420 Day - Freedom Has Begun

This day we give thanks.

Thanks that two states in this country have now legalized recreational marijuana.

Thanks that a majority of Americans now favor an end to cannabis prohibition.

Thanks that in many places, jails are too full to hold us. Sad, really. The mentally ill homeless have found their way to the only safe place still available, and have learned how to be just bad enough to stay there.

We give thanks that other countries are beginning to question and to legalize.

Thanks that already there are investment opportunities for those brave enough to buy penny stocks: MJNA, HEMP and PHOT are three that this writer owns.

The path to the future is getting clearer and clearer. Government is trapped into defending an obvious fallacy. They must defend the notion that cannabis is both toxic and addictive. Good luck with that!

Increasingly, the opposite is shown, the obvious is known. Government is a fool.

MJNA is making its money licensing systems that produce pre-packed, uniform-dosage, medical marijuana. They have made marijuana prescribable. They license production of THC/CBD formulations for medical use and, where it is legal, formulations for recreational use.

The federal government has hesitated to prosecute. Perhaps it sees the writing on the wall.

Obama Turns Out The Light

The sacred guarantee of retirement that keeps us all at our desks, the light at the end of the tunnel, has become pie in the sky.

Chained CPI:  If something cheaper can effectively replace what you buy, then your payment is reduced accordingly.

 - corn meal mush is as effective as Post Toasties.
 - a Ford is as effective as a Pontiac.
 - a 21" television screen is as effective as a 42" television screen.
 - a walk in the park is as effective as a trip to the movies.

Chained CPI is a winch that will ratchet ever tighter.

 - hamburgers from McDonalds are as effective as gourmet cookery for White House dinners?

Yah, sure.

There is no need to shrink the Social Security payouts - increase the pay-ins!

Scrap the cap. Scrap the income cap on Social Security withholding. Join your local 'scrap the cap' movement. Or start one.

Time to go on the offensive. We've lost an ally. It is up to seniors to become involved, to organize, to besiege Congress to stop playing games with Social Security.

The football must now be moved the other way.

Gun Insurance - A Boon For Connecticut?

Connecticut is famous for its gun manufacturers.

It is also well known for another, much larger, industry - the insurance industry.

The gun industry may soon have sold all the guns America will be wanting for a while. As background checks go into effect, as the flow of guns to gangs is staunched, gun manufacturers may have fulfilled the demand. Sales may diminish. 

Gun sales are one-time sales.

Suppose the one-time sale of a gun included a monthly pay-as-you-go insurance charge?

Suppose the insurance proceeds were then used to support communities which suffer multiple killings, and to help victims of gun violence?

Suppose the NRA could earn ongoing income from advertising this gun insurance? They would then no longer be quite so dependent on single-gun sales in the gun industry. Suppose the NRA got commission on insurance sales to members?

Suppose gun sellers and gun clubs could write insurance policies?  Suppose the policy writers could get a monthly commission on this insurance on the one-time sale of the gun?

Suppose gun owners could get a discount on gun insurance by storing their extra guns at the shooting range?

Suppose anyone who has gun insurance could earn commission on the insurance he sells to his friends, and then get a smaller commission on the sales they make? Let the insurance company decide if they're insurable and how much it should cost.

Suppose anyone who signed up a gun owner for insurance could get a monthly commission?

Suppose a person needed a current gun insurance card in order to buy bullets?

Just suppose.

Some people would still find a way around the limits. A majority would not.

Gun owners, paying into a fund for gun violence victims, may do their best to ensure that all guns are used sanely and that there are no more victims of violence.

Implementation could vary from state to state. Like auto insurance, gun insurance could become an indicator of responsibility. 

Sadness at Christmas

Christmas was saddened and somber this year, as the world mourned the loss of 20 children and six adults to a madman's gunfire at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. Retail sales of the killing machine he used - a Bushmaster semi-automatic carbine - are booming as a result.

The shooter's first victim was his apocalyptic mom. She knew he had mental problems, but she left her gun cabinet unlocked.

The National Rifle Association sprang to the defense of gun manufacturers by calling for armed guards in all schools. The Bushmaster carbine used in the shooting shoots a bullet that can penetrate a steel helmet at 500 yards. The school guards would have .38 revolvers. The concept failed reality-checking for many.

Bushmaster carbines are being pulled from the shelves by retailers nationally. The company that makes them is up for sale. For some buyers, though, they are a gotta-have.     

Since Newtown, a killing anywhere is a killing everywhere. One multiple killing after another is now being reported nationally. Multiple killings are a national problem, not local news.


~~ Addendum February 4, 2013 ~~

A month after the shooting, the madness has settled a bit. The NRA, personified in the news by its intentionally(?) wacky leader, Wayne LaPierre, has become a magnet for the crazies. This probably makes them easier to find. The NRA has flipped their position on background checks for gun buyers, accepting the idea that it might be good to screen out those who are both angry and mentally ill. States are thinking about restoring funds for mental health.

New York has enacted a new gun control law, one of the nation's toughest. It joins nine other states which are working to strengthen their gun laws.

Today, February 4, 2013, the President will be visiting Minneapolis, a city that has made gun control laws work. He will discuss his 9-point plan for controlling gun violence and find out from local police and sheriffs what more the federal government can do.

Meanwhile, in Alabama, a mentally ill man shot a bus driver, abducted a 5-year old boy as a hostage, and has sat for 5 days now in his survival bunker with his hostage.

May God have mercy on this community. And on this larger one, where we are all children.

Do Moore's Law Corollaries Double Biennially?

"Moore's Law" noted decades ago that computers, for the same money, become twice as powerful every two years.

There are corollaries. They also become twice as fast, as junction size in their semiconductors shrinks. Computers of the same power become half the size. Memory chips, flash drives, anything that uses semiconductor chips, becomes twice as effective or becomes half the price.

I recently bought a 64 gigabyte flash drive for $40. It is the size of my little fingertip. It could hold 100 Lady Gaga albums. (Bradley Manning has been accused of taking a copy of a Lady Gaga CD on a re-writable disk to work every day and overwriting the music with acres of classified data. Since the days of his alleged crime, technology has evolved to the point that this little bitty $40  thing could hold 100 of his disks. And he hasn't even been brought to trial, yet.)

The corollaries go on and on. Personal visibility doubles every two years. More people can see you. More people can find you. When one runs for office, one finds that transparency doubles every two years. People can better and better see through who a person is today way back to who they were when they first started out in politics. One may need to explain one's turns and changes. One's personal evolutions. The visibility corollary creates a transparency corollary.

Here's a big long list.  And on and on they go. A new one seems to appear every couple of months.


Question for experts: So the corollaries have corollaries, which then have corollaries. Can it be shown that Moore's Law and its corollaries spawn twice as many new corollaries every two years?

(revised 12/11/12.)

Following and Gathering

Is it better for a person to gather a following or to follow a gathering?

What happens for those who do both?

Why Did Romney Fail?

Why did the Repubs fail? Why does any business fail?  Their market lost faith in their product.

The Republican party has become a professional sales organization.

Romney was a product. He emerged from product testing in the primaries as the candidate most likely to win the conservative vote in the general election. Salesmen assume things, and in this case there was an assumption that whatever enthusiasm conservatives had for him in the primaries could be expressed as enthusiastically by all voters in the general election - given the help of the conservative entertainment complex. It could at least be presented as the general view, even if that's not the case.

Romney had problems. Bain offended some voters. RomneyCare offended others. His marketers attempted to solve this by trying to make Obama look even worse than Romney. Put the focus on Obama. So they plastered Obama with lies. But more than that, they plastered him with attitude, sneering as they lied. The continuing dark attitude expressed by conservatives could not take down Obama's happiness and sense of humor. Republicans suffered a loss on the emotional front as well as the conceptual. They will be remembered for their dark attitudes, Obama as the evangelist of "Yes We Can!"

