There Is No Plan

In early ’09, in the wake of President Obama’s weak-tea stimulus package (a good chunk of which was deficit-enhancing tax cuts) and the media began looking for signs of ‘the recovery’. Throughout ’09 and ’10 NPR’s “Marketplace” asked the same question about a hundred thousand times of various two-bit economists. “So is this a sign that the recovery is on the horizon?”. The answer was always essentially the same. “We’d sure like to think so.”

But a funny thing happened on the way to that recovery. It didn’t happen.

In ’11 so far we’ve had banner months for McJobs at McDonalds followed by job growth falling off a cliff, and high gas prices, and a still declining housing market, and a balloonnig European debt crisis, moribund credit, static wage growth, and a ton of other indicators tell us what we knew, and didn’t want to believe.

There is no recovery. And one is getting the sneaking suspicion that there isn’t going to be one, because maybe, just maybe, this is as good as it gets. Read the rest of this entry »

It will never happen.

They want to map us, share us, track us, provide for us.  They want to be our digital deliverance, our screen-saviors, the pioneers of our future. And we dutifully share, and comment, and post, creating more page views that they can monetize as they continue to propogate and colonize every corner of the internet with their shiny startups promising revolutionary ideas about how to reshape the very core of humanity. They’ve invaded our homes, our workplaces, our memories, the way we communicate, befriend, even fall in love.

Gradually we’re losing touch with the way it was, throwing out the good with the bad, as we suckle at the teat of the new, willing dupes allowing our humanity to be digitized and categorized. We’re gently prodded towards the new spiritual and intellectual vacuum, not capable of resisting the mesmeric call of the profile, the avatar, the lists of basic information that populate a billion databases in a humming, ice-cool, and human-free data center.

And who are the new overseers? Read the rest of this entry »

The 'special sauce that drives the US Economy.

Over 20% of the 244,000 jobs created in this month’s ‘torrid’ labor report were at McDonalds. And boy, was competition for these jobs fierce. What was once a pocket money position for teenagers and college students is now firmly in the wheelhouse of redundant middle managers in ripe middle age looking for some way, any way, of keeping the wolves at bay. Not that a job assembling burgers at a fast-food joint is going to help. In fact, it’s just going to stave off the inevitable for a few months, and destroy your last shreds of self-worth in the process. Hardly the makings of an economic ‘recovery’. Read the rest of this entry »

Take a brief look at this chart.

It’s a list of countries by national debt burden as a proportion of GDP.

Just under fully fledged basket case Zimbabwe at the very top is Japan at 196% of GDP. Now I know they’ve got their problems, but is their way of life threatened? No. Are they walking around in animal pelts, wielding home-made clubs? No.

At 83% of GDP is our northern neighbor, Canada, a nation that’s so stable people fall asleep at the very mention of its name. Is there a threat to the sleepy Canadian way of life on the horizon? Not unless Sarah Palin’s family invades the Yukon.

At 74% is Germany, manufacturing dynamo of Europe, and a nation that’s short of people to work in its BMW factories. I’m guessing that unless there’s a major recall of EVERY German car ever made, no threat to their way of life either.

Further down is Brazil, one of those developing countries that’s supposedly eating our lunch. They’re currently operating very nicely at 60% of GDP, and an outgoing President Lula had a positive approval rating of 223%.

And then comes  limping, holed below the water line, not much good for anything except a-whinin’, America at 58.9%, just above the world average of 58.3% of GDP.  And according to the GOP talking points our debt burden “threatens our whole way of life”.

Maybe it does. Maybe them GOP Congressmen know something we don’t, but I’m guessing if more people got a look at this simple Wikipedia chart, they might, sniff-sniff, smell a rat.

Captain Sensible gave a cracking performance out there tonight.

Every crafted word was about as rational and considered as it can be, threading the needle, professionally, professorially, as usual. The GOP and Tea Party responses, by contrast, came from the other side of the sanity spectrum, somewhere between total delusion, and crushing ignorance.

And yet, it’s the GOP in all its lies, puffery and vanity that scored big in the Mid-term elections last November. The Klingon forces of darkness zapped President Spock and his army of sane and sensible Democrats but good. Usually the good guy wins, but the rules were thoroughly shattered last time out.

