Some odd stories from the BBC in 2006

The man who married a goat
A paper clip for a house
Porn in the news

Don't the English Courts Have Better Things To Do?

It's been almost ten years. The deaths of Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed have been deemed accidents, yet there will be more hearings on the matter in January.

Maybe one is cheaper than many

The OECD has been publishing statistics on health care and its costs for years. The latest report is for 2004. Here's how we compare to Canada, France, Australia and Britain.

Health Care Spending per Person
United States $6102
Canada 3165
France 3159
Australia 3120
Britain 2508

Life Expectancy in Years
United States 77.5
Canada 79.9
France 80.3
Australia 80.6
Britain 78.5

Infant Mortality per 1000 births
United States 6.9
Canada 5.3
France 3.9
Australia 4.7
Britain 5.1

So, we spend more but die earlier and are more likely to have stillbirths. Is there something wrong with this picture? Each of the other countries has adopted a single-payer health insurance system. We have not. Could our higher costs be a function of the fact that we have an almost myriad number of health insurance providers?

Words for the USA?

David Grossman, an Israeli writer, spoke at this year's Yitzhak Rabin Memorial Ceremony. The NY Review of Books printed his talk , entitled "Looking at Ourselves", in this week's issue. While his words are addressed to the leaders of Israel, if watered down somewhat they also can be applied to our leaders. Here are some excerpts:

And I ask you, how can it be that a people with our powers of creativity and regeneration, a nation that has known how to pick itself up out of the dust time and again, finds itself today—precisely when it has such great military power—in such a feeble, helpless state? A state in which it is again a victim, but now a victim of itself, of its fears and despair, of its own shortsightedness?

My intention is to make it clear that the people who today lead Israel are unable to connect Israelis with their identity, and certainly not with the healthy, sustaining, inspiring parts of Jewish identity. I mean those parts of identity and memory and values that can give us strength and hope, that can serve as antidotes to the attenuation of mutual responsibility and of our connection to the land, that can grant meaning to our exhausting, desperate struggle for survival.

Today, Israel's leadership fills the husk of its regime primarily with fears and intimidations, with the allure of power and the winks of the backroom deal, with haggling over all that is dear to us. In this sense, our leaders are not real leaders. They are certainly not the leaders that a people in such a complicated, disoriented state need.

Look at those who lead us. Not at all of them, of course, but all too many of them. Look at the way they act—terrified, suspicious, sweaty, legalistic, deceptive. It's ridiculous to even hope that the Law will come forth from them, that they can produce a vision, or even an original, truly creative, bold, momentous idea.

In all sincerity, it is important to me that you succeed. Because our future depends on your ability to rise up and act. Yitzhak Rabin turned to the path of peace with the Palestinians not because he was fond of them or their leaders. Then also, if you remember, the common wisdom was that we had no partner among the Palestinians, and that there was nothing for us to talk about with them. Rabin decided to act because he detected, with great astuteness, that Israeli society could not long continue in a state of unresolved conflict. He understood, before many people understood, that life in a constant climate of violence, of occupation, of terror and fear and hopelessness, comes at a price that Israel cannot afford to pay.

And these are some of the reasons that, in an amazingly short time, Israel has degenerated into heartlessness, real cruelty toward the weak, the poor, and the suffering. Israel displays indifference to the hungry, the elderly, the sick, and the handicapped, equanimity in the face of, for example, trafficking in women, or the exploitation of foreign workers in conditions of slave labor, and in the face of profound, institutionalized racism toward its Arab minority. When all this happens as if it were perfectly natural, without outrage and without protest, I begin to fear that even if peace comes tomorrow, even if we eventually return to some sort of normality, it may be too late to heal us completely.

Appeal to the Palestinians, Mr. Olmert. Appeal to them over Hamas's head. Appeal to the moderates among them, to those who, like you and me, oppose Hamas and its ideology. Appeal to the Palestinian people. Speak to their deepest wound, acknowledge their unending suffering. You won't lose anything, and Israel's position in any future negotiation will not be compromised. But hearts will open a bit to each other, and that opening has great power. Simple human compassion has the power of a force of nature, precisely in a situation of stagnation and hostility.

Go to the Palestinians, Mr. Olmert. Don't look for reasons not to talk to them.

Of course not everything depends on what we do. There are great and strong forces acting in this region and in the world, and some of them, like Iran, like radical Islam, wish us ill. Nevertheless, so much does depend on what we do, and what we will be.

Why does our political leadership continue to reflect the positions of the extremists and not of the majority?

From where I stand at this moment, I request, call out to all those listening —to young people who came back from the war, who know that they are the ones who will have to pay the price of the next war; to Jewish and Arab citizens; to the people of the right and the people of the left: stop for a moment. Look over the edge of the abyss, and consider how close we are to losing what we have created here. Ask yourselves if the time has not arrived for us to come to our senses, to break out of our paralysis, to demand for ourselves, finally, the lives that we deserve to live.

Just a quiet Christmas party

From Myway.com

LILLINGTON, N.C. (AP) - A woman attacked a man in his genitals during a Christmas party, injuring him badly enough that he needed 50 stitches, authorities said Friday. Rebecca Arnold Dawson, 34, was charged with malicious castration in a fight early Tuesday at a party hosted by the 38-year-old man's girlfriend, police said.

All three were heavily intoxicated, police Chief Frank Powers said.

Dawson is accused of grabbing the man's genitals. Police said a weapon was not used. He declined to elaborate.

"I believe he needed more than 50 stitches to repair the damage, but he is back home at this point," police Cpl. Brad Stevens said. "All we can tell you is that the injury was done with her hands."

Dawson does not have a listed phone number.

State law describes malicious castration as cutting off, maiming or disfiguring a person's genitals with the intent to hurt or render the victim impotent.

Dawson, who was released Wednesday on $50,000 bond, also was charged with offenses including assault causing serious bodily injury.

The castration arrest was the first of its kind in Lillington, a town of about 3,000 roughly 30 miles south of Raleigh, Powers said.

Lowball it ...

and then jack up the price. That was Humana's strategy in offering the lowest cost Part D Medicare plan last year. This year, seniors who bought Humana will see their costs jump 60% on average. Some will see increases of 466%.

Yet, even with these increases Humana's plans are still among the lowest cost.

A different version

Here's "Somewhere over the Rainbow" as you've probably never heard it. I first heard it over the Muzak system at a hotel in Taormina a few weeks ago.

It's too bad that the singer, Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, died in 1997. Apparently, he was well known in his home state of Hawaii. His body lay in state in the capital rotunda.

Chrysler to sell Chery

That's 'CheRy' as in the Chery Automobile Company of China. Chrysler expects to offer the cars early in 2008. The price will be around $10,000.

More Numbers for 2006

An Israeli human rights group, B'Tselem, claims that three times as many Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces in 2006 than in 2005, while about half as many Israelis were killed by Palestinian attacks in 2006 as compared to 2005.

Also, 9,075 Palestinians are being held in Israeli jails, 738 without knowing the charges.

Where and how B'Tselem got this information is not specified.

45% More

The Pentagon will be asking for another $100 billion to fund its efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan and "the longer war against terror". This will bring FY2007's war costs to almost $107 billion, 45% more than we spent in FY2006. Who knows whether more will be sought later in the fiscal year which still has nine months to go? This round brings the total spent on these efforts to $507 billion since 2001; that's about $1600 for every man, woman and child in the US. And still we're told that the Bush tax cuts should be made permanent. What madness makes some of our leaders believe that the tax cuts (primarily for the wealthy) are on balance good for this country?

It's difficult to figure out how much of this round will be spent on the "longer war", but the question is whether the money could be spent more wisely on this 'longer war' by law enforcement groups rather than by the military.

Training the Iraqi and Afghan forces will receive as much money, $9 billion, in this budget round as it has received in total since 2001.

The Footnote of the Year

Footnoted.org selects the most egregious use of company money each year. This year it's Aaron's Rents which paid close to $1,000,000 to train the sons of their marketing VP in the art of automobile racing.

It may not be due to global warming...

but it's a heck of a big piece of ice.

