My wife just asked if anybody had seen the bananas she had purchased last night at Walmart. That is when we realized that she had left them behind last night with several other items. The ironic part of this is that she had gone back once already earlier today to claim a cartoon of eggs that had been left behind on that crazy carousel system for bagging they use. The lady at the "customer service" desk consulted a list of items she would not let my wife see. A list of items left behind by customers. So we got the eggs we left behind but instead of saying, "Oh, here are the other items you left behind." and giving them to us we got silence. There was a list and I am sure our bananas as well as other items we have not yet discovered missing were on it too. What else was left behind? We have no idea.
Enough with questions I cannot answer. Here is a question I can answer: What does Walmart do with the items that customers pay for and leave behind and do not claim? They put them back on the shelf and sell them again. I would feel a little better if those items were donated to local charities instead of enriching the pockets of multinational corporation which is already doing fine in a tough economy. Heck, they do well in a good economy.
This is a dishonorable business tactic. It is a mitzvah to return an item back to its proper owner and the practice as executed by Walmart is dishonest either through policy or oversight. Either way it is wrong. If a customer comes back with a receipt, and if the Walmart system works correctly and the left behind items are logged the way they are supposed to be (which does happen a reasonable amount of times) then the customer should get all their things back with no games.
There is a huge problem with items being left behind at Walmart. They are taking advantage of a confusing checkout system, the fact that most people will overlook forgotten items when they put their purchases away, and the fact that most people will not bother to put themselves through the ordeal of having to go back and hassle with them over a one or two dollar item. But, one or two dollar items ad up. The internet has many stories about this being a problem and our family looses dozens of items each year because they have a checkout system which is prone to error. I would estimate that we leave something behind 1 out of every 5 visits we make. Although some checkers are conscientious, and we have learned to check ourselves, it is still confusing - it is a system that needs to be fixed.
We have many friends who out of principle do not shop at Walmart and I think it is time that our family reconsiders our own shopping habits.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
Fight Night at Ole Mizzou
It starts out like a bad joke: "Three Missouri women's basketball players and one male Missouri cheerleader walk into a bar,...." It ends up with two young women arrested for suspicion of assault and duly suspended from the team and a young man suspended from cheerleading. I am not making this stuff up. It is even much more interesting than the mysterious settlement given to Coach Mark Mangino who was dismissed after a poor season and last minute concerns about verbal abuse and "inappropriate" physical contact. I never knew a coach who was above a little verbal abuse now and then. And, guess what? Had Coach Mangino taken his team to a decent bowl game all his sins, which may or may not have occurred, would have been miraculously forgiven. Such is the largess of big time college athletics, but I digress.
We will never know the whole truth about what happened on fight night, and that is just as well. We know enough. We know that alcohol was involved and that it probably played a huge part in the mess that ensued including creating legal and academic problems as well as public embarrassment.
We tend to forget just how problematic alcohol abuse is. In the very same issue of the paper where the story was carried about the Mizzou students and their fight night dirty laundry another incident was quietly reported that has received less media attention. Yet, that story is in many ways sadder. The story I am referring to was the third arrest of a local teenager for drunken driving including printing his picture.
Awareness of alcohol related problems and how to deal with them when confronting friends and loved ones is an important issue. You can learn more about this very serious disease at: https://health.google.com/health/ref/Alcoholism
We tend to forget just how problematic alcohol abuse is. In the very same issue of the paper where the story was carried about the Mizzou students and their fight night dirty laundry another incident was quietly reported that has received less media attention. Yet, that story is in many ways sadder. The story I am referring to was the third arrest of a local teenager for drunken driving including printing his picture.
Awareness of alcohol related problems and how to deal with them when confronting friends and loved ones is an important issue. You can learn more about this very serious disease at: https://health.google.com/health/ref/Alcoholism
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Afghanistan or Health Care: Which One REALLY Matters?
Health care. Health care reform really matters.
In the scheme of things Afghanistan is nothing but a holdover from the failed policies and adventures of President Bush. It is amazing to me how Republicans have attempted even now to rehabilitate the 43rd president. That effort to revive the cult of neo-conservatism is eerily like the ongoing attempts in Russia to rehabilitate Stalin (the only man in modern history to give Hitler a run for his money in terms of pure unadulterated evil and craziness).
In terms of Afghanistan in the end what will really matter is how effective the military will do its job and that is dependent on strategy and tactics as well as leadership. Does Obama have the generals he needs to do the job? One is of course reminded of President Lincoln's struggle to find the right person to lead the Union to victory. This quote is from a paper available at the Abraham Lincoln Association website:
Army leaders proved more frustrating.Lincoln Lincoln
There is of course another factor which weighs in heavily on what happens in Afghanistan, and that is of course Afghanistan itself. Arguably it is not even a country but a loosely associated grouping of tribes and ethnicities that do not play well together, and that has never functioned as a nation state. I often think that the only entity that really wants, and believes in, a united Afghanistan is the United States. We are certainly doing the heavy lifting and nobody is thanking us for it.
As I write this health care reform is by no means an accomplished fact. The Republican party is fighting its own alarmist slash and burn policy of scare tactics and nay saying. Support for the president is wanning as a fickle American people forget how serious problems were the day the last Bush left the white house in one piece but the rest of the world in a shambles. This president has used up a lot of political capitol to get the initiative this far and if it fails it will fail not because of the Republicans but because of Democrats.
Once again extremeism, and the sheer hysteria of manic voices like Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coultier, and Glenn Beck (am I the only one that thinks the uniform he is wearing on the book cover pictured below makes him look like a Nazi Storm Trooper?) resonate with the American people. What is the matter with Kansas?!
Beck does look like some flavor of fascist - either that or an old fashioned elevator man or perhaps a bell hop at a posh hotel? Look at that photograph and tell me who looks like an idiot. And what about Ann Coulter and her obvious eating disorder?
In the scheme of things Afghanistan is nothing but a holdover from the failed policies and adventures of President Bush. It is amazing to me how Republicans have attempted even now to rehabilitate the 43rd president. That effort to revive the cult of neo-conservatism is eerily like the ongoing attempts in Russia to rehabilitate Stalin (the only man in modern history to give Hitler a run for his money in terms of pure unadulterated evil and craziness).
In terms of Afghanistan in the end what will really matter is how effective the military will do its job and that is dependent on strategy and tactics as well as leadership. Does Obama have the generals he needs to do the job? One is of course reminded of President Lincoln's struggle to find the right person to lead the Union to victory. This quote is from a paper available at the Abraham Lincoln Association website:
Army leaders proved more frustrating.
There is of course another factor which weighs in heavily on what happens in Afghanistan, and that is of course Afghanistan itself. Arguably it is not even a country but a loosely associated grouping of tribes and ethnicities that do not play well together, and that has never functioned as a nation state. I often think that the only entity that really wants, and believes in, a united Afghanistan is the United States. We are certainly doing the heavy lifting and nobody is thanking us for it.
As I write this health care reform is by no means an accomplished fact. The Republican party is fighting its own alarmist slash and burn policy of scare tactics and nay saying. Support for the president is wanning as a fickle American people forget how serious problems were the day the last Bush left the white house in one piece but the rest of the world in a shambles. This president has used up a lot of political capitol to get the initiative this far and if it fails it will fail not because of the Republicans but because of Democrats.
Once again extremeism, and the sheer hysteria of manic voices like Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coultier, and Glenn Beck (am I the only one that thinks the uniform he is wearing on the book cover pictured below makes him look like a Nazi Storm Trooper?) resonate with the American people. What is the matter with Kansas?!
Beck does look like some flavor of fascist - either that or an old fashioned elevator man or perhaps a bell hop at a posh hotel? Look at that photograph and tell me who looks like an idiot. And what about Ann Coulter and her obvious eating disorder?
My point is that the Republican party is being led by a group of mean spirited maniacs with serious personality disorders and worse yet people listen to them. Those people are not wise, they are just loud. But, maybe loud mean spiritedness ego-centric behaviors are now what passes as wisdom? Don't even get me started on Sarah Palin. But, what do they all, including Sarah Palin, have in common besides all that? They are all millionaires with good health insurance who are against health care reform.
