65 is passing

The Commonwealth Fund aims to improve our healthcare system. One tool they use is an annual ranking of our system vis-à-vis the systems of other countries. The system compares the performance of our healthcare system against benchmarks that have been established both here and abroad. This is the third year in which they have performed their rankings. And things have not improved over the past three years; in fact, they have gotten worse. We now rank dead last among nineteen countries; in 2007 we were fifteenth. Out of a possible score of 100 based on 37 indicators of performance we scored 65, which was considered a D when I went to school. This low score is achieved despite our spending twice as much per capita as other industrialized countries.

We are especially bad on what you would think would be a strength – efficiency. We scored 53 when tested for use of information technology, administrative costs, avoidable hospital stays, wasteful care

The study looked at healthy lives, quality, access, efficiency and equity. In all of these areas we had some top-rated healthcare systems, but overall we sucked. For example, in the case of healthy lives, more of us die because we don’t get the right care or get it in time than should. 18% of our working-age adults are unable to carry out daily activities because of health problems.

We are particularly bad in the area of accessibility and getting worse; in 2007 42% of working-age adults were either uninsured or underinsured, in 2003 the number was 35%. 41% of adults had great difficulty paying their medical bills, in 2005 it was 34%.

However, the great American talent for advertising works. We did much better in areas which received a lot of coverage in the media and were subjects of national campaigns.

The authors of the report advocate for the following changes in our health care system:

• universal and well-designed
• coverage that ensures affordable access and continuity of care, with low administrative costs;
• incentives aligned to promote higher quality and more efficient care;
• care that is designed and organized around the patient, not providers or insurers;
• widespread implementation of health information technology with information exchange;
• explicit national goals to meet and exceed benchmarks and monitor performance; and
• national policies that promote private-public collaboration and high performance.

What being understaffed makes you do

One result of the difficulties in retaining troops and expanding the Army is the lack of leaders. We've seen problems staffing officer positions. There are also problems staffing NCO positions. If you've been classified as an E-4 for 48 months, you are automatically eligible to be promoted to sergeant (E-5). It used to be that you went before a promotions board after your commander had recommended you. Now your commander has to not recommend you and there is no promotions board involved.

Kudos to the Department of Labor

I've had occasion to call the Department of Labor a couple of times this week. It actually was a refreshing experience talking with them.

To begin with they spoke good English. The people with whom I spoke genuinely sounded as though they wanted to help. One of them walked me through their web site. They responded quickly to messages I left.

Maybe once long ago on a far planet there was such a world where people you pay actually did their job enthusiastically, politely and professionally. For a few brief moments that far planet existed in a telephone call. And it was to a government agency not a commercial enterprise

Sharing Information

In most cases sharing is a good thing. We teach our kids to share their candy. We applaud those who share their good luck with those less fortunate. But a lot depends on what is shared, who is doing the sharing, what is done with the shared item and whether everyone involved is aware that sharing is occurring. Using this caveat, one would have to say that the National Strategy for Information Sharing is not a good thing; it establishes state, local and regional “fusion centers” as a primary mechanism for the collection and dissemination of domestic intelligence.It shares our information without telling us and may use this information against us.

Like so many government initiatives of the 21^st century, this strategy is intended to protect us from the most evil thing in the world – terrorism. This evil can only be defeated if the government gathers enough information on all of us and shares it with other governmental bodies.

For example, the Los Angeles Police Department now has a policy to “gather, record, and analyze information of a criminal or non-criminal nature, that could indicate activity or intentions related to either foreign or domestic terrorism”. Some of your activities the police are interested in are

• - taking measurements
• - using binoculars
• - taking pictures or video footage “with no apparent esthetic value”
• - abandoning vehicle
• - drawing diagrams
• - taking notes
• - espousing extremist views

And they can pass this information on to the 800,000 law enforcement personnel in this country as constituting suspicious activity. Basically, the strategy defines suspicious activity as “observed behavior that may be indicative of intelligence gathering or pre-operational planning related to terrorism, criminal, or other illicit intention.” These observations of your local police department may then be shared with police and security departments across the country whether or not there is any sort of reasonable suspicion has been established.

And, state by state, laws are being passed to exempt these files from the Freedom of Information Act.

1984 has been here for a long time and its getting more and more pervasive.

Loose Lips Sink Ships

That may be the new motto for the EPA. The agency's boss has refused to testify before Congress. Now the agency has instructed its employees not to talk with reporters, GAO staffers or the EPA's Inspector General.

I can understand wanting to control press relations. But isn't stopping the IG and GAO from doing their job - protecting our money - illegal?

Merrill Is Selling Its Inventory

Merrill Lynch has announced a deal with Lone Star, a private equity fund, whereby Merrill will sell Lone Star $30.6 billion worth of CDOs for the bargain basement price of $6.7 billion. This will bring Merrill's writedowns over the past 13 months to $46 billion. One reason for the writedown is shown by the downgrade to junk status of 27 out of 30 CDOs originally rated AAA.

Maybe the writedowns have stopped for Merrill?

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

Courtesy of Dan Wasserman and the Boston Globe.

Pete Seeger for the Nobel Peace Prize

Think about it. Many have and have signed a petition. Will you?

The following is not the greatest musical rendition of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone", but it answers the question visually.

Cash for Clunkers

Alan Blinder, who seems to have an idea I find intriguing every year or so, suggests that having the government buy old cars which are very large polluters would be good for the environment (obviously), stimulate the economy (at a comparatively low cost) and might do a little to equalize income distribution. This idea is not original with Blinder, as he freely acknowledges. It's been tried or is being tried in California, Colorado, Delaware, Texas, Virginia and in Canada.

It's a simple idea that has merit. One study estimates that cars older than 13 years account for 75% of all pollution from cars. I think that's pushing it but clearly the clunkers do more than their share of fouling the atmosphere.

Headlines from the BBC

Floods kill 16 in eastern Europe

Thirteen die in Istanbul blasts

India on alert as bombers sought

Eta 'planned series of attacks'

Deadly gun rampage in US church

Iran executes 29 in jail hangings

Power crisis hits Indian states

Attacks on birds of prey 'up 40%'

Warning over blood-taking method

Cuban leader warns of austerity

Attacks begin on net address flaw

A Contrarian View of China

John Pomfret calls China his second home. He has been visiting it since 1980. He was bureau chief of the Washington Post. His wife is Chinese. He thinks that the world has a much rosier view of China and its future than the data warrants.

In Pomfret's view China will not become #1 in the world any time soon for four reasons:

1. Its one child per family program works against it. Their birth rate of 1.8 children per family is lower than that needed for simple replacement. True, China has become healthier; the average life span has gone from 35 to 73 in sixty years. But, today there are 100,000,000 over age 60; this will grow to 334,000,000 by 2050. As is true here, there will be fewer and fewer working age people to support the retired. But, we have Social Security although it has to be propped up soon, some still have pensions. In China, the elderly have to rely on their savings.
2. The economy is too reliant on non-Chinese forces. 60% of the exports are owned by non-Chinese entities. Plus, when you look at the economy on a per capita basis, China is way down the list.
3. The environment in China is terrible. Sixteen of the twenty most polluted cities are in China. Seventy percent of the rivers and lakes are polluted. Half of the population lacks drinking water. Factories have closed because of a lack of water.
4. Their form of government quashes the freedom and innovation that are necessary for a successful 21st economy.

