...instead of reining in trial lawyers:
Chicago USA Monday AM 24 August 2009
Editors, The Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
A fine letter from the US in the Monday, August 24 Financial Times asks: "Would we really rather reduce [healthcare] benefits... than think about reining in the absurd awards trial lawyers regularly walk away with?"
Follow the money: Tort lawyers make lots of money, and give lots of it to politicians' election campaigns.
On the other hand, the only tax 2/3 of voters pay is a hidden national sales tax that funds 2/3 of the US federal government:
In 2007, the federal government took in a total of $2.692 trillion, 62% of which was withheld from wages (2009 Statistical Abstract of US, table #462.) So nearly 2/3 of all the actual dollars that came into the US general fund were from employer bank accounts, not employee's. Employers pass all of this on to customers in higher prices, resulting in almost 2/3 of federal income coming from an invisible national sales tax. This hoax started with the 1943 Current Tax Payment Act, but a regularly expanding national economy makes it all but painless to voters, resulting in their lack of interest in what Congress spends or does.
This problem could be fixed by the House and Senate passing, and a willing president signing, an act to change paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." The employer would still calculate the tax, and remind each payee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days"
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy. But writing a check on their personal bank accounts to the Federal Government every month for 20% of their take-home pay would give voters strong incentive to stop voting for tort-lawyer supporters.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 No Marine Dr Chicago IL 60640 773-677-3010
Monday, August 24, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Email to Newt Gingrich
Chicago IL PM Sunday 23 August 2009
To: Newt Gingrich
Mr. Speaker:
In 1994 you engineered one of the three biggest takeovers of the US House of Representatives in history, picking up 54 seats, ending 40 years of Democrat party control, and severely crimping the ambitions of the 42nd president. You accomplished this unparalleled breakthrough with an entirely new approach - nationalizing a congressional election for the first time in history, with an entirely new tool, the Contract with America.
In 2010 we face a Democrat majority that has done more damage in two years than those 40 years that you ended. And now they have a President even more demented than they are. So here is a New Contract, for a new, but even more dangerous situation than we had after 40 years of Democrat control.
REPUBLICAN CONTRACT WITH AMERICA 2010
1] On the first day of the 112th Congress, the new Republican majority will immediately begin a promise made by the great Democrat President Franklin Delano Roosevelt who said in a speech to 5,000 people in Pittsburgh PA on Wednesday evening, October 19, 1932: "I shall approach the problem of carrying out the plain precept of our party, which is to reduce the cost of the current Federal Government operations by 25 per cent." [You can look it up.]
2] Next, we shall replace the traditional opening prayer led by a member of the clergy with a group recitation of the 158-word prayer written by our Founders:
"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed....
"And for the support of this Declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and...
our SACRED HONOR."
We will continue to recite these words at the opening of every session the people of the USA allows us to conduct. And we will make a strong, if non-binding, official Congressional suggestion to every local school board in the nation to have every school day started with the same recitation by all students.
We will also require of each voting Representative a signed affidavit for each bill they cast a vote for that they have actually read the bill, cover-to-cover.
Thereafter, within the first 100 days of the 112th Congress, we shall bring to the House Floor the following bills, each to be given full and open debate, each to be given a clear and fair vote and each to be immediately available this day for public inspection and scrutiny.
All legislation will be based on the recognition that the federal government can do only two things with other peoples' money: take it away from some, and give it to others.
3] We will implement the Enumerated Powers act, requiring all bills passed by congress to include their constitutional justification, expanded to include what James Madison wrote, in his Federalist Number 41, clarifying what the Founders' meant in Article I Section 8 by "provide... for the general welfare":
"Some critics say that the power to 'provide for the... general welfare...' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare....
"But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
That 'specification' is a list of 17 things Congress is Constitutionally allowed to do. Not a word about Social Security, Medicare, a Department of Education, or telling car companies how to build cars.
4] We will initiate a Constitutional Amendment repealing the ill-conceived 17th amendment that, by making Senators elected directly by the people, politicized a body the Founders specifically wanted to be non-political, by making its members elected by state legislatures. (It was only after three successive Senate elections following the Passing of this amendment that the senate saw its first party leader.)
5] In 2007, the federal government took in a total of $2.692 trillion, 62% of which was withheld from wages (2009 Statistical Abstract of US, table #462.) So nearly 2/3 of all the actual dollars that came into the US general fund were from employer bank accounts, not employee's (forget the strong implication if the money were not withheld, employers would give it to employees as wages. Also, if the money doesn't get to the feds, the employers go to jail, never the wage earners.)
Employers pass all of this on to customers in higher prices, resulting in almost 2/3 of federal income coming from an invisible national sales tax. This hoax has been going on since the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, but because of a regularly expanding national economy, it's all but painless to voters, resulting in their lack of interest in what Congress spends.
This problem could be fixed with a Voter responsibility act, changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." The employer would still calculate the tax, replacing the reassuring (but thoroly misleading) note "you earned and your employer paid" with "here is how much the feds are expecting you to send in within 30 days"
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy. But writing a check on their personal bank accounts to the Federal Government every month for 20% of their take-home pay would give voters strong incentive to vote the spenders out of office.
Would it be easy to do? Not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 25 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and two elections of a president. Soon enough congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it.
6] Recognizing that all federal income goes in the same account, we will replace all unrealisticly individually designated taxes (Social Security, Medicare) with a single rate tax on individual income. If the rate is 20%, someone making $1 million/week will pay $200K/week, someone making $100/week, will pay $20/week.
As possibly advantageous as it may be, individual home ownership is no business of the federal government - no more tax deduction for interest. And the entire income tax deduction list will be carefully examined for dropping of any deductions even less justifiable than the mortgage deduction.
At the same time we will elinate all corporate income taxes, since as the corporations are made up of individuals, these taxes result in double taxation.
7] Recognizinbg that every increase in the federally mandated minimum wage results in either jobs being lost, new jobs not being offered, or both, we will rescind this federal intervention in the private sector.
8] Recognizing that letting people who pay no federal income taxes vote for representatives who can give them money back, we will enact whatever necessary (amendment or statute) to limit voting rights to actual, check-writing taxpayers. Also, federal ballots will be printed only in English, a subtle hint that to exercise citizenship rights, you must speak the American Language, English.
9] Realizing that the Land use act of 1785 and the Morrill act of 1863 did not give local schools any money, only land as an endowment, and assumed no more control than to stipulate that income from such endowments will be used only for public education, the federal department of Education will be abolished.
10] ‘Dual Citizenship’ will be eliminated. Part of naturalization will include signing a document renouncing all allegiance to any country besides the USA. Anyone who obtains citizenship in another country will automatically be renouncing their US citizensip. Also, by whatever means necessary, statute or amendment, the so-called ‘anchor baby’ anachronism will be eliminated. To get birthright citizenship you must have at least one parent a US citizen.
11] Realizing that coal, oil, and natural gas, are absolutely necessary to the maintenance of our economy and living standard, and that there appears no reasonable chance of our running out of any of these resources even in our own country for at least many generations, we will open up all lands and seabed to exploration and mining/drilling, subject only to reasonable environmental regulation for health, safety and aesthetics. Further, because of the actual. Proven, pitiful potential of so-called biofuels, wind, and solar, we will stop all federal funding of such studies, leaving it to the ever-resourceful private sector to do our searching/testing for us.
12] Our planet earth is 4.5 billion years old, and the fundamental tool of climate investigation, the thermometer was invented only 445 years ago. Using a simple mathematical model of comparing the earth to an 80 year lifetime, we had our first tool for studying climate only 3 minutes 53 seconds ago. Recognizing this hoax for what it is, we will stop funding of all so-called 'global warming' and 'climate change' study, again leaving it to the private sector.
Now, Mr. Speaker, comes your part: This contract will obviously be assiduously studied and presented by press, TV and the blogosphere, but the most effective presentation would be by you presenting it in personal visits to each of the 435 Congressional districts, which you know all so well, between now and November 2010. We know the original Contract did well with Reagan Democrats - a 2010 version addressing each of these 12 points, would do at least as well, and after the disaster our Democrat president is building, a new contract may even go over well with so-called ‘independents’ and ‘moderates.’
On top of that, what could be a better start for a 2012 presidential nomination?
Arnold H Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive
Chicago IL 60640
773-677-3010
ah_nelson@yahoo.com
To: Newt Gingrich
Mr. Speaker:
In 1994 you engineered one of the three biggest takeovers of the US House of Representatives in history, picking up 54 seats, ending 40 years of Democrat party control, and severely crimping the ambitions of the 42nd president. You accomplished this unparalleled breakthrough with an entirely new approach - nationalizing a congressional election for the first time in history, with an entirely new tool, the Contract with America.
In 2010 we face a Democrat majority that has done more damage in two years than those 40 years that you ended. And now they have a President even more demented than they are. So here is a New Contract, for a new, but even more dangerous situation than we had after 40 years of Democrat control.
REPUBLICAN CONTRACT WITH AMERICA 2010
1] On the first day of the 112th Congress, the new Republican majority will immediately begin a promise made by the great Democrat President Franklin Delano Roosevelt who said in a speech to 5,000 people in Pittsburgh PA on Wednesday evening, October 19, 1932: "I shall approach the problem of carrying out the plain precept of our party, which is to reduce the cost of the current Federal Government operations by 25 per cent." [You can look it up.]
2] Next, we shall replace the traditional opening prayer led by a member of the clergy with a group recitation of the 158-word prayer written by our Founders:
"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed....
"And for the support of this Declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and...
our SACRED HONOR."
We will continue to recite these words at the opening of every session the people of the USA allows us to conduct. And we will make a strong, if non-binding, official Congressional suggestion to every local school board in the nation to have every school day started with the same recitation by all students.
We will also require of each voting Representative a signed affidavit for each bill they cast a vote for that they have actually read the bill, cover-to-cover.
Thereafter, within the first 100 days of the 112th Congress, we shall bring to the House Floor the following bills, each to be given full and open debate, each to be given a clear and fair vote and each to be immediately available this day for public inspection and scrutiny.
All legislation will be based on the recognition that the federal government can do only two things with other peoples' money: take it away from some, and give it to others.
3] We will implement the Enumerated Powers act, requiring all bills passed by congress to include their constitutional justification, expanded to include what James Madison wrote, in his Federalist Number 41, clarifying what the Founders' meant in Article I Section 8 by "provide... for the general welfare":
"Some critics say that the power to 'provide for the... general welfare...' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare....
"But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
That 'specification' is a list of 17 things Congress is Constitutionally allowed to do. Not a word about Social Security, Medicare, a Department of Education, or telling car companies how to build cars.
4] We will initiate a Constitutional Amendment repealing the ill-conceived 17th amendment that, by making Senators elected directly by the people, politicized a body the Founders specifically wanted to be non-political, by making its members elected by state legislatures. (It was only after three successive Senate elections following the Passing of this amendment that the senate saw its first party leader.)
5] In 2007, the federal government took in a total of $2.692 trillion, 62% of which was withheld from wages (2009 Statistical Abstract of US, table #462.) So nearly 2/3 of all the actual dollars that came into the US general fund were from employer bank accounts, not employee's (forget the strong implication if the money were not withheld, employers would give it to employees as wages. Also, if the money doesn't get to the feds, the employers go to jail, never the wage earners.)
Employers pass all of this on to customers in higher prices, resulting in almost 2/3 of federal income coming from an invisible national sales tax. This hoax has been going on since the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, but because of a regularly expanding national economy, it's all but painless to voters, resulting in their lack of interest in what Congress spends.
This problem could be fixed with a Voter responsibility act, changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." The employer would still calculate the tax, replacing the reassuring (but thoroly misleading) note "you earned and your employer paid" with "here is how much the feds are expecting you to send in within 30 days"
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy. But writing a check on their personal bank accounts to the Federal Government every month for 20% of their take-home pay would give voters strong incentive to vote the spenders out of office.
Would it be easy to do? Not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 25 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and two elections of a president. Soon enough congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it.
6] Recognizing that all federal income goes in the same account, we will replace all unrealisticly individually designated taxes (Social Security, Medicare) with a single rate tax on individual income. If the rate is 20%, someone making $1 million/week will pay $200K/week, someone making $100/week, will pay $20/week.
As possibly advantageous as it may be, individual home ownership is no business of the federal government - no more tax deduction for interest. And the entire income tax deduction list will be carefully examined for dropping of any deductions even less justifiable than the mortgage deduction.
At the same time we will elinate all corporate income taxes, since as the corporations are made up of individuals, these taxes result in double taxation.
7] Recognizinbg that every increase in the federally mandated minimum wage results in either jobs being lost, new jobs not being offered, or both, we will rescind this federal intervention in the private sector.
8] Recognizing that letting people who pay no federal income taxes vote for representatives who can give them money back, we will enact whatever necessary (amendment or statute) to limit voting rights to actual, check-writing taxpayers. Also, federal ballots will be printed only in English, a subtle hint that to exercise citizenship rights, you must speak the American Language, English.
9] Realizing that the Land use act of 1785 and the Morrill act of 1863 did not give local schools any money, only land as an endowment, and assumed no more control than to stipulate that income from such endowments will be used only for public education, the federal department of Education will be abolished.
10] ‘Dual Citizenship’ will be eliminated. Part of naturalization will include signing a document renouncing all allegiance to any country besides the USA. Anyone who obtains citizenship in another country will automatically be renouncing their US citizensip. Also, by whatever means necessary, statute or amendment, the so-called ‘anchor baby’ anachronism will be eliminated. To get birthright citizenship you must have at least one parent a US citizen.
11] Realizing that coal, oil, and natural gas, are absolutely necessary to the maintenance of our economy and living standard, and that there appears no reasonable chance of our running out of any of these resources even in our own country for at least many generations, we will open up all lands and seabed to exploration and mining/drilling, subject only to reasonable environmental regulation for health, safety and aesthetics. Further, because of the actual. Proven, pitiful potential of so-called biofuels, wind, and solar, we will stop all federal funding of such studies, leaving it to the ever-resourceful private sector to do our searching/testing for us.
12] Our planet earth is 4.5 billion years old, and the fundamental tool of climate investigation, the thermometer was invented only 445 years ago. Using a simple mathematical model of comparing the earth to an 80 year lifetime, we had our first tool for studying climate only 3 minutes 53 seconds ago. Recognizing this hoax for what it is, we will stop funding of all so-called 'global warming' and 'climate change' study, again leaving it to the private sector.
Now, Mr. Speaker, comes your part: This contract will obviously be assiduously studied and presented by press, TV and the blogosphere, but the most effective presentation would be by you presenting it in personal visits to each of the 435 Congressional districts, which you know all so well, between now and November 2010. We know the original Contract did well with Reagan Democrats - a 2010 version addressing each of these 12 points, would do at least as well, and after the disaster our Democrat president is building, a new contract may even go over well with so-called ‘independents’ and ‘moderates.’
On top of that, what could be a better start for a 2012 presidential nomination?
Arnold H Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive
Chicago IL 60640
773-677-3010
ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
"Massacre or battle?"
Chicago Tuesday PM, 18 August 2009 Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople:
Your "Massacre or battle?" editorial of Tuesday, August 18, attempting to justify the knee-jerk politically correct renaming of the site of the Saturday, August 15, 1812 Fort Dearborn Massacre is an assault on the bedrock foundation of newspapers: words. Battle means one thing, massacre means another.
Will Chicago's Native American citizens reenact the battle at the new park? Will they celebrate their victory? Will you issue a correction of your Friday, September 1, 1995 statement "During... the massacre of the Marlins, Cubs General Manager Ed Lynch was busy...."
