Ralph is at it again. His running for president is now nothing more than an ego trip and not an attempt to get attention for his causes -- whatever they may be. The worst thing to happen was when he got 3% of the vote in 2000 tipping the election to George Bush (who still lost the popular vote). It seems to have emboldened Nader and made him think that he is actually relevant.
He is not relevant and his cynical comments that there was no difference between George Bush and Al Gore hurt his own causes. He needs to work within the system to get his message heard and his issues dealt with. In Europe's parliamentary systems such small party candidacies have their place. However, in the US two-party system, for better or for worse, Nader is merely a spoiler and spoil sport.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Socialized Medicine
It's not that socialized medicine doesn't provide adequate care, but right now the privatized American system provides better than adequate care for those with health insurance. However, many Americans don't have adequate insurance or adequate care. The easy answer is to go to a single payer medical care system like those in Canada and Europe that provides equal access to medical care for everyone. Generally, this works.
BUT . . . that really is not good enough. The United States doesn't enjoy its economic position because it was constantly striving for economic equality. Thus, it makes no sense to lower the quality of care of those Americans with excellent care so that those without care can get some. The United States should strive to provide excellent care for all -- not meet in the middle.
Personally, I don't want adequate health care; I want superior health care. Those who can afford it shouldn't be made to lower the quality of care they receive. It is not the American Way. We need to find a way to provide health care for all without compromising the quality of health care many Americans currently receive.
Many would argue that this does not need to be the case. Let me share an anecdote. British Ambassador to the United States Sir Christopher Meyer wasn't feeling well. Turns out he needed surgery. He was preparing to go to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota for treatment. However, Her Majesty's government told him to wait until his US posting was up (which was happening shortly), and they wanted him to wait to get the surgery in the UK -- it would be much cheaper. He got the surgery in the UK, just in the nick of time. Had he waited another day or two, he could have died.
So, someone in the elite who should have access to the best health care has a bureaucracy decide where he should get his health care, because health care is rationed equally. Hmmmmmm.
But "Wait!" you say. Why should the elite get better care???!!! Well, my socialist friends, because that is the way the system works. There is nothing wrong with people with more resources getting more. It is called capitalism. Now, I am not getting carried away and advocating a strict capitalist model with no social contract. Ayn Rand's world of "Atlas Shrugged" is not a good model either.
So what can we do? We tweak the system we have. We take what works and use it. Private insurance works. We have more access to the best medical technology than any other place in the world. Believe it or not, Medicare works. It is super efficient with administrative costs at less than 2%. HMO's don't work so well. It's like socialized medicine. Each patient is allocated a certain amount of resources and there are incentives for not exceeding the allocation. That type of system is a race to the bottom. Not where I want to get care.
So, we like private insurance and Medicare and don't like socialized medicine and HMOs. Let's work with that.
Because our model includes a social contract we have to have some government involvement, but at the same time we want to make sure we are using the vaunted American market forces to keep innovation up. So, the first thing we do is require companies with 15 or more employees to provide health insurance to their employees. It's not a burden, it's a benefit. You will have better employees if you give them better insurance. We are using a 15 employee minimum as that is that standard for imposing federal regulations on businesses. By the way, did I mention that we will eliminate Medicaid, which is the state run health care system for the poor? Don't worry, they will get health care--better health care.
Now, we have all those people who don't work for companies with more than 15 employees. Well, there is still private health insurance for them to buy either from a private insurer or through the Federal government through a plan we will call Medicare for Small Businesses.
Thus, we take Medicare and expand it. But we are eliminating Medicaid, so we eliminate 50 separate bureaucracies and expand a very efficient system. Thus, we have a huge savings there. We also eliminate a set of taxes that fund Medicaid. Medicare taxes won't increase because we will be taking premiums from those who don't get private insurance from their employer. Small employers can opt-in to the Medicare system or provide private insurance.
The federal government is paying for the bulk of Medicaid anyway. So why duplicate the effort 50 times over, and have 50 different standards to get into the system and 50 different systems for reimbursement. It will also lower the cost of drugs as drug companies won't have to seek formulary approval in each state.
