The Nationalization of Elections

The idea of a representative democracy is that in contrast to a President who elected nationally, there will be Senators elected from the various states, and representing the interests of their states, and representatives who will likewise be elected from only a part of a state, and represent and look out for the interests of that part of their state.

Throughout the history of the Republic, this has worked pretty well. Critics may argue that at times it has led to the funding of projects of limited value (such as a highway interchange that will serve a town of a few hundred people or a research project on a topic of dubious importance but directs funding to a particular college where the research will be carried out,) but in fact this has always been as conventional wisdom had it, an important part of government. Standard wisdom in an earlier day was that "Political hacks used to say pork was the political grease that lubricated legislative deals."

This meant that it was possible to get enough votes for key legislation by including yes, some pet projects (though one man's 'pet project' may be another man's lifeline to the outside world; hardly any of the infamous 'pork' legislation did not in fact provide at least some benefit even if it was to a relatively small part of America; there are frankly a lot of towns that could be benefited by a new post office, a road paving or some other investment in infrastructure.

What we see today, instead of members of Congress who are able to effectively represent their district and in the process get the necessary funding for improvements, are members of Congress who may not even be beholden to their districts at all. Big money has (especially since Citizens United) moved into the political arena in a major way, to where even members who raise millions of dollars on their own, may have it matched by groups that have one or two anonymous donors. In 2010, these groups were almost entirely working on behalf of the GOP, but by now there are a few working on behalf of Democratic candidates as well.

Ironically, most of the members of Congress that these groups target are those in the middle. By now there are very few northeastern Republicans left (none at all from New England states in the House of Representatives) and only a couple of southern Democrats who come from districts that are not majority African-American. In particular, the northeastern Republicans have been replaced by Democrats who are almost all very liberal (so among the least likely Democrats to vote against the party line) and the southern Democrats have been replaced by very conservative Republicans who are similarly likely to march in lockstep. Since it was northeastern Republicans and Southern Democrats who traditionally were those most likely to vote for compromise or provide the key votes in moving legislation forward that might be of a bipartisan nature, what this means is that Congress is very polarized. To exacerbate this, most of the money is spent in 'swing districts' that are more likely to elect moderates to Congress. To cite one example, the district I live in changed partisan hands in 2008, 2010 and 2012. That makes it among the swingiest district in the country, and not surprisingly we see a great deal of political ad spending (almost all negative.) Members elected in a district like this, who might not be all that ideological otherwise, are pushed to toe their own party line because the attack ads will come regardless so in accordance with the old saying that 'if you will call me the devil whether I am or not, then I might as well be the devil' often they find the best path to re-election is to fire up their base (since the other side will turn out against them anyway) so therefore they are more likely to swing to that side.

In the short term this favors Republicans, if only because Republicans controlled redistricting so well after the 2010 election that they were able to draw a map that elected a Republican majority in 2012 even though Democrats got more votes FOR CONGRESS in 2012. In 2020, it will be a Presidential election year though so it is unlikely that Republicans will be able to maintain the kind of control over legislatures that they had after 2010, so their control of the House, if unlikely to be broken before then, may well be broken after 2020. In the long term however, the change is likely to simply harm communities across most of America. That is because the people who donate to the large Super-PACs are mainly national donors (even if we don't know all of what who donated, we do know that they are people with a national, rather than a local, agenda.) Since pork is also now banned, there is virtually nothing that a member of Congress can do that will win more votes in their district than making sure they are in the good graces of the Super-PACs who are running ads in their districts. As they will be attacked by the other side's PAC's, their main goal will be to give their own financial backers what they are asking for. In such a scenario, individual voters are less and less important, and that is the real tragedy of what we have come to.

New Year's predictions-- 2014

JANUARY: Congress will convene to discuss an extension of unemployment benefits. Republicans who have been trashing President Obama’s economic record and saying the economy hasn’t been recovering fast enough, will suddenly turn on a dime faster than the Communist party in the days of Stalin, suddenly arguing that the economy is recovering so fast that we don’t need to extend them anymore because there are enough jobs available for everyone. At least until the vote is taken, at which point they will finish a complete 360 and go back to trashing the President on the economy (“Who, me? I didn’t say that!”)

Also in January: Edward Snowden will stir up another controversy when it is revealed that the NSA has been spying on singer Katy Perry. It will turn out, however, that some cheapskate in the intelligence division just wanted to listen to her songs without paying for the download.

FEBRUARY: The Seattle Seahawks will beat the Denver Broncos in a snowy Super Bowl. Seattle head coach Pete Carroll will sustain a concussion when players will try to give him the traditional Gatorade shower, but in a cold Giants stadium the Gatorade in the bucket will have frozen solid. (KLONK!! oops.)

MARCH: Another government shutdown looming, John Boehner will tell the House Sergeant at Arms to lock the doors if he sees Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) coming to speak to house members.

Also in March: The Tenth Circuit Court in Denver confirms a lower court ruling that Utah’s same-sex marriage ban is unconstitutional, leading to a cascade of states allowing same-sex couples to wed. Opponents of marital equality will quote the Bible verse about how the penalty for homosexuality is death by stoning, but will be so out of touch with young people with more liberal attitudes that the young people think ‘death by stoning’ means a whole lot of marijuana.

APRIL: We will finally learn why Duck Dynasty’s Phil Robertson keeps shooting himself in the foot, when it is revealed that he hides a fifth of Jack Daniels deep inside that beard and takes it out for a quick swallow when nobody’s looking.

MAY: Surprise drug testing will be implemented at the Kentucky Derby. Owners will breathe a sigh of relief when they find out it is for the jockeys, not the horses.

JUNE: Kanye West will get married to Kim Kardashian. The smiling couple will be photographed with their child, North West, as Kanye gives Kim instead of a diamond, a platinum ring with his image stamped on it.

JULY: Kanye West and Kim Kardashian will announce their impending divorce. It will turn out that the ring was really made out of pewter. By this time though, she will announce she is pregnant with their second child, Wild West.

Also in July: It will be revealed that Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert (R-not the sharpest tool in the shed) was once hospitalized with Naegleria fowleri, the notorious brain-eating amoeba. Fortunately, Gohmert survived the encounter and even got elected to Congress, as a true half-wit.

AUGUST: There will be renewed interest in Mars, as NASA announces proof of life on the red planet after a Mars rover stumbles across a mysterious abandoned dome. Nothing about the design of the building will look familiar to anyone on the earth, except for the Dallas Cowboys logo on the back wall.

SEPTEMBER:The band One Direction will announce a break-up. Their fans bid the price of Hari-kiri kits on the internet up to $10,000 apiece.

OCTOBER: A three dimensional printer will bring about a huge breakthrough in the field of 'bioprinting,' and will print from a model a fully functional inner ear which will be transplanted to a patient who was formerly deaf. Unfortunately, the breakthrough will occur at the height of the campaign season and after a few days of listening to radio and television, the patient will ask the team of surgeons to take it out again.

NOVEMBER: It being late in the year to make headlines, the North Korean regime will launch a man into space. However they will be embarrassed when the astronaut realizes he is beyond the reach of Kim Jong Un’s security police, and intentionally brings the lander down in a corn field in Nebraska instead of the intended landing site in North Korea.

DECEMBER: In his Christmas message, Pope Francis will continue to question income inequality and talk about the need to help the poor, the sick, the destitute and the elderly. A pastor at a Dallas megachurch will ask his congregation to pray for the Pope to convert and become a Christian.

Also in December: Santa Claus will be inundated with the same unexpected increase in volume that affected FedEx and UPS this year, and will still be hustling around delivering presents on Christmas day and on December 26.

Cruise vs. Cruz

I thought it might be a good idea to help people tell the difference between Senator Ted Cruz, who led the recent shutdown of the Federal Government, costing $24 billion and harming the economy with actor Tom Cruise, who at least in recent years has exhibited other kinds of bizarre behavior.

Here are some differences between Cruz (pictured in the first photo) and Cruise (pictured in the second.)



Tom Cruise starred in ‘Mission Impossible.’

Ted Cruz just led ‘Mission Impossible,’ and yes, it was impossible.



Tom Cruise is a member of a religion that a lot of people consider a dangerous cult.

Ted Cruise is a member of a political faction that a lot of people consider a dangerous cult.



While on the set of ‘All You Need Is Kill’ , a movie being shot in London, Tom Cruise had his daughter flown in so he could show her around.

While on the floor of the Senate, Ted Cruz read his daughters ‘Green Eggs and Ham,’ and missed the point.



Katie Holmes has questioned Tom Cruise’s mental state.

The country has questioned Ted Cruz’ mental state.



Tom Cruise went nuts on national TV one time and jumped on Oprah’s couch.

Ted Cruz went nuts on national TV and jumped in front of all the TV cameras.



Tom Cruise has played a jerk in several movies, including ‘Cocktail,’ ‘Jerry McGuire’ and ‘Rain Man.’ It seems to come naturally to him.

It comes naturally to Ted Cruz, too.



Tom Cruise’s first movie was ‘Endless Love.’

Ted Cruz’s first stunt during the shutdown was ‘endless speech.’



Tom Cruise flew a fighter jet in ‘Top Gun.’

Ted Cruz supported the sequester, which has grounded all the fighter jets flown by the Navy Blue Angels and the Air Force Thunderbirds.



A forum on the Razzie Award website once described Tom Cruise as a ‘world class wacko.’

John McCain called Ted Cruz a ‘wacko bird.’