The Vineyard Makes The Wall Street Journal

Wednesday's Journal featured the Souza family of Oak Bluffs to illustrate some of the problems surrounding immigration. The Souzas are but one of a considerable number of Brazilians who have come to the Vineyard in the past 15 - 20 years. No one really knows how many Brazilians live here, but estimates range from 2500 - 5000. Many of them have come here illegally. Many have not. The Souza family is one of those who came here legally. The problem is they came here on a tourist visa. But that's only part of the story.

Zandro Souza came here in 2000 and started working in restaurants. He's a talented guy and quickly rose from dishwasher to demonstrating his skills at the chi-chi Tribeca Grill in NYC. He brought his wife and son here in 2001. His son is another part of the story. Igor was born blind and with mental deficiencies. He needs a heck of a lot of care, which the Souzas have given him and paid for on their own dime.

His family's arrival coincided with a change in the immigration laws which provided a temporary 'pardon' allowing employers to sponsor their employees for the green card process even if the immigrant had overstayed his visa or entered the country illegally. In 2002 the Souzas were notified that their application was being processed. In 2004 they received Social Security numbers and work permits.

In 2005 they were interviewed by an immigration officer as part of the last steps. Here was where the first real hurdle appeared - if Mr. Souza and his wife died, who would take care of Igor. They had 12 weeks to prove that Igor would not be a public charge should they die. This request by INS could be deemed excessive in that Souza's sponsor, his employer, was also a financial guarantor. However, the Souzas supplied evidence that his father's house would be sold should both of them die and the funds would be used for Igor.

At the start of this year the Souzas were denied their green cards and ordered to appear in court to begin deportation hearings. This time the reason was that they came on a tourist visa although they had intended to become permanent residents. Yet, the law under which they started this specifically included those who had come here illegally. The Souzas entered the US legally as tourists; they did not sneak in, like some of their compatriots. They have paid their own money to care for their son. They are willing to sell their house should they no longer be on earth. It would seem that they are the kinds of people this country should welcome.

Tax breaks for semi-professional athletes

Many colleges are renovating their stadiums, including adding the same luxury boxes you can buy at the stadiums of professional sports teams. Some colleges have been able to inveigle companies to pay for the right to put their name on these renovated stadiums. The problem is that we taxpayers are paying for a good portion of these renovations.

Since 1980 the tax laws have designated the right to purchase seating at a college game (which is what these luxury boxes are sold as) and the right to spend money to have a stadium named in your honor are charitable gifts for which the purchaser can deduct 80% of the payment from his taxes. Plus the colleges issue tax-free bonds for the actual construction costs.

Athletic directors claim that the tax breaks are needed so that they can get the 'donations' which are then used for such purposes as the stadium renovation, minor sports and academic tutoring of athletes. Right!

Ford's Thoughts About Iraq and Some of the Players

The Washington Post has an article by Woodward recounting interviews he had with Ford, which interviews would not be published during Ford's lifetime. Count Ford as another Republican who disagreed with the President but held his tongue.

The Truth Will Make You Free

Here are some intelligent comments made this year and gleaned by Media Matters.

Someone has to pay

It doesn't matter that the scientific evidence shoots large holes in the prosecution's case. But, unless the Supreme Court of Libya overturns their convictions, five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor will be killed for the 'crime' of deliberately infecting Libyan children with HIV. The Court spared the prisoners, who have been in jail since 1999, before. Maybe they will do it again.

Why can't we get more?

Britain gets half of an oil company's revenue produced on property owned by England. Norway gets as much as 78%. The average government brings in 60% and more. The US brings in 40%. Make sense to you?

Escalating responses

The peasants in China have apparently taken another step in their protests against getting screwed by local officials who sell village land and keep most of the proceeds for themselves. Now they have started taking the officials as hostages. In one case the hostages were kept for eight days before being freed by a police raid.

I guess they won't be responding

True to their apparent philosophy of "the customer be damned", Comcast has yet to respond to the letters I sent to their Vice Presidents 'extolling' the quality of their service.

Why are software renewal licenses so frustrating?

Particularly with security products. I dropped Norton when I found it impossible to explain my questions to the support people or to understand their answers. I dropped Bit Defender when they were unable to supply me with an updated copy of their software. I should have dropped Trend Micro when I realized that they were getting a royalty from every time they needed a restart of the computer in order to renew my license. Plus, the product cannot download using Firefox. Plus, their documentation stinks.

I swear

Does it really matter what book someone places their hand on when they take an oath to tell the truth? Does it matter whether a book is used at all? A Congressman from Virginia thinks so. He is quite upset about new Congressman Ellison's decision to take the oath of office with his hand placed on the Koran.

Just another indication of the low quality of our political leaders.

The first day of winter

Now the sun will shine a little longer each day. The blackness of night will take a trifle longer to arrive. Spring is only 90 days away.

Surging to Disaster

There are several articles on the web arguing against increasing the number of troops in Iraq. This article by Lawrence Korb and Max Bergmann is short and to the point.

One of my favorite boondoggles...

is the government's program to reduce STDs via abstinence education. In FY2005 you and I spent $158,000,000 on these programs. Did they work? The GAO tried to answer this question. The short answer is - no one knows. Furthermore, some of these programs provide educational materials that are based on wishes rather than facts.

Could we use this $158,000,000 more intelligently?

$74,000,000 spent wisely?

For the past ten years we have given $74,000,000 to dissidents in Cuba. Has the money been well spent? That's the question a new GAO report asks.

We shipped food, medicine, clothing, office equipment and supplies, shortwave radios, books, and newsletters to Cuba. In return, the recipients conducted international advocacy for human and workers' rights in Cuba and planned for a future democratic transition. Laudable goals perhaps.

But the GAO did not find that the internal controls used ensured that the grant funds are being used properly and that grantees are in compliance with applicable laws and regulations. Nor were there any measures to determine whether the funds were being spent wisely.

36 steps

The GAO (General Accountability Office) has published a list of suggested topics needing attention by the incoming Congress. There are thirty-six topics divided into three groups:

1. Targets for near term oversight - such as reducing the tax gap, making DHS a useful agency, improving security, etc.
2. Policies and programs that are in need of fundamental reform and reengineering - like Afghanistan and Iraq, Medicare and Medicaid, Energy Supply, etc.
3. Governance issues for a better government for all of us - such as the budget process, management structure and operation of the government, etc.

It's quite a comprehensive list, but we are in serious trouble. Unless these fine people who are representing us start actually doing constructive work such as that proposed by the GAO, we'll be in even deeper doodoo than we are now.

It's only been two weeks....

but I couldn't find anything about the Iraq Study Group today. Here, they spent nine months, interviewed a couple of hundred 'experts', delayed their report because it would 'affect' the election and it seems that the only aspect of the report that our leaders are talking about is whether or not to increase the number of our troops there. Hell, it worked in Baghdad. Didn't it? It's much quieter there since we sent in 17,000 troops this past summer.

One emphasis of the report was the need for national reconciliation on the part of the Iraqis. Will the Shiites, who have been under the control of the Sunnis and others for hundreds of years, now be willing to truly share the power that they finally have after so long being the underdog? It's unlikely.

Will Syria and Iran be willing to talk about helping resolve the issues in Iraq without wanting concessions from us? If they do sit down, will the Sunnis of Saudi Arabia and the other countries sit down with them?

Will our natural allies be willing to help after we ignored their warnings in so callous a manner?

Is a federated Iraq divided into three areas - Sunni, Shiite and Kurd - with some sharing of the oil wealth really an impossible goal?

Okay, the vacation is over

Although CNN and the BBC were available in Sicily, I did manage to avoid watching them most of the time. The few times I did watch I did get the sense that things were getting worse, however. Today's NY Times confirmed this sense.

The Army reports that in the last reporting period (August to November) there were 5 attacks against Americans or Iraqis every hour. American deaths and injuries numbered one an hour. The increase is attributed to the rise of the Shiite militias, not the insurgents.

Oil is being produced at the rate of 2,300,000 barrels a day, somewhat short of the 2,500,000 goal.

Electricity in Baghdad continues to be available fewer and fewer hours per day. Now it's only available less than 7 hours a day. Of the nine lines supplying power to Baghdad, only two are still standing. The people destroying power sources in the desert are working faster than the government can repair the damage. How long can this last?

