What Kind of Union ... ?

Watching reports about Steven Colbert testifying before Congress about illegal immigrants at hearings ultimately sponsored by the United Farm Workers made me wonder about something that left me puzzled for some time. What kind of union takes care of its workers by encouraging workers who would undercut the employability of its members? What could they possibly think would happen to their current workers by encouraging dilution of the work force? The argument they make is that then all the workers will be union and the wage will not be undercut; but this benefits only the union coffers and not the individual worker - neither the existing member nor the new one. Typically, work is fairly divided with each getting a supposedly equal share. (I know this one having suffered through it doing union work in the 70's and 80's. We spent a lot of time is US District Court) But what that really means is that the worker makes less than they would have without the union. But the union officers ... they do well.

Similarly what was the AARP thinking when they pushed a medical plan that takes from Medicare to give to people of an age when they should be working and able to pay their own way. Shooting their members in the foot they are.

Endgame

(Let me be the gloom preceding everyone's doom)

In life as in chess, moves sometimes are inevitable and unavoidable after a point. I think politically we are there now. Everyone is so relieved that the Republicans are (most likely) going to retake the House of Representatives and Senate in six weeks. But let me tell you how it will play out due to a fifth column press and unthinking gullible voters.

The lame duck House and Senate will ram through a number of seriously damaging pieces of legislation in the remaining weeks of 2010, "Cap and Trade", "Card Check", "Amnesty for illegal aliens" and probably more. President Obama will sign them immediately. The incoming House and Senate will try to rescind or repeal those nation-destroying bills of the 111th Congress.

The President will veto them.

The press will demonize the 112th Congress for being against the common man even though most of the new laws that they are trying to overturn benefit certain elite groups and individuals.

There will be insufficient voting strength to overturn the veto.

The new laws of the 111th congress will further deteriorate the economic state of the US, with expatriation of the super-wealthy, with collapse of the remaining industrial base, and disruptions in fuel and food supply.

The whole time the press will excoriate the 112th Congress for the damage they have have done in exact counterpoint to how they blamed Bush for the damage of the 110th Congress.

And finally, debt will collapse the US dollar which will render moot the U. S. Constitution and leave George Soros, Obama, and Obama's brownshirts* (who are currently mobilizing for an anti-tea-party march in Washington DC) to step-in to fill the void to the thanks and the cheers of the ignorant American underclasses, the press, and the newest political elites.

Checkmate!

*Want to see who they are? Are there any of these groups you would feel at home with?

Where are Proportion and Consistancy?

As I was driving between jobs this morning, I noticed three police cars arranged in a semi-circle blocking off a through road nearby. As I drove on I passed a police command-and-control truck as large as a fire truck racing toward the scene. But, a little further away on a side street I found the front of a sub-division where one of my schools is located blocked.
I went on to my destination, another school and went about my business. Later, I found out what the scare was about: a woman threw a box under a bus while both were stopped at a stoplight; and the bus had proceeded on to its destination, a minor elementary school. Now, when the police are called they must do their thing and go by the book. But who called and why? Did a student on the bus exaggerate someone littering to avoid a test or overdue homework? Or did some passerby see someone dispose of their McDonald's breakfast out the window? Or maybe, it was a serious but inefficient serious threat from the bus driver's jilted spouse or lover? In any reasonable event, it was not an international jihadi terrorist going to claim her 72 virgins at Minor Elementary.

But all this is prelude to my point. After hearing the news report on the radio I spoke with several people at a nearby middle school who were all of the opinion that we can't be too careful in this day and age, it just might be a Muslim terrorist. Now why the Muslim extremists would pick this minor elementary, Minor Elementary, I have no idea. World Trade Center, Pentagon, Eiffel Tower I can see. But a minor school in the middle of nowhere in suburban Atlanta? Why start here?

But even this is only prelude. MY real observation is that these women that are telling me that there is every reason to always fear the worst about the possibility of terrorists attacking this group of kindergarteners through fifth graders are the very same ones by whom I recently was lectured about how the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks on 9/11 were Bush's staged inside jobs. Now, which is it? Are they out to get us or aren't they? Or are they only really out to get us if a Democrat is President?

