A Surprise!

The Boston Globe has endorsed Alan Khazei for Senator! I'm shocked that they would go for the low man on the polling totem pole. Their basic argument is his potential and his success in bringing people together for the common good. Capuano is too angry for the Globe editorialists. Coakley is more a state than a federal person. And Pagliuca should run for governor.

Will the endorsement have much of an effect? Coakley should have the machine to get out her vote. If Pagliuca has called others as often as he's called my house, there is no way he will come close to winning. If anyone really reads the editorial, Capuano will lose.

1 in 8

Here we are contemplating an escalation of the war in Afghanistan - an escalation that will cost us billions today and trillions tomorrow - and we learn that one in eight of our neighbors is on food stamps. Nine million of us have joined the food stamp program in the past two years. The $1,000,000 a year it costs to deploy one soldier to Afghanistan would support 640 people for a year. Talk about misplaced priorities! How can our leaders be so cavalier?

Changing the Rules?

Far from it when it comes to the financial markets. Here's a quote from Elizabeth Warren, the chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel on the Tarp,

"The rules that got us into this financial crisis have not yet been changed. The too-big-to-fail institutions are bigger, the banking industry is more concentrated and the toxic assets remain on the books of the banks. Worse yet, the implicit government guarantee that let big companies take on high risks, then keep all the rewards if they succeed and get taxpayer bailouts when they failed, are even stronger than they were a year ago."

She added, "In other words, we are now operating under a set of rules that have proven to be disastrous, but we have not changed them."

And then, Bill Black, who helped resolve the S&L crisis, notes

"We're putting in place much more severely perverse incentives: There's the endorsement of ‘too big to fail’; and the gaming of accounting rules so they don't recognize the losses of lenders - and regulators can't prove that they should be shut down."

We seem to be quickly moving back to a world of excessive risk, some of which is fueled by our low interest rates which enable speculators to borrow low here and invest at higher rates overseas. Each week seems to produce another article about another bubble being pumped up.

What are our leaders doing about it? We still don't require TARP recipients to actually lend money. We still allow banks to inflate the value of toxic assets. We are still too skittish to accept that some banks will fail and should fail. We are more willing to accept 10+% unemployment than to do something about our banking system. It's a cliche but we care more about Wall Street than Main Street.

The Realm of the COIN

Gian Gentile makes a strong argument against what appears to be an almost religious belief on the part of our military leaders that population-centric counter insurgency (COIN) is the only way for our armies to go. He feels that we really have adopted a strategy of tactics; i.e., we have no strategy. Most importantly, our adoption of COIN has been one of the least debated changes in our military strategy. In Gentile's view, "The new American way of war has eclipsed the execution of sound strategy, producing never-ending campaigns of nation-building and attempts to change entire societies in places like Afghanistan."

Gentile quotes approvingly from an article by Major Ike Sallee:

The Army, if we want to remain a profession, is best served in adhering to core values, principles, and capabilities. If the core is strong . . . then we are able to transfer capability to other methods. But if we focus on methods (area-specific tactics, techniques, and procedures) at the expense of core capabilities (offensive, defensive, protection, battle drills, marksmanship, physical fitness) we will be chasing our tails and may find ourselves lacking identity and relevance . . . . If forced to prioritize (inevitable for the foreseeable future)—focus on core capabilities . . . what our Army can do exclusively for our Nation. If we are thrown into a condition requiring counterinsurgency tactics, we will be able to adapt because of our well-trained competencies.

Gentile goes on to quote Sun Tzu:

Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory . . . . Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat . . . . There is no instance of a nation bene¬fitting from prolonged warfare . . . . Speed is the essence of war.

And he concludes:

The new American way of war — wars amongst the people — has turned Sun Tzu’s maxim on its head. These days it is customary to think of war and conflict as prolonged affairs that afflict the farthest-flung precincts of US influence, thereby demanding a long-term American military presence on the ground. We are told by the experts that this new way of war requires time, patience, modest amounts of blood, and vast amounts of treasure. Sun Tzu was highlighting strategy, and strategy is about choice, options, and the wisest use of resources in war to achieve political objectives. Yet in the new way of American war, tactics have buried strategy, and it precludes any options other than an endless and likely futile struggle to achieve the loyalty of populations that, in the end, may be peripheral to American interests.

