Misha Sees the Rabbit

Misha Sees the Rabbit

Misha sees the rabbit, and she bends down so low,
and pulls the leash so hard, I know, she really wants to go.
We've been through this before, I'm trying to teach her right.
We walk up to the rabbit, who is looking me in the eye,
and I swear that rabbit is laughing and saying mentally:
"Why don't you just give it a try."

And Misha she is real quiet, tense, intent on the Rabbit.
But she doesn't seem to get the message, that the rabbit is looking at her.
I bring her up about ten feet away, and then she jumps and runs,
I try to stop her and my leash breaks away from its bonds on her collar.
Three hundred feet around bushes, and bounding down the hollow,
into a thicket, and out the other side,
around a building, and completely out of sight.
All in a couple of seconds, and I shout out loud;
"Misha! Come back here." 
She ignores my call.

I finally catch up to her, panting and stuck,
The leash wrapped firmly around a tree trunk.
The Rabbit I can see in a thicket nearby,
Is looking at me, and laughing real hard.

Oh "Waskally Rabbit" I say as I laugh,
And Misha, bless her heart is already hunting a squirrel.

The cycle of bad government

Right and wrong always matter. The result of wrong is oppression, repression, corruption, depression, dysfunction and finally failure. The failure contributes to anger and scapegoating. As long as we scapegoat and lie, the cycle will go on.

Wrong in government is tyranny, which John Locke rightly defined as:

"199. As usurpation is the exercise of power which another hath a right to, so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which nobody can have a right to; and this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private, separate advantage. When the governor, however entitled, makes not the law, but his will, the rule, and his commands and actions are not directed to the preservation of the properties of his people, but the satisfaction of his own ambition, revenge, covetousness, or any other irregular passion."

http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/locke/

http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/locke/loc-218.htm

ALEC As a symptom of a Process Gap

In our current corrupt setting, the fourth branch of the Government has proved to be, not the press, but organizations like the "American Legislative Exchange Council"; ALEC. ALEC is so powerful that legislators take it's legislative recommendations verbatum to the floor of their governing bodies. Bill Moyers refers to the situation as "The United State of ALEC" -- with little exaggeration. And it is allowing wealthy people from around the country to conspire to pass corrupt legislation and work together to get that legislation passed. Because it meets in secret, is not transparent, and results in such nasty laws. Folks want people to leave it. I think that national bodies meeting about important national issues should be part of democracy. I just think that everything such bodies do should be above the table and transparent, and that they should not be theaters for combinations and conspiracy. Unfortunately, most of what ALEC does is not exactly secret. The same abolitionist/prohibitionist and racist laws get passed across the country based on ALEC recommendations.

ALEC was responsible for:

1. the dissemination of Voter Purge and ID laws: http://www.politicususa.com/2012/06/07/dirty-red-state-secret-alec-gop-voter-purge.html a few years ago.
2. And it is the host for the exchange of laws from the Anti Abortion crowd (through Americans United for Life") to legislators around the country,
3. protectiong monsanto: labeling environmentalists as terrorists

This prompted one person to send a letter to the Justice Department asking for a RICO investigation:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CUNwbHlNpPVxd-eAJOU4mJL_B8FHWY3RcXsZii5Kca4/edit?hl=en_US

RICO Acts have been requested before with relationship to ALEC, and there are some provisions of the Hobbes act, or laws against anti-trust that could apply to ALEC meetings I believe, and I wish that the Fed would investigate them, though I doubt they will. ALEC is too convenient to both parties. As a target of hate for the Democrats and a tool for the Right. Actually investigating criminal conduct? I'm not cynical but I am realistic.

ALEC is also a symptom of an empty Governing Niche

But that is not what interests me. It is what such a powerful legislative advisory body means to the country. It's not a body that has representation from all the stakeholders, or the "Choice" crowd could also originate their ideas there. To me the problem isn't just that they do so much bad, but that they are filling a niche in governing process that needs to be filled in a corrupt way. I'm not sure that my ideas of corruption have any but constitutional remedies, but when an organization and its related system are badly constituted that automatically opens the door to other, more prosaic forms of corruption that can be reached with legal remedies.