What next? The Battle of Sand Creek (29 November 1864)? The Battle of St. Valentine's day?
Arnold H Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive
Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010
ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Gentlepeople:
Your "Massacre or battle?" editorial of Tuesday, August 18, attempting to justify the knee-jerk politically correct renaming of the site of the Saturday, August 15, 1812 Fort Dearborn Massacre is an assault on the bedrock foundation of newspapers: words. Battle means one thing, massacre means another.
Will Chicago's Native American citizens reenact the battle at the new park? Will they celebrate their victory? Will you issue a correction of your Friday, September 1, 1995 statement "During... the massacre of the Marlins, Cubs General Manager Ed Lynch was busy...."
What next? The Battle of Sand Creek (29 November 1864)? The Battle of St. Valentine's day?
Arnold H Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive
Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010
ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Melting arctic sea ice and the New York Times
Thursday, August 28, 2008 10:55 PM
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
Your Thursday, August 28 article "As Arctic Sea Ice Melts...."brought back amusing memories of a similar Times article of Saturday, August 19, 2000, John Noble Wilford's "The North Pole is melting" that breathlessly declared: "[A]n ice-free patch of ocean about a mile wide has opened at the very top of the world, ... more evidence that global warming may be real...."
That was followed only four days later by an equally bedazzled climate change enthusiast's Op-Ed "In the (Un)Frozen North" that started right out: "The 19th century's dream of an open polar sea has become the 21st century's nightmare."
But then five days later, Mr. Wilford wrote another article (Tuesday, August 29, 2000) quoting another expert: "[T]here's nothing to be necessarily alarmed about. There's been open water at the pole before."
Finally, the Times made honest journalists out of themselves with this Correction:
"A front-page article in the August 19, 2000 edition ... about the sighting of open water at the North Pole misstated the normal conditions of the sea ice there...."
But there still seems to be a problem with the most recent article, that starts out "[Officials have] reported that sea ice in the Arctic now covers about 2.03 million square miles" pointing out that this could be on the way to a new "record" since "the lowest point since satellite measurements began in 1979 was 1.65 million square miles, last September."
Folks, the earth is 4.5 billion years old, and you are concerned with the possibility of a record... for the last 29 years? A little simple arithmetic shows that the last 29 years of 4.5 billion years is equivalent to the last 8 seconds of a 40-year-old human's lifetime. If a doctor detected a pulse rate change in that subject over such a period, would he declare “We’re moving ... beyond a point of no return” as the head of a "multinational scientific assessment of Arctic conditions" is quoted in the article?
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640 ah_nelson@yahoo.com 773-677-3010
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
Your Thursday, August 28 article "As Arctic Sea Ice Melts...."brought back amusing memories of a similar Times article of Saturday, August 19, 2000, John Noble Wilford's "The North Pole is melting" that breathlessly declared: "[A]n ice-free patch of ocean about a mile wide has opened at the very top of the world, ... more evidence that global warming may be real...."
That was followed only four days later by an equally bedazzled climate change enthusiast's Op-Ed "In the (Un)Frozen North" that started right out: "The 19th century's dream of an open polar sea has become the 21st century's nightmare."
But then five days later, Mr. Wilford wrote another article (Tuesday, August 29, 2000) quoting another expert: "[T]here's nothing to be necessarily alarmed about. There's been open water at the pole before."
Finally, the Times made honest journalists out of themselves with this Correction:
"A front-page article in the August 19, 2000 edition ... about the sighting of open water at the North Pole misstated the normal conditions of the sea ice there...."
But there still seems to be a problem with the most recent article, that starts out "[Officials have] reported that sea ice in the Arctic now covers about 2.03 million square miles" pointing out that this could be on the way to a new "record" since "the lowest point since satellite measurements began in 1979 was 1.65 million square miles, last September."
Folks, the earth is 4.5 billion years old, and you are concerned with the possibility of a record... for the last 29 years? A little simple arithmetic shows that the last 29 years of 4.5 billion years is equivalent to the last 8 seconds of a 40-year-old human's lifetime. If a doctor detected a pulse rate change in that subject over such a period, would he declare “We’re moving ... beyond a point of no return” as the head of a "multinational scientific assessment of Arctic conditions" is quoted in the article?
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640 ah_nelson@yahoo.com 773-677-3010
Friday, May 22, 2009
Manitowoc submarines
Friday, May 22, 2009 7:59 PM
To: "Maureen Ryan" @ChicagoTribune.com
Ms. Ryan, your article about Manitowoc submarines in the Friday, May 22 Chicago Tribune was well written and interesting. There were certainly dozens of subs built in Manitowoc during WWII - two dozen, plus four - a total of 28 submarines, according to the Manitowoc Maritime Museum. One of those subs is tied up at their dock.
A sub commander, Edward L Beach wrote a really great book about WWII sub warfare, 'Run Silent Run Deep', subsequently made into a very good B&W movie featuring Clark Gable and Burt Lancaster. The story is about a commander losing his sub to a Japanese destroyer, but surviving, and able to get a new sub - from Manitowoc WI. The book even tells of the commander going to Manitowoc to get it, and testing it out in Lake Michigan.
A point made in the book is that Manitowoc subs were highly thot of by submariners, one reason being that instead of being built on 'ways' like a regular ship, they were built on a spit (very large) so they could be rotated, resulting in all welds being 'top side'.
Keep up the good work.
Arn Nelson at Foster Beach
To: "Maureen Ryan" @ChicagoTribune.com
Ms. Ryan, your article about Manitowoc submarines in the Friday, May 22 Chicago Tribune was well written and interesting. There were certainly dozens of subs built in Manitowoc during WWII - two dozen, plus four - a total of 28 submarines, according to the Manitowoc Maritime Museum. One of those subs is tied up at their dock.
A sub commander, Edward L Beach wrote a really great book about WWII sub warfare, 'Run Silent Run Deep', subsequently made into a very good B&W movie featuring Clark Gable and Burt Lancaster. The story is about a commander losing his sub to a Japanese destroyer, but surviving, and able to get a new sub - from Manitowoc WI. The book even tells of the commander going to Manitowoc to get it, and testing it out in Lake Michigan.
A point made in the book is that Manitowoc subs were highly thot of by submariners, one reason being that instead of being built on 'ways' like a regular ship, they were built on a spit (very large) so they could be rotated, resulting in all welds being 'top side'.
Keep up the good work.
Arn Nelson at Foster Beach
Monday, May 18, 2009
Chicago Tribune on Obama and Corporate Income Taxes
Chicago AM Monday, May 18, 2009
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople:
Your editorial of Saturday, May 9 "A bad tax idea" made good points about President IBM's lack of understanding of the relationship of foreign trade and corporate income taxes. The US Commerce Department's 2009 Statistical Abstract of the US has an interesting figure on this subject: Of the total Federal income of $2.692 trillion in 2007 (the latest year given), only $396 billion (14.7%) came from corporate income taxes.
A maybe even more significant figure from the Abstract is that 62% of that total federal income was withheld from employee wages, so nearly 2/3 of the actual dollars that came into the general fund were from employer bank accounts (even though it is strongly implied that if this money was not with held, employers would have given it to employees as wages.)
Of course, employers pass all of this on to customers in higher prices, resulting in almost 2/3 of federal income coming from a near invisible national sales tax. This has been going on since the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, but because of a regularly expanding national economy, it's all but painless to voters, resulting in their lack of interest in what Congress does with all that money.
This problem could be fixed by 218 house members, 60 Senators, and an agreeable president changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that she also send a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy. But it should also make voters a lot more interested in who they send to Congress.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
[Don't worry - if they had printed it, I would tell you.]
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople:
Your editorial of Saturday, May 9 "A bad tax idea" made good points about President IBM's lack of understanding of the relationship of foreign trade and corporate income taxes. The US Commerce Department's 2009 Statistical Abstract of the US has an interesting figure on this subject: Of the total Federal income of $2.692 trillion in 2007 (the latest year given), only $396 billion (14.7%) came from corporate income taxes.
A maybe even more significant figure from the Abstract is that 62% of that total federal income was withheld from employee wages, so nearly 2/3 of the actual dollars that came into the general fund were from employer bank accounts (even though it is strongly implied that if this money was not with held, employers would have given it to employees as wages.)
Of course, employers pass all of this on to customers in higher prices, resulting in almost 2/3 of federal income coming from a near invisible national sales tax. This has been going on since the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, but because of a regularly expanding national economy, it's all but painless to voters, resulting in their lack of interest in what Congress does with all that money.
This problem could be fixed by 218 house members, 60 Senators, and an agreeable president changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that she also send a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy. But it should also make voters a lot more interested in who they send to Congress.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
[Don't worry - if they had printed it, I would tell you.]
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Rachman in UK Financial Times : WMDs did not exist?
Chicago Tuesday AM 12 May, 2009
Editors, Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
In his Sunday, May 10 book review "A tale of two conflicts with Iraq" Gideon Rachman writes "The second Gulf war was ... fought to pre-empt a threat of attack from weapons of mass destruction that turned out not to exist."
That statement is not provable. All that's been proven is that when we looked in certain places we thot they had been. they weren't there anymore. Unfortunately the only thing that could be proved is if they are dropped on a population center's doorstep sometime, then they did exist, we just didn't know where.
What's important is the US Congress' thots when they passed House Senate Joint Congressional Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." Its 1300 words contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq , including the words 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'nuclear' (4 times,)'al Quaida' once, and 'weapons of mass destruction' (7 times.) This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
Even though the US Congress had not seen such weapons with their own eyes, thot the possibility of their existence high enough to justify recommending the President invade, and most important, paid for that invasion.
The international press throws more than enough conventional wisdom. It is unfortunate that a Financial Times commentator would feel the need to add to it.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North marine Drive Chicago IL 60640 USA
Editors, Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
In his Sunday, May 10 book review "A tale of two conflicts with Iraq" Gideon Rachman writes "The second Gulf war was ... fought to pre-empt a threat of attack from weapons of mass destruction that turned out not to exist."
That statement is not provable. All that's been proven is that when we looked in certain places we thot they had been. they weren't there anymore. Unfortunately the only thing that could be proved is if they are dropped on a population center's doorstep sometime, then they did exist, we just didn't know where.
What's important is the US Congress' thots when they passed House Senate Joint Congressional Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." Its 1300 words contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq , including the words 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'nuclear' (4 times,)'al Quaida' once, and 'weapons of mass destruction' (7 times.) This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
Even though the US Congress had not seen such weapons with their own eyes, thot the possibility of their existence high enough to justify recommending the President invade, and most important, paid for that invasion.
The international press throws more than enough conventional wisdom. It is unfortunate that a Financial Times commentator would feel the need to add to it.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North marine Drive Chicago IL 60640 USA
New York Times on health insurance
Chicago Wednesday AM May 13, 2009
Editors, the New York Times
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times' Tuesday, May 12 editorial "A Moderate Plan for Health Care" talks of "private insurers concerned about profit margins" who "need to generate profits", subjects the Times can certainly speak authoritatively about. Just ask anyone involved with the Boston Globe about the Times concern with its own profit margins and need to generate profits.
The editorial speaks further of "Private plans" who "mostly pass rising ... costs on to the subscriber." And who is more ready to pass their rising costs on to their subscribers?
The editorial also mentions "people who don’t trust private insurers to have their best interest at heart." Maybe the Boston Globe unions could describe whose interests the Times has at heart.
As with any good editorial, the best is saved for last: "It should be possible to design a system... without destroying the private coverage that most Americans have.... The question is whether Republicans in Congress are willing to try."
Since the Democrats have more than comfortable majorities in both houses of Congress, and a President just itching to take over as much of the private sector as he can, why the worry of what the Republicans are willing to try?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Editors, the New York Times
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times' Tuesday, May 12 editorial "A Moderate Plan for Health Care" talks of "private insurers concerned about profit margins" who "need to generate profits", subjects the Times can certainly speak authoritatively about. Just ask anyone involved with the Boston Globe about the Times concern with its own profit margins and need to generate profits.
The editorial speaks further of "Private plans" who "mostly pass rising ... costs on to the subscriber." And who is more ready to pass their rising costs on to their subscribers?
The editorial also mentions "people who don’t trust private insurers to have their best interest at heart." Maybe the Boston Globe unions could describe whose interests the Times has at heart.
As with any good editorial, the best is saved for last: "It should be possible to design a system... without destroying the private coverage that most Americans have.... The question is whether Republicans in Congress are willing to try."
Since the Democrats have more than comfortable majorities in both houses of Congress, and a President just itching to take over as much of the private sector as he can, why the worry of what the Republicans are willing to try?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Thursday, May 7, 2009
WSJ Filibuster-proof majority?
Chicago Thursday PM, May 7, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Daniel Henninger is as good a political writer as any, but why does he waste even eight words to "...giving the Democrats a filibuster-proof Senate majority." ("Should the GOP Forget Reagan?" Thursday, May 7.) Filibuster/cloture is a Senate 'rule of proceeding', and as such, can be set/changed/eliminated anytime 50 senators and a vice president agree to it. The Republicans couldn't do it even to formalize a long tradition of not filibustering judicial nominations. But it would take Democrats only seconds, depending on how much they have to gain from it.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Daniel Henninger is as good a political writer as any, but why does he waste even eight words to "...giving the Democrats a filibuster-proof Senate majority." ("Should the GOP Forget Reagan?" Thursday, May 7.) Filibuster/cloture is a Senate 'rule of proceeding', and as such, can be set/changed/eliminated anytime 50 senators and a vice president agree to it. The Republicans couldn't do it even to formalize a long tradition of not filibustering judicial nominations. But it would take Democrats only seconds, depending on how much they have to gain from it.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Monday, May 4, 2009
Response to GWB hater letter in Chicago Tribune
Chicago PM Monday 4 May 2009
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Monday, May 4 Chicago Tribune "Americans' rights" says "we elected a president [in 2000 and 2004] who chose to involve us in a war in Iraq.... to satisfy the insecurities and arrogance of a man ill-equipped to handle the job the voters of this country gave to him."
The writer apparently has not read House Senate Joint Congressional Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." Its 1300 words (less than the two editorials and five other letters on this editorial page) contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, including the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'nuclear' (4 times) and 'al Quaida' once. (Curiously, it does not contain the word 'oil'.) This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
As for President Bush being "ill-equipped to handle the job the voters of this country gave to him" before becoming President he managed a private-sector business with a $60 million payroll for 5 years, then was elected Governor of the nation's second largest state (with a 1500 mile international border,) and reelected by a 2 to 1 majority. Compare this to the present occupant, whose largest payroll ever met was baby-sitter fees, whose international experience was five crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia, and governmental experience eight years as an Illinois State Senator, a job requiring no more skill than a Chicago Bears third-string jock strap attendant, but without the responsibility.
Arrogance comparison is left as an exercise for the reader. Insecurities? Watch their non-teleprompter enhanced performance.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Monday, May 4 Chicago Tribune "Americans' rights" says "we elected a president [in 2000 and 2004] who chose to involve us in a war in Iraq.... to satisfy the insecurities and arrogance of a man ill-equipped to handle the job the voters of this country gave to him."