He makes some good points. Let's think about them.

Now the Main Stream Media Is Getting Wise

But, of course, it would be the McClatchy chain that raises the issue of how to succeed in Afghanistan. And in the article linked to you will read the same ideas that Tony Cordesman has - better planning and coordination between the various armed forces and the civilian reconstruction people, training the police, developing a working legal system, dealing with Pakistan, etc., etc., etc.

Bolero by Bejart

I don't like ballet but I was fascinated by this rendition of Ravel's "Bolero" by Maurice Bejart. You'll find it hard to distinguish between the male and female dancers and you may be surprised at the importance of hands and arms to the dance. I was.

I'm sorry that it's in two parts.

Brubeck on Miro

From "Time Further Out"

Keeping Secrets

Our 21st century wars have been unlike our previous wars in many ways. One way is the effort to prevent us from once more seeing what war really is. There is an excellent article in today's NY Times about the military's censorship of combat photographers. In this post you'll see some examples of what war really means.

A Column by Buzz Bissinger in the NY Times

As the clock pushed past midnight at Yankee Stadium last Tuesday, I surrendered. The All-Star Game was droning into its fourth hour, into the freaky ozone of what I feared would be infinity given the nobody-wants-to-score nature of the thing. I stopped paying attention. I brooded beyond the game of baseball.

I worried about how my son and I were going to get back to Philadelphia from the Bronx so he could work later that morning, which at the rate the game was plodding was going to mean the 3 a.m. train. I worried how that second bag of peanuts in the 11th inning would settle, given the already undeniable difficulties of the first bag in the fourth. But mostly I worried about General Motors.

I am not sure why — maybe it was those peanuts going down like pellets of lead. But I found it difficult to square the finances of what was taking place here, All-Stars from the American and National Leagues collectively collecting $392 million in salaries for the 2008 season, juxtaposed with employees from the once-mythic carmaker about to get vivisected.

The news out of General Motors the same day as the game had been particularly grim, symbolically marking the end of the American economic empire as we know it. There was talk, so unimaginable as to be surreal given its once-seeming impregnability, that G.M. would eventually have to file for bankruptcy. Among the announced cutbacks: a 20 percent reduction in salaried-worker costs, elimination of health care for older white-collar retirees, and a suspension of the company’s annual stock dividend of $1 a share.

But it was what 74-year-old William Parker told The Times that got to me the most. He has cancer, and he had just been placed on a new drug costing $2,700 a month; with a leaner and meaner G.M. eager to satisfy the warlords of Wall Street, the company would now pay only $50 of what Mr. Parker so desperately needed. “I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do,” he told a reporter. “I’m fighting for my life here.”

He isn’t the only one asking the very same question in the new America of vanquish. Hundreds of thousands are losing their homes through foreclosure because of the subprime mess. Housing prices are continuing to sink. The banking industry is in upheaval, writing off what some believe will be a trillion dollars in bad loans. The airline business is in upheaval. The newspaper business is in upheaval. American carmakers are in upheaval.

In May, the unemployment rate was 5.5 percent, up nationally a full percentage point from a year ago. The same month, in the sharpest rise in May in five years, employers cut 50 or more workers from their work force in 1,626 instances, what the Bureau of Labor Statistics bloodlessly referred to as “mass layoff actions.” And it seems likely that job losses will only accelerate into 2009.

But the tick of obscene salaries just keeps on ticking in professional sports, the one sector of the economy I know of, except for maybe Internet pornography, that still dances merrily along in the bubble of its isolation from the real world. As we try to figure out not just what is fundamentally wrong with the American economy but with America itself, look no further than what is being shelled out to the men who play with bats and balls roughly eight months out of the year (after all, they need their rest after such taxing work).

There were 64 players represented on American and National League rosters in the All-Star Game. For the American League, the aggregate 2008 salaries for its 32 players was about $215 million, or nearly $7 million a player, based on a database compiled by USA Today. For the National League roster the figure was slightly less, approximately $177 million, or $5.5 million per player. Taken together, the total figure in salaries comes in just shy of $400 million this season, or the rough equivalent of about 2,500 union autoworker jobs at G.M if you include wages and benefits.

“I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’m fighting for my life here.”

At the top is Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez, who even without the benefit of Madonna’s company will make $28 million this season and could pay the yearly $32,400 cost of Mr. Parker’s cancer drug without even knowing the money was gone. The same goes for Yankee shortstop Derek Jeter, who has a 2008 salary of $21.6 million. Or Boston Red Sox outfielder Manny Ramirez at $18.9 million, or Ichiro Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners at $17.1 million, or Chicago Cubs pitcher Carlos Zambrano at $16 million, or Houston Astros shortstop Miguel Tejada at $14.8 million, or New York Mets reliever Billy Wagner at what I suppose is a lowly $10.5 million. On the other hand, given the 72 innings of work he has averaged over the past three seasons, that does come out to $145,833 an inning.

Take the salaries of these players and apply a 10 percent cut — half of what is being lopped off at G.M. — and you could easily save the 80 jobs that are being lost at The Chicago Tribune for a savings of $9 million. It’s a pie-in-the-sky suggestion. The men with their bats and balls have a right to squeeze every nickel out of ownership they can get. Just as they have their own philanthropic foundations that range from the real (Derek Jeter has given hundreds of thousands) to the ridiculous (Rodriguez has given virtually nothing, according to documents from the Sports Philanthropy Project; Ramirez’s foundation, according to his own Web site, is still being formed, even though he’s been in the majors since 1993).

So I still believe Alex Rodriguez could live quite comfortably on $25.2 million a year instead of $28 million, as could Ramirez on $17 million instead of $18.9 million. So could all the rest who played in the All-Star Game, with more than enough bottles of top-notch Champagne to swig at the hottest clubs. On his reduced salary, Rodriguez could still share 84,000 bottles of the fine bubbly with Madonna, and Manny Ramirez would have 56,667 at his disposal.

It’s not going to happen of course. Baseball players are not in the business of saving other businesses, and we as fans are equally to blame with our insistence on keeping the beast in gold. Season tickets through the roof. Five dollars for hot dogs, three of which must go for the sogginess. Authentic uniform shirts upwards of $180. So far at least, we are still paying out. “Sports is one of the last things that people let go of,” Andrew Zimbalist, an economics professor at Smith College and an expert in the field of sports business, told me. “It is one of the things most deeply ingrained in our culture.”

“I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’m fighting for my life here.”

What is equally distressing, maybe even more so, is the size of the new contracts and contract extensions that are being handed out to the All-Stars smack in the midst of the country’s economic freefall. Philadelphia Phillies closer Brad Lidge, whom many thought was over the hill when he signed a one-year deal for this season for $6.35 million, was rewarded before the All-Star break with a three-year extension worth $37.5 million, plus incentives. Evan Longoria, barely a week after his first big league at-bat with the Tampa Devil Rays, signed a long-term deal that could be worth more than $44 million over nine years. Florida Marlins shortstop Hanley Ramirez, making a paltry $439,000 this season, still more than six times the median family income, was rewarded with a six-year $70 million contract. And it isn’t just baseball. Whereas the average salary in baseball is a little over $3 million, the average salary in the National Basketball Association is about $5.2 million, according to Zimbalist. It’s an amazing figure, made even more amazing by the fact that anyone who has been to a regular-season N.B.A. game can tell that too many players have little interest in actually playing for the first three and a half quarters. In the N.B.A., contract extensions and free agents signings once again reflect a world of sports separate and unequal from the one that tens of millions of Americans now dwell in as they grapple with the mortgage bill and the credit card bill and the health care bill. Like Elton Brand signing a five-year $79.75 million deal with the Philadelphia 76ers even though he was hurt almost the entire season last year.