Where is the democratic equivalent to ALEC? We have groups that serve similar roles, though not financed on the roundings from billionaires accounts, but there is no formal "advisory legislative" role that makes sense in the country. And that gap not only allows in organizations like ALEC, but it enables a committee of doctors from medicaid to set procedure billings, enables 2000 professional lobbyists to write international Trade law for their companies, all with no input from all stakeholders and with corrupt results. Process corruption seems harder to see than outright overt corruption. The problem with ALEC is that we make legislation freezing out stakeholders even when we don't have them meeting at giant conventions where they are wined and dined with caviar and good food. Our system suffers from too little representation (republican ideology) and too little democracy (participation). And we can combat that if we see ALEC as a symptom and not just an enemy.

There is a lot more to find and write about. But that is enough for now. It makes a good jumping off ground. If you want more on this follow Bill Moyers and some of the URLs I supplied.

Further reading:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002890486" Former IRS official demands investigation.

http://alecexposed.org/w/images/1/11/5B5-Parental_Consent_For_Abortion_Act_Exposed.pdf

Apparently ALEC works with a group called AUL

Putting the Victim on Trial

I'm really not too surprised (a little surprised and disappointed) that the Jury found Zimmerman not-guilty of murder (of at least Manslaughter) after Zimmerman confessed to hunting down and murdering Trayvon Martin. The defense did a good job of putting Trayvon on trial and the standard is "beyond a reasonable doubt", and so letting the defense make up a bogus theory about Trayvon attacking Zimmerman worked for them. Stand your ground was designed to legalize murder if the murderer is a white man who can establish he "reasonably believed" he was the one who was being attacked. And that was the premise of local authorities from the beginning. Trayvon was guilty of eating skittles and walking while black and wearing a hoodie in the rain. Wrong place wrong time. Summary:

One: the standard was "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Never mind that the man confessed to murdering him.

Two: The defense lawyer was allowed to put Trayvon on trial and play on racist fears.

Three: The prosecutor was unwilling to even challenge directly Zimmerman's lies about being attacked.

Good news is that this also was a Federal Crime (at least until the Gang of 5 Corrupt Judges get hold of it) and so

Once the Feds investigate this perp they'll see that:

Zimmerman violated Trayvon's civil rights

and probably Federal Hate crime laws;

and the local authorities did too by trying to cover up the crime.

And of Course, as always there is a larger issue lost in the mix here. One reason for the very lousy handling of Zimmerman's open and shut case is that Zimmerman's dad is a very powerful person who used to be a judge in Virginia. That side of "extrajudicial lawlessness" by our own authorities and their kin folks is a form of corruption, not just "how things are." Zimmerman's case should have been handled the same as anyone elses, but we seem to have one law for the powerful and wealthy, and another for everyone else. That should outrage at least 90% of us.

But finally, I've decided that these assholes don't deserve the attention they get. We have to fight them, at least partly, by contrasting their small, shallow and fearful behavior with the kind of behavior we'd like to see. We have to be the change we want to see. We have to be bigger then them. They can go into that hole to hell they dig. I'm thinking of Walt Whitman. I'm thinking of Bette Midler.

Meanwhile, we all should sign NAACP's petition asking the Justice Department to investigate:

Petition;

http://www.naacp.org/page/s/doj-civil-rights-petition?source=GZnotguiltyshareFB&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=GZnotguiltyshareFB&utm_content=share

Justice Department:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/14/justice-department-george-zimmerman_n_3595835.html

Further Reading:

http://occupydemocrats.com/zimmerman-may-be-not-guilty-but-america-is-guilty-as-charged/

But this is what I'd rather listen to:

http://www.upworthy.com/bette-midler-didnt-know-this-was-going-to-be-caught-on-tape-that-makes-this-even-more-amazing

Bottom up Repression

While we are entranced with "fearless leader" fascism and people like Mussolini, or Hitler, an examination of fascism around the world finds that visionary leaders like them are rare, and most Fascist movements have not been the genius of a single person, even when a single person gets credit for them. Franco was the general who prosecuted the coup and civil war that established Fascism in Spain, but he wasn't even its ideological founder. Pinochet was simply first among a cabal. The leader of Portugal's fascism movement was selected as an economist who promised to fix Portugal's economy. Fascism loves it's fearless leaders and tries to find them, but if they don't perform as expected they do get dumped. The politicians and military strategists are really like Dogs on a leash. Juan Peron was dumped by his own founders when he crossed path with the wealthy and Catholic Church. Mussolini was dumped by his own followers, put back in power by Hitler, and eventually hung upside down from a Fence. Fascism is not kind to fearless leaders who don't live up to those holding their leash. When Juan Peron's second wife tried to continue ruling Argentina after coming to power from his enthusiastic backers -- when those backers saw she was not following orders they staged a coup.