There are pieces of the Republican blow-out laying all over the ground. The ORCA system that broke. The pre-programmed voting machines that should have put Repubs into office, but didn't. The two polls that were strangely 2 percent off, showing Romney the winner. The angry donors, who were guaranteed a return on their investment.

Then there were the renegade radicals who captured the spotlight just because they could, using the big stage to exposit their own weirdness rather than temporarily suppressing their - uniqueness - on behalf of the party's possible success.   

Any campaign does its best to use its dollars well, and not to spend more than it needs to. So it is natural that campaigns should run neck and neck most of the way. This creates a vulnerability. A small surprise can lead to a big upset.

If the Petraeus affair had somehow come to light before the election, the press could have blown it into a scandal of a failed administration. The Republican-owned voting machines in Ohio and elsewhere could have produced an electoral college win. The two national polls which had  robocalled voters on their land lines, missing the cellphone crowd and thereby showing the Republicans winning, would have been right. And the election would have been nicely stolen. 

But instead, Sandra came ashore. NJ Governor Christie and NYC's Bloomberg embraced Obama, and the edge went the other way. Those who were thinking of winning the election in illegal ways may have discovered it to be so close that they had a failure of nerve.

Repubs had sold the idea of lower taxes and less governmental oversight to the big money crowd. Then they tried to sell the same ideas to the voters. Serving two clients who are at odds with each other doesn't work. It required Repubs to speak out of two sides of their mouths, and you just can't do that any more.

The Republicans paid people to go door-to-door in their GOTV effort. Dems had massive cadres of volunteers. Occupy Wall Street sold the world the idea of citizen empowerment. The Dems rode a million horses to victory.

So this election in ways was a battle between a business - a capitalist structure - and the people - a social network.

Businesses often cycle between salesman-driven booms and bean counter-driven busts, depending on who is running the show.  For Republicans, it soon may be bean counting time. Time for an audit, a reality check. What do they really have to sell any more?

President Obama: Why Must We Needlessly Kill?

Dear Mr. President,

You may soon be asked to explain how the law allows our military to consider all Pakistani men between 20 and 40 as at risk for targeting by drones. A government spokesmen has been quoted saying this, and it sits unrefuted.

Is this general policy? This fulfills a definition for war crimes. We are warring against a demographic.

Discussion of the right rules for extrajudicial killing could unite red and blue Americans. We all believe that we shouldn't kill anyone in our name when we don't absolutely need to.

I trust you will have your explanation for why this is happening and how it can possibly happen under our constitution well prepared.

In distress,

etc.
 

Can We Pay Down Gov't Debt When Times Are Good?

Dear Mr. President,

Suppose Congress wrote a law requiring government to pay off debt a little faster as the economy improves?

The law could set up an increment. The increment could vary, increasing as the economy improves,  decreasing when it sags. The increment could vary geometrically. 

When the GNP grows more than 1% a year, we could double the increment. When it grows more than 2% a year, double the increment again. The healthier the economy, the faster - geometrically - we could pay down our debts.
 
Small-government enthusiasts may appreciate that accelerating the debt pay-off in good times would tend to keep government small. It would keep government from automatically growing larger as the economy grows larger, only to become a burden when it slows.

At the same time, in a year when the GNP shrinks 1%, the pay-off increment would shrink by half, freeing tax money for pump priming.

If such a plan were in place, people might feel more easy about priming the pump when times are bad.
 
We borrowed to prime the pump, and doing this gave us 2% growth this year, while Europe floundered on the edges of recession. Foreign capital is finding its safest haven within our shores. This drives stocks up, and business owners like to see that. Persuading the business sector that in addition to priming the pump, we should set ourselves up here and now to pay off our loans more quickly as good times come may be the key to a compromise that could make America bloom.

The law is very simple. We do well - we pay debt faster.

Can we do this?

With tremendous regard for your vast potential,

Yours, etc.

Orca Sanka

One of the Romney campaign's key tools on election day was to be a communications system called "Project Orca" that would link observers on the ground out in the precincts with a central database that would let them update individual voter records.

Something like this is hard to test. It didn't survive in a real-time environment.

Orca sanka, along with thousands of votes, supposedly.

Puff The Magic Dragon Returns To Honah Lee

It's going to be an interesting four years. The poor will still be with us, including the poor in mind and the poor in spirit. The waste of money spent on warring when we could be supporting rebellion may soon end. And it looks like the waste of money spent on enforcing at least one drug law soon will come to an end, too.

Colorado and Washington have legalized weed. But there may be some growing pains. The feds have threatened to enforce the federal law against it. They will probably hit the big operations first, and that is where the battle line will begin. Scrimmage may never move to the far end of the field, to where people casually grow it in their homes. Colorado's Amendment 64 makes it immediately legal for Colorado adults to possess, grow, consume and give away marijuana.

In Chicago's Little Italy, old men - 20 years ago - used to make wine in their basements. Forty years ago in San Francisco I made beer in a small plastic garbage can in my kitchen (that's how you do it, folks! Covered with Saran wrap, of course.) Home production of euphoric experiences is common in many households.

Meanwhile, anyone busted for possession may want to ask for a continuance. The rules are changing rapidly. Once the legislatures start discussing taxation and regulation, the judges won't be far behind.

We just elected - re-elected - a President who enjoyed, as a teen, the weed. When a joint was being passed around, he would dive in, shouting "Intercept!" and grab a toke for himself. He invented "Total Absorption," a smoking method wherein one holds the smoke in the lungs for as long as possible. Nothing is wasted.

He now has two daughters, and the President's views on cannabis surely must have become more conservative than they were in his youth. But he has been there. And he is an understanding person. His administration did little to defend the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act in court, and it may be that his support for the current legal classification of marijuana as a harmful drug will find itself susceptible to rational change.

How soon will the current laws against marihuana be quietly ditched? How soon will legislatures in other states quietly discuss their own potentials for income from regulation and taxation of the weed?  Will people outside Colorado who wish to grow their own marijuana for personal use be safe and secure in their homes?

Puff The Magic Dragon is coming over the horizon. Somewhere up there with Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds. It looks like Puff may find a place to land.

Is Sandy God's Endorsement of Obama?

I watched CNN at a neighborhood restaurant for two hours today.  Romney's name was mentioned only once or twice. Obama had face time again and again. Obama has the microphone now. The hurricane emergency has obliterated election coverage.

Rather than Hurricane Sandy being an expression of God's anger against gays, as at least one fundamentalist pastor preaches, it's much more likely that Sandy is an expression of God's approval of Obama's support for gays.

Sandy is God's endorsement of Obama.

Tsunami Moon

The moon is full, in earth sign Taurus.

A major earthquake has struck, just off the western coast of Canada. Because it was at sea, the shock, though widely felt, did little damage.

A tsunami resulted from the earthquake, and warnings were issued. But by the time the waves hit Hawaii, they were only 5 feet high.

On the East Coast, hurricane Sandy is roaring up from the south and crashing into a winter storm from the north, and the mix is threatening 50 million people. The New York City transit system has shut down in anticipation. The stock exchanges will be closed for two days. There may be damage.

Windows 8 has just been released.

This can't all be mere coincidence.

Define The Need

Too often, government creates a solution in search of a need.

 A "needs definition" needs to precede any project plan. As my dear father said, many times in fact, "A problem clearly understood is half solved." 

Also the needs definition needs to be dynamic, not fixed. It needs to be adaptive. That way your project creep can keep up with your needs creep. Or needs shrinkage.

Romney: Drop Wages Below China's And Jobs Will Return

In the last debate, Mr. Romney called, essentially, for reducing American wages below Chinese wages. Then the jobs he sent overseas jobs will return, he says. 

I want to know, will we Americans be required to live in dormitories, too? And what if the Chinese then decide to reduce their wages below American wages? This could go somewhere dreadful.