“I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’m fighting for my life here.”

And let’s not forget the N.F.L., with the New York Giants recently announcing that fans, in order to maintain their season tickets, will be charged $1,000 to $20,000. The Giants hope to sell seat licenses for each of the 78,448 seats in their new home, which is what you have to do, I guess, when the cost of your shining colossus is $1.6 billion.

In fact, the plethora of new stadium building in the New York area, including not just the new Giants home but the new Yankee Stadium ($1.3 billion) and the new home of the Mets ($850 million) were in place long before the real estate crash. If the owners knew what they know now, they might not be so obscenely lavish.

Zimbalist believes that professional sports, like other industries, will have little choice but to pare down if the economy continues to falter. “I think the salaries in all of the sports follow revenues,” he told me. “The longer and deeper the recession, the more sports industry will feel it.”

I for one can’t wait.

Because the joy of watching Alex or Derek or Manny at an All-Star Game just isn’t joy enough, not when they are making a combined $68.5 million in 2008 while so many of us are scared to death over what will happen next because something surely will.

“I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’m fighting for my life here.”

So ask Alex for help, Mr. Parker. Ask him to pay for the cost of your cancer drug so you can live. Ask Manny or any of the players at All-Star Game last week.

And then hear the laughter.

Walls

Where did Obama say the following?

"The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand. The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand. The walls between races and tribes; natives and immigrants; Christian and Muslim and Jew cannot stand. These now are the walls we must tear down."

He said it in Berlin. But, as Steve Clemons notes, today the walls are in Israel and the West Bank. That would have been a more relevant place to preach against walls and would have indicated a degree of bravery and forthrightness we need in our leaders.

Allawi on the Surge

Ayad Allawi, former Iraq Prime Minister, feels that the gains of the surge are only temporary as the successes have only been military ones. Unless reconciliation comes about and the return of the refugees is handled properly and sectarianism is minimized and the police operate for all Iraqis, things will not really get better.

The Afghanistan-Pakistan War

The war in Afghanistan clearly has Anthony Cordesman excised. Two months ago he wrote a dispiriting analysis of the war. In his current report Cordesman blasts the lack of planning and of a unified approach to fighting what he sees as an Afghan-Pakistan war. This last point – an Afghan-Pakistan war – is a critical one. Unless Pakistan gets its act together and starts moving effectively against the Taliban in Pakistan, we can kiss Afghanistan good by.

He emphasizes that Afghanistan is a totally different country than Iraq. The terrain is much more difficult, communication facilities stink, tribal interaction is much more complex; corruption is rampant, governance outside of Kabul is almost non-existent and there really is no rule of law; basically, the country is a backwards nation when compared with Iraq. The Afghanistan troops and police need more and different training than their Iraqi counterparts. Yet, we don’t have nearly enough advisers and trainers; GAO and DOD think we have less than half the number needed.

A very big problem is getting money where it is needed. We’re not giving enough. Many of the pledges by our allies are not being fulfilled. A lot of the money going to the country is being spent outside the country.

What's with the Air Force these days?

Two weeks ago the officers guarding a device containing codes to launch a nuclear device fell asleep on the job. They were from the same air base that flew nuclear bombs across the country last year.

If they can't do simple jobs right, how can they be trusted with the billions of our dollars they want for exotic weapons?

How is this advancing peace?

Israel will be building a new settlement in the West Bank if Olmert, who has promised to build no new settlements, does not squash it. Proponents argue that it is not a new settlement, but an expansion of an existing one. Their reasoning is somewhat tenuous.

Contracting Woes

The Center for Public Integrity has published a report on contracting for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for the period 2004 - 2006. The important points:

• Over the three years studied, more than $20 billion in contracts went to foreign companies whose identities—at least so far—are impossible to determine.
• Nearly a third of the companies and joint ventures on the Top 100 are based outside the United States. These foreign contractors, along with the $20 billion in contracts awarded to the unidentified companies, account for about 45 percent of all funds obligated to the Top 100.
• U.S. government contracts for work in Iraq and Afghanistan have grown more than 50 percent annually, from $11 billion in 2004 to almost $17 billion in 2005 and more than $25 billion in 2006.

And, according to the head of the GAO, "We have identified about 15 systemic, longstanding acquisition and contracting problems that exist within the Defense Department—which is the single biggest contractor within the U.S. government—that we are still not making enough progress on. I mean, this stuff isn't rocket science."

Seeking an OK

Charles Rangel has asked the House Ethics Committee to investigate whether his solicitations on behalf of the Charles Rangel Center at CCNY violated House rules. It's an interesting move on Rangel's part. He must be confident of being absolved of any wrongdoing in the matter.

Will he also ask NYC's housing people whether his use of four apartments as an office violates the city's rules?

Regulation of Globalization

We've seen an acceptance of the idea on the part of many economists and others that markets are not always right nor self-correcting. They need some regulation. The idea has until relatively recently been applied to domestic markets only. But Dani Rodrik, of Harvard and Project Syndicate, sees it starting to be applied to world markets as well. He reminds us of some who have started issuing warnings about globalization.

"So we have Paul Samuelson, the author of the postwar era’s landmark economics textbook, reminding his fellow economists that China’s gains in globalization may well come at the expense of the US; Paul Krugman, today’s foremost international trade theorist, arguing that trade with low-income countries is no longer too small to have an effect on inequality; Alan Blinder, a former US Federal Reserve vice chairman, worrying that international outsourcing will cause unprecedented dislocations for the US labor force; Martin Wolf, the Financial Times columnist and one of the most articulate advocates of globalization, writing of his disappointment with how financial globalization has turned out; and Larry Summers, the US Treasury chief and the Clinton administration’s “Mr. Globalization,” musing about the dangers of a race to the bottom in national regulations and the need for international labor standards."

Rodrik still believes in globalization but what is needed in his view are regulations and institutions to effectively manage global issues for the common good.

Embedded with the Iraqi Army

Nancy Youssef spent four days embedded with the Iraqi Army in action in Amara province. Action should be in quotes as there really was no action. The group to which she was assigned was after Sadrist militia men. The Army was very confident but achieved nothing as it is very likely that the militia had left before the Army arrived; after all the militia has been ordered not to engage the 'enemy'. Since Sadr is Maliki's main opposition in the upcoming elections, all of this movement against the Sadrists may be just part of the election campaogn.

A sidelight - the governor of the province is under house arrest. The Army leaders are acting as the civilian governors, or, to call them by their right name - warlords.

New Zealanders are Odd

At least when it comes to names. A judge took matters in his own hand and renamed Talula Does the Hula, the girl's given name. She disliked this name so much that she never told her friends her real name. Other bizarre names - Violence and Number 16 Bus Shelter.