Talk about hysteria

From today's Boston Globe:

The Catholic Archdiocese of Boston reinstated a Waltham priest yesterday after an investigation found no evidence to support a single allegation that he had sexually abused a minor about 20 years ago. The Rev. Roger N. Jacques, former pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Waltham, was placed on administrative leave in October 2002 pending an archdiocesan review of the complaint. Jacques was among 58 Boston-area priests who signed a letter questioning the credibility of Cardinal Bernard F. Law and asking him to resign after a string of priests were accused of sexually abusing minors. (AP)

How would you like to be Rev. Jacques? One person accuses you and the church takes four years to find that the accusation was baseless? Makes you think of Salem.

We're back

How could a New Englander not like a place where the winter temperature is 65+? That's how warm Sicily was for our first ten days and then it cooled off to 55. The weather was not hard to take, nor was the scenery. It really is a beautiful island, but I would not want to drive a car outside of a major city; the roads are narrow and, since Sicily is fairly mountainous, they are also quite treacherous in places.

While we took about 500 photographs of the scenery, the event that struck me the most was a talk by a founder of an anti-Mafia group in Corleone, which is not only the fictional home of The Godfather but has been the home of many very real Mafia CEOs. Gino was a very good presenter, he also is a brave guy as he and his family are at risk from retaliation by the Mafia.

But, even Gino acknowledged that the fundamental problem is economic. With unemployment at 20+% and a low wage scale for those employed, the people of Sicily feel that they need the aid of the Mafia. In addition, the island has been conquered by an amazing number of nations. While this has led to a wonderful variety of buildings and public architecture, it has also, I feel, led to a nation accustomed to being ruled by the more powerful not only from their own people but, more importantly, from outsiders. That being said I met a number of people in their 30s and 40s who seemed to recognize the island's problems and were working to solve them.

See you in two weeks

We're off to Sicily and, hopefully, will have a break from the 21st century world.

The Morning After - Again

Five years after 'defeating' the Taliban there is still not an effective police force in Afghanistan. And no one knows how many police officers are on duty nor can many trucks and much equipment be found although we have paid for them. Heck, they can't even find the contract between the government and DynCorp, the contractor hired to train the police force. Furthermore, although Afghanistan and Iraq have about the same population, the Iraqi police force, such as it is, is twice the size of that of Afghanistan.

A friend of mine frequently said that success in business is all about blocking and tackling - that is, doing the mundane but necessary tasks that a successful business must be able to execute day after day. Clearly, he would be appalled at our government's inability to block and tackle.

A refresher on Europe and the Muslims

James Carroll provides a brief summary of the history between the Muslims and Europe, while recognizing that Pope Benedict seems to be mellowing with regard to his concerns with Islam.

Another victim of the war on drugs

That victim is this country if the article in today's Observer is true (and it sounds that way to me). Basically, the article, which is based on court records, accuses the Immigration and Customs Executive (ICE) branch of Homeland Security of turning a blind eye towards an informant who was killing people for a drug cartel in Mexico. Further, a Deputy Attorney General and the US Attorney for Western Texas are also accused of not stopping the employment of this killer and trying to silence any government agent who tried to make the public aware of this.

It is a damning indictment of the futility of the government's decades long war on drugs, which seems to engender a loss of ethics and morality.

The War of the Imagination

Mark Danner has quite a long article entitled "The War of the Imagination" in the holiday issue of the NY Review of Books. As with most NYR articles it's more than a review of books by Woodward, Suskind and Risen; Danner expounds on his views of our Iraq debacle. Danner's thesis is, at this point, not original: our leaders' actions were based on how they wanted the world to be, rather than how it is. However, he does makes some interesting points.

One of the more interesting sections of the article is an excerpt from the formerly top-secret National Security Presidential Directive entitled "Iraq: Goals, Objectives and Strategy", which President Bush signed on August 29, 2002. Looked at 4+ years later, it does seem to have become a work of the imagination, rather than of reality.

Woodward reports on a startling meeting between Bush, Powell and Rice in which Powell tries to explain the problems inherent in having two chains of command - Garner and Franks - in Iraq, both reporting to the Pentagon, neither reporting to the White House. First, Bush and Rice don't believe him; then, after verifying it, they do nothing beyond acknowledging that Powell is correct but the discussion was "theoretical".

Chalabi, of course, has to be brought up. He was the Pentagon's 'silver bullet' for postwar running of Iraq. Bush vetoed him. But neither the Pentagon nor Bush suggested a Plan B, i.e., if Chalabi was not going to be the man, who was?

But, as you would expect, Danner (and the authors of the books reviewed) reserves his sharpest criticism for Bush and Cheney. Essentially, they knew what was right and didn't want to hear anything else. They were the 'deciders'. They did not need to hear what was happening in the world of reality. We and the Iraqis continue to pay the price for their arrogance and stupidity.

An unusual decision..

but one that may help prevent departing CEOs from taking advantage of stockholders. A federal judge ruled that Mr. McGuire, ex-CEO of United Health, cannot exercise his severance benefits until a United Health committee decides whether the company has any claims against him. Demonstrating that he is a somewhat unusual CEO (or so wealthy that he doesn't need the money) McGuire supported the plaintiff's motion.

A novel idea

Why not ask the people affected? That's what Scott Turow, novelist, thinks we should do with regard to withdrawing from Iraq. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed he proposes a plebiscite that asks the Iraqis one question: Should American forces remain in Iraq until a stable democratic order emerges, however long that takes, or should we instead withdraw in stages over a fixed period, say, the next twelve months?

The answer would be valuable input into a reasoned decision.

And I thought it was just the name of a hot sauce

LONDON, Dec 1 (Reuters Life!) - Nearly two-thirds of Britons think the fiery Italian sauce Arrabiata is a sex infection, according to a survey on Friday.

The survey, of 1,015 people and released on World AIDS day, also showed nearly half were unable to identify a range of common sexual complaints.

"What is very worrying is the lack of knowledge about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) revealed in the survey," said sex therapist Emily Dubberley.

"Sixty-three percent in the UK thought an Italian sauce was an STD and over 43 percent couldn't identify any of the common sexual complaints we asked about.

"This ignorance has no excuse in today's world."

The survey, conducted by pollsters MYVOICE, also found that 48 percent of respondents found body odor and poor personal hygiene a turn off against just 4 percent who felt the same about a refusal to wear a condom.

The poll also found that 35 percent of people looked for information about sex on the Internet against 27 percent who consulted magazines.

In contrast only 4 percent went to their doctors.

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.

The role of women in Afghanistan is getting better?

Not when people are killed in horrific ways for teaching girls.

1 in 32

For every 32 people in this country, 1 is either in prison, on parole or on probation. That's an unbelievable number. But that's what the Justice Department says was the case at the end of last year.

Almost 50% of the prison population is there because of drugs.

It keeps getting worse

A couple of months ago the Red Cross was fined $4,200,000 for problems with its blood supply. Earlier this week they were hit with another fine, this one for $5,700,000. In a court settlement in 2003 the Red Cross agreed to a plan to ensure that they would detect and correct any problems with its blood supply. In the first comprehensive evaluation made by the FDA of the the Red Cross' compliance with the plan, they found 204 deviations from the plan.

This brings to $15,000,000 the amount that the Red Cross has been fined since 2003.

Stop, thief!

Some people are really determined even when on the surface it seems they have nothing to gain. Here's an article from Reuters illustrating this.

BERLIN (Reuters) - A father of two in Germany stunned authorities when he chased down an auto thief by car, leapt onto the roof of the stolen vehicle and then phoned through instructions to police as the crook sped off with him.

Police in the western town of Siegburg said Tuesday the 43-year-old had first called in to say he had spotted the thief by his suspicious driving and was in pursuit -- despite the fact he had his wife and two young children in the car.

The man stopped the thief by crashing into the stolen car, slightly injuring his wife and one of the children.

Then, as the 29-year-old thief put the car in gear and drove off again, the father jumped onto the roof.

"The witness held onto the roof of the vehicle, phoned through his position to the local station and audibly attempted to pacify the car thief," police said in a statement.

