Cleary Squared

When you beat drugs, you are a hero

2012-02-17T22:43:00.002-05:00

Chris Christie got some heat from military families for ordering flags to fly half-staff for Whitney Houston. I don't think it was a deed going unpunished as it was military families upset that Christie compared Houston's death from drug addiction to their sacr

I have had immediate family members and friends fall under the spell of hard narcotic drugs. When they begin their addiction, they think they can quit at any time. Soon enough, they are so down and out they steal, lie, cheat and give justification to why they get high. Then, the families slowly but surely get destroyed, piece by rotten piece. After seeing people go through this, the lesson was burned into my skull - never do narcotics.

When you beat an addiction - or at the very least, go through several days not smoking weed, not injecting heroin through your toes, not snorting cocaine cut with baby powder - you're already a hero. You've already hit bottom and now, through actual counseling, cleaning your house out of bad habits and sketchy friends, you see a much better path. You don't need to pick up the crack pipe to deal with a nasty boss on your case. You don't have to meet your drug connection with the paycheck you just got while your landlord is demanding to know why you're five months behind on rent, and your creditors have cut your credit line because you're maxed out and haven't paid in six months. You've paid everyone up, you've paid your dues, and all that you have to do is avoid the temptations that have plagued you and go year to year celebrating your sobriety.

I now understand why people hang around South Station, North Station, or elsewhere, with their tales of woe, looking for money. Not a stinking dime goes to bus fare to Springfield, or elsewhere. It goes up their nose, in their veins, or any other body orifice they can stick in once their veins have shriveled to thin thread. The more I see their sales pitches and hustles for money, the more I can see through their story. They want to get high, and think sympathy will rake in the bucks.

Even soldiers - shellshocked by war, coming home to bleak job prospects and derided for defending the country - self-medicate to numb the pain. They're even bigger heroes when they kick their habits, defeat their shellshock, and refocus their thousand-yard-stare into something positive.

And for those who want narcotics legalized...do you really and truly want the government to be the dealer? Do you really want tax revenues funded from extremely desperate people, ones who, if given the chance, would probably endorse their paycheck to the state if it meant avoiding withdrawal syndromes? And for regulation - don't think the Food and Drug Administration won't have an enormous influence towards diminishing the potency of narcotics to the point where you can't get high or overdose at all - all in the name of "safety." They want you to buy their obscenely-priced drugs, but aren't about to let you overdose because they need more tax revenue to line their pockets.

Yes, the Whitney Houston death is tragic. It is also a lesson for others who have pursued the same path as Whitney, yet conquered their demons. Many a person before her has hit bottom, then fought back and is enjoying a decade, two or three of complete sobriety. It is truly, "by the grace of God go I." It is true there is no shame in being an addict, but there is shame in being an addict and doing nothing about it.

Why BBC and PBS are "worlds apart"

2012-02-11T10:41:00.000-05:00

Imagine for a moment that you could have the best show on American television. It's critically acclaimed, has a giant fan following, and the network wants to have several spinoffs.

The catch? You have to pay $600 a year for the privilege. If you don't pay this $600 a year, the TV Enforcement Police will come and take you to jail.

Sounds silly, right? Not if you're in Britain. An "As You Were Saying" column in the Saturday Boston Herald breathlessly extols the "fresh and innovative" programming of the BBC over the "stuffy, predictable" PBS. Britons pay $230 a year for a TV license, which is a mandatory tax which is paid to the British government and is considered a criminal offense to try to evade it.

Unlike Britain, however, Americans have the luxury of not paying a TV tax to fund PBS, as PBS is already funded by taxpayers - partly by the government and partly by viewer donations through fundraising drives. The programming might be a little less than the BBC offers, but it's still good programming nonetheless.

Furthermore, the BBC has had its share of controversies and criticisms - thanks to its left-leaning political bias. Britons may not mind forking over $8 billion a year for improved programming, but when that money is used to promote political agendas from its directors and viewers that some Britons don't believe in, then it's no wonder Britons are not too keen on paying an excise tax just to watch TV.

If PBS were to take the licensing tax route, The Corporation for Public Television - PBS's parent - could demand that everyone pay for their network programming through a TV tax. In some respects the programming might improve, but at the expense of having the political opinions of the CPB overshadowing the next Office or Doctor Who. It would also result in many viewers and non-viewers going up in arms against paying for something they don't need, want, or use - which is the reason why PBS doesn't have a big a budget as BBC and must engage in such tactics as selling $20 DVD's for $240 and to have Sesame Street characters plead that they'll be joining Mr. Hooper in Heaven if PBS doesn't get funding.

The commercial and cable networks self-sustain through advertising and cable fees; they can cancel shows when they are not bringing in viewers, even if they are "critically acclaimed" and are much better than the various permutations of lowest-common-denominator TV, designed to give people their 15 minutes of fame before disposing them. PBS does broadcast commercials to a point, but even so, some upper-class viewers would immediately object to having McDonald's ads mixed in with Dora the Explorer, or ads for various drugs sponsoring This Old House.

If the intent of the writer was to promote a TV tax to fund PBS, he might want to read up on why the American Revolution got its roots - from the tax on tea.

Food - government (money + power) = freedom

2012-02-04T19:36:00.000-05:00

Two great articles in regards to the so-called "obesity" war...

Exhibit A: If the kids aren't fat, we don't get any more money to rule over the poor!
Exhibit B: If the kids aren't fat, we don't get any more power to rule over the poor!

Why Mitt Romney will break the GOP's curse

2012-02-01T21:15:00.000-05:00

Hub Blog outlines the curse that Massachusetts has had with nominees since JFK was elected.

The reason why Democratic nominees for President in Massachusetts haven't grabbed that brass ring since JFK is because once they got nominated, they abandoned the middle and thought they would be coronated. JFK had a weaker GOP candidate in Richard Nixon (who would wait eight years later to get it himself and go for 1-1/2 terms before being ousted) but he was popular. He didn't grind platitudes into fine dust. He didn't pontificate. He didn't promise to radicalize everything that didn't move.

Mitt Romney might be pompous, flip-flop like a madman, and come off as stiff. He beget Romneycare, which beget Obamacare, got routinely ignored by a corrupt Legislature, etc. Conservatives dislike him for not being conservative enough. Liberals don't like his Mormonism.

Remember in 2010, however, when Scott Brown was elected to fill Ted Kennedy's seat. Scott Brown is modest, honest, and even if you hated his guts and made a voodoo doll out of him, you had to admire his fortitude. Romney, while not cut from Brown's cloth, is a proven managerial leader. He laid off people when there was waste. He fired people from the Olympics because they were incompetent and corrupt. He doesn't have a circle of radicalized yes-people (including Karl Rove).

The reason why Mitt Romney will break that Massachusetts curse is the same way Scott Brown got to the Senate - his opponent, once the public found out how much of a liability they would be and how far narrow-minded and out of touch they were with their values, was not the one they were looking for to change their fortunes. Furthermore, as much as Massachusetts is the Athens of America, we find out later on that we don't like to be ruled by the aristocratic-minded buffoons whose heads are so swelled they can't fit through the doorway. That is why Scott Brown is equally reviled: he doesn't hew to the rigid dogma of the far-left (and why Elizabeth Warren is equally revered as the rock star to "take down" Brown).

We might not like Mormons taking the Corner Office, but regular Americans despise Ivy Leaguers bringing their radical heft to the forefront and thinking it might just work. It hasn't, it doesn't, and for four years, the novelty will have worn off. Romney, if nominated, will have Genesis to Revelation thrown at him; the long knives and dirty ads will play 24/7, but in the end, all he has to do it take Scott Brown's path to win.

Puritanical Killjoys, MA

2012-01-29T18:11:00.000-05:00

Boston Magazine's Colin Kingsbury highlights Massachusetts' tendency to indulge in buzzkill. (Caution: subject matter.) And he places it right at the feet of the so-called "progressives" who want to pretend that Puritanism never went away. He also compares the so-called "progressive" movement to "[a] Brookline PTA meeting, where offenses are cultivated like topiary and the cupcakes better be gluten-free." (Would a more accurate term be regressives?)

One of the commentors named Frederick states the situation succinctly:

"The tendency to pass extreme and outrageously restrictive laws on personal behavior is not limited to any political party. With one magic phrase: "Think of the children!", plaintively mewled to the television cameras, you can force the cash-strapped MBTA to pull alcohol ads (despite ZERO evidence this will have any effect on supposed child alcoholism rates), you can ban happy hours, late night hours for taco stands in Downtown Crossing, or just about anything else you want to ban, forbid, or restrict. Consequences to personal liberty, to the economy, or to rational thought be damned. The complete and total safety, real or imagined, of these precious, helpless, eternally vulnerable and infernally indulged little bundles must take precedence.

And here is George Carlin's thoughts (caution: liberal use of the Seven Dirty Words) on this...

Tim Thomas to White House: Thanks, but no thanks

2012-01-23T20:31:00.000-05:00

Hmmm...Tim Thomas, Conn Smythe winner...a (gasp! get the smelling salts out!) evil Conservative? One who didn't go to the White House because he didn't agree with Obama's policies!? (Dammit, where are those smelling salts? And a PBR while you're at it!) Why...you must...must...suspend him for the rest of his life! /s*

No...the NHL doesn't fine or suspend players for not attending the ceremony with the President. It's not a formally mandated ceremony - it's more of a luncheon than a state dinner. They gave Obama and Biden a jersey, pose for the camera, then hop the Acela Express for home.

On the other hand, if Tim Thomas got subpoenaed for some dirty things (doping, drugs, violence) his baseball, basketball and football compadres have done, and didn't show up...then he'd be in trouble.

But the only rule Tim Thomas broke today was that he was candid and upfront with what he thought. That's all. Honesty sometimes wounds more than a softly-peddled lie.

* sarcasm tag.

Get off the SOPA and pay the PIPA

2012-01-19T20:47:00.000-05:00

Jon Keller puts SOPA/PIPA controversy into a very good light. That is, the RIAA and MPAA wouldn't have to endorse such draconian rules if everyone and their brother didn't run to illegally download and distrubute things onto the Internet. Conversely, the Internet should neither degenerate into anarchy nor reined in with heavy chains.

As for the blackouts protesting SOPA/PIPA: here is a very good explanation of what the bill entails, explained in without going into histronical "ZOMG! No more misspelled cat memes!!!!" or the obnoxiously self-indulgent "turning off our webpage because we fear our bashing people and corporations we don't like will be killed by SOPA/PIPA." Ignorance is far more dangerous than this bill.

Some thoughts on the MBTA hikes/cuts

2012-01-11T21:50:00.001-05:00

Buses:

1. I think the MBTA's cutting of 101 bus routes in Scenario II won't happen. It's more of an attention grabber that a realistic way to get the $161 million gap they're trying to close through higher fares. I think the T is doing this to shock people into accepting Scenario I, which will cut around 61 routes over the week in exchange for a higher MBTA fare. The T should also add some of the cuts from Scenario II or outsource those routes to private operators

2. The MBTA's favoring (and subsidy) of CharlieCard riders over CharlieTicket/cash payors should end. A fair bus fare would be $2.25 no matter how you pay.

3. The T should also consider bringing back "zoned" fares for long distance local buses. For example, $2.25 for the first five mile zone, and then $0.75 each two-and-a-half miles after that.

Commuter Rail:

1. As I've said before, the entire city of Boston (not just selected neighborhoods) should be rezoned as Zone 1A (or rebranded City Zone). Why gouge Boston residents who live a hair's breadth from cheap zone to the expensive zone? It would be a much cheaper for bedroom community residents to pay the $2.40 fare than to shell out $6.50. This would encourage people to take a much faster ride into downtown Boston, even though it's infrequent. Once you cross the city line, then charge the higher fares. As for pass prices - $80-$100 a month for a City Zone pass is quite fair. Charging $80 in one zone and then $196 about 50 feet down the street is not fair.

2. Monthly pass prices will bring in more than enough revenue at 20-25%, not north of 35%. This is because suburbanites can shoulder higher pass prices and get other T services as a bonus.

3. Cutting service after 10pm and on weekends does make sense if you consider that the trains break down frequently and it would give the MBCR an opportunity to do necessary repairs and give the trains a rest. It would certainly disappoint current riders who would then be forced to ride to a rapid transit station to complete their journey, but would you want to be the rider stuck on a dead train for four hours on Monday?

4. Another thought: Why does the MBTA have eight or nine coaches at night when there are only maybe 100 people riding the train? It's a waste of energy and resources. Cutting the trainset down to five (or maybe even three) will reduce wear and tear on equipment, and save a lot of money. Investing in diesel multiple units (like the Budd RDC's in the past) would also make a difference during off-peak hours.

More thoughts to come on this...

Making memories - the last day in Hyde Park

2012-01-06T11:13:00.002-05:00

I was going to "plead the Fifth" of why I left Hyde Park, but now that I'm here in West Roxbury, I feel that I should tell you why I (and my mother) left.

After thirty-six years, Hyde Park just wasn't the same anymore. When people who lived here long ago remark that it looks like a ghost town, with hardly any vibrancy and reason to linger, it's time to go. If residents (and the police) think you're more an interloper than a resident, you know the neighborhood you grew up in isn't yours anymore. Hyde Park is still a bedroom community, but over the years there's a stark, unspoken line divided by the overcrowded, only-line-in-town Route 32 buses and the infrequent, expensive, yet designed-for-the-suburban-resident Commuter Rail.

After two days of moving back and forth between the old and new houses (I was tired, nay, exhausted, from hauling in boxes after boxes after boxes of stuff - and in significant pain), yesterday was the final day I would be at the old house, just to clean up the last things there. My brother came to see the house for the last time before he went back to his apartment in Roslindale.

While my mother cleaned out the house on Summer Street, I volunteered to walk to Central Hardware in Cleary Square to get new keys for the new house. Mainly, the walk was a way to clear my head, escape from all the stress of the move and the leave, and have a moment to myself other than constantly load and unload things out of boxes.

During my youth, I had walked to Cleary Square to get food, pizza, sundries, etc. All the old stores had gone, replaced by tacky stores and many empty storefronts. Even the bus stop, which for many years had conveniently been placed in front of what had been Mama Mia's and Van's, had been moved to in front of Most Precious Blood, which is now a charter school.

I got my keys, and walked back to Tedeschi's for a New York Post and some lottery tickets. I walked down Summer Street for the final time, like I had done many times late at night coming home from the Stoughton train. I came up the stairs for the last time as my mother finally cleaned everything up so the new tenant could move in.

After I turned in my keys and we locked the door for the last time, we visited my grandfather, and by then I knew the end was coming. When we had our last family Thanksgiving at Summer Street, I felt no emotion other than elation. This time, I beginning to choke up. Not cry like a banshee, but have that hefty, lump-in-the-throat feeling with stinging in the eyes. I quickly walked back to the car once we were done.

We got in the car, drove through the potholes of Parrott St for the last time, and then we were gone. Only the ghosts of memories past - good and bad - remained behind.

President Obama's Cartman-style appointments

2012-01-06T10:28:00.000-05:00

John Podhoretz's column about President Obama's directly-over-the-heads-of-Congress appointments smacks of weakness.

I agree - and in addition to this he's throughly frustrated because Congress is blocking his way - Obama believes that government and only government is the answer to the "saving" America. Tactics like that could very well turn off the electorate and prevent his re-election, rather than convincing

The people he appointed are certainly competent (more about that below), but according to the checks and balances of government, direct appointment isn't exactly constitional. Of course, if George W. Bush ran through the backs of the Democratic congress, they would declare his actions illegal (venemously and emphatically so) and demand his impeachment and removal from office. Something like this

Richard Corday, who was appointed to the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and board. Congress is leery that Corday, and only Corday, would have unchecked powers to change the financial markets. (Some would be common-sense, like stripping a ton of legalese from credit card brochures and spelling out how much a person would pay in interest over time. Others might involve mandating an 18% maximum interest rate on credit cards, and those issuers that operate from usury-exempt states, like Delaware and South Dakota, would go out of business because they would be forced to charge 18% and not a pip above.)

Congress wants a board of five people on the CFPB because they fear the CFPB would be too "activist" and impose a lot of rules that attack profitability. Obama fears that the five people on that board would be loaded with bank cronies who would keep the status quo. Hence, the impasse and Obama's frustration, and finally the "behind the back" appointment.

Obama is saying "I'm President Obama, and I can do what I want!"

The problem is - the people who engage in such activities are called authoritarians.

S(T)urm und drang

2012-01-03T16:57:00.001-05:00

The MBTA - of which I'm a frequent rider - might need to don heat-resistant underpants for its fare hike/service elimination proposal meetings.

There are two scenarios. Scenario 1 would elimiante high-cost bus routes - 23 weekday, 19 Saturday, and 18 Sunday routes. Scenario 2 would eliminate 101 bus routes and reconfigure 13, but fares would not go up as much.

Commuter rail fares will also be hit pretty hard. Commuter rail service after 10pm and weekend commuter rail service would be eliminated on top of it; 12 ride punchcards would be eliminated and one way fares would be valid for 14 days, not 180 as they are now.