All the wonks, from top to bottom tell us that the Obama Administration had got it right. The stimulus package put a million-plus to work, health care reform will cut the deficit, and the economy is growing at a good clip. So what gives? Why are people were so ungrateful?

The answer is simple.
Read the rest of this entry »

India should be our bestest friend

Okay, so maybe it wasn’t the move of the century to ditch our wounded republic for a far flung developing nation that’s trying to put us away. And maybe the idea of going to India to jinny up jobs for America seems a bit of an “uhh?” to use a technical term, considering they’re outsource central, but this apparently dry-as-a-bone trade visit could have been made just a little more exciting with just a tad more thought.

India has long regarded the US as it’s natural trading (and not just outsourcing ally). After all, we speak the same language, well most of the people who we’d want to do business with anyway, and we’re both democracies, even if India has a far larger ‘demos’ to deal with.

Now of course, India would say all that wouldn’t they.  They want our business and they really hate the Chinese our go-to cheap labor source, with whom there’s been a simmering cold war for a very long time. Read the rest of this entry »

In the old days, policy used to have at least some potential to become reality, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that in America at least, those days are over. Nothing anybody seems to suggest from the President on downwards seems to mean a hill of beans anymore. It’s as if the country is set on a course for planet “slow decline into mediocrity” (or worse) and there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it. All this despite some soaring rhetoric from the President, and plenty of hot air from just about everyone else.

Here’s a rundown of the current bullshitian landscape.

Jobs.

Anyone who thinks a $30-40bn Jobs bill is going to pass without being watered down to meaninglessness is dreaming. And it’s not certain why it will fare any better than the $800bn dollar stimulus package which was supposed to rebuild the economy and create, yes, that’s right. Jobs. The problems that the US economy is facing are profound and structural. Just throwing money at the problem without deep and lasting changes to – industrial, fiscal, and budgetary policy – sorry about the ‘P word’ again – needs to rethink very, very quickly. We don’t make stuff here. Some people suggest that manufacturing in the US isn’t “cost effective”, but my question is this. Why is it cost-effective in Germany?

Any-way, moving on to…

Wall Street

The President talks a great game about beating up onWall Street, especially now he’s been sobered up to the problem by the Massachusetts debacle. But it’s a tad too late. In January of 2009 the banks were still sinking in the quicksand. That’s the time to make them an offer they can’t refuse. After we’ve pulled them out, and they’ve put on fresh $500 shirts is not the time to be making a deal with them. And yet this is what we did. We had our boot on their necks and we blew our chance to make the single most destructive force in this country pay. And now, in the cold light of day, is anyone in the 41 strong Republican Senate caucus going to vote for meaningful financial reform? Uhh, Nope. Will Wall Street be constrained from ruining the nation again? Nope.

Healthcare

What was once a burning need is now a footnote that’s about to be buried ahead of the mid term elections. The Democrats thought that Healthcare reform was a winner, but after being thoroughly outmaneuvered by GOP demagoguery that idea is now going the way of another smart idea…

Stopping Global Warming.

Let’s get this straight. The world is waiting for America to get its act together on controlling greenhouse gases. But is 41 strong Republican Senate caucus going to vote fr meaningful climate legislation? Uhh, Nope. It will die.

Education

Ah, what’s the point. Nobody cares.

Finally, on domestic policy, my personal favorite…

High Speed Trains

California just got $2bn dollars of Federal Stimulus funding to build a high speed train network. Sounds great, right? Except for the fact that the total bill (and that’s before the usual corruption, incompetence, delays and overruns) is $42 billion. Chances of this happening in a state with a perennial budget crisis? Nil.

Moving abroad now…

Iraq

At a certain point in time, the United States is going to have to face the rather unpleasant moment when our last grunt gets on the last transport plane out of Baghdad Airport. Cue the bombs. Cue the resurgence of the insurgents and the reemergence of the Mahdi Army. Hello, reality.

Afghanistan

One day conference in London. Karzai tells us he’s going to end corruption and undo a millennia’s worth of being a basketcase that’s swallowed up empires, as well as buying off the Taliban recruits without guaranteeing their protection. He’s got 18 months before the troops we’re about to land there ship out. You do the math.

Iran

Sanctions work. And if you believe that, you think Sarah Palin is a closet liberal. Will the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 be able to justify NOT attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities? Unlikely.