So, those who can afford it, can still get the best insurance and best medical care available. Those working for employers with 15 or more employees have private health insurance. Those working for smaller employers can have either private insurance or a Medicare for Small Business Plan. Those who are unemployed are on Medicare at a reduced premium or with no premium depending on need. There is no rationing of health care and there is no increase in bureaucracy.
There is not necessarily equal access to health care, but their is access. Under this plan, no one will be without access to health care and there will be no reason for anyone not to seek medical care when they need it. Because there is insurance for all, people can go to doctors instead of emergency rooms at public hospitals for health care. This saves money as ER care is much more costly than a doctor visit--a more efficient system because people can now choose to go. They are not forced to seek a de facto socialist system by burdening public hospitals. Thus, health care is redistributed by market forces. Ahh, the American Way.
Americans need to remember what brought prosperity to America in the first place. Competition is key and the private sector is the backbone of our economic strength, but there is a responsibility to those on the periphery of the system. They can't be left behind, but we don't have to accept mediocrity across the board to honor our social contract.
Socialized medicine is un-American and stupid.
BUT . . . that really is not good enough. The United States doesn't enjoy its economic position because it was constantly striving for economic equality. Thus, it makes no sense to lower the quality of care of those Americans with excellent care so that those without care can get some. The United States should strive to provide excellent care for all -- not meet in the middle.
Personally, I don't want adequate health care; I want superior health care. Those who can afford it shouldn't be made to lower the quality of care they receive. It is not the American Way. We need to find a way to provide health care for all without compromising the quality of health care many Americans currently receive.
Many would argue that this does not need to be the case. Let me share an anecdote. British Ambassador to the United States Sir Christopher Meyer wasn't feeling well. Turns out he needed surgery. He was preparing to go to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota for treatment. However, Her Majesty's government told him to wait until his US posting was up (which was happening shortly), and they wanted him to wait to get the surgery in the UK -- it would be much cheaper. He got the surgery in the UK, just in the nick of time. Had he waited another day or two, he could have died.
So, someone in the elite who should have access to the best health care has a bureaucracy decide where he should get his health care, because health care is rationed equally. Hmmmmmm.
But "Wait!" you say. Why should the elite get better care???!!! Well, my socialist friends, because that is the way the system works. There is nothing wrong with people with more resources getting more. It is called capitalism. Now, I am not getting carried away and advocating a strict capitalist model with no social contract. Ayn Rand's world of "Atlas Shrugged" is not a good model either.
So what can we do? We tweak the system we have. We take what works and use it. Private insurance works. We have more access to the best medical technology than any other place in the world. Believe it or not, Medicare works. It is super efficient with administrative costs at less than 2%. HMO's don't work so well. It's like socialized medicine. Each patient is allocated a certain amount of resources and there are incentives for not exceeding the allocation. That type of system is a race to the bottom. Not where I want to get care.
So, we like private insurance and Medicare and don't like socialized medicine and HMOs. Let's work with that.
Because our model includes a social contract we have to have some government involvement, but at the same time we want to make sure we are using the vaunted American market forces to keep innovation up. So, the first thing we do is require companies with 15 or more employees to provide health insurance to their employees. It's not a burden, it's a benefit. You will have better employees if you give them better insurance. We are using a 15 employee minimum as that is that standard for imposing federal regulations on businesses. By the way, did I mention that we will eliminate Medicaid, which is the state run health care system for the poor? Don't worry, they will get health care--better health care.
Now, we have all those people who don't work for companies with more than 15 employees. Well, there is still private health insurance for them to buy either from a private insurer or through the Federal government through a plan we will call Medicare for Small Businesses.
Thus, we take Medicare and expand it. But we are eliminating Medicaid, so we eliminate 50 separate bureaucracies and expand a very efficient system. Thus, we have a huge savings there. We also eliminate a set of taxes that fund Medicaid. Medicare taxes won't increase because we will be taking premiums from those who don't get private insurance from their employer. Small employers can opt-in to the Medicare system or provide private insurance.
The federal government is paying for the bulk of Medicaid anyway. So why duplicate the effort 50 times over, and have 50 different standards to get into the system and 50 different systems for reimbursement. It will also lower the cost of drugs as drug companies won't have to seek formulary approval in each state.
