Saturday, May 17, 2008
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Letter to WSJ on their illegal immigration stand
Chicago IL Friday AM, May 30, 2008
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
The second sentence of the third paragraph of your Thursday, May 29 editorial 'The Menendez Method' reads: "No one wants to reward lawbreaking." Guess the first word of the next sentence. A hint, this is a Wall Street Journal editorial, so it's obviously "But", followed by the usual contortions trying to explain that there are laws, certainly, that should not be broken, but then there's those silly immigration laws, and if they threaten in any way guaranteeing a permanent class of perpetually bent-backed, low paid, agricultural workers, then so be it.
Why, if they were enforced, "growers will continue to move operations south of the border if they can't find labor in the U.S. at a price that allows growers to stay competitive."
Remember what happened to the US banana growers? Remember when red raspberries were in the store for only two weeks in June? Then better shipping techniques allowed them to be supplied near-year-round from Chile. It used to take a busload of (short) school kids to pick enough blueberries for a couple bowls of cereal and milk, now the grower calls up a guy who shows up in two days with a single machine, and whoosh, truckloads of crated blueberries.
When I read you spout this illegal immigration fetish, I can't believe I'm reading a top newspaper like the Journal. But the immediately preceding editorial starts out: "New Jersey is about the last place one might think to look for free- market policy reform," and before that: "Republicans in Congress may be out of gas, but that doesn't mean conservative ideas aren't percolating elsewhere...." page after clear thinking page of solid conservative positions.
But no, a yelp from a single southwestern lettuce grower threatening to move out if he doesn't get coolie-priced labor, and the WSJ editorial board is back in its illegal immigration fetal position. Grow up!
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
The second sentence of the third paragraph of your Thursday, May 29 editorial 'The Menendez Method' reads: "No one wants to reward lawbreaking." Guess the first word of the next sentence. A hint, this is a Wall Street Journal editorial, so it's obviously "But", followed by the usual contortions trying to explain that there are laws, certainly, that should not be broken, but then there's those silly immigration laws, and if they threaten in any way guaranteeing a permanent class of perpetually bent-backed, low paid, agricultural workers, then so be it.
Why, if they were enforced, "growers will continue to move operations south of the border if they can't find labor in the U.S. at a price that allows growers to stay competitive."
Remember what happened to the US banana growers? Remember when red raspberries were in the store for only two weeks in June? Then better shipping techniques allowed them to be supplied near-year-round from Chile. It used to take a busload of (short) school kids to pick enough blueberries for a couple bowls of cereal and milk, now the grower calls up a guy who shows up in two days with a single machine, and whoosh, truckloads of crated blueberries.
When I read you spout this illegal immigration fetish, I can't believe I'm reading a top newspaper like the Journal. But the immediately preceding editorial starts out: "New Jersey is about the last place one might think to look for free- market policy reform," and before that: "Republicans in Congress may be out of gas, but that doesn't mean conservative ideas aren't percolating elsewhere...." page after clear thinking page of solid conservative positions.
But no, a yelp from a single southwestern lettuce grower threatening to move out if he doesn't get coolie-priced labor, and the WSJ editorial board is back in its illegal immigration fetal position. Grow up!
Arnold H. Nelson 5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640
Saturday, May 3, 2008
Chicago IL Saturday PM, May 3, 2008
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
William Tucker's Friday, May 2 'Notable and Quotable' makes a surprisingly rarely heard, but most significant point about the vast amounts of land required by the allegedly "clean, renewable, and sustainable" so-called 'green' energy sources.
An even more significant point can be made by considering that land is a two-dimensional space, and at that only 30 per cent of the earth's surface not covered by water.
Oil, on the other hand, comes from a 3-dimensional space, a space under every square inch of the earth's surface. And with all the exploration that's been done for oil, it has been significantly limited to places where it could be economically extracted, which at this time doesn't include a very major part of the 70% of the earth's surface covered by water. Add to that the constant redefinition of the economics of oil extraction by ever improving technology, and the green arguments become even less realistic. And continuing study of abiotic sources of oil (as discussed in some detail by David J. Bardin in an article "What if Methane's Inexhaustible?" in the Thursday, January 26, 1984 Wall Street Journal) make the greenies' positions yet more precarious.
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
William Tucker's Friday, May 2 'Notable and Quotable' makes a surprisingly rarely heard, but most significant point about the vast amounts of land required by the allegedly "clean, renewable, and sustainable" so-called 'green' energy sources.
An even more significant point can be made by considering that land is a two-dimensional space, and at that only 30 per cent of the earth's surface not covered by water.