But seriously, ladies, if the world is that scary and fearful a place, maybe you better go home and hide under your bed - all day, every day.

Aren't Progressives Wonderful People?

This is a fascinating speech by War Against the Weak author Edwin Black who also wrote IBM and the Holocast.
It was an interesting dissertation about the English and American origins of Eugenics in the Hitlerian style. What was conspicuous to me though was that there was no mention of the terms Fabian, Socialist, or Progressive; even though he named many of the most important people in those movements. It almost seems like a conscious omission. He even answered a question whether the eugenics movement still existed by saying "Yes, in the Aryan Nation". That is a prison gang and of no general influence in the outside world. Later, he calls in and answers a question about whether socialized medicine has eugenic impact by stating emphatically that "no, only national policy would do that", completely ignoring that rationing would accomplish exactly that while all would be benignly blaming economics; and further ignoring that the elites will always have the best access to medicine whether they are corporate giants or powerful and connected politicians thus naturally selecting themselves and their kin and ilk.

WARNING: This is an hour and three minute long video. You should watch but it is long.

More Foreclosure ... I thought there was a recovery.

I have been following the legal notices for some time now. A year ago I was astounded how many foreclosures there were in the paper of record for Gwinnett County (suburban Atlanta) where I live. Last Thursday was this month's posting. Still more than 150 nine column pages of foreclosure notices. I found myself wondering how many there actually were, but I am too lazy to count. Fortunately, WSB news counted for me and broadcast the news as I was driving to one of my schools. 2100 foreclosures this month. Last year at this time I computed the count of column inches as 28,000. This years there are almost exactly the same number of pages with exactly the same number of columns, 9 per page, for a total again of 28,000 inches - 10 inches per listing. Only one problem the ones I see are not 10 inches long. I think they have under-reported the number of foreclosures. Could that be deliberate?

A Little Disappointed

For a long time, I have been defending the "Tea Party Movement" from charges that Tea Party is a religious movement, from the perception that somehow fundamentalist Christians were the only ones who opposed a massive Federal government. The media tries very hard to paint those who oppose the ever-increasing concentration of authority and power at that one level of governance as narrow-minded "think-as-I-think" religious zealots. Well, many of us are handing them the brush to paint us with.

On Saturday August 28th, Glenn Beck held a gathering at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. He called it the Restoring Honor rally. Although I did not go, it seems to me that this is more than an honorable, admirable pursuit, it is a necessity if we are to prevent becoming slaves to a modern feudal system based out of Washington, DC. But suddenly I am seeing in my mailbox and on my Facebook watched an undercurrent of "Glen Beck is a ... Mormon". "He is trying to be the religious leader of the country". There seems to be as much backlash from the far right Christians as from the far left Socialists. Well, I missed the part where he was trying to make me a Mormon. I heard it as go back to your church; and he appears to be trying very hard to keep a balance of faiths so it remains non-sectarian. I guess there really are levels at which the far-right and far-left are similar. Both are screaming as they see a threat from individual thought and freedom.

So, to the "Tea Party" candidate who barrages my mailbox daily, You miss the point. It is not about replacing one earthly master with another. We are no better served as servants of a theocratic ruling class than a secular one. It is about our personal sovereignty. We do not belong to the Imperial Federal Government to be used and abused as the ruling class desires; no matter whether that ruling class is bureaucrats or theocrats. They belong to us. They are our employees and as such we can give them no more rights than we have ourselves. We can not give them the right to steal or the right to kill. These are not rights that we ever possessed to give them. It really is time for us to remind them and put them back into check. We will never be able to do that as long as we self-divide on whether we are Protestant, Catholic, Jew, Atheist, or Mormon. We will have to stand together on this. We shall all stand together or we shall all hang separately.