After driving about half a mile, the thief let the man climb down, and was shortly afterwards apprehended by traffic police.

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.

The Iraq Study Group: A Minority View

The media have made a big deal about the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group. There have been claims that their report will advocate talking with a couple of our current enemies, Syria and Iran, and may suggest a pull-out date.

In a recent Christian Science Monitor article, Andrew Bacevich does not hold much hope that the Study Group will assess the reasons for our current situation and assign blame. I suspect he has a point.

A very different Town Meeting

Last night's Special Town Meeting for West Tisbury was very different from the previous three or four. There were no really contentious issues although the Board of Assessors was rebuffed once more.

The Board asked for $6500 needed to perform the triannual revaluation required by the state. The article lost on a voice vote (which I thought was too close for the moderator to call) due to the voters being concerned at the appearance of favoritism towards Vision Appraisal, the only company to whom the RFP was sent. Town customs and/or regulations usually require three bidders on a project. The Assessors claim that mass appraisal companies, such as Vision Appraisal, use clipping services to learn of opportunities and, thus, any company interested in bidding would have known of the opportunity. It's likely that this issue will be brought before the Annual Town Meeting as the Town must have this revaluation done in FY2008.

Another surprise was the approval of an article - to pay a past due bill - which required a 90% vote in favor.

The debate on most issues was informed and brief. Did the Finance Committee's televised hearings on their recommendations have an effect?

Who are your peers?

When I was hiring people for the various software companies I ran, one question I usually asked was, "What league do you belong to?" I wanted to find out what this person thought of his programming talent and whether he was basing his judgment on a realistic view of the programming world, for I think that, if we are experienced and honest enough, we have a pretty good idea of where we stand in a particular field, be that field programming, golf, writing, chess or our knowledge of zither players in 18th century Russia. We know to which peer group we belong and, most of the time, don't compare ourselves to those who are simply more accomplished in a particular field than we are. C'est la vie.

In the world of big business there is much talk of peer groups. Companies like to compare the performance of their stock with that of other companies in their peer group. We hear often that company x is paying their CEO $12,000,000 as that is a median salary in the executive's peer group. If you believe that the members of these particular peer groups are truly comparable, read Gretchen Morgenson's article in today's NY Times.

For example, the peers to which the NYSE compensation committee compared Grasso's pay had revenue more than twenty-five that of the NYSE, assets 125 times greater and thirty times the number of employees. How about Ford? Its peer group has many more non-auto companies than auto companies. Campbell Soup and Hewlett Packard use one peer group for compensation and a different peer group for stock performance.

Most companies claim that their executive's compensation is at about the 75th percentile in their industry. And you thought that Lake Woebegone where everybody is above average did not exist. It sure does exist in the world of the Fortune 2000.

Progress in Gaza?

Israel and Palestine have announced a cease fire in Gaza effective today. Hamas says it is giving Israel six months to create a Palestinian state. I doubt that six months is enough time, but at least there should be a modicum of peace there until the Spring.

Iranian propaganda?

From an interview with the Secretary of the Iranian Expediency Council (whatever that is):

Mohsen Rezai: Now, the [Iranian] officials should be careful not to view America and the West as clumsy and incapable people.

[...]

America's arrival in the region presented Iran with an historic opportunity. The kind of service that the Americans, with all their hatred, have done us - no superpower has ever done anything similar.

America destroyed all our enemies in the region. It destroyed the Taliban. It destroyed Mr. Saddam Hussein. It imprisoned the hypocrites [Mojahedin-e Khalq] in France. It did all this in order to confront us face to face, and in order to place us under siege. But the American teeth got so stuck in the soil of Iraq and Afghanistan that if they manage to drag themselves back to Washington in one piece, they should thank God. Therefore, America presents us with an opportunity rather than a threat – not because it intended to, but because its estimates were wrong. It made many mistakes.

In addition, America has now despaired of toppling the Islamic Republic. Therefore, the threats we face are not about toppling the Islamic Republic, but about blocking Iran's influence in the region. There were times when America was confronting the very essence of the Islamic Republic, but today it is confronting Iran's influence in the region. The entire nuclear dispute revolves around this. The Americans know that we do not have the atom bomb, and that we don't want to pursue the atom bomb. But the Americans claim that a nuclear Iran – even a peaceful one – will make its neighboring countries dependent upon it, and will expand Iran's influence in the region.

It may be propaganda but, with the exception of destroying the Taliban (which seems more and more unlikely) it sure sums up where we are today.

Not experts in filing

Homeland Security (DHS) hired a company to check how well the department was following federal contract regulations. So, they decided to look at 72 contracts. Unfortunately, they could only find the files for 39 of them. They substituted 33 different contracts to make the quota.

Of these final 72, 11 were "seriously inadequate", 47 met "minimum" standards and only 14 were in "excellent" shape. The DHS Inspector General says that the situation creates "a high risk of cost overruns, mismanagement or failure." Worse in the view of Charles Tiefer, who teaches law in Baltimore and is supposedly an expert on government contracting, "This strongly suggests that we're buying the wrong stuff, the wrong way, possibly from the wrong contractors, and failing to check before, during or after."

Don't you feel safer?

Is Pelosi working for the party and the country?

Or is she settling scores? Her backing of Murtha over her longtime ally was surprising. Now she does not seem willing to give the chair of the Intelligence Committee to the person next in line.

This time we can watch it as it happens

I don't think that there were any photographs of the Nazi concentration camps until they were liberated. In our modern 21st century world there are photographs of our 21st century holocaust - Darfur - as it is happening. Fittingly, the photographs are being shown at the U.S. Holocaust Museum.

It's not easy to know what is right sometimes

I still remember riding out of Jerusalem one day about thirty years ago. In those days you were surrounded by desert almost as soon as you left the city. But in the distance there was a speck of green. It grew larger and larger as we drove towards it. It was a farm. People - Israelis - had made the desert bloom. I was always a hard worker, but I knew then that the people who made the desert bloom had to have worked a lot harder than I and most people would or could.

Even in those days there was talk about Israel stealing the Palestinians' land and I suppose that is true in some (many? all?) cases. But it was obvious that the land was fallow for centuries and with superhuman effort the land was made to bear harvests. Why now should those who let the land sit there get the benefit of the work done by people who literally made the desert bloom?

So, today's news story that almost 40% of the land on which Israeli settlements sit is land owned by Palestinians brought back that day in Jerusalem.

Some boards are made of wood

I'm talking about boards of directors. For example, the board of FPL approved a deal wherein the company paid 'change of control' bonuses to its executives when a deal was signed, not when it was completed. As a result, shareholders gave up $62,000,000 in bonuses to compensate executives for a deal not made.

And some boards have just been taken by greedy CEOs who have overstated revenue and profits. Over 1000 companies have restated their results so far this year. How many of the executives running these companies have returned bonuses based on numbers that were false? I'd bet it's less than 1%.

Mirabile dictu

I went into work today, turned on my PC and, for some reason loaded Firefox. Lo and behold, my home page appeared on the screen. I was so surprised that I didn't realize for a minute or so that the Internet was functioning. I did nothing. Comcast must have done something, but, in line with their apparent philosophy of not communicating with the people who pay their bills, they were silent.

Bricklin pulls out

Earlier this year Malcolm Bricklin, early importer of the Subaru and Yugo, signed a deal to import the Chery from China. He's had second thoughts as to whether the quality and safety of the cars will be competitive in the U.S. and has pulled out of the deal. He still likes the cost equation of manufacturing cars in China and is looking for another deal.

Most of the established car manufacturers are focusing on selling -and building - their cars in China. Right now China seems to be almost in the same spot this country was at the start of the 20th century when there were car manufacturers galore.

The Comcast Cancer Spreads

Last week Comcast demonstrated its incompetence and anti-customer attitude with my home computer. This week is my work computer's turn.

Last Friday I spoke to Joanne at Comcast who told me we would be connected within a couple of hours and she would call me back then. Seventy-two hours later I had not heard from Joanne, so I called them again. The technician to whom I spoke realized that the problem required an on-site technician; I'd be called within two hours with a time for the appointment. You know that no one called back with 2+ hours. I called Pam who would research the issue and call me right back. After an hour I called back and the fun really began. I was connected with residential service, then commercial, then residential, then the Spanish line twice. Finally I was connected with an Adelphia person who seemed to know what he was doing. Unfortunately, he could not get me on-line. So the technician is due to come Wednesday morning.