Tom Cruise, in a 2006 interview with Parade Magazine, described his father as ‘a merchant of chaos.’

Ted Cruz fits that description.



Tom Cruise gave nothing other than expenses for Suri to Katie Holmes in their divorce agreement.

Ted Cruz helped make sure that in the end Republicans had such a weak hand that they got nothing other than $3 billion for a dam in Kentucky in their agreement to reopen the government.



Tom Cruise once appeared in ‘Interview with a Vampire.’

Ted Cruz’s shutdown helped suck the blood out of the economy in a lot of places around the country.



Via Perii Maestas Calles:

Tom Cruise is a dramatic actor.

Ted Cruz is a comedic actor.

Liberal Groundhog Day predictions

On Groundhog day:

President Obama will not see his shadow, because he is facing resolutely forward to meet and take on the challenges of building a better future.

Hard to say whether the President's GOP critics are seeing their shadows as they are running from raincloud to raincloud and standing in every little squall they can find as they insist there will be four more years of winter.

Lance Armstrong is seeing his shadow. And he is standing very much alone.

Bill Clinton is seeing his shadow, and he is quickly doing the dishes, vacuuming the floor and folding laundry, because his wife called to say that she is on her way home from the office.

New Secretary of State John Kerry isn't seeing his shadow, because he's still standing in Hillary's shadow.

Rush Limbaugh is seeing his shadow. The big, red, round nose, afro wig and size 22 clown shoes are easily visible.

Former Senator Jim DeMint may still be able to see his shadow, but it is fading rapidly.

New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg is seeing his shadow. It looks like Cory Booker.

A Liberal Contemplating the National Debt and Spending

In the coming months, it is clear that we will have a big debate about government spending and the debt.

And while I have often debated Republicans who advocate deep cuts in spending on various social or entitlement programs, these Republicans do have a point. And it's a point that we on the left made not too many years ago (during the Bush years.) We can't continue to run trillion dollar deficits and continue ignoring the pending storm clouds like the proverbial grasshopper. The winter of unsustainable debt, along with the crushing austerity that it will bring, isn't that far off. And to be honest, in everything from insisting on the Bush tax cuts remaining in place for the middle class to hardly even mentioning spending, I can see where the Obama administration is still fiddling when in fact we should all be working together like the ants to identify what we can to do bring the budget into balance again. We can make the debt if not vanish, at least become manageable, but not by just ignoring it. Granted, the periodic GOP gambit of threatening to default on the debt and not pay our bills would be a disaster if it happened and won't solve anything, but nevertheless they do have a point about the failure to address the debt and should be given credit for insisting that we pay attention to it.

In fact, we are fortunate that right now (partly because the economy has been so lousy for the past five years) interest rates are at historic lows and have been there for a long time. That means that the interest we pay just to service the debt is also very low. Imagine when interest rates go back up-- we could be paying a substantial portion of our tax not to actually do anything or benefit anybody, except to pay those who hold our I.O.U.'s for continuing to hold them.

My main areas of disagreement with the right have focused on two areas: 1. their insistence that the deficit is a function of spending alone (while conspicuously ignoring revenue,) and 2. that we must balance the budget on the backs of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, along with other government services that benefit working people.

The revenue area is one that was somewhat addressed by the recent 'fiscal cliff' agreement but still should have been addressed farther. The right tends to focus only one side of the budget. But in fact a budget has two sides: what you take in and what you pay out. When you spend more than you make, you run a deficit. In that case, it is necessary to look both at how to cut spending and also if there are feasible ways to increase revenue. For example, when our household ran a deficit (in fact we ended up losing a home to foreclosure during the housing crisis a few years ago) we did cut back on our spending, but I also took a second job early in the morning that brings in some extra income. Both of those things were part of the equation towards fixing our household budget. But to rule out earning extra income would have made no sense then, and we ended up making extra income instead. That said, the 'fiscal cliff' tax deal allowed only the taxes on the wealthy to revert to the Clinton rates, but kept the 'middle class tax cuts' intact (except for the payroll tax cut that was implemented under Obama, and which I thought was a mistake then and am glad that it is gone.) I am a middle class taxpayer. And in fact, I enjoy, for example, my expanded child tax credit every year. BUT-- I'd frankly rather have gone back to the Clinton tax rates now than have less Social Security available when I retire. The deal we got is expected to raise $600 billion in revenue over the next ten years. Granted, it's better to have $600 billion if the goal is to bring down the deficit than not to have it, but the truth is that repealing ALL of the Bush tax cuts would have raised four trillion dollars in revenue over the next decade. Getting 15% of the revenue that would have happened if we did nothing convinces me that to a degree, the administration doesn't take the deficit as a whole seriously enough.

Of course even if we did have $4 trillion in new revenue, that would only be enough to pay a quarter of the existing debt, not to mention any more deficit spending going forward if nothing is done on the spending side. So in other words, while revenue is part of the equation (and I refuse to even debate anyone who is so ideological that they ignore it completely) it is the lesser part of the equation. Even though most of the recent deficit spending can be justified, the money was still spent. For example, while we may not like TARP and the auto bailout or the Stimulus, those things did rescue an economy that was headed straight to Hades and bring it back to at least a slow rate of growth. But like an emergency loan to repair a vehicle that is needed to drive to work or to pay for a necessary medical procedure, once that is done the loan is still there and must be repaid. Other recent spending was probably less necessary (for example we wasted a trillion dollars to install a government in Iraq that is more friendly to Iran than it is to the U.S.) but that too, was charged to the national credit card and must be repaid. And beyond that, the driver for spending going forward is not one time spending like the Iraq war and the Stimulus, but rather ongoing expenditures in which the budget is just too large to support with what we are bringing in.

When we do discuss spending cuts, we on the left love to point to two areas: the War budget (known officially as the 'Defense' budget, although the United States hasn't been attacked by a foreign power on our soil since World War II, and not seriously threated by a foreign invasion since the War of 1812); and corporate welfare (a catch-all phrase that includes tax breaks to industries or specific corporations, direct payouts or subsidies, and contracts frequently championed by lobbyists that often pay corporations to do work that is less important to the people that the work is supposed to benefit than it is to the corporation's bottom line.)

And there is certainly ample room to cut in both of these areas. Perhaps nothing better exemplifies both than spending that Congress, under the influence of defense industry lobbyists, has appropriated for weapons systems that even the Pentagon has said they don't need, don't want and have no use for. Examples include the continued production of M-1 Abrams tanks, despite the fact that the army already has six hundred of them and says that is more than enough, the continued production and use of the C-27J Spartan transport aircraft, despite the fact that it has been rendered obsolete by the C-130 and the Pentagon wants to retire those still in operation (and certainly does not want any more,) and perhaps the poster child for this kind of thing, the F-35 fighter jet, an expensive boondoggle that has already been overbudget by billions of dollars (partly because it was rushed into production at the behest of lobbyists working for Lockheed before the prototypes had been fully tested) but now has literally become 'impossible to kill,' with accessories like an extra engine costing billions of dollars that the Marines (who would be operating the jet!-- when did Marines fly jets?) have said they have no use for. Rep. Tom Rooney (R-FL) deserves some credit here, for doggedly trying to get the funding for the extra engine out of the defense bill, but somehow it is never put to rest and keeps threating to come back.

HERE'S AN IDEA: What if the Joint Chiefs of Staff had something like a 'line-item veto' for the defense budget? If they found an item they just didn't want tucked in there, they could line item it out, with 50% of the money saved going back to the U.S. Treasury and the other 50% we would allow them to transfer to other parts of their budget as they saw a need. I'm sure the defense industry lobbyists would still make their case but since the Joint Chiefs are not elected they don't have to worry about which congressional district it's made in, or about campaign donations from defense contractors.

Beyond that, the United States spends over $700 billion per year on 'Defense,' which is five times what China spends, ten times what Russia spends and in fact more than China, Russia and the next ten nations after them(most of whom are our allies) all combined. As we've seen in Iraq and Afghanistan, just throwing money at the problem doesn't win wars anyway (I don't know what the defense budget for the Taliban is, but I'm sure it wouldn't be enough to afford even a single F-35 fighter.) The truth is, we could cut our defense budget fully in half and still spend more than twice as much as China and way more than anybody else. Even if you don't like that idea, the truth is that there is plenty of room to cut out a lot of the expensive military hardware we have stockpiled. Part of the problem is that in fact we do spend a lot of it to 'maintain a presence overseas.' Why? Why should the U.S. be jumping in and trying to solve everyone else's problems? Unless it is a matter of American national security, there is no reason for us to be deployed all over the world-- or more bluntly, to spend what it takes to be deployed all over the world. We can't afford it anymore.