These are only proposals, not set-in-stone, so I'm not worried about them yet. But I do have some proposals for Mr. Davey

- If you live in the city of Boston, expand Zone 1A (which is the city zone) to the entire city. In the two scenarios, Zone 1A fares would increase to $2.25-$2.40, versus $6.00-$6.50 for the stations in Zone 1, which are in West Roxbury and Hyde Park (and Readville, which is Zone 2). This would lessen the sting if Scenario 2 eliminated a lot of bus routes.

- Change the gas tax rate from a flat rate to a percentage of the wholesale price, which will increase or decrease the tax revenue as the wholesale price increases or decreases. For example, if you implement a gas tax of 20% and the wholesale price is $2.50, that's 50 cents the state gets versus the 23 cents it gets now. If the wholesale price goes up to $3.00, the gas tax increases to $0.75. Even if the price went down to $1 a gallon, the state is still getting 20 cents a gallon.

The new gas tax would be split between the MBTA and the roads. It would certainly eliminate the bitching and moaning from people who want the gas tax raised.

If there is one positive thing about this proposal, it's that the MBTA is keeping a lot of the key bus routes and will likely use the elimination of the other routes to improve the more frequent/high crowding routes. The problem: some of the routes are political hotwires. For example, Route 50, which passes by a senior citizen's apartment complex, would be kept in Scenario 1 with a higher fare structure, but be eliminated in Scenario 2 with a lower fare structure. Route 48 would be eliminated in both scenarios as it is low-ridership and very high cost.

We be scammin'...

2011-12-26T19:51:00.002-05:00

I'm tired of hustlers and scammers. Really tired.

I can recite their pitches for money verbatim. It's like a game of Mad Libs, and one day I want to recite their well-rehearsed pitches at them and end it with, "or something to that effect?"

Take for example the guy who is seems to appear everywhere, pitching that he needs to go someplace for a bed for a very specific price. E.g. "I need to go to a rehab center in Springfield and I need $29.95 to reserve a bed."

Only problem...he's at North Station. On the Orange Line. Unless there's some kind of new train that I don't know about that departs North Station for Springfield, he's lying. (Or, if you're heading south, and you hear a pitch for going to Newburyport.) If an unsuspecting person actually gives this person the money, I'm tempted to say, "You numbskull! He's playing you like a fiddle!" The other passengers simply roll their eyes.

But there are times when the scammer knows I know what they're up to. They know that their desperation is for something else other than help - and they don't like it one bit when I tell them no. They get extremely pissed when I walk away, growling and hissing that I wasn't the mark that would buy their story and fork over their cash.

What motivates these people to hustle? I think it's a combination of greed, power, and the fact they're either addicted, on the lam from the law, or just do it because they know no other job.

I went to the Assembly Square mall today and I think there was a team of scammers working on post-Christmas shoppers. One guy tried his pitch, starting with "I lost" and after a few seconds, he "got the message", and walked away. The second guy tried to do his pitch, and I loudly answered, "I ain't helping you!" and he had choice words to spit out at me.

(Silently, I thought to myself, I know I'm not what he called me, but that's probably the drugs or his massive ego talking.)

Thankfully, he and his little buddies scattered when the security corps rolled around. So not only are they hustlers, they're cowards!

The best way to avoid being hustled or swindled? Just walk away. Don't fall for the pitch, the tears, the sorrow - just walk away.

The opposite of the hustle is working hard - compare the nasty remarks the second guy at Assembly Square Mall gave me to the Spare Change Newspaper guy. I ducked into 7-Eleven for a bit and even though I don't read the Spare Change Newspaper that often (OK, I admit I don't agree with a lot of what's in the Spare Change Newspaper), I gave the guy a dollar for the paper. He was very pleased - and even though it's only a dollar, it's not a dollar that's going up his nose, in his veins, scratched on the ground or down his throat - it's being used for rent, groceries, shoes, clothing...and they have that feeling of being useful, not being a user of other people's emotions.

If I didn't have the money, the Spare Change Newspaper guy wouldn't have gotten mad - he would have wished me a nice day and that was that.

Separation of (financial) church and state

2011-12-24T11:32:00.002-05:00

To respond to Hub Blog's excellent response on breaking up the banks...

1a. Ya think? The R's and D's can't resist the campaign contributions; the banks rely on relaxed regulations and easy access and influence to polticians. The banks look one way, the hacks the other. It's a hack-bankster alliance that won't be broken so long as the cash flows...so why order the breakup of the banks?

One ace up the sleeve: if you have a poltician that was burned by one of banks (or more specificially, a bankster who didn't grease the wheels to the politician's advantage) and demands an investigation out of spite. Then it won't just be the banks that get a lookover...it'll be the SEC and CRTC, who are supposed to keep an eye on tricky transactions but they too fall under the spell of cash.

1b. The reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall Act (the law imposed in 1933 after the market crashes and repealed in 1993 that separated investing from banking) is the ultimate dream of the the left and the Larouchies - as Glass-Steagall would be a new springboard for more draconian, anti-capitalist laws. It would be a reverse of "privatize the profits, socialize the losses" to "redistribute (socialize) the profits, exponentially accelerate (privatize) the losses."

For instance, if Glass-Steagall were reinstated, what would prevent a new law forcing banks to redistribute whatever profits they make into a bailout fund? That is, if a major bank makes $100 billion in profits, $95 billion is captured and placed in a government-monitored fund in case the banks run into financial problems. (Of course, it doesn't stop the government from borrowing from this fund.) An act like that would kill the bank's financials and the $95 billion they could have used to lend to others is now snatched away by the government.

Who said altruism doesn't have its dark side?

1c. The one thing politicians don't want to embark on is the nationalization, i.e. a government takeover, of the Big Banks. The fear is that all of the banking rules and regulations would be at the whims and desires of the government, not the advantage of the consumer.

For example: all of the big banks are nationalized into the National Bank of America. The good things: your interest rate on your credit card doesn't exceed 18% because of the usury laws; the government could offer a minimum interest rate to savers; your mortgage payments are reduced. The bad things: interest rates, balance requirements, and everything else goes up to the stratosphere. Soft punitive taxation at its finest.

2. I agree - the R's would have to admit that the private sector is not as perfect as they'd like it to be, but what's holding them back is the notion that the private sector is superior to the public sector. On the other hand, if the government did step in, nationalize the banks, and it was wildly popular, then the R's would see the advantage of the government stepping in - it wouldn't be a bailout, but a reorganization that saves the day.

Christmas through the ages

2011-12-21T22:48:00.000-05:00

Remember when you were a little kid and you couldn't wait to open presents on Christmas morning?

At least in my family, Christmas began around 6. Both parents went downstairs, put on coffee, turned on the last of the Christmas music, and then after five minutes, allowed us to come downstairs. This worked until we were teenagers, and by then we knew that...well, Saint Nick's naughty and nice list was supplanted by our parents asking us what we wanted, and then giving us cash.

Now, Christmas is more of a money-making business, a time to snipe at one another, for the self-righteous to proclaim that unless Santa Claus is all-inclusive he's not welcome, and ditto creches and midnight masses and Christmas Carols omitting any mention of religion. (Wassailling doesn't have as much heft when it bears throwing rocks, burning Sarah Palin effigies, and squatting at a CEO's house because someone's bank account was three cents off and they got whacked with a $39 "convenience" fee.)

But perhaps that the cynic in me. Christmas is a fresh slap in the face when you lose the ones you love. It would be six years without my father and three years without my grandmother, so the weeks coming up to Christmas are like "hurry it up, get it over with" but by the final week you're really looking forward to it (the food! the presents! Oldies 103 going back to cheesy disco and 80's synth programming!) - because the ones you love will be there in spirit - or at lease relieved they don't have to sit through Aunt Jean's sermons about the environment or Cousin' Pat's fart symphony.

There is a poem called "Christmas in Heaven" in which the departed comfort their loved ones at home by telling them not to shed a tear because they're having Christmas with Jesus this year. What the loved ones don't know is that Jesus puts on one Heavenly show on the day of his birth - with comics, first-run Broadway shows, a massive rock concert (rumor has it Jimi Hendrix will sit in with Jerry Garcia for the big show), and a feast that beats even the best buffets in Vegas. And did we mention that God himself mans the three hour fireworks display? That's how I see my father and grandmother celebrating Christmas up there in Heaven.

Food taxes - goin' after the poor

2011-12-19T20:52:00.000-05:00

The Health Commission in Massachusetts always has this fantasy: if you can eat it and they don't approve of it, they can tax it. Yet another permutation of the treat tax is being thought up to put money from the urban poor into the state's general fund.

It's not a secret that the people who buy a lot of the cheap snacks today are the poor - and the upper class whites desire to keep them insoft slavery, if you will, through aggressive (and regressive) taxation and nanny statism.

All the tax would do would redistribute cash from the poor tossing Twinkies, Ho-hos and Coke onto the right back to the government from whence it came - ETB cards and federal earned income tax credits. A boomerang tax - and every bit as regressive.

If the Health Commission is going to go after snacks, it should do so equally. If you're going to have an 18% tax on a soda and chips, that same tax should also be levied on fois gras, artisan cheeses, organic vegetables, fair-trade coffee, and many other things. That way, everyone is covered - and everyone is equally pissed off at the health commission.

Post #700 - and an announcement!

2011-12-11T20:09:00.001-05:00

I don't celebrate milestones that often (well, with the exception of my 40th birthday), but this is Post #700 for this blog. This blog began on December 13, 2006, so on top of that the blog (which began as Only in Boston, Kids) is now five years old...huzzah!

Now, here is the announcement...it's good news, so bear with me.

I've lived in Hyde Park for the past 36 years. In January, however, I will be departing Hyde Park and moving to West Roxbury.

I'll give you the short answer - it's simply time to move out of Hyde Park. It's time for a new adventure. (I'm pleading the Fifth on the longer answer.)

Cleary Squared - the blog you're reading now - will remain as it is. Even though I moved from Roslindale in 1975 as a four year old, Hyde Park will always be in my blood. There will be times I miss it, but it's time for a change - a positive one.

Occupied...what worked, what didn't

2011-12-11T19:31:00.001-05:00

I eliminated my series of Occupied...posts because Hub Blog puts out a very intelligent summary of the end of the Occupy Boston.

The political charge behind Occupy - going after those who earned their wealth by not working (more accurately, letting wealth work for them through compound interest) versus those working three jobs and not making ends meet - is likely the reason why is was accepted at first. Who wouldn't cheer for the underdog - the one with thousands in debt, about one or two paychecks away from eviction or foreclosure? Occupy was encouraged by the people to "go get 'em," led by an original cast that wanted this to be a success. The call that they were "the 99%" seemed authentic.

Then the circus full of poseurs, anarchists, conspiracy theorists, drug addicts, and criminals-on-the-lam came to town, electronic gizmos and drums in tow, wanting to turn a protest into an urban Woodstock. Then the messages became sillier and sillier - "the 99%" morphed into shorthand for "we're entitled, we're spoiled, get used to it!"

In Boston - the rare place where Occupy was far more civil than, say, New York (where Occupy Wall Street was flushed out and now is making themselves nasty nuisances of themselves) - there was a lot more cooperation between the police and the protestors. The protestors in Boston in a way knew that going apeshit in Boston like their counterparts in Oakland, New York, etc. would garner very, very bad publicity, so they took a more nuanced approach. They policed themselves. They told the hustlers and scam artists to beat it, to no avail. Even though they didn't want to get the police involved, there was an honest, mutual respect for each other, much like the rabid Yankees fan whose grandmother is a casual Red Sox watcher (although if you diss her Mets, she'll whack you with a rolling pin!)

But there are stories within the Occupy movement that once some of the people got a taste of power, they wanted more of it - craving it like the heroin addicts over on the other side of the park. Soon enough, Occupy became more Lord of the Flies than Up the Man, and during the last days people were more interested in evicting people they didn't like out of the camp versus trying to maintain their message. It was high school cliques - the Anarchist Goths vs. the Socialist Che-erleaders vs. the Policy Wonk nerds vs. the Crunchy Granola Environmentalists - all over again.

Did this protest work? In the next few months, when Election 2012 occurs, it may and it may not have an effect. If it has a positive effect, then we'll see a lot of changes in the financial world that will benefit everyone. If it has a negative effect, then we'll see a lot of changes in the House and Senate with people voted out. We shall see.

Forty bites (not figuratively)

2011-11-16T15:07:00.001-05:00

The old bromide goes like this: "40 is the new 30." I say, "So? Big deal."

Yesterday was my 40th birthday. Or, if you like, the 22nd anniversary of my 18th birthday (when I was working at the shoestore with two sisters who were constantly at each other's throats) or the 19th anniversary of my 21st birthday (when I was at college).

I usually celebrate my birthday with a vacation and a birthday lunch. My first choice was to go to Ruth's Chris downtown, but with their prime steaks and food come prime prices. Ruth's Chris is several steps above York Steak House and a tiny step down from L'Espalier and the other three-star joints. Chef Chang's was closed back in 2010, which was my all time favorite. And last year, I went to Spike's for my 39th (followed by Sam Lagrassa's the next day, which serves the best deli sandwiches north of New Haven).

So I figured Amrhein's in Southie, which was an easy block away from the Broadway train station on A Street, would be a good place for a birthday lunch.

Let me pull you in on a little tip. There's always something zen about going to a restaurant on your own and not having to deal with screaming kids, gossiping relatives, and siblings pointing out to you that they've enrolled you in AARP. You can actually focus on the food and how it tastes rather than engaging in conversation (not that I'm against conversation - I just don't want to be discussing world affairs with chateaubriand flying out of my mouth).

My meal (steak tips, fries, and banana bread pudding) came to $31 (and that included the tip) and it was delicious...and for once, just right. If you go to a chain restaurant, they put you into a food coma with loads of drinks, appetizers that could easily become meals on their own, entrees that would feed a small nation, and desserts that come with their own insulin shots. At Amrheins, my stomach was saying, "Is this enough?" but my mind was saying, "Relax, bucko - this will be better than Burger King." And the mind was right.

Now, compare the Amrhein's experience to my experience at the Cosi at MIT a week beforehand. I had been going to Cosi for months because their Steak TBM is phenomenal. When the bread is warm and the steak is piping hot, it's an experience short of nirvana.

What I got was the following:

A cashier stridling up to me and asking what I want as I was selecting my food (extremely rude and pushy)
The same cashier asking me if I had a Cosi card (I did, but left it at home) and deciding to hold up the entire line to look up my name (by then I was irritated and I just wanted my food)
When I received my food, the steak was stone cold and the bread was stale.

Needless to say, once I got home the Cosi card got shredded and I won't be going back there again. When the focus of your business is not food but customer loyalty programs, it's a sign of a dying business. It's too bad: Cosi serves terrific food that McDonald's or Burger King can't touch, and the people who buy that food are more health conscious (except yours truly decided to get a chocolate chip cookie), yet their employees are likely forced to shove loyalty programs down people's throats.

I like my birthdays simple, quiet and drama-free. Give me a birthday card, a dinner and a small gift, and I'm satisfied. I've never, ever liked surprise parties - not because it's a thoughtful thing to do, but I don't like the sneaking around to keep the surprise away from the intended. It's underhanded and deceptive - and I'd prefer the devil I know to the devil I don't.

Joe Paterno gets Bob Barkered

2011-11-09T22:04:00.000-05:00

Update: Joe Paterno was fired, as was Penn State's president, Graham Spanier.

One word describes the Penn State/Joe Paterno scandal: disgusting.

Joe Paterno is one of the best known college football coaches in history. You can't deny him that. But when he forsakes the gross and disgusting acts by his staff to keep the donations rolling in from wealthy contributors and the college football program alive, he tarnished every single hard-earned victory he's accomplished. By then it doesn't matter what age he was; he had to go.

Money quote from Maureen Dowd's column:

Like the Roman Catholic Church, Penn State is an arrogant institution hiding behind its mystique. And sports, as my former fellow sports columnist at The Washington Star, David Israel, says, is "an insular world that protects its own, and operates outside of societal norms as long as victories and cash continue to flow bountifully.” Penn State rakes in $70 million a year from its football program."

There was a rumor that Bob Barker did not go willingly into retirement in 2007; it was yet another lawsuit from a Barker's Beauty that rendered his career toast and was asked to (read: forced to) retire by CBS. Just like Joe Pa, Barker was revered and trusted as the Grand President of the Loyal Friends and True, until the lawyers of CBS couldn't take another model-suing-Barker story. Janice Pennington, Holly Holstrom, and many others smiled for the cameras, but off the cameras was quite a different - and sordid - story.

Selfish ambition from a reality bimbo

2011-11-01T22:43:00.000-04:00

Jon Keller nails a three-pointer (sorry, Jon, had to do it) regarding Kim Kardashian's divorce to basketball player Kris Humphries.

Remember the very pretty high school cheerleaders who never gave you the time of day except when they had exams - and then they couldn't leave your side? Kim Kardashian embodies the very soul of the shallow, superficial bimbo that only looks out for themselves and nobody else, and uses anyone they can to advance ahead.