So, I spent close to three hours on the telephone today, about 45 minutes of which was productive in that I spoke to someone who actually knew something. But, still no e-mail and no web. Also, still no response from the e-mail I sent to Ms Rudnay on Sunday, the 12th.

China comes to Boston

More and more people and institutions are jumping on the China bandwagon. They smell money.

From today's Boston Globe

The University of Massachusetts and the Chinese Ministry of Education plan to announce today the formation of a nonprofit public institute to promote the teaching and understanding of Chinese language and culture.

The University of Massachusetts Confucius Institute would be the seventh such institute in the country and the first sponsored by China in New England. China, which plans to create 100 institutes worldwide by 2010, has given UMass a $1 million grant to start its institution. It will be on the Boston campus.
...............................................................................................................................................................

UMass-Boston has signed cooperative agreements with 11 Chinese academic partners in recent years to promote academic exchanges, foreign study opportunities, and management training. The Chinese government will pay for 100 scholarships for a three-week cultural program in China. Wilson said he would like students to study in China for a semester or longer.

Worse than the average

More details of the National Assessment of Educational Progress are in. Eighth grade students of schools in large cities did not do well in the recent tests. They knew less about science than their colleagues around the country. Nationally, about 57% of eighth grade students passed the test. In some big cities 20% passed.

Understand the Enemy, Contain the Threat

Max Rodenbeck has an interesting review in the current issue of the NY Review of Books. He looks at a couple of books on terrorism, including our national security strategy, but focuses on "What Terrorists Want: Understanding the Enemy, Containing the Threat" by Louise Richardson. While the sub-title really describes the book's thrust, Rodenbeck summarizes twelve key points Richardson makes (highlights are mine):

1. Terrorism is anything but new. Violence by nonstate actors against civilians to achieve political aims has been going on for a long, long time. The biblical Zealots known as the Sicarii used it against the Romans, as well as against fellow Jews, in the vain hope of provoking the Imperium to so extreme a response that they would foment a mass uprising. Following the failed 1848 revolutions in Europe, the German radical Karl Heinzen published a tract, simply titled Murder, which advocated selective homicide as a spark to general revolt. Various groups soon put such ideas into practice. The Clerkenwell bombing of 1867, carried out by the Fenians, an Irish nationalist group, prompted a surge of hysteria in London reminiscent of the response provoked by September 11.

So, in later decades, did the wave of anarchist terrorism that swept Europe and the United States. Revolutionaries assassinated seven heads of state between 1881 and 1914. Paris suffered bomb attacks no fewer than eleven times between 1892 and 1894. In the 1930s and 1940s of the last century, Menachem Begin's Irgun organization slaughtered scores of Palestinian civilians and British soldiers. The Israeli leader went on to share a Nobel Peace Prize.

2. Terrorism is obviously a threat, and the deliberate killing of innocent civilians an outrage, but it is not a very big threat. As John Mueller points out in Overblown, his sadly funny, far less patient account of America's response to September 11, the probability of an American being killed by terrorists is about the same as of being felled by an allergic reaction to peanuts. Six times more Americans are killed every year by drunk drivers than died in the World Trade Center. (And more Americans have now died in Iraq and Afghan-istan.) Excepting a few particularly bad years, the annual number of deaths from terrorism worldwide since the late 1960s, when the State Department started record-keeping, is only about the same as the number of Americans who drown every year in bathtubs.

3. The danger from terrorist use of so-called weapons of mass destruction is not as large as scaremongers profess. Known chemical weapons do not, in fact, cause much wider damage than conventional weapons, and in addition they are difficult to use. The Japanese religious cult Aum Shinrikyo (Aum is Japanese for Supreme Truth), which had excellent technicians and facilities and plenty of money to brew lethal potions, discovered this when it tried to poison the Tokyo subway with sarin gas in 1995. Biological weapons are potentially more deadly, but also hard to make and to diffuse. As for nuclear weapons, there is no evidence that any terrorist group has ever come close to acquiring them. Placing all these dangers in a single category of threat is misleading, and greatly exaggerates the overall threat posed by terrorist groups around the world.

4. Many terrorists are not madmen. The choice to use terror can be quite rational and calculated. In his memoirs, Nelson Mandela recalls that the African National Congress debated what method to use to confront apartheid. Terrorism was considered, but scrapped, mercifully, in favor of sabotage attacks, for fear of alienating potential supporters. The IRA was murderous, but found that planting bombs and then warning of their presence was just as effective as setting them off in crowds. This tactic had the advantage of avoiding some of the "collateral damage" of bad publicity. Other terrorists, such as those linked with al-Qaeda, unfortunately, like bad publicity as much as good.

5. Groups that commit terrorism, in many cases, believe they are acting defensively, using the most effective means at their disposal. Their justifications can be self-serving and morally repugnant, but are often carefully elaborated. Some terrorists rely on the complicity of the people around them, and so must work to persuade them of their rectitude. Others operate in inhospitable environments, and aim more to shock and provoke. It is, Richardson emphasizes, important to distinguish these differing approaches, since they suggest different remedies.

6. Suicide attacks can also represent a rational policy choice. They are cheap. They can be a means of access to difficult targets. They are effective in frightening people, and in advertising the seriousness and devotion of those who undertake them. Typical suicide "martyrs" are not loners or misfits; in their will to die for a cause, they tend to be sustained by the strong solidarity of a close group of collaborators. They are often motivated by personal humiliation at the hands of those they wish to hurt, or they wish to take revenge for the killings of family members or comrades. Suicide attacks are not new, either. They were used, for example, since the nineteenth century by the Muslim Moros guerrillas against both Spanish and US invaders of the Philippines. Before Iraq, their most intensive use in modern times was not in the Middle East but in Sri Lanka, where, since 1987, Tamil rebels have killed hundreds of government soldiers in scores of suicide operations, often carried out by women.

7. There is no special link between Islam and terrorism. Most major religions have produced some form of terrorism, and many terrorist groups have professed atheism. If there is a particular tenacity in Islamist forms of terrorism today, this is a product not of Islamic scripture but of the current historical circumstance that many Muslims live in places of intense political conflict. Contemporary Islamist movements that resort to terrorism are, however, often strengthened in their appeal by the fact that they want to link a faith-based activism, intended to "transform" society, with ethnic and nationalist causes. Most other terrorist groups have not combined their intentions in this way. For instance, the IRA does not have "transformational" aims, as Richardson puts it, but rather territorial ones.

8. Electoral democracy does not prevent terrorism, which has flourished in many democracies, typically being used by groups representing minorities who believe the logic of majority rule excludes them. The Basque separatist group ETA and Greece's November 17th urban guerrillas started under dictatorships, but continued their attacks following transitions to democracy in both countries.

9. Democratic principles are no impediment to prosecuting terrorists. On the contrary they are, Richardson asserts, "among the strongest weapons in our arsenal." Pointedly, she recalls that during the Revolutionary War, George Washington, although incensed by Britain's policy of incarcerating American revolutionaries on grisly prison ships, where twice as many perished as on the battlefield, gave strict orders for the humane treatment of British captives.

10. Military action is sometimes necessary to combat terrorism, but it is often not the best way to do so. When Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon in 2000, after a twenty-two-year occupation, it left behind a far stronger and more determined adversary in Hezbollah than it had started with. The Peruvian army spent twenty years in an ugly, scorched-earth campaign against Sendero Luminoso guerrillas, during which nearly 70,000 people were killed. The group was defeated and disbanded after a change in tactics when a seventy-man police team took just six months, using incisive analysis and good intelligence, to capture its leader. In the cases where brute military action has succeeded, as in Uruguay and Argentina in the 1970s and 1980s, it was at the cost of democracy and human rights.