Corporate welfare is not limited to Defense contractors, of course. Healthy industries like big agribusiness, the oil industry and the pharmaceutical industry are the beneficiaries of billions of dollars in government subsidies, tax breaks and special deals. They all employ lobbyists on K Street who make sure that those breaks and subsidies continue in any new bill, and perhaps even grow or multiply. I could give a long list of such breaks, but let's focus on one in particular: Medicare was actually solvent until the 2004 prescription drug bill. As I wrote at the time, the bill actually made it harder, not easier for a lot of seniors to get their medication, but beyond that it increased the cost to Medicare by $400 billion over the last decade but is projected to increase the cost by $1.5 to $2 trillion over this coming decade. While ostensibly this is going to help seniors pay for drugs, in fact most of it is a subsidy to the pharmaceutical industry. This does NOT decrease the cost of drugs, folks! The subsidy is supposed to hold the price of drugs down, but in fact the pharmaceutical companies are allowed to selectively gouge Americans and charge us higher prices (whether we pay or the government pays through Medicare, Medicaid or some other program) than the price of the SAME DRUG, from the SAME FACTORY in any other country! And not by a little either, but SEVERAL TIMES MORE!! That is because tucked into the prescription drug bill was a provision making it much more difficult for Americans to reimport prescription drugs from Canada or elsewhere. I do know people who do, in fact, go to Mexico to buy prescription drugs and pay a fraction of the cost (even though their insurance won't pay for it there) that they pay in the U.S. for the same unopened container that they would buy in the U.S., but the prescription drug bill prevents Medicare from negotiation of prices with suppliers as the governments in other countries do. This is truly corporate welfare at its worst: hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies on one hand to a very profitable industry to supposedly make their products cheaper, but in fact they turn around and price-gouge with the other hand, and our government BY LAW lets them do it! And don't tell me that the pharmaceutical companies are selling at a loss in Canada and Europe and everyplace else either. They aren't, or they wouldn't be selling there at all. They are just raking it in here from both customers and the government, because the bill that allowed them to do it was written on K Street by their own lobbyists.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO ABOUT IT: First, we should immediately re-open the prescription drug bill and allow Medicare to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical manufacturers. Also pare down or eliminate the subsidies. If we need to reign in the long term growth of spending of Medicare (and we do) this is where we should begin. And then after that, take a similar look at subsidies and special tax breaks that benefit agribusiness, the energy industry (both green energy AND big oil,) banking, and yes, those subsidies that we have heard kicked around for years that pay companies to move jobs offshore. If it can't be justified get rid of it. And just to make sure, don't trust Congress to do it-- they are too mesmerized by lobbyists. Create something like BRAC, except for corporate welfare that would have the ability to get rid of this stuff.

OK, so right about now I sound like the typical liberal. I've talked about raising taxes, and I've talked about cutting defense and corporate welfare. And we do need to look at those things, but our deficit is so massive that we can't get rid of it only by raisng taxes and cutting things I want to see cut. What else?

Well, let's be honest here. So-called 'entitlements; have grown pretty much unrestrained for decades. They aren't really 'entitlements' because they have been earned-- people paid into Social Security and Medicare for their whole lives, with the promise that it would be there. I have. I'm fifty, and got my first job when I was 16. And I expect Social Security and Medicare to be there when I'm old enough. However, as we can see from the travails of state pension plans, you can't expect to put tens thousands of dollars into a plan and take hundreds of thousands out unless 1) you do fully fund the plan every year (one reason I was frankly unhappy with the payroll tax cut and am glad it was allowed to expire) and 2) you either get a very good return rate on your investments or you have some mechanism for slowing down the rate of growth of expenditures.

Since we already began discussing Medicare under the paragraph on corporate welfare and the pharmaceutical industry, let's talk some more about it. To begin with, Obamacare does not take money out of Medicare. What it does is slow the growth of Medicare by $750 billion over the next ten years. The same $750 billion was in Paul Ryan's budget. Instead of scaring seniors about it, explain that all it does is hold down growth. This is a good thing, but it is insufficient (even if we also rewrote the drug bill into something sane.) Other fixes include getting rid of the cap on income subject to the payroll tax (also applies to Social Security,) cutting payments to providers, means testing for wealthier enrollees and increasing the eligibility age to 67. Personally, I don't have a problem with increasing the cap on income subject to the payroll tax from its present $119,000 since even if we do the payroll tax is still a flat tax (shouldn't conservatives love a flat tax?) However, while under this scenario everyone would still be eligible to receive Medicare, under means-testing, whereby wealthier retirees would received reduced or no benefits on the theory that they could pay their own bills, we have an inherent contradiction. Paying taxes for something we may not use is normal (for example, I pay tax to support the Child Support Enforcement division even though I personally don't get child support.) However, if we raise or eliminate the payroll tax cap, then it is doubling up on the same group of taxpayers if we also go to means testing (yeah, I know-- 'soak the rich' is popular, but can we honestly say it would be fair to raise a tax that is dedicated to paying for a benefit that right now everyone can get, and then turn around and tell them that by the way, they won't qualify for the benefit either? EITHER raising the tax cap OR means-testing is probably on the table but even I would be very much against doing both, as a matter of fundamental fairness. Cutting payments to providers is already in Medicare laws. We haven't been following through on it (i.e. we suspend the rule by passing the so-called 'doc fix' every year.) The concern is that if doctors and hospitals are underpaid then quality will suffer, or perhaps they will get out of the business altogether. There is, however, an easy fix to this which we should be consdering. Living in a rural area, I can see that there is a severe shortage of doctors. So why now go to more of a system of physician assistants, nurses and local clinics (as opposed to hospitals) that can offer medical care for all but the most complex of conditions? To some degree, that is happening now. But accelerate this change. Empower P.A.'s and nurses to do more, pay them accordingly (though probably less than the full price a doctor gets today from Medicare) and the same with smaller, more localized clinics. Train more P.A.'s. This will help bring the overall cost of healthcare down, so that maybe the 'doc fix' won't be needed. FURTHER let's not forget that the reason it is necessary now is because of the number of uninsured patients who show up in emergency rooms and then can't pay. As Obamacare kicks in (whether you like Obamacare or not, this will be true) there will be fewer uninsured people so providers won't get stuck with not getting paid as often. This again will cut costs, making a Medicare payment that keeps to the present schedule more feasible. Maybe the 'doc fix' could be phased out over time. One other proposal that has been raised for Medicare: raising the eligibility age to 67. The logic here is that the retirement age for full Social Security benefits is being raised to 67, so why not do the same with Medicare? There is a good reason why not to, however. Technically this would save the government money because in theory people would pay into the system for two years longer and then draw from the system for two years less. In reality what this means is that the poeple not entering the Medicare pool would be the 65 and 66 year olds, who are relatively the most healthy (meaning the cheapest to cover) so it could drive the cost up for everyone else as the average Medicare patient would require more resources. Conversely, they are generally less healthy than younger workers who are in their private insurance pool, so this could raise insurance premiums for everyone. Not much of a benefit. Further, with the Social Security retirement age going up to 67, many of them will remain working and earning a paycheck (and therefore paying payroll taxes (!!) ) until they reach age 67 anyway.

As mentioned a moment ago, the retirement age for full Social Security benefits was raised from 65 the last time a Social Security reform bill was passed, during the Clinton administration, and will be 67 beginning with my classmates and I, who were born in 1962. The logic here is pretty straightforward: people today live longer than they used to. Many people retire at 65 and live to be 90 or 100 or even older. This means drawing Social Security in some cases for virtually as long as the person paid into it (even though what they paid in is a fraction of what they are drawing.) Clearly this is not sustainable as it is presently structured, especially with a declining pool of younger workers. So some people have proposed revisiting the full retirement age again, possibly raising it 70. I have mixed feelings about that. Today, I am pretty healthy and knowing how long 20 years is, I don't believe I would be unable to work until 70. And if I became unable to work sooner than that, Social Security has a disability benefit that covers people who become sick earlier. However, I am a college professor. Physically, this is an undemanding job. But some people who work hard physical labor, like miners and construction workers, may not have a body that can last until 70. So maybe the answer is to put retirement into a range, say between 67-70, in which it is set to 70, but where people who spend more than 10 years working in certain jobs get a year credit for each 10 years worked at that job. Also,the President (causing great consternation among the AARP, made a concession during the 'fiscal cliff' talks which went nowhere because at the time Boehner was hearing from Republicans that they would refuse to vote for anything that included a tax increase. Obama's concession was not about taxes however, it was about using the so-called 'chained CPI' to calculate cost of living adjustments for Social Security. The regular CPI that is used now is based on comparing the cost of the same exact items month after month. But the chained CPI is adjusted by the rate at which folks quit buying those same items and substitute cheaper ones. For example, when the price of milk gets too high, a certain number of people will stop buying their favorite brand and begin buying the store brand, which is cheaper. The government has a pretty good handle now on how that happens, and the chained CPI takes this into account,so it is a lower rate than the traditional CPI. Doing that alone could over the long term save substantial money on Social Security without actually cutting anybody's benefits.

What about government itself, then? After all, if you ask a conservative they will say that the prime example of too much spending is not any program, but the Federal government itself. The Federal government does contain layers and layers of bureaucracy, often engaging in fights with each other over regulatory ‘turf.’ In fact, turf battles between agencies are often a symptom of too many people trying to do too little work, because if we had the right number of people working on problems then they wouldn’t be trying to get more work. So I would agree that there is some cutting within the Federal government that can be done, but I’d also caution that every agency or department was set up for a reason, and every regulation was similarly written for a reason, so I reject the approach of just naming entire departments that somebody doesn’t like and doing away with it. As one example, the other day someone told me that they think we should do away with the Department of Commerce; but that would include the weather service, which means that nobody would get any tornado warnings. In other words, think these things through instead of just blithely and casually tossing entire departments out. And in fact a lot of regulation is painfully necessary, as we have been learning from the investigation of the Upper Big Branch mine accident, in which the regulations that were supposed to be followed, weren’t. The answer to that is not to do away with regulation so other mines can be just as unsafe.