I can't feel sorry for Humphries, though. He'll get his 30 pieces of silver for being a good sport and then hopefully find a much nicer girl with scruples.

My parents were married for 35 years; my grandparents for 65. They had their fights, their disagreements, and their long spaces of silent treatments. But they treated their marriages as top priority until their ends (my father from cancer, my grandmother from dementia).

When people ask me why I'm single, the real reason is I enjoy my independence. Single isn't a life sentence - depending on your circumstances, single is liberating (after a particularly bad marriage), fulfiilling, an adventure, and in some cases, a clean break. That might sound pretty selfish to some people, but when you consider being in an unhappy relationship, or worse an abusive and violent one, being single (or widowed) AND self-sufficient can work out in your favor.

The 15-15-15 tax plan

2011-10-30T21:01:00.000-04:00

From Advice Goddess: Laurence J. Kotlikoff, a Boston University economist proposes a Purple Tax plan.

I kinda like it because it tunes up a lot of things in the tax code. It also kills the "percentage pleading" argument by equalizing things and smoothing out the rough edges.

Personally, you would have people saving TONS of money if you traded the "progressive" income tax and corporate tax with a national sales tax - but the argument has always been "what about the poor?" If given the correct amount of prebates and discounts, the poor won't have to pay anything, whereas the guy shelling out $10,000 for a Rolex must shell out $1,750 in tax. Or the guy buying a $200,000 sportscar having to fork over $35,000 to Uncle Sam. Or a movie star buying a $10 million mansion and tacking on another $1.75 million.

Also, capping FICA at a certain amount while those who earn even a single dollar has to pay FICA has always been wrong. In the triple fifteen plan, you wouldn't pay FICA until you hit $40,000 - which would cover everyone earning less than that. Above that, the new FICA tax of 15% has no limit - snaring earners who were once able to avoid paying additional FICA taxes.

The left bitches and moans because they think the rich pay too little and they must contribute to society. The right bitches and moans because they think the rich pay too much for schemes that only fill the pockets of lobby groups. If the 15-15-15 plan was implemented, all that noise would go away as everyone is too busy saving, spending, and bringing back prosperity.

Whole Not My Style

2011-10-29T14:50:00.000-04:00

I went to the Whole Foods for the first time last Sunday, after eating breakfast with my mother and brother at the 50's Diner. My brother needed milk, so we decided to stop at Whole Foods at Legacy Place.

Whole Foods was clean, uncrowded, neatly arranged, and had friendly staff. However, it's not my kind of store.

1. From the minute you walk in, you're not merely assaulted with the whole green religion; it's hard to escape it when it's right in your face. Slinging environmental hoo-hah for big bucks turns me way off. I felt like a West Berlin resident who had stepped into East Berlin and I was expecting pictures of Erich Honecker plastered all over the place.

2. Whole paycheck? Mostly if you're buying the upscale and organic stuff, yes - or you want to avoid the unwashed masses at Shaw's down the street. There are some good deals to be had, but otherwise, I wouldn't shop there.

3. I now realize the whole fight in Jamaica Plain over Whole Foods was over money, competition, and to see who could roll their eyes in disgust better. "Come ON, don't you see these corporate drones want to crush our competition? Now, let's break for lunch and eat our overly expensive organic food."

In short: When I shop, I don't want to be lectured. I don't want to feel like Al Gore has gone into my pocket and traded my dollar bills for carbon credits. I want to purchase my things and get the heck out of the store and not be looked down as if I were a People of Walmart freak.

Student loans = wage slavery

2011-10-19T21:17:00.003-04:00

Here's a story for Hub Blog in regard to student loans:

When I began paying off my undergraduate loans in 1995 (one year after I graduated from college and about six months after I dropped out of grad school), I paid about $355 a month.

Now, $355 doesn't seem like much, but when you're earning $8-$9 in temp jobs; get laid off (and disinvited from the company Christmas Party) on a job that paid $7.50 an hour, and have to live at your parents' home for several years - meaning no starting a family, no apartment, no discretionary money, no parties, no real vacations, no transportation, no 401(k) contributions - $355 is HUGE.

Thankfully for me, I was hired at a company (where I have celebrated my 15th anniversary), and I took advantage of that. $255 of that money was in MEFA loans, split up into four coupons. The other $100 a month was Sallie Mae. The MEFA loans were forgiven in 2005 thanks to the bonds being paid off; and then the Sallie Mae loans were paid off in February 2008.

I wholeheartedly agree: the student loan complex all but encourages wage slavery - where every single dime someone earns is endorsed to the loan company for decades. When a student loan payment is the same amount as a rent payment (at least in Boston), and graduates are only making enough to have pocket change as discretionary income, it's time to thoroughly investigate who's making a mint off of graduates.

Quite an expensive keg party - one that might be paid off when you're ready to retire.

Let the poor shop at Whole Foods!

2011-10-08T11:30:00.002-04:00

Thomas Sowell puts forth a outstanding premise in regards to food, food choices, and what really constitutes "poverty" and "obesity."

If you're a lower-class or working class person, you could cook cheaper and healthier meals at home, if you have access to a local supermarket, a working stove, and pots and pans. But they also have to pay rent, bills, heating/energy costs, and other incidentals, so they have to choose between cheaper food to stretch their paycheck (at the risk of being fat) or go without the little luxuries to make sure they're healthy.

The other thing is that the upper classes have always wanted control over the lower classes because the fantasy of the aristocrat with unchecked and unquestioned power over the peasant has existed for centuries. The upper classes want to deny the lower classes the pleasures and dreams they've enjoyed and take for granted, and they have to lie in order to keep that illusion perpetuated.

Also, fast-food and other restaurants are Big Business. If you have the lower classes cooking at home and dropping tons of weight, then you put a ton of people out of work - class hucksters, power-driven politicians, finger wagging nanny staters, and...the people who earn lower wages to serve the food to others. Cooking at home is cheaper and great, but it will cost others their jobs.

The flip side of that - imagine the amount of self-righteous shock, sneering and passive-aggressive behavior that would occur if the lower classes decided to invade the upper-class restaurants - the ones that serve $50 steaks, $350 lobsters and $1,000 bottles of wine. Then you would have the upper classes all but demand that these serfs go to their local McDonalds because the food here is way too refined for the boorish, lower-class palate.

People don't want to be ruled. If they choose to cook for themselves or get their food elsewhere, it's a choice. If there are people who want to prevent others from making choices about their lives and feel that someone else should be making them, it shows a breathtaking lack of consideration and respect - and only fuels a resentment that ends in angry revolt - and can only be described as a dictatorship.

Fine tuning your audience, Bank of America edition II

2011-10-05T22:54:00.000-04:00

A suggestion to the BofA honchos:

I have the Keep the Change feature, which transfers my debit card transactions to my savings account. Here's a no-brainer suggestion: how about reducing the $5 fee by the amount of KTC transfers my savings account, and if I save $5 or more, the monthly debit card fee is waived?

For instance, I transfer $3.29 to my KTC account for one month using my debit card. That would mean I'd pay $1.71 in fees for that month. The next month, I transfer $6.09 to my KTC account. Thus, I would not have to pay Bank of America anything (I'd actually be $1.09 ahead).

In both cases, I would keep the transfers in my accounts, and the only time I would pay the full $5 fee is when I don't use the debit card.

How about it? It's very simple - consumers have the incentive to use your card more, rather than giving BofA negative publicity...

Fine-tuning your audience - Bank of America edition

2011-09-30T20:51:00.000-04:00

I'm a current Bank of America customer who has quite a bit of money in the accounts - but next year, I likely have to pay $5 a month if I use my debit card other than for ATM withdrawals (which is what I usually do) or if I have $20,000 total in all my accounts (which I don't, but I'm working on it!).

The people who are furious are the ones who don't keep enough money in their accounts and see debit cards as a huge help vs. high interest rate credit cards or limited cash. I don't blame them for being furious at all - and they have every right to seek other banks that don't charge that $5 fee. They should never be a captive audience and should move to local banks or credit unions in their area - and if BofA is the only game in town, plenty of on-line banks will fill the bill.

The converse of that is that Bank of America is likely looking for richer and more financially-stable customers - ones who can maintain high balances, pay their bills in full and on time, and be profitable without a peep. Meanwhile, the poorer and working class customers don't have that luxury - they either take the $5 fee per month or they find another bank.

The criticism of this and other fees, however, is not just valid - it's necessary. If you nickel and dime your customers to death, like the airlines who charge outrageous baggage fees, all because you're losing money and you want to keep up those same profits you had in the past, chances are you'll alienate a lot of customers. Ask Netflix, who is becoming more unpopular because, in the search for more profits, hiked their prices by 60% and reduced the amount of movies people could stream or disks they could have out.

The one thing that Bank of America would fear the most that over this $5 fee, hundreds of thousands of customers would indeed put a run on the bank and withdraw every single dime out of it. Then, Bank of America would be in a position to fail - nice for the revenge fantasy folks looking to finally get a bankster scalp, but horrific for others who can't access their money immediately and must wait for the new bank to assume all assets and liabilities and function again.

And to consider a government takeover of Bank of America - the other dream of the revenge fantasy folks'? The government would consider their own interests over the customers', e.g. seizing customers' IRA's and issuing IOU's to make up for government shortfalls, and favoring high-dollar contributors and busybody bureaucrats for choice leadership positions over those who are competent from preventing a bank of that size and assuring customers that their funds are safe.

Does the $5 monthly fee bother me? Truthfully, I use my debit card more for ATM withdrawals, and I have other banks that I can use for debit. I would rather have the $5 fee than pay off a high-interest rate on a credit card.

Payback and Aggression, TSA edition

2011-09-29T18:02:00.001-04:00

I've never flown on an airplane, and I've had two brothers work for the Transportation and Security Administration at Logan Airport, but I likely won't fly any time soon, judging from the horror stories set about by Advice Goddess Amy Alkon (and many others).

A psychologist puts forth a very worthy premise in regards to aggressive TSA agents::

...[S]o many people have suggested that there is a problem with some TSA agents[...]taking pleasure in controlling and humiliating others. The title they originally entertained was "Passing the Pain Along" and that is what the book is about. People taking pleasure by wounding others when they've been wounded themselves. In particular, the authors focus on redirected aggression, those times when someone's been hurt (physically or emotionally) and can't take action against the person who hurt them. So they attack someone else (often an innocent bystander). A man comes home from work, humiliated in front of his boss by a co-worker and smacks around his son for a minor infraction (like forgetting to pick up the mail). It's not pretty but it happens more often than we like to think. People who feel the need to redirect their aggression may find certain jobs appealing. And certainly when others make them feel like they have to work harder, they may, if they have the power, simply retaliate directly and dish out humiliation in response.

What is the appropriate response to such humiliation? Short of not flying, what does it take for the TSA agent drunk on power and looking to exact revenge for the past to stop what they're doing?

If Homeland Security is smart, they'd be wise to put in a few decoys - e.g. senior agents who have received complaints from flyers who have been aggressively groped - and have them go through the humiliation that other passengers have gone through. Then you will see two things happen: a mass firing of TSA agents who have abused their position to exert their revenge-through-power, and a mass retraining of all TSA agents, with a very explicit directive - passengers WILL be treated with dignity and respect when they come here, and their civil liberties WILL be respected - don't be the agent who decides to overstep their boundaries, because it will mean automatic termination.

Hitting the sore point of Government Motors

2011-09-29T10:17:00.001-04:00

Ford should put out a Dennis Leary type ad to counterpoint the nose-orthogonally-out-of-joint government drones who put a kibosh on this Ford F-150 ad...

"Did you hear about the plug-in car that costs forty grand and can only get you two blocks before it conks out on you? Yeah, really fuel efficient - if your trips are around the block. Come buy quality trucks and cars from us - we didn't run crying to Uncle Sam because we missed out on government money - we survived and got better. We have fuel and energy-efficient vehicles that Uncle Sam would be proud to drive around in. Hey, if we're getting noses out of joint from the government peons, we're doing the right thing."

Cheech and Chong - fiber dealers

2011-09-26T22:47:00.001-04:00

Considering Cheech Marin is 65 and Tommy Chong is 73, marketing high-fiber brownies (without other "chemical additives") is up their alley.

(Perhaps they should offer these brownies to the family with the ruined fence in Up In Smoke? "You know, Cheech told me that word meant 'really good friend' but I didn't know it really meant something else.")

401notO(k)

2011-09-21T21:54:00.000-04:00

An few responses to Hub Blog's question: Are 401(k) programs Ponzi schemes?

1. The thing that irks me about 401(k) programs is that employers lure new employees with free money, imploring that if they don't participate, they're leaving money on the table. That "free money," in my opinion, is not the least bit free. That free money as it comes from somewhere else, such as company profits and from the salaries of employees who have left the company. Think about that - would you want to take free money from a company that does criminal dealings? A company that violates labor laws? A company that fires whistleblowers? A company that has a deaf ear to what employees think and how things can be improved? A company that fires competent people and hires incompetent lackeys? Then your best bet is not just to leave the money on the table, but leave your two week notice and find a company in which the "free" money is absolute free of strings.

2. If you're fortunate enough to save $1 million in your 401(k) account, remember that each year, fees eat away at the balance. Two to three percent a year on $1 million is $20,000 to $30,000, even when the account is untouched. That means you're paying a 401(k) company at least the cost of a brand new mid-sized automobile each year.

3. Thanks to the former wealthmeisters who hid their cash any which way they could, the laws to have access to your 401(k) accounts are purposely punitive and favor only two people: investors and the IRS.

- You can have loans at either 50% of your balance or $50,000, whichever is greater. Leave your job before you're 59-1/2, and the money becomes due immediately - and if you don't pay, there's an additional penalty of 10% for early withdrawal on top of the taxes.

- The maximum amount you can contribute per year is $16,500 ($21,500 if you're over 55).

- If you're 70-1/2 and haven't taken a distribution, you're penalized 50% of the value of the distribution you didn't take.

- Anything you put in that was deferred from taxes is now considered taxable when it comes out, meaning your employer forgot to tell you that all those years you enjoyed a lower taxable income (and "more money in your pocket") could end up putting you in the 25%-35% brackets, even if you were in the 10-15% for decades, once you start your distributions - and if you don't plan ahead, the IRS bite could be substantial.

4. 401(k)'s are really good for companies vs. employees because the employees are responsible for funding and analyzing how much they have to save - including to figure out those prospectuses that are maddening and confusing to read and the representatives from the 401(k) company that use scare tactics against naive employees - because they get commissions for what they can rope the unsuspecting into.

5. To answer Hub Blog's question: in effect, yes.

A young college kid at 22 earning $1,000 a week and kicking in $200 a week to their 401(k), with the employer kicking in another $50 a week, stockpiles $13,000 even before compounding.

You would say that $13,000 is going into their account, right? It is...but the profits he makes from his fund selections are going to people who have had it for awhile. So while they get an 8% return on their funds, they might see about 4% of it hit their accounts. However, if the funds go down considerably, so does their account balance. If a fund goes out of business and they don't select a new fund, their account is either (a) regaled to a stable-value fund, which has no return, or (b) liquidated in full - the contributions made by the employee and the employer vanish.

The real moral of the story? If you don't know what the hell you're doing in a 401(k) program, or you fully don't understand what's going on, your best bet is to stay as far away from it as possible. There are plenty of other savings programs out there - IRA's, savings bonds, etc. - that may not offer the best returns, but don't have that potential of another stock market crash to wipe out your life's savings.

6: A personal note: When I started a long time ago, I had college loan debt and credit card debt, so those came first come payday. Unlike today's college students who are saddled with hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, I was lucky enough to have a $325 monthly college loan bill - but with a net biweekly paycheck of $675, that's easily 50% of the check. (Once I received raises and such, the payments got easier.) For about ten years, I truly lived paycheck to paycheck, saving very little.

I contributed to a 401(k) program for a few months until I figured out I would get a far better return paying off the debts I had (the college loans were 8%) rather than contributing to the 401(k). I paid all of those loans off in 13 years - two years ahead of schedule - and I'm working on the credit cards, and in the process I've been able to save up a healthy emergency fund, using the interest I would have paid to the college loans and credit cards that have since been paid off (even at less than 1%, it makes a huge difference).

The best bet for the college student is to pay off those loans - and whatever's left over is best put into a good IRA account.

The law of diminishing influence

2011-09-13T21:27:00.000-04:00

Here is the gist of the anti-gambling movement: it's not because they care about the poor dumping their entire paycheck into a slot machine, it's the fear that a once-in-a-while player who is living occasionally paycheck to paycheck will win a big jackpot and break the parasitic symbiosis between the impoverished and the state, hence reducing the predatory influence of people whose business is to prey on the impoverished so their own bank accounts can be fattened - if not through squeezing the rich through onerous taxes, then through the .

Bold statement? It is - and is the reason why the anti-gambling movement is desperate to have the courts try to stop gambling in Massachusetts. The courts, in their infinite wisdom, will likely nod, smile, and rap the gavel to dismiss the case, telling them nice try, but stop bothering us.