11. Armies, in fact, often create more problems than they solve. When Britain sent its army into Northern Ireland in 1969 in response to the Troubles, it took just two years for the majority of Catholics, who were at first relieved by their presence, to turn against them. The turnaround for the US in Iraq was far shorter. During the seven months between September 2003 and April 2004, as Charles Peña reminds us in Winning the Un-War, the proportion of Iraqis saying that attacks on foreign troops were somewhat or fully justified leapt from 8 percent to 61 percent. This was exactly the period when a sudden surge in attacks on US forces, following the initial post-invasion calm, prompted vigorous counterinsurgency measures. That is all the time it took, it seems, for Iraqis to decide they did not like being searched, beaten up, shot at, jailed, and humiliated by American troops, whatever the reasons given. Recent polls show some 61 percent of Iraqis still approve of attacking the Americans, and 78 percent believe the US presence is "provoking more conflict than it is preventing."

12. To address the issues terrorists say they are fighting for cannot automatically be dismissed as appeasement. Britain did not succeed in disarming the IRA by ignoring its de-mands but by engaging them, and by altering the situation in Northern Ireland that had created the IRA's perception of a threat to its goals. In fact, the conversion of terrorist groups in-to peaceful political movements has often occurred because their rationale for violence has ceased to exist, or because they came to feel that resort to terrorist tactics would limit their room for political maneuver.

I hope Gates has read the book.

You make your own luck

That aphorism is quite true when it comes to big time corporate CEOs. So demonstrates a paper, Lucky Grants, by Lucian Belchuk and others at Harvard Law.

They studied stock option grants in the period 1996 - 2005. They looked at 19,036 grants made by 6,000 companies. 12% of these companies awarded grants at prices that were very likely based on backdating. That's a pretty high number. I don't think 12% of my friends and associates are crooks. Are yours?

Not only were these people thieves. They were greedy thieves. Their compensation was already greater than their peers. On average, they pocketed between $1,300,000 and $1,700,000 above their regular compensation.

But they couldn't have done it unless their board let them. This happened most often when the board was not independent or the CEO had been in power a long time.

And don't think that thieves exist only in the new economy companies. A majority of these grants were made by old economy companies.

This report is really a sad commentary on the state of America's business leaders.

There's money in Medicaid

Many states have been turning to HMOs to lower their Medicaid costs. They try to figure out what they spend on Medicaid patients and then ask an HMO to take over their patient base for a fee that is about 8% less than the state's expected costs. The assumption is that companies will be more efficient than the state.

The problem is that efficiency can be achieved in a variety of ways. Many of these companies have been accused of making it very difficult for patients to be treated. Others are spending less of their premium income on patients. States used to spend 94 - 96% of their Medicaid budget on medical benefits, HMOs spend 80 to 85%. Where does the difference go? It goes into salaries, political contributions, lobbying and getting the HMO's name plastered on a number of buildings.

The jury is still out on this issue, but the omens are not good.

You have to wonder...

whether the average Iraqi was better off living under the tyrant, Saddam Hussein. I don't believe that either the media or our government is telling us the whole story about Iraq. But no matter how much may be omitted or spin served, things are far from good there, especially in Baghdad.

I don't see how the Iraqi people can have the courage to live there. It's likely that they can't afford to move, as many of those who could afford to leave have done so.

Could things have been worse for the average Iraqi under Saddam? For some, sure; they are no longer here and probably suffered considerably in this life. But for the storekeeper, the farmer, the oil worker, things were probably not as bad as long as he kept quiet. He had electricity enough to turn the lights on. His kids went to school (where they were likely indoctrinated). She could shop without fear. You didn't worry that you might be kidnapped if a traffic cop stopped you. You had nothing to fear when you went to the mosque. Where do I stop this list?

And as Reagan famously asked, "Are we better off today than 3+ years ago?" It is far from "morning in America". More than 3000 of our youngsters have died. Many more have had their lives shattered. We have spent an inordinate amount of money on killing and destroying rather than on creating and repairing. We have jailed people without cause for years. We have spied on our fellow citizens. Where do I stop this list?

My early memories are suffused with images of America, the liberator of the oppressed, the vanquisher of tyrants, the land of the free, the home of the brave. What will the memories of my kids and grandkids be?

Comcast Update

In keeping with their apparent anti-customer policy, Comcast has yet to even acknowledge my letter of Sunday. Their hot line has at least a thirty minute wait. But, I can be consoled as I am not alone. Many of my former fellow Adelphia users are having similar problems with our new vendor.

Serendipity has played a fairly large role in my life. I won't go into the occasions when my life has changed simply because I 'chose' to wear a blue suit or a moth flew right instead of left. The latest occasion has enabled my wife and I to send e-mails using our Adelphia e-mail addresses.

Brian Athearn is a fellow member of the Finance Committee and, more importantly, a computer technician. He has been inundated with calls for help in converting to Comcast. By 'chance' I met him yesterday. He suggested that I change the name of my outgoing mail server. I did and got further than on Sunday: e-mails were making it to Comcast's server but were being rejected because of a supposedly faulty password. I eliminated password checking and, voila, outgoing mail.

I would have thought that the Comcast support people would have had the same suggestion. But they had none. It was someone from our small Island who had the answer. Talent is all around us if we only look.

Another black mark for the medical profession

The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, the state's medical school, is being monitored by the Feds for such activities as Medicaid fraud, waste and no-bid contracts. Corzine appointed a new president within the past year. The monitor accuses the university of concealing a report which alleged that the university hired eighteen cardiologists as associate professors at $150,000+ per year. The problem was that the cardiologists needed to do nothing but refer their patients to the hospital's operating room.

It was not a bad deal for the university. They paid the cardiologists $6,000,000 and got back $36,000,000 from the government. Of course, if the allegations prove true, the fine will be substantial and probably exceed the $36,000,000.

It just can't be done

"Government negotiation of drug prices does not work unless you have a program completely run by the government", says Mike Leavitt, Secretary of Health and Human Services, about trying to introduce negotiation into the buying of drugs for Medicare enrolees. Funny, the VA does it. Medicaid does it. States do it. Why can't Medicare do it?

A Letter to Comcast

Dear Ms Rudnay,

I would have liked to send this to Brian Roberts, but for some reason he does not like to reveal his e-mail address to some schmuck of a customer like me.

I have to tell you that I am absolutely amazed at the lack of professionalism displayed by your firm. Here’s my story.

I am an Adelphia customer, or perhaps I should say a former Adelphia customer, as I received a letter in October announcing the acquisition of Adelphia by Comcast. While Adelphia service when I first became a customer was pretty bad, it had improved quite a bit over the past few years. Still, being a naïve country bumpkin from Martha’s Vineyard, I expected Comcast to provide better or, at a minimum, equal service. Now I fear that the service will, in fact, be worse, considerably so, as I can no longer send e-mails via my Adelphia address and your technical staff cannot help me.

First indication: Your October letter mentioned that Internet customers would be transferred over to Comcast around November 6 and would be informed as to details when the day drew near. I have yet to receive such notification.

Second indication: When I logged on to my computer this morning, I could not log on to the Internet. I called the regular Adelphia number, 888-683-1000, and was not greeted by the same automated voice as I had gotten used to. This automated voice never identified the company I was calling. It asked for my phone number twice and then asked me to verify it. It then proceeded to tell me when I paid my last bill and how much I paid. I was really not interested in this information. This preamble wasted 3 – 4 minutes until I was told to press 2 for Internet help.

Third indication: The person I spoke to (who again asked for my phone number) told me that my account was being converted to Comcast and it would take between 24 and 48 hours for the conversion. I asked to speak to his supervisor but hung up after waiting more than five minutes.

Fourth indication: On a whim I called service around 6 p.m. and was surprised when the technician told me that the conversion was complete and walked me through the necessary changes. My system worked fine using my normal e-mail address of aldevito@vineyard.net.

Fifth indication: My wife, whose e-mail address is cdevito@adelphia.net, received e-mails but could not send them using Thunderbird. She tried at least three different addresses (verizon,net, yahoo.com and vineyard.net). In each case Thunderbird said that the mail server (a Comcast device) could not relay the message. I called again. The first service person could not help and passed me on to the e-mail specialist. She did some research and could not help despite the fact that she works in the area focusing on conversion from Adelphia. While she was researching, I tried to send an e-mail using Outlook on my computer with my adelphia address, adevito@adelphia.net. Same result – Outlook said that the mail server (a Comcast device) could not relay the message. I tried also to use Adelphia’s web-based mail to send a message from my wife’s computer to mine. This worked but my wife’s message was characterized as spam.