The writer apparently has not read House Senate Joint Congressional Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." Its 1300 words (less than the two editorials and five other letters on this editorial page) contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, including the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'nuclear' (4 times) and 'al Quaida' once. (Curiously, it does not contain the word 'oil'.) This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
As for President Bush being "ill-equipped to handle the job the voters of this country gave to him" before becoming President he managed a private-sector business with a $60 million payroll for 5 years, then was elected Governor of the nation's second largest state (with a 1500 mile international border,) and reelected by a 2 to 1 majority. Compare this to the present occupant, whose largest payroll ever met was baby-sitter fees, whose international experience was five crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia, and governmental experience eight years as an Illinois State Senator, a job requiring no more skill than a Chicago Bears third-string jock strap attendant, but without the responsibility.
Arrogance comparison is left as an exercise for the reader. Insecurities? Watch their non-teleprompter enhanced performance.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Randy Barnett in WSJ on Federalism Amendment
Chicago Saturday PM May 2 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Mr. Randy Barnett starts his Thursday, April 23 article "The Case for a Federalism Amendment" by pointing out how "hundreds of 'tea party' rallies around the country" are a strong indication of public distaste for "an unprecedented expansion of federal power...." Barnett proposes a "Federalism Amendment" to the US Constitution to stop this.
A better solution may be found by first looking upstream of the problem, specifically, The 2009 Statistical Abstract of the US which says, in 2007, 65% of all federal income came from employer-withheld taxes. This is the scam where the employer must send a tax check to the feds every month based on the number of employees he has, but is also forced to give the employee a written statement saying that if the employer were not so taxed, he would be giving the money to the employee.
Unhappy as the employer may be with this inconvenient truth, he can pass on the entire expense to customers as higher prices. So 65% of the entire federal income is actually a sales tax, silently, near-painlessly, being extracted from the soft underbelly of a regularly expanding US economy.
This problem could be fixed without a Constitutional Amendment, but by 218 house members, 60 Senators, and an agreeable president changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days accompany the paycheck.
This could not be done overnite, but even implementing it on the entire alphabetic list of US citizens, one letter at a time, in 26 months you would have the entire electorate sending in checks from their personal checking accounts for twenty per cent of their pay to the feds every month. This would cause an abrupt change in voters' preferences for congress creatures supporting "expansion of federal power" to supporters of significantly cutting federal spending and the tax rate.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Mr. Randy Barnett starts his Thursday, April 23 article "The Case for a Federalism Amendment" by pointing out how "hundreds of 'tea party' rallies around the country" are a strong indication of public distaste for "an unprecedented expansion of federal power...." Barnett proposes a "Federalism Amendment" to the US Constitution to stop this.
A better solution may be found by first looking upstream of the problem, specifically, The 2009 Statistical Abstract of the US which says, in 2007, 65% of all federal income came from employer-withheld taxes. This is the scam where the employer must send a tax check to the feds every month based on the number of employees he has, but is also forced to give the employee a written statement saying that if the employer were not so taxed, he would be giving the money to the employee.
Unhappy as the employer may be with this inconvenient truth, he can pass on the entire expense to customers as higher prices. So 65% of the entire federal income is actually a sales tax, silently, near-painlessly, being extracted from the soft underbelly of a regularly expanding US economy.
This problem could be fixed without a Constitutional Amendment, but by 218 house members, 60 Senators, and an agreeable president changing paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages'... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days accompany the paycheck.
This could not be done overnite, but even implementing it on the entire alphabetic list of US citizens, one letter at a time, in 26 months you would have the entire electorate sending in checks from their personal checking accounts for twenty per cent of their pay to the feds every month. This would cause an abrupt change in voters' preferences for congress creatures supporting "expansion of federal power" to supporters of significantly cutting federal spending and the tax rate.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
I sent this in to the Wall Street Journal this AM...
...and they used it today at OpinionJournal.com/TheBestOfTheWeb
And so my name is in the contributor's list at the end of the column. I've been in that list well over 80 times in the last eight years, but this is the first time in the last several months. I thot they were mad at me.
From: Arnold Nelson To: "Best of the Web"
Everything Seemingly Is Spinning Out of Control
"Raids disrupt cocaine pipeline into Minnesota"
Minneapolis Star-Tribune Wednesday, April 29, 2009
And so my name is in the contributor's list at the end of the column. I've been in that list well over 80 times in the last eight years, but this is the first time in the last several months. I thot they were mad at me.
From: Arnold Nelson To: "Best of the Web"
Everything Seemingly Is Spinning Out of Control
"Raids disrupt cocaine pipeline into Minnesota"
Minneapolis Star-Tribune Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Texas Senator John Cornyn: Checks and balances?
Tuesday, April 28, 2009 2:18 PM
From: "Arnold Nelson" <ah_nelson@yahoo.com>
To: "Senator John Cornyn" <newsletter@cornyn.senate.gov>
Cc: "Ramesh Ponnuru National Review Mag" <rponnuru@politicalusa.com>
Senator Cornyn:
Your fine newsletter is at the top of my subscription list, and I look forward to it. I was surprised to see you quoted by Ramesh Ponnuru on National Review's Corner blog referring to "checks-and-balances," but implying that they have to do with political parties.
"Checks-and-balances" appears twice in the 192,000 words of the Federalist papers (9 and 51,) but both times referring to departments - legislative, executive, and judicial. Are the words of the Federalist papers being slowly supplanted by common usage now, 220 years later?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 50540 Cornyn on Specter
[Ramesh Ponnuru]
In his statement, Specter thanked Cornyn and McConnell for their "forbearance."
Here's Cornyn's statement (bolded in the original release):
“Senator Specter’s decision today represents the height of political self-preservation. While this presents a short-term disappointment, voters next year will have a clear choice to cast their ballots for a potentially unbridled Democrat super-majority versus the system of checks-and-balances that Americans deserve.”
04/28 01:21 PM NationalReview.com/TheCorner
From: "Arnold Nelson" <ah_nelson@yahoo.com>
To: "Senator John Cornyn" <newsletter@cornyn.senate.gov>
Cc: "Ramesh Ponnuru National Review Mag" <rponnuru@politicalusa.com>
Senator Cornyn:
Your fine newsletter is at the top of my subscription list, and I look forward to it. I was surprised to see you quoted by Ramesh Ponnuru on National Review's Corner blog referring to "checks-and-balances," but implying that they have to do with political parties.
"Checks-and-balances" appears twice in the 192,000 words of the Federalist papers (9 and 51,) but both times referring to departments - legislative, executive, and judicial. Are the words of the Federalist papers being slowly supplanted by common usage now, 220 years later?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 50540 Cornyn on Specter
[Ramesh Ponnuru]
In his statement, Specter thanked Cornyn and McConnell for their "forbearance."
Here's Cornyn's statement (bolded in the original release):
“Senator Specter’s decision today represents the height of political self-preservation. While this presents a short-term disappointment, voters next year will have a clear choice to cast their ballots for a potentially unbridled Democrat super-majority versus the system of checks-and-balances that Americans deserve.”
04/28 01:21 PM NationalReview.com/TheCorner
Sunday, April 26, 2009
ChiTrib letter on George W. Bush's war?
Chicago, Sunday AM, April 26, 2009
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
A letter in the Tuesday, April 22, Chicago Tribune "Tea party shame" speaks of "the trillions it's costing us for George W. Bush's war."
If the writer goes to congress.gov (if he has no computer, I'm sure his local public library staff would be delighted to do it for him) and reads House-Senate Joint Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq" he would learn a lot of what he apparently doesn't know about "Geirge W Bush's war."
Its 1300 words contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, and includes the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'al Quaida' once, and 'nuclear' 4 times. (Curiously, it does not contain the word 'oil'.)
This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.) Every penny of those trillions the war is costing was approved by the Congress. This was not George Bush's war - it was the US Congress' war.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60650
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
A letter in the Tuesday, April 22, Chicago Tribune "Tea party shame" speaks of "the trillions it's costing us for George W. Bush's war."
If the writer goes to congress.gov (if he has no computer, I'm sure his local public library staff would be delighted to do it for him) and reads House-Senate Joint Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq" he would learn a lot of what he apparently doesn't know about "Geirge W Bush's war."
Its 1300 words contain 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, and includes the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'al Quaida' once, and 'nuclear' 4 times. (Curiously, it does not contain the word 'oil'.)
This resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of both houses of Congress (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.) Every penny of those trillions the war is costing was approved by the Congress. This was not George Bush's war - it was the US Congress' war.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60650
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Free help for the Republicans from the British press
Chicago PM Saturday, April 25, 2009
Editors, Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times is a fine newspaper, and I am lucky to have it available to me early every AM. But about the only good thing about your Wednesday April 22 editorial "Republicans slide into disarray" is that it will be ignored.
You begin "The founders of the US were right: checks and balances make for better government." If you would acquaint yourselves with the Federalist papers you would see that 'checks and balances" has nothing to do with political opposition, but specifically with the three branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, so arranged and empowered that they continuously check and balance each other.
Next you say "If the Republicans are to strengthen their position in Congress... and... mount a credible challenge for the White House... they must win back the independent voters.... Didn't we run the most independent of independent Republicans last fall? Look what it got us.
Then you say "Sarah Palin... compounds the party’s problems."
Yes, poor Sarah, with a pathetic 21 months of actual executive experience, as it turns out not only infinitely more than her running mate, but both opposing candidates too. Then you complain that "the [Republican] party keeps striding to the right." Yes, some of us are trying to stride back to 1980-1984, when we won two consecutive landslides with a no-nonsense right-winger, who also had eight years as governor of the largest state. We managed to follow that with a bureaucrat with zero executive experience, to lose to the first Democrat governor who popped up. Then we tried the "who's turn is it" strategy, nominating another legislator with no more executive experience that it takes to run a senate office staff Christmas party, and that foxy hillbilly governor did it to us again.
Then we got things more-or-less together again with someone who at least had 5 years experience meeting a $60 million annual private sector payroll, and 6 years governing the second largest state. He had weaknesses, but not enough for the Democrats to take over with another pair of legislative dunces with no executive experience. And for all that George W Bush was considered descended from 'political royalty' it was Al Gore who would never have got beyond cuttin' 'backy had his father not been a gifted politician.
Britain is a fine place to visit, but from all I read, not too good a place to need health care. And maybe approaching not too good a place to be non-Muslim, considering the rising imminence of Sharia law. So maybe the well earned influence of the Financial Times editorial page would be better applied to fixing your own considerable problems.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640 IL
Editors, Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times is a fine newspaper, and I am lucky to have it available to me early every AM. But about the only good thing about your Wednesday April 22 editorial "Republicans slide into disarray" is that it will be ignored.
You begin "The founders of the US were right: checks and balances make for better government." If you would acquaint yourselves with the Federalist papers you would see that 'checks and balances" has nothing to do with political opposition, but specifically with the three branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, so arranged and empowered that they continuously check and balance each other.
Next you say "If the Republicans are to strengthen their position in Congress... and... mount a credible challenge for the White House... they must win back the independent voters.... Didn't we run the most independent of independent Republicans last fall? Look what it got us.
Then you say "Sarah Palin... compounds the party’s problems."
Yes, poor Sarah, with a pathetic 21 months of actual executive experience, as it turns out not only infinitely more than her running mate, but both opposing candidates too. Then you complain that "the [Republican] party keeps striding to the right." Yes, some of us are trying to stride back to 1980-1984, when we won two consecutive landslides with a no-nonsense right-winger, who also had eight years as governor of the largest state. We managed to follow that with a bureaucrat with zero executive experience, to lose to the first Democrat governor who popped up. Then we tried the "who's turn is it" strategy, nominating another legislator with no more executive experience that it takes to run a senate office staff Christmas party, and that foxy hillbilly governor did it to us again.
Then we got things more-or-less together again with someone who at least had 5 years experience meeting a $60 million annual private sector payroll, and 6 years governing the second largest state. He had weaknesses, but not enough for the Democrats to take over with another pair of legislative dunces with no executive experience. And for all that George W Bush was considered descended from 'political royalty' it was Al Gore who would never have got beyond cuttin' 'backy had his father not been a gifted politician.
Britain is a fine place to visit, but from all I read, not too good a place to need health care. And maybe approaching not too good a place to be non-Muslim, considering the rising imminence of Sharia law. So maybe the well earned influence of the Financial Times editorial page would be better applied to fixing your own considerable problems.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640 IL
Response to NYTimes' Noble Laureate columnist Paul Krugman on "America's Soul"
Chicago Saturday PM 25 April 2009
Editors, The New York Times
Gentlepeople:
In a Friday, April 24 New York Times column Paul Krugman writes: "...[T]he Bush administration ... misled the nation into a war they wanted to fight, and, probably, tortured people in the attempt to extract 'confessions' that would justify that war."
For a man who won a Nobel Prize (thot by most to be well deserved,) it's hard to believe Krugman wrote that without reading House-Senate Joint Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." At 1300 words, this resolution is not long, but contains 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, and includes the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'al Quaida' once, 'nuclear' 4 times. (Curiously, it did not contain the word 'oil'.) And the resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of each house (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
Krugman concludes by writing "We need to do this [prosecute leaders of the Bush Administration for misleading "the nation into a war"] ... "because it’s about reclaiming America’s soul."
America's soul was defined first and best by Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men... are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
Unfortunately, the world being what it is, at times there are forces who would try to destroy that soul. To attack previous leaders who in good conscience tried their best to prevent this, has nothing to do with 'reclaiming' anything, but everything to do with cheap, juvenile, vindictiveness.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Chicago Saturday PM 25 April 2009
Editors, The New York Times
Gentlepeople:
In a Friday, April 24 New York Times column Paul Krugman writes: "...[T]he Bush administration ... misled the nation into a war they wanted to fight, and, probably, tortured people in the attempt to extract 'confessions' that would justify that war."
For a man who won a Nobel Prize (thot by most to be well deserved,) it's hard to believe Krugman wrote that without reading House-Senate Joint Resolution of October 10, 2002 for "Use of Military Force Against Iraq." At 1300 words, this resolution is not long, but contains 22 statements justifying invading Iraq, and includes the words 'weapons of mass destruction' (6 times,) 'September 11, 2001' (5 times,) 'al Quaida' once, 'nuclear' 4 times. (Curiously, it did not contain the word 'oil'.) And the resolution was passed by 2/3 majorities of each house (2/3 of Senate Democrats, too.)
Krugman concludes by writing "We need to do this [prosecute leaders of the Bush Administration for misleading "the nation into a war"] ... "because it’s about reclaiming America’s soul."
America's soul was defined first and best by Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men... are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
Unfortunately, the world being what it is, at times there are forces who would try to destroy that soul. To attack previous leaders who in good conscience tried their best to prevent this, has nothing to do with 'reclaiming' anything, but everything to do with cheap, juvenile, vindictiveness.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
National Review Mag's Rick Brookhiser on Obama and W
Chicago PM Saturday 25 April 2009
Editors, National Review Magazine
Gentlepeople:
You would have a hard job finding a bigger admirer of Rick Brookhiser than me. When he was in Chicago in 2005 to pitch his book, I apologized for not having a copy for him to sign, but did have an original copy of the second NR issue NR he ever had an article in - at age 16!
So it was a big surprise to see in his article "A Rhapsode and a Question Mark" in the February 9 edition: "[Obama] is also one of the least experienced [Presidents] ... but coming after George W. Bush... a little ignorance feels like bliss."
Before becoming president George W Bush was the managing partner of a business with a $60 million annual payroll. Sure, it was a baseball team, but $60 million is $60 million, whether you pay it to baseball players or baby sitters, which from all I've read is the biggest payroll Obama ever met, except for maybe the caterer for a senate office staff Christmas party.