You see, suing and putting forth glaringly obnoxious statistics to influence people works only so much and for such a limited time before someone much smarter calls these folks out and offers numbers they can't refute. Yes, the poor can least afford to gamble, but they also pay far higher hidden taxes when they fill up their car, buy a pack of cigarettes, renew their license, payday loans, check cashing, rent-to-own, etc. Workers gamble with their 401k accounts; they put forth a percentage of their paycheck (and have their employer match it - it's not free money, folks) in the hopes that the traders don't sell them out and zero out their accounts.

Last time they voted on gambling, Sal DiMasi used his influence via choice leadership positions to vote gambling down. Sal DiMasi was just give eight years in prison for peddling influence. Thus, to prevent needlers from gaining any ground and to get a somewhat cleaner vote, the arrangements are secret.

9/11 was a crisis that gladly went to waste

2011-09-11T15:43:00.000-04:00

Kyle Smith's dynamite column in today's New York Post highlights what happens when you let people go about their business and not let 9/11 be another opportunity to exploit a terrorist attack for craven political exploitation (via bureaucratic meddling).

People had enough problems processing the horror of planes hitting the Twin Towers and destroying them - to merely suggest that spikes in taxes (A $1 "Patriot" gas tax hike?!) and conscription for national service (i.e. "forced volunteering") will be the salve for our 9/11 wounds is incredibly ignorant and selfish.

Hawkeye's anxiety and 9/11

2011-09-11T10:13:00.000-04:00

In the light of the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, I present to you a scene from the final MASH show (via YouTube) called "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen."

It is the scene where Hawkeye is committed to a mental institution, and MASH psychologist Sidney Friedman tries to get to the bottom of Hawkeye's psychosis. Watch the scene first, then read the following...

=

There are people who, after 10 years, will still see the horrors of two airplanes ramming into the Twin Towers. That kind of horror shocks people and in many cases, puts the wheels in motion to have them believe an alternate reality. Most of those theories have been disproven time and again, yet people still insist on their alternate view of what happened that day.

What we don't want to believe, we make up a story. We rationalize things that happened, mutter "there by the grace of God go I" and then continue on with the day. Yet, no matter how hard we try to deny things, they are real.

Death is real. It doesn't have to happen through violence; it can happen through health and natural causes. As we hold our loved ones very close, we don't want to believe they're gone. We pretend they're still here emotionally and spiritually, but they are not here physically. As time passes on, however, reality does set in. The memories will be with us forever, but it's time to recognize people won't be coming home.

And even those who are alive believe there is no other purpose in life than to curl into the fetal position, quiver in their bunkers, self-medicate to a catatonic state, and give shrill demands to do things that comfort only them, but cause grave danger to others. Never mind defending yourself - it's taking that energy in sorrow and expending it in the wrong places when it should be used in a more positive method.

Sitting there and watching the 9/11 memorials this morning was tough. The moments of silence and reading which planes hit which towers brought me back to that morning of 9/11/01, when I had woken up from coming back from New York and watching those towers come down. But as time wore on, and I was finishing breakfast, I knew a lot had changed in ten years. Two deaths in the family, two births, two marriages, promotions, job changes, and fulfilled dreams; two wars, the removal of dictators, the election of the first black president ever, and the rises and falls of the stock market.

Anxiety doesn't easily go away, but with the proper perspective (and help), it diminishes greatly.

The right to act ignorant, selfish, cowardly and stupid

2011-09-08T22:09:00.001-04:00

The Pledge of Allegiance: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America...and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, and with liberty and justice for all.

The Pledge of Allegiance, Brookline PAX edition*: I pledge allegiance to myself and all my whacked-out conspiracy theories, my desire to finally throw Chimpy Bushitler (the Election Stealer and Warmonger) on a plane to the Hague to stand in front of the International Court for crimes against humanity for waging an illegal, unjust war (to us, at least) in Iraq, my fake piety against war unless it's against Republicans (like that bitch Sarah Palin), my desire to be a total control freak (and vote for politicians who do the same) like my heroes Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong and Che Guevara, who really knew how to take care of critics (they shot them dead) and how to take care of the impoverished (they enslaved them and then if they criticized what meager treatment they got, they shot them dead), my desire to declare myself a 'progressive' when all I really am is a full-bore control freak...

I would have printed the rest of this pledge, but when it involved George Soros playing Mr. Evil, the worship of Rachel Maddow's, erm, "constitutional amendments", and the marching Wall Street banksters down the Canyon of Heroes, shackled in chains, I had to stop reading because I was laughing too hard.

* Relax, folks. It's a parody, OK? Even the Brookline School Committee thinks the group is insane and will continue the Pledge. What's next - tarring and feathering Ted Nugent in Coolidge Corner?

First dates, according to Suldog

2011-09-06T22:52:00.003-04:00

Yes, indeed, friends...if you need a relationship counselor, consult Suldog.

And yes, showing up like an unshaven bum with nose hair won't get you a second date.

Causa Katrinae

2011-08-28T22:16:00.000-04:00

Have Irene fatigue yet?

Now I'm beginning to understand why there is a lot of coverage with Hurricane Irene and the reasons for all this precaution - and it can be summed up one word.

Katrina.

Hurricane Katrina was a massive Category 5 hurricane that hit the Gulf Coast in 2005. No one was prepared for the devastation that would be incurred when Katrina came ashore in all her fury, and the slow reaction from officials, the Bush administration, and others made it an example of what not to do in a disaster.

As Irene will affect major metropolitan cities on the Eastern Seaboard, I can't blame the mayors and governors who don't want to be the next Mayor Ray Nagin or the next Gov. Kathleen Bianco - both of whom found themselves lightning rods for controversy during and after Katrina. It might seem like overkill to shut down subways and airports, and tell everyone to stay inside, but Mother Nature is unpredictable. (And...Mayor Bloomberg would not like a repeat of what happened in New York in December, when reaction to the day after Christmas storm was slow and he got blamed for it...)

Which would you rather have? No train or bus service on Sunday and allow Monday to return to normal quickly, or have delays for three to four hours because tracks and roads are flooded? Would you rather be safe at home and have hurricane parties, or have delays for three to four hours because the roads are clogged?

Hence, shut everything down and hope nothing bad happens, otherwise you'd be criticized for not doing anything. A lot of mayors and governors are coming to that consensus.

The Eastern Seaboard will get the reduced form of Irene - most likely as a tropical storm. There will be a lot of rain, a lot of wind, some power outages, and flooded roads, but not nearly as bad as advertised. Monday may be a cleanup day for some and there might be delays, but at least it will be far nicer.

UPDATE: Howard Kurtz (via Dan Kennedy) considers the coverage of Irene was "a Category 5 performance that was driven in large measure by ratings." I agree - no producer wants to lose their audience to a rival station, and you can bet these stations will command high rates for advertisements. And Kurtz agrees with me on who doesn't want to be the next Ray Nagin.

Keller's Kernel of Truth about Hurricane Irene

2011-08-26T22:41:00.000-04:00

Think about the winter we just had - multiple snowstorms with at least a foot or more of snow every other week; school and train cancellations; and just plain misery. We weren't slaves to winter, nor are we slaves to summer, either (although July 22, when it reached 102 degrees, we were all slaves to either the 75 degree dewpoints or the furnace-like wiltering heat).

Jon Keller summarizes our angst or ennui neatly in regards to Irene (the rapidly weakening hurricane Irene which will visit our state as a strong tropical storm, not as the wise-cracking liberal counterpart to Archie Bunker, played by the late Betty Garrett).

What we can't control, we panic and enter fight-or-flight mode. What I really and truly don't like is wall-to-wall saturation of doom-and-gloom, gross misinformation, inescapable drama/hype-for-ratings/circulation, and overall analysis paralysis. That is the reason why people are going after meteorologists as if they were predicting the plague and finally yelling at the TV screen, "Oh for the love of all that is good and holy, please SHUT THE BLEEP UP AND STOP HYPING THIS BLOODY STORM!"

The most responsible way to alert the public is to inform and alert appropriately to keep them calm, not to whip them into a bloodythirsty fervor a la Lawrence of Arabia, to which Peter O'Toole shouts out, "No Prisoners!" as they go after the Arabians. A great local example is the June 1 tornado that plowed through the western part of Massachusetts; tornadoes are much different that hurricanes as they form faster and they wreak much more devastation. Hurricanes allow ample time to prepare; tornadoes limit that time from an hour to as little as minutes. The key, however, is to be as forthright and as accurate in reporting and not to treat this as Trash Journalism and Infotainment 101 - the breathless, trashy/tabloidy, cliffhanger-toss-to-a-commercial-during-a-dramatic-moment trash gimmick (American Idol, who hasn't been investigated by the FCC and should ASAP for rigging their contests, is notorious for this) that serves no good.

One last thing: it's OK to walk away from and tune out all things Irene even as you're preparing. Most meteorologists sell the storms according to a longtime PR benchmark, i.e. "This snowstorm will rival the Blizzard of '78." "This hurricane will rival the Hurricane of 1938." That's visual and aural candy for the producers; when you see the actual storm it could be much better (Irene) or much worse (Katrina) than advertised. Once the storm is past, then the cleanup and assessment commences.

Jon's last words deserve an amen..."[I]nstead of whining and finger-pointing, maybe we can respond to [Mother Nature's] reminder with something in short supply today — humility. All our knowledge and fancy technology means little when confronted with a higher power. Stripped of that, we are forced to rely on ourselves, and each other. And while I prefer nice weather, I have to say, that’s not such a bad change of pace."

The Berlin Wall - a vile and perverse monument to narrowmindedness

2011-08-13T16:14:00.000-04:00

The Berlin Wall was erected fifty years ago by the East Germans to keep those who didn't agree with the new Communist laws from escaping.

The Wall was a vile and perverse momument to the ultimate in unyielding, militant, narrow-minded thinking. The East German government, first led by Walter Ulbricht and then by Erich Honecker until his exile to Chile in 1989, were so bound to Marx and Lenin's ideals that they wanted a symbol of aggression towards the West without openly and explicitly killing Ossis (East Germans), as they wanted to maintain a false sense of democracy. Hence, the Berlin Wall was erected...and the East German Army and the Stasi (secret police) enforced to the absolute letter the whims of this malignant religion-cum-policy

Yet, there are some modern people who see that it was a good idea to erect the Wall. I'm taking that to mean that to defend a backwards, militant cult like that, it was completely OK to violate human rights. Klaus Wowereit, mayor of Berlin, has a message for those who wish to indulge in those sick fantasies:

"We don't have any tolerance for those who nostalgically distort the history of the Berlin Wall and Germany's division[...][t]he Wall was part of a dictatorship[...][a]nd it's alarming that even today some people argue there were good reasons to build the Wall. No! There's no legitimate reason nor justification for violating human rights and for killings."

And yet, these folks excusing the Wall as a good thing still wear their Che T-shirts and dream one day that the so-called "armed struggle" comes true. Yet, they will be the first ones pleading to be spared as they're dragged in front of a firing squad.

The European financial influenza

2011-08-09T22:48:00.000-04:00

The only reason the markets recovered nicely from their 5.8-7.8% drops yesterday is that there was good news from Bank of America and that per the Fed interest rates will remain low "until 2013." The real saving grace in this? I predicted that oil would be at $80 by the end of the month. The press is coming out with a premise that gas prices could be at $3.25 by Labor Day and sub-$3 after that. (What, no $5 gas?)

The real reason for this? The European Union is sick. The whole experiment where people could cross borders without having to figure out how many French francs equals how many Greek drachmas was was nice until it became unworkable and unrealistic. It will be less than ten years before the countries abandon the Euro and return to their own currencies - look for 1 euro to be worth 1500 Italian lire, 2 Dutch guilders, 5 French francs, 100 Portuguese escudos...

The China angle Hub Blog fleshes out is interesting. China currently holds our debt, so how would they be able to bail out Europe...they'll invest for sure, and the hard-left of Europe will be thrilled about their Communist brethren helping them fund their current entitlement schemes, but the middle and lower classes might say, "It's nice that China is rescuing us, but how are they paying for this?"

China could say, "Hmm...American debt is too risky, so how about we trade it all in and help out Europe?" If that's the case, Europe would be rescued at the expense of China holding their debt and not being able to point out China's human rights abuses ("Sorry, Dalai Lama, we can't host you today...") and environmental abuses. It took twenty-plus years for the Eastern Europeans to be rid of the command-and-control misadventures and brutalities of the Soviet Union - the Chinese aren't necessarily fond of Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel's criticisms of communism.

To wit - to rescue their economies, do the Europeans really want a new set of masters?

It's past time we gave Wall Street a good spanking

2011-08-06T19:40:00.001-04:00

The S&P's downgrade of our debt from AAA to AA+ is, at first blush, seems awful. For the first time in US History, we've lost our pristine credit rating. We may or may not have to pay higher interest rates. We may see the markets sell off to where they were in 2009. We may see China, which holds $1.3T of our debt, cash in, take the money and run. We may have another recession. We may see Godzilla rise from the Hudson and eat the Upper West Side because it enjoys all-natural, long-lasting products.

But from the way I see it, this is not the same as a person with a 9.99% interest rate on their card suddenly seeing their interest rate spike to a penalty rate of 29.99% because they made one payment late, nor is it the person who has huge balances on their cards and is making a concerted effort to pay them down, if not off. AA+ correlates to 760 on the FICO scale, versus AAA and an 850. The score dropped 90 points, but the interest rate will change little since 760 is still an excellent score. (If the score dropped from 850 to 620 - a 230 point drop - then the lenders would certainly spike those rates.)

The S&P's message in the debt downgrade was simple. Wall Street, according to Jon Crudele, is accustomed to getting its way all the time. Money printing, laws to their own advantage, you name it - what Wall Street wants, Wall Street gets, and in turn screw around with the middle class by spiking interest rates and refusing to lend money. The S&P said, since you folks on Wall Street are so good in manipulating the markets to your own benefit, it's time to grade you fairly on your performance - no more grading on a curve.

Given that the indexes for Wall Street plunged an average of 6-8% this week, even after the lifting of the debt ceiling by Congress, Wall Street is finding out that it's not nice to fool Mother S&P, especially when she's carrying brass knuckles and has already punched a few people in the mouth. Wall Street deserves to lose every single penny of ill-gotten gains between 2009 and 2011. Besides the easy money from the Federal Reserve bank, they likely made those illicit bets using margin bets. I wouldn't be surprised if the markets tank another 40% and return to the lows of 2009, or go even lower.

But there is one thing I disagree with what the pundits are saying, and that's in regards to oil. The conventional wisdom is that if interest rates go up, oil prices will skyrocket. I strongly disagree; when interest rates go up, oil prices actually go down because the interest rate in margin buying will also go up, making oil bets ugly and not worth holding - especially on paper. Tankers that have been offshore and not been able to have their oil refined will flood the markets and driving the costs to fill up way down. They might spike in the short term, but as the government gets more desparate, there may be severe crackdowns via the CRTC and SEC, including spikes in margin requirements and extensive investigations. The good news with that is that lower gasoline prices will bring people out of their staycations and into the stores to shop.

Update: Terry Keenan is right - but the markets will sell off anyway because they want to park their cash into bonds.

Playing Acela chicken in Hyde Park turns out deadly

2011-08-06T16:13:00.002-04:00

You have to appreciate the speed and power of America's version of High Speed Rail: between the MA/RI state line and near Route 128, Acela Express trains routinely hit the speed limit of 150mph. Roughly translated, that means it would take a minute to travel 2.5 miles.

Between Hyde Park and South Station, however, speeds routinely hit 100-120mph. If you're at Hyde Park Station during a cold winter morning, the speed of an Acela Express (or even a regular Amtrak train) will whip you back hard.

I see a lot of people hanging out at the benches near Hyde Park station when I get off the train after 8pm. Very few times it's to catch the train back to downtown Boston to avoid riding the Route 32 bus; mainly it's kids who are bored and hang out there. Once in awhile, however, they might give some lip (mainly due to fake bravado) to the passengers who commute in from Milton or even Hyde Park, and paint some graffiti onto the benches.

On Wednesday night, however, Acela Express train 2172 hit and killed a Hyde Park man, who decided to do a sprint from Track 2 (the inbound track) to Track 1 (the express outbound track). When he tried to return to Track 2, the Acela train instantly killed him at a speed of 120 miles per hour. EMS arrived on the scene but was told they were not needed because the victim was dead - there were body parts everywhere. A very gruesome scene indeed.

Even if the speed was far less than 120 miles per hour, the force of the speeding train would still not have spared him - even if he were alive today, he'd be in serious to critical condition. Even though the Acela Express units are light, at speeds over 100mph they still kill.

Cash Cheatfall

2011-07-31T19:54:00.003-04:00

When Mass Millions ended in 2004, the new Cash WinFall became the first $2 online (non-scratch) game in Massachusetts. The maximum jackpot is $2 million, but if no one hits that jackpot, the prize pool is distributed to lower prizes - the $5 fourth prize becomes $20-50, the $150 third prize becomes $600-1500, and the $4,000 second prize becomes $16,000-$32,000.