Training: Who, What, Why

Listening to the talking heads on television, I get the impression that a fair number of the increased troops to be sent to Afghanistan will be "trainers". If this is the case, my first question is who will be trained. I assume it will be Afghans. But why do those Afghans - supposedly on our side - need training in the art of war when the opposition, who are mainly Afghans, is doing quite well without the benefit of foreign trainers? What will they be trained in? Winning hearts and minds?

Helping the Gulf countries

Of course, you know that most countries along the Persian Gulf are quite poor. Just think of some of them - Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, UAE, Kuwait, Saudi

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Arabia, Jordan - and your heart goes out to the inhabitants who are really, really struggling to make a living. Couple the poverty with the attempt by these nations to give power to the people and you can readily understand why our military has financed a number of construction projects in these countries. It so happens that most of these projects involve bases for our troops.

But, hey, it's for a good cause.

What is it about the presidency?

It looks like Mr. Obama will escalate the battle in Afghanistan, which is probably what Bush would have done, though with much more alacrity. I wonder whether presidents take a secret oath to keep the nation in perpetual war. Obama may have won the Nobel Peace Prize, but will it be a more peaceful world after thousands more of our young people expand the war?

What is worth so much in Afghanistan? Would our world end if we left the place? Is it the only hotbed of terrorism? Are we there to support a corrupt government? Does the average Afghan think better or worse of us after nine years of combat? Does he even want us there? What do we gain by being there? What does it mean to win the war there? Can we afford to spend hundreds of billions there every year? What else could we do with the million dollars a year it costs to deploy one soldier there?

What kind of a country have we become? Is this change?

A perceptive view of Obama to date

Roger Cohen hits the nail on the head in this article from today's NY Times:

Before coming up to Canada’s Atlantic provinces, where the nicest people in this nice country are said to live, I found myself seated next to Henry Kissinger at a New York dinner and asked him how he thought President Barack Obama was doing.

“He reminds me of a chess grandmaster who has played his opening in six simultaneous games,” Kissinger said. “But he hasn’t completed a single game and I’d like to see him finish one.”

I thought that wasn’t a bad image for Obama’s international gambits, and then here, at the first Halifax International Security Forum, I heard a similar observation from one participant: “We’ve had the set-up, but is there a middle game?” Or, put another way, can this probing, intelligent president close anything?

As an Obama admirer, I’m worried. He feels over-managed, over-scripted to me, to the point where he’s not showing the guts that prevailed at various difficult moments in the campaign. The ideas are good, but the warmth, cajoling and craft that make ideas more than that are lacking.

I find myself yearning for a presidential gaffe if only to reveal an instinctual human moment. Memo to Obama handlers: Give us a little more of the unvarnished. De-teleprompt the president for a few seconds!

The list of Obama’s international initiatives is of head-turning scope. There’s his “world without nuclear weapons,” announced in Prague last April, reiterated at the United Nations in September. It’s an idea with resonance, and may provide some moral suasion over countries contemplating pursuit of a bomb, but I can’t help recalling that the worlds of 1914 and 1939 were worlds without nukes. No thanks to that.

Unless proliferation, the most worrying global trend of the past 15 years is reversed, this dream is just a feel-good notion.

Then there’s the “reset button” with Russia, which always makes me think of those announcements on flights — “We’re trying to reset the video system” — and my heart sinks. One way to measure the importance of this attempt to warm a cool relationship is that Russia and the United States still control upward of 95 percent of the world’s nuclear arsenal.

There are glimmerings with Dmitri Medvedev, the Russian president, but as Robert Gates, the U.S. defense secretary, observed here, Russia now offers “two perspectives on the rest of the world depending on which of its leaders you’re talking to.” The other perspective is called Vladimir Putin.

Obama needs Russian help on Iran, but I’m not holding my breath for forthright cooperation from Moscow on any eventual sanctions. As for the follow-up agreement to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or Start, intended to cut Russian and American arsenals by about half and supposed to be signed before the old pact expires on Dec. 5, it still needs work. I don’t believe Obama has yet shifted the basic confrontational optic of a resurgent Russia emerging from the humiliation of imperial collapse.