Sixth indication: The e-mail specialist consulted her supervisor and they concluded the problem was in Thunderbird. I explained to her that yesterday my PC and wife’s PC were able to send e-mails to the world. We changed exactly nothing. Yet, when we were converted to Comcast, our Adelphia e-mail addresses could not send e-mails. Logically, it is very likely that the problem is yours, not mine.

Seventh indication: I asked to speak to the supervisor. When I was told it might be a long wait (I had already been on the phone over a half-hour), I asked whether the supervisor could call me when he was free. I was flabbergasted to learn - in this day when supposedly companies are customer-driven - that it was not the policy to have your service people call customers, who, I suspect, pay the salary of the supervisor and everybody else at Comcast.

Tell me that Comcast just had a bad day. Otherwise, I’ll have to switch to Verizon if the problem cannot be fixed soon.

Buybacks and Executive Compensation

Part of the reason for the stock market’s rise has been the growth in the amount of shares being bought back by companies. It’s grown from $131 billion in 2003 to $345 billion in 2006. Of course, by buying back its stock a company reduces the number of shares outstanding, which translates into higher earnings per share.

How does higher earnings per share help CEOs? Well 28% of the S&P 500 use earnings per share as a measure of the company’s performance, and, thus, the CEO’s compensation. Do the CEOs in these 28% have a strong desire for a buyback? You can bet on it. A few do so even when the company has negative cash flow.

Heck, it's only money

Forbes reports that the Defense Department will be asking for $160 billion in supplemental appropriations to fund our war efforts for the balance of the fiscal year. This is just about double the supplemental appropriation of $82 billion and it is not counted in the official Pentagon budget, which is the largest in history.

Will there be any serious attempt by Congress to attempt to find out whether $160 billion is the correct amount? It would be nice if some steps were taken by Congress to ascertain the rationale behind the amount requested, to vet that it makes sense and, then, to devise metrics to make sure it was used that way. The metrics, by the way, could be kept by Mr. Bowen, the Special Inspector General for Iraq.

An additional problem, in my view, is that the money is being asked for in a supplemental appropriation, which usually gets less scrutiny and may not be counted when computing the fiscal deficit (although I'm not positive on this last point).

Water, water everywhere

The UN Report, Beyond Scarcity, begins with these quotes:

The water is not good in this pond. We collect it because we have no alternative. All the animals drink from the pond as well as the community. Because of the water we are also getting different diseases.
Zenebech Jemel, Chobare Meno, Ethiopia

Of course I wish I were in school. I want to learn to read and write…. But how can I? My mother needs me to get water.
Yeni Bazan, age 10, El Alto, Bolivia

The conditions here are terrible. There is sewage everywhere. It pollutes our water. Most people use buckets and plastic bags for toilets. Our children suffer all the time from diarrhoea and other diseases because it is so filthy.
Mary Akinyi, Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya

They [the factories] use so much water while we barely have enough for our basic needs, let alone to water our crops.
Gopal Gujur, farmer, Rajasthan, India

And it goes on from there documenting some of the problems many people have because they lack clean water: more deaths than from AIDS and malaria combined, five times as many kids die from water-borne diseases as from AIDS and malaria, water is more expensive per gallon in Kenya than in New York, 5% of Africa's resource of time is spent gathering water.

Phillip Carter on Rumsfeld

Some excerpts from Carter's Slate article on Rumsfeld's blunders:

Rumsfeld's failures transformed the Iraq war from a difficult enterprise into an unwinnable one.
Despite losing the war there, no senior officers or civilian leaders have been held accountable.
Rumsfeld's Pentagon failed to develop a strategy to win in the larger war on terrorism.
Runsfeld didn't just lose the fight, he also did a great deal of damage to the military and the country.

The Good War

FP Passport recently visited the Veterans History Project. It's filled with photos, drawings and interviews of veterans of World War II.

Let us end the suffering of the Palestinian people

So said the leader of Hamas as he announced that he would resign his post, the reason being the withholding of aid by the West and Israel while Hamas is in power. They're talking with Fatah and may come to terms soon. Hamas still controls a lot of electoral power.

They seem to be on the political offensive. Last week they had an op-ed in the NY Times proposing a truce with Israel.

It will take a while

but English scientists have been able to make nearly blind mice see. They were able to take cells from the retina of newly born mice and transplant them to the retina of mice with conditions similar to macular degeneration or retinitis pigmentosa.

Although scientists feel they are still in the very early stages of experimenting, they are hopeful. It's another example of what may be the benefits of stem cell research.

A new order in Washington?

The radio is filled with Democrats announcing how things will now start changing for the better. Well, you'd have difficulty coming up with more than a handful of Democrats who can look back with pride on their actions and behavior of the past six years. Why should things be any better now?

Pretty fast moves in 6 years

Geely Group started making cars in China in 2000. Their first cars were knockoffs and sold only about 5,000. Now in 2006 the company is producing 150,000 cars a year and selling them in Latin America, Russia and the Middle East. They have even signed a deal to make London cabs.

The cars are powered by Geely's engines and use their transmissions. Most everything else is bought from the same suppliers the big boys use. While their market is domestic and non-mainstream car countries, they do have plans to sell in Europe and the US. How soon? Who knows. But the Chery is expected to be sold here in a year or so.

The Morning After

A few surprises in the local races.

It looks like one incumbent, Les Leland, will be returned to the Dukes County Commission. Two incumbent commissioners finished fourth and fifth. So, I picked two of three.

It looks like all of the incumbents of the MVC were returned plus Richard Toole, Dan Flynn and Kathy Newman. I thought Strauss, not Newman, would make it.

One more day

I know that there will be a ton of Monday morning quarterbacking beginning tomorrow, but aren't you glad that this political campaign season is over? This has to have been a candidate for the lowest quality campaign season ever. Even more negative ads, screaming debates, trivializing of candidates without money or backing by powerful forces, brouhahas over trivial issues, very few good - let alone original - ideas, hardly any serious discussion of how we can start to solve some of our problems. What kind of a world are we leaving the people of the 21st century?

Despite the fact that Deval Patrick has almost been inaugurated by the pollsters, Kerry Healy is still spending money on her attempt to become governor of Massachusetts. So far, she has spent almost $10,000,000 of her own money. That's a lot to spend on what was an overly negative campaign. In contrast, Grace Ross, the Green Party candidate and the most impressive contender, has spent a grand total of $13,919.

While, at $42,800,000 and counting, this has been the most expensive gubernatorial race in Massachusetts history, the liquor and supermarket industries have spent over $11,500,000 trying to convince us to vote the right way on a ballot question as to whether wine should be sold in supermarkets.

In many states the media has made a big deal about the races for Congress and the Senate. Not so here. There is no way Kennedy and our incumbent Congressmen will not return to Washington. All have been challenged, but I'll wager 90% of the voters do not know who the challengers are.

Here on Martha's Vineyard there are few compelling races. I think the Democratic representative and Senator will be returned to the State House and Sollitto to the Clerk of Courts.

County government is another matter. I find it hard to see any of the incumbent Dukes County Commissioners being reelected. At the last minute some activists are mounting a write-in campaign to win a seat on a commission to study the Dukes County Charter. The County Commissioners are held in such low esteem that people can't believe that the problem is the people rather than the system, hence the study commission. While the Martha's Vineyard Commission, a regional planning agency, generates some controversy every so often, I think the incumbents have the upper hand.

My predictions:

County Commissioners - Gatting, Israel, Williams, Hefler
Martha's Vineyard Commission - the incumbents plus Flynn, Strauss and Toole. However, the election of a commissioner is complex in that at least one must be elected from each town no matter what her vote totals and no more than two can be elected from one town.
Charter Commission - not enough people signed up to run so all should be elected plus a few of the write-in candidates.
Up-Island Regional School District - there are five openings and five candidates.

Worth reading

That's James Carroll's latest column I'm talking about.