Five years after leaving the Texas Rangers (with an $80 million payroll) W was elected Governor of the nation's second largest state, and re-elected 4 years later by a two-to-one margin. Texas only has a 1500 mile international border, but even that is considerably more international experience than 5 crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia.
And a governor makes buck-stops-here decisions every day. A state senator, Obama's most extensive government experience, makes no more executive decisions than a 3rd string Chicago Bears jock strap attendant, but at that, without the responsibility. I take on any Bush hater when it comes to naming W's shortcomings, but having more ignorance than Obama? Say it ain't so, Rick.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
[I blind copy all sorts of folks with this stuff. To this note, an influential local Chicago blogger sent me this response:
"It is incredible that supposedly well-educated and informed people make such stupid remarks about Bush. I make a mental note not to easily trust people who have made such comments. Such people are a little too anxious to join the MSMherd, wherever their by-lines appear."]
Editors, National Review Magazine
Gentlepeople:
You would have a hard job finding a bigger admirer of Rick Brookhiser than me. When he was in Chicago in 2005 to pitch his book, I apologized for not having a copy for him to sign, but did have an original copy of the second NR issue NR he ever had an article in - at age 16!
So it was a big surprise to see in his article "A Rhapsode and a Question Mark" in the February 9 edition: "[Obama] is also one of the least experienced [Presidents] ... but coming after George W. Bush... a little ignorance feels like bliss."
Before becoming president George W Bush was the managing partner of a business with a $60 million annual payroll. Sure, it was a baseball team, but $60 million is $60 million, whether you pay it to baseball players or baby sitters, which from all I've read is the biggest payroll Obama ever met, except for maybe the caterer for a senate office staff Christmas party.
Five years after leaving the Texas Rangers (with an $80 million payroll) W was elected Governor of the nation's second largest state, and re-elected 4 years later by a two-to-one margin. Texas only has a 1500 mile international border, but even that is considerably more international experience than 5 crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia.
And a governor makes buck-stops-here decisions every day. A state senator, Obama's most extensive government experience, makes no more executive decisions than a 3rd string Chicago Bears jock strap attendant, but at that, without the responsibility. I take on any Bush hater when it comes to naming W's shortcomings, but having more ignorance than Obama? Say it ain't so, Rick.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
[I blind copy all sorts of folks with this stuff. To this note, an influential local Chicago blogger sent me this response:
"It is incredible that supposedly well-educated and informed people make such stupid remarks about Bush. I make a mental note not to easily trust people who have made such comments. Such people are a little too anxious to join the MSMherd, wherever their by-lines appear."]
Free help for the Republicans...
...from the British press:
Chicago PM Saturday, April 25, 2009
Editors, UK Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times is a fine newspaper, and I am lucky to have it available to me early every AM. But about the only good thing about your Wednesday April 22 editorial "Republicans slide into disarray" is that it will be ignored.
You begin "The founders of the US were right: checks and balances make for better government." If you would acquaint yourselves with the Federalist papers you would see that 'checks and balances" has nothing to do with political opposition, but specifically with the three branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, so arranged and empowered that they continuously check and balance each other.
Next you say "If the Republicans are to strengthen their position in Congress... and... mount a credible challenge for the White House... they must win back the independent voters....
Didn't we run the most independent of independent Republicans last fall? Look what it got us.
Then you say "Sarah Palin... compounds the party’s problems."
Yes, poor Sarah, with a pathetic 21 months of actual executive experience, as it turns out not only infinitely more than her running mate, but both opposing candidates too.
Then you complain that "the [Republican] party keeps striding to the right." Yes, some of us are trying to stride back to 1980-1984, when we won two consecutive landslides with a no-nonsense right-winger, who also had eight years as governor of the largest state.
We managed to follow that with a bureaucrat with zero executive experience, to lose to the first Democrat governor who popped up. Then we tried the "who's turn is it" strategy, nominating another legislator with no more executive experience that it takes to run a senate office staff Christmas party, and that foxy hillbilly governor did it to us again.
Then we got things more-or-less together again with someone who at least had 5 years experience meeting a $60 million annual private sector payroll, and 6 years governing the second largest state. He had weaknesses, but not enough for the Democrats to take over with another pair of legislative dunces with no executive experience. And for all that George W Bush was considered descended from 'political royalty' it was Al Gore who would never have got beyond cuttin' 'backy had his father not been a gifted politician.
Britain is a fine place to visit, but from all I read, not too good a place to need health care. And maybe approaching not too good a place to be non-Muslim, considering the rising imminence of Sharia law. So maybe the well earned influence of the Financial Times editorial page would be better applied to fixing your own considerable problems.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640 IL
Chicago PM Saturday, April 25, 2009
Editors, UK Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times is a fine newspaper, and I am lucky to have it available to me early every AM. But about the only good thing about your Wednesday April 22 editorial "Republicans slide into disarray" is that it will be ignored.
You begin "The founders of the US were right: checks and balances make for better government." If you would acquaint yourselves with the Federalist papers you would see that 'checks and balances" has nothing to do with political opposition, but specifically with the three branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, so arranged and empowered that they continuously check and balance each other.
Next you say "If the Republicans are to strengthen their position in Congress... and... mount a credible challenge for the White House... they must win back the independent voters....
Didn't we run the most independent of independent Republicans last fall? Look what it got us.
Then you say "Sarah Palin... compounds the party’s problems."
Yes, poor Sarah, with a pathetic 21 months of actual executive experience, as it turns out not only infinitely more than her running mate, but both opposing candidates too.
Then you complain that "the [Republican] party keeps striding to the right." Yes, some of us are trying to stride back to 1980-1984, when we won two consecutive landslides with a no-nonsense right-winger, who also had eight years as governor of the largest state.
We managed to follow that with a bureaucrat with zero executive experience, to lose to the first Democrat governor who popped up. Then we tried the "who's turn is it" strategy, nominating another legislator with no more executive experience that it takes to run a senate office staff Christmas party, and that foxy hillbilly governor did it to us again.
Then we got things more-or-less together again with someone who at least had 5 years experience meeting a $60 million annual private sector payroll, and 6 years governing the second largest state. He had weaknesses, but not enough for the Democrats to take over with another pair of legislative dunces with no executive experience. And for all that George W Bush was considered descended from 'political royalty' it was Al Gore who would never have got beyond cuttin' 'backy had his father not been a gifted politician.
Britain is a fine place to visit, but from all I read, not too good a place to need health care. And maybe approaching not too good a place to be non-Muslim, considering the rising imminence of Sharia law. So maybe the well earned influence of the Financial Times editorial page would be better applied to fixing your own considerable problems.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640 IL
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Is the New York Times familiar with the Federalist Papers?
Chicago AM, Saturday, April 18, 2009
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
Your Saturday, April 18, editorial "A Danger to Public Health and Welfare" says "... the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday confirmed what... had never been declared as a matter of federal law: carbon dioxide... constitute[s] a danger to public health...." Could the fact that federal law comes (so far) only from the US Constitution, which says nothing about an Environmental Protection agency, have anything to do with this?
Ah, but you say: "General welfare clause" to which James Madison (remember him?), in his Federalist #41 wrote: "Some [Constitution critics say...] that the power to 'provide for the... general welfare of the United States' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare.... "But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
And sure enough, following that semicolon are 17 specific clauses defining what Congress can do, with nary a mention of 'environment' or 'protection', no 'carbon dioxide' or 'climate change', either. Of course, Madison knew things would change, so he and his friends added a way for future generations to accommodate this: get 2/3 of each house of congress to agree, have this confirmed by 3/4 of the state legislatures, and you can add an amendment giving as much environmental protection as you want, let alone need. No need to even bother the President's pretty little head about it.
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine Drive Chicago
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
Your Saturday, April 18, editorial "A Danger to Public Health and Welfare" says "... the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday confirmed what... had never been declared as a matter of federal law: carbon dioxide... constitute[s] a danger to public health...." Could the fact that federal law comes (so far) only from the US Constitution, which says nothing about an Environmental Protection agency, have anything to do with this?
Ah, but you say: "General welfare clause" to which James Madison (remember him?), in his Federalist #41 wrote: "Some [Constitution critics say...] that the power to 'provide for the... general welfare of the United States' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare.... "But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
And sure enough, following that semicolon are 17 specific clauses defining what Congress can do, with nary a mention of 'environment' or 'protection', no 'carbon dioxide' or 'climate change', either. Of course, Madison knew things would change, so he and his friends added a way for future generations to accommodate this: get 2/3 of each house of congress to agree, have this confirmed by 3/4 of the state legislatures, and you can add an amendment giving as much environmental protection as you want, let alone need. No need to even bother the President's pretty little head about it.
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine Drive Chicago
Monday, April 13, 2009
Ari Fleischer on income taxes
Chicago Monday PM April 13, 2009 Editors
Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Seeing Ari Fleischer's name as the author of an article on taxes ("Everyone Should Pay Income Taxes" WSJ Monday, April 13) was not real encouraging, but my inner publicist said: "C'mon, look at the headline."
That was a good start. But Fleischer goes on to say three things I haven't read in years of three-a-day major newspaper reading.First, "... nearly every other social cause is given a loophole... in the tax code" demonstrated by listing 9 examples of such commonly accepted preferences, from buying a hybrid vehicle to paying alimony, rightly concluding that "everyone now has a sacred cow in the tax code."
Next he suggests abolishing "all Social Security, Medicare and estate taxes" and that "Social Security and Medicare will be funded from income taxes, ending the myth that these programs are supported through government trust funds and payroll taxes.
"What a breath of fresh air! Even more fresh air: tax rates should "go up or down for everyone -- no more... lowering taxes for some or raising them only for others.... If Congress wants to raise or cut taxes, it should do so for everyone."
Fleischer concludes that following his suggestions "will create an environment in which spending programs receive the scrutiny they deserve. It's funny what happens when everyone pays the bills...."
An even faster way to get tax payers to give "spending programs ... the scrutiny they deserve" is to get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to change paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days accompany the paycheck.
Mr. Fleischer was a fine presidential press secretary, but with ideas and imagination like this, he would be an even better Speaker of the house of Representatives.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
[For some reason I blind copied Larry Kudlow on this, and within an hour got this message:
From: Susan Varga @kudlow.com
Subject: RE: Ari Fleischer on income taxes
To: "'Arnold Nelson'"
Date: Tuesday, April 14, 2009, 11:09 AM
Dear Arnold :
Larry Kudlow is trying to reach Mr. Fleischer. Can you give me contact information?
Many thanks,
Susan
Susan C. Varga Chief Operating Officer Kudlow & Co., LLC 1375 Kings Highway East, Suite. 260 Fairfield, CT 06824
I sent her a short note saying I had no more contact than what was in the original article.
Then I thot a litt;le more, did some googling, found that Ari Fleischer has a PR firm, offices in Manhattan, called them up, taljed w/ a very sweet sounding Vicki Mcquade, and forwarded Varga's original message to her. Never heard anymore from either one of them.]
Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Seeing Ari Fleischer's name as the author of an article on taxes ("Everyone Should Pay Income Taxes" WSJ Monday, April 13) was not real encouraging, but my inner publicist said: "C'mon, look at the headline."
That was a good start. But Fleischer goes on to say three things I haven't read in years of three-a-day major newspaper reading.First, "... nearly every other social cause is given a loophole... in the tax code" demonstrated by listing 9 examples of such commonly accepted preferences, from buying a hybrid vehicle to paying alimony, rightly concluding that "everyone now has a sacred cow in the tax code."
Next he suggests abolishing "all Social Security, Medicare and estate taxes" and that "Social Security and Medicare will be funded from income taxes, ending the myth that these programs are supported through government trust funds and payroll taxes.
"What a breath of fresh air! Even more fresh air: tax rates should "go up or down for everyone -- no more... lowering taxes for some or raising them only for others.... If Congress wants to raise or cut taxes, it should do so for everyone."
Fleischer concludes that following his suggestions "will create an environment in which spending programs receive the scrutiny they deserve. It's funny what happens when everyone pays the bills...."
An even faster way to get tax payers to give "spending programs ... the scrutiny they deserve" is to get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to change paragraph 3402 of USC Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." leaving the tax calculation with the employer but insisting that a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days accompany the paycheck.
Mr. Fleischer was a fine presidential press secretary, but with ideas and imagination like this, he would be an even better Speaker of the house of Representatives.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
[For some reason I blind copied Larry Kudlow on this, and within an hour got this message:
From: Susan Varga @kudlow.com
Subject: RE: Ari Fleischer on income taxes
To: "'Arnold Nelson'"
Date: Tuesday, April 14, 2009, 11:09 AM
Dear Arnold :
Larry Kudlow is trying to reach Mr. Fleischer. Can you give me contact information?
Many thanks,
Susan
Susan C. Varga Chief Operating Officer Kudlow & Co., LLC 1375 Kings Highway East, Suite. 260 Fairfield, CT 06824
I sent her a short note saying I had no more contact than what was in the original article.
Then I thot a litt;le more, did some googling, found that Ari Fleischer has a PR firm, offices in Manhattan, called them up, taljed w/ a very sweet sounding Vicki Mcquade, and forwarded Varga's original message to her. Never heard anymore from either one of them.]
Monday, April 6, 2009
To Adam Pascarella, Managing Editor, Michigan Review, on Chicago White Sox
Chicago Monday AM, April 6, 2009
Dear Mr. Pascarella:
It was good to see your plump of the White Sox in the National Review symposium. I've been a Sox fan all my life, even my last 34 years here at 5100 North LSD. You may know 100 times more about Chicago than I do (your being a junior at the UM and managing editor of The Michigan Review are all I need to know that you know all sorts of other things better than I do, too) but your statement that the Sox play "a grinding style of baseball that appropriately represents the hard-working Irish population of south Chicago, puzzles me.
"South Chicago" (unlike "Wrigleyville") is one of Chicago's 76 US census recognized neighborhoods, and being on the south side of Chicago is certainly a very pro-Sox neighborhood. But it never was particularly Irish, and sure isn't now. Did you mean the Sox play "a grinding style of baseball that appropriately represents the hard-working Irish population of Bridgeport, the Chicago nabe where Comiskey park has been located since 1910?"
Bridgeport was where a big wave of Irish came in to help build the Illinois/Michigan canal in the 1840s, and many descendents remain (including two guys named Richard Daley (in spirit, at least.)) But thanks again for your fine writeup in National Review. I've been a subscriber for 50 years, and you sure fit right in.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
PS Here is a little story also connecting National Review w/ the Sox I think you might like:
In 1999 I went on the NR Baltic cruise w/ WFBJr (and a few others.) One of the stops was Wurnemunde, Germany. I certainly had never been there, but the town especially intrigued me because it is a big seaside summer resort, like my home town of South Haven MI, but considerably larger. They have a main street paralleling the beach, but a few blocks in. It is a very wide street, maybe wider than South Haven's 10 widest streets put together (I guess that is an exaggeration, but they have a real wide main street.) I stood on the side watching a sea of "summer people" passing up and down, then saw, way on the other side, four guys, staring in wonder like me, and one of them was wearing... A Chicago White Sox warmup jacket!
Wow! I had to investigate. So I struggled thru the crowd, finally got to them, and they looked pretty scared. Turns out they were sailors from the Philippines, from a visiting freighter.
So I confronted the jacket guy: "Do you know who they are?" pointing to the jacket front. I think there was only one of the four who spoke English (I know The Philippines are the 2nd largest English speaking country in the world, but they have lots of people there, and some don't speak English.)
He gave me a relieved look, like he had worried I was going to arrest him, then blurted: "Chicago Sox!"
