LogiPundit

Too Important to Miss ... Why Did Israel Attack Gaza?

2009-01-21T17:26:00.004-05:00

This is an important but lengthy thesis on why Israel attacked Gaza, the timing of it, and the political landscape behind the attack. On my site there are many other posts relating to Gaza, but since the cease-fire I think it is important to inspect the WHY of it all.

I had a suspicion the elections were involved, but Norman Finkelstein makes an interesting and supported thesis on why Israel attacked Gaza in the manner in which it did, and he might be correct. Normally the simplest explanation is the most plausible one.

Sigh

2007-12-03T20:41:00.001-05:00

Like Tom Cruise in "A Few Good Men", I wonder when someone is going to use the "Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire" routine when referencing the White House in the future. Bush is supposed to take to the Press podium in the morning after it was disclosed that he fought the release of this report for the last YEAR as the White House attempted unsuccessfully to get the intelligence community to toe the party line.

The NIE report says Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and it remains on hold, contradicting the Bush administration's earlier assertion that Tehran was intent on developing a bomb.

Click this link to read the whole report:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071203/ts_nm/iran_usa_dc

Atlas Shrugged

2007-11-12T00:03:00.001-05:00

I've never been a big fan of Ayn Rand . The linked article is a good discussion of her magnum opus, Atlas Shrugged. It talks about how Rand incorrectly portrays true nature of capitalists (even though she is a strong believer in the capitalist way) . I know there are a few on this site of the entrepreneurial ilk....so, what's your take?

Atlas Shrugged

Who wants to reform health care?

2007-11-10T19:46:00.000-05:00

I remember during some townhall forum where "normal people" (i.e. handpicked by Dan Rather or the like) asked questions to GOP and the Democratic candidate. This may have been in 2004. Bush said that the biggest concern for the average American small business owner was taxes. The questioner said that his biggest concern as a small business owner was health care, and what was government going to do to make it easier. I noted back then that health care is a tax policy issue, and that Bush for all his ham-fistedness had it right. Ramesh Ponnuru highlights this fact in Time.

That's how we ended up with the health-insurance system we have now, based on employers. You get a tax break if you get your insurance through your job. If you get a raise and use it to buy your own insurance instead, you have to pay taxes on that money. (Ditto if you use your raise to pay doctors directly.) Almost everyone takes the tax break. The market for insurance bought by individuals is, as a result, small and stunted, which is all the more reason to stay in the employer system.

The ABC's of fear

2007-11-10T15:02:00.000-05:00

George W Bush has made it clear that during his administration science should be producing tangible benefits for society. In simple terms, the culture has had to shift from a very basic science oriented approach inherited from the freewheeling 90's to an applied focus now. Often what that means is that the same scientists who were on top of basic research for so many years have to give lip service to clinical studies and trials.

A good example came out right before halloween. Here is a hodge podge of quotes from neuroscientists who study fear in the brain.

The first comes from Stephen Maren of Michigan, who is a reputable and good scientist.

"We're making a lot of progress," said University of Michigan psychology professor Stephen Maren. "We're taking all of what we learned from the basic studies of animals and bringing that into the clinical practices that help people. Things are starting to come together in a very important way."

The translation is: "Please don't cut my funding. Look this is all going to pan out clinically in a couple of years, we promise!"

That being said, some progress is being made in this field...so, uh, don't cut NIH funding!

He's an executive, you see

2007-11-10T13:49:00.002-05:00

He may be an executive now but Spitzer's big pitch on reforming immigration, a plan which runs to the left of George W Bush's own quasi-amnesty, is falling quite flat. This is happening in one of the most liberal states of the union, but one which was victimized, in part, by those who had easy access to fraudulent visas, and exploited that weakness to terrorize Americans. Spitzer's plan simply makes no sense, and the Billary juggernaut was even taken to task on it in the press. Will a Democrat nominee run to the left of Bush and Guiliani on immigration?

In my opinion, any democrat who opposes amnesty has a slam dunk chance of winning the White House. Too bad they, especially Hillary, are far too invested in amnesty.

Three years of logic, reason, passion, and spirited disagreement,

2007-11-10T10:05:00.000-05:00

Believe it or not, today is the third anniversary of the dawn of Logipundit. There have been good times and bad, right-wing nutjobiness, tree-hugging craziness, conspiracy theoryness, libertarian anarchiness, aristocratic elitistness...and a lot of fun.

My sincerest thanks for all of the contributions from authors, fellow-bloggers, and (all half-dozen) loyal readers.

Here's to another 3 years!

SCHIP: If you REALLY cared about children...

2007-11-09T08:42:00.000-05:00

This is just GREAT. A wonderful illustration of how completely bass-ackwards Congress looks at Health Care and the budget

YouTube - SCHIP: Care Enough to Smoke?