Auditing the auditors

The hot line of the General Accountability Office (GAO) received complaints about 14 audits conducted by the Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA), the group that is supposed to verify that our defense money is properly accounted for. The whistle blowers alleged that audit opinions were not supported by the working papers (i.e., the data), supervisors changed audit opinions without any backup, not enough work was put into the audit to justify rendering an opinion.

All these serious charges were substantiated when the GAO reviewed the 14 audits. They found that the whistle blowers were right. DCAA management seemed to be too cozy with contractors and would blithely accept contractor's objections and replace the auditors or direct them to revise their findings.

We're talking serious money here. You know how large the defense budget is. Wouldn't it be nice if the people we pay to audit it actually did the job.

My question - will any heads roll?

Being a good host

China wants to be a good host and has instructed its people how to be one. A district Propaganda Department has displayed a series of posters that tell residents not to ask visitors about income or expenses, age, love life or marriage, health, someone's home or address, personal experience, religious beliefs or political views, or what someone does.

What do you talk about with strangers?

When will they be ready?

Tony Cordesman has some reservations as to just how ready the Iraqi forces are to take over today and tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. He points out that the reporting of this fact has been neither crystal clear nor exactly honest. Here are the major problems he sees.

• Iraqi Police Force: In contrast to the limited successes in training the Iraqi Army, much of the Coalition police training effort has been a failure. While manpower levels in the IP are difficult to ascertain with accuracy, it is clear that a large proportion of IPs in Iraq did not receive Coalition training or equipment. Many IPs are hired locally by Provincial or local government officials. These officials themselves are often of dubious loyalty to the central government of Iraq, and the IPs they hire are likewise often of questionable loyalty. The percentage of IPs hired outside of the Coalition-sponsored train and equip program appears to be growing. Attempts to free IP units from local influence have largely failed, and MNSTC-I seems to have accepted de-facto local control of MOI forces for the time being.

Official reporting on the MOI and the IP in particular is extremely misleading. It is unclear what MNF-I’s current goals are for developing various elements of the police. It is also unclear how the new provincial powers law, and coming provincial elections, will affect the police force, how local and central elements will influence the force, and even how large the force will be in its end state. Official reporting on the manning, equipping, and training of the IP remains highly inaccurate.

• Slow Progress in the Local Rule of Law: There has been some progress at the highest levels in establishing courts and some rule of law. Yet the central government lacks an effective presence in many areas, and the criminal justice and courts system is unable to support the police. The IP needs effective governance and a functioning court system to back it up. The establishment of reliable and impartial courts has been extremely slow, and this has seriously harmed the development of effective MOI forces at the local level. There is little official reporting on Iraq’s jails, the availability of defendants to find counsel, the status of due process, and the role of religious and tribal courts. Furthermore, it is entirely unclear how all of these elements will interact, both at the central and local level.

• National Police: Until 2007, the National Police (NP) acted largely as a Shi’ite force within the MOI, and were responsible for much sectarian violence against Sunnis. Far from being a central-government run nationwide police force, they more often resembled a government funded tool of sectarian intimidation. MNF-I instituted a massive reform program in the NP in 2007. This ongoing program has clearly had some positive outcomes, and has reduced the previous Shi’ite dominance of the force and resulted in the firing of a huge number of the NP’s senior commanders. Many elements still, however, present problems, and it remains to be seen whether the reform program can make the NP a truly non-sectarian force.

• Sons of Iraq: This large mostly Sunni and tribal force is supposed to be temporary, and the ultimate destination of the over 100,000 men in these units is a major uncertainty. While MNSTC-I believes that 20-25% of the Sons of Iraq will be absorbed into the ISF , progress has been slow in this area. What will become of the other 75-80% of these heavily armed men, accustomed to their relatively high salaries, is also a major concern. Unless jobs and economic opportunities are found for the entire force, and Sunnis and mixed tribal groups come to trust in government help and funding, the gains this force has made will be lost and many elements could become hostile to the central government.

• Political and militia influence in the ISF: The “competition among ethnic and sectarian communities” that Gen. Petraeus believes is at the heart of conflict in Iraq includes the struggle for control of the MOD and MOI. Several major political parties, and their respective militias, have gained partial control over many GOI ministries. The MOI and MOD are no exception.

JAM, ISCI/Badr, Daawa, Kurdish groups, Fadilah, Sunni Awakening groups, and a host of smaller groups all vie for control of the various parts of the ISF. In many areas, such as Basra and much of southern Iraq, the Coalition had effectively ceded control of security and local government to these parties. JAM influence over the IP and elements of the IA were exposed in the desertions of ISF personnel during the fighting in Basra in March, 2008.

The MOI is heavily influenced by Shiite parties. At the center, control of the Ministry itself is largely balanced between ISCI and Daawa. Kurdish parties also exert some influence. The JAM exerts varying but significant levels of control at the local level, particularly in the south and in the NP.

The MOD is less influenced by these parties than the MOI, but still faces serious issues. The heavy Coalition presence at all levels of the MOD has helped to contain sectarianism somewhat, as has the presence of so many Sunni officers. Sadly, much of the truly impressive progress the ISF has made in the last 5 years will be rendered moot if its personnel are not loyal to the GOI.

• Intelligence: Iraq’s intelligence apparatus remains divided between a CIA-supported ‘official’ agency (the Iraqi National Intelligence Service or INIS) and a Shi’ite-run agency (under the auspices of the minister of state for national security, Shirwan al-Waely). The levels of competition or cooperation between these agencies remain unclear.

• Provincial Powers Law: The balance of power between the central and provincial governments remains undecided. How the power shifts between the provinces and Baghdad will affect the ISF is unclear. These issues are further compounded by unrealistic reporting on the transfer of security responsibilities by province, when the Iraqi forces are clearly unready to take over the mission.

• Equipment and Logistics: The ISF has made significant progress in the areas of logistics and equipping forces in the field. While the battles of Basra, Sadr City, and Mosul cannot honestly be called military victories for the ISF, they can be seen as testaments to the improved logistics capacity of the ISF. However, many units, especially in the IP, remain critically short of equipment. The IA still lacks armor. While its independence is increasing, the ISF remains dependant on Coalition support, particularly during combat operations.

Return to the Real World

William Astore, a retired Lieutenant Colonel, has some interesting words to say about our professional army. He advocates a return to the citizen-soldier, which I interpret as a return to the draft. Herewith some excerpts (emphases mine):

As surely as my fellow tourists were staying in their cars and buses, we, as a people, are distancing ourselves from the realities of war. As we seal ourselves away from war's horrors, we're correspondingly finding it easier to speak of "warfighters" and to boast of having the world's best military.

As we catch a glimpse, from the comfort of our living rooms, of a suicide bombing in Iraq or an American outpost attacked, then abandoned, in Afghanistan, are we not like those tourists in buses at Gettysburg, listening to sanitized recordings telling us what to see and think about the (expurgated) reality in front of us? And who dares challenge the "expert" commentary? Who dares turn off the canned talking heads and stare into the face of war?

But if we are to end our militaristic, yet curiously sanitized, "warfighter" moment, if we are ever to return to our citizen-soldier ethos and heritage, this is just what we must do.

