Citizens Against Government Waste

This bit of political (junk?) mail showed up the other day. Since it bore John McCain's name on the envelope, I opened it. The letter was full of indignation about wasting money, but, when you read it thru, there wasn't all that much money involved. There was a list of six questionable programs, but all put together it only came to $42 million, which is peanuts out of a $500 billion defense budget. Less than the cost of single military aircraft. Nothing's perfect, and if we are only wasting .00084% of the defense budget, the republic is well served.
Then there was a rubarb about purchasing 262 more C-130 transport aircraft than the Pentagon had requested. Maybe, but the old C-130 is one helova useful aircraft, capable of getting tons of troops and material into short dirt runways anywhere in the world. C-130's are essential in any kind of war, guerrilla war, full scale first world war, insurgency, Haitian relief, inserting special forces behind enemy lines, you name it and C-130's will do. It's as general purpose as pickup truck or a jeep. So I don't get upset about buying another 262 C-130's, I see it as money well spent on a versatile and reliable workhorse.
I dare say there is a good deal of waste fraud and abuse in the defense budget. I don't think Citizens Against Government Waste has found enough of it to get excited about. They need to look harder.

Is Bipartisanship a sellout?

Bipartisanship, a word beloved of today's democrats. When uttered, it means they want Republicans to vote for Obamacare, Cap & Tax, union card check, Porkulus, earmarks, and plump budgets. Republican support for any of these odious bills would give the Democrats enough votes to pass them, and prevent Republicans for using the bills as campaign issues in the 2010 election. Said election is already gathering steam.
So far, the Republicans have been pretty good at holding the line. The total lack of Republican votes shows the bills as questionable public policy. When all the Republicans refuse to vote for a bill it sends a message to the voting public. I think the Congressional republicans have been showing some backbone in their united opposition to awful bills.

Catcher in the Rye

The death of the author, J.D. Salinger, brought the book back to mind. I first read it in high school, on my own time, 'cause of the buzz it was getting. The book was new then. Like Holden Caulfield, I was attending boarding school, in fact a boarding school within 75 miles of Holden's fictional school. I could relate to Holden's desire to go to New York, to get served, and then get laid.

Unlike truly well written books, Catcher required real effort to keep reading. About three quarters of the way thru, where Holden starts obsessing about hairs in his roommate's razor, I decided Holden was a nut case and I was wasting my time reading about him. Forty odd years later, my son is required to read Catcher for school. So I borrowed his copy and read it thru, so I could discuss it with some authority.
On the second reading, I was struck by how Holden goes around with a kick-me sign on his back and then wonders why he isn't very popular at school. Early on Holden manages to loose the fencing teams equipment on the way to a match. It never occurs to him that his team mates are going think he is a jerk for that play. He takes advantage of his younger sister who adores him and lacks the courage to actually get sexual with a prostitute. With a more adult viewpoint, I could see that Holden, in addition to being a nut case, was a loser to boot. This time I got to the end and see Holden incarcerated in a booby hatch. At last, there is justice in the world I thought.
Son was unimpressed with Catcher. Teachers all love it.

5.7 % GNP growth. Do I believe it?

Yesterday the TV announced the US gross national product (GNP) had grown 5/7% in the last quarter of 2009.
Wow. Normal GNP growth is 3%, that number holds good all the way back to WWII. 5.7% is a boom.
Why does not the country feel like boom times? Could the figures be off or fudged? How can the country raise output of goods and services 5.7% with 10% of the workforce laid off? Surely it requires workers to turn out the goods.
On the other hand, if the number is real, Great Depression 2.0 is easing off. Lets hope.

Commentary on Avatar

Commentary, a conservative high brow magazine of politics and the arts, did a piece on Avatar. Not remarkable, it's only the top grossing movie of all time and thus worthy of a writeup. Stephen Hunter does the review and gets sucked into a search for the deep inner meaning of the flick. Trouble is, there is no deep inner meaning. The plot is shallow, as shallow as a Western or a Bond movie. Focusing on the light weight plot doesn't do much for his readers, most of whom have seen the movie by now. We know the plot was so light weight as to float. We enjoyed the scenery, the fighting, the flying, and exploring the lush jungle of Pandora.
A more perceptive review would have explored just what made this movie the all time best seller/top grosser despite the light weight plot, cardboard characters, and good guy bad guy role reversal.
Especially as Avatar is a "see once" movie, unlike Star Wars which racked up money from awe struck fans seeing it two, three, and four times.

State of the Union (SOTU for short)

I stayed up and watched it. It was unsatisfying. It ran forever. It was mostly bafflegab, motherhood and apple pie. Obama isn't changing direction, at least not much. The speech had no overall unity, it was a collection of political sound bites, one after the other, each one so vague as to be meaningless. It certainly didn't call the democrats to arms in the face of the Scott Brown threat, or state broad principles that drive his administration. No rousing lines to match "We shall fight them on the beaches,... " or "Ask not what your country can do for you..."
A few surprises. Obama admitted that his health care is not politically popular. This provoked a nervous titter of laughter. Then he said they ought to pass it anyhow. A real democrat here. Clearly Obama has gone far beyond believing that politicians are supposed to represent the voters. Obama still believes in global warming and still wants the job destroying cap & trade bill. He mentioned foreign trade and Columbia, South Korea, and somewhere else, but he did not advocate passing the free trade treaties for those countries bottled up in Congress.
He attacked the recent Supreme Court decision that overturned McCain-Feingold and allows unions, corporations large and small, and other organizations to, print and televise their viewpoints about political matters. Freedom of speech for unions and corporations. Obama is against it, although he didn't state what he wanted to do about it.
One good thing, he did speak up in favor of nuclear power and domestic oil and gas production. That was the only good thing in an hour and a half.

Who caused Great Depression 2.0?

Actually, it's like Murder on the Oriente Express, they all did it. But, one major villain is Elliot Spitzer, New York Attorney General and later Governor. While Attorney General, Spitzer targeted Hank Greenburg, president of AIG. Spitzer made such a stink that Greenburg stepped down as president. He never actually brought charges against Greenburg, but he made blood curdling threats which panicked AIG's board.
AIG was Greenburg's personal creation. He had assembled company after company into the biggest insurance company in the world. Greenburg was the only man competent to run AIG. He was a difficult man to work for, and so all the competent people in the organization had left for greener pastures, leaving a corporation staffed with narrow gauge yes men. With Greenburg gone, AIG began to slide down hill. The surviving management began gambling in the "credit default swap" market to make a quick buck.
Credit default swaps are insurance under a silly name. The deal goes like this. The seller, for a small fee, promises to insure some other company's debt against default. They became immensely popular with traders in risky bonds and securities. Give AIG a small cut, and take the rest of the income risk free. What's not to like?
When the market collapsed in September, AIG suddenly had to pay off zillions and it didn't have the money. Eventually we taxpayers paid off $140 billion of AIG's bad bets, making the buyers (Goldman Sachs, Lehman, Merrill Lynch & company) whole. We probably should have flushed the buyers down the drain, but at the time responsible officials (Treasury Secretary Paulson and Fed chairman Bernanke) thought that was just too dangerous. They only flushed Lehman and paid off the others.
If savvy old Hank Greenburg had still been running AIG, this probably would not have happened. Elliot Spitzer drove the man with his finger in the dike away and sure enough, the dike failed.