Need GHB for your next date? Buy toys made in China

2007-11-08T16:58:00.000-05:00

Just in time for Christmas, boys and girls. Kids in Australia that consumed these aqua dots fell sick, it has since been pulled from the shelves in Australia, Spain, and from Toys R Us stores worldwide.

Does Sarkozy like America, or what?

2007-11-08T16:24:00.000-05:00

Ceci n'est pas un fromage mangeant singe de capitulation

Nicolas Sarkozy's speech given yesterday to a joint session of the House and Senate was quite a breath of fresh air.

A touching excerpt:

Ladies and gentlemen, the men and women of my generation heard their grandparents talk about how in 1917, America saved France at a time when it had reached the final limits of its strength, which it had exhausted in the most absurd and bloodiest of wars. The men and women of my generation heard their parents talk about how in 1944, America returned to free Europe from the horrifying tyranny that threatened to enslave it.

Fathers took their sons to see the vast cemeteries where, under thousands of white crosses so far from home, thousands of young American soldiers lay who had fallen not to defend their own freedom but the freedom of all others, not to defend their own families, their own homeland, but to defend humanity as a whole.

Fathers took their sons to the beaches where the young men of America had so heroically landed. They read them the admirable letters of farewell that those 20-year-old soldiers had written to their families before the battle to tell them: "We don't consider ourselves heroes. We want this war to be over. But however much dread we may feel, you can count on us."

Before they landed, Eisenhower told them: "The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you."

Oregon votes down expansion of SCHIP like program

2007-11-08T16:14:00.000-05:00

Good news for common sense, and good job by the citizens of Oregon to look past simplistic populist rhetoric. WSJ notes the important lesson here for Arnold Schwarzenegger and the 2008 election.

There are political lessons here, in case anyone in Washington is paying attention. Voters are rightly concerned about health care and would like everyone to have insurance, but they realize that government programs are very expensive. Americans also don't seem to want to pay for health-care reforms directly through higher taxes. That accounts for the reliance by politicians on the easier sell of tobacco taxes, and it also explains why Congress has disguised the real cost of its Schip contraption with a $30 billion budget gimmick. (No thanks to GOP Senators Orrin Hatch and Chuck Grassley.)

Mike Huckabee hits double digits.

2007-11-07T10:20:00.000-05:00

And is only 1 point behind Mitt "Ken doll" Romney...

At the least this separates himself clearly, and hopefully permanently, from the other "second-tier" contenders (so I guess making them "third-tier"). The trend is not surprising to me...basically every time someone has dropped out of the race over the last several months, Huckabee has picked up their points.

Unfortunately the "third-tier" candidate votes that are left (Ron Paul, Duncan Hunter, and Tom Tancredo), totaling about 12 points by this poll, might represent a slightly different type of voter than those from Gilmore, T. Thompson, and Brownback.

I wouldn't mind (being the RWNJ that I am) a Huckabee/Hunter ticket.

How about Huckabee/Hunter taking on Obama/Biden...that would be a MUCH better race than:

Giulliani/? and Clinton/Richardson.

Don't ya'll think?

WH2008: Republicans

Hillary Care 101

2007-11-04T16:00:00.000-05:00

Here's my step-by-step take on HillaryCare. I've been putting it off for two reasons:

1) I'm busy trying to make money damnit.
2) I found the "plan" so confoundedly confusing and poorly written that I just didn't know where to start. To be honest, I actually was taken aback by the lack of sophistication in the details.

So here you go. Unfortunately, my commentary is almost as poorly organized as the original work...but, well, I'm not running for President:

"Affordable: Unlike the current health system where insurance premiums send people into bankruptcy, the plan provides tax credits for working families to help them cover their costs. The tax credits will ensure that working families never have to pay more than a limited percentage of their income for health care."

Insurance premiums have never bankrupted anyone. Medical costs have, though. Medical insurance premiums calculated as a percentage of income is ABSOLUTELY the most inefficient economic model I've ever heard of.

"Available: No discrimination. The insurance companies can't deny you coverage if you have a pre-existing condition."

States have tried this. In these states, the health insurance market is completely gone, now. People wait until they're sick to get coverage. If you're going to go 100% guaranteed issue, don't pretend that you're going to keep it private.

"Reliable: It's portable. If you change or lose your job, you keep your health care."

Believe it or not, this is true with individual health insurance. Isn't that odd?

"If you have a plan you like, you keep it. If you want to change plans or aren't currently covered, you can choose from dozens of the same plans available to members of Congress, or you can opt into a public plan option like Medicare. And working families will get tax credits to help pay their premiums."

This is a myth. So you can keep your current plan. Sure, but you're going to get free money to sign up for the "good" plan the government offers. It doesn't say anything about letting you use said tax credits to pay for insurance you want.