So what can we do to cut government regulation (which = government spending to enforce?) Well, we have an answer right here in Arizona. Following the giant Rodeo-Chedeski fire on the Mogollon rim in 2002, there was a lot of finger pointing. The timber industry blamed environmentalists for opposing logging that might have created natural breaks in the forest. The environmentalists blamed cattle ranchers for destroying the natural habitat in the forest and fostering erosion along stream beds that helped dry out the soil and eventually the trees. Everybody blamed the government (and with good justification) for decades of mismanagement, especially the policy that was in place for many years of putting all fires out quickly, thereby allowing the growth of thick underbrush that in a healthy forest would be burned out periodically by smaller fires instead of accumulating over decades to help feed a monstrous fire when it happened. But a funny thing came out of that. Stakeholders in the management of the forests, including environmentalists, loggers, ranchers, state, county and local governments and local residents came together in what became known as the Four forest restoration intitative (4FRI for short) and wrote their own rules and regulations for how the forest should be managed. And, it’s worked pretty well. The forest is healthier because of logging which thins, but does not destroy, the forest. And a couple of years ago the program showed its success. The Wallow fire burned even more acres than the Rodeo-Chedeski, but it was much less destructive, largely because of forest thinning that limited how much fuel was available at any one time. So here is what that gives us: Regulation may be necessary, but the success of 4FRI shows that it doesn’t have to be the Federal government writing the regulations. 4FRI has the blessing of the Federal government, even though they are not involved. If representatives from the logging industry and the Sierra club can sit down and write a better set of logging regulations than the Federal government could have come up with, then perhaps the same could be done in other places. In that case we would have regulation but not necessarily regulation written by the Federal Government. If so then that would be one area where the government could be cut.

In any case, the adage about spending our grandchildren's money is correct, and we do have to fix the problem. Divided government necessitates that for it to be fixed anytime soon, both parties will have to put aside ideologically mandated solutions and figure out a path forward together, or we really will be the grasshopper, stuck out in the cold with nothing to eat when winter does arrive.

Elitists in the Senate don't want an enlisted man in charge at the Pentagon

The President has decided to stick by his original intent to nominate former Senator Chuck Hagel, a Republican from Nebraska, as the new Secretary of Defense, to replace Leon Panetta.

Many Senators, especially among Hagel's former Republican colleagues are gearing up to oppose him. The truth is that whatever other issues they may have (and we will look at those,) there is one underlying fact: Chuck Hagel, if confirmed will be something that other Secretaries of Defense have not been. A combat veteran and an enlisted man rather than an officer. Hagel rose to the rank of sergeant and served in Vietnam, as a squad leader, where he was awarded the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry and a commendation, as well as two purple hearts.

Fundamentally, that's what it comes down to. The Senators who will be sitting in judgement of Chuck Hagel are largely Ivy League educated, and often had things handed to them along the way. If they did serve in the military, they were officers, not 'grunts,' as enlisted soldiers are sometimes called. So they were much more comfortable confirming Secretaries of Defense like the past several, i.e. Leon Panetta (who was an army intelligence officer,) Robert Gates (who went directly into the CIA,) Donald Rumsfeld (an officer and flight instructor in the peacetime navy,) Bill Cohen (who was never in the military) William Perry (who was briefly an enlisted man in the peacetime military but later became an officer,) Les Aspin (an officer who served during Vietnam as a systems analyst in the Pentagon,) Dick Cheney(who subsisted on several college deferments to avoid going to Vietnam, though as Secretary of Defense under George H.W. Bush and later Vice President he was perfectly agreeable to sending other people off to fight,) Frank Carlucci (a naval officer who never saw combat) and Caspar Weinberger (a captain on Douglas MacArthur's intelligence staff who never saw combat.) IN FACT, IF CHUCK HAGEL BECOMES SECRETARY OF DEFENSE HE WOULD BE THE FIRST SOLDIER TO GO THROUGH HIS CAREER AS AN ENLISTED MAN EVER TO HOLD THE OFFICE! He would also be the first combat veteran since Elliot Richardson, a Nixon administration official who led a platoon at Normandy as a young lieutanant. Later, after he had served as Secretary of Defense, Richardson became the Attorney General and showed he had much the same stuff as Hagel when he resigned rather than fire the Special Watergate Prosecutor on direct orders from the President. Even Richardson was an officer, however. The idea of an enlisted man giving orders to the entire military is upsetting and shocking to elitists in the Senate who believe that a military man must at least have received a commission before daring to stand before them and ask permission to serve in the office.

Traditionally, Presidents have had the right to select their cabinet members, with the term, 'advice and consent of the Senate,' mainly a formality. In fact, in the past century, only three cabinet nominees were not approved by the Senate. In 1925, Calvin Coolidge nominated Charles B. Warren for Attorney General. The Senate rejected Warren over his ties to the 'sugar trust,' a consortium of sugar companies that had been attempting to gain monopolistic control over the industry. The Senate rejected him, 41-39 (with over a dozen Senators abstaining.) Coolidge stupidly re-nominated Warren, and the Senate rejected him again.

In 1959, President Eisenhower nominated Louis Strauss, former head of the Atomic Energy Commission. Strauss, as head of the AEC had overseen a monthlong hearing which resulted in the revokation of the security clearance of J. Robert Oppenheimer, who had been the director of the Manhattan Project over Oppenheimer's political views. In 1954, when the hearing was held, the United States was still in the grip of McCarthyism, but by 1959 things had changed so much that Strauss' preoccupation with Oppenheimer and previous anti-communist witch hunt were held against him by many Senators, particularly those who saw in Strauss a stand-in for McCarthy, who many of them remembered and not fondly. Strauss didn't help his own case with his abrasive personality, arguing with members of the Senate who were questioning him. In the end, he was rejected by the Senate on a 49-46 vote.

In 1989, George H.W. Bush nominated Senator John Tower as Secretary of Defense. The Senate itself has always been considered a 'safe' place to go for a nominee, and that is what Bush thought, as Tower was a sitting Senator and Senators were generally more than happy to vote for a member of their own body, knowing them well (and in addition sometimes wanting to keep collegial relations because one day many of them might be nominees for cabinet positions.) What he miscalculated on was that Senators might know their own members too well. Senators generally don't air each other's dirty laundry to the press for obvious reasons, but as a nominee, it didn't take long for Tower's reputation for womanizing and heavy drinking to become an issue. In other words, Senators may know the nominee, but they may know personally issues that could disqualify him without having to root around and find those things. That was the case with Tower, who was rejected by a 53-47 vote.

Despite strong partisanship following the 2000 election, only two of George W. Bush's nominees even faced much questioning over their appointment. The only one who was opposed even by a majority of Democrats was Attorney General John Ashcroft, who won a 58-42 confirmation vote after issues were raised over his past refusal to enforce court orders on desegregation and other issues. Later during Bush's presidency, the Senate blocked one of his nominees, John Bolton as Ambassador to the U.N. over concern that Bolton's abrasive style and inflammatory rhetoric might not be suited to the position; Bush made a recess appointment and appointed Bolton to the position anyway.

In 2008, President Obama, despite having a couple of nominees who had to step down before they had a hearing over allegations of scandal unrelated to either the President or the positions they were nominated for, was able to get the Senate to confirm all of his nominees (the most controversial probably being Eric Holder.) But two weeks ago, Susan Rice, who the President wanted to nominate for Secretary of Defense, stepped down after it would be clear that she would be blocked by the Senate over questions related to faulty information she apparently received and relayed regarding the attack on the Benghazi consulate in September. As soon as that happened, attention turned to Hagel, who was even then rumored to be in the running for Secretary of Defense. Hagel is not only a former Senator, but a former Republican Senator, though one who was known for being willing to speak his mind and not necessarily constrained by party orthodoxy; for example Hagel, despite voting for the resolution in 2002 that was used by the Bush administration to justify the Iraq war, was one of the first Republicans to openly regret his vote and speak out against the war. At times his bluntness has gotten him in trouble, for example in 1998, he criticized James Hormel, President Clinton's nominee to serve as ambassador to Luxembourg, as "openly, aggressively gay." However, Hagel has apologized to Hormel and said that he was wrong and is now fully committed to supporting the rights of the LGBT community, and while Hormel originally was skeptical he has now accepted Hagel's apology. Hagel has said that if nominated he would continue to fully implement the repeal of 'Don't ask don't tell' that the Defense Department is now enforcing. While he could get some questions over this, I doubt if that would sink his nomination, since many people have over time changed their position on a number of issues including gay rights, and that includes some of Hagel's Senate colleagues (remember that in 1993, Bill Clinton settled for DADT because Congress wouldn't pass a law allowing openly gay members to serve in the military; but two years ago Congress did just that at President Obama's request, and quite a few members who were present in 1993 voted for it two years ago but probably would not have then.) Far better for Hagel to just say, as he has in effect done, "I was wrong," and move on.

A bigger issue with some members of the Senate is likely to be officially Hagel's stances on Israel and Iran. In fact, Hagel has several times expressed support for Israel, but has often criticized the power of the Israeli lobby in the U.S. Well, he's right. If the pro-Israel lobby wasn't so strong, we might not have seen so much opposition to Hagel for just cricitizing them. Hagel has openly opposed Iraeli settlement policies in the West Bank (something that President Obama opposes too) and in fact he is also correct that as long as Iraelis are building settlements on the West Bank, they are in effect rendering any kind of a 'two state solution' impossible. Hagel's opponents have taken to smearing him as a result as an anti-Semite. This is not unusual treatment for anyone who speaks out against Israeli policies (I've experienced it myself even though I was raised in a Jewish household) but even former Secretary of State William Cohen, himself both a Jew and a Republican, has defended Hagel against this charge

Hagel has also been skeptical of U.S. involvement in foreign wars and opposed both the troop surge in Iraq and the continued deployment in Afghanistan. Hagel is also on record as being skeptical of military operations against Iran, believing that it is much easier to get into a war than to get out of one. For this reasons, he wants to give sanctions a chance to work before contemplating military action in Iran or anyplace else.