On Afghanistan, where an announcement is at last imminent on the troops the United States will commit to “the necessary war,” Obama has mixed messages with unhappy results. The clarity of March yielded to the cloudiness of fall and the long think has, in the words here of John McCain, “sounded an uncertain trumpet.” Peter MacKay, the Canadian defense minister, said the hesitation was “not helpful” because “everyone has hit the pause button until the U.S. decision.”

I worry now that Obama’s quest for perfect calibration will yield a less than resounding fudge where the tenacious message of a troop increase is undermined by talk of exit timing. That’s not how you break the will of an enemy.

In Europe, a more modest reset attempt has been compromised with political leaders (if not the public) by a perception of cool distance, underscored when Obama did not show at 20th-anniversary celebrations of the Berlin Wall’s fall. Feelings are particularly strong in Paris, where mutterings about Obama’s “Carterization” are heard. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who ushered France back to NATO’s integrated military command structure, and shattered political taboos dictating coolness toward America, has seen his hopes for a special relationship evaporate.

In Israel-Palestine, Obama underestimated the damage of the past decade and has been outmaneuvered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The president’s groundbreaking outreach to Iran, which I applaud, has unsettled a regime that does not know how to respond. But here, as elsewhere, Obama has been unnecessarily weak on human rights issues in the face of an unconscionable crackdown. There’s a trace of churlish “ABB” — “Anything but Bush” — in Obama’s failure to speak out more for human rights and freedom. Once again, calibration has trumped gut to a damaging degree.

Ieva Kupce, a Latvian Defense Ministry official here, told me, “Watching Obama, I worry that democracy is going out of fashion. We in Latvia would not have made it without the United States.”

The great battle of the 21st century is going to be between free-market democracies and free-market authoritarian systems. America’s position in that struggle has to be clear if Obama’s simultaneous grandmaster openings are to produce victories.

Back in the day

In what appears to be the first of a series of articles about "Why They Hate Us", Stephen Walt really brings home the problems of an extended military occupation. He has a very apt analogy on the personal level.

Military occupation generates resistance because it is humiliating, disruptive, arbitrary and sometimes terrifying to its objects, even when the occupying power is acting from more-or-less benevolent motives. If you've ever been caught in a speed trap by a rude or abusive policeman (I have), or selected out for special attention crossing a border (ditto), you have a mild sense of what this is like. You are at the mercy of the person in charge, who is inevitably well-armed and can do pretty much whatever he (or she) wants. Any sign of protest will only make things go badly -- and in some situations will get you arrested, beaten, or worse -- so you choke down your anger and just put up with it. Now imagine that this is occurring after you've waited for hours at some internal checkpoint, that none of the occupiers speak your language, and that it is like this every single day. And occasionally the occupying power kills innocent people by mistake, engages in other forms of indiscriminate force, and does so with scant regard for local customs and sensibilities. Maintain this situation long enough, and some members of the local population will start looking for ways to strike back. Some of them may even decide to strap on explosive vests or get behind the wheel of a explosives-laden truck, and sacrifice themselves.

Many countries - England, France, Russia, Israel - have tried to dominate by sending their military to run another country. We ran into massive problems when we tried to militarily occupy parts of our own country. That experience, Reconstruction, has generated hatreds that have lasted more than 100 years. Think about it.

Is he nearing the end?

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

The week hasn't started well for Governor Mark Sanford. The state ethics commission has charged him with 37 violations. The South Carolina House has started impeachment proceedings. And to think that only a short while ago some people thought he would be a good candidate for President.

How little we know

Can you imagine a life whereby people think that you are comatose but you are not? Your brain is still functioning. Some scientists think a good number of supposedly comatose people areeally alert to what is going on around them. The primary example of this is Rom Houben, the victim of a severe auto accident in 1983.

Mr. Houben lived the life of the comatose for twenty-three years when in 2006. for some unknown reason, he was the beneficiary of advances made in brain technology at the start of this century. A scan of his brain showed that his brain was working. With the help of more technology he is now able to communicate with the world.