So I introduced myself, and the 5 of us talked for a few minutes, and I started to go back. But I had a brain storm, turned around, asked: "Do you know the song?" They looked at each other, shaking their heads 'no.'
So I started singing: "Nah nah nah naaaah, Nah nah nah naaaah, hey heeeeeeey, goodbye!" and explained how it was the most famous fight song in the majors.
They seemed to like it, but the one guy who seemed to know English pretty good asked: "That sounds like such a sad song... why would a baseball team use it?"
Me: "Sad?!? Only for the other pitcher, 'cuz he just got booted out of the game by the Sox!" I said the words a time or two more, then took off. I looked back and saw them singing, and could just barely hear them, too, over the crowd.
Dear Mr. Pascarella:
It was good to see your plump of the White Sox in the National Review symposium. I've been a Sox fan all my life, even my last 34 years here at 5100 North LSD. You may know 100 times more about Chicago than I do (your being a junior at the UM and managing editor of The Michigan Review are all I need to know that you know all sorts of other things better than I do, too) but your statement that the Sox play "a grinding style of baseball that appropriately represents the hard-working Irish population of south Chicago, puzzles me.
"South Chicago" (unlike "Wrigleyville") is one of Chicago's 76 US census recognized neighborhoods, and being on the south side of Chicago is certainly a very pro-Sox neighborhood. But it never was particularly Irish, and sure isn't now. Did you mean the Sox play "a grinding style of baseball that appropriately represents the hard-working Irish population of Bridgeport, the Chicago nabe where Comiskey park has been located since 1910?"
Bridgeport was where a big wave of Irish came in to help build the Illinois/Michigan canal in the 1840s, and many descendents remain (including two guys named Richard Daley (in spirit, at least.)) But thanks again for your fine writeup in National Review. I've been a subscriber for 50 years, and you sure fit right in.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
PS Here is a little story also connecting National Review w/ the Sox I think you might like:
In 1999 I went on the NR Baltic cruise w/ WFBJr (and a few others.) One of the stops was Wurnemunde, Germany. I certainly had never been there, but the town especially intrigued me because it is a big seaside summer resort, like my home town of South Haven MI, but considerably larger. They have a main street paralleling the beach, but a few blocks in. It is a very wide street, maybe wider than South Haven's 10 widest streets put together (I guess that is an exaggeration, but they have a real wide main street.) I stood on the side watching a sea of "summer people" passing up and down, then saw, way on the other side, four guys, staring in wonder like me, and one of them was wearing... A Chicago White Sox warmup jacket!
Wow! I had to investigate. So I struggled thru the crowd, finally got to them, and they looked pretty scared. Turns out they were sailors from the Philippines, from a visiting freighter.
So I confronted the jacket guy: "Do you know who they are?" pointing to the jacket front. I think there was only one of the four who spoke English (I know The Philippines are the 2nd largest English speaking country in the world, but they have lots of people there, and some don't speak English.)
He gave me a relieved look, like he had worried I was going to arrest him, then blurted: "Chicago Sox!"
So I introduced myself, and the 5 of us talked for a few minutes, and I started to go back. But I had a brain storm, turned around, asked: "Do you know the song?" They looked at each other, shaking their heads 'no.'
So I started singing: "Nah nah nah naaaah, Nah nah nah naaaah, hey heeeeeeey, goodbye!" and explained how it was the most famous fight song in the majors.
They seemed to like it, but the one guy who seemed to know English pretty good asked: "That sounds like such a sad song... why would a baseball team use it?"
Me: "Sad?!? Only for the other pitcher, 'cuz he just got booted out of the game by the Sox!" I said the words a time or two more, then took off. I looked back and saw them singing, and could just barely hear them, too, over the crowd.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Card check and the Pledge of Allegiance
Chicago Wednesday PM, April 1, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Wednesday, April 1, 2009 Wall Street Journal "Court Might Uphold 'Card Check'" compares the lack of anonymity under 'card check' union voting with the lack of anonymity in a public-school classroom recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, where a student "whether he recites the pledge or not, will be seen as expressing himself...."
A vote is a group choice, while public recitation of the Pledge is a promise, to support the nation as an institution, which seems reasonable considering the pupil would not even be going to a public school if it wasn't established by the government. Of course, the poor little 'pledge', written by a defrocked minister (rolling in his grave over the addition of the words "under God") is hardly up to the task.
Replacing it with the first 71 words of the Declaration of Independence ("When in the course of Human events..." thru ""the consent of the governed",) followed by the last 32 words ("And for the support of this declaration" thru "our Sacred Honor.") would be a promise expected of every citizen, as are the promises of the President to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" and members of the Armed Forces to "obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me...."
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Wednesday, April 1, 2009 Wall Street Journal "Court Might Uphold 'Card Check'" compares the lack of anonymity under 'card check' union voting with the lack of anonymity in a public-school classroom recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, where a student "whether he recites the pledge or not, will be seen as expressing himself...."
A vote is a group choice, while public recitation of the Pledge is a promise, to support the nation as an institution, which seems reasonable considering the pupil would not even be going to a public school if it wasn't established by the government. Of course, the poor little 'pledge', written by a defrocked minister (rolling in his grave over the addition of the words "under God") is hardly up to the task.
Replacing it with the first 71 words of the Declaration of Independence ("When in the course of Human events..." thru ""the consent of the governed",) followed by the last 32 words ("And for the support of this declaration" thru "our Sacred Honor.") would be a promise expected of every citizen, as are the promises of the President to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" and members of the Armed Forces to "obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me...."
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Congress deals a blow to 'honest budgeting'
Chicago IL Saturday AM, March 28, 2009
Editors, Washington Post
Gentlepeople:
The Washington Post Thursday, March 26 Article "Congress deals a blow to 'honest budgeting'" notes Congressional leaders "were spooked by a Congressional Budget Office analysis of President Obama's $3.6 trillion proposal that found the government would run a deficit of $9.3 trillion... over the next decade," adding that Obama's budget "was a 10-year financial plan" that "endeavored to be more honest."
Some might doubt the honesty of a 10-year plan offered by someone constitutionally limited to eight years of office, but this man wrote two autobiographies before he was 50 years old, so I guess it's all right.
Even a single autobiography at this age would be audacious considering the thin experience pool it had to work with: four crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia, eight years as an Illinois state senator (a job requiring no more skill than a third string Washington Redskins jock strap attendant, without the responsibility.) Beyond that, it was 'Community Activist', a Chicago euphemism for Democrat vote hustler.
The article continues approvingly describing Obama's budget contributions such as putting aside "$250 billion for more funding for fiscal stabilization" and "providing relief from the alternative minimum tax." This is a remarkable performance from someone who has never met a payroll, whose most important management duty of his life has been organizing senate office Christmas parties, and who made his first buck-stops-here decision only ten weeks ago. The lightness of this resume is even more startling compared with three of his four immediate predecessors: multiple term governors of the largest, second-largest, and 30th-largest states. Even the incredibly incompetent George W Bush was managing partner for 5 years of a private sector entity with a $60 million annual payroll.
Next, the Post notes that Mr. Obama and the Democrats in Congress "want to spend more on education, energy and other popular programs." A quick computer enabled search of the United States Constitution shows that of its 8,000 words, not one of them is 'education' or 'energy'. Could the Democrats be proposing evading the Constitution?
Ah, but you say: "General welfare clause" to which James Madison, in his Federalist #41 wrote: "Some [Constitution critics] ... have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power to "provide for the... general welfare of the United States" amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare.... "Had no other... definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution... the authors of the objection might have had some color for it.... But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
And sure enough, following that semicolon are 17 specific clauses defining what Congress can do, but again no mention of the words education or energy, nor health, homeland, housing, transportation, agriculture, or security, either.
Next The Post grumps that neither Mr. Obama nor Congressional Democrats "want to level with voters about the need to pay for such programs (Education, energy, etc) through increased taxes." Even this proposition gets cloudy when you consider that the Commerce Department's 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States shows 65% of the $2.3 trillion total of the US government income in 2007 came from the bank accounts of a very small portion of voters, employers, and even this group is further special in that it can pass on the cost of these taxes to their customers, a pretty much constantly growing segment of a growing national economy, all but eliminating the need for ballot box influence.
A national political commentator recently suggested that rather than the federal government spending $trillions to jump start the economy, wouldn't leaving that 65% of federal income undisturbed with the voters do an even better job? But of course that would allow no 'redistribution', and on top of that, the voters might save it instead of spend it - a practice you could never accuse the federal government of.
According to generally accepted, natural, fundamental laws of economics, what the President and Democrat Leaders of Congress are proposing will only make things worse, unavoidably leading to the country failing, at which point the President can announce (with the aid of his ever present teleprompter, confident smile, and perfect delivery): "The country is too big to fail. To prevent it, we are nationalizing the entire economy: every private sector organization is hereby made a unit of the federal government, every citizen, and non-citizen, are now employees of the federal government, everyone has equal income, and healthcare. May the force be with us."
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago, IL 60640
Editors, Washington Post
Gentlepeople:
The Washington Post Thursday, March 26 Article "Congress deals a blow to 'honest budgeting'" notes Congressional leaders "were spooked by a Congressional Budget Office analysis of President Obama's $3.6 trillion proposal that found the government would run a deficit of $9.3 trillion... over the next decade," adding that Obama's budget "was a 10-year financial plan" that "endeavored to be more honest."
Some might doubt the honesty of a 10-year plan offered by someone constitutionally limited to eight years of office, but this man wrote two autobiographies before he was 50 years old, so I guess it's all right.
Even a single autobiography at this age would be audacious considering the thin experience pool it had to work with: four crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia, eight years as an Illinois state senator (a job requiring no more skill than a third string Washington Redskins jock strap attendant, without the responsibility.) Beyond that, it was 'Community Activist', a Chicago euphemism for Democrat vote hustler.
The article continues approvingly describing Obama's budget contributions such as putting aside "$250 billion for more funding for fiscal stabilization" and "providing relief from the alternative minimum tax." This is a remarkable performance from someone who has never met a payroll, whose most important management duty of his life has been organizing senate office Christmas parties, and who made his first buck-stops-here decision only ten weeks ago. The lightness of this resume is even more startling compared with three of his four immediate predecessors: multiple term governors of the largest, second-largest, and 30th-largest states. Even the incredibly incompetent George W Bush was managing partner for 5 years of a private sector entity with a $60 million annual payroll.
Next, the Post notes that Mr. Obama and the Democrats in Congress "want to spend more on education, energy and other popular programs." A quick computer enabled search of the United States Constitution shows that of its 8,000 words, not one of them is 'education' or 'energy'. Could the Democrats be proposing evading the Constitution?
Ah, but you say: "General welfare clause" to which James Madison, in his Federalist #41 wrote: "Some [Constitution critics] ... have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power to "provide for the... general welfare of the United States" amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the... general welfare.... "Had no other... definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution... the authors of the objection might have had some color for it.... But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?"
And sure enough, following that semicolon are 17 specific clauses defining what Congress can do, but again no mention of the words education or energy, nor health, homeland, housing, transportation, agriculture, or security, either.
Next The Post grumps that neither Mr. Obama nor Congressional Democrats "want to level with voters about the need to pay for such programs (Education, energy, etc) through increased taxes." Even this proposition gets cloudy when you consider that the Commerce Department's 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States shows 65% of the $2.3 trillion total of the US government income in 2007 came from the bank accounts of a very small portion of voters, employers, and even this group is further special in that it can pass on the cost of these taxes to their customers, a pretty much constantly growing segment of a growing national economy, all but eliminating the need for ballot box influence.
A national political commentator recently suggested that rather than the federal government spending $trillions to jump start the economy, wouldn't leaving that 65% of federal income undisturbed with the voters do an even better job? But of course that would allow no 'redistribution', and on top of that, the voters might save it instead of spend it - a practice you could never accuse the federal government of.
According to generally accepted, natural, fundamental laws of economics, what the President and Democrat Leaders of Congress are proposing will only make things worse, unavoidably leading to the country failing, at which point the President can announce (with the aid of his ever present teleprompter, confident smile, and perfect delivery): "The country is too big to fail. To prevent it, we are nationalizing the entire economy: every private sector organization is hereby made a unit of the federal government, every citizen, and non-citizen, are now employees of the federal government, everyone has equal income, and healthcare. May the force be with us."
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago, IL 60640
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Snarlin' Arlen shows his core value...
...getting reelected.
Chicago Wednesday PM, March 25, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Your editorial of Wednesday, March 25 "The Power of 41" notes one of those rare occasions when Senator Specter of Pennsylvania acts like a Republican for a change, backing a filibuster of the "Free Union Bosses from the Tyranny of the secret ballot" bill. You add that for this to occur, there's probably a reelection campaign coming up: "Mr. Specter is undoubtedly hoping that by getting on the right side of what has become a grassroots issue for the GOP, he might avoid an ugly primary battle for his Senate seat next year."
We had a similar situation in the fall of 1991, when Senator Specter uncharacteristically was a strong supporter of Clarence Thomas for the Supreme court. The Senator had no problem with a primary challenge in 1992, but he was forced to pull a squeaker win in the general that fall.
But going back five years from that the Senator was finally able to vote his conscience, against the nomination of the finest legal mind of a generation, Robert Bork, conveniently only eleven months after a healthy election win in November 1986.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Chicago Wednesday PM, March 25, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
Your editorial of Wednesday, March 25 "The Power of 41" notes one of those rare occasions when Senator Specter of Pennsylvania acts like a Republican for a change, backing a filibuster of the "Free Union Bosses from the Tyranny of the secret ballot" bill. You add that for this to occur, there's probably a reelection campaign coming up: "Mr. Specter is undoubtedly hoping that by getting on the right side of what has become a grassroots issue for the GOP, he might avoid an ugly primary battle for his Senate seat next year."
We had a similar situation in the fall of 1991, when Senator Specter uncharacteristically was a strong supporter of Clarence Thomas for the Supreme court. The Senator had no problem with a primary challenge in 1992, but he was forced to pull a squeaker win in the general that fall.
But going back five years from that the Senator was finally able to vote his conscience, against the nomination of the finest legal mind of a generation, Robert Bork, conveniently only eleven months after a healthy election win in November 1986.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
"Everyone hates ethanol"...
...and why not?
Chicago, Tuesday AM, 24 March 2009
Editors, The Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Monday, March 23 WSJ "Break the Addiction to Foreign Oil" is not a particularly coherent response to your Monday, March 15 editorial "Everyone Hates Ethanol" ("Researchers... recently found that ethanol... reduces carbon emissions by up to 59%." Doesn't "up to 59%" include everything from zero thru 58%?) The letter's closing line goes completely over the edge: "The benefits of ethanol are irrefutable -- greater energy independence, cleaner air and enhanced economic growth." Has the writer and his 'Growth Energy' associate, Retired Army General Wesley Clark, considered that ethanol comes from a 2-dimensional space, the surface of the earth, and only 1/3 of that not covered by salt water, further limited by its inability to grow just anywhere, such as nearly uncrossable, let alone untillable, mountains, vast deserts, thousand-foot thick ice caps - all sorts of corn-unfriendly places.
Oil on the other hand comes from a 3-dimensional space, all that's under the surface of the earth, and the entire surface, covered by water or not. The depth of this space is ultimately limited to 4,000 miles, but so far we've only tried the first eight miles, and that in only a very few locations.
The WSJ editorial board is accused of having an "addiction to foreign oil" preventing it from looking at "homegrown alternatives." Aren't some of those 'alternatives' ANWR and the continental shelf, currently in the death grip of the environmentalist wackos?