"Good for small business: Small businesses are the engine of new job growth in the U.S. economy but face bigger challenges when it comes to providing health care for their employees. Hillary would give tax credits to small businesses that provide health care to their workers to help defray their coverage costs. This will make small businesses more competitive and help create good jobs with health benefits that will stay here in the US."

Completely contradictory to the portable concept. Lifting the financial burden from the backs of small businesses is great, but keeping administration of medical coverage in employer's hands would not improve the situation.

"Reins in insurance companies--Insurance companies won't be able to deny you coverage or drop you because their computer model says you're not worth it. They will have to offer and renew coverage to anyone who applies and pays their premium. And like other things that you buy, they will have to compete for your business based on quality and price. Families will have the security of knowing that if they become ill or lose their jobs, they won't lose their coverage."

This is complete poppycock, especially the "compete" part. Insurance companies allowed the honor of participating will be at the mercy of Government subsidies and not the will of the patient and their money, so where is the incentive for them to "compete?" Simultaneously subsidizing group coverage and individual coverage is just weird. The security is knowing you will be bailed out by the government, when a better idea is to have individual coverage in the first place so you're not dependent on a job for coverage.

"Insurance and Drug Companies: insurance companies will end discrimination based on pre-existing conditions or expectations of illness and ensure high value for every premium dollar; while drug companies will offer fair prices and accurate information."

OK...as long as you simply stop calling them insurance companies. At what point did "insurance" not mean pooling and managing risk? Are we going to outlaw car insurance companies from discriminating against bad drivers?

"Individuals: will be required to get and keep insurance in a system where insurance is affordable and accessible."

This is their only responsibility? Not managing their health or helping manage usage or costs?

"Providers: will work collaboratively with patients and businesses to deliver high-quality, affordable care."

How? Admittedly this is a problem. This will be solved by providers being assigned by the Fed instead of insurance companies? How is this "plan" going to make this happen?

Employers: will help finance the system; large employers will be expected to provide health insurance or contribute to the cost of coverage: small businesses will receive a tax credit to continue or begin to offer coverage.

This is exactly the direction that creates problems. This whole employer thing is just confusing. Why help employers fund it? Why not let them pay their employees more? When you can just let the individual fund it, and give them direct tax subsidies?

"Government: will ensure that health insurance is always affordable and never a crushing burden on any family and will implement reforms to improve quality and lower cost."

How would the government improve quality? Lowering administrative costs is only part of the battle. Slowing down increases in costs is the bigger problem.

"Provide Tax Relief to Ensure Affordability: Working families will receive a refundable tax credit to help them afford high-quality health coverage."

I'm all for it. Define "high quality". What is a "refundable tax credit?" Is the government going to get a refund?

"Limit Premium Payments to a Percentage of Income: The refundable tax credit will be designed to prevent premiums from exceeding a percentage of family income, while maintaining consumer price consciousness in choosing health plans."

This is a little vexing. The credit will make people more price conscious about choosing plans? So is this an incentive to earn more or less?

"Create a New Small Business Tax Credit: To make it easier-not harder-for small businesses to create new jobs with health coverage, a new health care tax credit for small businesses will provide an incentive for job-based coverage."

Incenting job-based coverage, still, is the wrong idea.

"Strengthen Medicaid and CHIP: The Plan will fix the holes in the safety net to ensure that the most vulnerable populations receive affordable, quality care."

"Most vulnerable" is virtually everyone. Everyone is affected by the high cost health care. What we're talking about here is the beginning of socialized medicine. Period.

"Launch a Retiree Health Legacy Initiative: A new tax credit for qualifying private and public retiree health plans will offset a significant portion of catastrophic expenditures, so long as savings are dedicated to workers and competitiveness."

Admittedly, I don't even know what that means.

"Most Savings Come Through Lowering Spending Due to Quality and Modernization: Over half the savings come from the public savings generated from Senator Clinton’s broader agenda to modernize the heath systems and reduce wasteful health spending."

Modernizing only reduces costs temporarily (arithmetically). If over half the savings comes from this...then there is virtually no savings. The cost INCREASES (geometric...even exponential) are not due to lack of technology, but increased demand, and a lack of access to cost vs. quality demand by the consumer.

"A Net Tax Cut for American Taxpayers: The plan offers tens of millions of Americans a new tax credit to make premiums affordable-which more than offsets the increased revenues from the Plan’s provisions to limit the employer tax exclusion for health care and discontinue portions of the Bush tax cuts for those making over $250,000. Thus, the plan provides a net tax cut for American taxpayers."

Classic. Tax the rich and give "health care" to the poor. A net tax cut...unless of course you pay the majority of the taxes.