Wasting Money

We're considering spending some time in Florida this winter. So, I was pleased to see the special travel magazine in the NY Times today. My wife is interested in Sanibel and four Sanibel places had joined in a full page ad. Since we're just looking now, I went to their web sites. Or, I should say that I tried to go to the web sites listed in what had to be an expensive ad. One site could not be found via IE or Firefox. The search feature of a second site was in a loop that focused on bookings starting today. Did these organizations actually try to see how well their webs sites worked?

You're never too young

Would you spend $145 per session to enhance the chances of your child getting into a kindergarten for gifted children? If you lived in New York City, I guess you might. There seems to be a thriving kindergarten test prepa

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ration industry there. We have more and more parents who are convinced their offspring live in Lake Woebegone, where all children are above average.

I guess their willingness to spend the money is good for some parts of the economy, but is it good for the kids and for our nation?A basic question: If your four-year-old has to have extra coaching to be considered for a program for the gifted, should he be consider gifted? I think one also has to question the quality of some of these programs when one of the instructors says “You can see that when I scaffolded her, she knew it,” when she means she explained something to a child rather than placed the child on a scaffold.

Lose your job, lose your house

Some chilly news on the mortgage front. Just about 10% of home mortgage holders are at least one month behind in their payment; last year the number was 7%. The current rate of 10% is the highest it has ever been since this data has been tracked. The worst part of the news is that it's starting to look like those with quality loans are falling behind in their payments largely due to the crappy job market.

Making the Sale

Apparently some candidates for the Kennedy Senate seat believe that the telephone is a good way to sell their candidacy. Three of the four have called us over the past week or so. They have all called around 6:30 (p.m., of course), which is a perfect time to interrupt our after-dinner conversation. These calls have been very short as I hang up almost immediately.

I'm sure that they do make some sales, but at what cost. I'm talking about more than dollars and cents. I'd bet that more of these calls result in lost rather than won sales. You have to wonder particularly about the candidate who boasts of his business credentials. Is this an example of his business acumen?

In Pursuit of Truth, Justice and the American Way

Yesterday I told you of my experience dealing with the offices of a long-term Congressman. That experience was disappointing. Being a persistent bloke, I decided to go to the source, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Renewal (HUD), as opposed to the agency's funders, Congress. My experience with HUD was unbelievably different and rewarding.

First of all, I was not halted by a 'gatekeeper'. I found the name of the person who headed the department I was interested in and telephoned him. He was not in, so I left a message, expecting that would be the end of it. However, twenty minutes later he called back and gave me the name and telephone number of the person who could answer my questions.

Again, there was no 'gatekeeper'. The woman to whom I was referred answered her own phone. Best of all, she was aware of the problem and knew how close HUD was to resolving it. After telling me when the solution was expected, she asked that I call her if the problem was not resolved within the expected time.

One would have expected exactly the reverse of the responses I received - Olver to be accommodating, HUD to be secretive. Why the difference between HUD and Congress? Was it because Olver has been in Congress for decades and has lost the fire of serving the nation as well as his constituents? Or, was it because the people I spoke to at HUD were likely new to the job? Interesting questions, the answer to which I think supports my contention that our 'leaders' should be recalled as they really do not believe that we are their bosses.

Another record year

Back in February we reported that it was starting out as a record year for Army suicides. Sadly, that is the reality. To date 140 soldiers have committed suicide this year and there is still six weeks to go. In all of 2008 there were 128 suicides, so we've got at least a 10% rise. What will it be next year if Obama deploys more troops to Afghanistan?

Who are your constituents?

Congressman John Olver believes that only people who live in his district are his constituents and, strictly speaking, he is correct. But, if one is chair of a House or Senate committee, isn't this much too narrow a definition? I think so.

So, for perhaps the first time in my life I called a Congressman's office, as an organization to which I am close is dramatically affected by the work of a subcommittee Olver heads. But, I could get nowhere with Olver's staff. Their advice was to contact my Congressman, who, as far as I know, has no connection with Olver's committee and, since I had already contacted him via the mail, had been unable to help.

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I think this behavior is another indication of what is wrong with this country. Sure, you don't want YOUR Congressman wasting time talking with nuts. But, I really don't think I come across as a nutter. I'm of the school where Congressmen and Senators represent not only the people who elect them, but they represent the entire country.