Our health care system only works if you have money and/or insurance. If you want to live in a country where it is everyone for themselves then that is fine. If you aspire to something higher then we need a change. Lets get health care reform.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Making Grades Count
I just finished reading a brilliant article in the October 2009 issue of the National Review by Robert Verbruggen entitled "Beyond the BA: Why Fewer People Should Get One." I am pretty ecumenical when it comes to looking for insight and erudition and the National Review does not disappoint. It is good to see that not all conservative "thinkers" come equipped with personality disorders, and that there are some important voices coming from the right. I highly recommend that article.
In my last post I discussed how many college students hate the process of higher education and merely endure it. I have some recommendations to make on how we can begin to change that by making grades really count and having a process of real accountability.
We hire students emerging from college without adequate evidence as to their abilities and especially as to their character and work habits. We know that grades earned in college may have no bearing on actual ability, and that letters of recommendation are from carefully picked persons who will at the very least damn them with faint praise. An acquaintance of mine, an editor at a magazine, told me how her publication inadvertently hired an intern who could not write. The managing editors suspect that the sample paper used in the application was professionally written because there is such a mismatch between the quality of that document and the subsequent inability of that person to form coherent sentences. They literally gave up on having the intern write stories since it was more work to rewrite (editing is too light a term) the articles than it was worth. Situations like that can be avoided with improved hiring practices and expanding how we grade. What to do?
First of all we need to not only award grades for academic performance but for such things as attendance and honesty. As an employer I would definitely like to know that the job applicant in front of me had atrocious attendance. I would like to know that the next candidate cheated on a biology exam, and the one after that routinely showed disrespect for the teacher or spent their class time texting. Is that better to know than they made an A in English Composition and a B in Biology? With such a system that C student with a stellar attendance record who worked full time while acquiring their degree might suddenly look better than the other candidates who cynically played the grade game with their constant mantra of: "Will we be getting a study guide?" and the perennial favorite "Will that be on the test?" Somethings are more important than the things we currently grade for.
Employers can do something too. Get tougher on checking things out. Ask for a recommendation from the students advisor, from two other faculty members including one outside their major. Ask tough questions about attendance, ability to work with others, and how they accepted responsibility. Ask for a couple of writing samples from old papers rather than something prepared especially for the hiring process. Then, require them to write something right there during the hiring process.
The current grading system is inadequite and designed for a different era. That era is dead. Grades no longer tell you enough about a student and many many things that you should know never make it onto a college transcript. Trust me on that.
In my last post I discussed how many college students hate the process of higher education and merely endure it. I have some recommendations to make on how we can begin to change that by making grades really count and having a process of real accountability.
We hire students emerging from college without adequate evidence as to their abilities and especially as to their character and work habits. We know that grades earned in college may have no bearing on actual ability, and that letters of recommendation are from carefully picked persons who will at the very least damn them with faint praise. An acquaintance of mine, an editor at a magazine, told me how her publication inadvertently hired an intern who could not write. The managing editors suspect that the sample paper used in the application was professionally written because there is such a mismatch between the quality of that document and the subsequent inability of that person to form coherent sentences. They literally gave up on having the intern write stories since it was more work to rewrite (editing is too light a term) the articles than it was worth. Situations like that can be avoided with improved hiring practices and expanding how we grade. What to do?
First of all we need to not only award grades for academic performance but for such things as attendance and honesty. As an employer I would definitely like to know that the job applicant in front of me had atrocious attendance. I would like to know that the next candidate cheated on a biology exam, and the one after that routinely showed disrespect for the teacher or spent their class time texting. Is that better to know than they made an A in English Composition and a B in Biology? With such a system that C student with a stellar attendance record who worked full time while acquiring their degree might suddenly look better than the other candidates who cynically played the grade game with their constant mantra of: "Will we be getting a study guide?" and the perennial favorite "Will that be on the test?" Somethings are more important than the things we currently grade for.
Employers can do something too. Get tougher on checking things out. Ask for a recommendation from the students advisor, from two other faculty members including one outside their major. Ask tough questions about attendance, ability to work with others, and how they accepted responsibility. Ask for a couple of writing samples from old papers rather than something prepared especially for the hiring process. Then, require them to write something right there during the hiring process.
The current grading system is inadequite and designed for a different era. That era is dead. Grades no longer tell you enough about a student and many many things that you should know never make it onto a college transcript. Trust me on that.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Hating College
I am amazed at the number of college students who despise going to college and are only doing so because of social/family pressures and their desire to "have a good job." When I survey any given class the vast majority admit that they are essentially in college because they feel they have to be, and that they are only enduring college because they think it is their ticket to a more lucrative future. They admit to no intellectual curiosity and find the whole experience mind numbing. Admittedly my sample is skewed and I have no idea what students would be like in the physical sciences. I have a theory though that there is a correlation between ACT and IQ scores and satisfaction with college as an intellectual experience but presently I have no data to support it.
With college rapidly becoming the new high school more and more people are coming to college that are marginally qualified by inclination and aptitude to attend. These students are in a kind of vocational holding pattern as they put in their time to get their ticket punched so they can enter the adult work force. In the meantime they take out student loans and work at low paying jobs in order to pay their way. What does this do to the college experience?
Do not be fooled. Qualitatively there is a difference between the college graduate of today and the one of ten or more years ago. The discourse and milieu of the current classroom is controlled not by students who are there to learn but by those who are there to endure. To most students today the college experience is an obstacle they must navigate with guile and cunning so they can "get on" with their real life. Grade inflation is in fact a result of what happens when the ideal of college is marketed with such spectacular success that college is seen as a necessity for even a modicum of success, and that in a society where success is mostly equated with higher incomes.
This is at a time when the cost of college continues to rise much faster than the cost of living while institutions of higher learning show little propensity, or skill, in curbing the rising cost by focusing on the core mission of education. Colleges are increasingly guilty of mission creep where the educational experience is subjugated to supplemental services while the growth in faculty numbers is fabulously dwarfed by the growth in staff. Colleges and universities have recently been forced to cut expenses because of the current recession but these revised budgets have included continued increases in tuition which are funded primarily through student loans.
When a student graduates from high school there are few jobs for them and most have been led to believe that their future happiness is best served by obtaining a college degree. There are "statistics" to support that claim but I am suspicious of those numbers. I do not think there is a direct cause and effect connection but that something else is happening. I suspect that those same persons without a higher education would have made more money than their unschooled peers for other reasons than having a college degree, and that those who do not have a college degree remain at a lower income level for reasons other than not having a college degree. Many students leave college and enter jobs for which they could have been trained in much less time and with much less expense had other options been available to them.
I do not think the college degree, at least as I envision it, was ever intended to be the universal experience that we are making it. It is like assuming that everyone who played high school sports is capable of performing at the level required for college. Also,I find it highly ironic that we are sending more and more students to college when the public education system is vastly inadequate and incapable of turning out students who are truly prepared to enter institutions of higher learning. What to do?
The biggest culprit is student loans which are a racket. Student loans guaranteed by the government are no longer the good deal they used to be but financial traps. Colleges and universities can count on a seemingly endless supply of tuition monies funded by student loans and have no incentive to cut costs and lower tuition. Currently, colleges and universities have no incentive to restrict the flow of students through their doors despite the empty rhetoric to the contrary. The next culprit is that we have no alternatives for young people and have created a myth that everyone is both obligated and capable of attending college no matter what. Let me end with a true story.
Several years ago I had a student in one of my classes that was having some extreme difficulties. That student showed me their Individual Education Plan from high school and their paper work from the Missouri Department of Vocational Rehabilitation. Both documents confirmed that the student was mentally retarded. Think about the implications of this last example and what it means.
With college rapidly becoming the new high school more and more people are coming to college that are marginally qualified by inclination and aptitude to attend. These students are in a kind of vocational holding pattern as they put in their time to get their ticket punched so they can enter the adult work force. In the meantime they take out student loans and work at low paying jobs in order to pay their way. What does this do to the college experience?
Do not be fooled. Qualitatively there is a difference between the college graduate of today and the one of ten or more years ago. The discourse and milieu of the current classroom is controlled not by students who are there to learn but by those who are there to endure. To most students today the college experience is an obstacle they must navigate with guile and cunning so they can "get on" with their real life. Grade inflation is in fact a result of what happens when the ideal of college is marketed with such spectacular success that college is seen as a necessity for even a modicum of success, and that in a society where success is mostly equated with higher incomes.