"Making the Employer Tax Exclusion for Health Care Fairer: The plan protects the current exclusion from taxes of employer-provided health premiums, but limits the exclusion for the high-end portion of very generous plans for those making over $250,000."

This is insane. Health Insurance, and health care, is not any more expensive for rich people than it is for poor people. It's health that dictates rates, not income. This makes no sense. So rich people would get less tax incentives from buying health care. This keeps healthy rich people off the insurance rolls, because they'll find a better place to shelter their money from taxes.

I'd rather her just come out and say, "Hey. Everyone is going to be on Medicare." She can't do that, though, because she would lose the social argument as well. Americans really don't WANT the Government to control their healthcare, they're just desperate to be able to afford it, so those who are big fans of Government-run healthcare are attempting to wrap a social argument with an economic rationale. It just won't fly, though, because there IS no economic rationale for the U.S. converting to single-payer or socialized medicine. The only rationale that's left at the end of the day is:

Everybody else is doing it.

And that's simply not an economic argument...

HillaryClinton.com - American's Health Choices Plan

Autism video glossary

2007-11-03T12:45:00.000-04:00

Neat video glossary of normal and autistic children. Good tool for clinicians and parents. Need to create a username, but it's free.

The insolvency of single payer

2007-11-03T12:07:00.000-04:00

Benjamin Zyncher makes a compelling case against single payer universal health insurance based on economic theory. Remember my statement earlier about the difference between "complimentary" and "free". If you get a service comped by a hotel, the profit comes off the back of another guest. This idea is called "cross-subsidization" by Zyncher. In a definitive statement:

Government is an institution that exists explicitly for the purpose of engendering cross-subsidies among groups, whether through the tax/expenditure system or the regulatory mechanism. Single-payer health insurance, by its very nature (because it accepts all those eligible, and does not base taxes and fees on health status), must create such subsidies, and the tax system prevents competition on the basis of price.

So what, right? All this theory is too abstract? Insurance companies are the bad guys, according to the media and the democratic party. The only way out of this Gordian knot is to let the government take over the industry. The debate that then remains is how quickly or slowly do you want government to encroach on an already highly regulated industry. Hillary and her myrmidons have decided to do this incrementally, by increasing the funding of S-CHIP, which defines children upward to 25 years of age, and defines poverty upwards to an annual income of $75K/year per household. It may sound good to mandate everyone to pick up the tab on health insurance for the poor, but the problem is that rationing services, especially artificially, always has a price. If not in actual dollars, then in time.

In practice, mandating coverage is a slippery slope to price rationing, which quickly becomes wildly unpopular. Sally Pipes explains.

We have a large number of uninsured because insurance is expensive. Insurance is expensive because the product for which it pays — the world’s most advanced medical interventions — doesn’t come cheap. It’s also expensive because regulations severely limit the free-market’s ability to develop inexpensive, less comprehensive plans.

Few politicians are willing to deregulate.

The only levers left to pull are the ones bureaucrats love: price controls and rationing. This is why Hillary speaks of “fair prices.”

Once you get beyond the rhetoric of "40 million uninsured", the argument for universal health insurance is fairly weak.

Watson and racism

2007-11-03T10:55:00.000-04:00

Jason Malloy at Gene Expression wrote a long and detailed post on James Watson's recent statements on evolution in Africa vs. Europe. The opener:

It is long and detailed with a lot of facts. Here's the opener:

The public intellectual forum is being manipulated with intimidation and coercion and you are being lied to. The media is not doing its job, and the scientific community is not playing its proper public role as a beacon of dispassionate truth seeking, as a conduit of knowledge to the public, or in fostering an open and fair intellectual climate. Both are abusing their power and authority to do the opposite of their honor bound social and intellectual roles; facts are being distorted in service of values.

Watson's remarks in the interview, like Larry Summers before him, were fairly mild. Notheless, a lot of tsk-tsking from the editorialists at Nature.

More Medical News

2007-11-02T13:23:00.001-04:00

In Pharmacology, all drugs have two names, a trade name and generic name. For example, the trade name of Tylenol also has a generic name of Acetaminophen. Aleve is also called Naproxen. Amoxil is also called Amoxicillin and Advil is also called Ibuprofen.

The FDA has been looking for a generic name for Viagra. After careful consideration by a team of government experts, it recently announced that it has settled on the generic name of Mycoxafloppin. Also considered were Mycoxafailin, Mydixadrupin, Mydixarizin, Dixafix, and of course, Ibepokin.

Pfizer Corp. announced today that Viagra will soon be available in liquid form, and will be marketed by Pepsi Cola as a power beverage suitable for use as a mixer. It will now be possible for a man to literally pour himself a stiff one. Obviously we can no longer call this a soft drink, and it gives new meaning to the names of "cocktails", "highballs" and just a good old-fashioned "stiff drink". Pepsi will market the new concoction by the name of MOUNT & DO.