Indian Givers

I was never certain if the term Indian Giver referred to the South-Asian sub-continent or the American aboriginal Indian. But now I am fairly certain that it refers to the American aboriginal variety - Mexican in particular. There is a tremendous area of southern Arizona that has become off-limits to American citizens due to being unsafe. I have not once heard the mainstream media refer to this area by its name. That name we all had to learn in sixth grade geography: The Gadsden Purchase. Known as Venta de La Mesilla, or "Sale of La Mesilla" in Mexico, this was the last territorial acquisition of the continental United States and was purchased by Franklin Pierce for a mere ten million pre-inflation gold dollars. (Someone on Wikipedia extrapolates that to 241.333 million of todays dollars. 25 to 1 is a four cent dollar. About right.)

I do understand that the purchase gives the continental United States that linear filled in geometric look of our border that we are all familiar with, but if the Mexicans really want that land that badly; and if, apparently, our Government does not really wish to continue owning it; then maybe, they should sell it back de jure rather than give it back de facto. With improvements, it should be worth considerably more than 241 million dollars in gold. Lets see, there are highways, and the restaurants in Tucson and ...

The Mood of the American Electorate

Time Magazine Cover: Is America Islamophobic?

While I am not one to even suggest prohibiting the Cordoba Center for Islamic Bragging (I say meet it in kind); I have to take issue with the ad hominem defense of the center.

First of all, we are well served to be Islamophobic, "in fear of Islam". One is not paranoid when they really are out to get you. Islam has been at war with all non-Muslims for all its existence. Peaceful coexistence is contrary to the Quran. Despite the best protestations of the American Liberal Media, their own words damn them. And when the time comes, there will not be exceptions made for being a dhimmi (Arabic: ذمي‎ [ˈðɪmːiː]).

Second, Islam is America-phobic also, and has been since the days of Thomas Jefferson. They have been increasingly so for the last forty years, as have their violent attacks on Americans, Europeans, and Asians.

Time Magazine, if you wish to defend the Cordoba Center, defend it on the basis of the United States' freedoms of speech, of assembly, and religion. Attacking the American public for feeling offended and not sharing your infinite wisdom is adding insult to injury. It does nothing to change anyone's mind. It reinforces the general public perception that Time magazine, the media, and the Eastern elites are un-American. And most important, it reinforces the divide between Islam and the rest of the world.

In Defense of the Ground Zero Mosque

Contrary to what the Political Correctness Police would have us believe, there is no right not to be offended.

I am sorry, but it is so. There is, however, a right to the free practice of religion. Of course they can build. There is also a right to free speech. You can stand outside with a protest sign or build a billboard across the street saying "Jesus Saves". These are parts of the strength of America.

So, maybe, this might be better ...

On one side of the mosque build a synagogue. On the other build a Christian church, preferably a Pentecostal variety of some kind.

And my personal favorites, on the other side of the street, with flashing neon and chase lights a spectacular topless (bottomless?) club. And with smoke a-blowing, a TastyPig Bar-B-Que.

Like I said, in America, no one has the right not to be offended.

No point in building a gay bar, though, some things don't offend the Moslems.

Election Campaigns That Still Don't "Get It"

It is Political Season in Georgia, and I am so sick and tired of Politicians whose sole reason to vote for them is that their opponent is worse. I have reached the end of my rope. In this case it is a man who wants to be our Attorney General and he wastes three pages of his four page brochure, his one chance to tell me why he would be a good AG and what he would do to help hold us back from the abyss that our President and Congress are trying to push us into. He wastes it telling me about his opponents infidelity - on three pages!

