from GMAC) are examples of this phenomenon. If the talent is diluted into so many ancillary ventures, how can the manufacturer be competitive with the foreign companies who keep their eye on the ball. A certain financial acumen is necessary to assist buyers in financing their new (and probably over-priced) vehicle, but a mortgage company and a bank??????????

So by all means, let's put together a stimulus package. And let's support our domestic industries, the few we have left. But let's make sure that this support is aligned with the longer term goals of energy independence and reversing the damage we've done to our planet.

11/4 Hangover

The election is done. I heard a story on NPR Wednesday night that Kenya had declared Thursday a national holiday because of the election of Barack Obama as president of the U.S. One segment reported that people went to the grave of Obama's father and chanted that he had sired a king. I didn't think the popular vote margin was quite that large, but I do believe that it's a good thing for America's image around the globe.

Congratulations to Auntie Bucksnort!!! Her granddaughter Paloma Luz had a tropical storm named after her---Paloma is bearing down on the Caymans and Cuba as I write this Thursday evening. Way to go Dove Light!!!!!!!!!!! But now the Pirate Dogs want to storm NOAA---their idea is to get the National Weather Service to name hurricanes from the BACK of the alphabet. Some muttering from the Captain about Weetzie being more potent than a Dove..................Gotta let those dogs out more during the day.

Watching MSNBC post-election. I can't believe the stories coming out about Sarah Palin. I may not be a fan of hers, but to state that she doesn't know the countries in North America (U.S., Canada, and Mexico), the ones that make up NAFTA, or that she doesn't know Africa is a continent, not a country, all that seems a little over the top. She obviously doesn't care to share what knowledge she might possess---witness the Katie Couric interview question about what magazines or newspapers she reads---all of them, whatever they put in front of me was the response. I don't think anybody (Keith "Big Head" Olbermann excepted) would laugh too hard if she admitted to Fins and Feathers Alaska or the Anchorage Daily News. Maybe US, People, Time or Newsweek. But everything?? Come on. This woman is a master politician and apparently quite the manipulator. Really says something negative about John McCain's campaign that they pick her to be "a heartbeat away" from the presidency and then throw her under the bus when they lose. Shame on the McCain campaign and aren't we glad we didn't elect such a pathetically poor decision maker as our leader?

Time Travel

Driving on the highway the other day, a perfect confluence of events punctured the space-time continuum and transported me back to when long hair for men was ok and my guitar strap was red with white doves alternating with white peace symbols.

The radio was playing Ohio by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. As the vocal wailed "Four dead in Ohio" I passed a pick-up with a bumper sticker reading America, Love It or Leave It. Serious flashback, man.........................Today, we'd say Blue or Red, Joe the Plumber or "palin around with terrorists". ( I meant to spell it that way!!!!)

Why there are people who "'oppose your interests' and 'really believe that if they can make you afraid enough or angry enough, you can be tricked into voting against yourself. It is all part of the same contempt, and [on Election Day] you can show them the mistake they have made.' The debate wasn't between left or right, but between 'the politics of fear and the politics of trust. One says: you are encircled by monstrous dangers. Give us power over your freedom so we may protect you. The other says: the world is a baffling and hazardous place, but it can be shaped to the will of men...cast your vote for trust, not just in leaders or policies, but trusting your fellow citizens, in the ancient tradition of this home for freedom and, most of all, for trust in yourself."

If that don't sound like the Bush/Cheney era and the tone of the 2008 presidential campaign, I don't know what would. Divisiveness, the culture wars, an unpopular military action overseas, fear of terrorism and crime......The above is from Nixonland by Rick Perlstein on pgs.536-537. The context is a televised speech by then Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine exhorting voters to cast their ballots the next day for Democratic candidates. The fear-mongers were Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew. And their speeches and approaches would be so familiar to John McCain and Sarah Palin----because they are the same. And for me, Edmund Muskie's words ring as true today as when he spoke them on that evening in 1970.

Vote early if you can (I did) and please vote with your head, not your fears!!!!!