Is our present system so much better than one where we would appoint our representatives by lottery? I think not.

Not Understanding the Real World

I think Geithner has lived in a bubble most of his life. His shirking of his tax obligations when working overseas was the first clue. His stumbling as the Treasury Secretary was another indication. Now, the report of the TARP Inspector General with regards to AIG provides still more support for this position.

The problem in the AIG situation began with Geinthner's belief that the government would not have to intervene, the private sector would take care of the matter and there would not be a bankruptcy. Thus, there was no Plan B when help did not emerge from the private sector. As a result, Geithner accepted the deal no private organization wanted and threw in an extra $10 billion. To add frosting to the cake, the deal was not workable, the interest rate was impossible for AIG to pay. So, Geithner and company at the NY Fed decided to get $40 billion from TARP to reduce the principal. They also created a special purpose vehicle, Maiden Lane III, to releive the pressure of the CDOs held by AIG. This SPV simply bought the CDOs at the contract price, which was quite a bit above market price. They initially tried to get a deal, but backed down at almost the first refusal.

The NY FED and company either forgot or refused to use any of the massive leverage they had over the situation. It seemed to be a case where the guys in deep shit were, in fact, calling the shots. The AIG counterparties got considerable cash - our cash - because of Geithner's lack of deal-making prowess. What did we get? What will we get? When?

10,400 vs. 17,000,000

The stock market closed above 10,400 today. Also happening today was the release of a study of hungry people by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. This study shows that there are 17,000,000 households with 49,000,000 men, women and children who have gone to bed hungry over the past year. That works out to 14.6% of the households in our country. That's the highest percent since the government counted these numbers.

Is the economy stabilizing? Certainly it is for some. But not for the 10.2% unemployed or the 14.6% hungry. We have a ways - a long ways - to go before we can say goodby to economic adversity.

Getting By

These old Mainers show how you can get by - and do good - as you age. See it on PBS as soon as you can. And have a handkerchief handy.

Our Times

From today's NY Times:

• 22 Republicans and 20 Democrats either gave speeches - or included verbatim in their speeches talking points - written by lobbyists for Genentech.


• The White House estimates that it costs $1,000,000 to deploy a soldier in Afghanistan for one year.

And we're wasting time arguing whether Hasan is a terrorist! What kind of a country have we become?

Taking Kennedy's Place

Today's Boston Globe gives the four candidates for Kennedy's Senate seat a chance to advance their candidacies via a brief article.

Coakley, the state attorney general, apparently thinks the election is a referendum on health care since that's what her article is about. Capuano, a Congressman and formerly Somerville mayor, thinks it's about combating terrorism while maintaining our values. Neither appeals to me. Coakley appears to be getting bad advice as she entered this race as the leader, but, to someone who has not been closely following the race, seems to be fading. Why she would talk only about health care when our state government is approaching the ICU is beyond my comprehension. Sure, health care is a major issue, but there is more than one issue of vital importance as we enter 2010. Capuano is mouthing cliches.

Khazei argues that the problem is really with us as he says, "We need to move past the tired debate of Big Government vs. Big Business and embrace Big Citizenship. It is always citizens - involved in politics, service, and movements for change, combined with bold political leadership that changes our country.... I learned from Senator Kennedy that being a great senator is much more than casting votes and giving speeches. It is about utilizing the platform to empower citizens to achieve the American Dream, to make a

Image via Wikipedia

difference in their lives, communities, and the Commonwealth. That way, we will leave both the state and the country stronger and better for it." Khazei does have a point. We have ceded too much to 'leaders' who are incompetent, greedy or lazy. But he's been portrayed as a kook.

Pagliuca, the venture capitalist, focuses on the economy. He does have some good ideas - investing in the life sciences, overhauling the financial regulatory system, controlling health costs, spending tax revenue differently. He's come out of nowhere but has spent his way to some recognition.

I don't see myself voting for either Coakley or Capuano. I've voted for kooks before, as not all of them turn out to be weirdos. Some of Pagliuca's ads actually make sense.

It will be an interesting month, one in which hopefully the voters become more interested in the other Senator from Massachusetts. We need someone who actually will do something other than conduct a vapid campaign for President.