Thought for the day: There is more money being spent on breast implants and Viagra today than on Alzheimer's research. This means that by 2040, there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs and huge erections and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them.

More lies about Universal Healthcare

2007-11-02T13:03:00.000-04:00

Apparently, in his rush to denounce "Hillarycare", which apparently is any change to our health system that Hillary would propose, Giuliani got caught in a giant fib.

I'm referring to his presidential campaign's recent radio ad in New Hampshire, in which Giuliani speaks of his personal experience with prostate cancer and then cites an ear-grabbing statistic: "My chances of surviving prostate cancer -- and thank God I was cured of it -- in the United States: 82 percent. My chances of surviving prostate cancer in England: only 44 percent under socialized medicine."

Hold it, you mean I'd be nearly twice as likely to die of prostate cancer in Liverpool as in Los Angeles? Twice as likely to succumb in Oxfordshire as in Ohio? Amazing. Also, not remotely true. Follow the link above for the facts.

The Income Gap

2007-11-02T01:16:00.000-04:00

If you want to read an article that shows the disconnect between rhetoric and reality and completely misses the point on "Income Gap" by literally pretending things are true that aren't true...read this.

Here are a couple of highlights:

One intuitive measure of inequality is to compare "high-income" and "low-income" families. Suppose we define a high income level as income at the 90th percentile: that is, the income level higher than that of 90 percent of all families but lower than that of the top 10 percent. Similarly, we can define a low income level as the income at the 10th percentile.

A sign of no economic foundation is words like "intuitive", "suppose", "can". This method of defining inequality is not only arbitrary, but also useless.

This part is the part I agree with:

Why has inequality increased?
It is always tempting to look for a single cause that can explain a major social or economic event, but in all likelihood the growing gap between rich and poor has many causes. A list of the "usual suspects" is easy to compile; evaluating their relative importance is far more difficult.
Much evidence points toward declining demand for low-skilled workers as a crucial factor. In the view of many economists, the principal source of this shift has been technological change that has allowed firms to economize on low-skilled labor while increasing the demand for highly educated workers. Ironically, these changes are broadly a consequence of the growing importance of computers and automation in the economy, the very technological advances that have helped drive the current economic boom.

Globalization of the economy may also have played a role. In the past 25 years, low-skilled American workers have experienced increasing competition from both low-paid immigrants and low-paid workers living in other parts of the world who produce goods that compete with American products. Although the effects of globalization are not negligible, most economists think they are less significant than the effects of technological change on wage inequality.

Finally, institutional changes in the labor market have had an impact. These include the declining membership in labor unions in the private sector and the declining real value of the legal minimum wage, which until recently had been severely eroded by inflation.
International comparisons support this analysis. The pressures on low-skilled wages from technological change and globalization have affected all developed economies, but the growth of inequality has been far greater in the United States. International differences in wage-setting institutions and income-transfer programs may explain the different outcomes. They may also help account for the higher unemployment rates in many other developed economies, a perspective that casts the U.S. experience in a more favorable light.

This is all precisely true...Did you like that last part, though? The U.S. in a more favorable light for lower unemployment...THE HORROR!!

But then they get to the "solution" and something really cool happens. They dismiss ALL of the above as completely irrelevant:

Individual and communal acts of charity will always play a role in reducing the adverse effects of income inequality, but significant reductions of inequality will depend upon the government's power to tax, transfer, and regulate. Inevitably, however, redistributive policies involve real costs, in terms of both their economic impact and the infringements of property rights that accompany them. Thus there is a trade-off between equity and other values. To minimize the damage to these other values, two principles of policy design-efficiency and efficacy-should guide us as we evaluate proposals for reducing inequality.
If a policy is efficient, it will achieve its redistributive goals at minimal cost to the economy as a whole. Perhaps surprisingly, the criterion of efficiency is usually better served by policies that treat the symptoms, rather than the causes, of inequality.
For instance, to the extent that import competition is a source of downward pressure on low-skilled wages, protectionist trade policy could counteract the trend. Yet protectionism comes at a high cost to consumers and trade-dependent sectors of the economy. More efficient would be a policy that directly enhanced low-skilled workers' incomes, whether through training, subsidies, or minimum wages.

So, technological changes, globalization, a lack of education in the workforce is best solved by simply "taxing, transferring, and regulating." The source of the problem is simply not important. Well there you go. At least they acknowledge the "trade off" between property rights and equity.