This is at a time when the cost of college continues to rise much faster than the cost of living while institutions of higher learning show little propensity, or skill, in curbing the rising cost by focusing on the core mission of education. Colleges are increasingly guilty of mission creep where the educational experience is subjugated to supplemental services while the growth in faculty numbers is fabulously dwarfed by the growth in staff. Colleges and universities have recently been forced to cut expenses because of the current recession but these revised budgets have included continued increases in tuition which are funded primarily through student loans.
When a student graduates from high school there are few jobs for them and most have been led to believe that their future happiness is best served by obtaining a college degree. There are "statistics" to support that claim but I am suspicious of those numbers. I do not think there is a direct cause and effect connection but that something else is happening. I suspect that those same persons without a higher education would have made more money than their unschooled peers for other reasons than having a college degree, and that those who do not have a college degree remain at a lower income level for reasons other than not having a college degree. Many students leave college and enter jobs for which they could have been trained in much less time and with much less expense had other options been available to them.
I do not think the college degree, at least as I envision it, was ever intended to be the universal experience that we are making it. It is like assuming that everyone who played high school sports is capable of performing at the level required for college. Also,I find it highly ironic that we are sending more and more students to college when the public education system is vastly inadequate and incapable of turning out students who are truly prepared to enter institutions of higher learning. What to do?
The biggest culprit is student loans which are a racket. Student loans guaranteed by the government are no longer the good deal they used to be but financial traps. Colleges and universities can count on a seemingly endless supply of tuition monies funded by student loans and have no incentive to cut costs and lower tuition. Currently, colleges and universities have no incentive to restrict the flow of students through their doors despite the empty rhetoric to the contrary. The next culprit is that we have no alternatives for young people and have created a myth that everyone is both obligated and capable of attending college no matter what. Let me end with a true story.
Several years ago I had a student in one of my classes that was having some extreme difficulties. That student showed me their Individual Education Plan from high school and their paper work from the Missouri Department of Vocational Rehabilitation. Both documents confirmed that the student was mentally retarded. Think about the implications of this last example and what it means.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
This week I had the honor of meeting Chanrithy Him at the National Organization for Human Services annual convention in Portland, Oregon, where she was the keynote speaker. After the keynote she held another question and answer session, and book signing session, which I also attended. Chanrithy Him is the author of When Broken Glass Floats which tells her story of growing up during the Viet Cong invasion of Cambodia and the subsequent American bombing under president Richard Nixon. When the weak Cambodian government finally fractured it was followed by the horror of Pol Pot and the Khamer Rouge which began a psychotic episode of horror and mayhem that swallowed up her family. You may be familiar with the Khamer Rouge from the movie The Killing Fields.
Being in her presence was being in the presence of history. When she spoke it was the voice of a witness who survived to tell the story for those who could not. It was an honor to meet her and I urge everyone to read her book.
Was is it about the human condition that brings about the ability to commit unspeakable atrocities? The Talmud teaches us that in this world good and evil is mixed together and we have to sort one out from the other. Isn't that the truth.
Being in her presence was being in the presence of history. When she spoke it was the voice of a witness who survived to tell the story for those who could not. It was an honor to meet her and I urge everyone to read her book.
Was is it about the human condition that brings about the ability to commit unspeakable atrocities? The Talmud teaches us that in this world good and evil is mixed together and we have to sort one out from the other. Isn't that the truth.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Good Teachers
I had three teachers at Columbia College when I was there as an undergraduate. Polly Batterson taught me political science and she is still living. Ron Taylor taught me psychology and unfortunately he has passed away. The last one is Jim Metscher who died this year after a remarkable career of 35 years teaching mostly sociology. I love all three of them and they live forever in my heart and mind influencing what I do everyday. I am surprised at how much I reference their inner voice that they created in me. I also had two teachers in high school (Alan Charbeneau and Kathy Yount who taught me at Harrisburg), one in graduate school (Dr. Donaldson in the ELPA program), and none in elementary school. As a matter of fact that is where I had my worst teachers. So in over 20 years of teaching I have had six teachers. That is about right. Real teachers are rare and precious things.
I am sure that not everyone would agree with my choices and I have to tell you that they all pretty much had their own styles. What made them good teachers? Ron and Jim were polar opposites as to their approach to teaching.
At times I am a good teacher but often not. It takes a lot of spiritual and emotional energy to be a good teacher. You have to love your students and nurture them while at the same time challenging and pushing them to do more than they want to do. It is easier to just go through the motions. I guess most things in life are that way.
Teaching is a handicraft and despite all the technology it cannot be mass-produced. No video of the teachers I mentioned would do them justice. You had to have been there in person in the same room. Teaching is analog and exists in the present whereas training is digital and is infinitely reproducible. Training lends itself to mass production techniques and although it is valuable in and of itself the two are very different. Learning takes more energy and changes you on the inside in a way that training cannot touch.
In my other blog, Around Columbia, I am working on a tribute to Dr. Taylor. I call it "The Last Assignment," and it comes directly from a project he suggested somebody should do. I hope I get a good grade but really it doesn't matter because it is the process of doing it that really matters. You can check out that project at: Around Columbia.
I am going to write more about the difference between teaching and training in my next post. Please stay tuned.
I am sure that not everyone would agree with my choices and I have to tell you that they all pretty much had their own styles. What made them good teachers? Ron and Jim were polar opposites as to their approach to teaching.
At times I am a good teacher but often not. It takes a lot of spiritual and emotional energy to be a good teacher. You have to love your students and nurture them while at the same time challenging and pushing them to do more than they want to do. It is easier to just go through the motions. I guess most things in life are that way.
Teaching is a handicraft and despite all the technology it cannot be mass-produced. No video of the teachers I mentioned would do them justice. You had to have been there in person in the same room. Teaching is analog and exists in the present whereas training is digital and is infinitely reproducible. Training lends itself to mass production techniques and although it is valuable in and of itself the two are very different. Learning takes more energy and changes you on the inside in a way that training cannot touch.
In my other blog, Around Columbia, I am working on a tribute to Dr. Taylor. I call it "The Last Assignment," and it comes directly from a project he suggested somebody should do. I hope I get a good grade but really it doesn't matter because it is the process of doing it that really matters. You can check out that project at: Around Columbia.
I am going to write more about the difference between teaching and training in my next post. Please stay tuned.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
The Forecloure Scam: How Lending Institutions Make Money on Foreclosed Homes
How is it that financial institutions granted home loans without checking income or other key indicators of a buyers ability to pay back their loan? It is most peculiar when you take into consideration the fact that approach goes against decades of developed experience and documented best practices. Most of those loans were granted knowing that the buyer’s qualifications and the ruinous terms of the loan made it probably, not just likely, that at some point there would be a foreclosure. What is more puzzling is the fact that myriads of homes are sitting empty and deteriorating daily while lending institutions are not aggressively trying to prevent the damage done when a house sets empty.
Empty Houses
My contacts in the business, particularly in Kansas City, indicate that empty homes are being pillaged by highly skilled teams of thieves who come in and take anything of value including copper and other accouterments such as windows, doors, and appliances if they are worth stealing. These teams are very efficient and seem to operate with impunity with little public or private investigation into who they are and how they are disposing of the goods. You would think that banks would be aggressively attempting to protect empty houses and pressuring law enforcement to increase enforcement efforts to stop the thievery. It is fascinating that the holders of these mortgages have not raised a hue and cry in the media and through lobbying efforts to get something done.
Let me briefly summarize before going on. So, lending institutions aggressively pursued home loans known to be risky, and there is little creativity or aggressiveness to somehow generate some income from the abandoned homes. Instead houses languish abandoned to deteriorate, and creative ways of finding someone to live in them to generate some kind of income, even as a renter, have not really become popular. Everyone is assuming that these lenders are losing money at a horrific rate even as the lenders remain remarkably passive. That just does not make sense. The only thing that I can think of is that somehow many of these lending institutions counted on two strategies.
Two Strategies for Success
I think the first strategy was a cynical optimism that the “housing bubble” was a trend that would continue forever – or at least long enough for a terrific payday which indeed was the case at least for many individuals. I think many of the lending institutions counted on either huge profitability from usurious rate, or repossessing homes that had appreciated in value past the original loan value in order to resell at a profit. The other strategy became obvious when I learned about dead peasants insurance. Many lending institutions had probably hedged their bets using various insurance strategies with the tax payer as the patsy. How did that work?