Romney was responding to the Goldberg question:

Crowley: "I want to ask Carol Goldberg to stand up, because she gets to a question that both these men have been passionate about. It's for Governor Romney.

Goldberg: The outsourcing of American jobs overseas has taken a toll on our economy. What plans do you have to put back and keep jobs here in the United States?

Romney: Boy, great question and important question, because you're absolutely right. The place where we've seen manufacturing go has been China. China is now the largest manufacturer in the world. It used to be the United States of America. A lot of good people have lost jobs. A half a million manufacturing jobs have been lost in the last four years. That's total over the last four years.

One of the reasons for that is that people think it's more attractive in some cases to go offshore than to stay here. We have made it less attractive for enterprises to stay here than to go offshore from time to time. What I will do as president is make sure it's more attractive to come to America again.

This is the way we're going to create jobs in this country."

Suppose, instead of reducing American wages, that we helped to unionize China. Turn it  back into a workers' paradise. Get them some decent wages. That would also bring our jobs back. Without reducing our wages.

Dumpster-gate in Virginia?

It started small. Somebody found some discarded voter registration forms in a dumpster. A person had driven up, dropped them in, then had gone and parked in front of the Republican headquarters down the street. He was driving a car from Pennsylvania. The sheriff said he would investigate.

That was yesterday. Today we learn that there has been an arrest.

"A Pennsylvania man employed by a company working for the Republican Party of Virginia was arrested by investigators from the Rockingham County Sheriff’s office on Thursday and charged with destroying voter registration forms.

Colin Small, a 23-year-old resident of Phoenixville, Pa., worked for Pinpoint, a company hired to register voters on behalf of the Republican Party of Virginia. Prosecutors charged him with four counts of destruction of voter registration applications, eight counts of failing to disclose voter registration applications and one count of obstruction of justice."

Colin Small's "Linked-In" profile says he is a "Grassroots Field Director at Republican National Committee" rather than an employee of Pinpoint. He has worked for the Republican National Committee since August, according to his resume. Before that, he worked as an intern for four months in 2011 on the staff of conservative congressman Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania.

Mr. Small graduated in 2012 from the Catholic University of America with a BA in politics, minor in philosophy.  College activities included " Homeless Food Runs, Relay for Life, Habitat For Humanity." And he was an Eagle Scout.

He must have thought he was doing good.

How many registrations have been tossed overall is an open questions. Who it was that told him to break the law is an open question. How many other organizers toss registrations is an open question.

Voter registration forms are the kind of form that is carefully audited.This is the kind of crime for which people serve jail time.

Obama Fact-Checks Romney

Two evenings ago, candidate Romney stumbled badly over his own deceptions. In the second presidential debate of the current season, he saw his collection of lies that had been made popular by the right defused, deflated, disabled by facts.

Romney started off by insulting the moderator, Candy Crowley. This failure of diplomacy did not serve him well. She later caught him in a lie. Obama caught him over and over again, saying "That's not true!" at least six times. Romney's son Tagg got so mad at his father being called a liar that he wanted to take a swing at the President. But distance and the many layers of Secret Service people led him to hesitate.

Truth is different for the Right. Truth, for many of them, is what you believe. Not proven fact.

Strong enough faith can ignore facts and embrace the ancient inscribings of a small tribe in Israel as its over-arching paradigm. Strong enough faith can work miracles. Strengthen your faith in your husband, and he will be true again. Sometimes it works that way.

When Romney preaches to his faithful, they love to hear how bad things are, how weak the President is, how low their taxes could be cut. Whatever myths right-wing radio has managed to stick to the wall become fact due to the cheering section's belief. And these "pseudo-facts" are what Romney has been running on. Truthiness.

So, ignorant of the real facts, Mr. Romney proudly charged that Obama had not called the attack on the American consulate in Libya an 'act of terror' for two weeks. In fact, Obama had done so the next day, speaking in the Rose Garden. Romney had not checked the truth of his truthy 'fact'. Obama and Cindy Crowley almost simultaneously threw a flag on that statement.

Romney spoke of going out as governor and filling binders full of women's resumes so he could have a lot of women in his organization. In fact, the binders were created and vetted by women's organizations before his election. He did not do it, he did not think of doing it. They tasked him with hiring women. But he claimed the credit.

What's worse for his cause than lying is that Romney says things that are easily disproven. If the world can easily disprove your words, you shouldn't say those words. That is, if you have a shred of common sense. But Romney can't tell when his lies are transparent. Here is his face as he realizes the problem: Romney in panic.    


 Republicans face a truth crisis. "Truthiness" is not enough. Factuality is needed, too.

"Trickle-down" economics hasn't been working.  Tax cuts for the rich do not spur economic growth.

Also, free birth control access dramatically reduces abortion rates.

Also, massive drug control spending has no effect on the addiction rate. 

Also, Obama cut the deficit and slowed spending increases to the lowest level in 50 years.

Surely, Mr. Romney will come to the next debate armed with proven facts.

Ryan Rants As Biden Smiles

With a voice resembling an adenoidal Jerry Lewis playing to Mitt Romney's urbane impression of Dean Martin, the Republican candidate for Vice President, Congressman Paul Ryan, two nights ago found himself full of principles but bereft of practice.

Ryan whined. Joe Biden, the Democratic candidate, sounded instead like a gentle daddy explaining to his son why he couldn't take his balloon to bed.

Ryan stretched the truth. Biden smiled, even laughing now and then, he held up his hand, he finally interrupted with the facts. Again and again.

Biden told about the large group of countries involved in organizing sanctions against Iran to halt its development of nuclear power. Biden clarified that Iran is very far from producing a bomb as Republicans have claimed. Biden gave details on his and the President's close working relationship with Bibi Netanyahu, the hawkish leader of Israel. Biden pointed out that the Libyan embassy's request for more security guards was not one that would have come to the President's desk. 

The gentle daddy could be firm. Although many listeners considered the moderator the winner of the debate, Biden was willing to correct misunderstandings on her part as well.

As FactCheck.org observes, Biden himself stretched the facts several times. He said that his administration rescued Detroit, when it simply carried through on a process started under the Bush administration. But their review found Mr. Ryan's failures severe.
 
For voters, one hopes the question may be "Which of these people do I want to have his hands on the red telephone?"  The answer should be clear.

Fight Terrorism Locally - Stand Up Against Bullying

"Spirit Day" is October 19th. Last year and again this year, people who wish to stand against bullying in the schools, bullying in the workplace, bullying in marriage, will wear something purple.

Perhaps Mitt Romney and Barack Obama will stand against bullying.

More:  http://www.glaad.org/spiritday/purple2012

Romney Puts His Best Foot Forward

It's hard, when you tell a joke and nobody laughs. It's harder still when no one even realized it was a joke.

So it was for Mitt Romney a week or two ago when the presidential candidate innocently asked the press why airplane windows cannot be opened in an emergency. His wife had just been riding on a plane with a cockpit fire, and had sat trapped in smoke that couldn't be exhausted. He may have been sardonically echoing his wife's complaint. He may have been trying to make a joke. The dryness of his humor was missed by the press.

They then noted his failure to provide specifics on his pledge to provide specifics.

But in the first presidential candidates' debate last week, Mitt Romney shone like a newly polished shoe. He had warned ahead of time that he would be armed with zingers. So the President let him zing. The President cooled his heels.

Mitt proposed a $17,000 limit on income tax deductions. Mitt proposed removing Big Bird from the airwaves by de-funding public television. Mitt was confused, refusing to admit that his changes to Medicare would once again deny coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, although his campaign corrected him the next day.  He backed away from his own tax plan. Mitt said that half of the green energy firms that the Obama administration had given loans to had gone out of business.