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Chicago, Tuesday AM, 24 March 2009
Editors, The Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
A letter in the Monday, March 23 WSJ "Break the Addiction to Foreign Oil" is not a particularly coherent response to your Monday, March 15 editorial "Everyone Hates Ethanol" ("Researchers... recently found that ethanol... reduces carbon emissions by up to 59%." Doesn't "up to 59%" include everything from zero thru 58%?) The letter's closing line goes completely over the edge: "The benefits of ethanol are irrefutable -- greater energy independence, cleaner air and enhanced economic growth." Has the writer and his 'Growth Energy' associate, Retired Army General Wesley Clark, considered that ethanol comes from a 2-dimensional space, the surface of the earth, and only 1/3 of that not covered by salt water, further limited by its inability to grow just anywhere, such as nearly uncrossable, let alone untillable, mountains, vast deserts, thousand-foot thick ice caps - all sorts of corn-unfriendly places.
Oil on the other hand comes from a 3-dimensional space, all that's under the surface of the earth, and the entire surface, covered by water or not. The depth of this space is ultimately limited to 4,000 miles, but so far we've only tried the first eight miles, and that in only a very few locations.
The WSJ editorial board is accused of having an "addiction to foreign oil" preventing it from looking at "homegrown alternatives." Aren't some of those 'alternatives' ANWR and the continental shelf, currently in the death grip of the environmentalist wackos?
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Sunday, March 22, 2009
WSJ loses its editorial balance for a minute...
WSJ Editorial "Bowling Pins and Needles" Saturday, March 21, 2009:
"President Obama is getting lashed by the political correctness police for a comment on "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno Thursday that his bowling skills were "like the Special Olympics or something." Mr. Obama's attempt to make light of his poor score may have been in poor taste, but the real gutter ball goes to anyone trying to score political points off the remark.
"Even before the show aired, the White House apologized for the gaffe and Mr. Obama called Special Olympics Chairman Timothy Shriver from Air Force One. Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton hurried to assure the world that President Obama believes the Special Olympics are a wonderful program that gives people with disabilities an 'opportunity to shine.'
"Of course he does. Even if the joke was unbecoming, Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself, not special needs children or adults. The best response came from Special Olympics bowling champion Kolan McConiughey, who has bowled five perfect games in the past four years and challenged the President to a match. 'He bowled a 129. I bowl a 300. I could beat that score easily'. Mr. McConiughey said.
"The Special Olympics took the opportunity to admonish that 'words hurt and words do matter.' Yet it's impossible to believe that Mr. Obama doesn't understand that these Olympians are great -- and the best way to show that would have been to treat them as tough enough to get past a wisecrack."
I responded:
Chicago Saturday, March 21, 2009 2:28 PM
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
What possible good do you see in wasting 243 words of the most valuable opinion space in Journalism on defending Obama from “getting lashed“ for another outrageous tongue slip that tells much more about him than the people he insulted. Sure he apologized to everyone in sight, and I'm sure Special Olympians are no more immune to Obama worship than any other segment of the population. You say “Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself….” That’s for sure, by clearly comparing himself to special Olympians.
Did you have similar WSJ editorials chastising the ‘political correctness police’ for their lashing of misspelling ‘potato’ and mispronouncing ‘nuclear,’ neither remotely demeaning anyone other than the speaker?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
"President Obama is getting lashed by the political correctness police for a comment on "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno Thursday that his bowling skills were "like the Special Olympics or something." Mr. Obama's attempt to make light of his poor score may have been in poor taste, but the real gutter ball goes to anyone trying to score political points off the remark.
"Even before the show aired, the White House apologized for the gaffe and Mr. Obama called Special Olympics Chairman Timothy Shriver from Air Force One. Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton hurried to assure the world that President Obama believes the Special Olympics are a wonderful program that gives people with disabilities an 'opportunity to shine.'
"Of course he does. Even if the joke was unbecoming, Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself, not special needs children or adults. The best response came from Special Olympics bowling champion Kolan McConiughey, who has bowled five perfect games in the past four years and challenged the President to a match. 'He bowled a 129. I bowl a 300. I could beat that score easily'. Mr. McConiughey said.
"The Special Olympics took the opportunity to admonish that 'words hurt and words do matter.' Yet it's impossible to believe that Mr. Obama doesn't understand that these Olympians are great -- and the best way to show that would have been to treat them as tough enough to get past a wisecrack."
I responded:
Chicago Saturday, March 21, 2009 2:28 PM
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
What possible good do you see in wasting 243 words of the most valuable opinion space in Journalism on defending Obama from “getting lashed“ for another outrageous tongue slip that tells much more about him than the people he insulted. Sure he apologized to everyone in sight, and I'm sure Special Olympians are no more immune to Obama worship than any other segment of the population. You say “Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself….” That’s for sure, by clearly comparing himself to special Olympians.
Did you have similar WSJ editorials chastising the ‘political correctness police’ for their lashing of misspelling ‘potato’ and mispronouncing ‘nuclear,’ neither remotely demeaning anyone other than the speaker?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
The New Tork Times actually says something resonable...
...for a change:
New York Times Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101"
"Congress is regularly mocked for earmarking taxpayer money to study exotic life cycles; this year’s favorite target is the Mormon cricket’s pestilential threat to agriculture in Utah. Too bad the Capitol has no appetite to study the ultimate in symbiotic survival: the relationship between campaign donors and the customized appropriations they are fed by grateful lawmakers.
"Democratic leaders in the House have been swatting back Representative Jeff Flake as if he were a Mormon cricket as he repeatedly proposes that the ethics committee start a
cause-and-effect study of earmarking and campaign money. Mr. Flake, a Republican from Arizona who is an earmark battler, is now calling on the committee to investigate the large donations to defense appropriators made by the PMA Group, the lobbying
powerhouse that recently shut itself down after an F.B.I. raid over election-law violations.
"Mr. Flake has picked the right place to start the investigating: some of the PMA Group’s lobbyists learned their craft as staffers in the appropriations subcommittee led by
Representative John Murtha of Pennsylvania. Once in the free-enterprise zone, the PMA Group scored numerous defense earmarks and doled out generous gifts to Mr. Murtha and other subcommittee members.
"This relationship cries out for an ethics inquiry. And we are pleased that Mr. Flake is refusing to be discouraged by his colleagues’ lack of courage. He reports that he picks up a few more supporters with each new challenge to the House ways of doing business. Mr. Flake is now bolstered by Peter Visclosky, a top Democrat on appropriations who announced after the F.B.I. raid that he’s returning $271,000 in donations from the PMA
Group.
"Mr. Visclosky has endorsed Mr. Flake’s quest, urging fellow Democratic leaders to push for an investigation of how the PMA Group’s clout worked. Of course, everyone on the Hill already knows the answer. But the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth."
I respond:
Sunday, March 22, 2009 4:40 AM
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times deserves as much commendation for their Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101" as its subjects, Congressmen Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, and Peter Visclosky, Indiana Democrat, for their David-like attack on Congressional earmarks. But your closing comment "the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth," well-meaning as it is, from past experience is not real encouraging.
The solution is found looking upstream, in this case at the 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States, that says in 2007, 65.64% of the total federal income that year ($2.568 trillion) was 'withheld' by employers from employee paychecks. 'Withheld' is a euphamism for the entire amount coming into the feds as checks on employer bank accounts and immediately deposited to the US general fund, no better demonstrated than the fact that if any of those checks fail to arrive, it is the employer who goes to jail, never the employee.
The employers are not real happy with this, but 1) they don't have enough votes to complain, and 2) unlike the employee, they can pass it on to customers, which has worked just fine for 75 years of a regularly expanding national economy. So 535 people control 2/3 of the federal income that no one cares about, to the exteant of needing to take it out of their personal accounts and send it in. Result: earmarks. No number of editorials or letters to congress creatures has had any effect in the 66 years it has been going on.
There is an way to fix this. Get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to sign it in to law, and change paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." Leave the tax calculation with the employer so that with the check they include a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days. Would it be easy to do? Probably not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 26 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy, but instructive for a growing portion of the electorate, sending in sizable checks every month from their own bank accounts. Questions would arise: Is the federal level the best to run health care? Education? retirement? What did the founders think of this approach? Apparently not much, since they not only didn't authorize it in the Constitution, but in fact wrote specifically prohibiting it. Little did they envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and election of a president. People would be asking the candidates these questions, and voting on the answers. And congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it. This is the only way the voters will ever unnderstand "the full and shameful truth" of why congress throws money around.
Arnold H. Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL
Just after I sent that, I sent the following to some friends:
What a breakthru!
I just sent a letter to the NYTimes where I used the sentence "Little did they [the Founders] envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country."
I been wanting to use it for a long time, but today decided to find out how true it was.
So I went to the Federalist papers. I have them on my HD (192K words) and can search just fine, but recently acquired a new research tool: A 700 page paperback, $8 from Amazon, "The Federalist Papers, by Clinton Rossiter." Apparently Mr. Rossiter lived, breathed, and slept w/ the Papers for the last 40 years of his life (I think ended by suicide not too long ago, unfortunately.)
I look in the index and find "'general welfare' clause," pointing to James Madison's Federalist #41, where St. James himself writes:
"Some [Constitution critics] who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation, have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power ``to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,'' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare....
"Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it.... A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms ``to raise money for the general welfare.'' But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?" [Me: !!!!!]
I'm finally catching on, so go directly to US Constitution (also on HD) Article One Section Eight. And there's that semicolon, separating the infamous 'general welfare' Clause 1 from clauses 2 thru 18:
Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
Clause 2: To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;
Clause 3: To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
Clause 4: To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;
Clause 5: To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
Clause 6: To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;
Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads;
Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
Clause 9: To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;
Clause 10: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;
Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
Clause 13: To provide and maintain a Navy;
Clause 14: To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
Clause 15: To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
Clause 16: To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
Clause 17: To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;--
And Clause 18: To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof."
Mw again: I've read those 17 clauses many times, but have never found anything remotely requiring executive departments of Energy ($20bn in 2007,) Homeland Security ($39bn,) Housing and Urban Development ($45bn,) Labor ($48bn,) Transportation ($62bn,) Education ($66bn,) Agriculture ($84bn,) and Health and Human Services ($672bn.)
New York Times Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101"
"Congress is regularly mocked for earmarking taxpayer money to study exotic life cycles; this year’s favorite target is the Mormon cricket’s pestilential threat to agriculture in Utah. Too bad the Capitol has no appetite to study the ultimate in symbiotic survival: the relationship between campaign donors and the customized appropriations they are fed by grateful lawmakers.
"Democratic leaders in the House have been swatting back Representative Jeff Flake as if he were a Mormon cricket as he repeatedly proposes that the ethics committee start a
cause-and-effect study of earmarking and campaign money. Mr. Flake, a Republican from Arizona who is an earmark battler, is now calling on the committee to investigate the large donations to defense appropriators made by the PMA Group, the lobbying
powerhouse that recently shut itself down after an F.B.I. raid over election-law violations.
"Mr. Flake has picked the right place to start the investigating: some of the PMA Group’s lobbyists learned their craft as staffers in the appropriations subcommittee led by
Representative John Murtha of Pennsylvania. Once in the free-enterprise zone, the PMA Group scored numerous defense earmarks and doled out generous gifts to Mr. Murtha and other subcommittee members.
"This relationship cries out for an ethics inquiry. And we are pleased that Mr. Flake is refusing to be discouraged by his colleagues’ lack of courage. He reports that he picks up a few more supporters with each new challenge to the House ways of doing business. Mr. Flake is now bolstered by Peter Visclosky, a top Democrat on appropriations who announced after the F.B.I. raid that he’s returning $271,000 in donations from the PMA
Group.
"Mr. Visclosky has endorsed Mr. Flake’s quest, urging fellow Democratic leaders to push for an investigation of how the PMA Group’s clout worked. Of course, everyone on the Hill already knows the answer. But the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth."
I respond:
Sunday, March 22, 2009 4:40 AM
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times deserves as much commendation for their Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101" as its subjects, Congressmen Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, and Peter Visclosky, Indiana Democrat, for their David-like attack on Congressional earmarks. But your closing comment "the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth," well-meaning as it is, from past experience is not real encouraging.
The solution is found looking upstream, in this case at the 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States, that says in 2007, 65.64% of the total federal income that year ($2.568 trillion) was 'withheld' by employers from employee paychecks. 'Withheld' is a euphamism for the entire amount coming into the feds as checks on employer bank accounts and immediately deposited to the US general fund, no better demonstrated than the fact that if any of those checks fail to arrive, it is the employer who goes to jail, never the employee.
The employers are not real happy with this, but 1) they don't have enough votes to complain, and 2) unlike the employee, they can pass it on to customers, which has worked just fine for 75 years of a regularly expanding national economy. So 535 people control 2/3 of the federal income that no one cares about, to the exteant of needing to take it out of their personal accounts and send it in. Result: earmarks. No number of editorials or letters to congress creatures has had any effect in the 66 years it has been going on.
There is an way to fix this. Get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to sign it in to law, and change paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." Leave the tax calculation with the employer so that with the check they include a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days. Would it be easy to do? Probably not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 26 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy, but instructive for a growing portion of the electorate, sending in sizable checks every month from their own bank accounts. Questions would arise: Is the federal level the best to run health care? Education? retirement? What did the founders think of this approach? Apparently not much, since they not only didn't authorize it in the Constitution, but in fact wrote specifically prohibiting it. Little did they envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and election of a president. People would be asking the candidates these questions, and voting on the answers. And congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it. This is the only way the voters will ever unnderstand "the full and shameful truth" of why congress throws money around.
Arnold H. Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL
Just after I sent that, I sent the following to some friends:
What a breakthru!
I just sent a letter to the NYTimes where I used the sentence "Little did they [the Founders] envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country."
I been wanting to use it for a long time, but today decided to find out how true it was.
So I went to the Federalist papers. I have them on my HD (192K words) and can search just fine, but recently acquired a new research tool: A 700 page paperback, $8 from Amazon, "The Federalist Papers, by Clinton Rossiter." Apparently Mr. Rossiter lived, breathed, and slept w/ the Papers for the last 40 years of his life (I think ended by suicide not too long ago, unfortunately.)
I look in the index and find "'general welfare' clause," pointing to James Madison's Federalist #41, where St. James himself writes:
"Some [Constitution critics] who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation, have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power ``to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,'' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare....
"Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it.... A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms ``to raise money for the general welfare.'' But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?" [Me: !!!!!]
I'm finally catching on, so go directly to US Constitution (also on HD) Article One Section Eight. And there's that semicolon, separating the infamous 'general welfare' Clause 1 from clauses 2 thru 18:
Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
Clause 2: To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;
Clause 3: To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
Clause 4: To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;
Clause 5: To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
Clause 6: To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;
Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads;
Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
Clause 9: To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;
Clause 10: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;
Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
Clause 13: To provide and maintain a Navy;
Clause 14: To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
Clause 15: To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
Clause 16: To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
Clause 17: To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;--
And Clause 18: To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof."
Mw again: I've read those 17 clauses many times, but have never found anything remotely requiring executive departments of Energy ($20bn in 2007,) Homeland Security ($39bn,) Housing and Urban Development ($45bn,) Labor ($48bn,) Transportation ($62bn,) Education ($66bn,) Agriculture ($84bn,) and Health and Human Services ($672bn.)