So, those who can afford it, can still get the best insurance and best medical care available. Those working for employers with 15 or more employees have private health insurance. Those working for smaller employers can have either private insurance or a Medicare for Small Business Plan. Those who are unemployed are on Medicare at a reduced premium or with no premium depending on need. There is no rationing of health care and there is no increase in bureaucracy.
There is not necessarily equal access to health care, but their is access. Under this plan, no one will be without access to health care and there will be no reason for anyone not to seek medical care when they need it. Because there is insurance for all, people can go to doctors instead of emergency rooms at public hospitals for health care. This saves money as ER care is much more costly than a doctor visit--a more efficient system because people can now choose to go. They are not forced to seek a de facto socialist system by burdening public hospitals. Thus, health care is redistributed by market forces. Ahh, the American Way.
Americans need to remember what brought prosperity to America in the first place. Competition is key and the private sector is the backbone of our economic strength, but there is a responsibility to those on the periphery of the system. They can't be left behind, but we don't have to accept mediocrity across the board to honor our social contract.
Socialized medicine is un-American and stupid.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
The Loss
Over the last six years the Bush administration has led the United States into its greatest loss since the Vietnam War. And that loss has nothing to do with military success or failure in Iraq, Afghanistan or the war on terror. The loss is that of Moral Authority. The shining city on the hill, which shone brightly with the fall of the Berlin Wall, is now obscured by the fog of paranoia and the quest for power; the quest for security at the expense of liberty.
America stood out in 1989 not as a beacon of perfection or the ultimate society, but as a sharp contrast to the corruption and moral decay that fell the Soviet empire. Even through the 1991 Gulf War the United States maintained itself as flawed, but with a stead moral compass. President George HW Bush put together a coalition of nations to liberate a small nation overrun by a large one only for the sake of territorial expansion and a grab at wealth. There was an undercurrent that this was only being done to defend the supply of oil, but the broad coalition validated the use of force and showed that the United States was not acting brashly solely in its own national interest, but was acting as the leader of the international community.
The United States is no longer the leader of the international community. The coalition of the willing sent into Iraq in 2003 was a mere shadow of the coalition that liberated Kuwait in 1991. The outpouring of solidarity with the American people following 9/11, the zenith of which was the declaration of French editorial boards that "we are all Americans" and the playing of the Star Spangled Banner by the Welsh Guard at Buckingham Palace, has collapsed into near universal condemnation of Bush administration policies both at home and abroad.
The American people have finally recognized that the erosion of their civil liberties by the Bush Administration does not assure security, but political tyranny. The once moral Bush administration advocating "faith-based initiatives", whose political philosophy was based upon the teachings of Jesus Christ, is now shunned by the conservatives who championed him.
However, America is on its way to regaining its moral authority. The American people are rejecting the ways of the Bush Administration. The abuses of the Patriot Act are coming out which will lead to its repeal, or at very least its emasculation. The majority of the populace has taken to hear the truism that those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither. The Bush administration is reviled like that of Nixon -- however, without the foreign policy success (and of course we cannot forget the Endangered Species Act which may qualify Nixon as a "compassionate conservative" at least in regard to animals). On both sides of the political spectrum Americans have recognized that we have lost our way and it is time to get back on course. Presidential candidates on both sides are rejecting the absolutism brought forth by the unitary executive and a real debate is now occurring; and open and honest debate, while dirty, is the only way to clean-up America's reputation in the world and once again become that beacon that lets the world see both its qualities and its flaws.
America stood out in 1989 not as a beacon of perfection or the ultimate society, but as a sharp contrast to the corruption and moral decay that fell the Soviet empire. Even through the 1991 Gulf War the United States maintained itself as flawed, but with a stead moral compass. President George HW Bush put together a coalition of nations to liberate a small nation overrun by a large one only for the sake of territorial expansion and a grab at wealth. There was an undercurrent that this was only being done to defend the supply of oil, but the broad coalition validated the use of force and showed that the United States was not acting brashly solely in its own national interest, but was acting as the leader of the international community.