The Mysteries of Software

You'll note that I've dumped FeedBlitz as a way for you to be apprised of updates to this blog. For some unknown reason it just stopped working. Getting FeedBurner to work was not a piece of cake, but try it and let's see.

Let me know if you'd prefer to subscribe via RSS.

Thanks for subscribing and for reading these ruminations every so often.

Ah, the English

They would do almost anything to make their gardens grow. The latest is a pee bale, which is a three-metre long pile of straw and other things upon which the male employees of a National Trust property urinate. The Trust believes that urination activates a compost heap. Not only will this make grass grow greener, but it will save water in that toilet flushing is expected to be reduced by 30%.

Veteran's Day

Image via Wikipedia

It is my fervent wish that there never be a need for a Veteran's Day or, if you're old enough, an Armistice Day.

We have wasted so many lives in the pursuit of righteousness, in the belief that we know what's right for the rest of the world, convinced we know what's right for everyone else. And who has paid the price of our arrogance? Our youth and their parents and grandparents. Gates has not, Obama has not, Bush has not, Clinton has not.

I am not a pacifist, as I believe that evil exists and, at times, you must do what can be seen as bad things to defeat it. But, in the 21st century this country has overstepped its boundaries and has exhibited many qualities of an evil, arrogant nation. Will we ever return to a day when we practice what we preach? Hate and fear and greed and irresponsibility have taken over this nation.

"Defying Gravity"

That's what a JP Morgan managing director said about American Business Financial Services (ABFS) in February 2003. He went on, "A lot continues to rest on the willingness of subordinated debt investors to roll over their notes." These "investors" were mainly old folks who were somehow convinced of the soundness of ABFS, which went belly up in 2005 losing some $600,000,000.

A Morgan Stanley managing director forecast a PR nightmare by dealing with ABFS. Others at these two firms raised doubts about ABFS yet they made sure that the company would continue to deal in subordinated debt; in 2002 JP granted credit to the company only if the compamy maintained $375,000,000 in subordinated debt. Credit Suisse signed a similar agreement. Why do you suppose that JP and Credit Suisse force ABFS to continue to peddle crap? Do you suppose greed made them do it?

Sign the petition

Okay, Bernie Sanders does walk a different path than most of us. But, he's written a very simple bill which might actually restore some sanity to our financial system. Here's the bill (and it's not 1990 pages):

A BILL

To address the concept of ‘‘Too Big To Fail’’ with respect to certain financial entities.
1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa
2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Too Big to Fail, Too
5 Big to Exist Act’’.
6 SEC. 2. REPORT TO CONGRESS ON INSTITUTIONS THAT
7 ARE TOO BIG TO FAIL.
8 Notwithstanding any other provision of law, not later
9 than 90 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the
10 Secretary of the Treasury shall submit to Congress a list

1 of all commercial banks, investment banks, hedge funds,
2 and insurance companies that the Secretary believes are
3 too big to fail (in this Act referred to as the ‘‘Too Big
4 to Fail List’’).
5 SEC. 3. BREAKING-UP TOO BIG TO FAIL INSTITUTIONS.
6 Notwithstanding any other provision of law, begin
7 ning 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the
8 Secretary of the Treasury shall break up entities included
9 on the Too Big To Fail List, so that their failure would
10 no longer cause a catastrophic effect on the United States
11 or global economy without a taxpayer bailout.
12 SEC. 4. DEFINITION.
13 For purposes of this Act, the term ‘‘Too Big to Fail’’
14 means any entity that has grown so large that its failure
15 would have a catastrophic effect on the stability of either
16 the financial system or the United States economy without
17 substantial Government assistance.

Simple but powerful. Sign his petition.

Stimulating Afghanistan

Even before we passed the stimulus bill here we were providing economic stimuli to Afghanistan. In FY2009 the U.S. Army alone awarded $2.2 billion in contracts, $834,000,000 of which went for construction projects. It's amazing the amount of construction going on there.

Bagram Air Base is one of the more popular places to expand. The four concrete plants on the base have been working 24 hours a day for 18 months. The Air Force section of the base is building $200,000,000 worth of projects.We're building a prison that can hold more than 1,000 detainees. There will be a $30,000,000 passenger terminal opened in 2011.