Argentina's reign of terror was managed by three drunken military leaders from the Navy, Army and Air Force. They militarized the police, tried to capture and kill anyone who was a socialist. And since they were using Ayn Rand's definition of socialism as equal democracy, and Hayeks premise that any socialism (including social democracy) inevitably leads to left wing fascism, they went to war with most of the urban population. They sent teams of soldiers around the country in Ford Falcons snatching people, torturing and secretly trying them, and then dumping their bodies in the Ocean (or other still not found places), and all on the motto "you must have been guilty of something."

Fascism is usually about defeating socialism and reestablishing order, so it is often as "bottom up" in it's implementation as any other movement. Just the bottom is usually the land-lords, business leaders, and military officers. It's also advertized based on nationalism. So it's entirely possible for fascist states to go to war with each other. When Hitler started his "unification" program targeting his home state of Austria, the Austrians resisted. They had a dictator named Dolfuss who was an admirer of Mussolini, not Hitler. The little guy was trying to get control of Austria by imposing martial law on workers, killing Union leaders, and breaking Unions. His economic advisor was Von Mises and the two were close enough so that when Dolfuss sent his wife to refuge with Mussolini, Von Mises sought a chair in Switzerland. Dolfuss tangled with the Nazis and they sent an assassination team to kill him. But before that they threatened Austria and Mussolini backed his little friend Dolfuss. Mussolini threatened to go to war with Hitler. A lot of folks would have liked this. But Mussolini met with Hitler and liked that little guy better than the other little guy. He withdrew support for Dolfuss, looked the other way, and Dolfuss was assassinated by a team of Nazis in broad daylight. Von Mises went to Switzerland and then on to the US; and pretended to be anti-Fascist the rest of his career. Fascists can and do go to war with each other.

Argentina was like an enthusiastic dog during the Reagan program to repress socialism in the Americas. They sent teachers to El Salvador to teach the Salvadoreans (as if they needed teaching) how to "collect intelligence" through torture more efficiently. They were backed by Reagan and Thatcher in the whole operation Condor and anti-"Communism" effort. The Vatican backed them, while pretending to be pissed that they were killing over-enthusiastic monks and nuns. The Vatican had it's war on Vatican II and "liberation theology" and it made a grand alliance between nominally warring parties.

But then the Argentines attacked the Falklands. Fascists can go to war with each other, and this is because they always are serving oligarchs. Fascism has always been elitist, and if the fascist parties elevate leaders to be "new oligarchs" they do so serving the old oligarchs or the "old oligarchs" yank their leash.

An Evil Innocence

An Evil Innocence

Refrain: They are isolated from what they don’t know

Their jack booted thugs go where they don’t go

You’d better listen to their orders and take it slow

Or they will take you in their hands.

They send their jack booted thugs out to commit crimes

While they lounge in country clubs or play rounds of golf.

They own the courts and they own politicians,

And they laugh at the Godfather for being too soft.

Refrain

They live in a country club built over hell,

With bypass venting so they don’t smell its smell.

They dance on a dance floor carried on the backs

Of lost souls writhing and suffering under the floor.

Refrain

And they admit visitors and they admit members

From among the best and brightest and the cleverest;

People who climb party lines, but never Mount Everest,

And people who snort cocaine lines while writing drug laws.

Refrain

And they have it so good, they want it understood,

That no one else can have life or liberty.

So they make men dogs and put them on leashes

And give them jackboots and give them guns.

Refrain

And their jack-booted thugs walk among us like kings,

Trailing long leashes and stinking of hell.

And fill us with lies and fill us with hate,

And try to destroy whatever they can’t own.

Refrain

And we fight them at risk of injury and pain,

And to avoid falling into their spell.

For they are really small people with no sense of smell,

Standing on a platform over hell.