Later in the debate, Romney fuzzied up his original $17,000 number:  "Make up a number — $25,000, $50,000. Anybody can have deductions up to that amount."  Charities which depend on deduction-driven contributions were not impressed with his concept. It appears to still be in flux.

"Leave Big Bird Alone" became the battle cry of public television defenders, now rallied to join the anti-Mitt cadres. The New York Times op-editorialized. The Obama campaign came riding to Big Bird's defense.
 
On October 4th, the Romney campaign admitted that Romney didn't mean to say that half the green energy firms that were given help had failed. He said it, but he didn't mean to say it. Not to this audience. (The number is actually about 1%.)

Although Romney had no opportunity to use his "47%" zinger during the debate, on October 5th he denounced his own words, saying about his recorded speech at a fundraiser, "In this case I said something that's just completely wrong."  (As noted on this blog, Romney's statement that 47 percent of the American people are playing a victim game was a confabulation of three different populations: voters, homes with a person receiving government aid, and people who pay no income taxes.) Romney had been roundly criticized for this, and he had paid for his statement in the polls.

The Romney campaign is moving its staff out of Pennsylvania. 28 days before the election. Their work there is done.

At a Romney fundraiser on October 8th, there was a big sign, "No Video or Audio Recordings Allowed of Tonight's Event."  This message warns donors that they are going to be told what they want to hear, not what Romney, given popular pressure, may actually do if  he actually were to be elected.

Presidential Debate Goes Global

YouTube will be streaming the US Presidential Debate tonight. To connect, a person simply needs to go to YouTube and search on "presidential debate streaming".

People can watch this debate from anywhere in the world that has internet access. At the same time that global money is trying to rule the United States by overwhelming voters with ads, this vision of democracy in motion will be going out to the whole world.

- - - - - - - - - - -

Appendum and addendum:  YouTube froze. Way too many viewers for their bandwidth. Same thing for ABC, which was covering the debate. However, Huffington Post had viewer slots left in their streamery, so I watched it there. Also watched the Vice Presidential debates at HuffPo.

It seems like sites are re-streaming the video. Significant video gets re-streamed, like the video of the British bobbies getting ready to invade the Ecuadorian Embassy and capture Assange a month or two ago. Enough people saw this before it happened that it didn't happen.

Will Ending Medicare End Inheritances?

Conservatives want to end Medicare and Social Security. But Medicare and Social Security conserve inheritances. If grandma has to spend all her money on her retirement needs, she isn't going to leave you any money, sonny.

Old folks like to have a bit of a stash, if they can. If they are forced penniless like everyone else, they can't leave anything to anyone.

Romney Throws Away The Poor Folks' Vote

One third of the voters who live below the poverty line were planning to vote for Mitt Romney for President. Now they may not. Mitt just slammed their faces in the mud. If they are on food stamps or Medicare/Medicaid they are playing the victim game, he says. And so are their kids.

   "There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it,"  said Mr. Romney at a private fundraiser some months ago.

In "preaching to the choir," telling them what they had paid to hear, Romney conflated three different groups, each of which is about 47 percent of a larger population.

About 47 percent of voters say they have decided to vote for Obama for President. They are from all walks of life.

About 47 percent of households have at least one member who receives help from the government - everything from student loans to Medicare. To  Romney, not one but every person in such a household, whether grandparent, wage-earner or child, is a dependent playing the victim game. To Romney, 47 percent of all Americans are dependent on government.

About 47 percent of American households pay no income taxes. This group includes (a long list here) for example, people among the very rich who sequester their wealth and income overseas. It includes poor families with a lot of kids, where the many little deductions are greater than the income. It includes people who are elderly and retired. It includes veterans on disability. It includes people who have no income. 

While these three groups may overlap somewhat, Romney considers them identical. Each one is 47%, isn't it? This makes for better preaching.

It is inevitable that a candidate who needs big-dollar corporate donations so he can advertise his worth would preach corporate dogma and daydreams to a corporate crowd. Inevitable also, given Moore's law, that this sermon to the choir someday would be recorded, and that private lies told to major donors would be heard by the multitudes. Inevitable.

And he defends them. Romney defends these lies. As he throws votes away.

The conservative press is in a tizzy, as noted by comedian John Stewart. The Club for Growth is telling Romney he's on his own.  Senators fled their weekly press conference after a brief statement, not taking any questions from reporters. Vulnerable House Republicans distance themselves from Romney.   Former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty is stepping down as Romney campaign co-chair to take a job as CEO of the Financial Services Roundtable, a K Street lobbying group for Wall Street interests.

Watching an avalanche can be fun when you're not under it.

Obama is Our Safety Net

Obama is our safety net.

The Republicans continue even in hard times to try to destroy the nation's safety net. This makes them unattractive to the average voter. Ask a dozen average people what kind of safety net they would like to have in place for their own needs, should need develop. Obama knows about poor people. More and more of us are poor these days.

Having a safety net out there - whether a person or a program - is our security. It allows us to go on.

Just Government Being Government

There is a 'governing' imperative. Governments must govern. As thoroughly as they can.

Whatever is random and ungoverned could cause dismay. So the random and ungoverned must be tamed until no waves are made.

Does your government seem onerous? That's just government being government. If they weren't as busy governing as they could be, vocal citizens would think something is wrong.

Government that doesn't govern is a waste of taxpayer dollars.

Tottering in Tampa

On Monday, the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida begins. Oh, but wait, now the latest word is that the first day of the convention has just been cancelled.

Hurricane Isaac is bearing down on Tampa. It is expected to expunge the first two days of the convention from the news. The city closed the convention for safety reasons. The airports are probably closed, too. Bringing people in for a convention isn't going to happen until the airports are open.

The media circus is not going well.

Ann Romney's opening speech had already been pre-empted by re-runs at the major networks. So it was moved to Tuesday night.

The Republicans were hoping to focus on the deficit. Although the deficit is an abstraction for most people (there are six kinds of deficit), having an opinion about it makes a person sound like they know what they are doing.

Also they wanted to focus on reducing taxes even further by cutting ineffective government programs that do not directly stimulate business. To this end, they consider Social Security and public health care ineffective. That was to be their second big story.

But the Senate candidate for Missouri has now captured the spotlight with a clinker that just won't go through the grate.

This gentleman, Todd Akin, said that a woman's body can somehow reject the sperm of a rapist. That a raped woman does not get pregnant unless she somehow inwardly wants to.

This was an old belief. Girls who had been raped not only were no longer marriageable virgins, but if they then became pregnant it was because they had felt lust, so they were also sluts and whores. And possibly available for rape again. This was a useful belief for a culture, unless you were a woman. It defers blame for the rape on the woman. Why was she so pretty?

No proof has ever been found of this sperm-blocking proposition. Rape statistics deny it. Women deny it.

However, for opponents of abortion, the belief that pregnancies from rape happen because of a wish on the part of the victim has fueled the notion that pregnant raped women should carry their babies until they are born. That it was God's will that they should be raped,, become pregnant and have this child. Not every Republican agrees.

The Romney campaign just didn't know what to say, and in two instances, in Denver and Dayton, they told news people not to ask Romney about Akin or abortions.

The Republican Convention's discussions and decision on whether to support a rape/incest exception for abortion are very newsworthy. Lots of opinion available here. This issue was decided long ago, but Republicans are somehow re-considering it. Paul Ryan, the vice presidential candidate, has already confirmed that although he is personally opposed to rape and incest exceptions, he is willing to compromise.

So the free publicity that Republicans might have gotten from broadcasting Mitt Romney's pre-programmed slide to home base has been hijacked by an ultra-righteous anti-abortionist. Between the ultra-righteous and the wrath of God, Rove and the Kochs' carefully concocted hot-air baloney souffle is being flattened in a kerfluffle.

