The Wall Street Protests and the 53%

These are two sides to the economic crisis. First you have the protesters who appear to have a vague understanding that something is wrong. They’re calling themselves the 99% and are trying to call attention to the ongoing wealth disparity in this country.

I agree with them whole heartedly that the disparity is approaching crisis proportions. Unfortunately the message is getting garbled.

On the other side is the conservative counter which labels itself the 53%. The name comes from the fact that some 47% of the population pays no income taxes. Conservatives have been posting their stories on a web site. The stories, typically, portray what I’ll call good old perseverance and hard work. Stories of people that have succeeded despite hardships and disadvantages without asking anything from anyone.

I’m not going to take anything away from these people. They have a right to be proud of what they view as their success in the face of adversity. They view the protesters as whining and looking for handouts rather than putting in the necessary effort to succeed.

To some extent they are correct. But they overlook a number of things. First of all, if they look a little deeper into their success they will find that even though they didn’t overtly ask for help, it was most likely there in the form of government regulations and subsidies.

Second, they don’t realize that it shouldn’t have been as hard as it was. It’s the disparity of wealth and the pure greed that seems to be endemic in society today that has made it such a struggle for so many people including themselves.

Third, and most important, to a lesser or greater extent they’ve been lucky, but there is no guarantee that luck is going to hold. Again, I do not want to disparage their accomplishments, but, in many cases, it’s a lot more fragile than it looks. Overnight their success can change to failure through no fault of their own and that’s the problem.

Now let’s talk about the 47%. According to a Brookings Institute and Urban Institute report, about half of these people pay no tax simply because their liability is eliminated due to the standard provisions of the tax system. These are the same rules we all adhere to. The overwhelming majority of the other half end up with no liability due to tax expenditures for the elderly and the working poor many of which were part of the Bush Tax Cuts.

In other words we’re not talking about people given special privileges here. These are either retired folks who worked their whole lives and the working poor who are doing the best they can. The conservative idea that these people are freeloaders is horseshit.

Let’s also remember that they do pay payroll taxes and state and local taxes. In fact, as shown in the graph, there isn’t a big difference between the percentage of total income and the percentage of total tax liability for the various income groups.



However this graph points out two problems. The first is that 1% of the population should not have 21% of the income. The second is the tax liability should be more progressive with the tax burden increasing faster than it does compared to the income percentage. These are the two primary things the Wall Street protesters need to focus on.

So, as usual, the conservatives have a distorted view of reality. So what else is new?

Missing Baby Lisa

I hate these stories because they never seem to have a happy ending.

An 11-month old baby girl is missing from a home in Kansas City. She’s been missing for about 2 weeks now and we all know that the longer it goes the smaller the chase for finding the child unharmed.

The latest twist (and these sort of stories always have twists and turns) involved the mom admitting she was drunk the night Lisa disappeared and that she lied about the last time she saw her. Originally she said she saw her around 10:30 PM when she checked on her. Now she’s saying it was closer to 6:40 PM. Four hours is a long time in these situations.

The Kansas City police, FBI and officers from neighboring communities have been taking the neighborhood apart house by house, tree by tree and blade of grass by blade of grass. Military Police from the Missouri National Guard joined the search Monday. So far, nothing. An “anonymous benefactor,” supposedly close to the family, has put up a $100,000 reward. I’m sure there’s a story there as well since these people don’t strike as having many friends with that kind of money.

So what the hell? Where is this kid?

Suspicion immediately falls on the parents in these cases. The father was working the night shift the night the child disappeared. Coincidentally this was his first night shift. I’m married, so I can sort of guess how the wife didn’t care for the change in schedule. Women rarely sit well with anything you do that upsets the routine. Perhaps that’s the reason why she got plastered that night.

This is not sounding terribly encouraging. People don’t break into houses and steal sleeping children. It’s not impossible, but It’s seems unlikely. The alternative is utterly horrible so one can only hope that’s what did happen and a good resolution is right around the corner.

Tim Tebow to Start for Denver

And this matters why?