The United States is no longer the leader of the international community. The coalition of the willing sent into Iraq in 2003 was a mere shadow of the coalition that liberated Kuwait in 1991. The outpouring of solidarity with the American people following 9/11, the zenith of which was the declaration of French editorial boards that "we are all Americans" and the playing of the Star Spangled Banner by the Welsh Guard at Buckingham Palace, has collapsed into near universal condemnation of Bush administration policies both at home and abroad.
The American people have finally recognized that the erosion of their civil liberties by the Bush Administration does not assure security, but political tyranny. The once moral Bush administration advocating "faith-based initiatives", whose political philosophy was based upon the teachings of Jesus Christ, is now shunned by the conservatives who championed him.
However, America is on its way to regaining its moral authority. The American people are rejecting the ways of the Bush Administration. The abuses of the Patriot Act are coming out which will lead to its repeal, or at very least its emasculation. The majority of the populace has taken to hear the truism that those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither. The Bush administration is reviled like that of Nixon -- however, without the foreign policy success (and of course we cannot forget the Endangered Species Act which may qualify Nixon as a "compassionate conservative" at least in regard to animals). On both sides of the political spectrum Americans have recognized that we have lost our way and it is time to get back on course. Presidential candidates on both sides are rejecting the absolutism brought forth by the unitary executive and a real debate is now occurring; and open and honest debate, while dirty, is the only way to clean-up America's reputation in the world and once again become that beacon that lets the world see both its qualities and its flaws.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Iraq
Iraq has reached a new level of stupidity for me on a personal level.
Sure, the handling of the execution of Saddam Hussein was typical of the handling of the entire Iraq expedition (or is it a foray?). Should he have been executed before being put on trial for all his other crimes? Is execution even an acceptable way in 2007 to deal with a war criminal?
While these are very interesting and valid points for discussion, one other thing happened in Iraq that crystallizes all these questions: my friend's son was shot by a sniper in Iraq. Now, I use the term "friend" loosely. He is more of a co-worker. A very nice guy who I work with and interact with on a daily basis. However, having heard that his 20-year-old son, a Marine, had been wounded and was being airlifted back to the US, I was devastated. I was angry. I was sad. I had a very strong reaction. Now, I make it a point to read the names of those who have died in Iraq as they are published in the newspaper. We have to realize that no matter what our feeling about the war in Iraq, people are dying and lives are being irreparably changes. And while I feel empathy for those killed and wounded and their families, there is no feeling as knowing someone who has felt it directly.
It put me into a funk for a good two days and whenever I thought about it I had strong emotions. The rest of us in the office made sure he got to meet his son at the hospital and his family flew there with him. We called friends and relatives in the area of the hospital to make sure that anything the family needed would be taken care of. But with great emotion comes some deep thinking.
What is our objective in Iraq? Why are these young people dying?
No one is sure. We have many platitudes about the frontlines in the war in terror, bringing democracy, stabilizing the Middle East, etc. None of these is an acceptable objective.
World War II was very clear cut. We were attacked by a definable enemy and we looked into the eye of evil. In Korea we were defending democracy and making a stand against China exporting its Communist revolution. We thought we were doing the same in Vietnam, but stepping back, we realized that we had gone in to save a colonial possession (of the French) and were not really containing Communism as much getting in the middle of a civil war. Even in the first Gulf War we had an objective: remove Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and protect the oil fields of Saudi Arabia that are essential to our economy. We did so with overwhelming force and stopped once the objective was achieved (we made other mistakes, but achieved the main objective and got out).
In Iraq we abandoned what was termed the "Powell Doctrine," the use of overwhelming force coupled with a clear military and political objective and the support of the American people and our allies. We have paid dearly for not listening to those who learned the hard lessons of Vietnam taught in the rice paddies and the jungle and instead paid heed to the political scientists who studied it without experiencing it.