Oil, on the other hand, comes from a 3-dimensional space, a space under every square inch of the earth's surface. And with all the exploration that's been done for oil, it has been significantly limited to places where it could be economically extracted, which at this time doesn't include a very major part of the 70% of the earth's surface covered by water. Add to that the constant redefinition of the economics of oil extraction by ever improving technology, and the green arguments become even less realistic. And continuing study of abiotic sources of oil (as discussed in some detail by David J. Bardin in an article "What if Methane's Inexhaustible?" in the Thursday, January 26, 1984 Wall Street Journal) make the greenies' positions yet more precarious.
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
WSJ letter 'Billification' of HRC prez campaign article
Chicago IL Saturday PM, April 16, 2008
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
Your Saturday, April 26 article "He's Back; Bill Clinton gives his wife's campaign new momentum..." says Bill Clinton "has become something of a strategist-in-chief in recent weeks", "told the campaign to double the number of his daily appearances" and is "sending out fund-raising appeals, with strong results."
It almost sounds like he's running for a third term. He can't do that, can he...?
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
Your Saturday, April 26 article "He's Back; Bill Clinton gives his wife's campaign new momentum..." says Bill Clinton "has become something of a strategist-in-chief in recent weeks", "told the campaign to double the number of his daily appearances" and is "sending out fund-raising appeals, with strong results."
It almost sounds like he's running for a third term. He can't do that, can he...?
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Letter to WSJ 04/15/08 Loopholes editorial
Chicago IL Wednesday, April 16, 2008
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
No one in American media comes close to the Wall Street Journal in delivering powerful editorials, but you beat even this high standard with your Tuesday, April 15, 2008 800 word "Loophole Factory"
After 700 words describing the absolute mayhem being committed by our federal legislature on their number one responsibility, taxes and spending, there is one loose end: "The losers are taxpayers who aren't powerful or rich enough to afford a tax lobbyist."
The problem here is that ever since the enactment of the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, the number of taxpayers, people who write actual checks on their personal accounts to the federal government, has dwindled to considerably less than a critical mass.
Ninety percent of voters are wage earners, and ninety percent of US wage earners do not pay income taxes. They get a statement with every pay check saying they have paid federal income taxes, but the actual dollars in that transaction came from employers'
bank accounts, not wage earners'.
Employers are certainly not happy with this situation, but don't have the votes to change it, and are able to easily pass on the expense to customers. Also, as is so well described in your editorial, many employers are the same perps demanding, and getting, all those outlandish loopholes.
So 'income taxes' become a near-painless extraction of the fed's largest source of income from the soft underbelly of a continuously growing US economy. In 230 years we have moved from violently rebelling against "taxation without representation" to acceptance of "representation without taxation", without a whimper.
The solution to this problem is not the 'Fair tax', nor repealing the 16th amendment, just a majority vote in the House of Representatives and 60 votes in the Senate, to change 11, and add 24, words deep in the federal tax code, specifically:
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 (a) Requirement of withholding (1) In general...' from:
"Except as otherwise provided in this section, every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax determined in accordance with tables or
computational procedures prescribed by the Secretary[of the Treasury]."
To: "Regardless of what is provided in this section or anywhere else in US law, every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee, and calculate upon such wages a tax determined in accordance with tables or computational
procedures prescribed by the Secretary[of the Treasury] and report the amount of that tax directly to the US Treasury and the employee."
Here would be a good place to add that the employee is expected to remit a personal check to the federal government for the amount of the tax before getting his next pay check.
Would this be inefficient? Sure, for an insatiable federal government, but educational for wage earner/voters, especially once they start writing checks on their own bank accounts to the feds for 20% of their last paycheck. This would result in direct responsibility for 80% of federal income being given back to those who are supposed to have it in the first place: US voters.
This could not be done over nite (as could not be done with the Fair tax either, but don't tell them.) So pick a random letter every month, and change all employees with last names beginning with that letter, to the new, real, pay-as-you-go system.
After the 26-month conversion period, every wage earner in the country would be writing a check to the feds for 20% of his pay every pay period. They would not be happy. That same period would include a re-election of all 435 members of the House and 1/3 of the Senate, that would reflect some of that voter unhappiness.
Employers could include an additional note with the pay check, suggesting the wage earner encourage their congressional candidates to bone up on Article I Section 8 of the US Constitution that lists all 18 things the congress is allowed to do, with a minor mention that the founders had no idea what future congresses would do with the 'general welfare' clause.