THAT'S WHY WE NEED A COMBAT SOLDIER AS SECRETARY OF DEFNSE!!

Unlike the Secretaries of Defense that most members of the Senate are comfortable with, Chuck Hagel understands the ugly reality of combat and is reluctant to send soldiers into harm's way. Maybe that's the real reason why mostly Republicans and some Democrats in the Senate are uncomfortable with the idea of Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense. It's true that he is a mere enlisted man, but they could probably get past their pride and arrogance on the matter if he wasn't so reluctant to send other people's children to foreign shores to fight and die. They don't like Hagel's reluctance, because they've always been so willing and eager themselves to give the word and vote to send the sons and daughters of others to go marching off to the next apocalypse.

2013 predictions

OK, back by popular demand (well, I did get one person ask me how come I wasn't doing New Year's predictions this year.) Deep Thought New Year's predictions for 2013.

January: President Obama is sworn in for another term. After the swearing in, Republicans will also be swearing.

February: Congress takes up the sequester and the debt ceiling. Republicans get some spending cuts in return for raising the ceiling, but as a concession to Democrats, before the ceiling is raised, Grover Norquist is superglued onto it so by raising it they can all just push him away.

March: After a vote was taken on raising the debt ceiling at all, Republicans in the Congress rebel and oust John Boehner as speaker. He is replaced by Michele Bachmann, whose plan for solving the debt crisis involves arming all members. This plan backfires when during a heated debate, Louie Gohmert challenges Carolyn McCarthy to a duel.

April: Baseball season begins. The Arizona Diamondbacks win their first seven games-- and then lose their next 155.

May: Not to be outdone, the Arizona legislature takes up gun law reform. They propose that the solution to school shootings is to add a gun to the required list of school supplies that students are required to bring with them to school every day.

June: Congress takes up immigration reform. Rush Limbaugh promises that if they pass it, that he will 'move to Costa Rica.' Which of course it passes, and he does not, much to the chagrin of millions of people who were hoping he was serious this time.

July: The President brings up gay marriage and repeats that his position has undergone an evolution over time. Republicans say that they are disappointed in the President. For believing in evolution.

August: A massive hurricane hits 11 states and leaves even more damage and deaths than Sandy. FEMA runs out of funds and asks Congress to appropriate more emergency money. The Senate passes a bipartisan relief bill right away, but Republicans in the House agree to act only if the emergency funding is offset by cuts to Medicare and Social Security.

September: Football season begins. Frustrated with all the coaching problems that the Arizona Cardinals have had, President Michael Bidwill assumes coaching duties. The team goes 0-16. It is then that he realizes that the fault did not lie with the coaches.

October: Halloween movies are not such a big deal anymore, since people can get scared for free just by watching the news.

November: Looking ahead to the end of the year when unemployment benefits run out and other factors favor a 'grand bargain,' President Obama again makes major concessions in negotiations with the House leadership. The Republicans get the President to agree to almost everything they want in the proposed deal, with deep cuts in spending on entitlements, and tax cuts for millionaires. The Speaker backs out of the deal when most of the members of the Speaker's own caucus throw another tantrum and refuse to support the deal because the President doesn't have to write a note apologizing for standing for something.

December: Visitors to Bethlehem are shocked to find out that the town has been bulldozed to build apartment buildings for a new Israeli settlement in the West Bank.

Call me a Flip-Flopper. But I have Reconsidered and Altered my Position on Guns

I've been remarkably consistent in my views on guns over the past few decades. Essentially, it has boiled down to the following statement, which I had posted in more places than I can count:

I support your right to own a gun. Any gun.

The Constitutional fact that Americans have the right to be armed aside, I fundamentally believe (as a liberal) that you have the right to read, download, drink, smoke, have sexual activity or whatever as you please as long as you are not harming someone else by it, and therefore also to buy what you please (and if it is a gun, then buy it.) In fact, until recently the debate on guns has been moving further and further to the right, where without changing a single position, I had gone from guns being one issue where I generally agreed with the right (when the debate was about registration and limitations on ownership) to where I was more likely to agree with the left (when the debate had moved past that to trying to force guns into more and more places like public buildings and private businesses over the objections of the business owners.) I summarized this several months ago in this post: The Debate on Guns has been Changing.

Recently though, in light of a spate of deranged gunmen killing large numbers of people, the debate has been moving back the other way. And in theory that would move me back to where I had been focused, against any new restrictions. To restrict individual rights, I believe in a high bar.

That bar has been reached. The slaughter of first grade children at an elementary school yesterday has been the point at which I have to reluctantly agree that the harm to society caused by allowing the ownership of a particular category of weapons-- assault weapons with clips capable of firing large numbers of rounds before reloading, and in rapid succession-- outweighs any good reason one could have for owning one.

And the fact is, this weekend was only a third as bloody as it could have been. In the past 48 hours you didn't read about another school shooting in Bartlesville, Oklahoma because of a brave student informant and an alert school administration, nor about a massacre in a hospital in Alabama this morning because of two alert hospital staff and two police officers, three of whom were wounded but who stopped the gunman before he could shoot anyone else.

Let's consider the arguments against restricting large capacity clips one at a time.

If everyone was armed, then they could take out the shooter before he kills more than a few people. This argument presupposes that people are armed every time they go out in public (because you don't expect someone to walk into your classroom or into a movie theater or into your place of worship and begin blazing away.) Besides, people always assume that if they were armed they would win a shootout against a random gunman. But would they? Yes, they might (repeat might) have the element of surprise, but that would only last for a moment. Keep in mind that these shooters have lately been wearing full body armor, and are likely armed with a much nastier weapon than what most people have for self defense. So unless you could get an exact head shot with a pistol (difficult even for a practiced police officer) just having a gun for self-defense might not be adequate. Further, the random shooter would have the advantage that most people might be deterred if, for example, there were people between them and the shooter or behind the shooter, for obvious reasons. But a deranged gunman wouldn't even care about that. SO IT IS VERY POSSIBLE, that the result of an armed citizen during a random shooting would instead of stopping the gunman, only provide him with another weapon and some more ammunition.

Further, if everyone was armed, then that would indeed mean everyone. Including people with a short temper. If we consider that scores of people are killed in arguments (especially domestic violence situations) for every person killed by a random shooter, we can see that having everyone armed would probably not be such a great idea after all.

So-called 'gun free zones' aren't. It is certainly true that if someone wants to walk past a sign advising them they can't have a weapon on the premises while armed to the teeth, the sign won't reach out and slap them. However, the truth is that weapon-free zones do work, in preventing law-abiding people who get angry while there from using a firearm. Many years ago, while I was teaching a college class in Albuquerque, an angry young man blew up in class, threw a pencil (hard) at another student (luckily she ducked and it missed,) screamed obscenities at everyone in the class and stormed out of the room. Luckily he did not have a gun at that moment, because if he did I would not be a bit surprised if he had used it. For that matter, Jared Lougher, the Tucson shooter, is by now well-documented in the problems he had in classes at Pima Community College. However, every time he lost his temper on campus, he was at that moment unarmed. In other words, he was complying with the 'gun free zone' rule when he came on campus. Nobody plans or expects to lose their temper. But, the fact is that many people do. Gun free zones may not do anything to stop someone who carefully and methodically plans to go on a rampage, but they do stop the much more common hothead who follows the rules until he (or she) loses control.

There are too many assualt weapons out there already for a ban to do any good. In the short term, this is probably true. And I'm not advocating that the government go around and pick up guns that people bought in good faith, believing that they should be legal. However, over time the supply of clips for such weapons (i.e. 30 round rapid fire clips) would diminish. I also don't support the registration of guns (because fundamentally it is still not the government's business how many guns you own or what kinds.) But limiting what new kinds of weapons one can purchase is not a restriction on anybody's freedom (after all, we all agree that you can't own a howitzer and keep it at your house) and starts to work the problems out of the system.

Why should we prevent responsible people from owning weapons when the vast majority of gun owners are law-abiding citizens who would never think of killing someone else? Again, the right to own a weapon is on very firm Constitutional ground. However, what would the vast majority of American gun owners need a 30 round, rapid fire clip for? If you are that bad of a shot that you need 30 rounds then maybe you need to improve your aim. The point is, that the potential harm from a few people outweighs the desire of people to have a weapon which is frankly not useful for hunting and was invented for only one reason-- military style weapons which are useful for killing a lot of people at one time.

The United States was borne out of opposition to tyranny, and having military-style weapons helps prevent its return. Yeah, I know. That argument is out there. And I concede that our government has gone way past where I feel comfortable in terms of spying on us and restricting our rights. And in fact, I've made exactly that point. However, it's hard to see how having assault weapons on the streets answers this. For one thing, rights disappear a little at a time, and often when the folks out there complaining about 'tyranny' aren't even looking (for example, did any individual rights disappear between the end of the Clinton administration and the start of the Obama administration? Of course they did. So how come the militia 'movement' went into hibernation for eight years and said hardly a word, even though rights that get taken away remain for all future administrations to use and abuse? The truth is, that assault weapons would only be useful if tyranny was imposed all at once and provoked an actual civil war (some folks do in fact predict a full out war against the Federal Government.) But in that case, it's hard to see how a Glock 19 would come in very useful against a Predator Drone anyway. In other words, let's not go there. What they have done though is allow criminals to outgun the police. And the police after losing officers all over the country, have spoken out against them.