The rest of the article continues to argue against itself in the most extraordinary ways, and it's really fun to read. Within a couple of paragraphs, training and minimum wages are supported and then not supported. A good idea would have been for the Applied Ethics Department of Santa Clara University to go have a little conversation with the Economics department of Santa Clara University. It might've resulted in a slightly less ridiculous article. So OK, this isn't really the best article to illustrate the argument on the "Income Inequality Crisis." But it illustrates pretty well how rhetoric can so quickly and easily win out over science, logic and reason.

The Income Gap

The final nail in the middle class coffin

2007-10-31T12:07:00.001-04:00

Not!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A pickup in consumer spending and strong exports powered economic growth ahead at its fastest rate during the third quarter since the beginning of 2006, according to a government report on Wednesday.

While the Democrats and my colleagues continually complain about how bad this administration is, I PTL every day we don't have a (more) socialized economy like the ones in Europe.

Brokaw on Buffet

2007-10-30T11:18:00.000-04:00

My last post on this topic got some action, so let's see how this one does ;). Tom Brokaw has come back from a visit with the 3rd Richest Man in the World: Warren Buffet. He was on Morning Joe this morning and what he had to say was truly astounding.

Buffet has done an informal survey of his employees and found out some shocking (at least to me) news. 15 of his 18 employees allowed him to look through their tax returns and he found that HE paid an aggregated 17% of his income while THEY paid a median of 32% of theirs. This makes his overall tax rate HALF of what his admin staff pays.

Buffet does not have an accountant do his taxes and does not have fancy tax shelters. He literally pays (on principle) exactly what congress tells him to pay. This inequity has prompted him to take action and begin speaking out for a revision of the tax code with some kind of progressive consumption tax.

Somehow some voters (and commenters of this Blog) have been brainwashed into thinking that we can't touch the tax code to raise taxes on the richest Americans and lower taxes on the middle class because that would be some kind of "wealth transfer". One reader actually asked last week, how are the middle class entitled to rich people's money?

Obviously this isn't the case. There is wealth transfer occurring, and it's from the working class people to the rich - not the other way around. If Buffet can see that, maybe it's time for the rest of us to open our eyes as well.

U.S. Imposes New Sanctions On Iran

2007-10-25T10:55:00.000-04:00

With a new round of sanctions against Iran, it's important to look at a number of things: what are the repercussions of the sanctions and what is really motivating the US to pursue Iran's further economic deterioration. Is the US further destablizing the region? What it is most certainly doing is ramping up the anti-US sentiment among the countries in the Middle East.

What are the reasons for this round of sanctions? Condi Rice's press statement offers a litany of complaints about Iran. Most of them we've heard already:
1) Iran is purusing the development of nuclear weapons. This assertion is still speculation.
2) Iran is supporting Shia militants in Iraq and terrorists in Iraq. How so? The Iranian-made weapons argument is weak. Is Iran donating these weapons or selling them the way the US sells its massive supply of weapons all over the world?
3) Denying the existance of Israel.
4) Iran has threatened to wipe Israel off the map, which by now many know to be utterly false.

According to Condi Rice, these new sanctions are "designed, among other things, to punish Tehran for its support of terrorist organizations in Iraq and the Middle East."

Rice and other Bush Administration officials continue to harp on the "threatening behavior of the Iranians.” Once again notice the choice of words in Rice's propagandizing speech. "Iranians" [plural] might lead you to believe she means the entire people of Iran. Not so. Far from it. Governments in many ways fail to represent their people, so put the breaks on the invasion equation.

She also said that Washington remains open to “a diplomatic solution.” This should set off alarms right away. If it doesn't, please let me point out the utter hypocrisy of Rice, the Bush Administration, and US government in regards to our relationship with Iran.

You'll have to consider first why Iran developed into the way it is today. I use the term "developed" loosely, since it may suggest lack of interference, which is certainly not the case. A recent Adbusters magazine article charted this bit of history well, stating that "the story of how Iran-US relations arrived at such a critical juncture has been all but expunged from historical memory." Quite so. For the average American impressions of Iran begin with images of American hostages during the 1979 revolution. What the average American does NOT know is that the 1979 revolution was preceeded by a constitutional democracy in Iran. In 1953 the United States elminated this democracy by means of a CIA coup, overthrowing the democratically elected Prime Minister Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh, who was Time Magazine's "Man of the Year" one year earlier in 1952. Why overthrow a democratically elected leader? Dr. Mossadegh believed fervently in national independence and very quickly nationalized Iran's oil industry. Ah, the oil. Look back in time and you'll find that England had a monopoly on Iran's oil. During World War 2 Britain and the Soviet Union (who by then had a finger in the pie) invaded Iran to secure their oil fields and supply lines. Just before Mossadegh's ascent to power of Premier, Britain owned most of the stock in the Anglo-Iranian (later British Petroleum) Oil Company, gave Iran a raw deal for the oil coming out of their own ground, and taxed them more than they profited! Raping of the Iran, raping of the Middle-East, a theme for decades.