After all, it's later than you think. Our military now relies not only on a volunteer (if, at times, "stop-lossed") Army, but increasingly on tens of thousands of hired guns, consultants, interrogators, interpreters, and other paramilitary camp followers. Private, for-profit "security contractors" - companies like Blackwater and Triple Canopy - give a disturbing new meaning to our "warfighter" terminology and the rhetoric that marches in step with it. As even casual students of history will recall, a clear sign of the Roman Empire's decline was its shift from citizen-soldiers motivated by duty to mercenaries motivated by profit.

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But here's the question to ponder: At what price virtuosity? In World War I and World War II, the Germans were the best soldiers because they had trained and fought the most, because their societies were geared, mentally and in most other ways, for war, because they celebrated and valued feats of arms above all other contributions one could make to society and culture.

Being "the best soldiers" meant that senior German leaders - whether the Kaiser, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, that Teutonic titan of World War I, or Hitler - always expected them to prevail. The mentality was: "We're number one. How can we possibly lose unless we quit - or those [fill in your civilian quislings of choice] stab us in the back?"

If this mentality sounds increasingly familiar, it's because it's the one we ourselves have internalized in these last years. German warfighters and their leaders knew no limitations until it was too late for them to recover from ceaseless combat, imperial overstretch, and economic collapse.

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Think about it: Must our military forever remain "second to none" for you to feel safe? Our national traditions suggest otherwise. In fact, if we no longer had the world's strongest military, perhaps we would be more reluctant to tap its strength - and more hesitant to send our citizen-soldiers into harm's way. And while we're at it, perhaps we'd also learn to boast about a new kind of "warfighter" - not one who fights our wars, but one who fights against them.

A Positive American Economic Story

And in manufacturing, too. Manitowoc, Wisconsin, has been rebuilding its manufacturing base. In the past four years manufacturing employment in the town has increased. Not much, it's true, only 6%. But in this day in this country any increase has to be a positive sign.

Why Manitowoc? Some people think that there are several reasons - its location near a large share of the population, its ability to reach the ocean shipping lanes via the Great Lakes and, to my mind perhaps the most important, its population which has a long history of manufacturing. It also helps that the town is not dependent on the auto or housing markets; their factories make a lot of different products, from bombs to pipes to ice cream machines. And its not simply small factories that have been responsible for the comeback. Manitowoc Co. sold $4 billion of cranes last year; this year it will sell more as its backlog is up 72%.

Who knows but maybe the rise in transportation costs may hurt the countries that have been exporting to us. Perhaps, we'll see factories being re-opened to serve the people in the next town or state.

Questions for the Candidates

Here is a list from Pete Davis:

Q. How many more natural disasters is it going to take before we revitalize FEMA?

Q. How many more food poisonings and tainted drug imports is it going to take before the FDA can protect us again?

Q. When is the EPA going to start enforcing air and water quality standards again? You know something is wrong when an agency is repeatedly sued to get it to enforce present law.

Q. Why didn’t federal financial regulators move in to stop the housing bubble? Or Enron before that?

Q. Why couldn’t the Interior Department collect oil and gas royalties owed? Or keep track of reparations due Indian Tribes?

Q. Why has our nation’s highway, bridge, and rail infrastructure declined to its worst point since the Depression?

Q. How many more failures to move air traffic is it going to take before FAA technology enters this century?

Q. Why did the FAA fail to inspect Southwest Airline planes according to schedule and then punish the whistleblowers who drew attention to it?

Q. When will we ever be able to conduct the census electronically in the country that invented high tech?

Q. When will the government protect sensitive personal information from theft, careless loss, and snoopy State Department Passport Office employees?

Q. When will we stop losing track of our own nuclear weapons?

Q. When will we provide our returning veterans the mental health care they need to reduce their record suicide rate?

Q. Why is K-12 education failing so many students despite No Child Left Behind?

Q. Bottom line: Are we better defended? Is our economy stronger? Has our energy security improved? Are we leaving a better future for our children than we enjoyed?

And you wonder why I'm depressed?

Turkey Attack

Here is part of the Turkey Attack Force (TAF). A couple of weeks ago one of their number died in combat. He was shot by the police in Chilmark here on the Vineyard as he would not be deterred from attacking a policeman who had been called by civilians who were under attack. Most thought that it was just one bad turkey, but they were wrong.

The existence of the TAF was revealed at a meeting of the Chilmark Selectmen. Many residents testified about being attacked by a band of female turkeys led by one or two males. They wanted the Selectmen to nominate someone to manage the turkeys. But, Chilmark being a liberal town, the Selectmen simply took note of the complaints.

The TAF is not without supporters. Angered at the shooting of the turkey, a seasonal resident of Chilmark attacked the policeman who fired the shot. The resident was subdued and arrested.

SLIPping and a SLICCing

Some Air Force leaders expect to travel in comfort, quite a bit of comfort, in fact. A lot more comforts than GI Joe. For example, they want the Senior Leader In-transit Pallet (SLIP) and the Senior Leader In-transit Conference Capsule (SLICC) to have ar least these amenities:

• “The wall mounted flat screen/flat panel monitor must have a diagonal measurement of at least 37 inches”;

• “A full length mirror”;

• “Aesthetically pleasing wall-to-wall carpeting”;

• “Aesthetically pleasing wall treatments/coverings”;

• “Aesthetically pleasing ceiling treatments/coverings”;

• “Internal illumination level will automatically adjust to ambient lighting levels”;

• “A single remote control unit which controls operation and all functions of the video playback devices as well as the wall mounted flat screen/flat panel monitor.”

SLIP and SLICC are modifications to military planes to make them fit for the brass and civilian leaders to fly comfortably. The Air Force has been trying to get money from GWOT funds to make SLIP and SLICC a reality. The leaders have also been hard at work making sure the modified planes are up to snuff; e.g., they spent $68,000 to change the color of the seats to Air Force blue. After all, how can one work if one sits a seat that is not blue?

All of this is costing us millions while our soldiers travel in less than stellar comfort.

Haste Makes Waste

That's probably a motto for some in the Pentagon's contracting division. How else to explain the delays in correcting dangerous electrical problems in Army barracks and other buildings in Iraq? In the six months between August 2006 and January 2007 there were 287 electrical fires in these buildings;that's about three every two days. At least two died in these fires. The danger was officially recognized in a safety survey report in February 2007, almost eighteen months ago. Yet nothing has been done.

I'm not a conspiracy nut but could the delay have anything to do with the fact that KBR is responsible for these buildings. The same KBR that has overbilled us. The same KBR that provided unsanitary water for our troops. That KBR.

When will the writedowns end?

Citibank wrote down $7.2 billion of bad loans this quarter, Merill $9.7 billion. Will the writedowns ever stop? Citi has written down $56 billion since last July.

Sound Words from Ted Sorensen

From today's Boston Globe:

Communications between adversaries are a proud American tradition. Ronald Reagan, in meeting with Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, paved the way for mutual nuclear arms reductions and limitations. The desirability of meetings between adversaries won President Jimmy Carter a Nobel Peace Prize for bringing Egypt's Anwar Sadat and Israel's Menachem Begin together at Camp David; won President Teddy Roosevelt a Nobel Peace Prize for bringing Russia and Japan together over Manchuria and Korea in 1905; won Ralph Bunche, a distinguished American United Nations official, a Nobel Peace Prize for bringing the Arabs and Israelis together for their first armistice in 1949; and almost won President Bill Clinton a Nobel Peace Price for his effort to bring the Israelis and Palestinians together at Camp David in 2000.