- - - - - - - - - -
Sunday morning 8/26: from a comment by Joe Carlin on TPM

"Would it be wrong to ask people to pray? Would it be wrong if we asked people to pray for rain? O.K., not just rain, abundant rain. Torrential rain. Urban and small stream flood advisory rain. Would it be wrong if we prayed for rain on, say, a particular night at, say, a particular location? Ah, say the evening of August 28th, right here at Mile High Stadium here in Denver. During the prime time t.v. hour when a certain presumptive nominee is set to give a certain acceptance speech at a certain Democratic National Convention?"

~ Focus on the Family spokesman Stuart Shepherd, speaking in 2008

What goes around... comes around. Twice as quickly every two years, sometimes.

Watching The Bobbies Almost Arrest Assange

At this moment, 11:30 PM Chicago time, I'm watching the London police commit international crime by entering the Ecuadorian embassy, apparently in an attempt to arrest Julian Assange.

The live stream is at

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/occupynewsnetwork

Incredible to be watching a major event, a breach of the integrity of the diplomatic system, and to be live-blogging it.

More as it comes...

Here's some background:

Assange Embassy Controversy: Britain Threatens To Raid Ecuador's Embassy Over Amnesty Issue

The embassy was about to make a statement to the effect that they will hold Assange forever. The Brits were not amused. We don't pay them to be amused.

- - - - -

Morning. It looks like the two vans of policemen were there in the middle of the night to scope out the building in which the Embassy of Ecuador rents its space. The embassy is not in a building of its own. There is no report today that police entered the embassy proper.

This evening, Ecuador will release its statement about accepting Julian Assange as a refugee. The UK government has mentioned that they could, if they wanted to, de-authorize the use of the embassy space for embassy purposes. But they won't go that far.

Not if Ecuador gives up Assange. Pretty please? With bells and ribbons on it?

They're begging. As power players do.

7:33 AM in comments on the Occupy video link above, one reads that the Ecuadorean foreign minister has just said that Assange is applying legitimately and that he will do nothing to deny the application.

8:25 AM Ecuador announces - surprise - that Assange has just been granted asylum. CNET has the story.

Now what?

Impasse. Here are two postings on Op Ed News that pretty much clarify the situation.

"By Stephen Lendman
Ecuador to Washington and Britain: Go to Hell

For around two months, Julian Assange has been holed up in Ecuador's London embassy after requesting political asylum.

By Ruth Hull
Will Britain's Declaration of War Against International Law Backfire? Will British Embassies Be Stormed?

Britain has threatened to violate international law by storming the Ecuadorian Embassy and arresting Julian Assange. Will the governments around the world retaliate against this act of war and terrorism by storming British embassies? Have the leaders of Britain lost their minds?"

The above is excerpted from a promotional mailing by Op Ed News.

And now, 8/18, the British have apologized for going overboard:

"Britain's government seems to have toned down its rhetoric. Speaking to reporters Thursday, British Foreign Secretary William Hague insisted that Britain would act within the law.

"We are committed to working with them amicably to resolve the matter," he said. "There is no threat here to storm an embassy."

It was all a big mistake.

Blow Me A Rainbow

As the end of Gay Pride Month drew near this year, people around the world were delighted to see a video of a small whale spouting water which suddenly caught the light of the sun and became a rainbow.

Here it is. Happy rainbows.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/21/whale-rainbow-out-of-blowhole_n_1617146.html

The Trickle-Up Effect

The price on the gasoline pump at the station on the corner is one of my investment management flags. It says that times will improve for a while.

This price has edged down from $4.69 a gallon in January to $4.29 a gallon today. This change has given commuters a extra $4 or so in the pocket for every tank of gas they buy. This feeds the economy from the bottom, slowly pumping it up. That increasing health adds to the Dow's growth in an example of a "trickle-up effect".

As the world's economy gets healthier and healthier and people begin to drive more, the increase in demand drives the price of gas up once again, until driving is curtailed - once again. And then the stock market totters and crashes a bit. Once again.

Such a trickle-up effect should be easy for an economics student to prove. Data on the varying price of gas, miles driven per month, and smoothed averages in the Dow might be all that is needed to show the relationship between gas price changes, driving patterns, and stock market ups and downs.

Already, it works for me.

This is not to say that the trickle-down effect doesn't work. The university whose professor invented the trickle-down effect just built a building named after him, from donor money - an example of the trickle-down effect at work. But donors tend to sit on their cash in hard times, and not spend money when the economy is down. The inventor of the trickle down effect didn't, I've read, anticipate this defect in his scenario.

Perhaps if the money that fails to trickle down were channelled into keeping gas prices low, the trickle up effect could then make more money trickle down. Just a thought.

A Trading Floor For Congressmen?

Suppose someone were to set up a trading floor for Congressmen?

Start simply by calling each Congressman and listing online their favorite charity. How many ways could this go wrong?

Could people be induced to give money to a charity in support of their Congressmen?

Suppose Congressmen could have many favorite charities. Every charity would want to be 'favorited' by as many Congressmen as possible. Which Congressmen would fave the food banks?

If the NRA or the Chamber of Commerce were to become a Congressman's favorite charity, since they help fund political campaigns, the internet site would then effectively become a trading floor.

Suppose the list were extended to include the favorite charities of Senators and Supreme Court Justices?

The market is global.

The End of Possessionism

A thread on the Democratic Underground blog observes that right-wing political correctness is being used as a tool to corral the masses:

"Today, however, the big threat to our discourse is right-wing political correctness, which — unlike the liberal version — has lots of power and money behind it. And the goal is very much the kind of thing Orwell tried to convey with his notion of Newspeak: to make it impossible to talk, and possibly even think, about ideas that challenge the established order."  http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002730957    and for the full story, http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/26/the-new-political-correctness/

So now there is going to be a sellers market in stories that challenge the established order? Those who dare to break the taboos and to speak of the unspeakable are already at the top of the best seller lists. Human nature may be hard to change.

The established order is crumbling into the sea. It always has been so.

What may be ending soon is the worship of possessions, "possessionism".

The word "possessionism" is already used to denote a person's tendency toward 'spirit possession' or to denote an individual who acts as if he possesses another individual. A third definition for "possessionism" that denotes human attitudes toward collecting possessions in general does not seem inappropriate.

Most television advertising promotes possessionism. People are encouraged to own the newest, own the best, own things that tell people who you are. Ownership of objects gives a person a stake in reality.   

Filling a home with good furniture used to be an ideal. Make the parlor a palace. Then jobs gave out. The probability of still being employed a year hence has become less for many people. Simplicity has become economical. Portability enhances mobility, and mobility enhances survival.

Tomorrow I may live in a one-room studio. What will I take there? Why should I need anything more? If I go live under a bridge, what will be in my shopping cart?

A person doesn't need much. The new order, the information society, lets a person live a life that is both simple and richly creative. Who needs wealth?

The War Unwinds

Last night President Obama gave his vision for the end of our war cycle.

He noted that the war in Iraq has ended and that half of our troops are no longer at risk. He didn't mention that we had no real reason for putting troops in Iraq in the first place.

He noted that Al Qaeda, the hyper-violent sect that attacked America on 9/11, has been pretty much defeated. He spoke of our continuing support for Afghan security forces that would keep it from returning. He mentioned that the Taliban, a group of militant purists, took part in the negotiations. Like the Christian evangelicals, they take their holy book literally. Violence in the name of God is an act of worship for them. And now they will be renouncing violence and becoming a political party.

While for much of the last ten years we have been fighting this very same Taliban, more numerous even than the Taliban are the "militants" we have been fighting - people who have no identification other than that they were simply defending their country. We have been fighting the people who wanted us to leave. We sorely wore out our welcome, if we ever had one.

Our interest now is to help them maintain a peaceful society. With our 'iron hand in a kid glove' now in a straight-jacket behind bars.