The deaths of those soldiers in Iraq are not in vain if we redeploy to protect our allies and contain the current Iraqi civil war. We removed a dictator and a genocidal maniac, now it is up to the Iraqi's to sort out their differences. We should not spend our blood and treasure to try and stabilize a situation that is not of our making. It is not foreign fighters or elements of Al-Qaeda stirring up trouble. It is hundreds of years of religious animosity that is causing the violence along with the repression of the Sunni-dominated regime of Hussein that has let it explode into the streets. After repressing Shiites for years the Sunni's fear retribution. This is not our fight. Let's pull back and protect Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Let's protect the border with Iran so they don't dominate the now lawless Iraq and lets deploy our troops to Afghanistan to get the guys who attacked us.
Sure, the handling of the execution of Saddam Hussein was typical of the handling of the entire Iraq expedition (or is it a foray?). Should he have been executed before being put on trial for all his other crimes? Is execution even an acceptable way in 2007 to deal with a war criminal?
While these are very interesting and valid points for discussion, one other thing happened in Iraq that crystallizes all these questions: my friend's son was shot by a sniper in Iraq. Now, I use the term "friend" loosely. He is more of a co-worker. A very nice guy who I work with and interact with on a daily basis. However, having heard that his 20-year-old son, a Marine, had been wounded and was being airlifted back to the US, I was devastated. I was angry. I was sad. I had a very strong reaction. Now, I make it a point to read the names of those who have died in Iraq as they are published in the newspaper. We have to realize that no matter what our feeling about the war in Iraq, people are dying and lives are being irreparably changes. And while I feel empathy for those killed and wounded and their families, there is no feeling as knowing someone who has felt it directly.
It put me into a funk for a good two days and whenever I thought about it I had strong emotions. The rest of us in the office made sure he got to meet his son at the hospital and his family flew there with him. We called friends and relatives in the area of the hospital to make sure that anything the family needed would be taken care of. But with great emotion comes some deep thinking.
What is our objective in Iraq? Why are these young people dying?
No one is sure. We have many platitudes about the frontlines in the war in terror, bringing democracy, stabilizing the Middle East, etc. None of these is an acceptable objective.
World War II was very clear cut. We were attacked by a definable enemy and we looked into the eye of evil. In Korea we were defending democracy and making a stand against China exporting its Communist revolution. We thought we were doing the same in Vietnam, but stepping back, we realized that we had gone in to save a colonial possession (of the French) and were not really containing Communism as much getting in the middle of a civil war. Even in the first Gulf War we had an objective: remove Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and protect the oil fields of Saudi Arabia that are essential to our economy. We did so with overwhelming force and stopped once the objective was achieved (we made other mistakes, but achieved the main objective and got out).
In Iraq we abandoned what was termed the "Powell Doctrine," the use of overwhelming force coupled with a clear military and political objective and the support of the American people and our allies. We have paid dearly for not listening to those who learned the hard lessons of Vietnam taught in the rice paddies and the jungle and instead paid heed to the political scientists who studied it without experiencing it.
The deaths of those soldiers in Iraq are not in vain if we redeploy to protect our allies and contain the current Iraqi civil war. We removed a dictator and a genocidal maniac, now it is up to the Iraqi's to sort out their differences. We should not spend our blood and treasure to try and stabilize a situation that is not of our making. It is not foreign fighters or elements of Al-Qaeda stirring up trouble. It is hundreds of years of religious animosity that is causing the violence along with the repression of the Sunni-dominated regime of Hussein that has let it explode into the streets. After repressing Shiites for years the Sunni's fear retribution. This is not our fight. Let's pull back and protect Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Let's protect the border with Iran so they don't dominate the now lawless Iraq and lets deploy our troops to Afghanistan to get the guys who attacked us.
Sarbanes-Oxley
First, we had the stupidly anti-constitutional "Thompson Memo" which stated that the Department of Justice would only consider a corporation to cooperative in an investigation if it waived attorney-client privilege. Just recently, the Department of Justice stopped the insanity and replaced the Thomposon Memo with the McNulty Memo which reverses that course of action stating that it was counter-productive. Gee, really?
Now, Sarbanes-Oxley strikes again. The ridiculous act which has caused the international financial community to abandon US IPO's for international companies, leading London to be the king of the financial hill, has now directly caused a cost on US consumers. The Act which was supposed to protect investors and make corporations more transparent has added so many layers of complexity to corporate accounting and reporting that the costs are now becoming apparent to consumers as it forces corporations to make decisions adverse to the general public so that they may contort themselves to fit within the absurd constrictures of the Act and its progeny, most importantly changes to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles.