After years of outside control, Iranians elect Mossadegh in 1951, a man who believed that Iran and its oil belong to Iran (not to the West). How did the West respond? First with British warships in the Persian Gulf and an economic blockade. When this failed to convince Mossadegh, the British government persuaded the incoming Eisenhower administration to send in the CIA. Within a month Iran's secular and democratic future was under permanent house arrest courtesy of the good ol' well-meanin' USA. The official CIA report included a cautionary note: "Possibilities of blowback against the United States should always be in the back of the minds of all CIA officers involved in this type of operation." Wise words from the spook department, never heeded. Moving on, how does the US replace Mossadegh's democratic government? With a monarchy! Why would the US commit an act that it would later apologize for? Well, for the same reason it has always futzed in the affairs with the Middle-East and other parts of the world, not to spread democracy but for full economic advantage, because of power and greed.

Let's keep going with the history lesson. Iran's new US-backed ruler Mohammed Reza Shah enjoys his throne, his American-trained secret police, the SAVAK, which kidnapped and tortured its dissidents, and unbridled corruption from start to finish. The Shah plunders Iran's fortunes over the next quarter of a century, but that is okay for the West. Economic revival at the expense of democracy and personal freedom. What about his character? If the US supported him, he must've been a good guy. Right? Wrong. The Shah said once to a female journalist: "Women are important in a man's life only if they're beautiful and keep their femininity. You're equal in the eyes of the law but not, excuse my saying so, in ability." Doesn't matter. The Shah's rule meant economic gain for the US. Priorities, people. In Iran, however, the Shah's corruption inspires vast widespread revolutionary fervor. Understandably so! Their symbolic leader, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, returns from exile in Paris and dethrones the Shah.

And the rest is more recent history, which most people know of but without the above context.

Was deposing Mossadegh a "diplomatic solution"? Absolutely not.

If the Bush administration wants diplomacy with Iran, Iran has welcomed it for quite some time. Iran sent a letter to Washington in 2003 shortly after we invaded Iraq. It was an offer from Iran to help stabilize Iraq and end its military support for Hezbollah and Hamas! The U.S. State Department was open to the offer. What happened? As this Washington Post article goes on to say, as soon as the letter got to the White House, as soon as it got to the vice president's office, the old mantra of 'We don't talk to evil' reasserted itself. Dick Cheney flatly rejected the proposition. Again, we turned our backs on Iran.

By that, should we believe Condi Rice when she says the US wants a diplomatic relationship with Iran?

No. The government lies.

What does the US really want? Why impose these sanctions and isolate Iran even more from the rest of the world? Because Iran sponsors terror? Maybe, maybe not. According to our own definition of state-sponsored terrorism, the US is positively guilty of many acts of state-sponsored terror of its own. I will support that argument when the US stops toppling other governments and installing monarchs and dictators.

What are the sanctions really about? The nuke issue? Somewhat. Iran is more than 10 years away from ever building a nuke. There's time to talk. And by the way, who would their possessing a nuke affect? The US? No. Israel? Yes. Who is lobbying for the invasion and destabilization of Iran? Answer: The very powerful Israeli lobby. Why else undermine Iran's nuclear development? Iran's nuclear powerplant built 30 years ago but still unopened is lucrative for the Russians for many years to come, if it's ever to get up and running, and will set the stage for future Iranian-Russian cooperation. Imposing sanctions, however, will slow down that process, which might explain why Mr. Putin has not supported the sanctions.

What other unspoken motivation is there for the US to impose sanctions? Oil. Ah, the oil. According to this article: "Iran houses the second-largest pool of untapped petroleum in the world, an estimated 125.8 billion barrels. Only Saudi Arabia, with an estimated 260 billion barrels, possesses more; Iraq, the third in line, has an estimated 115 billion barrels. With this much oil -- about one-tenth of the world's estimated total supply -- Iran is certain to play a key role in the global energy equation, no matter what else occurs." Consider also: "Iran also sits athwart the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which, daily, 40% of the world's oil exports pass. In addition, Iran is becoming a major supplier of oil and natural gas to China, India, and Japan, thereby giving Tehran additional clout in world affairs. It is these geopolitical dimensions of energy, as much as Iran's potential to export significant quantities of oil to the United States, that undoubtedly govern the administration's strategic calculations." If the US topples the current regime in Iran, it secures its place first in line for Iranian oil. In the meantime, government officials are doing their best to prevent other countries from doing business with Iran. Stave off competition until we get a foothold. Sound possible? Sound ludicrous? I think so. But governments are not rational entities and seldom admit their actual intents.