On his one remaining page what information does he try to squeeze in? Well, 2.4 inches at the top of his 11 inches is address space. Then 4.5 inches of the obligatory smiling family picture. Then the obligatory "Proven Conservative Leader" boilerplate. A 12 point line about how he got an "'A+' rating from the Georgia Christian Coalition." That tells me both good and bad about him - the good that he probably is a decent person, but the bad is that he is probably the kind of anti-libertarian Republican that drives people away from the Republican Party, especially when we need to scale back the size, power and cost of ALL OUR GOVERNMENTS. And finally, the coup de grace, the obligatory Pro-Life line. Sam, you aren't pregnant. You aren't running for gynecologist. You aren't even running for the legislature where you could pursue the issue. It has nothing to do with Attorney General. So why is it there? Twice. Twice because this section has a second column consisting of a 16 point this time list of "PROVEN. CONSERVATIVE. PRO-LIFE", his logo and "REPUBLICAN".
I think it is a cynical grab at what he thinks conservative voters are. Cynical because he thinks we, like he, are more concerned about trying to control others than we are about our own freedom, independence, fiscal responsibility and the Georgia and United States Constitutions. He is just another professional politician more interested in getting himself a job than in fixing our government.
No, Sam, I won't be voting for you. It doesn't mean I will vote for your opponent, but I won't vote for you.

Do not reward negative campaigning.
Force them to tell us about what they will do, or withhold your vote.

Seventh Level of Hell

Unlike Dante, I do not know who it is reserved for or what I have done to go there; but I do know what it is:

It is an endless loop of Pachelbel's Canon in D played over and over wowing & fluttering and fading in & out, interrupted every 45 seconds by "Your call is very important to us. Please stay on the line for the next available [agent]"; knowing full well that if you hang up, you will only have to go back to square one and start over again.

State of New Jersey, Treasury Department, Division of Pensions, fix the damn tape, or better yet, use a digital recorder - they don't wear out!

Don't Worry Your Pretty Little Head, ...

... your Government is looking out for your best interest.

Further increases in federal debt relative to the nation’s output almost certainly lie ahead if current policies remain in place. The aging of the population and rising costs for health care will push federal spending, measured as a percentage of GDP, well above the levels experienced in recent decades. Unless policymakers restrain the growth of spending, increase revenues significantly as a share of GDP, or adopt some combination of those two approaches, growing budget deficits will cause debt to rise to unsupportable levels, as shown in the figure below. (For more details, see CBO’s recent report The Long-Term Budget Outlook.)

Although deficits during or shortly after a recession generally hasten economic recovery, persistent deficits and continually mounting debt would have several negative economic consequences for the United States. Some of those consequences would arise gradually—but a high level of federal debt, combined with an unfavorable long-term budget outlook, would also increase the probability of a sudden fiscal crisis prompted by investors’ fears that the government would renege on the terms of its existing debt or that it would increase the supply of money to finance its activities or pay creditors and thereby boost inflation. The resulting abrupt rise in interest rates would create serious challenges for the U.S. government. For example, a 4-percentage-point across-the-board increase in interest rates would raise federal interest payments next year by about $100 billion; if those higher rates persisted, net interest costs in 2015 would be nearly double the roughly $460 billion that CBO currently projects for that year. Such an increase in rates could also precipitate a broader financial crisis because it would reduce the market value of outstanding government bonds, inflicting losses on mutual funds, pension funds, insurance companies, banks, and other holders of federal debt.

From the blog of the Director of the Congressional Budget Office

Our National credit card is maxed out, and we aren't even making minimum payments.

Congress Adds Another Nail in the Coffin of the American Economy

The United Sates Congress has exempted the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) from the Freedom of Information Act. This will really inspire the restoration of confidence in the Stock Market and the United States Dollar. NOT

Omerta.

No Dollars and No Sense

Federal Reserve Chairman and Time Magazine Man of the Year, Ben Bernanke notes the our economy is "unusually uncertain". How condescending of him to let us know what we already knew.

Open Letter to my Children

(A response while forwarding some old depression era photographs)
Even by my childhood not even 15 years later, the world had improved a lot from the world of the 1930s, but nothing like you know now.