New York Times Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101"
Chicago Sunday AM, March 22, 2009
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times deserves as much commendation for their Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101" as its subjects, Congressmen Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, and Peter Visclosky, Indiana Democrat, for their David-like attack on Congressional earmarks. But your closing comment "the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth," well-meaning as it is, from past experience is not real encouraging.
The solution is found looking upstream, in this case at the 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States, that says in 2007, 65.64% of the total federal income that year ($2.568 trillion) was 'withheld' by employers from employee paychecks. 'Withheld' is a euphamism for the entire amount coming into the feds as checks on employer bank accounts and immediately deposited to the US general fund, no better demonstrated than the fact that if any of those checks fail to arrive, it is the employer who goes to jail, never the employee.
The employers are not real happy with this, but 1) they don't have enough votes to complain, and 2) unlike the employee, they can pass it on to customers, which has worked just fine for 75 years of a regularly expanding national economy. So 535 people control 2/3 of the federal income that no one cares about, to the extent of needing to take it out of their personal accounts and send it in. Result: earmarks.
No number of editorials or letters to congress creatures has had any effect in the 66 years it has been going on. There is a way to fix this. Get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to sign it in to law, and change paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." Leave the tax calculation with the employer so that with the check they include a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days.
Would it be easy to do? Probably not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 26 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy, but instructive for a growing portion of the electorate, sending in sizable checks every month from their own bank accounts. Questions would arise: Is the federal level the best to run health care? Education? retirement? What did the founders think of this approach?
Apparently not much, since they not only didn't authorize it in the Constitution, but in fact wrote specifically prohibiting it. Little did they envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and election of a president. People would be asking the candidates these questions, and voting on the answers. And congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it. This is the only way the voters will ever understand "the full and shameful truth" of why congress throws money around. Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Editors, New York Times
Gentlepeople:
The New York Times deserves as much commendation for their Friday, March 20, 2009 Editorial "Political Animal Behavior 101" as its subjects, Congressmen Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, and Peter Visclosky, Indiana Democrat, for their David-like attack on Congressional earmarks. But your closing comment "the best hope of ending this cynical influence trading is for the taxpayers to hear the full and shameful truth," well-meaning as it is, from past experience is not real encouraging.
The solution is found looking upstream, in this case at the 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States, that says in 2007, 65.64% of the total federal income that year ($2.568 trillion) was 'withheld' by employers from employee paychecks. 'Withheld' is a euphamism for the entire amount coming into the feds as checks on employer bank accounts and immediately deposited to the US general fund, no better demonstrated than the fact that if any of those checks fail to arrive, it is the employer who goes to jail, never the employee.
The employers are not real happy with this, but 1) they don't have enough votes to complain, and 2) unlike the employee, they can pass it on to customers, which has worked just fine for 75 years of a regularly expanding national economy. So 535 people control 2/3 of the federal income that no one cares about, to the extent of needing to take it out of their personal accounts and send it in. Result: earmarks.
No number of editorials or letters to congress creatures has had any effect in the 66 years it has been going on. There is a way to fix this. Get 218 members of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators, and an agreeable president to sign it in to law, and change paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages... from "every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax..." to "every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee...." Leave the tax calculation with the employer so that with the check they include a stern note telling the employee how much the feds are expecting him to send in within 30 days.
Would it be easy to do? Probably not all at once, but a good place for the "frog in boiling water' technique: over a three-month quarter convert the 0.1 percent of the population w/ names starting with 'x' to a new, real 'pay-as-you-go' system, add in a new letter every quarter for 26 quarters, thru the 20% of the population w/ names starting with M and S.
Would this be inefficient? Certainly for an insatiable federal bureaucracy, but instructive for a growing portion of the electorate, sending in sizable checks every month from their own bank accounts. Questions would arise: Is the federal level the best to run health care? Education? retirement? What did the founders think of this approach?
Apparently not much, since they not only didn't authorize it in the Constitution, but in fact wrote specifically prohibiting it. Little did they envision their add-on 'general welfare' clause being beaten within an inch of its life, finally threatening the very existence of the country.
Those 26 quarters would cover three elections of the House of Representatives, reelection of the entire Senate, and election of a president. People would be asking the candidates these questions, and voting on the answers. And congresscreatures would forget how to spell 'earmark', let alone use it. This is the only way the voters will ever understand "the full and shameful truth" of why congress throws money around. Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Obama on the Special Olympics
Chicago Saturday PM, March 21, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal Gentlepeople: What possible good do you see in wasting 243 words of the most valuable opinion space in Journalism on defending Obama from “getting lashed “ for another outrageous tongue slip that tells much more about him than the people he insulted ("Bowling Pins and Needles" editorial Saturday March 21, 2009.) Sure he apologized to everyone in sight, and I'm sure Special Olympians are no more immune to Obama worship than any other segment of the population. You say “Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself.” That’s for sure, by clearly comparing himself to special Olympians.
Did you have similar WSJ editorials chastising the ‘political correctness police’ for their lashing of misspelling ‘potato’ and mispronouncing ‘nuclear,’ neither remotely demeaning anyone other than the speaker?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
Editors, Wall Street Journal Gentlepeople: What possible good do you see in wasting 243 words of the most valuable opinion space in Journalism on defending Obama from “getting lashed “ for another outrageous tongue slip that tells much more about him than the people he insulted ("Bowling Pins and Needles" editorial Saturday March 21, 2009.) Sure he apologized to everyone in sight, and I'm sure Special Olympians are no more immune to Obama worship than any other segment of the population. You say “Mr. Obama was clearly trying to make fun of himself.” That’s for sure, by clearly comparing himself to special Olympians.
Did you have similar WSJ editorials chastising the ‘political correctness police’ for their lashing of misspelling ‘potato’ and mispronouncing ‘nuclear,’ neither remotely demeaning anyone other than the speaker?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago 60640
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
If WSJ letters and op-eds ever bore you...
...try reading a news article.
Chicago Tuesday, March 17, 2009 11:22 AM
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
The Wall Street Journal's Monday, March 16 article "Small Business Loans Criticized" starts out "President Barack Obama is set to release a plan Monday raising the federal guarantee on small-business loans up to 90%..." and ends "...but a study by Congress's watchdog agency contends that insufficient oversight is in place for that program." This is a 37 word euphamism for: The president's found another nail for the Republican Party's coffin, and Congress says make sure you've got enough bureaucrats to do it.
Continuing: "The Small Business Administration... lends to small businesses that can't otherwise get credit, such as ...from private banks." And, the Presdident's plan "... will increase that guarantee... temporarily eliminate many of the loan fees that help pay for the program and cover potential defaults. And Mr. Obama on Monday will instruct the government to purchase small-business loans bundled and sold on the secondary market."
But, wait a minute: "Government watchdogs fear the potential for another debacle, similar to... the mortgage crisis, in which poorly documented loans were granted by mortgage brokers, then shuffled off to banks and hedge funds as securities. "By eliminating the upfront fees for banks and lenders while increasing guarantee levels, watchdogs say, the administration could be creating incentives for banks to rush credit out the door....
"'According to the GAO investigation, I think we have nothing more than a large, unregulated pot of money that lenders are going to scramble to get their hands on,' said one congressional investigator...."
Are the ever-so-sly WSJ suits test-driving a potential satire subsidiary on us here?
Note to the President: A Rush Limbaugh-like brite idea: why not have Congress make a simple change to paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages..." to exclude employers meeting the present definition of constituients of the Small Business Administration.
Um, Mr. Presdident, you don't think much of this idea? And you doubt Congress, even the Republicans, will either, since it will reduce federal income?
The small business creature will still be reporting to the employee how much they owe the federal government. You don't have confidence with the backbone of the working populace following the law and paying their fair share?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Chicago Tuesday, March 17, 2009 11:22 AM
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
The Wall Street Journal's Monday, March 16 article "Small Business Loans Criticized" starts out "President Barack Obama is set to release a plan Monday raising the federal guarantee on small-business loans up to 90%..." and ends "...but a study by Congress's watchdog agency contends that insufficient oversight is in place for that program." This is a 37 word euphamism for: The president's found another nail for the Republican Party's coffin, and Congress says make sure you've got enough bureaucrats to do it.
Continuing: "The Small Business Administration... lends to small businesses that can't otherwise get credit, such as ...from private banks." And, the Presdident's plan "... will increase that guarantee... temporarily eliminate many of the loan fees that help pay for the program and cover potential defaults. And Mr. Obama on Monday will instruct the government to purchase small-business loans bundled and sold on the secondary market."
But, wait a minute: "Government watchdogs fear the potential for another debacle, similar to... the mortgage crisis, in which poorly documented loans were granted by mortgage brokers, then shuffled off to banks and hedge funds as securities. "By eliminating the upfront fees for banks and lenders while increasing guarantee levels, watchdogs say, the administration could be creating incentives for banks to rush credit out the door....
"'According to the GAO investigation, I think we have nothing more than a large, unregulated pot of money that lenders are going to scramble to get their hands on,' said one congressional investigator...."
Are the ever-so-sly WSJ suits test-driving a potential satire subsidiary on us here?
Note to the President: A Rush Limbaugh-like brite idea: why not have Congress make a simple change to paragraph 3402 of United States Code Title 26 — 'Internal Revenue Code' Subtitle C 'Employment taxes' Chapter 24 'Collection Of Income Tax At Source On Wages..." to exclude employers meeting the present definition of constituients of the Small Business Administration.
Um, Mr. Presdident, you don't think much of this idea? And you doubt Congress, even the Republicans, will either, since it will reduce federal income?
The small business creature will still be reporting to the employee how much they owe the federal government. You don't have confidence with the backbone of the working populace following the law and paying their fair share?
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Monday, March 16, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Rush Limbaugh "I hope Obama fails"
Sunday, March 15, 2009 8:03 PM
Chicago Tribune Voice of the people
Gentlepeople:
Charles Madigan's Sunday, March 15 commentary "The business of Rush Limbaugh" starts "It all started with Limbaugh's hoping aloud that President Barack Obama fails."
And that claim started out with statements on Rush's Friday, January 16 radio show. An online transcript describes his receiving a request "from a major American print publication: 'Dear Rush: For the Obama Inauguration we are asking a handful of very prominent... commentators... to write 400 words on their hope for the Obama presidency....'
Rush's on air comment: "The premise is, what is your 'hope.' My hope, and please understand me when I say this. I disagree fervently with the people... who say, 'we've got to give him a chance.' Why? They didn't give Bush a chance in 2000.... I've been listening to Barack Obama for a year-and-a-half. I know what his politics are. I know what his plans are, as he has stated them. I don't want them to succeed. Look, what he's talking about is the absorption of as much of the private sector by the US government as possible, from the banking business... to health care. I do not want the government in charge of all of these things.... "
"So I'm thinking of replying... 'Okay, I'll send you a response, but I don't need 400 words, I need four: I hope he fails....
"I don't care what the Drive-By story is. I would be honored if the Drive-By Media headlined me all day long: 'Limbaugh: I Hope Obama Fails.' Somebody's gotta say it."
Later in the article, Madigan explains that "Limbaugh should take every chance he can get to bash away at the Obama administration and hold onto his audience...." After reading the above transcript, does Madigan still believe "keeping his audience" is what drives Rush Limbaugh?
Madigan continues, describing Rush Limbaugh's "product" as "very conservative opinion. But he is not a William F. Buckley conservative...." Beyond his immediate family, Rush Limbaugh's most often referenced and quoted heroes are Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley Jr. I never heard RWR or WFBJr say anything questionable about Rush, and I have heard Buckley speak very highly of Rush. There are a few writers on Buckley's magazine who recently have been less than flattering, but many more have come out in his strong defense. So Madigan's claim is no more than a wild guess.
But Madigan is full of wild guesses: "Limbaugh, perhaps the most successful broadcaster of the last two decades...."
Perhaps? Who is number two?
"Limbaugh's audience most likely trends toward an older demographic...."
"And who knows how many Limbaugh listeners are voters?"
No doubt about who people looking for something-for-nothing vote for.
"[A]ctual Republicans who have to carry the ball in Congress and in statehouses will never be able to keep up with [Rush's] rhetoric.
Rush often speaks on his show of his pride in a plaque naming him an honorary member of the 1995 Republican House of Representatives freshmen, thanking him for the help he gave them in taking over the House in 1994.
“Rush is ‘selling personality on air.’"
Since Obama brought not 5 minutes of executive, buck-stops-here experience to the office of president, what was he selling but "personality". At least Rush does it without a teleprompter.
Besides the title of this article, the word 'business' occurs 7 times, 5 referring to Rush Limbaugh. Would Mr. Madigan ever write about Barack Obama's business, which for his entire career has been applied 100% to getting out the vote for Democrat, left wing causes?
Madigan finally makes his major point, that "Limbaugh is about rhetoric, not reality...," which conveniently explains an earlier qualification that Madigan doesn't "listen to talk radio". If Madigan would listen to Rush Limbaugh for a couple hours some week, he would find 'rhetoric' is buried under tons of description and discussion of the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, the principles put forth by our founders to encourage private initiative, and keep the government out of it. The down side is that you would also hear lots of description of forces out to destroy all of this by convincing the public they cannot do anything by themselves, but must have the watchful eye, and constant intervention of 500 all-but-life-time elected public officials in DC, riding on the back of a vast bureaucracy they no longer control, beyond helping them stay in office.
After a murky opening paragraph that appeared to do little more than get him off the ground, Madigan closes with "Everyone involved [in the Limbaugh 'flap'] ... is motivated by self-interest." Maybe it would be easier to understand if Madigan could name a single person in the world who is not "motivated by self interest."
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine DriveChicago IL 60640773-677-3010
Chicago Tribune Voice of the people
Gentlepeople:
Charles Madigan's Sunday, March 15 commentary "The business of Rush Limbaugh" starts "It all started with Limbaugh's hoping aloud that President Barack Obama fails."
And that claim started out with statements on Rush's Friday, January 16 radio show. An online transcript describes his receiving a request "from a major American print publication: 'Dear Rush: For the Obama Inauguration we are asking a handful of very prominent... commentators... to write 400 words on their hope for the Obama presidency....'
Rush's on air comment: "The premise is, what is your 'hope.' My hope, and please understand me when I say this. I disagree fervently with the people... who say, 'we've got to give him a chance.' Why? They didn't give Bush a chance in 2000.... I've been listening to Barack Obama for a year-and-a-half. I know what his politics are. I know what his plans are, as he has stated them. I don't want them to succeed. Look, what he's talking about is the absorption of as much of the private sector by the US government as possible, from the banking business... to health care. I do not want the government in charge of all of these things.... "
"So I'm thinking of replying... 'Okay, I'll send you a response, but I don't need 400 words, I need four: I hope he fails....
"I don't care what the Drive-By story is. I would be honored if the Drive-By Media headlined me all day long: 'Limbaugh: I Hope Obama Fails.' Somebody's gotta say it."
Later in the article, Madigan explains that "Limbaugh should take every chance he can get to bash away at the Obama administration and hold onto his audience...." After reading the above transcript, does Madigan still believe "keeping his audience" is what drives Rush Limbaugh?
Madigan continues, describing Rush Limbaugh's "product" as "very conservative opinion. But he is not a William F. Buckley conservative...." Beyond his immediate family, Rush Limbaugh's most often referenced and quoted heroes are Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley Jr. I never heard RWR or WFBJr say anything questionable about Rush, and I have heard Buckley speak very highly of Rush. There are a few writers on Buckley's magazine who recently have been less than flattering, but many more have come out in his strong defense. So Madigan's claim is no more than a wild guess.