Unfortunately, a lot of citizens would be as outraged as the feds over this change. Rather than see it as their responsibility as citizens to have first hand experience with how much money the feds are playing with, they would want the present system to continue, where deep down, they like to feel they are getting something for nothing. Convincing them otherwise would be a major PR task, but better now then telling future generations why their nation is collapsing underneath them. 788 words
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
WSJ editors
Gentlepeople:
No one in American media comes close to the Wall Street Journal in delivering powerful editorials, but you beat even this high standard with your Tuesday, April 15, 2008 800 word "Loophole Factory"
After 700 words describing the absolute mayhem being committed by our federal legislature on their number one responsibility, taxes and spending, there is one loose end: "The losers are taxpayers who aren't powerful or rich enough to afford a tax lobbyist."
The problem here is that ever since the enactment of the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, the number of taxpayers, people who write actual checks on their personal accounts to the federal government, has dwindled to considerably less than a critical mass.
Ninety percent of voters are wage earners, and ninety percent of US wage earners do not pay income taxes. They get a statement with every pay check saying they have paid federal income taxes, but the actual dollars in that transaction came from employers'
bank accounts, not wage earners'.
Employers are certainly not happy with this situation, but don't have the votes to change it, and are able to easily pass on the expense to customers. Also, as is so well described in your editorial, many employers are the same perps demanding, and getting, all those outlandish loopholes.
So 'income taxes' become a near-painless extraction of the fed's largest source of income from the soft underbelly of a continuously growing US economy. In 230 years we have moved from violently rebelling against "taxation without representation" to acceptance of "representation without taxation", without a whimper.
The solution to this problem is not the 'Fair tax', nor repealing the 16th amendment, just a majority vote in the House of Representatives and 60 votes in the Senate, to change 11, and add 24, words deep in the federal tax code, specifically:
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 (a) Requirement of withholding (1) In general...' from:
"Except as otherwise provided in this section, every employer making payment of wages shall deduct and withhold upon such wages a tax determined in accordance with tables or
computational procedures prescribed by the Secretary[of the Treasury]."
To: "Regardless of what is provided in this section or anywhere else in US law, every employer making payment of wages shall pay all of those wages to the employee, and calculate upon such wages a tax determined in accordance with tables or computational
procedures prescribed by the Secretary[of the Treasury] and report the amount of that tax directly to the US Treasury and the employee."
Here would be a good place to add that the employee is expected to remit a personal check to the federal government for the amount of the tax before getting his next pay check.
Would this be inefficient? Sure, for an insatiable federal government, but educational for wage earner/voters, especially once they start writing checks on their own bank accounts to the feds for 20% of their last paycheck. This would result in direct responsibility for 80% of federal income being given back to those who are supposed to have it in the first place: US voters.
This could not be done over nite (as could not be done with the Fair tax either, but don't tell them.) So pick a random letter every month, and change all employees with last names beginning with that letter, to the new, real, pay-as-you-go system.
After the 26-month conversion period, every wage earner in the country would be writing a check to the feds for 20% of his pay every pay period. They would not be happy. That same period would include a re-election of all 435 members of the House and 1/3 of the Senate, that would reflect some of that voter unhappiness.
Employers could include an additional note with the pay check, suggesting the wage earner encourage their congressional candidates to bone up on Article I Section 8 of the US Constitution that lists all 18 things the congress is allowed to do, with a minor mention that the founders had no idea what future congresses would do with the 'general welfare' clause.
Unfortunately, a lot of citizens would be as outraged as the feds over this change. Rather than see it as their responsibility as citizens to have first hand experience with how much money the feds are playing with, they would want the present system to continue, where deep down, they like to feel they are getting something for nothing. Convincing them otherwise would be a major PR task, but better now then telling future generations why their nation is collapsing underneath them. 788 words
Arnold H. Nelson5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
ChiTrib letter ChinatownCTA accident truck driver
Saturday, April 26, 2007 5PM
Voice of the PeopleChicago Tribune
Gentle people:
An article in the Wednesday, July 4, 2007 Chicago Tribune "No charges in fatal crash... " describes the resolution of a case where a semi-truck driver was not prosecuted for driving "...his semitrailer into a line of vehicles on the Indiana Toll Road in April [2007], killing eight people...."
The Elkhart [IN] County Prosecuting Attorney Curtis Hill was quoted in the Tribune article: "Leonardo Cooksey, 32, was trying to charge his cell phone while driving and didn't see the traffic stopped in front of him until it was too late..." and further: "Mr. Cooksey's conduct was inattentive driving, not speeding, not driving while intoxicated or under the influence of alcohol or drugs... inadvertence alone, while an indication of negligent conduct, does not rise to the level of criminal liability, notwithstanding a catastrophic result."
Later the Tribune article says: "Lawyers in Illinois said the case's outcome likely would have been the same in Illinois, because Cooksey's actions, while unfortunate, did not constitute recklessness...."