Our Place in the World

Regular readers know that I'm especially concerned with the decline of this country over the past several years. The decline is in a number of areas - innovation, educational achievement, health care, economics, competitiveness; the list goes on. So you can appreciate how intrigued I was when I heard of the American Human Development Project. This is a privately funded group that applies some of the methodology used in the development of the UN Human Development Index.

Note the title - human development - not economic development. It's an approach based on the work of the economist and Nobel laureate, Amartya Sen. Briefly, the approach is based on the principle that life is more than making money. Yes, one needs money but the question is what one does with one's money. The approach looks at how well we are educating our children, caring for the sick and weak, how much freedom we have; basically, what kind of life do we lead.

For at least the past twenty-eight years the U.S. has not been the top-ranked country in terms of human development. We were second in the 1980s, dropped to sixth in 1995, ninth in 2000 and twelfth in 2005. We had the highest per-capita income in 2005 but could not do as well in the areas of health and knowledge as those countries above us in the human development index (HDI).

Some disturbing facts with regard to our place in the world:

• We spend more per capita on health care but die at a younger age than most developed countries.
• Our life expectancy is lower than forty-one other nations.
• More of our babies die at birth than thirty-three other countries; we're at the same level as Croatia and Cuba.
• We are no longer tops in math and science education.
• In France and Italy just about every three- and four-year-old goes to pre-school. In Russia, Japan, England, Canada and Germany, 75% do. Here the average is 53%.
• We're #1 in the percentage of kids living in poverty.
• 163 countries mandate paid maternity leave. Our mothers are dependent on the generosity of the employer.
• 145 countries have paid sick leave. We are dependent on the generosity of the employer for paid sick leaves.
• We have the most people in prison; with 5% of the world's population we have 24% of the prisoners.
• We spend more on defense than any other OECD nation.
• Mirder is five times higher in the U.S. than in other OECD nations.
  

And some facts about us:

• A baby born in D.C. is two-and-a-half times more likely to die before reaching one year than a baby born in Vermont.
• 6% of us have severe mental illness.
• 14% can't read the newspaper.
• 22% can't balance a checkbook.
• One in five kids lives in poverty, one in thirteen lives in extreme poverty.
• The value of the minimum wage has decreased by 40% since 1968.
• More families with children are homeless today than at any time since the Depression.
• Until the 1970s .1% of the population was in jail. Now its .7%.

The authors of this report know that we can do better. We all know that we can - and must - do better. Here is their prescription for doing so:

• Promote prevention and public health.
• Make health care affordable to all Americans.
• Modernize K-12 education
• Invest in at risk children as early as possible.
• Strengtheen and support famikies to better balance work and family responsibilities.
• Launch a Marshall Plan for the Gulf states (e.g, Louisiana, Mississippi)
• Take responsibility for our most vulnerable.

Are they smartening up?

We know that a deputy secretary of state will attend the talks with Iran this weekend. Now it's being bruited about that we may open an 'interests' section in Tehran soon. Have our leaders lost their mind?

Very Slow Learners

Fifteen years ago the FDA warned the Red Cross that their procedures for collecting and processing blood needed to be improved. At that time - and today - screening of donors for exposure to disease is not consistently performed, tests for syphilis are not routine, preparation of the area from which blood is to be taken is not what it should be and, most disturbingly, bad blood is not necessarily always disposed of.

I can't believe that I'm writing about this as it's essentially the same as a post less than twenty months ago. The numbers have gone up. Then the fines totaled $15,000,000, now they're $21,000,000. It just seems that, when it comes to blood, the Red Cross is a disaster area. Sound management is needed and badly.

A Man After my Own Heart

One of the beauties of the web is that every so often you find something you wish you had written. Here is one such piece:

Idiots Fiddle While Rome Burns

by Barry Ritholtz The Big Picture — last modified Jul 16, 2008

The collection of ne'er do wells, clueless dolts, political hacks, and oh, let's just be blunt and call them what they are -- total Idiots -- expands into an ever larger circle.

While the Republic burns due to the unsavory combination of incompetence, ideological rigidity, and crony capitalism, the fools and assclowns seem ever more determined to avoid any personal responsibility for the damages they have wrought. Instead, they flail about blindly, blaming everything and everyone -- except their own horrific negligence.

This is financial incompetence writ on a scale far grander than anything seen for centuries.

As a nation, our institutions have failed us: Under Alan Greenspan, the Federal Reserve slept through the most reckless and irresponsible expansion of bank lending in history for reasons of ideological purity. His opposition to the Fed’s regulatory role reached the point of malfeasance long ago. History is unlikely to be kind to the Maestro.

There is a choice to be made: Either we regulate the Banks, or leave it to the vagaries of the free markets to punish those who trade with, or place their assets in the wrong institutions. But for God's sake, do not give us the worst of both worlds -- do not allow banks the freedom to make horrific but preventable mistakes (i.e., only lending money to those who can pay it back), but then expect the taxpayers to foot the trillion dollar bill.

That's not capitalism, its not socialism, its not regulation, and its sure as hell isn't what free markets are. Our language is insufficient to describe this hodge-podge system, other than to call it a random patchwork of quasi-capitalism, quadrennial-socialism, and politics as usual. Ideological idiocy is the only phrase I can muster that has any resonance with the daily insanity.

We have entered into a fit of Orwellian madness: The American Capitalists, long the globe's leading advocates for free markets, have become near Socialists. Halfway around the world, the Chinese Communists have picked up the baton, and are moving rapidly towards a form of Capitalism. Ironically, it is the once largest communist nations -- the Chinese and the Russians -- who holds much of Fannie and Freddie's paper.

Hey comrades, who's selling the rope to whom?

Perhaps the rescue of "Phony and Fraudy" are not so much a bail out of American homeowners as it is a desperate attempt to stay in the good graces of our friendly global bankers. We are the world's largest debtor nation, and as such, we depend upon the kindness of strangers -- be they Japanese or Europeans or Abu Dhabians -- or even former communists.

Back in the States, something beyond cognitive dissonance is occurring -- this is full blown case of dementia unfolding in the public sphere. When this era of excess and absurdity is treated by historians in the future, the question I expect to be asked most is not why many of these people weren't jailed for their financial felonies. Rather, I expect them to wonder why so many of these folk weren't placed in protective custody, and heavily medicated, for the only rational explanation for their statements and behaviors is that they have gone so far beyond the bend as to be completely and totally insane.

Massively over-leveraged companies? Blame short sellers.

Wildly under-capitalized financial firms? Blame rumors.

Heinously poor corporate management? Blame a Senator.

It is as if someone is running around Washington D.C. with a ball-peen hammer, smacking senior government officials on their skulls. If you find the standard finger pointing hard to fathom, perhaps blunt head trauma is a better explanations for the absurdities proferred.