Would fixing the infrastructure here have been a better use of the money? Does all this investment indicate our children's children will be serving in Afghanistan, as has happened with the overseas bases we established after WWII?

Europe Runs The Banks

Which is not quite the way things are turning out over here. A couple of examples show a Europe that does not want a repeat of the current situation. Ing has to split its banking and insurance operations and sell its on-line U.S. bank. Anglo-Irish Bank is nationalized. Commerzbank has to sell off its real estate lending operations. RBS has to sell off its insurance and commodity trading operations. Fortis is moving back to being split nationally.

By and large, all of these companies have gotten less from their governments than our banks have. Yet, the foreign governments do not seem to be returning to the good old days as we are.

A Professional Army

We've seen the difficulties that have occurred in recruiting soldiers over the past few years which have led to a growing number of waivers allowing many to jo

Image by US Army Africa via Flickr

in the armed services. Now a group of former and current military leaders have issued a report that asserts that 75% of our teenagers would not be admitted to the service because they are are either too fat, under-educated or have a criminal record.

Is a professional army a viable solution in an era of constant war? Does a professional army make it easier for people to avoid thinking of our constant wars? In every year of this century we have been at war and it looks like we'll continue that record. Is this what our country is about?

Believe this one and..

I have a bridge for sale.

A 68-year-old Korean woman claims to have taken the written exam for a driver's license 950 times in four years before she finally passed it. That's 237 times in a year. If South Korea has a five-day work week, that means she takes the test almost every work day. I know people aged 68 have more time, but who in their right mind would spend almost every day taking a test for four years.

Now she faces the task of passing the actual driving exam.

Proof Positive?

The Atlantic seems to be on a medical kick. Last month David Goldhill discussed an alternative way to pay for health care, a way that is quite different from our current structure. This month Shannon Brownlee and Jeanne Lenzer question the efficacy of flu vaccines.

Essentially they argue that vaccines are not scientifically tested. In their opinion and that of some medical gurus we need to test vaccines in what I thought was the normal scientific method: have a large and representative enough sample, give half the people the vaccine and half a placebo, measure the result. Well, we have not done it that way.

The way we measure the efficacy of flu vaccines is “cohort studies”. In these studies the death rate of those who choose to be vaccinated is compared to the death rate of those who do not so choose. Is this a reasonably representative sample? Are those who choose vaccination fundamentally different – in education, income, health, etc. – than those who do not? True, there is an attempt to weed out variables that might bias the result, but one never knows whether these attempts are successful or not. The article quotes studies that demonstrate that there is a meaningful difference in the subject categories.

A couple of substantiating facts. In 2004 because of production problems 40% fewer people were vaccinated, yet the death rate did not climb. In 1968 and 1977 the vaccines that were produced protected against a different form of virus that actually appeared in the flu seasons for those years, yet the death rate did not climb. In 1989 15% of the elderly population had the flu shot. Now, more than 65% do. However, death rates among the elderly during flu season have increased. We are not at all specific about identifying deaths actually caused by the flu; if it’s caused by a respiratory failure, we call it flu.

Brownlee and Lenzer also do not have kind words to say about Tamiflu and Relenza, the vaccines of today. The FDA says. “Tamiflu has not been proven to have a positive impact on the potential consequences… of seasonal, avian or pandemic influenza”.

Have you gotten your flu shot yet?

Is Britain Leading The Way?

The Journal reports that the British "government is starting a process to rebuild the country's banking system, likely pressing major divestments from institutions and trying to attract new retail banks to the market". Maybe, "too big to fail" is not acceptable in England.

AIPAC Still Runs The Show

The Goldstone UN report on the war in Gaza castigated both Israel and Palestine and accused both of committing war crimes with Israel bearing more of the burden. Well, AIPAC didn't like the report and has convinced some of our peerless leaders to sponsor a resolution condemning the report.

It looks as though AIPAC has also succeeded in making its case with the Obama administration as Ms Clinton seems to believe that Netanyahu has made "unprecedented concessions" although he has continued to expand the settlements.

Change we can believe in?

Fun as a way to change behavior

You have to hand it to the Swedes