Insurance as an Investment Strategy
Is it impossible to make insurance profitable over the long run as an investment strategy? Yes, unless something magic happens. The reason is that insurance companies are rather clever and design their rates such that they are not in the unfortunate possession of having to pay out more claim money than what they take in as premium payments. At best insurance would have been a conservative method of limiting losses in a worst case scenario. The problem is that companies would have been very hesitant to spend the money on premiums for marginal, or no, returns. The cost of the premiums would have come right out of profits. But, magic does happen for business in the form of tax breaks, and tax breaks change everything.
Tax Breaks
If insurance premiums are tax deductable for businesses then suddenly it becomes much more attractive for them to buy policies. You also gain an ally in the insurance company which rightly divines that it will sell more insurance if the price of the policy is severely discounted, cost you nothing, or perhaps even saves business money in taxes. That is the case with dead peasants insurance. Tax breaks make dead peasants insurance not just a method of limiting losses, but an investment tool. Turns out that lending institutions often take out policies themselves (often without letting the borrower know that it is happening and charging more interest), or have the consumer take out a policy to protect themselves from default. As it turns out these are standard industry practices.
The point is that there is a distinct possibility, actually a probability, that this bursting of the housing bubble was not the financial disaster for lending institutions that we thought. I am certain that the losses for many of those institutions has been minimal or nonexistent.
Blaming the Victim
When the “financial crisis” first started most of the blame was being put onto the shoulders of the consumer and the government. Pundits declared that banks and other lending institutions were perhaps guilty of nothing more than being a bit aggressive and under government pressure to liberalize loan policies. More and more evidence is mounting to show that the greed and avarice of lenders was the primary cause of the problem. What is really disturbing is that the lenders, at least in some cases, might have actually profited from the whole experience while allowing the public to believe that they had lost their shirts.
Thursday, October 08, 2009
Capitalism: A Love Story
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun:
I saw the tears of the oppressed—
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors—
and they have no comforter.(Ecclesiastes 4:1)
Michael Moore's latest movie, Capitalism: A Love Story, is truth telling at the highest level. For years I have said that capitalism in America has run amuck, running about in a murderous frenzy, trampling the vast majority of the American People. We are the pawns, or rather the peasants, deluded thinking we are living in some kind of capitalist utopia. Capitalism in and of itself is neither good nor evil - it just is. It is an economic tool that can be used for the good of the people or for the good of the top 1% who unfortunately do run this country now. As a citizen you have been voted out of office my friend. Right now capitalism is good for the top 1%. (roughly 100,000 families) and bad for everyone else. Very good for them, and getting better.
What is puzzling about all this is that through a well financed propaganda program, and the restructuring of laws and courts, that the elite has been able to convince the middle class (and even the poor) to do the heavy lifting for them. Why that happens was the question behind the book What's the Matter with Kansas? The current Tea Party movement is certainly right wing reactionary but it has several things right. For one, it conveys a sense that somehow we are getting screwed over, and those who have been elected to look out after our best interest are instead lining their pockets. With disturbingly few exceptions that is true. The other is that the movement is against the bailout which is the biggest con game ever perpetrated on the American people and a crime so large in magnitude that it makes Berny Madoff look like a jay walker. I think the movement is wrong on health care though and a few other issues. But, the Tea Party movement is a populist movement and populist movements tend to have real good ideas stained with bigotry. Just one example of that is the Know Nothings which were anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic, but otherwise did have a real agenda for reform.
What happened? It used to be that we put people first. Help people and all good will flow from that. Even the Republicans believed that. That got turned around to where we now bow to the god of market capitalism, a religion created by the elite, and declare that our duty is to help, preserve, and coddle capital interest. If we do not protect business, which certainly is not in the business of protecting you, with our own money then something "bad" will happen. What is so darn fascinating about that is that many people without a pot to piss in, and many who are heavily in debt maintaining a middle class facade, or the most avid worshipers at that alter. But, I digress.
Our current religion is Utopian Capitalism. Many churches give lip service to Jesus (who most decidedly was not a capitalist but someone with populist tendencies who believed in democracy) but in reality worship the modern day golden calf in the form of the dollar. Most of modern day Christianity has become a grotesque parody of what it once was. I am not a Christian, I am Jewish, but I recognize much wisdom and beauty in authentic Christianity which is so now so rare it is in danger of extinction. Money has become an end in and of itself. Even institutions of higher learning, churches, and other organizations which are pledged to help people are more interested in their own financial interest that there very purpose gets subverted. As modern capitalism has been allowed to run rampant democracy has suffered proportionately. That is the point of Michael Moore's brilliant movie.
The major prophet of utopian capitalism was Ayn Rand. Rand believed that we should all act selfishly in our own best interest rejecting any notion an obligation to help others. She believed blindly in lazzi faire capitalism which paradoxically has the mystical belief in the invisible wise hand of the market regulating and making things alright. And, this is important for you to know. Among her many acolytes are Rush Limbaugh and Alan Greenspan, So the next time you listen to ole Rush keep in mind that his philosophy according to the gospel of Ayn Rand (her term for it was Objectivism which is just about as weird as Scientology) is basically "I've got mine so screw you."
One last thing. Wake up to the fact that WalMart, GM, Citigroup, your health insurance carrier (if you are lucky to have one at least for now), or your local bank do not care about you or your family. They are not your friends. They are predators feeding on your hopes, dreams, and most of all your hard earned money and you my friend are the prey.
I started with a verse from Ecclesiastes and so it is perhaps a good idea to end with one too:
Whoever loves money never has money enough;
whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income.
This too is meaningless. (Ecclesiastes 5:10)
I saw the tears of the oppressed—
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors—
and they have no comforter.(Ecclesiastes 4:1)
Michael Moore's latest movie, Capitalism: A Love Story, is truth telling at the highest level. For years I have said that capitalism in America has run amuck, running about in a murderous frenzy, trampling the vast majority of the American People. We are the pawns, or rather the peasants, deluded thinking we are living in some kind of capitalist utopia. Capitalism in and of itself is neither good nor evil - it just is. It is an economic tool that can be used for the good of the people or for the good of the top 1% who unfortunately do run this country now. As a citizen you have been voted out of office my friend. Right now capitalism is good for the top 1%. (roughly 100,000 families) and bad for everyone else. Very good for them, and getting better.
What is puzzling about all this is that through a well financed propaganda program, and the restructuring of laws and courts, that the elite has been able to convince the middle class (and even the poor) to do the heavy lifting for them. Why that happens was the question behind the book What's the Matter with Kansas? The current Tea Party movement is certainly right wing reactionary but it has several things right. For one, it conveys a sense that somehow we are getting screwed over, and those who have been elected to look out after our best interest are instead lining their pockets. With disturbingly few exceptions that is true. The other is that the movement is against the bailout which is the biggest con game ever perpetrated on the American people and a crime so large in magnitude that it makes Berny Madoff look like a jay walker. I think the movement is wrong on health care though and a few other issues. But, the Tea Party movement is a populist movement and populist movements tend to have real good ideas stained with bigotry. Just one example of that is the Know Nothings which were anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic, but otherwise did have a real agenda for reform.
What happened? It used to be that we put people first. Help people and all good will flow from that. Even the Republicans believed that. That got turned around to where we now bow to the god of market capitalism, a religion created by the elite, and declare that our duty is to help, preserve, and coddle capital interest. If we do not protect business, which certainly is not in the business of protecting you, with our own money then something "bad" will happen. What is so darn fascinating about that is that many people without a pot to piss in, and many who are heavily in debt maintaining a middle class facade, or the most avid worshipers at that alter. But, I digress.
Our current religion is Utopian Capitalism. Many churches give lip service to Jesus (who most decidedly was not a capitalist but someone with populist tendencies who believed in democracy) but in reality worship the modern day golden calf in the form of the dollar. Most of modern day Christianity has become a grotesque parody of what it once was. I am not a Christian, I am Jewish, but I recognize much wisdom and beauty in authentic Christianity which is so now so rare it is in danger of extinction. Money has become an end in and of itself. Even institutions of higher learning, churches, and other organizations which are pledged to help people are more interested in their own financial interest that there very purpose gets subverted. As modern capitalism has been allowed to run rampant democracy has suffered proportionately. That is the point of Michael Moore's brilliant movie.