The Last Debate

OK, I'm sure you've all been deluged with the analysis and commentary about the last presidential debate Wednesday night. So what have I got to add? Probably not much, but............
As the Pirate Dogs and I watched the candidates, we noticed a couple of statements that screamed out for some further exposition but as of this posting I haven't seen any---in the N Y Times, on MSNBC, the BBC, FoxNews, etc.

First, does John McCain really equate Down's Syndrome with autism??? And does the fact that Sarah Palin has a Down's baby make her one of the world's foremost authorities on autism and special education as Mr McCain stated???

Second, did anyone else out there catch the bit about making people who serve in the army teachers without making them go through all the rigors of certification?? Does John McCain believe that any veteran can teach?? Enlistment standards are so low that they waive high school graduation and minor drug offenses!!!!! I think BETTER teachers are what's needed, not just more of them.

Don't forget to pay attention to reason and think before you vote. The Pirate Dogs are counting on you since they can't get that armament ship and take over in DC.

Flashback

"We see Americans dying on distant battlefields abroad...We see Americans hating each other...at home. And as we see and hear these things, millions of Americans cry out in anguish. Did we come all this way for this?...When the strongest nation in the world can be tied down for four years in a war...with no end in sight; When the richest nation in the world cannot manage its own economy; And when the president of the United States cannot travel abroad or to any major city at home without fear of a hostile demonstration-then it's time for new leadership for the United States of America...My friends, America is a great nation. And it is time we started to act like a great nation around the world."


So did John McCain say this? Or Barack Obama? Maybe Joe Biden? In my humble opinion it seems to exhibit too much understanding of our times to come from Sarah Palin.


The answer is---NONE OF THE ABOVE. The quote is excerpted from Richard Milhous Nixon's speech accepting the 1968 Republican nomination for president of the United States as reported in the book Nixonland by Rick Perlstein (pgs 304-305).


The parallels to 1968 just keep on manifesting themselves. Obama "pals around" with terrorists according to Ms. Palin. Did she, or anyone else in the McCain organization, note that the terrorist, Bill Ayers, formerly with the Weather Underground who botched a couple of bombings when Obama was 8 years old, was named citizen of the year in Chicago in 1997? For helping with educational reform in the City of Chicago---serving on the same board as Obama? Which educational kudos have the Republican ticket won? And do you, watching your retirement funds bleed away into the bank accounts of the stupor-rich like Cheney, W, and, yes, John McCain, really care about this issue??? If you do, then you deserve what's happened to you.

Syndromes

Syndromes seem to be in the forefront around here this week. The Pirate Dogs' look-out has SDS, the Captain has SDS, and even I was SDS. And they're all different syndromes!!!!!!!!

Weets is part chihuahua so she is very noisy and aggressive---Small Dog Syndrome.
'Roid has the foulest breath in the western world, the result of a peculiar and disgusting habit I won't go into here--Stinky Dog Syndrome.
And this blogger was fairly radical in his younger years, even joining Students for a Democratic Society in college.
So why all the "syndrome-icity" this particular week??
How's your 401-k? How's your trust in the sitting government to get us on the right track? If you have any syndromes, now's the time to give them free reign. Loosen that halter and give them their head.



I think I've decided on the elections. Paris Hilton for Prez, Tina Fey for VP. (Although Gina Gershon does a good job as well.) Paris makes sense on the environment and the pool-side shots could be inspiring as well as profitable for the government. Sales of her exploits would dwarf the tax cuts of either main-stream candidate and could result in a surplus. Tina does a better Palin than Sarahcuda. Only problem is after she gets elected, where would she get her material? No worry though, the current VP candidate has just regurgitated the same lines since she was nominated. Is there really that big a difference between 6 weeks and 4 (or 8) years??
Hey, after this week we need to exhibit a sense of humor more than ever.