Finished in Honor of “Vaginal Probe” Governor McDonnell

Christopher H. Holte

"Coddling" the Giant Oligarchic Companies

Fareed Zakaria writes in the Washington Post:

"The American economy is sputtering and we are running out of options. Interest rates can't go any lower. Another burst of government spending -- whether a good or bad idea -- looks politically impossible. Can anything protect us from the dangers of stagnation or a double dip? Actually, there is a second stimulus that could have a dramatic effect on the economy -- even more so than government spending. And it won't add to the deficit."

Nevermind that it is only the commoners such as me, who see the "economy sputtering" and there is clear evidence that well financed politicians are blocking every effort to invest in infrastructure or redressing the massive inequality and dispossession that has been getting worse and worse, since Reagan was elected. Fareed is offering up a bait of spending money that workers around the country earned for their companies at one time and is now offshored instead. At least 1.6 trillion of which is "permanently invested offshore" as part of tax avoidance and offshoring schemes aimed at leveraging slave wages in other countries and tax avoidance here. (NY Times article) and as happened with about 400 billion they repatriated in 2004, they are trying to sell the USA on letting them repatriate the money at low tax rates on grounds that they'll invest it here, when - as happened in 2004 such repatriation will most likely go to CEO salaries and bonuses as it did in 2004. The New York times article recaps that:

" it led to no discernible increase in American investment or hiring. On the contrary, some of the companies that brought back the most money laid off thousands of workers, and a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research later concluded that 92 cents on every dollar was used for dividends, stock buybacks or executive bonuses."

Nevermind that government tax breaks unless they come as specific exemptions only result in more money in executive and financier coffers, or that our various companies have been running a rigged, union busting, pension stealing, cheating system of corporate governance that has resulted in that 1.8 trillion declared and even more undeclared money hidden around the world in secret accounts. But of course the CEOs didn't come out and remind him of that. Instead he talks indirectly of the benefits "if only" the honorable CEO's would spend that money here. We tried that, they pay no attention to carrots when they can dig into the nation's wealth in other ways. So Fareed notes:

The Federal Reserve recently reported that America's 500 largest non-financial companies have accumulated an astonishing $1.8 trillion of cash on their balance sheets. By any calculation (for example, as a percentage of assets), this is higher than it has been in almost half a century. Yet most corporations are not spending this money on new plants, equipment or workers. Were they to loosen their purse strings, hundreds of billions of dollars would start pouring through the economy. These investments would probably have greater effect and staying power than a government stimulus.

And other reports put the estimated money hidden abroad even higher. But so far carrots haven't gotten us any "stimulus" and Obama's begging and cajoling them is taken as "anti-business." "Pro-business" means letting them bring that money home as bonuses and for them to buy up foreclosed properties with. In other words, the switch is that none of that money would actually go to stimulus unless it is highly taxed. I say tax it all.

To be clear: There is a strong case for a temporary and targeted government stimulus. Consumers and companies are being very cautious about spending. Right now, government spending is keeping the economy afloat. Without a second stimulus, state and local governments will have to slash spending and raise taxes, which will produce a downward spiral of higher unemployment, slower growth, lower tax revenue and a larger deficit. Joel Klein, the New York City schools chancellor, told me that when the stimulus money runs out at the end of this year, he will be forced to lay off 5,000 teachers. Multiply that example a thousand times to get a sense of what 2011 could look like.

Of course the obvious fact that we have these CEOs, their companies, and their well heeled investors paying lower tax rates than unemployed Steel workers, while lobbying for lower wages and fewer benefits for the 99% of us nation-wide (actually world-wide) doesn't seem to connect with Fareed. Fact is none of them pay their fair share of taxes, and the afore mentioned New York time article showed that the "offshoring" is also just a means to funnel more wealth to their officers and leading investors. The irresponsibility and cheapness of our wealthy has a direct relationship to the loss of jobs for teachers, fire-fighters, police and workers across the country. Who will buy their products if they don't invest in the USA? Chinese, Vietnamese, etc.. of course silly. And our folks will soon be poor enough to be willing to work for slave labor wages.

Fareed buys into their sales pitch:

But government spending can only be a bridge to private-sector investment. The key to a sustainable recovery and robust economic growth is to get companies investing in America. So why are they reluctant, despite having mounds of cash? I put this question to a series of business leaders, all of whom were expansive on the topic yet did not want to be quoted by name, for fear of offending people in Washington.