The major prophet of utopian capitalism was Ayn Rand. Rand believed that we should all act selfishly in our own best interest rejecting any notion an obligation to help others. She believed blindly in lazzi faire capitalism which paradoxically has the mystical belief in the invisible wise hand of the market regulating and making things alright. And, this is important for you to know. Among her many acolytes are Rush Limbaugh and Alan Greenspan, So the next time you listen to ole Rush keep in mind that his philosophy according to the gospel of Ayn Rand (her term for it was Objectivism which is just about as weird as Scientology) is basically "I've got mine so screw you."
One last thing. Wake up to the fact that WalMart, GM, Citigroup, your health insurance carrier (if you are lucky to have one at least for now), or your local bank do not care about you or your family. They are not your friends. They are predators feeding on your hopes, dreams, and most of all your hard earned money and you my friend are the prey.
I started with a verse from Ecclesiastes and so it is perhaps a good idea to end with one too:
Whoever loves money never has money enough;
whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income.
This too is meaningless. (Ecclesiastes 5:10)
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
The Lost Consensus
In Xanadu, an excellent travel book by William Dalrymple, the author retraces the steps of Marco Polo. There is a whole genre of books that do that, but In Xanadu does it particularly well. The book is often funny, spares no one or no place, and is written in an engaging style deserving all the accolades it has acquired and I would like to add yet another reason to read it.
In the book William Dalrymple is traveling through a good deal of the middle-east as the Islamic fundamentalist movement (a horrible term but one I am hard pressed to replace) is poised to explode into the world scene. The book was written in 1989 well after the Iranian revolution was well established (having occurred early in 1979) having wrecked one President in Jimmy Carter, and befuddled the successor Ronald Reagan. Carter of course having failed on multiple fronts to manage the Iranian Hostage Crisis. The seeds for 911 and a lot of other mischief had been planted but the world had yet to fully recognize what was coming.
Ayatollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 14 years exile on February 1, 1979. He is helped off the plane by one of the Air France pilots. The start of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism?
Within less than a year the United States was humiliated and the administration impotent to react effectively on either the diplomatic or the military front. It was a portent of things to come:
Iranian militants escort a blindfolded U.S. hostage to the media.
As the fundamentalist movement put down deep roots and branched out we were distracted with the death throes of the U.S.S.R. which ironically had not only been deeply wounded by the new movement but helped nurture it along with it's Afghanistan adventure. We were also distracted by a whole laundry list of short-termed crisis, both domestic and international, to include the Contra affair and Grenada. Yet there were hints, and that brings me back to a remarkable quote from In Xanadu that I read today and had to share. In Iran the author met a Christian Armenian by the name of Tadios in the town of Tabriz who had this to say:
In the book William Dalrymple is traveling through a good deal of the middle-east as the Islamic fundamentalist movement (a horrible term but one I am hard pressed to replace) is poised to explode into the world scene. The book was written in 1989 well after the Iranian revolution was well established (having occurred early in 1979) having wrecked one President in Jimmy Carter, and befuddled the successor Ronald Reagan. Carter of course having failed on multiple fronts to manage the Iranian Hostage Crisis. The seeds for 911 and a lot of other mischief had been planted but the world had yet to fully recognize what was coming.
Ayatollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 14 years exile on February 1, 1979. He is helped off the plane by one of the Air France pilots. The start of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism?
Within less than a year the United States was humiliated and the administration impotent to react effectively on either the diplomatic or the military front. It was a portent of things to come:
Iranian militants escort a blindfolded U.S. hostage to the media.
As the fundamentalist movement put down deep roots and branched out we were distracted with the death throes of the U.S.S.R. which ironically had not only been deeply wounded by the new movement but helped nurture it along with it's Afghanistan adventure. We were also distracted by a whole laundry list of short-termed crisis, both domestic and international, to include the Contra affair and Grenada. Yet there were hints, and that brings me back to a remarkable quote from In Xanadu that I read today and had to share. In Iran the author met a Christian Armenian by the name of Tadios in the town of Tabriz who had this to say:
Sometimes I am worried, though," he said. He spoke slowly, choosing his words carefully. "For the last century or so there has bee some sort of consensus across the world as to how civilized men behave You know. There is an agreement that men should not be killed for peacefully believing in an idea, that every man deserves a fair, impartial trial, that all men have a right to express what they think. Often these values have been ignored, but however evil a government may be, it has always paid lip service to them." He refilled our glasses. "Well it's different in Iran now." pg 123-124.It is different everywhere now. Even here. America has become a nation of angry and shrill voices worshiping materialism with unprecedented actions such as the mass suspension of civil rights in Guantanamo Bay and preemptive military action. Those values that Tadios was talking about are the values of a free and democratic nation - they are the values that we have somehow lost:
This is a great nation but we have indeed lost our way and have become cruel, boisterous, and barbaric. I hope, and actually I think, we might be on the mend but the next test is to see if we, the American people, will be bamboozled again by big business and refuse some kind of health care reform. We once had a consensus of humanity and the belief that we could make things better but we traded it in for one that is short-sighted and lacks a vision for the future. Can we find our way again and regain the consensus that we, and indeed the whole world, used to embrace?
This is a great nation but we have indeed lost our way and have become cruel, boisterous, and barbaric. I hope, and actually I think, we might be on the mend but the next test is to see if we, the American people, will be bamboozled again by big business and refuse some kind of health care reform. We once had a consensus of humanity and the belief that we could make things better but we traded it in for one that is short-sighted and lacks a vision for the future. Can we find our way again and regain the consensus that we, and indeed the whole world, used to embrace?
Monday, August 17, 2009
Hilary Clinton Channeling her Rage
I have been a big supporter of Hillary Clinton but her performance in Africa was not only puzzling but embarrassing. In my last post I spoke of the anger of the American right which is demonstrated on talk radio and in the angry combative reception given to Senator Arlen Specter during his town hall meetings. I was wrong. It is not just the right. This anger and incivility is endemic in our culture and you will see this kind of acting out on the left and the right as well as with our Secretary of State.
Here is the video of that shameful moment:
Hillary Clinton represents the United States and our country was not well represented with this tirade. I do not know the back story for this incident and I do not need to. We saw glimpses of this during the election when Obama started to overtake her in the polls but I gave her the benefit of the doubt. This time her behaviour cannot be ignored.
Secretary Clinton has long toiled under the shadow of her husband. Was it possible that Bill Clinton's involvement in affairs of state was one of the things that was bothering her? In the following video one of the freed women praises the "super cool team" that worked to free them. Bill, you dawg, young women still think of you as being cool and it looks like Uncle Al has loosened up a bit:
There are no excuses for this kind of behaviour at her level. It does not matter if her feet hurt, if she was upset that her 401K plan is tanking, if she was jet lagged, or just cranky for some unknown random reason. She is experienced enough to know that when your in the public eye and the cameras start rolling (for her they probably seldom stop rolling), it is time to cowboy up and smile nice. Also, she knows that Fox news is stalking her at every turn trying to find fodder for their kennel of attack dogs. Regrettably, I am starting to think maybe it was a good thing that she was not elected president since she does not have the poise and personal fortitude to sufficiently separate the professional and personal in her life.
Here is the video of that shameful moment:
Hillary Clinton represents the United States and our country was not well represented with this tirade. I do not know the back story for this incident and I do not need to. We saw glimpses of this during the election when Obama started to overtake her in the polls but I gave her the benefit of the doubt. This time her behaviour cannot be ignored.
Secretary Clinton has long toiled under the shadow of her husband. Was it possible that Bill Clinton's involvement in affairs of state was one of the things that was bothering her? In the following video one of the freed women praises the "super cool team" that worked to free them. Bill, you dawg, young women still think of you as being cool and it looks like Uncle Al has loosened up a bit:
There are no excuses for this kind of behaviour at her level. It does not matter if her feet hurt, if she was upset that her 401K plan is tanking, if she was jet lagged, or just cranky for some unknown random reason. She is experienced enough to know that when your in the public eye and the cameras start rolling (for her they probably seldom stop rolling), it is time to cowboy up and smile nice. Also, she knows that Fox news is stalking her at every turn trying to find fodder for their kennel of attack dogs. Regrettably, I am starting to think maybe it was a good thing that she was not elected president since she does not have the poise and personal fortitude to sufficiently separate the professional and personal in her life.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
The Be$t Health Care Money Can Buy
If you do not think that our current health care system is irrevocably broken do not waste your time reading this post. Instead here is a link to Rush Limbaugh's web page. Go there instead.