But Madigan is full of wild guesses: "Limbaugh, perhaps the most successful broadcaster of the last two decades...."
Perhaps? Who is number two?
"Limbaugh's audience most likely trends toward an older demographic...."
"And who knows how many Limbaugh listeners are voters?"
No doubt about who people looking for something-for-nothing vote for.
"[A]ctual Republicans who have to carry the ball in Congress and in statehouses will never be able to keep up with [Rush's] rhetoric.
Rush often speaks on his show of his pride in a plaque naming him an honorary member of the 1995 Republican House of Representatives freshmen, thanking him for the help he gave them in taking over the House in 1994.
“Rush is ‘selling personality on air.’"
Since Obama brought not 5 minutes of executive, buck-stops-here experience to the office of president, what was he selling but "personality". At least Rush does it without a teleprompter.
Besides the title of this article, the word 'business' occurs 7 times, 5 referring to Rush Limbaugh. Would Mr. Madigan ever write about Barack Obama's business, which for his entire career has been applied 100% to getting out the vote for Democrat, left wing causes?
Madigan finally makes his major point, that "Limbaugh is about rhetoric, not reality...," which conveniently explains an earlier qualification that Madigan doesn't "listen to talk radio". If Madigan would listen to Rush Limbaugh for a couple hours some week, he would find 'rhetoric' is buried under tons of description and discussion of the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, the principles put forth by our founders to encourage private initiative, and keep the government out of it. The down side is that you would also hear lots of description of forces out to destroy all of this by convincing the public they cannot do anything by themselves, but must have the watchful eye, and constant intervention of 500 all-but-life-time elected public officials in DC, riding on the back of a vast bureaucracy they no longer control, beyond helping them stay in office.
After a murky opening paragraph that appeared to do little more than get him off the ground, Madigan closes with "Everyone involved [in the Limbaugh 'flap'] ... is motivated by self-interest." Maybe it would be easier to understand if Madigan could name a single person in the world who is not "motivated by self interest."
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine DriveChicago IL 60640773-677-3010
Friday, March 13, 2009
Another wishy-washy Republican...
...gets a letter printed in the WSJ (March 12, 2009):
"Daniel Henninger ('Has Obama Buried Reagan?,' Wonder Land, March 5) has one thing right: Republicans had better start talking about economic growth. But first they have to stop dithering and consorting with buffoons like Rush Limbaugh or threatening to go beyond the cutting edge and get really hip-hop.
"Maybe then they can join the conversation about growth that's already underway in many quarters -- not just within the Obama administration, but also in the private sector, which, Mr. Henninger claims, is the Republicans' political bailiwick.
"Hoping that the ghost of Ronald Reagan will offer, again, a way out of the darkness is also just bad political strategy. Many young voters (most of whom were Obama voters this time around) were born during President Reagan's second term. To them, 'Ronald Reagan' sounds a bit like 'William McKinley.'
"Sticking to conservative principles shouldn't rule out coming up with new ideas."
I responded:
Chicago Friday AM, March 13, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
The letter "Can't Live in the Past" in the Thursday, March 12 Wall Street Journal suggests the Republicans "... join the conversation about [economic] growth that's already underway... not just within the Obama administration. ..."
How did that 'just' get in there? The administration told everyone what they would do if they won, and since they did, the economy as grown by -$3 trillion in the private sector stock market alone.
The letter further suggests the Republicans "...stop dithering and consorting with buffoons like Rush Limbaugh". In politics, if an ally seems less than helpful, what does your real opposition think? Rush Limbaugh has the Democrats so befuddled, Republicans are lucky he still prefers them to Democrats.
The letter-writer doesn't think "the ghost of Ronald Reagan will offer... a way out of the darkness". So what have we had since RWR that's better? Another Republican who was no Reagan, but did win two elections. Then there was the guy who ran because "it was his turn," who then ignored the greatest political legacy of the 20th century, the two-year-old Contract with America. Then there was that guy last fall, effectively nominated by Democrats because of some weired "new ideas" in the Republican nominating process.
But even picking a VP partner someone with demonstrable executive experience (in contrast to himself and the opposing ticket) couldn't save him from his own incompetence.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
"Daniel Henninger ('Has Obama Buried Reagan?,' Wonder Land, March 5) has one thing right: Republicans had better start talking about economic growth. But first they have to stop dithering and consorting with buffoons like Rush Limbaugh or threatening to go beyond the cutting edge and get really hip-hop.
"Maybe then they can join the conversation about growth that's already underway in many quarters -- not just within the Obama administration, but also in the private sector, which, Mr. Henninger claims, is the Republicans' political bailiwick.
"Hoping that the ghost of Ronald Reagan will offer, again, a way out of the darkness is also just bad political strategy. Many young voters (most of whom were Obama voters this time around) were born during President Reagan's second term. To them, 'Ronald Reagan' sounds a bit like 'William McKinley.'
"Sticking to conservative principles shouldn't rule out coming up with new ideas."
I responded:
Chicago Friday AM, March 13, 2009
Editors, Wall Street Journal
Gentlepeople:
The letter "Can't Live in the Past" in the Thursday, March 12 Wall Street Journal suggests the Republicans "... join the conversation about [economic] growth that's already underway... not just within the Obama administration. ..."
How did that 'just' get in there? The administration told everyone what they would do if they won, and since they did, the economy as grown by -$3 trillion in the private sector stock market alone.
The letter further suggests the Republicans "...stop dithering and consorting with buffoons like Rush Limbaugh". In politics, if an ally seems less than helpful, what does your real opposition think? Rush Limbaugh has the Democrats so befuddled, Republicans are lucky he still prefers them to Democrats.
The letter-writer doesn't think "the ghost of Ronald Reagan will offer... a way out of the darkness". So what have we had since RWR that's better? Another Republican who was no Reagan, but did win two elections. Then there was the guy who ran because "it was his turn," who then ignored the greatest political legacy of the 20th century, the two-year-old Contract with America. Then there was that guy last fall, effectively nominated by Democrats because of some weired "new ideas" in the Republican nominating process.
But even picking a VP partner someone with demonstrable executive experience (in contrast to himself and the opposing ticket) couldn't save him from his own incompetence.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Saturday, March 7, 2009
The UK Financial Times is pretty good...
...when they talk about Bangkok, but they don't know beans about Rush Limbaugh:
Saturday, March 7, 2009 7:56 PM
Editors, UK Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times Friday, March 6, article “Man in the News“ on Rush Limbaugh is interesting and well written. Granting that "his audience contains a large share of people with college degrees..." and "Democrats... would be rash to underestimate his ability..." is refreshingly fair, especially considering he didn't reply to your e-mailed questions.
But there are points that are absolutely wrong. Rush's nickname for "James Carville, a leading Democratic consultant" is not "Forehead”, but "The Serpent". The Forehead is Paul Begalla, a Democrat political strategist, and California Congress creature Henry Waxman is nostrilitis" (look at pics of those three and you will see, cruel they may be, the nicknames could not be more descriptive.)
And Mr Obama is not the “Supreme Leader” - he is the Messiah, a nickname not particularly liked by many on the right. Saving the "best" for last, Rush did not call John Edwards, the “Bret Girl”; but yes "in honour of a shampoo advertisement" called him the "Breck" girl. And “ditto heads” is not a "disparaging name" Rush gives to his audience, but an honored trademark (he calls his in-studio video camera "the ditto cam.") As he has explained many times, it comes from the early days of his national show, many callers did indeed compliment him, so much so that many more started off with "dittos to that last caller". Those compliments were often expressly qualified with "but I don't agree with every thing you say."
And I assume that you are quoting "moderate Republicans" when you say "Parties do not get elected by heading into the wilderness...." Did Ronald Reagan head into the wilderness? George W Bush was a little weaker there than RWR, but not near as deep in the wilderness as his two opponents. You want to see real 'wilderness'? Look at the results of George HW, Bob Dole, and John McCain.
As far as Rush's callers phoning in to agree with everything he says, I remember in the Teri Schiavo disaster, he came in on Monday AM and took 3 1/2 days of "Pull the plug", and it sounded like Sammy Sosa batting practice. Every one out of the park, until the last hour Thursday, when he finally took a caller who agreed with him.
Your statement that Rush talks "in a distinctive American conservative style – angry about white victimhood...." would only carry weight if you could quote a single instance of Rush talking about "white victimhood." A single example of any American Conservative saying that could only help your credibility also.
You object to Rush saying the Obama presidency would “lead ineluctably to 'socialism', 'socialised medicine' and other original sins." I've always understood that Socialism is public ownership of all means of production. Obama is well on his way to taking over the banks and the home mortgage industry. The investor class lost $2 trillion from Obama's election to his inauguration, another $trillion since then. How long will it take before Obama declares "the country is too big to fail," and nationalizes the entire economy because no one else wants it? And if taking management of the health care sector away from local doctors, hospitals, and common-stock-owned health insurance companies, and giving it entirely to Washington DC bureaucrats isn't "socialised medicine", what is?
Edward Luce is a fine writer, certainly deserving of a high place in FT's outstanding group of writers. But it's questionable how many Rush Limbaugh shows he's listened to, or how many listeners he's talked with.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Saturday, March 7, 2009 7:56 PM
Editors, UK Financial Times
Gentlepeople:
The Financial Times Friday, March 6, article “Man in the News“ on Rush Limbaugh is interesting and well written. Granting that "his audience contains a large share of people with college degrees..." and "Democrats... would be rash to underestimate his ability..." is refreshingly fair, especially considering he didn't reply to your e-mailed questions.
But there are points that are absolutely wrong. Rush's nickname for "James Carville, a leading Democratic consultant" is not "Forehead”, but "The Serpent". The Forehead is Paul Begalla, a Democrat political strategist, and California Congress creature Henry Waxman is nostrilitis" (look at pics of those three and you will see, cruel they may be, the nicknames could not be more descriptive.)
And Mr Obama is not the “Supreme Leader” - he is the Messiah, a nickname not particularly liked by many on the right. Saving the "best" for last, Rush did not call John Edwards, the “Bret Girl”; but yes "in honour of a shampoo advertisement" called him the "Breck" girl. And “ditto heads” is not a "disparaging name" Rush gives to his audience, but an honored trademark (he calls his in-studio video camera "the ditto cam.") As he has explained many times, it comes from the early days of his national show, many callers did indeed compliment him, so much so that many more started off with "dittos to that last caller". Those compliments were often expressly qualified with "but I don't agree with every thing you say."
And I assume that you are quoting "moderate Republicans" when you say "Parties do not get elected by heading into the wilderness...." Did Ronald Reagan head into the wilderness? George W Bush was a little weaker there than RWR, but not near as deep in the wilderness as his two opponents. You want to see real 'wilderness'? Look at the results of George HW, Bob Dole, and John McCain.
As far as Rush's callers phoning in to agree with everything he says, I remember in the Teri Schiavo disaster, he came in on Monday AM and took 3 1/2 days of "Pull the plug", and it sounded like Sammy Sosa batting practice. Every one out of the park, until the last hour Thursday, when he finally took a caller who agreed with him.
Your statement that Rush talks "in a distinctive American conservative style – angry about white victimhood...." would only carry weight if you could quote a single instance of Rush talking about "white victimhood." A single example of any American Conservative saying that could only help your credibility also.
You object to Rush saying the Obama presidency would “lead ineluctably to 'socialism', 'socialised medicine' and other original sins." I've always understood that Socialism is public ownership of all means of production. Obama is well on his way to taking over the banks and the home mortgage industry. The investor class lost $2 trillion from Obama's election to his inauguration, another $trillion since then. How long will it take before Obama declares "the country is too big to fail," and nationalizes the entire economy because no one else wants it? And if taking management of the health care sector away from local doctors, hospitals, and common-stock-owned health insurance companies, and giving it entirely to Washington DC bureaucrats isn't "socialised medicine", what is?
Edward Luce is a fine writer, certainly deserving of a high place in FT's outstanding group of writers. But it's questionable how many Rush Limbaugh shows he's listened to, or how many listeners he's talked with.
Arnold H Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Trib letter on Boul Mich bridge safety
Chicago Tuesday afternoon, December 2, 2008
Voice of the People, Chicago Tribune
Gentlepeople: Your Tuesday, December 2, article "Slippery when wet—but ever so pretty" makes excellent points about how the Michigan Avenue bridge can get dangerous in icy weather. But how safe is it on a bright, tourist-clogged summer day? A camera tugging visitor stands right next to the roadway to get a pic of his hosts standing at the rail with Wacker Drive and Trump Tower in the background. He wants a slightly better angle, so instinctively takes a backward step, but trips backwards over the ankle-high rail, the only thing separating him from speeding traffic. The photog could fall so quickly that even a motorist traveling at normal Michigan bridge speed would have no chance of stopping in time. The fact that it has apparently never happened could mean only that we've been very lucky.
Arnold H. Nelson Chicago 60640
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Does FT already have the 2009 journalistic poor tast award in the bag?Sunday, January 18, 2009 2:38 PM
From: "Arnold Nelson" To: "Financial Times"
Chicago Sunday PM January 18, 009
Editors, UK Financial Times :
Gentlepeople: Everyone has biases, no less newspapers, even the leading international newspaper. But is it to much to ask that the Financial Times try to show a little more control than you did with your way-to-crude Saturday, January 17, editorial cartoon depicting a startled-looking US President George W. Bush being kicked out of a way-to-large shoe by an even larger black foot. Have you ever actually examined George Bush's pre-presidential resume? Before being elected President he was elected, and reelected (by 2 to 1 vote margin) governor of the nation's second largest state (with a 1,000 mile international border.) Before that he was managing partner of a sports franchise for five years where franchises regularly have $75 million annual payrolls, and approach $1 billion sales prices; and before that was a combat-ready trained Air Force National Guard jet pilot.
Now compare the big black foot: he has never met a private sector payroll in his life (a Columbia U graduate without an 'emphasis' on economics.) His international experience is limited to four crucial pre-teen years slogging thru the mud of Indonesia (but yes, 'emphasis' on international relations at Columbia.) His government experience is 8 years as an Illinois state senator, a job requiring no more skills than a Chicago Bears third string jock strap attendant (but without the responsibility.) He was a non-tenure-tracked instructor of Constitutional Law at a major University, but rarely mentions the document, and even then rarely without pointing out supposed defects, ignoring its genius.
And oh! Did I mention he has no military experience?
Certainly many say Bush didn't do anything right, but he got those tax cuts through getting us out of a left-over Clinton recession and over the worst domestic attack in the nation's history. And he made the first honest effort at averting the inevitable Social Security civilization-destroying Ponzi Scheme, but a spineless Congress would not let him do it.
His administration went to Congress annually asking them to do something with the obvious Fannie/Freddie disaster, but again they would have none of reality.
The same many will say he took us into Iraq, but I'm sure FT has read the House-Senate Joint resolution of October 10, 2002 and its list of 22 statements supporting invading Iraq, passed by 2/3 majorities in both Congressional houses.
For sure no one know what a President Obama's legacy will be, but from all he has said, and even more important what his appointees and top supporters have said, here is a prediction: Soon after noon on Tuesday the new president will make the first buck-stops-here decision of his entire life. Then he will start his professed attempt to 'jump start' the economy with out-of-control deficit spending that will only make things worse. This will inevitably force the inspirational new leader to publicly announce: "Our country is too big to fail, so to prevent its failure, I have just signed an executive order making all US residents, legal and illegal alike, direct employees of the federal government. May the force be with us!"
And everyone will go along quietly, happily, because it feels good.
Arnold H Nelson Chicago IL 60640
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