So what about the NRA? Don't they hold Congress in an iron grip and make sure anybody who challenges them on guns will face a well-funded and well-organized challenge the next time they run? No, not anymore, or at least not any more than they will anyway. For one thing, the NRA held their endorsed candidates liable for a budget bill last year, an investigation of Eric Holder, and several other bills that had nothing to do with gun rights. For another, the NRA did spend heavily to defeat propositions that were on the ballot in several states and those propositions passed anyway. Finally, in the wake of Citizens United, in which both sides and their allies were well into the billions of dollars in spending this election, the NRA is just another Washington funding source, but not the largest, or even close to it. Citizens United has in effect defanged the NRA because no matter how much it can raise from its members, it's now competing with billionaires who can write a check in a moment that can match its fundraising for a year. That's not to say the NRA isn't still important (for one thing it is still a bulwark, or will be if it gets back to focusing exclusively on gun issues) against those who actually do want to get rid of all guns, as well as the good work it does in terms of pushing training in the proper use and storage of weapons (because it is still true that far more people, and especially far more children, die from gun accidents than from someone intentionally shooting them.)

the bad old days

The Road to Ruin is Paton with intentions (not all of them good.)

About a week ago I attended a Republican debate in Springerville. I have blogged about the Congressional District One race before, but I decided I would go see for myself what the GOP is sending us for candidates this year.

All four of the GOP candidates for the office were present, Patrick Gatti, Gaither Martin, Jonathan Paton and Doug Wade. The GOP establishment has annointed Paton, and given their track record in choosing candidates whether local Republicans want them or not (think Rick Renzi, who jumped into the district from outside and spent big outside money to defeat Louis Tenney in a primary in 2002, or Paul Gosar, who did live in the district but who also got a lot of outside money to beat several other candidates two years ago before abandoning the district this year) I suspect Paton will be their nominee. Like Renzi, he jumped into the district just to run; also like Renzi, he is bringing a lot of outside money into the district; and also like Renzi he is ethically challenged (as I discussed in this post about a month ago.)

So what kind of a GOP nominee is he? Well, he sounded very much like a career politician (a good reason for that, because he is a career politician) in most of his answers, consistently ducking and weaving while avoiding providing a lot of direct answers unless the question was a softball (i.e. "did you vote in the last election?") However, he had a couple of answers I would like to talk about right now.

I had one chance to ask a question, so I decided to ask it about the Paul Ryan budget, which Paton is on record (both in 2010 and 2012 as supporting.) The Ryan budget proposes phasing out Medicare for workers below 55 and replacing it with a series of exchanges where seniors could purchase subsidized private insurance. Of course this is exactly what is at the heart of Obamacare, but according to Republican logic, Obamacare is better than Medicare for seniors, but nothing at all would be better for the rest of us than Obamacare. So, I mentioned my age (presently 49) and the fact that I have paid Medicare taxes since I had my first job at the age of sixteen (a third of a century ago) and asked about how he felt about the Ryan budget's plan to privatize Medicare. He of course hemmed and hawed a great deal, going back and forth and finally saying it would be 'wrong' to "deny coverage to people that have been paying their entire lifetime into anything." Which was a classic dodge-- the Ryan plan does not seek to deny coverage, it seeks to change it to a privatized system. He then went on to discuss Social Security (which I had not even mentioned in my original question) and said, "I don’t believe I’m ever gonna see a dime of the money that I’ve put into Social Security, and I think most young people believe that today. We should be able to do with our own money what we want to. And I think that’s the right way to go." In other words, keep your money and invest it yourself. Which is to say, no Social Security. Exactly the same thing the Bush people were saying when they tried to privatize Social Security in 2005. Their arguments may be evolving, but make no mistake about it, the plans set forward by the Cato Institute to privatize Social Security are still intact, and Jonathan Paton's comment makes it clear that he will be on board the next time they try to privatize Social Security.

The only other thing I'd like to remind people of concerning the Ryan budget is that as bad as their plans are for Medicare and Social Security, Paton and other Republicans who have signed onto it are also supporting deep cuts in a wide range of programs that benefit virtually everyone, in order NOT to cut the deficit (as they have tried to say to sell it) but to finance deep tax cuts for billionaires. The tired old logic that low taxes on so-called 'job creators' will boost the economy should have pretty much been disproven by now, as taxes are already at historically low levels so if they really helped the economy we'd be seeing it boom right now. Instead, tax cuts only reduce tax revenue, which in turn creates deficits. Using deficits as an excuse to cut spending on programs, while at the same time pushing tax cuts for billionaires that will add back onto the deficit is pretty brazen, though I do have to admire their messaging people for convincing people not to think about the math (maybe there really IS another reason for all those cuts we've seen the GOP push in education the past few years.) But make no mistake about it. Paton is fully on board with the entire Ryan budget, including the 'cut spending to reduce the deficit and then cut taxes to blow the deficit up again' math.

There was one other answer I would like to dicuss that came from Mr. Paton, and one which left me cold. Someone asked him a question about treaties that we have entered into with other nations as well as the United Nations, and also about the second amendment. Paton first said that we should not observe 'any federal law that's unconstitutional.' Huh? I thought that it was up to the courts to decide whether a law is unconstitutional. And if they do make that determination, then the law is no longer in force. So what exactly does he mean by that? How will he determine which laws to obey and not to obey as 'unconstitutional,' since we already obey only laws which the courts have upheld or which have not been challenged. But it was the rest of his answer which really bothers me. He talked about people (presumably members of Senate, since the Senate ratifies treaties) who vote for treaties made with the U.N. and said, "we should not vote for it, and if you do vote for it, I think you’re a traitor, you’re a traitor to this country.”

Excuse me? If you vote for a law that he believes is unconstitutional, then you're a traitor? It's one thing to disagree with a law or what it says. It's quite another to accuse people who exercise their Constitutional duty to vote on whether to ratify a treaty, "traitors" if they do not vote the way he believes they should. Yeah, I know. Just what we need to fit in with the image of Arizona. Another member of Congress who goes to Washington and calls people who disagree with him, "traitors."

After going to the debate, I can only say that it is of critical importance that we NOT send Jonathan Paton to Congress!

Joe Paterno offers us a chance to have an honest discussion about cultural obsolescence

[Workers at Penn State remove the statue of former football coach Joe Paterno]

Joe Paterno had the highest of standards, and paradoxically at the same time the lowest of standards. Paterno, who coached the Nittany Lions as an assistant coach beginning in 1950 and became head coach in 1966 and coached until he was fired in late 2011, was undeniably 'old-school.' An Ivy League product (from Brown,) "Joe Pa" made very sure his athletes graduated and got the academic help they needed to remain in school. Nowadays this would be less remarkable since the NCAA has made academic success a part of what is needed for football players and other athletes to remain eligible, but he did so from the day he began coaching, when there was little or no concern about academics in college football. "Saint Joe" literally had a halo painted over his image in a mural on the Penn State campus. For that matter, when the NCAA caught up with where Paterno had been for years and began to focus on academics and other rules, Paterno's program was able to avoid a single NCAA infraction. The idea of using bribery or other illegal methods to induce players to play for him was unthinkable. Besides academic success, Paterno preached lifelong character, and his players as well as many others upheld him and his unassuming, humble nature as a model of character.

All of which made the Sandusky scandal all the more shocking. It would have been shocking at any university, but at Penn State it was a scandal of monolithic proportions. It would have been no more shocking if the Vatican itself had been caught covering up for pedophiles in the priesthood (wait a second, let me restate that.)

For Paterno to be guilty of covering up such an awful crime as child rape was unthinkable. Except that it's true, spelled out right there in the Freeh report.

In contemplating how this could happen, I keep coming back to Paterno's age (he was 85 when he was fired, and died not long after.) Now, don't get me wrong. I'm 49 and in a few weeks when I turn fifty, I do plan to join AARP. One reason why is that AARP has a long history of fighting against 'ageism,' the term for discrimination against older people in the workplace and elsewhere. But to get to the root of ageism, we need to examine both the myths and the realities of age, and discuss a concern that is at the heart of ageism but is not often discussed because to do so is sometimes difficult.

This concern is simply put, that older workers may be obsolete. I know, you’re thinking this is a post about obsolete job skills. NO, IT IS NOT!! We all know that as the workplace is modernized, all workers of any age must update their career skills to adjust to new technology, innovations and other changes that go along with any job. And Paterno did so. Penn State has over the past two decades (since Joe Pa became eligible for Social Security) been a college behemoth. In every aspect of the game Penn State was an elite football program, often appearing in the top ten in recent years and winning three Big Ten championships after joining the league in 1993, most recently in 2008. Obviously he was still up to running a top level football program.

But it’s a more sensitive job issue that ‘obsolete job skills’ is sometimes used as a code word for. It is obsolete cultural skills.

Let me say that again: obsolete cultural skills.