While it remains hazy why we're letting our leaders impose new sanctions on Iran, consider who this is going to affect. The Tehran elite? No. It will affect Iran's people. With new sanctions forbidding our allies from investing in Iranian banks and therefore in its oil industry, which is most vulnerable to sanctions, it would be a tough blow. Sanctions might also inflame anti-US sentiments not only among Iranian people but among people in the Middle-East as well.

These sanctions are entirely counter-productive. Nor does Iran deserve the constant demonization that our government and this current administration has churned out on a regular basis. They are typically half-truths and hypocritical accusations meant to distract us from the real reasons we are trying to break Iran.

In his article on economic sanctions against Iran, William O'Beeman concludes the argument well: "The lesson that the Bush administration refuses to learn is that Iran will not respond to pressure. The only route to Iranian cooperation is face-to-face dealings with no preconditions, where Iran is treated respectfully as an equal partner. This proposition sticks in the craw of the Bush administration—to the point where the irrational call for military action becomes preferable in some quarters."

Obama / Osama

2007-10-25T10:39:00.001-04:00

No one said this guy didn't have a sense of humor. Almost makes me want to vote for him!

Mitt Romney has been (intentionally?) mispronouncing Obama's name as "Osama" on the campaign trail.

Well, Romney was present in spirit - if not in the flesh - at Obama’s town hall in Dover, NH yesterday, NBC/NJ’s Aswini Anburajan reports. A day after Romney confused Obama and Osama bin Laden, the Illinois senator responded to a voter’s question on what the difference was between him and the world's most wanted terrorist. "I have a simple question. What's the difference between you and Osama bin Laden," the man asked.

“Well, Mitt Romney has been very confused about this. I have a lot of trouble growing a beard. I don’t have a lot of facial hair. He lives in a cave,”

Advice for the new Louisiana governor

2007-10-22T22:47:00.000-04:00

John Fund from the Wall Street Journal has some advice for Bobby Jindal:

He plans tax cuts and an expansion of school choice. Part of his philosophy is that the federal government can't be Louisiana's salvation. "New Orleans has suffered from the trauma of three crises," he told The Wall Street Journal last year. "First was Katrina, second was the levees breaking, and the third has been a case study in bureaucracy and red tape at its very worst."
...
Mr. Roemer's failure to alter the state's mores provides some guidance for Mr. Jindal. While he won outright election on Saturday, many races for the state legislature will be decided in runoffs next month. With legislative term limits kicking in for the first time this year, many of those runoffs will be in open districts where reform candidates will square off against those more are skeptical of change. If Mr. Jindal wants to be a successful governor, he would be wise not to rest on his laurels but instead to pour his time and energy into making sure a Legislature is elected that will pay more than lip service to his bold proposals.

Bobby Jindal dominates the election!

2007-10-21T21:41:00.000-04:00

Here's a blurb from the Times Picayune:

After thanking his wife and family, Jindal said his victory represents a "fresh start" for the state and likened the state's future to the American dream that his parents came to Baton Rouge to pursue shortly before he was born.

"Guess what happened? They found the American dream to be alive and well right here in Louisiana," Jindal said. "In America and here in Louisiana, the only barrier to success is your willingness to work hard and play by the rules."

Stressing the themes that he has emphasized throughout the campaign, Jindal promised to call the Legislature into special session shortly after he is inaugurated to pass stronger ethics laws: an issue he termed the "linchpin for change."

Should anyone try to derail those efforts, Jindal said, "I will call them out."

Here's what a commenter at the Times Picayune has to say:
Governor-Elect Bobby Jindal won 54% of the voters who actually voted, but Governor-Elect Jindal received only 25% of the total registered voters.
75% of Louisiana voters did not vote for Governor-Elect Jindal, making him a minority governor in more ways than one.
We will have to wait and see if a minority governor can govern -- or was it all empty talk and show.
Classy opposition, huh? These kinds of trolls are all over the net, often on both sides, but let's take a closer look at some of the numbers.

Party Candidate Votes %
Republican Piyush Jindal 699,672 53.91
Democratic Walter Boasso 226,364 17.44
Independent John Georges 186,800 14.39
Democratic Fost Campbell 161,425 12.44

The top three candidates were all center-right, and the left-wing populist received 12% of all votes. That's a far cry from the political victories of the Long's and Edwin Edwards. That he won 60 of 64 parishes says, by any legitimate definition, that he has a mandate to run the state.

I think in her heart Blanco is a good person, but is shameful that she was more loyal to her political party than to the citizens of her state in a time of crisis. And the road home program hasn't been too successful either. It's time for a change, and I think for the better. No place to go but up, anyway.

Also, here's what the Indians think about "Bobby". No snickering from them.

Lastly, the folks at national review put together a neat spreadsheet of the 2003 & 2007 elections