Month: August 2007

House on Shorties Hill

A Win-Win-Win Proposal. Russell Shaw wrote a piece for the Huffington Post suggesting that we could put together some sort of government agency to rebuild our infrastructure. Things like bridges and roads and parks would be (re)built and maintained; Joe and Jane Average would have the benefit of things like bridges and roads and parks; American citizens would be employed in such fields as construction, engineering, and even back-office professions. You know what? FDR tried that in the 30’s and it works!

A Tale of Two Fed Heads. Ok, by now everybody has seen the footage of Jim Cramer going on about how Bernanke needs to lower interest rates by a full percent to avoid catastrophe, fire and brimstone, dogs and cats, living together? Never mind that he made a very similar speech a week earlier on his own show. Needless to say Mr. Cramer had some things to say about yesterday’s Fed meeting. Meanwhile, the always insightful Tim Iocono has advice for Mr. Bernanke and a summary of current Greenspeak. What Would Alan Greenspan Do?

Listen, we know you only have about an hour of electricity a day, and that temperatures are over 100F, but you really need to ram through this piece of legislation mmkay? Next time you see one of those political cartoons making fun of the Iraqi Parliament for taking August off — huh, just like the President and Congress does! — go ahead and look up a current Baghdad weather report. But sometimes it feels like nobody in the West except me and Alternet have noticed that maybe the reason Iraq can’t get the “oil bill” passed is that it is a steaming pile of stuff that isn’t good for Iraq.

Insurance Filter. USA Today asks and answers, When is something less than nothing? When it’s insurance coverage for childhood and adolescent vaccines. Listen folks, kids who don’t get vaccinated become a health hazard in our communities. They become the basis for outbreaks among people too young to be vaccinated, people whose immunity has worn off for whatever reason, and other people who are not vaccinated. Sure, the insurance companies are trying to save a few bucks; that comes with being a for-profit company. But public health is more important than meeting Wall Street expectations. Elsewhere in the Wonderful World of Insurance, young adults make up 30% of those without health insurance, largely because they can’t afford it.

Congress better have an ace up its sleeve. US News’s roundup confirms what was clear to me from Ed Schultz’s callers yesterday: people are mad that the Democrats they sent to Congress in the 2006 elections to change the status quo have caved in to Presidential pressure and fears of being branded some kind of terrorist-lover by passing this wiretap bill. Here’s the List of Shame.

Tough rules are meaningless unless you enforce them. “In a new effort to crack down on illegal immigrants, federal authorities are expected to announce tough rules this week that would require employers to fire workers who use false Social Security numbers.” Here’s a thought, enforce the rules that already exist! Enforcement of these rules during the Bush Administration is down 95%. And that’s 95% down from what the Christian Science Monitor calls reduced enforcement since the Reagan Administration, noting that “Since the 9/11 attacks, there has been even less focus on interior investigations.”

Somebody Knew the Ride was Ending. What a coincidence! Four guys who got out of those now-defunct Bear Stearns hedge funds just happened to be executives with Bear Stearns.

And finally, That’s One Heck of a Snow-Cone! Of course, in Japan they call it kakigori.

Two for the Road

Part One: What, Me Worry?

The New York Times was kind enough to publish a little item called “A Question Recurs: How Safe Is Las Vegas?”

Please remember, I am one of the 1.5 million people who live in the Las Vegas Valley, and that Las Vegas itself is one of the 50 largest cities in the United States, and 5000 people move here every month. This is before you account for the fact that 16 of the 20 largest hotels in the world are in Las Vegas and that 38.9 million people visited town last year.

Reading the article, I could not decide whether the NYT was saying “eek beware stay away” or “hey, they have things under control.” You wouldn’t know it to watch reruns of CSI on Spike, but there have really only been two recent incidents that have broken into the national news seen: a lone nutcase who opened fire before being taken down by off-duty military tourists, and a hit that happened to involve a bomb on the victim’s car. A former sheriff, who now runs security for one of the casino groups, says:

“We have not had an event here in Las Vegas the equivalent of the events of 9/11 or anything close to that, and that hasn’t been by accident…. With all that said, it’s going to be very, very, very difficult to prevent lone criminals who have the intentions of harming themselves and others.”

Translation: it’s really hard to stop one nut.

Look, folks, I am not worried about terraists attacking here. First, every casino has cameras everywhere (remember? “part of me knows what you’re thinking”?) — and there’s even casinos in grocery stores. There’s also security everywhere, and they have been trained to make sure that the city’s guests have a good and safe time. There are other factors I won’t trouble you about, let me just say that the only coordinated attack that I think has any chance of success is if some truly fringe religious group is involved.