Astute players found a way to make money without winning the jackpot. From the Boston Globe (via Hub Blog), if you have enough money to purchase about $100,000 - $200,000 worth of CashWinfall tickets, and the attention of a cashier who looks the other way, you're guaranteed a LOT of second, third or fourth prizes. Some lottery syndicates (groups of players) can win close to or over $1 million if they have enough money to do it when the jackpot is about to roll over.

The best solution is not to cancel the game outright, unless sales have been so bad that it warrants being yanked. What the focus should be on is how to make the game much harder to cheat on. Some ideas:

Increase the price of a ticket from $2 to $5.
Increase the number field from 46 to 60. This would expand the odds from the current 1 in 9,366,819 to 1 in 50,063,860.
Increase the minimum jackpot to $2 million, and increase it $125,000 each time it is not won to $10 million. This means it would take 64 draws to reach the rollover point versus 12.
The 5 out of 6 win would be increased to $50,000; the 4 out of 6 win would net $5,000; a 3 of 6 win would get $500; a 2 of 6 wins $25; and a 1 of 6 wins $10.
If the $10 million is not won, the players who had 5 of the 6 numbers would split 50% of the jackpot, or $5 million, with the remaining 50% split between those who had 4 of 6 numbers. If there is only one winner in the 5 of 6 pool, they receive the $10 million outright. No other prizes would be rolled over.

Putting harsher rules into CashWinfall will straighten the market cornering and cause a lot of cheaters to give up - or find another game to cheat on.

UPDATE: From the Boston Globe: Lottery agents can only sell 5,000 Cash Winfall tickets per day or risk having their machines shut down. The Consumerist also reports on this article...unfortunately, the phrase "I make my own lottery at home" is a meme that would get me arrested.

Drugs and drinking diminish a great talent

2011-07-27T21:22:00.001-04:00

Many people ask why I don't drink, and I think it was my mother and father hammering it into me that if I ever got into trouble from drinking, I would have to fend for myself.

Truthfully, I hate the taste of alcohol, which is probably a good thing since I can count on one hand the times I got drunk in the past 21 years I've been legally able to imbibe. Being in bars is like an alien on earth - what do you do first? How do you drink? What's the difference between Keystone Light (yecch) and Stella Artois (good but expensive)? However, if said bar has keno and lottery, I'll shove a 20 into the instant ticket machine and grab as many $1 and $2 tickets as possible.

Seeing Amy Winehouse in her first video ("F___ Me Pumps" - just the lyrics are enough to make you take notice) brought to mind a chanteuse with darker skin and bigger soul fresh from the urban centers, but this London girl would have caught the critics minds: "Hey, she's not bad at all. She's got a future."

So did Brian Jones, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. All died at the age of 27.

That god-awful rats nest of a beehive, the cat's eye makeup, and the wobbly walk belied a fragile woman with a ton of raw emotion and talent. But once fame hit her, the drugs and drinking followed - and she let drinking and drugs overpower her and her unlimited potential.

That's not merely tragic - it's damn shameful for her to let drugs and booze do that to her.

Someone - her parents, trusted relatives, or even close friends - should have spirited Amy away from the limelight. The drug-free Amy would have listened. Unfortunately, the drugged Amy would hear none of it. And now we know the end of the game, don't we?

A rant that Boston residents would agree with regarding tourists

2011-07-24T15:57:00.003-04:00

I work overtime on Saturdays, so I took the train from Ashmont (after getting a haircut at Joe Carlevale's) to Harvard. Between Ashmont and Downtown Crossing there weren't many passengers.

Then other passengers got on in Park Street. Still no problems.

Then I saw the flash of a camera and giggling, and different accents.

Yep, the tourists have invaded Boston for another summer. They were headed to Harvard Square - because MIT isn't all that interesting unless you're a geek, and Central Square...well, the corn-fed yokels might not understand that the bums and hustlers and drug addicts are lying through their eyeteeth when they start telling their lies about getting to a counselor in Springfield and they have to get there on the Red Line (the truth is that they want to score for their drug fix.)

I've been through Harvard Square since I was 13. I hung out there when the Wordsworth Booksmith was there with cheap books; I ate at the Tasty when coming home from Waltham and I still get an ice cream cone at Ben & Jerry's at the Garage.

The same corn-fed yokels think it's some kind of quirky mecca, one where they can scream out "Pahk the cah in Havahd Yahd" without a single blessed person noticing their thick Southern/Midwestern/Japanese accent. They also think they get carte blanche to choke off access to the sidewalks, take idiotic pictures of themselves, and purchase way, WAY overpriced tchotckes like Havahd T-shirts and snow globes with John Harvard inside.

That is, if tourists have any money left from the bums, scam artists and drug addicts relieving them of their monies thanks to a well-rehearsed bullshit story. (Tip: if they're showing cash along with their story, they're lying - they're there to extract the maximum amount of cash from gullible dupes, and usually speeding up and walking away is enough for them to stop their pitch.) Otto, the new pizzeria, has become a Ground Zero for these vermin to write whatever bullshit story they can on cardboard.

Now, before you say I'm being too harsh on tourists, let me assure you that not all tourists should be tested for mental and psychological problems. Perhaps it's my Boston neighborhood cynicism that has seeped through my bloodstream lo these 39 years, or that I yearn for the past when going to downtown Boston was a special treat, but I like it when a tourist is just as adventurous as I am and isn't afraid to head to other places that don't sell expensive tourist food. ("Hey, how do you get to Santarpios? I hear their pizza pies are as good as Brooklyn's." Hint: you can't get there by duck boat or tourist trolley, but you can get there by MBTA if you're willing to walk.)

I like it when a tourist doesn't have a map and can teach me how to get some place.

I like it when a tourist excuses themselves for being in your way.

In fact, when the tourists don't make themselves out to be as such, then it's a good sign to me - they want to blend in and be like us, not like tourists who are being scammed, upsold, nickeled and dimed to death.

But here are the dislikes about tourists.

I don't like it when tall, winsome teenage girls, in their miniskirts and flowing hair, yammer excitingly through their braces, OMG, this is the spot where Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez bought cannolis from Mike's Pastry!"

I don't like it when entire families decide to choke off access to the sidewalk to marvel over ducklings. Even worse is when they shove their camera into your hands and ask you to take a picture. (I'll do it if you politely ask, but I will go out of my way to avoid you if you insist on being obnoxious about it. Or, I could announce that "oh, Format means take a picture, right?" only to have that camera whipped away quicker than a Boston Police officer.)

I don't like it when a woman with her babies decide to jam onto an already crowded bus with her urban assault stroller.

And I certainly don't like the vibe of families so excited to be in Boston when I know, by watching TV and reading the newspapers, that if they actually found out what goes on here, they would hesitate to come back - or at least have their naivete tempered.

That is, sometimes Boston ain't so wonderful. It still has an old-boy network that hasn't been touched by time; the MBTA can be delayed and filthy; the Governor and Mayor try to cook up schemes to bring in more money on middle class and poor taxpayers, all while being so tin-eared and out-of-touch that their speeches and promises are jokes; and that violence can be found steps away from the tourist spots, not just in the inner city. And if you're thinking of going to happy hour, finding beer in a convenience store, or getting more than two drinks at a time, forget it. Our liquor laws are oppressive and up until 2004 the Blue Laws (enforced by the Puritans) banned liquor sales on Sundays.

The one word that comes to mind that tourists tend to forget is that everything runs on politics.

As a requirement, every tourist to the city should be dropped off at the big gaping hole at Filene's. The smart tourists will begin to draw conclusions to why nothing's been built there - and why packs of feral teens and the homeless hang out there and why police seems to be present in all forms - uniformed, undercover and on bike. The naive tourists will want to know when the Mother Goose grave closes.

Then, tourists should be marched over to Temple Place, where the long 60 foot buses pick up and drop off passengers with the word "Dudley Square" on them. The smart tourists will know why they're there, why Dudley Square is not listed as a prime tourist destination (or why there's a warning from their tour book stating "some areas in Boston are not recommended for travel as they are in high crime areas," such as Roxbury, Dorchester, and Mattapan). The naive tourists will just add that picture - if their camera hasn't been stolen from them or the photo subject gives them a glare - to their photo album.

If tourists want to learn something about Boston, they should clear their minds of all the pablum fed by the Duck Boat conductor (and turn off Good Will Hunting too while you're at it) and crack open a few books about the Boston busing crisis, Mayor Curley, the Combat Zone, and how the West End of Boston was destroyed by development. Then, they should also read about the Old Howard, Kevin White, the Brinks Robbery, how the building of the Mass Turnpike extension found resistance in rich towns but found none at all in the slums of Boston because the residents there didn't know how to stand up until 1972, when they cancelled the Southwest Expressway.

The FDA are tax addicts - not nicotine addicts

2011-07-23T20:00:00.001-04:00

No further comment required.

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

One for you, nineteen for us...or the IRS is a diehard Red Sox fan

2011-07-17T12:24:00.002-04:00

Somehow, the IRS are either very ruthlessly efficient or are diehard Red Sox fans. (Sorry, folks in NY reading this...)

Witness the the 3000th hit Derek Jeter made, and the man who caught it. Now, if the ball were about $250,000 - $300,000, he would have had enough money to pay his tax bill (about $84,000) and pay off his college loans (north of $100,000) and still had enough money left over for a decent car, a down payment on a house, and a little scratch to splurge on himself.

Instead, he gave the ball back. A very nice gesture, don't you think? (Nod your heads if you agree...)

Jeter rewarded the man with Yankees swag and tickets, which itself is a very nice gesture. The IRS (plus the State of New York and the City of New York) sees the nice gestures as taxable income to the tune of $14,000-$32,000. And if you think help is going to lighten his burden, unfortunately the IRS says, "nope, because any help is also considered taxable income."

The simplest and easiest thing he could have done is to decline the gifts and walk away. Catching Jeter's ball is plenty enough to tell your kids and grandkids, and the IRS can't tax you on words (unless you're compensated). Of course, turning down the ball and the swag denies the IRS and NY State the taxes it would have received, but as the man also has college loans and other payments, even the small $14,000 he would have paid in taxes would have wiped him out.

The law of Unintended Consequences had its catcher's mitt further out than the IRS.

Side note: That is why George Harrison of the Beatles wrote "Taxman," and the "one for you, nineteen for me" refers to the 19 shillings in the pound (!) the Beatles paid on their tour earnings thanks to the . (That computes to a 95% income tax...interestingly enough, when Britain switched to decimalization, it made it a lot easier to compute, as it was 95 new pence in the pound!) A lot of Britons sidestepped this by becoming tax exiles in the Mediterranean or in the US, where taxes weren't as hefty. The lesson: never, ever piss off the Quiet Beatle.

For the Advice Goddess fans...

2011-07-06T22:24:00.000-04:00

For the folks at the Advice Goddess blog about the conservative case for raising income taxes:

My thoughts here: Getting rid of tax envy, and getting rid of tax envy, Part II.

tl; dr summary: no one escapes paying; and if you wish to pay more, plan on paying 55% with zero deductions or credits.

To get to the yolk of a rotten egg, you have to break a few shells

2011-06-28T09:17:00.002-04:00

Hub Blog puts forth an outstanding analysis of the James "Whitey" Bulger capture here in Part I and continutes here in Part II.

Money quote:

Some liberals really want to put the entire Bulger saga behind them. Don’t they?

If I a member of the progressive alliance (I'm not progressive, liberal or anything else, so when I say "I" it's a theoretical "I") who got burned by a hack, not only would I be arranging several appointments with the Feds to squeal, I would enlist a few of my dirt-digging friends in the media to delve far, deep and wide into his friends, colleagues, and businesses.

I would not only want that rep hiding in a bunker in a secured location, but everyone to the top of his chain be shit-scared that they're going to be next to get a visit from government agents, and fiddling nervously and shoving their flacks in front of a camera to avoid being taken out of their office in handcuffs.

I'd also ask to be the star witness for the prosecution, even if that prosecutor had a tattoo of Sarah Palin on his chest, reclining on her elbow al fresco and winking saucily.

If the hack is convicted, I would also be the one giving a victim's statement, giving every lurid detail of that hack's corruption for Howie Carr to lap up in his columns, even though I (theoretical, not actual) despise Carr with every fiber of my liberal being.

It's very telling that the folks that Hub Blog is describing wants this matter quickly swept under the rug. Perhaps the hacks have some dirty laundry on the progressives that the progressives don't want to be broadcast, such as having those donations to their campaigns shifted sub rosa to a radical leftist groups or a few friends getting plum government do-nothing (or do little) jobs, but doing so would dry up their campaign revenue stream.

In order to find out why a rotten egg stinks, you have to break it open. Usually, it's not the egg white that generates that stench, but the yolk itself. That's why you're seeing this so-called "hack-progressive alliance" sustain as a measure of convenience, but it will only be time before either one holdstheir nose, cracks the egg open, and lets the stench fill the entire room.

A poster child for attitude adjustment tax

2011-06-21T22:21:00.003-04:00

For many a year, state and federal governments have wanted desperately to "fight the war against obesity" (quotes mine) and get a little pin money for their general funds, pork projects, campaign coffers, and that odd time with a local stripper popping out of a cake stark raving nude (or, for a more Scollay Square feel, a old-time burlesque stripper a la Dita Von Teese, complete with her stripping and writhing around in a champagne bath and twirling her pasties like a helicopter rotor. "Oh, so that's where our 6.25% sales tax is going to...")
Depending how desperate a government is for funds, the sugar, soda and snacks tax (3S) would be levied on treats, junk food, or whatever a government would define at its conceited whim.

For example: this state could levy a 5¢ per fluid ounce tax on soda (doesn't matter what kind - diet and regular would not be exempt), giving a 12 oz can of soda a 60¢ tax, a 20 oz bottle a $1 tax, and a 2 liter bottle at about 67.6 ounces reaping $3.40. For snacks, 25¢ in additional tax per ounce, giving a 6 oz bag of potato chips a $1.50 surcharge. Candy bars would depend on weight - perhaps 10¢ per ounce for a regular, 20¢ per ounce for a King Size. Candy bars would be priced around $2 - $5 - roughly what would be (over)charged in the movie theaters. Fast food joints could charge 1/2¢-1¢ per calorie in additional tax - making that triple-stacker Whopper at 1325 calories and costing $4.99 a whopping $11.61-$18.24. And for pure sadism, there's a shake out that Baskin Robbins sells that's 2680 calories. An easy $13.40 - $26.80 in extra tax will certainly drive the food competitors to the 100 calorie tasteless vanilla soy shake sprinkled with elfin magic.

Of course, the hoo-hahs in health would breathlessly "applaud" all those high taxes - and supposedly that money would go to health programs and that so-called "fight in the war against obesity."

Yet it won't be the rich or the middle classes who will be stuck with the $12 Big Macs, the $8 fries, and the $170 Vermonster bucket.

The poor will foot ALL of these food sin taxes, of course. Right now, it's easier to grab cheap junk food than to prepare snacks and meals at a fraction of the cost. Convenience store customers will not only get hit up with a sales tax, they'll pay an Orwellian "wellness" tax, purported for their own good but really to extract as much taxes from the poor in revenge for not paying income taxes.

If the poor think they'll head off these taxes at the supermarkets - they're in for an even ruder awakening: supermarkets draw a prejudice on minorities. The management sees minorities as coming in for quinoa and organic apples - they're there to shoplift lobster and steak down their pants and flash their EBT cards. The other alternative is to go down to the convenience store or bodega and discover that the 99¢ per pound red delicious apples go for $1.25 each - and those weigh about 4 ounces each, so four would be $6 - a nice 500% profit.

=

What would be the one person who the government could say, "this person is a huge fatty and a perfect poster child for putting our 3S tax on the fast track to extract extra money from the poor captive audiences?"

I visited my local convenience store to cash in a lottery ticket (a tax all by itself). A group of people with their children came in, but the female (whom we'll call Miss Nasty Attitude because that's precisely what she came with) was yammering on her cellphone while her children (nice and polite) and male companion (father of her children) were talking.

I begin to hand over my ticket to the cashier when Miss Nasty Attitude butts in with an "excuse me" that rubbed me the wrong way.

It wasn't the polite excuse me when you bump into someone, or the polite excuse me when asking a question because you're lost.

This was the nasty, "I'm more important than you and I come first" excuse me. It seems that her children, her male companion, and herself wanted Richie's Slush.

Now.

And how dare I cut into her transaction of purchasing over-sugared and overpriced slush that would induce a diabetic coma within 30 seconds?

My first reaction was to walk away, but that would give her the satisfaction of yielding to her unwarranted power. My second reaction was to engage in a long diatribe about how she was yapping away on her cellphone and during that time she was talking she could have ordered her slushes for her children. My third (which would have resulted in my arrest) would have been to shove her body into the slush box and stuff her face into it while shouting several obscene phrases.