It matters because as much as I disagree with Tebow’s religious views, I don’t think they should a factor in whether or not he plays for the Broncos, or any other team, and I can’t help but believe they have been.

Even the story announcing that Tebow would start against the Miami Dolphins included a “Hail Mary Pass” reference saying how appropriate it was that Tim had flung one.

Well I hope the writer’s fooball knowledge exceeds his theological knowledge because I doubt Tim would be saying any "Hail Marys." As a fundamentalist Christian that would be roughly equivalent to him praying to Zeus.

Now let's talk football because that's how Tebow needs to be judged. I say he deserves a chance and John Fox is right to give him one. The man clearly has the kind of passion for the game that makes everyone else around him play better. He’s the kind of player that is capable of producing results way beyond his level of talent and I think the guy’s pretty talented as well. The big questions are how well does he fit into Denver’s offensive scheme and what’s going to happen when teams start preparing for him rather than Kyle Orton.

I don't care for his religious beliefs but that has nothing to do with football. Besides, he's free to believe whatever he wants.

I think some folks are letting their agreement, or disagreement, with his religious outlook color their football judgment. If there is a God (which I doubt), he doesn't play football and he doesn't participate in a fantasy league or weekly pool either.

Cain’s 9-9-9 Plan

Everyone else seems to be talking about it so I suppose I should too. For those who don’t know what 9-9-9 stands for, it’s a proposal to replace the current federal tax code with a 9% flat income tax, a 9% corporate tax and a 9% federal sales tax. I’m not sure where Social Security taxes fit but I believe they would still be separate under the plan.

I’m going to grade it based upon three qualities. First, Simplicity, I don’t think you should need four accountants to pay your taxes. Second, Revenue Adequacy, you have to take in enough revenue to keep the federal government operating. One can argue its gotten bloated over the years but it still performs a wide range of functions that we’re going to need. Lastly, Fairness, while a tax code doesn’t necessarily have to be fair, I think most people, including me, believe it should be.

As for quality importance, to my mind Revenue Adequacy and Fairness are 5 credit factors and Simplicity is a 3 credit factor. Simplicity is nice but it’s not essential and the other two are.

I wholeheartedly agree that something needs to be done about the federal tax code. It’s too complicated. Cain’s plan is simple and straight forward so, for Simplicity, it gets an “A.”

On the question of Revenue Adequacy I have two concerns. The first is I find it highly unlikely it’s going to bring in anywhere near as much revenue as the current code and, secondly, it’s unclear to me that we’re going to accrue any significant benefit from slicing the corporate tax rate so significantly other than enrich the CEOs, the major stockholders and the corporations themselves. More money means more power and influence and the big corporations have too much of those already. I give Cain’s plan a “D” here and that’s being generous.

Now we come to fairness. The plan clearly favors the rich. A 9% flat tax on income would cut my taxes dramatically and I’m not anywhere near the top income bracket. Pure Flat taxes, where everyone is taxed at the same rate, are regressive and further encourage greed. I believe the tax rate should increase with income and would much prefer a graduated flat tax that started at 0% and worked its way up by marginal income.

In other words, for example, for the first $X no one would pay any taxes. Then from $X+1 to $Y one would pay say 5%; then from $Y+1 to $Z dollars one would pay 10% and so on. For incomes in the millions I would have the marginal tax rate in the 75% range. There would be no deductions, no tax shelters, but the flat rate would increase with income.

A sales tax is also regressive. In fact it’s probably the most regressive type of tax because the poor pay a much larger proportion of their income than the rich. A sales tax is also too easy to get around by buying goods and services outside the country. I can see “duty free” zones springing up on dozens of Caribbean Islands selling foreign goods to rich Americans just to get around the 9% federal tax.

For Fairness, the plan gets a big whopping “F.” I’d give it an F- if there was such a grade.

So let’s do the old college index calculation. ( (3x4)+(1x5)+(0x5))/(3+5+5) = 17/13 = 1.3. That’s a D+ folks so Cain’s plan flunks out.