So since only two people (so far) were killed in Friday's unfortunate incident in Chinatown, that semi driver probably will not need to use even the "fiddling with the charger" excuse the 2007 Tribune article said the Indiana driver had given to the police, to avoid any official reprimand at all. Maybe just 'picking his nose' will get him off.
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
PS If 'no picking' is off limits for VOTP, you have my permission to use 'scratching himself', 'clipping his nails', whatever makes the point a little more delicately.
Voice of the PeopleChicago Tribune
Gentle people:
An article in the Wednesday, July 4, 2007 Chicago Tribune "No charges in fatal crash... " describes the resolution of a case where a semi-truck driver was not prosecuted for driving "...his semitrailer into a line of vehicles on the Indiana Toll Road in April [2007], killing eight people...."
The Elkhart [IN] County Prosecuting Attorney Curtis Hill was quoted in the Tribune article: "Leonardo Cooksey, 32, was trying to charge his cell phone while driving and didn't see the traffic stopped in front of him until it was too late..." and further: "Mr. Cooksey's conduct was inattentive driving, not speeding, not driving while intoxicated or under the influence of alcohol or drugs... inadvertence alone, while an indication of negligent conduct, does not rise to the level of criminal liability, notwithstanding a catastrophic result."
Later the Tribune article says: "Lawyers in Illinois said the case's outcome likely would have been the same in Illinois, because Cooksey's actions, while unfortunate, did not constitute recklessness...."
So since only two people (so far) were killed in Friday's unfortunate incident in Chinatown, that semi driver probably will not need to use even the "fiddling with the charger" excuse the 2007 Tribune article said the Indiana driver had given to the police, to avoid any official reprimand at all. Maybe just 'picking his nose' will get him off.
Arnold H Nelson5056 North Marine Drive Chicago IL 60640773-677-3010 ah_nelson@yahoo.com
PS If 'no picking' is off limits for VOTP, you have my permission to use 'scratching himself', 'clipping his nails', whatever makes the point a little more delicately.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Response to WSJ: "World has Plenty of Oil...
Wednesday, March 5, 2008 3:34 AM
From: "Arnold Nelson" ah_nelson@yahoo.com
To: "WSJ Letters" <wsj.ltrs@wsj.com
Chicago IL Wednesday, March 5, 2008 Gentlepeople: A Tuesday, March 4 article 'The World Has Plenty of Oil' was refreshing, so no surprise that it appears in WSJ.
When I first heard of bio fuels, I thot: Here's the way to convert energy from the sun into fuel for our cars. Who cares if we run out of oil. After a while, I thot further: virtually all biofuel sources, and corn especially, come from a two-dimensional space. the surface of the earth. But 70% of that space is under several thousand feet of water, unavailable for any crops in the traditional sense. Of the remaining 30%, there's not a whole lot af space to grow anything convertible to biofuels. Rule out the deserts - Sahara, Arabian, Gobi, etc. Not much corn grows there. Same for the mountains - Himalayas, Rockies, Andes - not much market for combines.
Another potential plus for bios, their replenishable. But how often? Corn especially I understand takes so much out of the soil that it cannot be grown in the same fields, year after year.
Now take oil - it comes from a 3-dimensional space. Except for some minor nibbling on the continental shelf, 70% of this has never been tested for oil availability, and if found, it will be a while before we develop the tools needed to extract it. But we will, when cost effective.
Arnold H. Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL
From: "Arnold Nelson" ah_nelson@yahoo.com
To: "WSJ Letters" <wsj.ltrs@wsj.com
Chicago IL Wednesday, March 5, 2008 Gentlepeople: A Tuesday, March 4 article 'The World Has Plenty of Oil' was refreshing, so no surprise that it appears in WSJ.
When I first heard of bio fuels, I thot: Here's the way to convert energy from the sun into fuel for our cars. Who cares if we run out of oil. After a while, I thot further: virtually all biofuel sources, and corn especially, come from a two-dimensional space. the surface of the earth. But 70% of that space is under several thousand feet of water, unavailable for any crops in the traditional sense. Of the remaining 30%, there's not a whole lot af space to grow anything convertible to biofuels. Rule out the deserts - Sahara, Arabian, Gobi, etc. Not much corn grows there. Same for the mountains - Himalayas, Rockies, Andes - not much market for combines.
Another potential plus for bios, their replenishable. But how often? Corn especially I understand takes so much out of the soil that it cannot be grown in the same fields, year after year.
Now take oil - it comes from a 3-dimensional space. Except for some minor nibbling on the continental shelf, 70% of this has never been tested for oil availability, and if found, it will be a while before we develop the tools needed to extract it. But we will, when cost effective.
Arnold H. Nelson
5056 North Marine Drive B-8 Chicago IL
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