What I did was to be unfailingly polite, although inside I was seething. I let her and her children (the nicest, kindest kids you would ever know) select the slushes, and the male companion paid for them - of course, she went outside and was nom-nom-noming the treat as her friend paid, so before I handed over the tickets, I had a great big smile on my face before I delivered the sting in my tail.

"Is it my turn now?" I said in a firm, yet strong voice. The cashier broke up into a huge smile and said it was, as if to say, "Bless you, sir!" Then, I completed my transaction and was on my way.

Normally, I don't stand up for myself, but I wasn't going to let someone try to walk right over me (and besides, that slush probably clogged Miss Nasty Attitude's ears up - hope she had brain freeze).

=

I recognize that occasional treats are fine, and so do most of the government (those who aren't being nutritional puritans). I can bet slapping an extra 80¢ on those slushes would certainly reduce the Miss Nasty Attitudes from stepping foot into the store, but not prevent them.
When the government uses taxes for social and behavioral modification (aka control) than for collecting revenue, it draws that fine line between personal freedom and government meddling. People wise enough to avoid these types of taxes will go out of their way to avoid them, but those who can't get stuck paying them.

Captive audiences, all, and as I've said before, people despise being ruled by others, especially in this country.

"Get Thee Out or Else Thy Minutemen Will Get Medaeval On Your Arses"

2011-06-06T22:47:00.000-04:00

Where Sarah Palin got the information that Paul Revere warned the British first as he went on his famout horse ride remains to be seen, but if the experts are saying it really did happen, I'm going to postulate (accept as neither true nor false) that it did.

And to her critics: don't laugh. Half of the history you're revising or whitewashing is more for your comfort and shaping your bias than it is for accuracy - i.e. lying about what happened to make yourself feel better is worse than what really happened.

"Maybe they should be banned...for not being able to spell"

2011-05-28T09:51:00.001-04:00

Fifty students got banned from the prom because of an extremely virulent case of senioritis - or is it prepping for what they're going to do in college, including misspelling "senior"?

To quote one of the parents, whose student likely didn't cause chaos:

"Originally, they were going to cancel the prom outright, but when they figured out who was behind it, they decided to just suspend those students[...]Vandalism is a crime, and there deserve to be consequences."

The prinicipal's decision, unlike the knee-jerk reaction of some administrators looking for someone to blame for their own ineptitude, was absolutely correct in banning only those who participated. Of course, once the principal announced the ban of those students, there was gnashing and grinding of teeth, fighting, blaming...in other works, a knee-jerk reaction from the jerks who did this.

Some of the banned saw their prom dreams disintegrate. Limos, pre-prom hair styling, $1,000+ (!) dresses, corsage and flower arragements - all down the drain because the seniors wanted to feel their oats. To have an "alternate" prom for those who were banned, even if they (allegedly) didn't do anything, misses the point. Don't act crazy before graduation, or you'll have to pay the consequences. Attendance to a prom is a privilege, not a right. and punishment (if had been worse, they would be banned from the graduation ceremony). In fact, it's enabling these kids and saying, "yeah, you were caught and banned from your school prom, but we're celebrating anyway." This sets a bad example - and cheats those who did everything right from having a good time.

On the other hand, being banned from the prom is a very small price to pay. Witness the alternative - the students could have been held liable for the amount of damages done, likely in the tens of thousands of dollars, plus the prospect of being banned from their graduation ceremony (having the pomp and circumstance being taken away - no cap, no gown, no valedictorian speech, no graduation party - by receiving their diploma in the principal's office or the very worst, by mail), police arrest with very high bail, hospitalization for acute alcohol poisoning or severe injury, or the very worst: having the police visit your parent's home telling them you were killed in a drunk driving accident.

I remember when I was at Latin Academy during my senior year (1990) and they took away the Senior Lounge for two weeks. The reason? People were going to McDonald's across the street - including those who told us the class will was being left out of the yearbook because people were being insulted left and right. We were allowed to run through the hallways once we received our yearbooks, but we didn't go out and get loaded. That was then. Our parents were far more strict.

Why Ted Rall is correct about the cult of Barack Obama

2011-05-20T20:26:00.000-04:00

Ted Rall is the left's Thomas Nast: he gave no quarter to the GWB Administration and he agitated every way but loose. Leftist magazines praised him for his sharp insight; even Time Magazine gave him space to put forth his spleen.

I don't agree with him on everything. However, he is absolutely on the mark when he talks about how the editors who used to lavish praise on him for bashing Bush is shying away when it comes to bashing Barack Obama.

Rall, to his respectable credit is not doing any such thing as holding back - in fact, he's damning the weak, wimpy cult torpedoes of the Obamabots and going full speed ahead.

Like a shiny crystal ball that sparkles in the sky, the media is so fixated on a "get" with the President that they genuinely fear that telling the truth about Obama's less-than-genial and somewhat questionable activities will shut off the spigot of Obama speech nectar flowing from his Teleprompter.

That is precisely why the so-called "progressive" tomes welcome a Ted Rall cartoon criticizing Obama being as much as putting George Bush on their cover saying "Miss Me Yet?" Broadcasting all the dirt and Chicago politics is exactly dissent in its most patriotic form, and just as much warranted as the left did during Bush's eight years in office.

Ted Rall is saying "the Emperor has no clothes because his besotted serfs are too busy worshipping them." It's a statement that's giving grave discomfiture to editors who are so cowardly to make waves, they'll sew their lips together to defend their idol.

Chapter-and-versers and zero-tolerance fans are afraid of being sued

2011-05-15T11:29:00.001-04:00

Margery Eagan has the overreactive school adminsitrators hall of shame, including such heart-stopping incidents as bringing in a toy gun and getting sent to juvenile court; being forbidden from hanging up an American flag, and being banned from the prom for hanging up a large mural on the side of the school to ask someone to said prom (until massive protests from students and harsh words from mayor finally had the administrator relent). Add to this cameras so Big Brother can watch watch what you eat and being banned from a field trip because you deigned to bring your insulin, and you have fear of being sued run amok.

Three thoughts:

1. Zero-tolerance rules are narrow-minded and do nothing to prevent litigation.

That's the whole gist of the reason why administrators/leaders overreact - the persons who are offended will consult their lawyers and hope for a huge payoff, but that huge price for an innocent mistake will only encourage people to skirt - and in some cases, aggressively and deliberately flout - the zero-tolerance rules even more.

If one school child is allergic to peanuts, and another child brings in a peanut butter sandwich, what kind of sense does it make to suspend the latter child for the peanut butter sandwich? Common sense would dictate two things: gently warn the peanut eaters that there might be people with peanut reactions, and have anaphalxis available for reactions of the peanut allergic. Thus, there are still rules, but they are sound enough to discourage lawsuits.

2. Negative publicity usually kills or alters zero-tolerance policies.

Zero-tolerance rules also foment hostility and resentment because the zero-tolerance rules are so rigidly and inflexibly reinforced. Thus, what usually kills zero-tolerance rules is continued and sustained pressure via negative publicity until the rule is either made more flexible, or eliminated completely.

In the Shelton, CT case, the young man who asked the girl to the prom did no harm. All he did was paste letters to the side of his school to ask someone to a prom. There was no real safety issue; the materials were made of light cardboard and the building is brick. Furthermore, the students were upset at the rigidity of that ruling - that the student couldn't attend the prom "because those are the rules." Whenever a person in authority defaults to that line of thinking, it's not a sign of strength. It's a sign of weakness - the whim of the weak to avoid controversy.

To counteract this, the students highlighted the capriciousness of them by making them the focus of sit-ins, protests, Facebook pages and the like.

3. Zero-tolerance policies derive from guilt, self-interest, prejudices, and lack of control.

No one can predict or prevent disasters from happening. Zero-tolerance rules today attempt to head off the unpredictable "at the pass" with a thick veneer of guilt ("I wasn't able to stop that drug overdose in the girl's bathroom, so all medicines and drugs will now be grounds for suspension"), self-interest ("I don't want those kids hurting themselves like I did when I was young, so anyone paying tag during recess will be punished"), prejudices ("I'm banning pizza because I don't want kids to get fat, even though some are rumored to be anorexic" "No Christmas paegants or carols because there are kids who don't practice Christianity"), and lack of control ("I can't handle a small group of kids running the halls, so I'm going to punish anyone who fits their profile").

Thus, while it's within reason to arrest a student with a real gun, it's absolutely ridiculous to arrest someone with a Lego gun, joke that you're going to go "postal" on a student, or suspend someone from consuming drugs that will save their lives if they don't take them is a product of guilt and lack of control - you think you're preventing horror and lawsuits by putting in rules so rigid and unbending...but all it does is show how cowardly and inconsiderate these rules came to be.

Who gives a damn what they think of us? Osama bin Laden death edition

2011-05-08T12:37:00.001-04:00

Maureen Dowd (via Hub Blog) is exactly right on the end results of Osama bin Laden being killed by United States Navy Seals, under the direction of President Barack Obama.

What says even more about OBL's death is that there's not only evil still in the world, but cowardice by hand-wringers and the tut-tutters are decrying this as "an unjustified killing." That OBL was in a wealthy suburb south of Islamabad, is a huge clue to OBL's own ego - he loved being a PR man as much as Public Enemy #1. Those who protected OBL - the wealthy, the government of Pakistan, NGOs with their own twisted versions of utopia - are equally guilty of giving OBL a haven, as he was likely their meal ticket to perpetuate and justify their own myths, to raise funds, or to simply be one of his propaganda points. Bringing OBL to trial, rather being buried undersea, would have generated far more publicity and fervor for him and his group than to satisfy the blatant ignorance of those who think celebrations are barbaric and medieval.

In fact, maybe this hue and cry is the upper classes of our world chagrined that the lower and middle classes took out one of their fellow travelers - an evil, bloodthirsty thug who ruled with an iron fist, just like the aristocrats of the past did. They dream of a day where they can rule without question, can execute people for even the slightest bit of disagreement, and take everything they can from those who are too weak to resist.

The myth of Che Guevara as the hero to the oppressed was smashed to bits once it was discovered he was a bloodythirsty murderer of epic proportions as he murdered anyone who got in his way. Like Osama bin Laden, he came from an aristocratic, upper-class background; he too was executed when he was caught.

We're going to celebrate the death of evil to the end of days - whether it's the arrogant politician who was arrested and jailed for lining his own pockets, the killer who gets hundreds of consecutive life terms plus a few more 99 year terms for good measure, the dictator who draws his last painful breath in his bed from cancer, the foaming-at-the-mouth agitator who gets caught with their pants down on something trivial, or the rogue banker who made the wrong bet and caused an economy to collapse.

A lot of countries praised the USA, but some said "We're glad OBL's gone, but terror still exists." That caution is completely acceptable, and is more out of wisdom than of fear. Celebrating and shouting "USA!" is also a catharsis of the horrors of September 11, not a sign of jingoism. And celebrate we should, until we're too hoarse to shout and too tired to lift our arms. Once the celebrations are through, it's a sign to move forward.

Petrorevolution IV: No actual money, no crude trading, honey

2011-05-08T11:41:00.002-04:00

Jonathan Trugman has a great idea to flush out the frat boys/bandwagoneers/day traders/speculators in energy futures: hike the margin requirements like they did with silver.

The silver markets forced traders to increase the money required to bet on credit, also known as margin. Think of margin as secured credit - if you put up $100, the credit company will match your contribution with an equal amount of money. If you drop below $100, the credit company will demand you put up an amount of money equal to your limit, or else your account will be closed.

The silver trading markets spiked the price of silver up to $50. The CME Group, who oversees NYMEX, decided to impose much higher margin requirements because the price was getting far too high - and decided to make the traders pay far more - up to 85%.

When margin calls came in fast and furious, silver dropped 30% from its all-time high of $50 per ounce to around $35 an ounce - still high, but it had an effect on oil futures as the monies from those futures had to cover the silver margin calls. Within a week, oil futures have dropped 15%, from $113.93 to $97.18. Gasoline futures dropped from $3.42 to $3.09.

If the CME Group can demand a hefty spike in margin requirements in silver, they can certainly demand them in oil, flushing out the dirty lucre. An 85% margin requirement would require a trader to put up 85¢ out of every dollar they want to gamble with, or, if you like, stick traders with a virtual 85% interest rate. That alone would take out a lot of the cash-poor traders who have way too much in virtual money.

But perhaps that's the problem: the real traders (the ones who deal with oil and energy and nothing else) know well enough to have more than enough money to deal with margin calls. The remainder are doing it "just because" and are always looking for that quick buck or easy hedge.

Thus, not only should the margin requirments be hiked, each and every trader in energy should have their creditworthiness looked at through a fine-toothed comb. This creditworthiness requirement would be world-wide - meaning the excuse "if we can't trade here, we can trade in other places that have lax requirements" would be silenced very quickly. All countries would have access to credit profiles and can automatically deny margin.

NYMEX would pull the credit reports of ALL traders and set a minimum credit score. Anyone whose credit score is lower than the NYMEX's limit (including those who have had charge-offs, bankruptcies, and debts unpaid after 90 days) would find their trading accounts locked out whatever profits the traders made would be seized - and the proceeds used to pay off any remaining margin, and then satisfy whatever debts they have that got them their low scores.

The NYMEX could also pair it with a debt-income ratio, e.g. 25% - meaning if you earn $40,000 a year, you can trade if you owe anyone $10,000 or less. If you owe more than that, you cannot trade on margin, even if your credit score is above the NYMEX's requirements.

For those traders that are left, the higher margin requirements will be enough to discourage price spikes and other monkey business, as the real traders will know what to do and they may not require margin at all. Thus, prices in energy will continue to fall and eventually be priced according to supply and demand, not on how much of a profit can be made.

Silver will likely reach its lows, but the NYMEX would be crazy not to take away the oil/energy punchbowl and smash it to the ground, and then require the partiers to empty their wallets to clean up the mess.

Petrorevolution III: A fair trade between profits and drilling

2011-05-01T12:08:00.002-04:00

President Obama wants to end tax subsidies for oil companies, who have enjoyed the bump in profits from higher oil and gasoline prices from mid-February to now.

I'm not going to make Big Oil the bad guys here (the fault lies more with overeager Wall Street bettors, such as day traders and hedge funds looking for that ever-elusive "quick buck"), but I do agree with Obama to an extent. If it hadn't been for last year's oil spill in the Gulf and the moratorium on drilling, plus the spike in inflation, gas prices wouldn't be where they are now. Of course, once the Treasury stops buying bonds, the dollar will go up and gas prices will come down.

What if the oil companies and Congress made a deal - the oil companies lose their their $4 billion subsidy, plus a hike in the gasoline tax, in exchange for completely lifting the moratorium on drilling throughout the United States?

The oil companies, without a subsidy, would lose the $4 billion, but would make far more back in profits from drilling and production than they would from government subsidy. An example: An oil company discovers 250 million barrels of oil after the moratorium is lifted. At the current price of $110 a barrel, the total amount of the discovery is $27.5 billion dollars. When the oil discovered is delivered to the market through gasoline and other fuels, the price of oil plunges. The more oil that is discovered, the more the price decreases.

And of course, the price of gasoline also decreases, but here is where the hike in gas tax comes in.    The government could implement a new gas tax that would be 50% of the wholesale price. Hence, whenever the wholesale price of gasoline goes up, so does the amount of tax...which would discourage speculators from ginning up the prices because the amount of tax would spike alongside the wholesale price.

Some examples for Massachusetts:

1) At $1.00 wholesale, with a 41.9 cent/gallon combined federal and state excise tax (18.4 federal, 23.5 state) and state sales tax of 6.25%, the price per gallon would be about $1.51.   If the new gas tax went through, the that would mean the new federal gas tax would be $0.50, so a price of a gallon of gas in Massachsetts would be $1.83.

2) At $2.00, with a 41.9 cent/gallon combined federal and state excise tax (18.4 federal, 23.5 state) and state sales tax, the price per gallon would be about $2.57.   If the new gas tax went through, the that would mean the new federal gas tax would be $1.00, so a price of a gallon of gas in Massachsetts would be $3.42.

3) At $3.00, with a 41.9 cent/gallon combined federal and state excise tax (18.4 federal, 23.5 state) and state sales tax, the price per gallon would be about $3.63.   If the new gas tax went through, the that would mean the new federal gas tax would be $1.50, so a price of a gallon of gas in Massachsetts would be $5.02.

Everyone would win - Obama for getting more tax revenue from higher gas taxes plus the elimination of the subsidy from oil companies. The oil companies getting more revenue from drilling and driving wholesale oil prices down, and bringing more domestic oil to the markets, reducing foreign oil imports. The consumers will benefit from the revenues used on mass transit and road improvements, and prices for food will also go down. Even the hardcore ultra-left environmentalists win - even though there's drilling, people may demand smaller, more fuel efficient cars to avoid paying high gas prices.

It's a trade well worth considering.

Princess Diana and ratings II

2011-04-29T22:37:00.002-04:00

The American news reporters probably got orders like this from their directors and producers: give America a Princess Diana overload. The dress, the kiss, the drive in a sportscar to the commoners - that's fine, but every time you sneeze, blink your eyes, or fart, mention Princess Diana.