Without getting into why GAAP distorts the financial picture of public companies and makes it impossible for a normal human to comprehend the actual financial health of a company, let's just get to the example.
Apple, Inc. (formerly known as Apple Computer), has announced that due to changes in GAAP mandated by Sarbanes-Oxley it will have to charge for a software patch to update a chip in its new computers that will allow the computers to access 802.11n Wi-Fi devices, the newest high speed standard for wireless computing. Apple is charging $1.99 for the patch.
Is this just an excuse to charge people for something they already paid for? Apple says no and logic seems to bear this out. This fee will effect about 1 million Macs sold during the last quarter or so that contain the newest wireless chip. Thus Apple stands to make $2 million. Not a lot of money for a company that earned $1 Billion net profit in the last quarter. Apple claims that Sarbanes-Oxley's change to GAAP requires them to charge for a significant enhancement to a product they have already sold. Otherwise, they couldn't have recognized the full amount of the revenue earned from the previous sales.
So the end result is that everyone who bought a Mac in the last few months have to pay $1.99 to unlock the power of something they already bought or pay $179 for an Airport Extreme Base Station that includes the software patch in its price.
So, is Apple's accounting now more transparent or the consumers are just getting screwed, again?
Now, Sarbanes-Oxley strikes again. The ridiculous act which has caused the international financial community to abandon US IPO's for international companies, leading London to be the king of the financial hill, has now directly caused a cost on US consumers. The Act which was supposed to protect investors and make corporations more transparent has added so many layers of complexity to corporate accounting and reporting that the costs are now becoming apparent to consumers as it forces corporations to make decisions adverse to the general public so that they may contort themselves to fit within the absurd constrictures of the Act and its progeny, most importantly changes to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles.
Without getting into why GAAP distorts the financial picture of public companies and makes it impossible for a normal human to comprehend the actual financial health of a company, let's just get to the example.
Apple, Inc. (formerly known as Apple Computer), has announced that due to changes in GAAP mandated by Sarbanes-Oxley it will have to charge for a software patch to update a chip in its new computers that will allow the computers to access 802.11n Wi-Fi devices, the newest high speed standard for wireless computing. Apple is charging $1.99 for the patch.
Is this just an excuse to charge people for something they already paid for? Apple says no and logic seems to bear this out. This fee will effect about 1 million Macs sold during the last quarter or so that contain the newest wireless chip. Thus Apple stands to make $2 million. Not a lot of money for a company that earned $1 Billion net profit in the last quarter. Apple claims that Sarbanes-Oxley's change to GAAP requires them to charge for a significant enhancement to a product they have already sold. Otherwise, they couldn't have recognized the full amount of the revenue earned from the previous sales.
So the end result is that everyone who bought a Mac in the last few months have to pay $1.99 to unlock the power of something they already bought or pay $179 for an Airport Extreme Base Station that includes the software patch in its price.
So, is Apple's accounting now more transparent or the consumers are just getting screwed, again?
Monday, December 25, 2006
Winning
I am confused by winning in Iraq. I just read another letter to the editor where the person equated withdrawl with "cutting and running" and that the United States should not leave Iraq or draw down troops until we "win."
What constitutes winning? Is it peace in Iraq? Is it no more dead American troops? Is it US domination of the country so that violence gets to a manageable level?
President Bush hasn't really defined "winning" or "finishing the job" or whatever else the ultimate goal is in Iraq. If the goal in Iraq was democracy, well, its done. They had free and fair elections. That it resulted in a civil way is a completely different problem. I would prefer to have US troops intervene in the civil war (if that is what it is) in Darfur. At least there we have a defined goal and a defined enemy. In Iraq, you help Shiites one day and Sunnis the next and they both hate you for the day before. It's a no-win situation.