In a more serious vein, I'm currently reading Nixonland by Rick Perlstein. The sub-title pretty much summarizes the premise--"The rise of a president and the fracturing of America." I'm only about a quarter of the way through the 800-plus pages but the parallels from the 1968 campaign to today's are striking and, for me, terrifying. I have watched film of the current Republican rallies where either of the candidates whipped up the crowd to the point of denouncing the Democratic nominee as an Arab, a terrorist, or, even worse, calling for his head. First off, pandering to racism and fear is Nixonian. That's a large part of how he won. The "Silent Majority", "law and order", the menace of racial warfare. Have we learned nothing in 40 years? Watching McPalin is remembering Tricky Dick and Spiro. I've long felt that the Baby Boomers squandered their potential with their pursuit of riches pre-empting the idealism of the counter-culture. Now we pay for it with the Republican attacks that, let's face it, are racist without saying that word. I've seen comments on other blogs where people wrote about their fathers saying "Good, they shot another Kennedy" about RFK's assassination in 1968. I can remember comments about how "that uppity nigger" Martin Luther King got what was coming to him, also in 1968. I get the same feelings of foreboding listening to some of the McPalin supporters today. And I try to remember that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself" but still there's this thing in he back of my mind..............a motorcade in Dallas, Nov 22 1963....

See http://zeesgowest.blogspot.com/ post for October 11 for a powerful video. We can take back this country. We can undo what Nixon spawned and W has promulgated.

WE ARE THE ANSWER!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pirate Dog-onomics

So first the meltdown, then the deal, then the no-deal, then more negotiations ad nauseam while my retirement funds shrink and shrink and shrink.........

The Pirate Dogs just don't get it. For them, economics is simple and transparent. Their favorite treat, home made bone turks, are kept in a CLEAR GLASS jar. 'Bout as transparent as it gets, right? When they want a treat, they let us know either by barking, pointing, or doing something obnoxious to get our attention, then repairing to the kitchen and staring at the jar. Simple supply and demand. They demand bone turks, we supply them. No derivatives or CDOs here. Just basic macroeconomics at work.

Maybe we should send the three of them to Washington DC???

Bubble-licious

So the financial bubble is bursting. The housing bubble has supposedly already burst. But these are so intertwined that there is probably more pain coming. How did we get to this point?



As I understand it, the housing bubble was inflated, at least in part, by low interest rates and easy credit terms. Remember the days, not so long ago, when a buyer was required to have 20% of the purchase price for a down-payment on a house. The principle and interest on the mortgage loan could not exceed 25% of their gross monthly income and the buyer's total monthly payments had to be less than 33% of that income. Remember when real interest rates were positive numbers? Thanks to central banks, many interest rates today are less than the rate of inflation. That makes borrowed money cheaper than the money earned by trade or work. Add new "mortgage products" like interest-only mortgages and adjustable rate mortgages to a loosening of lending standards, i.e., the ability to repay the loan, and people can obtain more house than they can afford to pay for in actual terms. Good for low income and young buyers until the rates adjust and their payments increase faster than their wages which is the scenario over the last seven or eight years.



So now the chickens have come home to roost. These ill-conceived and improperly vetted loans have gone into default, there's a glut of over-priced McMansions on the market. Real estate prices are plummeting, probably searching for a sustainable level based on real economic data about wages, output, and productivity. And the geniuses of financial engineering have packaged all these toxic loans into "financial instruments" so devious that experts like bond and credit ratings agencies, as well as the bankers and financial traders, can't assign the risk to those to whom it belongs. So taxpayers will pay for all this with a government bail-out so the system doesn't totally stop functioning. It would be much worse if the credit markets tighten for small businesses and companies that need some credit to keep the doors open.



But let's also address the real causes of these bubbles. The lack of transparency in many "financial instruments" needs to be addressed. And the entity charged with this regulation is the federal government. The public does not need to own Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or AIG. These companies, as well as the others still operating in the financial sector, need to perform their function under their charters in the market according to the regulations governing what is acceptable in the markets---investing, not gambling. Proper vetting of applicants for loans. Transparency in investment solicitations.



Congress should not pass the bail out without asserting its responsibility for economic oversight and without guarantees that it will indemnify the taxpayers against a further melt-down.