Books will be written about this period of time, and our descendants will wonder in awe as to how this was allowed to happen. Tulips got nothing on us! Its not just the total dollar value of the losses that have exceeded all other global fits of financial madness combined, but rather, how so many warning signs were so blithely ignored by so many and for so long. What was wrong with these people, the authors and historians will wonder. Did the antibiotics in the food supply drive them mad? Did the High Fructose Corn Syrup compromise their ability to think? Some form of viral plague? Roid rage? What else could have created such a mass delusion amongst not just the populace, but their leadership and institutions?

Indy Mac goes belly up, having lost $900 million this year alone. Its shares fell 87% in 2007 and then its value dropped (on top of last year's collapse) another 95% this year-to-date. The stock fell to 28 cents yesterday. Some estimates of the total bad loans made by this somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 billion dollars -- and the Office of Thrift Supervision blames a senator who is investigating how much of the FDIC's $53 Billion this is going to eat up, with Wall Street estimates ranging from 15% to 30%. The towering incompetence of OTS is incomprehendable, but it is their colossal gall that is truly stupefying.

From beyond the grave, Adam Smith does not know whether to weep or retch.

A slightly different viewpoint on oil

Jeff Frankels of the Kennedy School does not back Bush's idea of opening up our offshore drilling spots. He thinks things could get a lot worse and we should hold off on drilling to reduce the price some years in the future as we may have to drill to survive should the world get crazier, damn the price.

He seems convinced that we are not doing enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. While he realizes that increase taxes on oil are a no-no in today's world, he advocates that we learn to live with these prices and increases taxes when the barrel price goes down. Although you don't hear the argument very often today, he argues that the best way to reduce emissions is via conservation (remember Jimmy Carter in his sweater?)

The Trappings of Power

Charles Rangel has been a Congressman for 38 years and it sounds like he is building his monument to himself. Last year we paid $1,900,000 to start work on the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at CCNY. Now he is soliciting funds for the center from businessmen who appear before his committee. He wants to spend $64,500 of our money for his official portrait. He has been able to secure below market rents for four apartments in the building in which he lives. And, being of the old school he leases a Cadillac for which we pay the tab. You would think with the current state of the economy the Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee would have more pressing business to attend to.

Term limits anyone?

Which came first?

The criminal background or the PTSD? It seems almost axiomatic that if a veteran of today’s wars commits crimes upon his return, it must be because he suffers from PTSD. But very few PTSD experts believe that crime is a symptom of PTSD. It is more likely that these crimes are a function of the veteran’s pre-war life.

The Sacramento Bee continues its series on ‘moral waivers’ with a review of several returning veterans who have committed crimes upon their return to the U.S. Some served in combat, others did not. What they seem to have in common besides committing crimes is that the crimes they committed after their return were of the same type as those they committed before they enlisted.

Moral Waiver

As we have learned, the manpower drain has caused the Army to lower recruiting standards, particularly with regards to 'moral waivers', that is, accepting people with criminal records. The percent of people accepted under moral waiver has gone from 4.6% in 2003 to 11.2% in 2007. The Army claims that many of these people do quite well. If a study by the Sacramento Bee is any indication, the Army has a different definition of 'well' than most people.

The Bee did not have access to the records of many soldiers. However, they were able to identify 120 who had been admitted on a moral waiver. 70 (58%) of these were involved in criminal or controversial activities.

Part of the problem is that recruiters are under a lot of pressure and really don't vet the background of enlistees.

You may recall the wounding of an Italian journalist and the killing of her bodyguard at a checkpoint manned by U.S. soldiers. The American who shot them was there because of a moral waiver.

A professional army? I don't think so.

Going off the Deep End

The Safford Middle School in Arizona does not allow prescription or over-the-counter drugs to be brought to school unless the school's permission is granted. A student was accused by another student of bringing Ibruprofen to school. The Assistant Principal, a man, became excised over this putative violation of policy and searched the student's backpack. He found nothing, but refused to stop at that point. Since the student was female, he ordered an assistant to search the girl. A strip search was conducted. Nothing was found.

The student's parents sued the Assistant Principal and his cohorts. The lower court found in the school's favor. An appeals court did not. One wonders how experienced this Assistant Principal was and what incident could have caused such a policy to be formulated.

It's a sad commentary on the state of at least one school in this country.

The Dark Side

Boone Pickens may have something

T. Boone Pickens, the oil and gas man, may actually have a viable plan to reduce our dependence on oil - use wind and natural gas. The middle of the country can be a windy place, but we can use the wind to supply some of our electricity; Pickens thinks 20% by 2030. Natural gas, of which we have plenty, would be used to power cars. It now powers 7,000,000 cars around the world but a platry 150,000 here. The technology exists today. The natural gas exists today. The wind exists today. It sounds reasonable to me. What do you think?

Paying the Dead

My experience with Medicare has been great. But, then, the doctors I see are alive and, I believe, pay their taxes. The issue of Medicare providers not paying taxes came up last month. This month it's Medicare paying dead doctors. I should say people using the ids of dead doctors in order to steal our money.

This week the Senate held a hearing on the problem of false claims being paid by Medicare. It seems that between 2000 and 2007 about 18,000 dead doctors filed 478,500 claims for such items as wheelchairs, canes, drugs, etc. Medicare paid the departed at least $92,800,000 of our money.

The real gotcha in this comedy is that this paying false claims is not new. The same thing happened in 1999 when $91,000,000 was paid out.

Now, however, the problem will be solved. And, then there's this bridge I'm selling.

Free to be a prostitute?

John Miller led the Bush's administration's attempts to eliminate human trafficking. He feels that the Justice Department is promulgating legislation that will make it harder to convict known traffickers. The department's argument seems to be that prostitutes choose their profession. While this is true in some cases, I suspect that there are many, many girls (not women as many prostitutes are very young, some as young as 13 or 14) who have been duped or forced into providing sex. It is these people that should be protected. Miller lists some of the areas in which the legislation proposed by the Justice Department is faulty.

Should the State Department’s annual report on trafficking, which grades governments on how well they are combating modern slavery, consider whether governments put traffickers in jail? The Justice Department says no. Should the Homeland Security and Health and Human Services Departments streamline their efforts to help foreign trafficking victims get visas and care? No. Should the Homeland Security, Health and Human Services, State and Justice Departments pool their data on human trafficking to help devise strategies to prevent it? Amazingly, no.

Should the department prosecute the American sex tourists who create demand for adult human-trafficking victims in foreign countries? No. Should Congress make clear that there should be increased penalties for Americans who sexually abuse children abroad? No way. Should we give our courts jurisdiction over Americans who traffic human beings abroad? Certainly not. Should the attorney general include information in his annual report on his department’s efforts to enforce anti-trafficking laws against federal contractors and employees? No. Too “burdensome,” says the Justice Department.

And he tells us why he thinks this legislation is bad.

Put me on the side of those who have worked with the victims. I have talked with survivors all over the world, including the United States, and I share the view that these women and girls — the average age of entry into prostitution is 14 — are not participating in the “oldest profession” but in the oldest form of abuse. They are slaves.

Where's that ration book?

During the second world war, almost everything one bought, including gasoline, was rationed. As a kid, I did not get the sense that anyone really complained about it. We were at war and sacrifices had to be made.