In the early 1950's:
There were no Interstate highways. Most country roads were still dirt.
Motels were little individual houses in a semicircle - and often had flashing neon signs saying "No Vacancy".
Men still wore dress hats and suit jackets to go to town. Women wouldn't be caught dead in pants in town.
By the way, those hats were always removed indoors.
School teachers were always dressed up. Women wore their good dresses and men suits and ties - always.
Good dress? Suitable for church. Even the kids were dressed up for church. The boys wore jackets and ties too.
Somehow what passed for fat back then don't seem anywhere near today's standard. There were no 300 pound people.
There were no jet planes. Crossing the US took an entire 24 hour day by plane and you were dirty and exhausted.
But that was OK because trains still served small towns and competed in style and service.
Telephone calls still required operators except very locally where it was a four-digit dial. There were no Area Codes or Zip codes for that matter.
Party lines where you shared a line and could listen in to your neighbor's call and vice versa were the norm.
Long distance required setting up a connection ahead of time.
Pay phones were everywhere often in great lines.
Television broadcast in black and white like these pictures but just a few hours an evening - sometimes just 15 minutes.
Not every family had one. If you did you were considered rich. In my high school, I was the first to have my own: a 9inch round tube set (with a plastic water blister to magnify the picture) that I patiently restored from dead myself.
FM radio was an adapter that plugged into some radios. There was nothing on it anyway. AM radios glowed orange with the light of the tubes inside. I got one for my eighth birthday. I was proud of it. None of my friends had one.
Soft drinks came in glass bottles with no screw tops.
Smokestack factories dotted our country.
Most things were made in the U.S.A., not yet with a few shoddy things made in Japan.
Most kids still bragged on what there dad "did in the the war".
A penny would buy you candy, a nickel would even get a chocolate bar and you would
be thankful when one of your parents friends gave you a penny.
Most drug stores still had lunch counters or soda fountains as we called them.
Downtown areas were busy with stores - clothing, hardware, grocery, drug, and of course, the bank.
The big cities had a signature department store or two; and you would go once a year generally before Christmas.
There were no computers - not even at the banks.
There were no credit cards. Not even Diners Club or American Express yet.
The bank was like a fortress with walls with gun-ports between you and the teller.
You kept track of your money in a bankbook which the teller wrote in and you guarded with your life.
A camera folded out with a bellows and your pictures were hand developed and back in a week or so.
There were no meals that merely needed to be heated to eat, but mothers stayed home all day to cook and clean.
No one's home had air conditioning. If it was that hot, you went to the movies - maybe. Otherwise you just fanned yourself and bore it.
Coffee, spam, and tuna fish came in cans that were opened by turning keys that wound off a strip of metal and would often cut you.
Politicians knew their constituents and would greet you by name, so would policemen.
Milk bottles were left in a metal container by the kitchen door and the empties picked up. Some places also delivered bread.
And in some places (York, PA for example), even cases of beer were left at the door.
The annual introduction of the new cars was a big deal shrouded in secrecy and created a great deal of interest.
Penicillin was about it for wonder drugs.
X-rays were dangerous except for that machine at the shoe store I guess.
The doctor made house calls - even 15 miles from his office.
When you had the measles, they put dark curtains over the windows lest you go blind or need glasses.
The dentist's drill was run by strings and pulleys - and hurt. Some even were pumped with foot pedals like old sewing machines.
Remember them? Most kids wore clothing made by their mothers. Patches on the knees of boy's pants were not at all unusual.
High schools did not have student parking. Few teenagers had cars. If they did they were being restored. What they did have was bicycle racks.
Cars did not have air conditioners and barely had heaters. Even windshield wipers were primitive and
driven by vacuum from the engine and would speed up and slow down with the engine.
Some even had radios, but most did not.
The dash board was metal and hurt if you hit it on a sudden stop.
Almost nothing in your world was made of plastic. If it was, it would not be any plastic you would recognize today. It would be something like melamine of phenolic. There was no polyethylene or polystyrene. Nylon was new and a substitute for silk in ladies stockings.
Schools did not have intercoms or door holders other than a kid in your class.
The desks were screwed to the floor, often in long rows, but always with an inkwell.
The teacher was an authority figure backed up by your parents who would sometimes even provide a meal for (generally) her.


And these were things the people in these pictures would have found as marvels and been thankful for!
And however bad things seem today, be thankful for the changes we have made.