The British news reporters? "This is a Royal Wedding. Avoid the rubbish the Yanks are doing full stop. And if they interview any of our folks, approach them afterwards and tell them that they're only doing it to one-up each other, and the Queen would not be amused."

I think the backlash on the American media for the Royal Wedding hype is forthcoming. The ratings won't be good because they put the wedding on at a time in the morning when people are commuting on their way to work, and seeing reporters interviewing bemused Brits in very bad hats, and pulling off stupid gimmicks and rattling off useless information is a ratings dud. The advertisers will see right through it and the networks won't get as much money.

The bigger stories in America were (a) the next-to-last shuttle launch in which the recuperating Gabrielle Giffords will see her husband off, and (b) a series of wicked tornadoes that killed 200 people in Alabama. Yet, we had American reporters murmuring Princess Diana's name every thirty seconds or so as a cat's paw to get that extra 0.1 ratings point. Purely disgusting.

(Although I have to admit - Dunkin' Donuts had a pretty good Royal Wedding Donut with chocolate and vanilla icing and raspberry jam (!) filling. Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more?)

Getting rid of tax envy II

2011-04-25T21:29:00.002-04:00

In the previous blog entry, I wrote about the people who want high earners to pay higher taxes. I alluded to that kind of thought as tax envy - that the low earners want the high earners to pay up more.

Here are some things that will never fly: total confiscation of income above a certain level (communist!); national income taxes (regressive!), flat taxes (super regressive!) and value added taxes (double secret super regressive!) Income redistribution raises a lot of hackles, and sometimes ends up being entirely circular, defeating the purpose (i.e. the money taken from the high earners goes to the low earners as some form of "social justice" payment, and the government charges sin taxes, paid by the poor earners, and spirits it back to the government).

Rob Sama has a fantastic outline of what he'd do with the current tax code, but I have some ideas to eliminate (or at least reduce) tax envy is as follows.

1. Keep the progressive tax structure, but adjust the tax rates and broaden the income levels they fall under. The rates would be as follows:

- 5% absolute minimum tax (deducted from any refunds; explained below)
- 10% (income $15,600 and under)
- 20% ($15,601 to $78,000)
- 30% ($78,001 to $390,000)
- 40% ($390,001 to $1,560,000)
- 50% ($1,560,001 and above).

For head of the household, multiply by 1.25; for married filing jointly, multiply by 1.5.

Also, $15,600 is the minimum wage per year if you work 40 hours a week and 52 weeks a year, not including holidays. If the minimum wage increases or decreases, the structure also increases.

2. Everyone who works pays something - no ducking the IRS. I would propose an absolute minimum tax of 5% for people who have $100 or less in taxable income - and it's deducted from your refund. If you earned $20,000 in a year and had no tax liability, yet you had $3,000 withheld, the IRS will take $150 from your refund, leaving you with $2,850. If you earned $100,000 in a year and had a tax liabillity of $50, and had $15,000 withheld for the year, your absolute minimum tax would be $5,000 and would be deducted from your refund of $15,000, leaving you with $10,000.

The people who claim zero tax liability at both ends of the earning spectrum is part of the reason for tax envy, and curing that is as simple making sure no one escapes the IRS.

3. Change the Alternative Minimum Tax into the Alternative Income Tax, with a flat rate of 55%. However, unlike the current alternative minimum tax, which has rates of 26% and 28%, filers can choose to this higher tax, but there would be no exceptions, deductions or deferments allowed. The AIT would be applied to gross income, including income, stocks, bonds, investments, and other items. This would give those who truly want to give more a chance, but at a steeper rate.

Example: You've earned $1 million in a year. You decide to file the AIT instead of paying at 35%. You pay the government $550,000.

These ideas might not satisfy everyone, but it's a start.

Getting rid of tax envy

2011-04-25T20:57:00.000-04:00

I write this blog for free. Gratis. I get no income from it, and the only value I put on it is that people can read it.

Whenever I hear grumblings and sniffs that the higher earners* should be taxed more, and supporting propaganda such as "X% of higher earners pay Y% of all tax while Z% of low earners pay nothing," "The zillionaires should have their earnings (taxed heavily, confiscated above a certain level)," and "the fair tax/flat tax/Richard Simmons Shake Your Left Leg and Rub Your Tummy tax is regressive to the poor, the blind, and David Letterman", there is one word that sticks out like a sore thumb: Envy.

Envy is a powerful thing. Little wonder why the lower classes cast a huge green eye at the upper classes, and wish they were taxed to the stratosphere.

But there's a problem with punishing the high earners with punitive taxes, even though in the past, it was acceptable to have an income tax rate of 90% during WWII and a 70% rate in the 1960s and people were just as prosperous. The problem is that when there's a disincentive in place to earn money, the ambition to avoid that tax will go up exponentially. Whether it's plowing it into investments, putting it into an overseas tax shelter, or giving it away to charity, the high earners will find every which way but loose to avoid having that money snared by the IRS. And, when the high income earner gets fired, laid off or their business heads overseas, that narcotic tax income that the IRS has enjoyed evaporates - usually because the business itself cannot sustain handing over a high corporate tax rate plus salaries, so the jobs are either eliminated to save money or are sent overseas to countries where the tax rates are far lower and the employment rules aren't as strict.

The lower earners lose also, because to paraphrase John Scarne, Old Man Tax Collector will find a way to get their money, and it's as high or higher than the upper tax bracket of 35%. The lower earners think they pay no income tax, but they pay high taxes on cigarettes (45-70% effective), gasoline (10%), cell phone bills (12-20%), excise taxes, sin taxes, and many others. So while it's great to get all that money IRS withheld in your paycheck due to tax credits, all it takes is a sick kid or a major car repair (or a missed rent payment) to wipe that refund out in a jiffy. Meanwhile, even though the high earner is paying 75% to the government in income tax, they have the ability to save good chunks of their income and can live comfortably, whereas the low income earners are forced to live paycheck to paycheck while paying a ton in hidden taxes.

Ironically, when the lower income earners move up and make comfortable salaries, the revenge fantasies go away. They don't care if the guy across the street has four BMWs and just returned from a 60 day cruise around the world; so long as the mortgage is paid and the credit cards are current, that's all that matters. Even the former higher earners, when they lose their job and find a new one that pays less, get the ever-vigilant eye of the IRS off their backs because they've gone down two or three brackets. Sure, you're not earning as much as you did, but so long as the mortgage is paid and the credit cards are current, that's all that matters.

In my next entry, some ideas to reduce tax envy.

* Rather than using "the rich" as a pejorative term, "high earner" is a little more accurate to me because I'm not putting a random dollar amount on how "rich" a person can be.

Princess Diana and ratings

2011-04-23T20:30:00.004-04:00

The whole media hoopla about Prince William and Kate Middleton can be neatly summed up with that above phrase.

Nearly everyone adored Princess Diana because she was considered the world's princess. And, as Wills is her eldest son, the progeny of the Princess of Wales carries on with a new royal wife. Thus, it's understandable that the media wants to show their love and honor for the late Diana by giving the wedding much needed attention.

Then again, the media is always hungry for ratings (and circulation, if you're a newspaper), and you can bet news directors and producers have their entire reputations resting on this Royal Wedding. Whoever has the best and most comprehensive coverage (even if it is larded heavily with every bit of minutiae and trivia possible, such as what Kate bought for her honeymoon) gets the praise and adulation.

But Outraged Liberal makes a great point...in the midst of the hoopla over the Royal Wedding, what happens should more important news break out?

For instance, while everyone is ooh-ing and aah-ing over Kate Middleton's dress, New York undergoes a terror attack surpassing 9/11. The entire city is paralyzed; people are wandering the street in a daze, unable to get to a subway station or bus. Hospitals overflow with the walking wounded, the seriously injured, and in some cases, those with black triage tags are wheeled to the morgue every five seconds. The number of dead is in the tens of thousands. {Of course, this is an extreme example, but lesser situations could also occur.}

1. Do the networks keep on reporting about how great the wedding vows were, at the risk of angering the public wanting to find out whether their love ones are alive or dead?

2. Do the directors and producers abandon all reporting about the wedding, and shout in their reporter's earpieces to get their asses on the first plane back to America because terrorists have hit New York even harder than 9/11?

3. Do the directors and producers tell the second-stringers, who have toiled in the shadows of the bold-face reporters for years, reporting on such stories as shopping mall openings and kittens who can talk - that they rush to the scene ASAP, and decide while the wedding is important, coverage will be curtailed significantly to because of the New York attacks?

The networks that undertake #2 and #3 would probably receive more respect for curtailing or abandoning their Royal Wedding coverage than #1, who are only in it for the ratings and bragging rights.

Update: Oh, and it's the beginning of the network sweeps period, in which the local network set their advertising prices for the next year by putting out all sorts of overhyped junk and garbage to lure viewers, who in turn plump up the ratings. So I ask the question again - if a much more emergent news item supersedes the Royal Wedding, will the networks abandon Wills and Kate in droves?

The cleansing of the stock market - not always a bad thing

2011-04-18T22:59:00.001-04:00

I agree with Hub Blog: where was the S&P before the 2008 crash? We're at that point - again - and the end game is going to be even worse, should the debt be degraded even further or the debt ceiling is forbidden to be raised, in favor of total default. (Cue dramatic soap opera organ here.)

Should any of the above happen, it won't just be us who have to down that financial Buckley's Mixture (a cough medicine that is probably the worst tasting in the world, but actually does work) - the world will be taking a dose of it and not like it as the camphor and pine oil courses through their veins.

The only difference? This stock market rally has been more fake than Paris Hilton's doctoral thesis on Frederick's of Hollywood. Thanks to low interest rates, QE(insert number here), and lax oversight on Wall Street, we not only didn't learn from the mistakes of 2008, we plan on multiplying them in 2011.

(One aside: If it's not the economy that will make Obama a one-term president, excessively high gas prices have that Kryptonite-like action to turn 70-80% approval rating swans into 20-30% virtually unelectable lame ducks.)

What could possibly happen?

1. China, seeing that America is at its weakest point, decides that holding US debt isn't so great after all. They decide to sell ALL of their Treasuries and interest rates SKYROCKET. Forget those quaint, piecemeal 1/4 to 1/2 percentage point hikes - figure a 5.75% kick for starters, and then 1% each month until the interest rate is in the double digits and stays there for a couple of years. If you are in debt, a 20% interest rate will be low, but on the bright side those already at default levels will likely stay there.

2. Instead of spending their money on overpriced gasoline, people will spend their money on their skyrocketing debt instead. Demand will plunge because people are now forced to service their debt rather than filling their tank, and gas and oil prices will not fall like a feather, it'll fall like a Looney Tunes anvil - whistles and all - on oil and gas speculators. Drivers will be thrilled to pay $1-$2 for gasoline again, but traders panic selling their overbought positions won't be as thrilled.

3. The stock market will undergo a hefty, if not severe, correction. Consider a 25% correction a very conservative estimate, and a lengthy spate for the Dow under 10,000 (even a few months under 5,000), the Nasdaq under 2,000, and the S&P under 1,000.

4. The good thing about high interest rates if you don't have debt? The dollar becomes king once again, and it's not singing Elvis classics. What you've been saving now gets a nice boost every month from pennies to actual dollars per month, courtesy of your bank, as they now have to pay interest from their hoarded stores to the customers. With interest rates of 12%, a person who has $10,000 in the bank gets $1,200 a year. Oh, which also has to be reported to the IRS as interest income. C'est le guerre.

On the other hand, this kind of financial exorcism may be the key to putting a lot of people on Wall Street in handcuffs - what the chattering classes and politicians have been demanding since 2008. That is, until the chattering classes themselves are served subpoenas and are led out in front of cameras because they have connections with them. Then, they won't hesitate to plead the Fifth as much as they can repeat the menu at Spago.

When saving a life absolutely trumps living the good life

2011-04-16T11:59:00.002-04:00

Before the MBTA fully rebuilt Charles/MGH station, there was a nice little elevated section so people could see the hospital, the Charles Street jail, and Buzzy's Roast Beef. When it was rebuilt, the elevated section remained, the jail turned into a restaurant, Buzzy's Roast Beef was long-gone, and there was a noise wall that blocked out the stores.

Likely, the Beacon Hill residents were tired of the commoners riding under their million-dollar brownstones and demanded noise mitigation. The MBTA complied - and while Charles/MGH looks more modern, the old charm of the station is gone.

Beacon Hill residents are now complaining about air ambulances and helicopters flying to MGH's Helipad, along with news helicopters flying out when breaking news occurs. Even the most dense, out of touch and clueless members of the upper classes should understand this. They don't - they prefer their invisibly-gated enclave untouched and unsullied by things that they cannot control.- like accidents and breaking news.

From a practical standpoint, life-threatening injuries are transported by helicopter to a Level 1 Trauma Center. Even if an ambulance is able to transport to a hospital, the resources may not support critical or severe levels of injury. For example, if a person has a skiing accident in the Berkshires, they would be taken to either Berkshire Medical Center in Pittsfield if the injuries are minor or moderate, but would be medivacked to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield if the injury is serious, critical or life-threatening,

Maybe the residents of Beacon Hill - having their upturned noses out of joint with these life-saving efforts - should ask East Boston residents who are used to having jumbo jets fly at even lower clearances how they get used to such noise. Then, they should attempt to be considerate of people who are not in their social circle, i.e. the great unwashed who can't afford million dollar brownstones, and smarten up. Yes, an ambulance can travel over 100 miles per hour from the sticks to MGH, but by then the victim could be permanently injured or dead.

When the wealthy bitch about helicopters ruining their peace and quiet, they remove all doubt about their sense of entitlement and desire to keep the commoners out of their invisibly-gated enclaves. The truth is that saving a life trumps the glamourous life, and no amount of tantrums will change that.

That -1566.67% profit margin on Charlie Sheen's "Not Winning" tour

2011-04-12T20:49:00.002-04:00

For the people who purchased $300 front row seats to see the not-so-winning (and possibly soon to be committed) Charlie Sheen at the Agganis Arena, if you're feeling had for purchasing said tickets, you're quickly learning the lesson of artificial inflation and bubble bursting.

The ticket brokers certainly feel your pain. They were so confident Charlie Sheen would be a huge hit and run into unbelievable demand that they snapped up huge blocks of tickets to sell at a huge markup, and then get a nifty profit.

That would be true - if Charlie had a show that wasn't booed just about everywhere - when people weren't walking out at the same time demanding their money (and time?) back - the brokers would have made a fortune.

The only thing that's killing them now is discounting those $300 tickets that aren't selling at a fire-sale price of $18. (Hence, the -1566.67% profit margin.)

That's exactly what happens when something is so overhyped that when reality - that sharp, glistening needle that bursts that bubble - slices it open, it's a horror and beauty to behold. The financial term is demand destruction, but it's really "don't believe the hype and jump on the bandwagon, unless you like smelling like dung and you can't get rid it."

Remember the Tickle Me Elmo craze of 1996? Tickle Me Elmo was priced at $28.95 but it was a Hot Christmas Toy of 1996, and as manufacturers couldn't keep up with demand (or made an artificial shortage to whip up hysteria) prices on the off-market went through the roof. People would buy available Tickle Me Elmos, and then sell them to parents desperate to mollify their children. The highest commanding price for a Tickle Me Elmo right before the holiday season was $1500.

Then, reality popped the Tickle Me Elmo bubble and price gouging. Kids loved Tickle Me Elmo - for only a few minutes. Then they went onto other toys. The parents who paid a huge money for Tickle Me Elmos that only held their attention span? Upset would be an understatement. The bubble burst even harder for the greedy sellers who tried to sell the Hot Toy at $1,500, but once word got out that Tickle Me Elmo wasn't the hot toy it purported to be, the bottom kicked out. Manufacturers compounded the scalpers' problems by flooding the markets with Tickle Me Elmo dolls, and by March 1997, Tickle Me Elmo was relegated to the clearance aisles as stores could no longer artificially hold back their supply - and even they took a huge amount of heat and losses because kids didn't particularly care for an animatronic Sesame Street doll that would only hold their attention for mere seconds. (That profit margin loss for the boob who tried to shell out a $1500 Elmo but couldn't? Minus 5081%.)

But don't feel bad for the ticket scalpers. Once people discovered Charlie Sheen was losing (and losing royally) and dreams of ticket profits evaporated with blisteringly negative reviews, angry ticketholders walking out and demanding their money back, thanks to a mentally unstable and drug-addled Hollywood celebrity participating in a vanity circus, flew out the window, the ticket brokers found themselves losing even worse than Charlie Sheen.

Lesson learned: cornering the market on something in short demand is always a losing proposition. The market, when reality intervenes, usually corrects in a way that cornering it causes severe financial ruin, even bankruptcy.

And, deliciously, demand destruction in oil will do the very same thing to those who came in late and bought too high...and the ones expecting huge profits will find themselves taking a huge financial loss instead, thanks to their greed. (On the other hand, there is a benefit: gas prices won't fall like a feather - they'll tumble just as hard as they rose.)