The solution in Iraq is political and not military. Take a lesson from Yugoslavia and divide the country. The Kurds are doing quite well without the Shiites or Sunnis in there protected northern enclave. Divide Iraq into three zones, share the oil revenues and get the hell out. Divide and conquer. Iraq as a nation is fiction of British colonialism. Better to have the uneasy peace between Pakistan and India (another case of dividing along ethnic and religious lines) than an ongoing civil war (and yes it is a civil war).
What constitutes winning? Is it peace in Iraq? Is it no more dead American troops? Is it US domination of the country so that violence gets to a manageable level?
President Bush hasn't really defined "winning" or "finishing the job" or whatever else the ultimate goal is in Iraq. If the goal in Iraq was democracy, well, its done. They had free and fair elections. That it resulted in a civil way is a completely different problem. I would prefer to have US troops intervene in the civil war (if that is what it is) in Darfur. At least there we have a defined goal and a defined enemy. In Iraq, you help Shiites one day and Sunnis the next and they both hate you for the day before. It's a no-win situation.
The solution in Iraq is political and not military. Take a lesson from Yugoslavia and divide the country. The Kurds are doing quite well without the Shiites or Sunnis in there protected northern enclave. Divide Iraq into three zones, share the oil revenues and get the hell out. Divide and conquer. Iraq as a nation is fiction of British colonialism. Better to have the uneasy peace between Pakistan and India (another case of dividing along ethnic and religious lines) than an ongoing civil war (and yes it is a civil war).
Sunday, May 08, 2005
Tom Delay
I think is pretty self-explanatory. Here are some links:
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=tom+delay+ethics&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/ 2005/03/27/politics/main683332.shtml
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=tom+delay+ethics&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/ 2005/03/27/politics/main683332.shtml
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Unfair and Unbalanced
In the ever futile attempt to maintain objectivity and provide balance in the media C-SPAN has bested all other media outlets combined.
A professor had been sued for libel by a rival historian and successfully defended the suit. She then went onto to write a book about the experience. A lecture in support of the book was going to be taped for airing on C-SPAN. In order to show balance and give the "other side" of the story., C-SPAN was going to give the rival who felt libeled a chance to support his side of the story.
Well, one may say, that seems fair. We all know how fickle courts can be. Maybe there was a real controversy? We should be open to hear all sides and decide for ourselves -- they report, we decide. Sounds nice.
Turns out, the "rival" is a Holocaust denier, that a British judge labeled an anti-Semite and a bigot in throwing out his case for libel. The work of this so-called historian is riddled with errors and falsehoods such as no one was killed at Auschwitz, let alone in gas chamber. Needless to say, this person, David Irving, does not deserve any airtime to espouse falsehoods. Conversely, Deborah Lipstadt, is a noted Holocaust scholar.
Maybe C-SPAN could show WEB DuBois debate someone from the KKK about whether there was actually slavery in the US (I know WEB Dubois is dead, but it is a good analogy); they can run something on Neil Armstrong and then have those guys on that deny the moon landing; and so on and so on.
C-SPAN is confusing journalism with stupidity.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200503180002
A professor had been sued for libel by a rival historian and successfully defended the suit. She then went onto to write a book about the experience. A lecture in support of the book was going to be taped for airing on C-SPAN. In order to show balance and give the "other side" of the story., C-SPAN was going to give the rival who felt libeled a chance to support his side of the story.
Well, one may say, that seems fair. We all know how fickle courts can be. Maybe there was a real controversy? We should be open to hear all sides and decide for ourselves -- they report, we decide. Sounds nice.
Turns out, the "rival" is a Holocaust denier, that a British judge labeled an anti-Semite and a bigot in throwing out his case for libel. The work of this so-called historian is riddled with errors and falsehoods such as no one was killed at Auschwitz, let alone in gas chamber. Needless to say, this person, David Irving, does not deserve any airtime to espouse falsehoods. Conversely, Deborah Lipstadt, is a noted Holocaust scholar.
Maybe C-SPAN could show WEB DuBois debate someone from the KKK about whether there was actually slavery in the US (I know WEB Dubois is dead, but it is a good analogy); they can run something on Neil Armstrong and then have those guys on that deny the moon landing; and so on and so on.
C-SPAN is confusing journalism with stupidity.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200503180002
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