It’s an interesting idea but I think it needs work. Going with a graduated flat tax on income while reducing the sales tax might be enough to make it a plan I could support, but I can’t support it the way it is.

The “Real” Origins of Christianity

I took an online course entitled “The Real Origins of Christianity.” I put the real in quotes in the title because it was strikingly obvious to me that we’re dabbling more in opinion and speculation than historical fact.

I did learn a lot of things and did have a number of misconceptions corrected. However, I had some difficulty with the main hypothesis of the instructor.

The instructor was Dr. Richard Carrier who, it is safe to say, sits near the left outer extreme of the continuum associated with the reliability of the gospels. To the extreme right are the fundamentalists that insist that every word is literally true and the text, at least in the original autographs, is inerrant and wholly without contradiction or error. At the opposite end are the ultra-skeptics who don’t even concede that the gospels are based upon a real man. Carrier acknowledges there was a real Jesus, but seems to take the position that the gospels are fiction written to make a point rather than relate a true story.

I had always been of the impression that the gospel story, or at least the Synoptic gospel story, consisted of an accurate core to which had been added mythical elements and which had been massaged to make the message better fit the particular audience. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever consider the idea that the entire story was pure fiction.

Nor do I buy that conclusion now. Carrier is writing a book defending that idea and apparently Robert Price has addressed a similar hypothesis in the “Incredible Shrinking Son of Man: How Reliable is the Gospel Tradition?” So I decided to buy Price’s book while I’m waiting for Carrier to finish his.

Now all I need to do is find time to read it.

The Mormon Question

There have been some mumbles about Mitt Romney’s religion. A Baptist preacher, who introduced Rick Perry at a forum, told reporters that Romney was not a Christian. The same preacher in 2008 said that Mormonism was a “cult.”

Now, personally, I happen to agree with the preacher that it's a cult. Mormonism was created by a third rate con man and is demonstrably false. It is total and complete crap. Anyone who has actually read the Book of Mormon, and has more than half a brain, could figure that out. Of course it’s so boring that reading it is a feat in itself. Mark Twain called in “Chloroform in print” and I think he was being kind.

Of course the Baptist preacher’s religion is complete crap also, it’s just not as demonstrably so. To my mind anyone that actually believes the tenets of Mormonism is unfit to be allowed anywhere the nuclear codes.

On the Republican campaign trail they’re tiptoeing around the question a bit. Newt Gingrich called the preachers comment “unwise and inappropriate.” Notice however that he didn’t say he was wrong.

Michelle Bachmann mumbled something about religious tolerance but also didn’t say the preacher was wrong.

Hermann Cain acknowledged that Romney was a Mormon and then said “I am not going to do an analysis of Mormonism versus Christianity for the sake of answering that."

Which sort of implies that Cain thinks they’re different doesn’t it?

And then there is Rick Santorum. He simply said something to the effect of if Romney says he’s Christian, I believe him.

Not one of them actually addressed the question. Politicians, you have to love them.

A Palestinian State

The Palestinians have asked for recognition from the U.N. as a full member nation.

In order to achieve such status a Security Council recommendation is required. The U.S. has indicated it would veto any such recommendation so, unless the Obama administration has an epiphany, that’s not going to happen.

Plan B is to take the request directly to the General Assembly. If 129 out of the 193 member states approve, then the Palestinians would be granted non-member observer status which would be a step up from where they are now as an “observer entity.”

The big benefit would be such a status would allow the Palestinians to join U.N. bodies including the International World Court and that would afford them an opportunity to file charges against Israel for violations of International Law.

The Palestinians claim to have 122 votes and hope to accumulate as many as 150.

Both the U.S. and Israel are saying that such a move would slow down the peace process.

What peace process? Do you people live on the same planet I do?

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu clearly has no interest in negotiating anything while he continues to illegally build additional West Bank settlements.