Our military's supply route through Pakistan to Afghanistan is still frozen. We have refused to apologize for killing 24 Pakistani soldiers by a mistake due to our incompetent messaging. Pakistan won't play our game any longer. We won't play their game any longer.

Peace is about the only option left. Constructing peace appears to be the work at hand.

Bravo for peace.

Cannabis Day, 2012

Time for the yearly Cannabis Freedom review.  Freedom Now!

April 20th has become that day of the year when people to whom marijuana has brought health and joy in life gather and honor the gift.

In this year's news, full legalization of cannabis will be on November's ballot in Washington state and also in Colorado, where the state Democratic Party has just endorsed the full legalization amendment.

More states may join them. A drive to get signatures to put a proposition on the ballot in Michigan begins Wednesday. A drive is on in Missouri.  Proponents are collecting signatures for three initiatives in Oregon.  And collecting signatures for three more in California.     

Internationally, a group of South American leaders have called for an end to the drug war. President Obama is willing to discuss the issue, but in a strange leap of logic he doesn't think that taking drug distribution out of the hands of criminals will end the drug war - instead

"... he believes that legalization could lead to greater problems in countries hardest hit by drug-fueled violence."

If cannabis is to be delivered to Americans through drugstores or state liquor stores, what requires that it should it even be imported?  What would American consumption have to do with South American production?  What part of "legalize / regulate / tax" does the president not understand?

The combination of legalization, regulation and taxation "just like alcohol" is a formula that most folks can and do understand. When people have enough money to buy pricy cannabis, they have enough money to pay a good tax on it. Even the conservative Washington Times newspaper notes that recreational drug legalization would do more to fix the deficit than would appropriately taxing our poor millionaires. Of course, appropriately taxing our millionaires and also taxing the usage of recreational drugs would double the tax benefit. There's no reason not to do both.

Eminent evangelist Pat Robertson came out this year for full legalization, regulation and taxation. The logic of taxable legalization did not escape him.  Even Fox News seems to see the positive side.

Now the National Cancer Institute says cannabis has curative effects.  Cannabis cures cancer. It's not a silver bullet but is a slower cure - the cure seems to result from the cancer cells relearning how to die. But it cures cancer.

Cannabis was at first seen as palliative. It reduced pain and inflammation and enabled cancer victims to keep their food down longer. Then it was seen to be preventative. Tobacco smokers who also smoked cannabis were much less likely to get lung cancer. Now it is discovered to be a curative. It helps cancer cells find their way to a righteous death.

It is a rare non-toxic curative. No one has ever died from it. There is no toxic level of dosage. Unlike alcohol.

If science were to discover next that cannabis prevents wrinkles, it would become legal overnight. Or if the President checks his facts and gets his story straight.

Will Israel's Bomb Destroy The Evidence?

Israel is very worried about the possibility that Iran may be making bomb-grade uranium. All indicators suggest otherwise, but in the absence of Iran's cooperation with the UN's inspection regime, who is to know?

Israel is said to have about 100 nuclear bombs and the means to deliver them. Suppose they were to bomb the suspected nuclear sites into the dust? Destroy them completely.

How, then, would they ever prove that there was a problem? If they destroy the evidence, they will remain guilty of dropping a bomb, yet they will no longer have proof that they should have done so.

North Korea Joins The World Again

North Korea has once again agreed to inspections of their nuclear program.

I like to think that someone got into a discussion of the implications of Moore's Law with the intransigent iconoclasts. Once there was a mutual understanding of the law itself, this growth principle that seems to be governing the world's future, then there could have been discussion of the mutual implications. A package of quid-pro-quos developed. A document that was attractive to both sides was signed.

It certainly wasn't a result of the use of military force.

North Korea has agreed to inspections and has then suspended their agreement several times over the years, so keeping this agreement in place will require both sides to have a strong shared focus on the present moment, with a continuing analysis of the kind of world that is developing for each country and the implications of the changes that occur. This agreement should not just be set on the shelf.

May Happiness Be Yours Today

"May happiness be yours today"

Repeat this phrase inwardly when you hand a person their groceries over the counter. When you let them go through the door first. When you're forced to sit and listen to someone else's prattle. When you wave to a friend on the street. When you give a street person a dollar. When riding a bus, you may be able to say it inside yourself to everyone on the bus.

What happens?

There are no guarantees. But what goes around often comes around.

May happiness be yours today.


Sometimes people look like they would not welcome happiness. For these people, one can say, inwardly,

"May happiness surprise you today!"

"May happiness sneak into your life today!"

"May the possibility of happiness enter upon your solemn consideration."

"May the remembrance of happiness guide and guard you."

The Shanty By A Stream

Shanty By A Stream

There's a shanty by a stream
And a house upon a hill,
And the shanty has a dream
That the house never will.

It's to rise and to rise
Above the flood and drought,
But the house don't know how,
'Cause that's where it started out.

So the shanty has to struggle
And to figure out the rules,
'Cause the house long forgot them,
And the house is full of fools.

And the shanty will be rising
As the house starts to tilt
And to tumble toward the river
'Neath the shanty on the hill.

DM(S) - - 2005

The Saturn-Uranus Conjunction Breeds Radicals

Is there any connection between the demonstrators of the sixties and the "Occupy" demonstrators of today? One subtle connection seems to be that both groups were born during a rare aspect between planets in the solar system. An astrological connection it is.

When Saturn, the planet of discipline and focus passes in front of Uranus, the planet of invention and spontaneity, rebels appear to be born. Many of those who were 19 in 1961 were born on or near the dates when this "conjunction" between Saturn and Uranus occurred. Many of those who are 24 today were born when the conjunction happened again in 1988. Today's young demonstrators seem more mature than the 1961 activists, and a common complaint among them is that they've finished college with a load of debt only to discover that there are no jobs.

The planet Saturn goes around the Sun every 28 years. Every now and then it passes over the slower-moving planet Uranus, about once every 44 years. As viewed from Earth, one of these events happened on May 3rd, 1942. There may be people still living whose lives began about then, and I would like to meet them. Nineteen years later in 1961 and onward through the early sixties, some of us got arrested for our beliefs, we did.

In 1988, Saturn as viewed from Earth, passed over Uranus three times - going forward, in reverse, and going forward again. This zigzag along Saturn's orbit is thanks to parallax caused by Earth's own orbit around the Sun. If an outer planet is holding fairly still, Earth's yearly motion can make the planet appear from Earth to shift back and forth against the background behind it. In this case, the background was the even slower planet Uranus.

People born in 1988 on February 12 at 7:48 PM Eastern Standard Time (in Britain, that's 00:48 GMT on 2/13) will have Saturn precisely conjunct Uranus. The sun will be in Aquarius and the Saturn-Uranus conjunction will be at 29 degrees and 55 minutes of Sagittarius, right on the Sagittarius-Scorpio cusp. The effect of the conjunction will precede February 12th for several months. The effect will continue after the conjunction for several months as well.

People born in 1988 on June 26th at 12:26 PM EST will have Saturn precisely conjunct Uranus. The sun will be in Cancer and the conjunction will be at 28 degrees 47 minutes of Sagittarius.

People born in 1988 on October 18th at 8:14 AM EST will have Saturn precisely conjunct Uranus. The sun will be in Libra this time and the conjunction will be at 27 degrees 49 minutes of Sagittarius.

The effects of the conjunction can last for weeks or months. Some even speak of years.

Midway between each conjunction comes an opposition - every 22 years, Saturn and Uranus are on opposite sides of the sky as viewed from Earth. Astrologer Courtney Roberts tells in a YouTube video how this affects the earth. She sees the effects of the opposition beginning in 2008, the year President Obama was elected. A similar upsetting happened in 1968, when a strong movement had developed that was against the Vietnam War, and it led President Johnson to decide not to run for a second term.

And this year, dictatorships have turned into democracies in three countries on the south shore of the Mediterranean: Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Syria may be next on the list.

