Words of the Weasel Part 5

ISSUE:

Often used by computer people as a neutral sounding replacement for “bug”. Issue is favored because it holds out the hope that the “issue” can be negotiated away, rather than requiring the programmers to get off their duffs and fix the problem. Also used as a replacement for “problem” and “malfunction”

Who reads a 1000 page act of Congress?

Answer, no one really understands 1000 pages of anything. When it gets to court, lawyers will argue for this interpretation or that interpretation, and in the end, a judge decides what the law really means. These overly wordy acts are Congress's way of shirking their Constitutional duty to legislate. The verbose legislation fails to bind anyone to do anything, nothing happens until some judge decides what the law is.
The overly wordy acts occur for a number of reasons, all of them bad. For openers, its hard to get agreement on anything these days, so rather than negotiate, the committee (probably the committee staffers) just puts in everyone's pet language and sends the bill to the floor.
Then everyone on the job is a lawyer. Lawyers get sent to special four year schools that teach how to use a lot of broken English and some Latin mumbo jumbo to make the paperwork unreadable by anyone. Once the paperwork is 1000 pages long and unreadable, they can slip all sorts of goodies (pork) into the nooks and crannies of the law and it will slide right thru Congress.
We ought place a word limit upon acts of Congress. For instance, require that no act of Congress contain more words than the Constitution itself contains. The Constitution has enough words to keep the US of A going over for better than 200 years, that ought to be enough for anything else.

No WSJ, No inspiration for posts

What with veterans day and all, its been two days since I last got the Journal. I kept trying to think of things to blog about, but everything that came to mind seemed like I'd said it before, or it came off as a plain old rant.
Drought is over, USPS just delivered both the Monday and the Tuesday Journal, Aviation Week and Eweek. That oughta keep me going.

First over ride of a Bush veto to save the pork

What more needs be said. Lets stand up to Bush and get our pork. Defense bills, children's health insurance, ho hum, but let Bush veto a "water projects" bill and Congress will rise up in righteous wrath and restore every dollar in hard won pork.

Fiscal Responsibility Proves Costly (WSJ)

"Democrats took control of Congress this year with a pledge to me more fiscally responsible than their Republican counterparts. Trying to fulfill that promise, however, has cause strains among lawmakers, forced cutbacks on big policy goals and snagged major legislation,
The root of the problem is what is known as pay as you go or paygo, a budget rule revived by the new majority that says Congress must offset new costs with tax increases or spending cuts. The rule's purpose is the prevent new entitlement spending from increasing the budget deficit.
Thus far, it has complicated efforts to pay tax breaks for renewable energy, slowed progress on a farm bill, and become a sticking point with the Bush administration over an effort to expand children's health insurance. "

Costly? Sounds to me like paygo has saved us long suffering taxpayers from yet more fleecing. No kind of energy (renewable, nuclear, biological, fossil, or magical) needs any kind of tax break. The price of energy is so flipping high that it will draw investment dollars out to thin air. Farm bills are subsidies for farmers, taking my money and giving it away to farmers. Why should that happen? What makes farmers worthy enough to take my money? The "children" s health insurance will give my tax money away to adults, and children of families making more than I make.
Lets have more paygo. It's saving us taxpayers real money. The Republicans ought to make a campaign promise to retain paygo should they regain control of Congress next year.

Ford is losing less money than GM? (WSJ)

" As Detroit's two biggest auto makers brace for economic turbulence their respective turn around efforts are running in different gears.
The surprise: Ford Motor Co., not General Motors Corp, suddenly appears to be on a faster track to profits.
Ford, considered by many industry executives to be the sickeset of Detroit's big three, yesterday surprise investors by sharply narrowing its third quarter loss and forecasting it would break even for the year and generate positive cash flow."

Well, good news from Ford and all, but the comparison with GM is worthless. GM reported a $36 billion loss on some kind of tax credit scam, totally unrelated to the real business of assembling cars and selling them. That's a loss of $68 a share on shares that are only worth $35. This kind of accounting isn't real. It tells us nothing about what's really happening in the real world of styling new models, buying parts to produce today's models, negotiating better labor costs, advertising, and selling cars. It's an accountant's magic wand, reporting a fantastic paper loss. The accountants tilted the books by $36 billion with a wave of their pens, hiding any modest gain or loss in the core business. Yet the WSJ and the industry pundits really think Ford is doing better than the General, based upon this kind of phony financial reporting?
At least the Ford suits were responsible enough to spent Ford money on the core business, as opposed to the GM suits who used GM money to speculate in the sub prime housing market and rack up a $750 million loss (which is almost invisible compared to the $36 billion loss the accountants invented).

Government backing for McMansion mortgages (WSJ)

"Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke floated a new idea to fix the troubled market for mortgages to large for Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac to buy. All the companies to securitize jumbo size mortgages but have the Federal government guarantee them.
Fannie and Freddie currently can buy mortgages only up to $417,000 and Congress, so far, hasn't acted to lift that limit, despite distress in that market that has made jumbo mortgages at "somewhat tighter terms and higher prices" as Mr. Bernanke put it."

Wow. Fannie and Freddy were set up by act of Congress to make it easier for working stiffs to get home mortgages. For this reason Congress limited to size of mortgage eligible for US government subsidy to $417K to prevent fat cats buying McMansions taking advantage of subsidies for working stiffs. $417K will buy one hell of a house in any market you care to mention. Why should Uncle Sam use my tax dollars to make it easier to finance rich people's houses? Let the fat cats pay market rates for their houses, just like real people.
Presumably Mr. Bernanke was attempting to ease the pain for banks and brokerage houses who are getting burned in the sub prime crisis. I'm agin it. Let the speculators take some solid losses. That will teach 'em not to drive up the price of housing by speculation.