Secure in the assumption that no U.S. president will risk the political fallout of not supporting Israel, Netanyahu isn’t going to budge. He demonstrated this by his raising such a hullabaloo about Obama saying that any negotiation STARTS with the 1967 borders. This has been the agreement for a decade. Note that this is the start and not the end point. No one expects Israel to return to the 1967 borders.

I say go for it Palestine. Time to shake some things up and see what falls out.

Michelle Bachmann and Arab Spring

Michelle Bachmann has decided that Arab Spring, which resulted in the toppling of three dictators and gave hope to the emergence of democracy in the Arab World, was a BAD thing.

Am I missing something here or a is Bachmann a bigger idiot than I thought she was?

Granted, the jury is still out on the final outcome of the popular uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya but I would think that the U.S. would support people rebelling against dictatorships.

Is it possible Egypt will emerge as a Islamic State? Yes it is. But if that’s what her people want, so be it. That’s how Democracy works.

Anwar al-Awlaki and Ron Paul

Al-Awlaki was an American born radical Islamic terrorist that has spent the last few years recruiting in the west for Al-Qaeda. He was killed in Yemen by an American drone strike.

Ron Paul, running for the Republican presidential nomination, thinks this was a terrible thing to do and that Al-Awlaki, as a American citizen, was entitled to a trial.

As I’ve said before, not only does Ron Paul not have any answers, he doesn’t even know what the questions are.

One of the few things I agreed on with George W. Bush was treating the confrontation with terrorism as a war. Article III of the United States Constitution defines treason as:

“Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.”

I think it is safe to say that Al-Awlaki, by this definition, committed treason. Article III goes on to say.

“No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.”

I would consider his open recruiting for Al-Qaeda and bombastic sermons equivalent to a “Confession in open Court.”

Besides, no one has any rights in a battle during war. In this war, drone strikes are part of the fighting. Al-Awlaki wasn’t assassinated as Ron Paul claims, he was killed as part of a military action.

If he had been captured I would have agreed with a trial but I can’t justify not taking him out when the chance presented itself.

In other words, good enough for me and good riddance.  

A Little Extra at Lions Games

What could be better than an NFL football game, cold beer and food?

Apparently in Detroit some enterprising folks are providing a mobile strip joint for those tailgaters that have everything else.

According to the AP, The “Booty Lounge,” a black and red bus complete with two stages, associated dancing poles and a smoke machine were allowing Lions fans access after a $10 “donation.”

Needless to say the Detroit police are taking a dim view of the arrangement and are investigating the incident to determine if the setup is illegal. At the very least the operators haven’t paid for the special license needed by strip joints.

Hey, after the last 10 years of lousy Lions football I think they should give their fans a break. On the other hand, the Lions, along with the Bills are looking pretty good this year.

The Republican Race

Well, a month has gone by and Rick Perry has apparently talked his way out of first place in the race for the 2012 Republican nomination.

In the latest Fox News Poll, the numbers came out like this:

Mitt Romney – 23%
Rick Perry – 19%
Herman Cain – 17%
Newt Gingrich – 11%
Ron Paul – 6%
Jon Huntsman – 4%
Michelle Bachmann – 3%
Rick Santorum – 3%

The other two big stories are the sudden surge of Herman Cain after his Florida Straw Poll win and the total collapse of Michelle Bachmann. The falls of Perry and Bachmann lead me to hope that while the American people are really freaking dumb, they’re not all complete idiots.

I don’t know what to make of Cain. I’m betting this is a temporary bubble like Bachmann’s temporary bubble. I’m thinking it’s going to be a two man race with Romney ultimately beating out Perry.

Why? Because Romney has the widest appeal, he’s not likely to say anything so extreme as to turn people off and he’s got the best chance against Obama and most Republicans know it.

They’ll play around with the idea of nominating someone else but, in the final analysis, the fat cat portion of the party will have its way and that way will be Romney.

Troy Davis

Troy Davis is scheduled to be executed in Georgia tomorrow for the murder of an off-duty police officer in 1989. A last ditch appeal to Georgia’s pardon board was rejected on Monday.