NO they should fear offending the vast majority of Americans who have supported, funded, and once staffed these companies; and are now getting the shaft from them.

"Economic uncertainty was the primary cause of their caution. "We've just been through a tsunami and that produces caution," one told me. But in addition to economics, they kept talking about politics, about the uncertainty surrounding regulations and taxes. Some have even begun to speak out publicly. Jeffrey Immelt, chief executive of General Electric, complained Friday that government was not in sync with entrepreneurs. The Business Roundtable, which had supported the Obama administration, has begun to complain about the myriad laws and regulations being cooked up in Washington."

General Electric moved a lot of it's manufacturing abroad. Now they claim they are moving them back home. But they don't want to invest here unless they can do it on their terms. In other words, they ware witholding investment as part of a game to force Americans to accept corporate rule. Like John Galt's team in Atlas Shrugged, it's basically a financial strike at American Workers, bureaucrats and the people of this country in general. "Economic uncertainty?" Bullhocky, they know that they can get firesale prices if they hold off, and more importantly they are trying to extort tax breaks from a congress that is just flaccid enough to give into their designs. More "laws" and "regulations" is code for "we won't be held accountable."

He quotes a CEO as saying:

One CEO told me, "Almost every agency we deal with has announced some expansion of its authority, which naturally makes me concerned about what's in store for us for the future."

So they lobby for de-regulation and fund the Tea Party instead. And he quotes Another as:

.... pointed out that between the health-care bill, financial reform and possibly cap-and-trade, his company had lawyers working day and night to figure out the implications of all these new regulations. Lobbyists have been delighted by all this activity. "[Obama] exaggerates our power, but he increases demand for our services," super lobbyist Tony Podesta told the New York Times.

The combination of 1.8 trillion dollars and lobbyists can certainly get a lot done.

"Most of the business leaders I spoke to had voted for Barack Obama. They still admire him. Those who had met him thought he was unusually smart. But all think he is, at his core, anti-business. When I asked for specifics, they pointed to the fact that Obama has no business executives in his Cabinet, that he rarely consults with CEOs (except for photo ops), that he has almost no private-sector experience, that he's made clear he thinks government and nonprofit work are superior to the private sector. It all added up to a profound sense of distrust.

All that is smoke. They know it is smoke. The Obama administration has been the most business friendly Democratic Presidency the business community has ever seen. The man has reached out over and over again to accommodate them. And if they get what they want with the two trade agreements they are negotiating they'll have almost complete impunity and immunity from laws they don't like. So what they are really saying is "we want it all" -- they want their 1.8 trillion in bonuses and stock options -- not to pay any taxes on it.

Fact is they act like they own us

He concludes:

Some of this is a product of chance. The economic crisis forced the government to expand its authority in dozens of areas, from finance to automobiles. But precisely because of these circumstances, Obama needs to outline a growth and competitiveness agenda that is compelling to the business community. This might sound like psychology more than economics, and the populist left will surely scream that the last thing we need to do is pander to business. But the first thing we need is for these people to start spending their money -- soon. As a leading New York businessman who publicly supported Obama during the campaign told me, "their perception is our reality."

Maybe they have a point. We need industrial policy, and corporate CEO's need to have executive advisory roles on a board of governors. They have much more power than that currently. It's just all from behind closed doors. And given the revolving door and the fact that corporations write much of our regulations and laws lately. I have trouble taking them at face value. Also given Obama's administration habit of coddling them up until now, and CEO tendency to have a ruthless and thankless negotiating style. I don't believe them.

No what we need to do is to tax the hell out of that 1.8 trillion and yes, stop coddling CEOs and demand them to earn their money instead. My perception is that these are greedy b*st*rds. And Coddling them will only allow them to run yet another swindle on the taxpaying public, employees and their customers. And yes we need a growth agenda -- spend that money on infrastructure, invest in our people, decentralize our industry, and stop coddling the oligarchs. And yes, we need to reform our regulation process. Just not at the demand of often irresponsible industrialists.

Sources and references:

Fareed Zakaria is editor of Newsweek International. His e-mail address is comments@fareedzakaria.com.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/04/AR2010070403856.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

NY Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/22/business/for-us-companies-money-offshore-means-manhattan.html