I have been amazed at the hysteria created by the monied interest here in America regarding not only Obama but health care reform. The only thing more surprising is the number of people of much more modest means who act against their own best interest and fight health care reform. I finally decided to write something after what happened tonight.
I was out walking the dogs tonight and found this flyer attached (illegally) to a utility pole so on behalf of the people I confiscated it in the name of the Socialist Party of Greater North America (just kidding,... as far as I know there is no such thing but somebody will believe it anyway):
Oh my goodness. Obama's fiendish plan is to make this a socialist paradise like North Korea?! People will believe anything. It is interesting, albeit scary, to know that many people think that President Obama is a secret Muslim and/or a person who was not even born in this country. What is really weird is some of the stuff I have heard on television from "concerned citizens" who "on their own" have shown up at town hall meetings to demonstrate that in America you really can say almost any damn fool thing you want. Here are my two favorite:
1. Lady stands up with a clip board, somehow the clip board is important I think, and informs us that if the President's health care reform passes that it will "increase abortion by 30%." Humm. How do we know that? Let me state for the record that I am against abortion but I am also consistent in being against the death penalty but I digress.
2. Another older woman stands up and with a shaky voice, full of equal parts fear and rage, declares that she does not want the government to "decide when I die." Interesting. I did not know that. I did not know that as part of the health care plan we are going to just kill old people to save money. Well, as a person who gets older each and every day and who is related to many old people that I love I am against it! I say lets just cross the killing old people out of the plan - I think it was a bad idea in the first place.
Of course there is the famous incident with Senator Arlen Specter when a devout Christian in the loving spirit of Christianity told him:
"One day God's going to judge you, and he's going to judge you, and the rest of your damned cronies on the Hill and then you can get your just deserts."
That incident of grace and loving kindness is depicted on the following video:
Many Americans are angry and feeling sorry for themselves and it is these very people who elected George Bush twice. That anger is fueled by the Tea Party gang and the rest of the ultra-conservative right who make their living by being rabble rousers appealing to the most base of emotions and calling it a virtue when in reality it very much something else. They spread innuendo, fear, gossip, and outright falsehoods and call it truth. However, that is the subject of a whole new post.
Our current system is good if your healthy and/or if you have money. If you are poor and sick it goes downhill pretty fast. Why? Let me give you a lesson in business. Insurance companies are not here to give Grandpa Bob a pace maker, or to cure Little Sue's cancer. Nope. They exist to make money and the more money they have to pay out to sick people the worse their profit margins. If I was an insurance executive I would hate sick people and avoid them at all cost. As a matter of fact insurance companies are pretty good at avoiding sick people. They are clever ferreting out pre-existing conditions, and if you get sick they will start raising your premiums in order to drive you out. Insurance companies are not your friend and they begrudge each and every penny they pay out on you. Insurance companies operate on greed rather than faith, hope, and charity.
Obama's health care reform strategy has been to let a consensus build to do something and he knows that whatever plan for change we come up with will be neither perfect, not maintenance free. It will have to be adjusted and modified as we find out where the flaws are. What he knows is that this is an existential battle and if big money wins again we are in for another twenty years are so with a system that is good for certain businesses and bad for everyone else.
Think about this. There are some things that government should be involved in. What if you had to buy police protection insurance or the cops would not show up when you called? What if the courts would not prosecute people who committed crimes against you because that was not covered in your police protection insurance policy? What if your policy for police insurance did not cover misdemeanors but only felony crimes against you or if you were only allowed three calls to the police a year and after that you had to pay for it out of your own pocket? Then there is fire protection. What if you were required to have fire protection insurance in order for the fire department to respond to a fire at your home? What if you could not afford fire protection insurance so nobody would come to put out your house fire when you called 911 but they would come to prevent the fire from spreading to your neighbors house in the event they were insured? Communities and governments realize that it is in the best interest of everyone to provide police and fire protection to everyone. Shouldn't health care be one of those things that a civilized and humane society provides to its citizens?
Maybe a government sponsored health care plan, or some other kind of truly equitable plan for health care, is something democracies do for their people. Maybe it has nothing to do with socialism but rather responsible and responsive government for the people, by the people and of the people? I think that is the case. If you do not believe me make a comparison with China.
The largest remaining Communist country in the world (although it is really an oligarchy and there has never been a true communist country since they all end up being ran by tyrants or elites), China, has a horrible health care system that requires you pay as you go with no safety net for health care for the poor to speak of. Paradoxically, communist China has deliberately picked a market-based health care system just like us. So maybe a public health care system and socialism are not necessarily synonymous. But, maybe a market-based health care system and control by an elite are?
I have been amazed at the hysteria created by the monied interest here in America regarding not only Obama but health care reform. The only thing more surprising is the number of people of much more modest means who act against their own best interest and fight health care reform. I finally decided to write something after what happened tonight.
I was out walking the dogs tonight and found this flyer attached (illegally) to a utility pole so on behalf of the people I confiscated it in the name of the Socialist Party of Greater North America (just kidding,... as far as I know there is no such thing but somebody will believe it anyway):
Oh my goodness. Obama's fiendish plan is to make this a socialist paradise like North Korea?! People will believe anything. It is interesting, albeit scary, to know that many people think that President Obama is a secret Muslim and/or a person who was not even born in this country. What is really weird is some of the stuff I have heard on television from "concerned citizens" who "on their own" have shown up at town hall meetings to demonstrate that in America you really can say almost any damn fool thing you want. Here are my two favorite:1. Lady stands up with a clip board, somehow the clip board is important I think, and informs us that if the President's health care reform passes that it will "increase abortion by 30%." Humm. How do we know that? Let me state for the record that I am against abortion but I am also consistent in being against the death penalty but I digress.
2. Another older woman stands up and with a shaky voice, full of equal parts fear and rage, declares that she does not want the government to "decide when I die." Interesting. I did not know that. I did not know that as part of the health care plan we are going to just kill old people to save money. Well, as a person who gets older each and every day and who is related to many old people that I love I am against it! I say lets just cross the killing old people out of the plan - I think it was a bad idea in the first place.
Of course there is the famous incident with Senator Arlen Specter when a devout Christian in the loving spirit of Christianity told him:
"One day God's going to judge you, and he's going to judge you, and the rest of your damned cronies on the Hill and then you can get your just deserts."
That incident of grace and loving kindness is depicted on the following video:
Many Americans are angry and feeling sorry for themselves and it is these very people who elected George Bush twice. That anger is fueled by the Tea Party gang and the rest of the ultra-conservative right who make their living by being rabble rousers appealing to the most base of emotions and calling it a virtue when in reality it very much something else. They spread innuendo, fear, gossip, and outright falsehoods and call it truth. However, that is the subject of a whole new post.
Our current system is good if your healthy and/or if you have money. If you are poor and sick it goes downhill pretty fast. Why? Let me give you a lesson in business. Insurance companies are not here to give Grandpa Bob a pace maker, or to cure Little Sue's cancer. Nope. They exist to make money and the more money they have to pay out to sick people the worse their profit margins. If I was an insurance executive I would hate sick people and avoid them at all cost. As a matter of fact insurance companies are pretty good at avoiding sick people. They are clever ferreting out pre-existing conditions, and if you get sick they will start raising your premiums in order to drive you out. Insurance companies are not your friend and they begrudge each and every penny they pay out on you. Insurance companies operate on greed rather than faith, hope, and charity.
Obama's health care reform strategy has been to let a consensus build to do something and he knows that whatever plan for change we come up with will be neither perfect, not maintenance free. It will have to be adjusted and modified as we find out where the flaws are. What he knows is that this is an existential battle and if big money wins again we are in for another twenty years are so with a system that is good for certain businesses and bad for everyone else.