The question on the table is whether Davis is in fact guilty of the crime for which he was convicted. A number of witnesses that testified against him have recanted their testimony. Other potential witnesses claim that another person actually committed the crime.

Yet, Davis was unable to convince a federal judge to give him a new trial and the Georgia Supreme Court has upheld his conviction. Prosecutors say they have no doubt they charged the right man with the crime.

I’m not sure what to say about this. While it seems there is significant doubt, the case has been looked at in detail and no one seemed to think there was enough doubt. This is precisely the reason I oppose the death penalty. The potential of an error easily outweighs any perceived advantage.

Psalm 46

At the 9-11 ceremonies yesterday President Obama reportedly read from Psalm 46. You will excuse me but I find the Psalm especially inappropriate.

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.”

Well then why didn’t he stop the planes from hitting the towers? This is basically bullshit of the first order of magnitude. You can trust your own right arm and your intelligence and that’s about it. This is the kind of crap the elite spew to keep the riff-raff in line.

“Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts.”

Yet the nations remain in an uproar, wars still rage and people still die. If this all powerful God can end war then why doesn’t he?

“He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth. He breaks the bow and shatters the spear; he burns the shields with fire.”

Not that I’ve noticed. As a matter of fact, wars go their merry way just as if there was no such thing as a God. Amazing isn’t it?

“He says, ‘Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.’”

Conceited son of a bitch isn’t he? One wonders why an all powerful being would be such a megalomaniac as to require the exaltation and worship of his pitiful so-called creations.

Like I said, I find this Psalm particularly inappropriate given it was religious fanatics with an eye toward exalting their God that flew the planes into the towers.

Some 9-11 thoughts on 9-12

I’m not the sentimental type. I respect those that lost people close to them in the attacks and I’m especially prepared to recognize the courage of those who tried to help and in doing so became victims themselves.

I think a moment of silence on the anniversary or a modest ceremony at the three main sites is appropriate. What is not appropriate is a week of constant media noise and the violation of the U.S. Constitution with readings from the Bible.

I guarantee you that some of those lost on that day did not recognize the Bible as Holy Scripture nor the existence of God. So you might as well have spit on their graves especially considering the fact that it was religious morons that killed them.

Granted, this was the tenth anniversary, and cardinal anniversaries tend to be looked upon as having special significance, but enough already. How many others have died in the resulting conflicts around the world since 9-11-2001 and has anyone really bothered to address the problems that led to the attack so that countless others won’t die?

Of course not. That would mean putting aside our cherished notions and facing up to reality. We certainly wouldn’t want to do that now would we?

They keep saying everything changed on 9-11. I wish that were true, but it isn’t. Nothing has changed other than simmering antagonisms were escalated into full scale shooting wars perhaps earlier than they would have been. All of the underlying causes still exist. The tension in Palestine is still there and fundamentalist religion, both Islamic and Christian, continues to impede the maturing of society.

This guarantees there will be another attack. The only questions are when, where and how.

A fee for prison visits?

How do people come up with these ideas?

The state of Arizona is charging a one-time $25 fee for anyone that wants to visit someone in an Arizona prison. Supposedly the fee is to cover the costs of a background check (they do background checks on people that visit prison inmates?).

Unsurprisingly the fee is being challenged as unconstitutional on the grounds that it is a special tax. Critics have also argued that it has nothing to do with background checks and the money simply goes into the general fund for prison maintenance. A charge supposedly admitted to by a corrections official in an interview with the U.K. Daily Mail.

You would think that someone would realize such a fee would get challenged in the courts wouldn’t you?

Why not go all the way? Why make it a one-time fee? Why not $25 every time you visit or have a renewal fee every year?

Sure, just what you want, isolate prison inmates from their support group to insure they become hardened criminals and gang members.

The Jobs Bill

If nothing else Obama presented an “in your face we need to get our act together” speech to congress and the nation last night.