Some years ago I was on an interview committee for a teaching position. One of the candidates was an elderly gentleman who had some teaching experience, though it was decades old. During the interview, he referred to female students as ‘co-eds.’ This is a term that hasn’t been in wide use since at least the 1970’s, and this and other answers led the committee to question whether he might unintentionally say something that would offend someone. Language is one aspect of cultural skills. The terms we use to describe people or groups of people change. For example, when I was growing up in the 1960’s, I first learned the term, ‘negro’ as a word for black people. However, today the term would be considered so out of date that it would be close to racist, and should never be used.

Returning to Joe Pa, he may have done a good job of adjusting to a more pass-oriented, faster paced offense or to new NCAA rules on recruiting, but he did a poor job of adjusting to a new world. Consider the world he began coaching in, in 1950. Surely child sexual abuse happened, probably at least as often as it does now. But it was never talked about. If something was said about it, most people at the time would (wrongly) assume it was likely a single (or even several) instances of easily correctable misbehavior, and a talk with the offender would have been good enough (with little or no thought given to the victim.) Whether Joe Pa ever had such a talk with Sandusky we will probably never know. One of them is dead, and the other will spend the rest of his life in prison and what he says from now on probably has no credibility at all. But whether he did or not, we now know that child molesters are never ‘cured’ (certainly not by a quick chat or word of warning.) And the crime itself has come to be taken much more seriously. In the 1950’s, very rarely would anyone be prosecuted for the rape of a child, unless perhaps the parents of the victim pressed charges (though the victim would often be too ashamed to acknowledge this in the first place.) People like Jerry Sandusky could count on that, and then he took advantage of troubled kids, who often did not have parents who would stand up for them to begin with.

This is not in any way to excuse Paterno. It is instead to point out that for older workers (whether they remain at their jobs or start new ones) the culture around them is changing. If you want to work until you are 85, as Joe Pa did, that’s great. I commend it. BUT, you have to do more than learn to use the newest computer program or new way to fill out a form. You have to keep up with the world, and adjust your thinking. And when you do, you have to act on it.

I believe that unspoken concerns about cultural obsolescence are at least as big a factor in the decision to pass over older workers as concerns about obsolete job skills. And until we can have an honest discussion about these concerns, we won’t really be able to make the job path smoother for older workers, even those who have a mind as sharp as a tack and who have kept up with every new technological development that comes down the pike.

Why a one-state solution is the only viable answer

It's hard to recognize that much of what you were told growing up wasn't true.

I was raised in a good, Jewish home. So I went to Hebrew school on Saturdays and religious school on Sundays. I even remember going to a Zionist day camp in the summer. We learned a lot, of course about Israel. We were told about the roots of Zionism, and about 'Tzedakah,' those little blue boxes people had put money into to buy land in Israel (of course when I went to school the state of Israel had been establshed for twenty or thirty years, so the money went to plant trees, but we were told about how during the Depression era people had put their spare change in the boxes to buy land in Palestine.) They gave us the impression that most of the land had been a barren, sparsely populated desert until the Zionists came and planted it and made it bloom, and that the few people who had lived there prior to the settlement by Jewish settlers were mostly nomads. There was even a slogan that went along with that, "The land without people for the people without a land."

We were told lots of other things about the Arabs too, little of it good. We were told that they were mostly terrorists, or supporters of terrorists. We were shown a map of the middle east in which Israel was a small piece and there were over 20 countries where 'arabs' lived. The implication was that those arabs (all residing outside of Israel) who wanted to take it over were fanatics and greedy for every bit of land ('why not a small piece for the Jewish people?' was a rejoinder I heard when the map was rolled out.) We were told that Palestinians living in the West Bank or Gaza (at the time they were still considered occupied parts of Jordan or Egypt) were 'squatters' and that they could go to any of those countries, from Iraq all the way to Morocco. We were told that not only were there some arabs living peacefully in Israel, but that those who had left did so voluntarily, either because they wanted to go someplace where they could take up arms and fight against the peaceful Israelis, or because they 'believed the stories' others were telling them that if they stayed then later when the Zionists were defeated they would be executed as 'collaborators.'

Even until a few years ago, I was, if not a Zionist, much more ready to give Israel the benefit of the doubt. But what I've observed though, is the intransigence of the Israeli government, and it has convinced me that there is no way that one can reasonably support such a government or support a peace process that depends on the cooperation of such a government.

It was a useful fiction. But unfortunately, as I later learned, it was a fiction. Like most fiction, there are small pieces of it that may be true but are used to misrepresent the whole. Yes, there were boxes where people put spare change to buy land. But by 1948, the fund set up to purchase land, using money that had been sent from abroad, had only purchased 2 million of the approximately 26 million dunams of land in Palestine (a dunam is a unit of area equal to 1000 square meters, or about a quarter of an acre.)

They also did not buy the land that they did buy from nomads. In fact, they bought it from farmers and other landowners. Palestinian farmers. But those Palestinians who sold their land were only a small minority. Most Palestinians lived on land, or at least in a land that their ancestors had lived in for thousands of years and had no desire to sell it or to live anywhere else. The whole idea of a 'land without people' is false. In 1947, on the eve of the beginning of all out war and after decades of Jewish inmigration, the estimated population was 1,970,000 (see table on page 5) in which Palestinians (who are both Muslim and Christian) outnumbered Jews by 2-1. Keep in mind that this was nearly 2,000,000 people packed into an area the size of Vermont; had it been in the United States it would have been the most densely packed state (there is a reason why land was measured in quarter-acres.) The Palestinians had ancestors who had lived there since antiquity. They had their own culture, and were not merely 'arabs' any more than, for example, Hungarians are merely 'Europeans.' Imagine, for example, if the Hungarians were told that Hungary had now been assigned to the Chinese, but since the Hungarians were 'Europeans' they could all just move to Spain. Ridiculous? Yes. But no more so than reasoning that the Palestinians are 'arabs' so if they are forced to leave Palestine then they can move to Morocco. Another fiction, but one which betrays a bigoted and simplistic viewpoint on the part of those who brought us the map to look at.

The British attempted to divide up the land into two separate states, one for Israelis and the other for Palestinians. This was at the same time they were doing the same thing in India and Pakistan, and we know how poorly that worked. It worked no better in Palestine. Here is where the fiction really got hard to separate from the fact, but it must be separated. We all have heard the saying, "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter." This is true. The Israelis won the war, so we must also keep in mind another adage, "History is written by the winners." Certainly that is true in the Zionist school and summer camp. We were certainly told of every instance of Palestinians killing any Israeli (and during the 1970's there were frequent P.L.O. attacks, including at the Olympics, so it was very easy to tell this narrative,) but it was not until I was in high school that I learned that then Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin had been the leader of the Irgun, and the Irgun had committed many massacres and killings. Of course these were all explained away as 'necessary' massacres (not sure how a massacre can be 'necessary' but there it was told to us.) The Palestinians who fled were not fleeing because of some perceived threat of being shot as 'collaborators,' when some other arabs returned! They were fleeing because the Irgun and other armed Zionist groups killed many of them, and theatened to kill the rest if they remained. It is true that some arabs were allowed to remain behind. In some cases these people actually were the collaborators (!) but in other cases they were allowed because the new masters of the land (including new masters of the homes of those they forced to flee) needed a supply of low-wage, low skill laborers to do menial tasks. But the number of arabs who were allowed to stay was carefully limited to be far fewer than the Jewish population. The Palestinians who fled mostly went to refugee camps in southern Lebanon or other neighboring countries, or to camps in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, areas that had remained nominally under Palestinian control but were taken over by Jordan and Egypt, respectively.

There is a term for this process of driving an entire ethnic group or population out of their homes and forcing them to leave an area. It is 'ethnic cleansing.' But that term only came into vogue in the 1990's. It happened to the Palestinians much sooner than that. To argue that this was justified because there were also some arabs who killed Jews (which is also true) misses the point. Ethnic cleansing is always wrong, no matter who is doing it, and to whom.

It also explains why Americans are so much more willing than people in other countries to accept at face value the Israeli narrative on ethnic cleansing. We have it in our own history. The 'five civilized tribes,' the Cherokee, Choctaw, Creek, Chickasaw and Seminole, had all signed treaties with the United States and adopted American cultural and governmental designs. However, when southern planters wanted their land, President Andrew Jackson and his successors chose to ignore the treaties and forcibly sign new ones, and removed them to Oklahoma along the 'Trail of Tears.' In other words, the tie between native people and their land meant nothing-- they could be arbitrarily 'assigned' to land a thousand miles away and then forced to abandon their homes and walk there. This model repeated itself throughout the history of American westward expansion; the Nez Perce were rudely driven out of the Wallowa Valley in Oregon despite a treaty they had signed with representatives of Thomas Jefferson years earlier promising them the valley in perpetuity, the Sioux who were promised the Black Hills (sacred to them) but were forced out when gold was discovered there, and locally, the Navajo and Hopi tribes (historically blood enemies) who were assigned land together at Bosque Redondo-- after both being forced to walk hundreds of miles to get there they almost killed each other off in a tribal war while American officers couldn't understand why the 'indians' were fighting each other. Luckily, things turned out better for the Navajo and Hopi than for the five civilized tribes, the Nez Perce or the Sioux; after the army decided that the land they had been driven away from was 'worthless' they were allowed to return home. But an understanding of American history helps explain why we have been so willing to accept that the Palestinian people can be removed from their land (ironically in the name of 'returning' the Jewish people to the same land.) We have removed nations of people that were smaller and weaker than we were to some arbitrarily selected piece of land, so at a visceral level we are less willing to call it a crime when others do it because then the finger can be pointed back at us. Well, it can. Deal with it. It was wrong in the 1800's and it was wrong in the 1900's and it's still wrong.