Old habitual ways yield to the new when Saturn and Uranus are in opposition. Revolutionaries appear to be born when they are conjunct.

The Chicago Occupation

Downtown, I walked from a class over toward the "Occupy Chicago" protest yesterday, arriving first at a demonstration at the Bank of America just after the B of A had been gifted with a large amount of garbage removed from foreclosed houses. Apparently these turn into crack houses. B of A needs to keep foreclosed property from destroying the neighborhoods.

Protestors were standing and chanting. A fellow from a peace group from the suburbs was handing out leaflets. He was sort of talking Quakerism and I found myself talking class warfare.

A block south on LaSalle, I passed a bank which had a new wooden sign: "The Private Bank". This looked like a movie prop, but it is for real.

The intersection of LaSalle and Jackson is the center of the "Occupy Chicago" protest. People there were chanting "Banks got bailed out, we got sold out." A few demonstrators were chatting casually with the cops. A man came by passing out a small note about a meeting in the suburbs for planning a demonstration about the NATO and G8 meetings here next spring. Keeping time with the chant, a man was pounding a baseball bat on a drum made from half of a plastic 55 gallon drum. The racial mix was perfectly Chicago. Lots of people were just standing, not talking, so I didn't force anything. Witnessing.

When the feet gave out, I walked away. Passed what would appear to be a mortgage banker, two inches taller than me and fifty pounds heavier. Was wordless at the time, but now I wish I had shouted at his back as he walked away, "Diminishing returns!"

The Mortgage Bankers Association number is 202 557-2700. They are destroying neighborhoods.

- - - - In the news... - - - -

The lawyer for one of the four women in NYC who were spritzed inappropriately with pepper spray has just called on the District Attorney to arrest senior officer Anthony Bologna (aka "Tony Baloney") for assault. He was photographed spritzing - caught in the act. Per the NY Post... Huffington Post... More background from the International Business Times.

A photo of the provocateur who led the break-in at the National Air and Space Museum was quickly identified by commentors at the Democratic Underground website, which has the best detail about Occupation projects. This chap is history. Caught in the act.

The "Occupy" movement is totally peaceful and considers policemen to be within the 99% who need to see change by the top 1%. Spitting in the eye of a cop is totally out of order. Guys like this get turned in. Risky misbehavior!

Those Who Will Never Buy Houses Again

Every foreclosure turns a homeowner back into a renter. How many of these people will never again attempt to buy a house?

In many states, recovery of an overpriced house by the bank does not satisfy the home loan. The difference between what the bank gets from reselling the property and the outstanding balance on the loan can be up to the borrower to repay. Even after having been evicted from their home, they often must pay this money, and all the while, interest is accumulating. (However, in Alaska, Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Minnesota, North Carolina, North Dakota, Texas and Utah, homeowners may be able to "walk away" successfully.)

Needless to say, these former homeowners who still must pay off their lender will be forever lost to the housing market. How dare they ever buy again?

Anywhere from 25% to 47% of the mortgages in Chicago are already "underwater". The owners owe more than the houses are worth. Even if times get better and they pay off their current mortgages, will these owners be likely to buy again? After having been trapped once, they will probably be wary of becoming ever again so trapped.

Eviction of illegal aliens leaves empty houses. Empty houses bring down neighboring home values and help drive their mortgages underwater. Foreclosures also produce empty houses, also bring down home values and help drive mortgages underwater. Each neighbor's foreclosure can reduce the value of your own home by $10,000, estimates a Wall Street Journal article.

The government uses the number of new home sales (which fell again last month) as a metric to measure our economic health. With owners rapidly turning into renters, the number of potential new home buyers may dwindle down to where this metric is meaningless.

The National Mortgage Bankers Association is now meeting in Chicago. Is there anything you would like to say to them?

Their number is 202-557-2700.

A Circular Hiring Squad

Every morning before the American stock markets open, I look in Yahoo Finance at the set of charts in the upper left hand corner of the page to see what has happened overnight in the Asian and European markets. These can often give a hint about what kind of day may be ahead in the American markets.

If the Asian markets are up by 1 percent and the European markets are up by 2 percent, a very good day may be ahead. A good day to sell, for a contrarian. If the foreign markets are dreary and drearier, then the American markets may open below their previous closes and perhaps also head down all day. A good day to buy.

Just as Americans watch the Asian and European markets, so Asians may watch the European and American markets to inform them about their day. European traders may likewise watch the prior American market close and then the Asian close to see a hint of what may be coming for them.

It's like three cats chasing each other around a tree. Each keeps the next one going. If one tires, that allows the cat behind him to slow down and rest a little, and the cat behind him as well. If one speeds up, the cat ahead will also speed up, and then the cat ahead of him.

This forward propagation of ups and downs provides a sense of momentum, a sense of mass. There is inertia in the stock market. Yet it's really just good news - or bad news - going around in a circle.

If every trader were a contrarian, buying on the downs and selling into the highs, would this inertia disappear?

Surfing the Volatiles

The stock market is slowly heading down a bit today, tucking it in before the weekend. The fall of Tripoli ensures Libya's oil will once again supply Europe, and the oil stocks I'm following are down. That means cheaper gas, cheaper feedstocks, and a growing economy all may be here soon.

In audio, when you turn the volume up too high, the waveforms become clipped at the top and bottom, flattened out against the limits of the channel that conveys them. In volatile stocks as compared to blue chips, there may be a similar effect to making sound waves clip. Volatiles will rise until there's no enthusiasm to lift them further, then hold until the blue chips start to fall. On a blue chip (Dow) downward trend, volatiles will fall even faster, as the short sellers drive the adventurists out and shares are sold to meet margin calls. As the bottom nears, volatiles will fall only as fast as blue chips. They have lost their volatility, and reflect the general market.

There is not so much change at the bottom. Stock prices are nearer to book value. Changes are small and random - there is no signal - all one sees is noise.

Then an upward tick in the Dow is doubled in the volatiles. But a downward tick in the Dow is only equaled in the volatiles. The volatiles are edging upwards once again.

Proxy Power

This morning, I have been researching Saul Alinsky's idea about using proxy power to elect members to corporate boards of directors.

When a person holds shares in a company, as through an IRA or an ordinary brokerage account, they get to vote on candidates to the board of directors. An e-mail arrives with a voting code. If they just delete this, the board of directors elects the board of directors. But suppose they were to forward it. Suppose they were to assign their favorite organization as their proxy?

The greatest difficulty in using proxy power is in gathering the votes. These are widely distributed. But suppose that every time I get an email proxy from Scottrade - and at this time of year, for each stock in my IRA, they are arriving in the e-mail - suppose I could forward it to "AARProxy" or some such? That would be no trouble.

AARP Proxy needs only to sort incoming emails by company name, then to read the voting codes in the emails into a database. They would also need to examine candidates for the corporate boards they are interested in and to vote when the time comes.

That is to say, modern data processing and communications can easily conquer the mountain of trivial paperwork that would have been involved even ten or twenty years ago. Many, many retired people hold IRAs and have email. As their annual meeting notices come in, for them to forward instead of deleting the emails would not be a problem.

It would, in fact, give AARP a chance to send a "thank you" note to everyone who sends them a proxy, thereby building their base of support.

Even people who just plain hold stock could forward their proxies. Suppose even ordinary guys with brokerage accounts - I'm reminded of a cabbie who was investing in techno-bubble stocks in 2002 - suppose these guys were to forward their proxy emails to AARProxy without deleting them? Or to "ProgressiveProxies", "EarthProxies", "LGBTQ Proxies", "Rand Paul Proxies", "PreacherJesseProxies", "PowerlessAndPoorProxies", "ILoveNYProxies", "TaxiProxies", "HikerProxies", "BikerProxies", et al, ad infinitum?

Proxy collectors would be solicited by candidates for the boards.