Haiti

Will the outpouring of aid from Americans be matched by a long-term commitment to fix Haiti? Watch the BS flow. Ain’t nothing gonna change in Haiti.

So you see, on just about every front, there’s an awful lot of talk about how we’re going to fix things.

And then there’s reality.

Welcome to the Bullshit Era.

The little mermaid of copenhagen will watch sea levels rising and say precisely ntohing about it.

Whatever the reasons for Global Warming, whether it’s cyclical or whether it’s all our fault for pumping the atmosphere with CO2 and upsetting the equilibrium, it really doesn’t matter. Chances are that it’s coming with a vengeance. And there’s not a damn thing we can do about it.

Up until now, the world has talked a good game about “stopping”, “slowing” or “reversing” climate change. But it’s all just hot air. Unless the human race is prepared to make monumental sacrifices that change the course of history in a matter of decades, we’re not going to have any effect. And the chances are very slim that the Chinese, Indians or even the Prius driving Americans will do even 5% of what’s necessary. President Obama’s last trip to Copenhagen to shill for his home town’s Olympic bid was a big disappointment. He’s not going to risk political capital to show up in the Danish capital for a second time in a year to give the headline writers a chance to say “Copenhagen is where President Obama goes to fail”

I’m sure in his private thoughts, Obama, along with Al Gore for that matter know the truth. The train has left the station. Global warming is unstoppable. But that’s not something you can trumpet from the rooftops without making the human race, well, hate you. For example, Obama has virtually trademarked the word “hope”, so he’s hardly going to start telling the truth anytime soon.

Unfortunately, all that hope is misdirected and might be damaging our long-term future. Because instead of concentrating on how to “contain” and “manage” global warming, we’re focusing on beating it. That’s a mistake. Read the rest of this entry »

Global warming is coming. And there’s really not much we can do about it. Sure, there’s plenty of blame and hot air to go around, as well as an endless flow of pronouncements from world leaders that we’re going to corral and control it. But when the President of the United States visits Copenhagen to pitch his home town as an Olympic host city but may not return to attend an important Climate Change conference, it’s not exactly a good sign that the world is actually going to make much headway against this thing.

So here’s a suggestion. Whatever the reasons, human or not, let’s change our approach to this – to damage limitation. Let’s accept that global warming is an inevitability, and shore up and defend what we have – not for our good, but for the good of future generations. Part of that defence is not to add to the problem by developing green energy solutions and building a new infrastructure, as well as finding ways to adapt to that change, in agriculture’ energy’ industry and society.

But were wasting valuable time and creative energy pretending we can stop it. We can’t and we won’t. All we can do is manage it.

AIG = Ask an Idiot and Get

The word du jour right now is “rathole”, a rather ugly expletive that equates to plughole, drain, succubus, and other such unpleasantries. It may however be too polite a phrase for what is going on right now with the bailout of AIG, the government’s new pet project that looks like it’s going to hand the downpayment on fixing the nation’s health care shambles to Goldman Sachs and their ilk.

Just like everyone else in this country, I’m spitting with fury at the idea that the government is handing over money to keep these clowns out of the poorhouse. The bonuses should have been blocked way before they went public, and the fact that the President is being exposed to ye olde “What did you know and when did you know it?” game only eight weeks into his administration does not bode well.

Then there’s the irksome question of whether the meeting where it was decided to keep AIG alive in September of last year was actually a little joke played on us by Goldman Sachs. (After all the key people around that table were Paulson, ex-boss of GS, Blankenfein, current boss of GS, and Tim “someone put me out of my misery now” Geithner). We’ve known for years that Goldmans was a class above every other investment bank, but their ability to game the system seems utterly unparalleled now.

Finally, there’s this little nugget. We were told that if we’d let AIG die the global banking system would have collapsed. That the $1.6 trillion in Credit Default Swaps (CDSs) that they sold to the world’s top financial institutions who’d sunk their dough into those toxic assets would suddenly go away, leaving them totally exposed, and toppling like dominoes. Makes sense, right? I mean, if the insurance company backing those toxic assets goes belly up then the world’s banks are left holding the bag. Stands to reason.

Or does it?  With the caveat that I really don’t know what I’m talking about, I’m not so sure. And here’s why. Read the rest of this entry »