Several wars later, the world came to realize that this conflict if it continued was intractable, so for a while the answer was the so-called 'two state solution.' This idea reached its zenith in 1994 with the Oslo accords, signed by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The basic idea was straightforward enough: that Israel would be recognized by the Palestinians on territory it controlled prior to the 1967 war and a Palestinian state would be established in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Like many others, I bought into it at the time, and in fact did so until fairly recently. In fact, the 'two state solution' is still the official position that the U.S. government and at least officially, both sides are operating under. The reason I said 'its zenith' occured in 1994 when the accords were signed, is that it has pretty much gone downhill since then. After signing the accord, Rabin was assassinated by a fanatical Israeli settler. Then in 2000, an accord was nearly reached between Arafat and Ehud Barak, a member of Rabin's Labor party who succeeded him as prime minister. However, the final agreement proved just too elusive and talks failed. Shortly thereafter things broke down completely and Israeli voters booted the Labor Party from power and have elected a succession of right wing governments who may claim to want peace but have shown no interest at all in peace talks. Only one of the right wing leaders even hinted that he might be interested in moving forward on the peace process, Ariel Sharon, but after he said he might do that, he had a stroke and remains in a vegetative state to this day. On the Palestinian side, after Arafat died the Palestinians elected a new leader, Mahmoud Abbas (and let's be clear here-- Arafat himself only had the support of the Palestinian people because he was the leader according to the west, and the west provided funds, much of which Arafat kept for himself; a Palestinian friend of mine once explained to me, "Arafat has the authority to say 'yes,' " or in other words as long as he was willing to condone whatever the people were doing anyway then they would call him a 'leader,' but the resistance fight had long since moved on past Arafat.) But Abbas has been unable to make any progress towards negotiations, and in fact suffered what could be considered the equivalent of a civil war when Hamas, a rival group that unlike the Palestinian Authority has never recognized Israel and continues to fight took control of the Gaza strip in 2007.

In order to unify the Palestinians, Abbas formed a government with Hamas, which also gives Israel a way to avoid serious negotiations. A big reason why there are no negotiations right now also has to do with Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank. Unlike limited settlements like those in the Gaza strip (which settlements Israel abandoned and physically removed settlers from in 2005) in the West Bank, fully 10% of the population of Israeli Jews is now living there, not in the pre-1967 borders. This means that a right wing government can't negotiate peace because these settlers are a strong part of their base. In theory a Labor government could (since the settlers will certainly not vote for Labor anyway) but with more and more votes being cast by settlers the entire complexion of the government has shifted to the right so it is unlikely that Israel will elect another Labor government anytime soon, if ever again. At the same time, the complicated patchwork of Palestinian areas, legal settlements, illegal settlements (a crass distinction, because what is 'legal' is what Israeli law makes it, in fact according to international law the settlements are ALL 'illegal') and segregation walls makes it almost impossible to come to envision where one might put any kind of a border if the settlements remain, and as just discussed they are too big for Israel to likely be able to root out politically. In other words, Israeli intransigence is likely to remain because the tail has now taken over the dog. The settlers don't want any peace negotiations and they are now politically powerful enough that their opposition guarantees that there will in fact be no peace negotiations.

So where to now, then? Well, despite my upbringing and even my support for a two state solution until a couple of years ago (for an example of my evolution on the subject, consider that in a post I wrote seven years ago, I was still open to both a two-state solution and to bogus arguments about Israel needing extra land for 'security': Abraham Had Two Sons,) I believe it is time to suggest seriously a one-state solution. A single, secular state that allows everyone, Jews, Christians and Muslims equal rights, including equal religious rights. I know. Doesn't that put me in agreement with Hamas? It does, to a point. Hamas, of course is on record favoring the deportation of almost all Israeli Jews. I don't favor that. The overwhelming majority of Jews in Israel were born in Israel. So where would they go? Instead, what if the international community got behind a plan to create a single state, including everyone who lives there now. If someone lost a piece of property because it was seized from them, and they can prove legal ownership then give it back or compensate them (for example if an apartment house is now where there used to be a farm, it may not be possible to restore the farm, but then shouldn't the owners of the farm (or their descendants) if they were forced to flee, get compensation for the farm? Why not bring back the "Tzedakah boxes?" Bring them back, and let people put their spare change in them to compensate Palestinians for the land they had stolen. Yes, in a one state solution with guaranteed freedom of religion for everyone, we are going to have some major issues of trust (especially after decades of violence.) But wouldn't an effort abroad to compensate those who deserve it, be a worthwhile effort and a start towards building trust?

Latest decision makes it clear that the Supreme Court has an agenda to elect Republican candidates

The Supreme Court two years ago issued the Citizens United decision, allowing both corporations and unions to spend unlimited sums of money in U.S. elections.

To a degree this was a balanced decision because while corporate spending on elections is much higher than union spending, it is also true that corporations heavily support Republican candidates while unions heavily support Democratic candidates in terms of their political donations.

This week however, the same Supreme Court ruled that unions must get an 'opt-in' from members before making political donations while corporations do not need any permission from shareholders.

If it wasn't clear before (think stopping the Florida recount in 2000,) it is now: the Supreme Court is not an independent branch of government. Whether because the majority of the court is in fact made up of Republicans, and/or because several judges are now in their seventies and may be considering who will replace them, the high court has a cynical political agenda to elect Republican candidates. Let's be perfectly clear about that.

A Democrat gets for 46.5 cents what a Republican spends $24.23 on

One of the most frequent claims made by the GOP is that they are better 'stewards' of taxpayer money. In other words, they have made the case that they are penurious and refuse to spend a dime that doesn't have to be spent, and make sure that if it is spent it goes the farthest.

Clearly, nobody wants to see their tax dollars wasted. That is true of Democrats as well as Republicans (and keep in mind that all those Democratic elected officials they claim are not keeping as close an eye on your money, are taxpayers too. It's also their money.) But let's take a closer look at a specific comparison, now that Maricopa county Sheriff Joe Arpaio (R) is planning to move into his new headquarters, which costs $92.5 million.

The building is 128,000 square feet in area. For those of you keeping track at home, that works out to $722 per square foot. Keep in mind that this is for an administration building, NOT a jail. Apparently among other things, the Sheriff is having bomb proof blast doors installed on the way leading to his office. Yeah, I know. After years of making inmates eat green lunch meat and sending his deputies on junkets to Hawaii to investigate the President's birth certificate* Arpaio claims he has a lot of 'enemies.' Never mind that there has never been a single actual attempt on his life. To hear Arpaio tell it, he is at the top of everyone's target list from Mexican cartels and al-Qaeda to federal agents who want to rub him out for being such a 'threat' to the President. Please! This guy makes Donald Trump look rational. To be sure, all sheriffs and law enforcement officers do make enemies (that comes with the job of enforcing the law against bad guys) but the rest of them all manage to do it without getting a martyr complex. Frankly if he's so paranoid about getting 'whacked' then maybe he should retire at the age of 80 instead of forcing the taxpayers to pay for bomb-proof blast doors on his office.

Now let's look at a contrast. Here in Navajo County, in 2009 the Sheriff's office needed another building for administration. Always keeping an eye on the taxpayers money, newly elected Democrat K.C. Clark bought the abandoned former Heilig-Meyers furniture store (about 8,000 square feet) for $50,000. He made the necessary renovations using prisoners on supervised work release from the county jail and moved in. The new building cost taxpayers here $6.25 per square foot, or less than 1% the rate that Arpaio's gilded new digs is costing in Maricopa county.

But wait a second. Isn't Maricopa County a much larger county? Of course it is. And of course the Sheriff needs a larger building to handle a larger staff. And he is getting one. So shouldn't this explain why it is so many times more expensive? Yes, and we just compared the cost per square foot, $722 per square foot for Sheriff Arpaio vs. $6.25 per square foot for Sheriff Clark. So per square foot, Sheriff Arpaio is spending 115 times as much (vs. 1,850 times as much if you just go with up front cost for the building.)

So what about per taxpayer? According to 2010 census data, the population of Navajo County was 107,449. The population of Maricopa County was 3,817,117. So dividing each of those numbers into the cost of the new Sheriff's headquarters, that works out to $24.23 per taxpayer for Sheriff Arpaio, and 46.5 cents per taxpayer for Sheriff Clark. That's about 52 times as much per taxpayer for Arpaio's building. And then you have to consider that a larger county means more staff, but not necessarily proportionately more because there will be at some level an economy of scale (for example, a sheriff in a small county may not need as many staff, but if the county is 35 times as large you still won't need three dozen times as many secretaries.) But this is the best case scenario for Arpaio, cost per taxpayer and he still can't get his use of taxpayer money on his new building to even be one fiftieth as efficient as Sheriff Clark's.

So next time someone tells you that, "Republican" is the same as "careful with taxpayer money," think again. They can say it, but that doesn't make it so.

* here's a thought on another topic-- every bit of evidence in Honolulu has long since been picked over, but birthers like Joe Arpaio's deputies still flock there. If the President had been born in North Dakota, do you think they'd be flocking to Bismarck year around in their intrepid pursuit of finding something that no other birther before has found yet? In fact, if the birthers are right, and the President was really born in Mombasa, Kenya wouldn't the real evidence be there? How come birthers like Sheriff Arpaio's deputies never go to a slum-ridden African city like Mombasa to look? You think that maybe it's because the surfing isn't as good?