Think about this. There are some things that government should be involved in. What if you had to buy police protection insurance or the cops would not show up when you called? What if the courts would not prosecute people who committed crimes against you because that was not covered in your police protection insurance policy? What if your policy for police insurance did not cover misdemeanors but only felony crimes against you or if you were only allowed three calls to the police a year and after that you had to pay for it out of your own pocket? Then there is fire protection. What if you were required to have fire protection insurance in order for the fire department to respond to a fire at your home? What if you could not afford fire protection insurance so nobody would come to put out your house fire when you called 911 but they would come to prevent the fire from spreading to your neighbors house in the event they were insured? Communities and governments realize that it is in the best interest of everyone to provide police and fire protection to everyone. Shouldn't health care be one of those things that a civilized and humane society provides to its citizens?
Maybe a government sponsored health care plan, or some other kind of truly equitable plan for health care, is something democracies do for their people. Maybe it has nothing to do with socialism but rather responsible and responsive government for the people, by the people and of the people? I think that is the case. If you do not believe me make a comparison with China.
The largest remaining Communist country in the world (although it is really an oligarchy and there has never been a true communist country since they all end up being ran by tyrants or elites), China, has a horrible health care system that requires you pay as you go with no safety net for health care for the poor to speak of. Paradoxically, communist China has deliberately picked a market-based health care system just like us. So maybe a public health care system and socialism are not necessarily synonymous. But, maybe a market-based health care system and control by an elite are?
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Following Your Rav to the Bathroom
One of the giants of Torah, R. Akiba, told how he followed R. Joshua to the privy and learned three things (Berakoth 62a). I remember once following one of my teachers, Rabbi Yari, out of the bathroom at a seminar in St. Louis to ask a question and he very nicely held up a finger to delay the interaction and recited the asher yatzar benediction (prayer said after going to the bathroom) and then devoted his full attention to answering me. Instead of reading about it in a book I was able to see the mitzvah of that particular blessing demonstrated before me in real life. Seeing great teachers in private and perhaps intimate moments has a long tradition in Jewish life.
My own journey to Orthodox Judaism has been long, arduous, and even incomplete. However, despite that ongoing struggle I have learned much and would like to comment on that as well as my wife's return, בעלת תשובה, from the perspective of a social worker which I most certainly am, rather than a Talmudic scholar which I am most certainly not.
There are many excellent books, a plethora of outstanding web sites, and many wonderful outreach organizations for Jews, and even a few good resources for persons wanting to convert properly under Jewish law (Halacha). YouTube even has a huge collection of frum videos showing you how to say certain blessings and perform mitzvot. What is missing is hands on instruction and direct observation. Some things you just cannot learn from a book, or even a video. You have to be in a posistion to follow your Rav to the bathroom. The question is how to get there.
The obvious answer is to move to an observant community. That will be the subject of a whole other post but for now suffice it to say that in many cases that is much easier said than done. We are a case in point. The other is being allowed to be engaged in Jewish life rather than being a guest and assigning mentors that go beyond studying with you to show you how to get things done.
Case in point is when we went kosher. We learned some painful lessons (mostly of an economic nature), and hard lessons that could have been avoided with just good advice and living examples. If it was not for the practical advice of a Chabad rabbi in St. Louis and a set of methodical lectures, hours long in length, that I inadvertantly found on the internet we would have never gotten it done. What we needed was somebody to come here and say this is the way you do it and to walk us through the process. My wife would have benefited greatly by just being in someone's kitchen while they showed her how things were done, and ideally perhaps several people. It is one thing to be invited for Shabbos, very nice, but another to have someone say come over and let me show you how to run a kitchen. It was for this very reason that I taught extra classes last semester to be able to send my kids to a Jewish camp.
This summer my two daughters attended Camp Nageelah Midwest. It was a wonderful experience and it did everything I wanted it to do. My girls were exposed to wonderful female role models who guided them on a daily basis and worked with them on the practical aspects of living a Jewish life. A couple of days ago one of my daughters walked by while I was saying the morning prayer. I was facing Jerusalem, read that in a book, but she told me I was doing it wrong since I was not in front of a window. She just picked that up as part of the everyday routine from her camping experience.
It is one thing to have a study partner, anther to experience Shabbos hospitality, but seeing your rav come out of the bathroom and helping somebody peel potatoes in a kosher kitchen is important too. It is all about socialization. You do not get that from a book.
My own journey to Orthodox Judaism has been long, arduous, and even incomplete. However, despite that ongoing struggle I have learned much and would like to comment on that as well as my wife's return, בעלת תשובה, from the perspective of a social worker which I most certainly am, rather than a Talmudic scholar which I am most certainly not.
There are many excellent books, a plethora of outstanding web sites, and many wonderful outreach organizations for Jews, and even a few good resources for persons wanting to convert properly under Jewish law (Halacha). YouTube even has a huge collection of frum videos showing you how to say certain blessings and perform mitzvot. What is missing is hands on instruction and direct observation. Some things you just cannot learn from a book, or even a video. You have to be in a posistion to follow your Rav to the bathroom. The question is how to get there.
The obvious answer is to move to an observant community. That will be the subject of a whole other post but for now suffice it to say that in many cases that is much easier said than done. We are a case in point. The other is being allowed to be engaged in Jewish life rather than being a guest and assigning mentors that go beyond studying with you to show you how to get things done.
Case in point is when we went kosher. We learned some painful lessons (mostly of an economic nature), and hard lessons that could have been avoided with just good advice and living examples. If it was not for the practical advice of a Chabad rabbi in St. Louis and a set of methodical lectures, hours long in length, that I inadvertantly found on the internet we would have never gotten it done. What we needed was somebody to come here and say this is the way you do it and to walk us through the process. My wife would have benefited greatly by just being in someone's kitchen while they showed her how things were done, and ideally perhaps several people. It is one thing to be invited for Shabbos, very nice, but another to have someone say come over and let me show you how to run a kitchen. It was for this very reason that I taught extra classes last semester to be able to send my kids to a Jewish camp.
This summer my two daughters attended Camp Nageelah Midwest. It was a wonderful experience and it did everything I wanted it to do. My girls were exposed to wonderful female role models who guided them on a daily basis and worked with them on the practical aspects of living a Jewish life. A couple of days ago one of my daughters walked by while I was saying the morning prayer. I was facing Jerusalem, read that in a book, but she told me I was doing it wrong since I was not in front of a window. She just picked that up as part of the everyday routine from her camping experience.
It is one thing to have a study partner, anther to experience Shabbos hospitality, but seeing your rav come out of the bathroom and helping somebody peel potatoes in a kosher kitchen is important too. It is all about socialization. You do not get that from a book.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Camp Nageela
These are the pictures from Hannah and Rachel's packing and first day at Camp Nageela Midwest where they will be for three weeks coming back home in mid July. It is a strange experience to drop your kids off for three weeks especially when the longest they have been away from home and/or family has been two days.
Jenifer and I drove fifteen kids from St. Louis to the camp in two very packed vans with LOTS of luggage. We started out that morning at 9 a.m. in St. Louis and arrived back home in Columbia at 2 a.m. in the morning.
Watching the Camp Nageela video one last time
Arriving
Checking In
Hannah's Cabin
Hannah's Room
Pictures of the Grounds
Rachel's Cabin
Monday, June 22, 2009
Israeli Scout Caravan 2009
On 28 Sivan 5769, June 20th 2009 in the secular calendar, one of the Israeli Scout Caravans visited congregation Beth Shalom in Columbia, Missouri. These young people from Israel follow a grueling schedule with very little time for sightseeing. It is It was a wonderful experience for members of the congregation and our guest from the community. Here is a video tribute to that experience.
Please note that the original photographs are much sharper. In order to get the file size for this video under the allowed limit the quality of the images suffered.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
John Ashcroft at Truman State University
When my daughter graduated from Truman State University on 9 May 2009 I was able to witness John Ashcroft receiving an honorary doctorate and listen to his rather rambling speech. John Ashcroft is a former Missouri governor and was the United States Attorney General during George Bush's first term.
This is a picture taken from the stands of John Ashcroft as he was giving his speech.
Both the decision to award John Ashcroft the doctorate and the opposition of some faculty and students who disagreed is understandable. The issue even became a bit of a cause célèbre with the American Association of University Professers which is sort of like risking the ire of other such powerful, and influential, shapers of American public opinion as the American Communist Party - but I digress.