Well, Richard Heinberg argues that the days of cheap oil are gone forever and, if we don't ration its use while we find alternative sources, we'd better be ready for doomsday. Of course, rationing must be on a world-wide level or it will not succeed. How this idea will ever come to pass in this world is beyond me.

Engage or Attack?

Jon Alterman, Director of the Middle East Program for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, contrasts the Cold War with the current situation with Iran. He feels that we were successful in the Cold War because we had relations, albeit strained, with Russia. We exchanged ambassadors, entertainers, academics and goods. Maybe both Russia and the U.S. understood the civilization destroying dangers of the Cold War turning hot.

True, Russia and Iran are and were very different countries with very different roles in the world. But, Alterman argues, both Russia and Iran could threaten us in very vital ways, Russia by attacking Western Europe, Iran by stopping the flow of oil. And both countries were ideologues. In our view Russia was behind the Korean and Vietnam wars. Today some think Iran is supporting Hamas, Hezbollah and Iraqi insurgents.

Alterman acknowledges that Iran may be irrational, whereas Russia was rational. However, he claims that in the 30 years of the Islamic Republic, the leaders have pursued their interests in realistic and cold-blooded terms, despite the rantings of the Ahmadinejads. So, it would be a good idea to find out whether they are nuts or just nasty and you can’t find that out unless you have relations with them over a period of time.

That’s one thing the Cold War taught us. Engaging with the enemy diplomatically may result in not having to engage militarily.

Another Casualty of Fuel Prices

Although my town, West Tisbury, has a volunteer fire department, I was unaware that 2/3 of this country is protected by 800,000 volunteers. The price of gas is wreaking havoc on these departments. Their budgets never anticipated the current or likely future price of gasoline. Since the big trucks get a mere 3 - 4 miles per gallon, their budgets are really getting killed. The problem has been recognized but whether any significant, creative help will be forthcoming is problematic.

The rich are not like you and me

One way they are different is that they can avoid - not evade - taxes better than we can. One way they do this is with their 'donations' to charity, as explained by Ray Madoff of BC Law.

First, some have a different definition of charity than many people. For example, Leona Helmsley's bequest of $8 billion for the care and welfare of dogs. Had these funds been taxed, the federal deficit would be $3.6 billion less. Or, put another way, you and I have to kick in our share of $3.6 billion. While many bequests of the wealthy do benefit the world, Madoff argues that there should be a limit as to the amount of the bequest that is tax-free. Sounds reasonable to me.

Madoff does not have a high opinion of the laws governing private foundations, which must spend 5% of their assets each year. The problem is that fees to the trustees and administrative costs are part of this 5%. Shouldn't all of it go to charity?

This is just another example of the corruption of the language. Charity no longer means doing something for those in need.

What will my Congressman do about this?

Dear Colleague,

During the Fourth of July holiday a WWII veteran stood ram-rod straight in his crisp dress uniform and saluted our flag as it passed in a parade. His silent reverential stance was a powerful reminder of the love of country that is reflected in our veterans of all generations and all services.

It is also a powerful reminder of the responsibilities of the President of the Untied States in his capacity as Commander in Chief.

It is worse than heartbreaking that George W. Bush, as Commander in Chief, caused this country to go to war based on information which was false, and which he knew to be false. The consequences for our troops have been devastating. We have lost 4,116 of our beloved servicemen and women since the war began, with over 30,000 physically wounded and countless others emotionally wounded. The toll on the service persons and their families will be felt throughout their lives.

There can be no greater responsibility of a Commander in Chief than to command based on facts on the ground, and to command in fact and in truth. There can be no greater offense of a Commander in Chief than to misrepresent a cause of war and to send our brave men and women into harm's way based on those misrepresentations.

There has been a breach of faith between the Commander in Chief and the troops. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or with Al Qaeda's role in 9/11. Iraq had neither the intention nor the capability of attacking the United States. Iraq did not have weapons of Mass of Destruction. Yet George W. Bush took our troops to war under all of these false assumptions. Given the profound and irreversible consequences to our troops, if his decision was the result of a mistake, he must be impeached. Since his decision was based on lies, impeachment as a remedy falls short, but represents at least some effort on our part to demonstrate our concern about the sacrifices our troops have made.

This Thursday evening I will bring a privileged resolution to the House with a single Article of Impeachment of President Bush for taking our nation and our troops to war based on lies. We owe it to our troops who even at this hour stand as sentinels of America because they love this country and will give their lives for it. What are we willing to do to match their valor and the valor of their successors? Are we at least willing to defend the Constitution from the comfort and security of our Washington, DC offices?

Sincerely,
Dennis J. Kucinich

Member of Congress

Coping with 20th century technology

The Registry of Motor Vehicles of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has problems keeping up in our electronic world. They have not yet been able to share information with the courts in a timely manner nor have they been able to properly tax true luxury cars, such as Ferrari.

Although courts have 'taken away' the license of repeat drunk drivers, chronic speeders and those convicted of murder by vehicle, the Registry has been unable to collect this information for at least two years after the court ruling. How many accidents and deaths these people have caused is unknown.

Further, the Registry has not been able to assess a proper excise tax on Ferraris and similar cars because they are not listed in the Blue Book. How much towns, which actually collect the tax, have lost because of this error is unknown.

The new Registrar vows to bring the agency into the 21st century.

The Profit Motive is Universal

The World Health Organization recommends that Caesarean sections account for 15% or less of births. Yet in China they account for 40%, in Mexico 39%, Brazil 36%, the U.S. 31%. Although C-sections are more costly and more dangerous, they can be done in minutes versus the possibly long labor of natural childbirth. Some doctors in Brazil perform sixteen C-sections a day. Why? For the money. You have to believe that accounts for the high number of these operations around the world.

Trading with Iran

AP reports that the volume of exports from the U.S. to Iran has increased ten-fold since Bush assumed the presidency. In those years it has totaled $546,000,000, which is chicken feed in the export world. But it is strange to learn that we have sold perfume, clothes, golf carts, cigarettes, bras and bull semen to Iran. Some was sold illegally but most was sold after getting the okay from the Feds.

One Small Step for Man…

I’d guess that just about every American my age and many younger could finish that sentence, would know who said it and would probably know where they were when they heard it almost forty years ago. Will the next person to reach the moon be an American? It does not look that way the way things are going.

The U.S. remains #1 in military use of space, but we are being very seriously challenged in the commercial use of space. Where we were the only country that could put sophisticated satellites and spaceships into space, now this is done almost routinely by China, Russia, India, Japan and Europe. South Korea, Israel, Taiwan and Brazil are not far behind in building their space programs. The Chinese put a man in space five years ago and are working to put a man on the moon.

Where we launched satellites for other nations, most launching now is done by other countries. Countries as small as Nigeria and Singapore are paying Russia and other countries to launch satellites for them.

We’ve cut NASA’s budget by 20% in the past fifteen years. Conquering space has not been the subject of daily conversation for quite a while, although it appears that we still have the technological talent to remain an important player in the race for space. Some experts think that China may have more than the technical talent as they think of space in the same way England thought of the ocean or the U.S. of air power in the days when these countries were #1.

Our desire to protect ourselves from the enemy by barring shipments of space hardware to many countries has been a boon to other countries in the space business.