Part Two: Even Steve Liesman doesn’t like the numbers

CNBC was talking about the job creation figures for July, which were released today. CNN nicely summarizes job growth as “weaker” and points out that average hourly wages grew a whole six cents! So much for how raising the minimum wage was going to put employers in a bind. Those who would like to blame the minimum wage hike for these numbers would do well to remember that this is merely the latest in a trend of bad numbers, and that we have actually had a month with worse job creation earlier this year. TheStreet.com has some more details, but if you want the overall picture check out this chart from The Mess That Greenspan Made.

Let’s set aside the fact that 92,000 jobs were created, when we need at least 150,000 to absorb new people in the labor pool. Let’s not get bogged down in the fact that none of those people count as “unemployed” because they were never employed in the first place. And let’s only give a passing nod CNBC’s mentioning “All the July job growth came in service industries, which added 104,000 jobs while goods-producing industries cut 12,000 positions. The government shed 28,000 jobs in July, the first time in more than a year and half that the government has cut hiring.” That’s the second month in a row that “service industries” created more jobs than the headline job creation number! How long until every job requires phrases like “how can I help you”? How can we continue to call ourselves a “superpower” when each month we make less stuff, we build fewer things, and we spend more time giving one another “service” using products made somewhere else?

An hour after the figures were released, CNBC’s Chief Economist Steve Liesman asked whether the job creation numbers in the financial services industry accounted for the 7000 employees of American Home Mortgage for whom today is the last day of work. Frankly, he sounded skeptical of the numbers overall. Could it be that he’s beginning to suspect that the employment and job creation numbers are just as rigged as the inflation figures?

In closing: the things dads can teach their kids include financial literacy and lockpicking; remember me mentioning that the Canadians had sent an expedition to claim the North Pole? Well Russia sent a submarine to claim the land under the ice cap, so the Stalemate for Santa is on!; and finally, beating your wife is not a Christian value! Submitting to “authority” and having the crap beaten out of you are different things, and any man who can’t see that does not deserve to have a wife. Or, to paraphrase Karl Cullinane, “You do not say ‘my wife’ or ‘my child’ in the same way you would say ‘my shovel.'”

From the “now I’ve seen everything” files….

Today I got one of those coupon booklets in the mail. You know the sort of thing. I was flipping through it when I saw this:

Menopause, the Musical

The rest of the page informed me that someone from the local paper wrote “Dollar for dollar, it’s the best show in town.” At this point, it is worth pointing out that the next line on the page is “Free Las Vegas Hilton Buffet! See Reverse Side for Details!”

Apparently this is for real, but I bet you’ll never ever see a high school production of it.

But Wait There’s More

If you are pressed for time today, the Associated Press has condensed this Washington Post article. For the truly short-of-attention-span (emphasis mine):

The Bush administration’s top intelligence official has acknowledged that a controversial domestic surveillance program was only one part of a much broader spying effort, The Washington Post reported in its Wednesday edition. [snip]

“That is the only aspect of the NSA activities that can be discussed publicly because it is the only aspect of those various activities whose existence has been officially acknowledged,” McConnell wrote, according to the Post. [snip]

The letter was written to defend Attorney General Alberto Gonzales….

So it’s ok for someone to lie to Congress because they’re not in the loop about your illegal spying operation? What?

Just about the only person standing up for Mr. Gonzales at this point is Mr. Cheney, who appeared on Larry King Live to say that since there’s no charges yet, the investigation is a “witch hunt.” Apparently Mr. Cheney is unaware that investigations usually precede charges, not the other way around. If you would like to see Mr. Cheney’s comments analyzed and certain facts disputed, check it out here. One thing that I will point out is in the very last minute or so. Mr Cheney very specifically says something that is supposed to be interpreted as “I don’t recall that I sent [Mr. Gonzales] to the hospital [to see Mr. Ashcroft].” What he in fact says is “I don’t recall I sent him to the hospital.”

The word that does not appear between those phrases. Perhaps he meant a period.

Stop waiting for “the other shoe to drop”, because we clearly have a centipede on our hands.

In closing: researchers come to the conclusion that it’s because it feels good; Brad Plumer tells us how the War on Drugs is the War on the Welfare Rolls, and there is a related commentary here; where business and fashion collide, we find Liz; three items for economics filter, housing prices, “blame the Chinese”, and “5 lies my economist told me”, and last a solution so simple it should already be in place, if classrooms have locks, it’s easier to keep gunmen out. Now of course it is possible for Bad Guys to lock doors too, and I’m sure most Principals are sputtering on about kids locking the door for nefarious purposes. That’s why locks have keys, people. It seems to me the Principal should probably have one.