John Ashcroft was instrumental in the rivatalization of the Northeast Missouri State University as it transformed into Truman State University. Arguably he served with some distinction as a Missouri govenour. As a matter of fact, so far he is the only Republican to have been elected to the Missouri governors office for two consecutive terms. After that he was elected to the United States Senate but was defeated by his deceased opponent Mel Carnahan (eventually the senate seat was given to former Missouri Lieutenant Governor Roger Wilson). However he did take up with a bad crowd and ended up involved in all the shenanigans surrounding torture and the abridgment of constitutional rights we experienced under the last Bush administratioin.
John Ashcroft, pictured in the middle, walking off the field at Truman State University's May 2009 graduation.
As a member of the Bush team he supported the USA PATRIOT Act including the infamous Section 215.
Most of what I have written so far is commonly known. What is conveniently forgotten is that John Ashcroft had decided to stand up to the White House and oppose a National Security Agency wiretapping program. Evidently he was having concerns with how the White House was riding rough shod over civil liberties. Remember too that Ashcroft did not stick around for the next four years. Here is a quote from an outstanding article from the online magazone Salon:
So begins a remarkable tale that nearly led to the resignation of the Justice Department's senior leadership, an ordeal that was recounted in great detail for the first time Tuesday. Two senior White House officials, Andrew Card and Alberto Gonzales, were headed to Ashcroft's hospital bed, despite the instructions of his wife that there would be no phone calls or visitors. They wanted Ashcroft to sign off on the secret National Security Agency wiretapping program, a program that Ashcroft had already decided to reject before falling ill.
The Ashcroft-Gonzales Hospital Room Showdown
John Ashcroft as he walked past me just before exiting the venue.
In my book Alberto Gonzales operated at the same low level of integrity as Condolezza Rice whose blind ambition and ignorant loyalty to a president of mediocre talents will become legendary. The term henchman comes to mind. It seems clear that more powerful people who began to develop a difference of opinion with the President such as Ashcroft and Collin Powell were pushed out in favor of lesser lights who just told the president whatever he wanted to hear.
As we began to learn more about the dirty secrets of the Bush administration we will certainly hear more about Alberto Gonzales who was eventually forced to resign. In January of this year the New York Times carried an excellent editorial about Gonzales that I recommend you read.
This is what I have to say about Ashcroft. I do not agree with everything he has said or done but I do not think he is anywhere close to the level of the bottom-feeders that populated the White House during the second Bush administration. Also, he desperately needs a speech writer. I am not kidding. His rambling speeches are nearly incoherent and make him sound like an idiot. The mild protest that occurred at Truman were nothing compared to the treatment he received at Knox College where his speech was similarly reported to have been equally as incoherent as the speech at Truman.
I also think there are two reasons, at polar ends of the integrity scale, that keep him from telling all he knows. The first is that it would hurt his business propositions as he tries to make a buck leading the Ashcroft Group Consulting Services. The second? I think John Ashcroft might actually have some integrity bruised and battered as it may be. The whole story has yet to be told. Contact me John, ... I would love to hear it.
One final comment. Besides the hospital incident with John Ashcroft we have forgotten one other thing. 9-11 shook us up, and a lot of people are in denial now about that fact. 9-11 not only scared the bejesus out of us it scared the whole world. It was a desperate time and we were desperate to find a way to respond to what happened, and again let me emphasize that it was not only us. There was a visceral global response to a horrific act. It is perhaps understandable that we overreacted with water boarding and in other ways as well. Not right, but understandable. What is not understandable however is that instead of moderating and fine tuning our response something else happened. Our reaction become more hysterical, less defensible, and more fanatical as group think took over the White House and incompetency became the order of the day.
This is a picture taken from the stands of John Ashcroft as he was giving his speech.
Both the decision to award John Ashcroft the doctorate and the opposition of some faculty and students who disagreed is understandable. The issue even became a bit of a cause célèbre with the American Association of University Professers which is sort of like risking the ire of other such powerful, and influential, shapers of American public opinion as the American Communist Party - but I digress.
John Ashcroft was instrumental in the rivatalization of the Northeast Missouri State University as it transformed into Truman State University. Arguably he served with some distinction as a Missouri govenour. As a matter of fact, so far he is the only Republican to have been elected to the Missouri governors office for two consecutive terms. After that he was elected to the United States Senate but was defeated by his deceased opponent Mel Carnahan (eventually the senate seat was given to former Missouri Lieutenant Governor Roger Wilson). However he did take up with a bad crowd and ended up involved in all the shenanigans surrounding torture and the abridgment of constitutional rights we experienced under the last Bush administratioin.
John Ashcroft, pictured in the middle, walking off the field at Truman State University's May 2009 graduation.
As a member of the Bush team he supported the USA PATRIOT Act including the infamous Section 215.
Most of what I have written so far is commonly known. What is conveniently forgotten is that John Ashcroft had decided to stand up to the White House and oppose a National Security Agency wiretapping program. Evidently he was having concerns with how the White House was riding rough shod over civil liberties. Remember too that Ashcroft did not stick around for the next four years. Here is a quote from an outstanding article from the online magazone Salon:
So begins a remarkable tale that nearly led to the resignation of the Justice Department's senior leadership, an ordeal that was recounted in great detail for the first time Tuesday. Two senior White House officials, Andrew Card and Alberto Gonzales, were headed to Ashcroft's hospital bed, despite the instructions of his wife that there would be no phone calls or visitors. They wanted Ashcroft to sign off on the secret National Security Agency wiretapping program, a program that Ashcroft had already decided to reject before falling ill.
The Ashcroft-Gonzales Hospital Room Showdown
John Ashcroft as he walked past me just before exiting the venue.
In my book Alberto Gonzales operated at the same low level of integrity as Condolezza Rice whose blind ambition and ignorant loyalty to a president of mediocre talents will become legendary. The term henchman comes to mind. It seems clear that more powerful people who began to develop a difference of opinion with the President such as Ashcroft and Collin Powell were pushed out in favor of lesser lights who just told the president whatever he wanted to hear.
As we began to learn more about the dirty secrets of the Bush administration we will certainly hear more about Alberto Gonzales who was eventually forced to resign. In January of this year the New York Times carried an excellent editorial about Gonzales that I recommend you read.
This is what I have to say about Ashcroft. I do not agree with everything he has said or done but I do not think he is anywhere close to the level of the bottom-feeders that populated the White House during the second Bush administration. Also, he desperately needs a speech writer. I am not kidding. His rambling speeches are nearly incoherent and make him sound like an idiot. The mild protest that occurred at Truman were nothing compared to the treatment he received at Knox College where his speech was similarly reported to have been equally as incoherent as the speech at Truman.
I also think there are two reasons, at polar ends of the integrity scale, that keep him from telling all he knows. The first is that it would hurt his business propositions as he tries to make a buck leading the Ashcroft Group Consulting Services. The second? I think John Ashcroft might actually have some integrity bruised and battered as it may be. The whole story has yet to be told. Contact me John, ... I would love to hear it.
One final comment. Besides the hospital incident with John Ashcroft we have forgotten one other thing. 9-11 shook us up, and a lot of people are in denial now about that fact. 9-11 not only scared the bejesus out of us it scared the whole world. It was a desperate time and we were desperate to find a way to respond to what happened, and again let me emphasize that it was not only us. There was a visceral global response to a horrific act. It is perhaps understandable that we overreacted with water boarding and in other ways as well. Not right, but understandable. What is not understandable however is that instead of moderating and fine tuning our response something else happened. Our reaction become more hysterical, less defensible, and more fanatical as group think took over the White House and incompetency became the order of the day.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Hebrew Lessons
The National Jewish Outreach Program runs a whole series of educational events throughout the United States and Canada. Perhaps the most well known is Shabbat Across America which Congregation Beth Shalom, of Columbia Missouri, has participated in during the last ten years and which is in the early planning stages for this year.
Currently the congregation is hosting a beginning Hebrew class using the material provided free of charge from the National Jewish Outreach Program.
Above is our head instructor, Irwin Kaye, instructing the Sunday morning class. On Sunday the first hour is a review and a tutorial and the second hour is the regularly scheduled class.
Two participants talk during the break between the tutorial and the regular class.
Below everyone gets back to work as learning commences after a short break.
Stay posted for a review of Alan Dershowitz's new video The Case for Israel coming soon.
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