Perhaps another small step

China has proposed revisions in its property laws in an attempt to reduce some of the litigation generated by the emerging property-owning class. They are also proposing to grant only to its top court the power to approve death sentences.

The reverse logic of those in power

Tommy Franks and Paul Bremer were awarded a medal for their 'great service' to our country. Stuart Bowen will lose his job for his 'poor service' to this country. All Bowen did was find the errors committed by Franks and Bremer and make them public. I wonder what the powers that be considered the worse crime - finding the errors or telling the public about them.

In today's world incompetence is rewarded. Competence is punished. Is Orwell laughing right about now?

Courting Africa

China opens the China-Africa forum today. China will host 48 of the 53 countries in Africa as part of its move to become the predominant foreign power in Africa. China wants Africa's raw materials, including oil, and also wants to add Africa to its commercial markets. Some in Africa see China as the the first foreign power that seems to treat African nations as equals. China will deal with any African country, even Sudan, as it does not factor the corruption of a state into its calculus.

The Problem with Software from Microsoft

I installed Firefox 2.0 last week. It took about a minute. I was using the new version as soon as it was installed.

I installed Internet Explorer 7.0 last night. After 15 minutes it was finally installed, but I had to re-boot. After the re-boot it could not find anything on the web, i.e., it did not work.

In the world of software - and many other worlds - simpler is usually better.

Update:
Well, I never could get IE7 to run. So, I elected Microsoft's option to uninstall 7 and go back to 6. Now IE6 will not connect.

Talk about getting the most out of your employees

The Hall of Fame of the Westchester Business Council might want to cover the plaque honoring Terrence Chalk. Mr. Chalk was indicted yesterday for stealing the IDs of guess who - his employees. With the stolen identities he obtained bank loans and ran up $100,000 in credit card bills.

It's a mystery to me how a guy who was apparently well-known in his town could have convinced a bank that he was someone else not once but several times and using different identities each time. There must be more to the story.

A welcome surprise

Perhaps the international outcry had something to do with it, but whatever the reason China has reversed the guilty verdict against Chen Guangcheng, who has been railroaded for being an activist.

Good news if they mean it

Yesterday's NY Times had an op-ed from "a senior adviser to the Palestinian Prime Minister, Ismail Haniya," in which he proposed a long-term truce during which the Israelis and Palestinians will try to negotiate a lasting peace. He asserts that Hamas will give its word to such an agreement and, by so doing, invokes God to indicate that they will keep their word.

It's a small step, but it is in the right direction.

Political Discourse - 2006

Kerry makes a stupid statement which has exactly zero bearing on the plight we are in. Bush & company accuse him of sabotaging the war effort. It's interesting that 'veterans' like Romney, Bush and Snow took umbrage at a fellow veteran's remark.

A plague on both their houses!

The Stern Report on Climate Change

Here's what some economists say about the report.

Why wait for the courts

After all, it's only our money that the Interior Department seems to want to give to Chevron and other oil and natural gas companies.

Last month I wrote about the four cases four separate Interior Dept. auditors had initiated alleging that the department stopped their investigations into oil companies' fraudulent schemes to reduce their royalty payments to the government.

The case has not been decided, yet the appeals board of the Interior Department has ruled that the department should drop its claims to recover what is likely hundreds of millions - possibly billions - of dollars in underpaid royalties to you and me.The same set of facts have been sufficient for states to rake in over $70,000,000 from the companies.

Why the department did not wait for the courts to decide the issue is one question of many.

Stuart Bowen should get a medal

He's the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction. On Sunday his office released a couple of reports which, if you read the posting below, have to be inaccurate as he gives an unfavorable picture of what's going on in Iraq.

Report 1 says that more than a half-million weapons intended for the Iraqi security forces cannot be tracked as their serial numbers were not recorded. Report 2 questions whether the Iraqis will ever develop or spend the money to develop the logistical capabilities needed by a modern army. Report 3 urges our "provincial reconstruction teams" to abandon work in six provinces because it's too dangerous.

Is he giving a true picture of what's happening there?

It's the bloggers and other enemies of America...

that are preventing the true picture of the events in Iraq from being made public, or so it would seem the administration believes. Why else would they spend our tax dollars on a new Pentagon group which will counter the inaccurate stories that appear on the web and elsewhere? It's obvious that these stories are planted by insurgents and other enemies of America. So, not only will the Pentagon monitor blogs but they will also use politicians and lobbyists to bring the Pentagon story to America.

The Cigar is out

Red Auerbach, the greatest basketball coach and selector of players, is dead.

Headlines are not always supported by the story

We all know that. An article in yesterday's NY Times was headlined "Ethanol Could Corrode Pumps, Testers Say". Well, the story went on to say that fuel comprising 85% ethanol could corrode pumps designed for fuels with 15% ethanol. Seems pretty obvious to me that almost anything could be damaged if used incorrectly.

Remember Galileo

For millennia we believed that the earth was the center of the universe. Even the scientists and learned people of the time held the belief. Galileo proved them wrong. This week comes confirmation of the fact that everything is a theory waiting to be disproved.

Thirty years ago we sent the Viking landers to Mars. One of the aims of the missions was to prove whether there was life in the soil there. After experimenting with the soil, the conclusion was that since there were no organic molecules found in the soil, there was no life; the assumption being that life in other worlds must be based on life in this world, i.e., it must be made of organic matter.

I don't know why but recently scientists did the same tests on earth that were done on Mars in 1976. They tested soil from Antarctica and a Chilean desert. And, surprise! The experiment said that these earth soils contained no organic molecules. Ergo, life does not exist on the earth! So, somehow the Martian experiments were flawed in some way.

In fairness, one of the three experiments conducted on Mars suggested that there was biological activity, but this was not followed up.

Refco back in the news

Philip Bennett, the Refco CEO, was indicted shortly after the scandal broke last Fall. Now, the CFO, Robert Trosten, has been indicted for being part of a fraudulent scheme. The 37-year-old Mr. Trosten walked away with $48,000,000 when he left Refco.

Bawag PSK, an Austrian bank, was intimately involved in the Refco scandal. Its exact involvement has not been fully explained but it appears to have been the linchpin in making the scheme work for many years. This week saw Viennese prosecutors charge nine people involved with Bawag on various offenses, including embezzlement and fraud.

Ross for Governor

I'm not a member of a political party. It's unlikely that I would join the Green Party. But, I have to tell you, I was impressed with Grace Ross, the Green Party candidate for governor of Massachusetts, when I saw her in a recent debate. Today's Boston Globe had an illuminating article about her.

She really is the star of what is a very dismal field, full of impolite, screaming demagogues who want your vote but, with the exception of Mihos and Ross, won't really tell you in fairly specific terms what they will do to try to fix the problems in the state and why we should believe that their programs will work and they can implement them. Ideas are cheap. It's picking the right ones and making them happen that is tough. With the exception of Ross, these people don't seem to be the types that have original ideas or the talent to pick good ones and make them happen.

It's not only the executive branch...

that is responsible for the decline of our government. I've long contended that the quality of our legislators is insufficient for a world leader. It was better in the 20th century.

There is an excellent article by Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann in this issue of Foreign Affairs that documents the failure of Congress to work for the country and perhaps a failure to work at all. This is the shortest congressional session in decades; they've been in session less than 100 days. The work is so scant that votes are held after 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday and before noon on Thursday of the weeks in which they are in session.

One of the legislators' primary responsibilities is oversight. The number of such hearings was 37 in 2003-4, as compared to 135 ten years earlier. The Senate Armed Services Committee held zero hearings on Afghanistan in 2003-4; the House held one. A small percentage (less than 15%) were on the wars we have been engaged in.

We've been inundated with horror stories about the Department of Homeland Security. Yet, the only real issue for Congress in this massive reorganization was whether the workers would lose civil service benefits. No thought as to how the reorganization would be or was being implemented.

Bush has issued over 700 signing statements. Not a word from Congress until the Boston Globe broke the story.

Whether Clinton misused his Christmas mailing list took 140 hours of testimony at Congressional hearings. Abu Ghraib was granted 12 hours.

Bush has acted like a king and Congress has been silent.

What are we paying these clowns for? Throw them all out come November 7!