The automatic turnover of unused voting rights to the currently elected boards would end.

Does this seem far-fetched?

Whoever writes a proxy-aggregater program that people can download for free will liberate the world.

Parsing Leviticus

Much is made by those Christians who happen to be ultra-conservative of the command in Leviticus that a man should not lay with another man as with a woman.

While conservatives are often faulted for taking their bible too literally, in this case they don't take it literally enough. Let's look at the whole sentence:

"Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination."
(KJV Lev 18:22)

Many generalize this statement into the belief that men should not have any sexual experiences with other men. It doesn't say that.

Leviticus did not say that man shouldn't lie with man. He says that man shouldn't lie with man "as with womankind". The phrase "to lie with" rather apparently does mean to have a sexual experience. And "as with womankind" is a particular kind of sexual experience.

He next says that for man to lie down with an animal is also verboten. "As with womankind" doesn't enter the picture here. He could have been equally general one verse earlier in speaking about man's laying with mankind. But he wasn't.

If he had wanted to disavow all homosexuality, Leviticus could have saved ink and said "Thou shalt not lie with mankind." Period. But he qualifies the rule. He limits it - "as with womankind" is the particular way in which laying with mankind is forbidden.

What could "as with womankind" mean? Was Leviticus perhaps speaking of insertion? If a man lies with another man and has a sexual experience and no insertions take place, is Leviticus' command violated?

Were the Greeks, whose homosexuality included a lot of "intercrural" sex - insertion between the thighs - condemned for this by Leviticus? This was a class of sex known to the times. Did Leviticus use the phrase "as with womankind" to exempt intercrural sex?

For that matter, does "to lie with" include sex standing up?

There is no reference in Leviticus to females having sex with other females. Once again, his injunction fails to be universal.

Leviticus was a cleanliness freak. God - as spoken to Moses and reported word for word by Leviticus - God is a cleanliness freak. In Chapter 18, He warned people to stay clean, and told them how. In Chapter 20, God speaks through Moses through Leviticus once again and commands that the community kill those who ignored His warnings back in Chapter 18.

Now, one can't catch AIDS through the fingertips. One can't, unless one has sore gums, catch AIDS through the mouth. One can catch AIDS through insertion.

AIDS was, as far as we know, not present in Leviticus' time. But there were other diseases. So the injunction against insertion into the most sensitive flesh of others who are human makes a lot of sense. They may be passing diseases around.

Yet since the male sexual cycle can call for release two or three times daily when young if one is not to spot the bedclothes, the space created by allowing male-male non-insertive sexual relationships may have been used to stabilize their urges until young males were ready to become family men. This appears to have happened in other cultures, and it may well have been quietly present among the early Jews.

Curiously, in the long list of relatives at the beginning of chapter 18 whom one should not attempt to disrobe, the brother is not included. The sister, yes...

"The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father, or daughter of thy mother, whether she be born at home, or born abroad, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover. " (KJV Lev 18:9)

Even the sister. But not the brother. No mention of the brother.

Leviticus says in 18:6:

"None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness: I am the LORD."

He then details exactly what he means by 'near of kin', taking 12 verses. Even thy sister's nakedness thou shalt not uncover. But not your brother. "Even" suggests a boundary.

Not the brother. So brotherly male-male nudity at least is tolerable. In poor families today, children of the same gender are bathed together. It saves water. But this injunction is not about visual contact. It is about uncovering another.

This omission adds to the "not as with womankind" exemption. It is ok to uncover a brother and lie with him if it's not as with womankind. Says Leviticus.

Cousins are also ok, even the girls - they are not on the 'near of kin' list. And there is a whole world of same-sex people waiting beyond who are also not on the 'near of kin' list. It is ok to uncover them and lie with them if it's not like with a woman.

This was a pre-condom era. Sadly, the potential cleanliness of sex with a condom was not a part of Leviticus' discussion. Who knows what he would have permitted his people, if Leviticus had had access to condoms.

Later, in Chapter 20, Leviticus loses his temper and instructs his people that those who violate the laws in Chapter 18 must be killed. In this modern day, Christian conservatives may feel some lingering sense of responsibility to at least dump on, if not kill, those souls who violate the Levitical laws, at least the laws which these same Christians have not themselves broken.

Leviticus has become the enforcer.

What a gift to mankind. God has far greater gifts than Leviticus.

And even Leviticus allows males to lie with males so long as they do not lie 'as with womankind'.

religion

Everyone has a personal religion. It is the life of the spirit.

When people group together, personal religions interact and organize around the commonalities of interest into shared religions.

Eventually shared religions become a substitute for spiritual life. They become a place to pay penance or to make appeals to that which is already all ways within us always, that for which our personal spiritual life is its own expression.

When one is in a shared religion, there is always a tension between the group belief and the personal belief. There is always a compromise. Other people's dances are never quite our own.

Eliminate The Middleman

Value is created when a sharp tool touches raw material. When a newly washed shirt is ironed. When a brain is led to think in ways it never thought before.

Rather than being value-creators, many people seek gain in life by edging themselves into the delivery system. Buying cigarettes by the pack and selling them one at a time. Offering credit cards for a fee so people can buy today's goods with tomorrow's money.

Making money by facilitating commerce can bring wonderful wealth - but it's a shaky wealth, vulnerable to those who find shorter paths between buyer and seller. eBay, the popular auction house, survives. It links buyer and seller and does nothing more.

An artist could sell through a gallery. The gallery displays the art, sends out mailings, brings in customers. The gallery enables the art to be sold. For a big piece of the action. Or the artist could sell her art on eBay and spend most of her time painting, rather than dealing with marketers.

The most economic transaction is the one that follows the shortest path, eliminating all unnecessary middlemen. The most effective economy is the one with the fewest middlemen.

A Whole Self

Every city is like a total universe, for it contains that which is being born, that which is living out its life, and that which is dying. It contains the dead, the unborn, and that overall uniting force that impels intent and design and endless redesign.

Is the mind not such a city? When it looks at what is possible, does it not see room for hope? When the mind looks at what is, does it not see life going on, see birth, continuance, and death, the whole meta-system? When it looks at the intersection between these two worlds, the possible and the ongoing, can it see how to do? If it has intention.

Is the world such a city? What is mankind's intention? What is organic life's intention?

Can a man redesign himself? Can life redesign the world?

TV Goes Around The Bend

My TV sits, waiting for the repairman from the cable company. It has been this way for months. I have yet to call him. I am suddenly now getting everything I used to get on TV at no extra cost over the internet.

John Stewart : http://www.thedailyshow.com/

Stephen Colbert : http://www.colbertnation.com/

Keith Olbermann : http://current.com/shows/countdown/

Rachel Maddow : http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/

Home and Garden Channel : http://www.hgtv.com/

At the moment I am writing this, I am watching Stephen Colbert's "Colbert Report". It is in segments, but each segment leads into the next. I will be watching whole show.

There are no commercials. It is continuous. The image is smaller than regular TV, but it is free. Click to make the image full-screen. Still a little fuzzy, but livable.

Each show is archived, so you can watch it when you like. You can browse older shows. If the Earth doesn't collide with humanity, perhaps Colbert's art will survive intact for generations.

Cable TV doesn't do this. This is a new paradigm.

A new paradigm is devouring the old paradigm. Making change. Much of the content that cable stations now broadcast over cable they also broadcast over the Internet, making it globally accessible. As more and more people use the internet, the older method of delivery may slowly fall away.

Just link to the web site of the program you would like to watch. Google and ye shall find.

The quantitative incremental improvement (40% yearly) of computing power has turned television, a thing of the moment, into a new type of entity with a third, temporal, dimension. It still is what it always was, but it can also be anything it ever has been.

Continuous quantitative change has generated qualitative change. Just as, in the political world, continuous reform has created revolution.

Moore's Law marches on.