I sort of agree with a lot of what he said. I do think we need to reform the tax code. I do think the rich should be paying more taxes on excessive income. As a matter of fact I think that tax rate should be so prohibitive as to dampen the unbridled greed that is running amok in the U.S. I also agree we should be closing corporate tax loopholes and rewarding companies that manufacture here in the U.S.

I’m sure the Republicans loved the speech too because they could hear the coins headed their way from the corporate lobbyists to make sure none of these ideas are implemented in any way that would inconvenience corporate American and the wealthy elite.

In other words, expect the Republicans to place roadblocks in front of everything. Besides, why would they want Obama to succeed?

Drug Testing, more Conservative Bull

In Florida they have a “great” idea. They’re going to keep them welfare cheats from using taxpayer’s hard earned dollars for drugs. How are they going to do that you ask? By requiring welfare applicants to first take a drug test, at their own expense, before receiving any benefits. In the, according to Conservatives, “unlikely event” they’re clean, the state reimburses them for the test.

How has this worked out so far? Well, according to a Florida TV station, of the first 40 applicants tested only 2 came up positive and one of those is contesting the test. Not providing welfare benefits to the two that failed the test would save Florida $240 a month. Cost of the 40 tests? $1,140. That means it would take Florida 5 months to recoup the dollars spent on testing and the failed applicants can retest in 12 months.

And that’s not to mention what it’s going to cost to defend the policy in court as I guarantee you it will be challenged as violating the 4th Amendment.

It’s been my experience that there are two types of Conservatives. The rich ones and the poor ones. The rich ones play the poor ones like a fiddle and their objective is to get richer. The poor are uneducated, ignorant slobs that have somehow been convinced that all of their troubles are the result of their money being used to subsidize those even poorer than themselves.

In their left hand they have their bible and in their right hand they have their gun and between their ears is mostly empty space. They are kept riled up on nonsense issues like gay marriage. They’re constantly being told the government is spending their money when the fact of the matter is they’re far more likely to be beneficiaries of government spending and the cuts their rich buddies keep pushing for are most likely to land right on their own heads.

No one likes to live from pay check to pay check or be in dept but chasing boogey men isn’t going to help resolve the problem. I think government spending needs to be cut back as well but we also need to rebalance the distribution of wealth in this country and stop the constant rampant greed that has driven our economy to the brink of disaster.

As for the drug testing, I’m betting it fails the constitutional test and would lose money in the long run anyway so why bother?

Hurricane Irene

This was just another example demonstrating that the media and our so-called leaders are out of touch with reality.

After days of dire warnings of doom, it turns out they weren’t even focused on the right issues. The massive storm surge never materialized but inland there was flooding and lots of it.

This turned out to be not nearly as bad as the storm in March of 2010 that knocked down trees all over the place but the amount of rain, piled on top of already swollen streams and rivers, was an absolute mess.

My power has been going off and on like a yo-yo goes up and down after being out all day yesterday and most of the night. The surges appear to have fried at least one power strip.

If half the effort spent on unrealistic predictions of doom had been spent on preparing for the inevitable flooding and power issues, this would have been a “disaster” that almost no one noticed. Of course, for some folk, it was a disaster.

That it wasn’t a total catastrophe is of course a good thing. That it was blown quite a bit out of proportion by the hype is not because, like crying wolf, the next time around people might not believe you.

Oh That's Just Creepy

It seems Libyan rebels found a book with pictures of Condoleeza Rice in Omar Ghadafi's lair.

That's really creepy. If I was Rice I'd be really grossed out. Then again, I hear they shared a late dinner to break the Ramadan fast a few years ago so who knows?


I guess it could have been worse. It could have been a book with Dick Cheney photos.

The East Coast Earthquake

Yeah, I felt it. I could feel a slight tremor in the building and one of the table chairs in my office started to squeak as it shook back and forth.

It was sort of weird but so slight as to not be much of a big deal.

That's the second mild earthquake I've been through. The first was in California and was so slight that I slept through the whole thing.

I suspect hurricane Irene might be a tad dicier if it lands on the New Jersey coast. Maybe I'll get lucky and it will swing out to sea.