(Smug) Fools and their (tax) money are soon parted...

2011-04-06T22:13:00.000-04:00

A little background: The Massachusetts income tax was 5.95% for everyone before being reduced to 5.3%. Howie Carr makes a good point about the "optional" 5.85% income tax that 682 people paid and generated $69,000 in extra revenue for the state...that is, if people feel so self-satisfied in paying extra taxes, it's their choice, but it's not a choice for everyone.

If you're earning far less, that 0.55% difference means a lot - between getting their lights shut off and putting food on the table. However, if you want to brag that you're paying more, don't be surprised if the Legislature is laughing behind your back and figuring out a way to spend that extra dough you gave them.

A better income tax would be 25% of whatever you paid for your federal return, similar to what they do in Rhode Island. If you paid $1,000 to the Feds, you pay $250 to the state. If you pay $125,000 to the Feds, the DOR gets $31,250.

Certainly the Massachusetts income tax rate would no longer be a flat rate (as the Federal taxes are already progressive) but those in the lower brackets would pay less than they do now - if you're in the 10-15% bracket, you'd be paying around 2.5%-3.75%, but if you're in the 35% bracket, it would be about 8.75%. There would still be withholding - no avoiding that - but calculating 25% of what you owe to the Feds is easier than figuring out what 5.3% of something is without a calculator handy.

And then those who want to pay higher taxes would have to earn more, or if they can't, they can simply write out a check to the Department of Revenue as a way of helping the state reduce their deficits. They'll appreciate it, even if they're trying not to gasp in fits of laughter.

A penny saved in interchange fees could close your business

2011-03-26T10:42:00.004-04:00

Congress is proposing to reduce interchange fees between banks and businesses on debit cards from 63 cents to 12 cents per transaction.

Kenneth Brennan, president of the Village Bank in Newton, highlights why that promise of lower interchange fees may benefit Big Retail instead of Mom and Pop - to the point where Mom and Pop loses their business and shuts down.

For example: if you're a small business and have 100 debit card transactions per day, currently you would pay $63 to the banks. With the new laws, you would pay $12 - a savings of $51 a day or $18,615 per year. If you're Big Retail and have 10,000 debit card transactions a day, you go from paying $630,000 to $120,000, saving $510,000. The bank doesn't profit from small business all that much, but from Big Retail, $510,000 a day savings paying the bank is huge ($186.2 million a year). To compare, $186.2 million in savings can be plowed back into marketing, sales, purchases, salaries, hiring, and administrative costs (and of course, political donations and lobbying), while the small businesses savings of $18,615 per year might be able to hire a couple of part timers and stretch the electricity bill a bit.

In turn, Big Retail can lure customers away from small business with promises of huge sales and savings, effectively reducing small businesses' sales. Even though the interchange fees are cheaper, the ability to compete against Big Retail will end up putting those Going Out of Business signs at a rapid pace.

Are the banks right to point these details out? Of course. (Refreshingly, Mr. Brennan did in a clear and concise manner. And he did so as a president of a local bank, not through the flack of a Big Bad Cigar Chomping Bankster pledging allegiance to Helicopter Ben.) Equally so, bank customers are free to close those same accounts when they realize the bank is making money off of them, not the other way around. Businesses who don't want to deal with interchange fees and the middleman can refuse to accept credit cards and checks, or establish limits to mitigate those fees.

It's perfectly within our rights to ask this question: are the banks aware that living off consumers simply for profit and revenue soon enough will end in their total and final demise?

Watching the Ten Percenters

2011-03-15T21:14:00.000-04:00

I'm responding to this excellent Herald article by Hillary Chabot as a long-time lottery player.

I've cashed tickets at the Lottery offices for years. Until 2004, I got the full amount of my winnings, and since then I've paid my 5% cut to the state. (Quit laughing back there if you're thinking I'm financing Deval Patrick's junkets. OK, maybe a nice lunch at a London restaurant.) If you have nothing to hide and you won a substantial amount of money, you would go and cash in the ticket...

...unless you owed child support, back taxes, parking tickets, and the like. Not only do you get the 5% haircut from the state (or, if you're over $5,000, an additional 25% to the IRS), whatever you owe to the Department of Revenue gets taken. For instance, if you owe $100,000 to the state for child support and you win $250,000, all you get left is $87,500, as $75,000 is sent to the DOR and IRS for taxes and the $100,000 is sent to the ex who has been demanding payment. Even if you win as little as $600, whatever you're in arrears gets reduced by your winnings. If you owe $100,000 and you win $600 - sorry, no check for you, but you get your bill reduced to $99,400.

Enter the professional ticket casher, or the "ten percenter." What a ten percenter will do is cash the ticket for you in his own name, take 10% for themselves, and then give the rest to the winner. The result: the tax/child support cheat still owes money, but keeps his winnings out of the radar of the DOR and the IRS

If you're not in trouble and you still want to remain anonymous (or have relatives or collectors dial you night and day because they discovered your suddenly fattened bank account) a blind trust established by a lawyer would be better than giving it to a ten percenter. That way, the lawyer can come forward and claim the prize in the interest of the trust; the members of that trust remain anonymous (well, except for those under 18).

So what to do about this loophole that's costing the DOR millions in back taxes and child support?

Appeal to the ten percenters to turn against the ninety percenters. A back stabbing move? Sure, but if the ten percenter knows that the cheat won't give them their 10%, nothing lubricates the skids more than a ten percenter entrapping his boss.

Here's how it would go: a tax cheat owes $50,000 in child support and $25,000 in back taxes. The tax cheat wins $100,000 in Mass Cash. His $70,000 net will be seized if he turns in the ticket, so he gives it to the ten percenter with a promise of giving him $10,000. The ten percenter knows the tax cheat has screwed him in the past, so he works with the DOR and cashes in the ticket for the cheat.

The catch: the $70,000 check the ten percenter receives gets deposited into a traceable DOR account, who is also monitoring the amount of money given to the tax cheat. When the tax cheat discovers DOR and IRS agents at his door and arrests him for child support and tax evasion, he also will find out all of his assets are seized too, thanks to the help of the ten percenter. The $60,000 that the tax cheat tried to evade gets applied to his outstanding liens, and the ten percenter still gets his 10% of the original winnings - plus 10% interest on what the cheat originally owed, which is $7,500. A fairly nice bonus.

The program, which I would call "Operation Dime Time," would help the DOR get lost cash from their evaders through the work of the ten percenters, who would also get rewarded for their assistance. The ten percenters themselves would shed their image as mules for tax and child support cheats. Even better - children who have been suffering due to the selfishness of their parents would get the money they deserve.

Somewhere, Juan Williams is chuckling to himself

2011-03-09T21:57:00.001-05:00

After months of controversy, Vivian Schiller, the head of NPR, resigned after one of her colleagues got into a foaming anti-Tea Party tirade, thanks in part to conservative activist James O’Keefe, posing as a Muslim group carrying a $5 million donation to NPR and a hidden camera. Ron Schiller not only offered his opinion, he offered the rope to strangle funding for public broadcasting. (Not only that, one of the hoo-hahs chuckled that NPR is actually National Palestinian Radio. She's on adminstrative leave.)

The clincher in all of this? Upper class white people have maintained their facade of tolerance for many years, but their unadulterated spleen and contempt for others not like them - in other words, their real opinion about minorities, poverty, etc. - comes behind closed doors. They are every bit as bigoted, ignorant, racist, and intolerant as they proclaim their bete noirs to be. The upper white class lusts for power even more than the ones who "cling to their guns and religion," only their guns are mobs of professional agitators and their religion is socialism-lite.

NPR will only have itself to blame when federal funding is cut off from public broadcasting, and their only crime was being too candid.

Juan Williams, who was dismissed for exhibiting his opinion at NPR, is somewhere chuckling wryly to himself.

UPDATE: Juan Williams responds in the New York Post. Compared to his former NPR bosses, Williams at least has his shoes tied while they tripped over themselves.

Instant Monkey Business (or I voted for #1 but we elected #3?!?!)

2011-03-05T23:05:00.000-05:00

Instant Runoff Voting is an alternative way of voting for candidates versus the usual method of voting for one person. In a nutshell, people are ranked in preference.

Sounds great in principle...but in this article by Brendan O'Neill (editor of spiked!) it really isn't that bright and shining pearl of democracy its supporters purport it to be. I've included some parts here, and as it's written mainly in British English, I've put some words in braces {example} for an American approximation. Anything bolded is also my emphasis.

AV is a form of super-technical majoritarianism. The way it works is through insisting that a candidate secure more than 50 per cent of votes before he is declared winner. So it asks voters to list their candidate choices in order of preference, marking them as 1, 2, 3 and so on. If after the first count no single candidate has 50 per cent of votes, then the candidate with the least number of votes is kicked out and those who voted for that candidate have their second-preference votes counted instead. This continues until one of the candidates – through a combination of his own first-preference votes and less keen voters’ second-preference votes for him – finally reaches the 50 per cent mark. So someone eventually wins, even if many of ‘his’ votes were cast very half-heartedly for him.Instead of voting for one person, you select people in terms of preference. When the voting is closed, the person who receives over 50% of the vote wins. If no one gets to the magic 50%, the person who has the lowest percentage is eliminated and the votes get passed around until someone hits 50%.

[AV] would make things less democratic, in two important ways: firstly through its impact on the act of voting, which would turn from being an impassioned statement into a watered-down listing of candidates you like, kind of like and dislike; and secondly through its impact on the act of deciding, which would more and more become a post-election, closed-off process of sifting through people’s preferences to try to decipher which candidate sort of represents the electorate’s desires.

AV would weaken the vote by implicitly inviting people, not to stamp their ballot paper with a heartfelt X for their party, but to scribble numbers next to various candidates, regardless of whether they feel very much for them. Voting would become less a declaration of belief and more a hedging of political bets.

The pro-AV lobby often points out that you will still be able to vote for only one candidate (or just two, or three, or four… it’s up to you). However, the knowledge that your first-preference vote might swiftly be discounted, and that second- or third-preference votes could become key in deciding the outcome of the election, will put moral pressure on voters to play the AV game, effectively to list their feelings about all the candidates rather than attach their flag to one of them. In keeping with our era of ideology-lite, where strong political convictions are seen as weird, voters will be tempted away from their so-called ‘tribal allegiances’ towards the expression of a more relativistic sentiment.

This could impact on what kinds of candidates are put forward for elections in the first place. Which political party will risk {campaigning} a hardcore individual[...]when it knows that if its candidate fails to secure 50 per cent of the vote in the first count then the views of other parties’ voters may become key? Today’s {weaker} parties rarely {campaign} risky candidates these days anyway; but with the introduction of AV we would likely see the party leaders exerting even more influence over which individuals are permitted to {campaign}, with the elbowing aside of those with possibly controversial beliefs in favour of more acceptable, politer and blander candidates who might not only pick up lots of [#]1's from said party’s traditional voters, but also some [#]2's and [#]3's from the other parties’ voters, too. AV would implicitly encourage the homogeni[z]ation of political life.

The new way of voting would also create enormous scope for {mischief}. The knowledge that second- and third-preference votes could become key will invite opportunistic lobbying between the various candidates and their minions. Under AV, the emphasis will inevitably shift from politicians appealing directly to the public for their outright political support and towards candidates cosying up to each other, striking deals, saying ‘get your people to give me their second-preference votes, and I’ll get mine to give them yours…" AV has a built-in tendency towards oligarchical relationship-building over direct, passionate, people-oriented electioneering.

Finally, AV would transform the traditional act of counting votes into a political form of tea-leaf-reading. Elections will be decided through the laborious process of sorting out preferences, expelling failing candidates one-by-one and subsequently spreading their supporters’ votes to other candidates. The people’s will would become something that is not so much clearly expressed in the election itself, in the act of voting, but rather something that is worked out after the election by officials and experts. Politics would become less open, less forged in the public realm, and more an act of elite deciphering of what ‘the people’ seemingly prefer rather than want. We could easily end up with representatives that no one truly, passionately, wants.

In short, AV will both weaken The Vote and strengthen electoral bureaucracy. It will encourage even more candidates not to stand on a platform of ideas or policies that they are prepared to live and die by, but rather to take fewer political risks and always to keep one eye on the lowest common denominator of appealing to as many people as possible. And AV will strengthen the hand of that expert caste of middle-class negotiators and well-connected, well-educated political players who already dominate much of the modern political sphere. It will be a travesty for democracy.

Which may be the reason why some people, who despise the current, yet imperfect electoral system, would love to have IRV up and running. Or maybe not...if IRV were active during the 2010 Mass Gubernatorial elections, and Tim Cahill and Jill Stein were eliminated, the 9% of the votes would have gone to Charlie Baker rather than Deval Patrick, and Baker would have been governor. And, for the reasons listed above, vote pandering and dealing would dilute the very idea of voting in the first place - and dilute the votes themselves.

Petrorevolution II: The fear of $5 Gas (and why it likely won't happen)

2011-03-01T21:19:00.000-05:00

Memo to the Boston Herald: stop drinking the $5 per gallon gasoline price hysteria Kool-Aid.

While we have high gas prices now (17 cents in a week), it's possible that gas prices might reach $5 a gallon. It happened down south during Hurricane Katrina, but that was because there was real fear that the refineries would not come on line and gasoline would be disrupted.

Katrina, however, was a one-shot deal. The refineries recovered within two months, oil and gas prices plunged, and then we got back to normal...until the next crisis.

It's possible gasoline prices could reach $5 per gallon. But if history is on our side, I can say with confidence if it did, it wouldn't last very long, or we would get close to it, but not reach it, and once it did it would plunge just as fast as it rose (i.e. it would fall faster than Charlie Sheen's reputation - similar to what happened in 2008, when prices between October and November plummeted 20 cents a week).

Here are the reasons why:

1. It's true what's happening in the Middle East disrupts the oil and energy markets and production, but the unrest that's going on now involves getting rid of despotic leaders. Sure, Qaddafi is as crazy as a quilt, but once these dictators lose their power, there is a distinct possibility, if not probability, that far friendlier leaders will be glad to deal with the United States and no longer use oil as a weapon, but as a benefit for their nation and their people. There of course will be some people skeptical of the United States, but once the standard of living improves and pure social justice flows in, they'll appreciate the efforts (even if they don't show it publicly).

2. $5 gas is a psychological breaking point in several ways.

a. It would immolate the stock rally that's been happening since 2009, and return us to a recession - or, the worst case scenario, sticks us with a 20-50% plunge in the markets across the board. The 401(k) accounts so delicately rebuilt from three years ago would take a huge hammering.

b. Profits from companies, already facing higher transportation and materials prices, would vaporize, forcing businesses to either to delay new purchases or layoff employees; the unemployment rate would then skyrocket to the double digits.

c. The Federal Reserve would be forced to not only abandon its quantitative easing program, which prints money to purchase bonds, it would be forced to hike interest rates to help savers make up the difference between lost money in their 401(k) funds and lost money from their paychecks. The interest rate hikes wouldn't be small steps, either – 2.5% hikes every two months - and would force the banks to give its profits to its best savers, rather than hoard it for investments.

3. While oil and gasoline are going up, natural gas is still stable ($3.78 per million BTUs as of today). If you're lucky to have a car or vehicle that runs on CNG, the Gas per Gallon Equivalent price is much better – from around $1.39 per Gallon of Gas Equivalent to $2.50 GGE. It's also the end of the heating season, so cooling prices during the summer might be cheaper than driving.

4. Demand is still low due to the bad economy, and despite the stock market, so $4 gas might be a more plausible (yet no less painful) possibility versus $5 gas. It will certainly dampen the summer driving season, forcing people to take smaller vacations or stay local and those refineries in the US that are full of oil will go into overtime to produce it, so that should a disruption actually occur, there's ample backup...

5. Never forget the Strategic Oil Reserve. When Hurricane Katrina came to the shores in 2005, gasoline prices spiked over $3 a gallon, but President Bush authorized releasing oil from the SOR for just such a case so that people would still get gasoline. Two months later, oil plunged to around $2 a gallon or less.

6. $5 gas would make Barack Obama's 2012 campaign for re-election extremely difficult, if not impossible if he does nothing to assure the public that this is only temporary, and he is doing everything he can. If he doesn't – or he uses this crisis to ram through energy plans through Congress – not only will he not be re-elected, he will burnish his reputation as the Nero President - the President who let the world burn while he dithered around.

7. The media might be using $5 gas to generate more web hits, plump up their newspaper circulation, or get better ratings, but the public knows the difference between total hype and information. You'll get the occasional person screaming about price gouging and greed, but for each of those, 9 others are conserving fuel, filling up only when necessary, and using public transportation. Reducing demand now will be rewarded later.

8. Believe it or not, high gas prices prevent shortages in gasoline. Running out of gas at $3 a gallon because of piggish, self-centered herd mentality is much worse than having plenty of it $5 a gallon - and once the crisis is over, the glut will mean much better prices for those who had the patience and courtesy to wait, rather than fearing that gasoline would run out. It's no longer 1973.

Sit tight, relax, find cheaper gas stations, and remember - the Petrorevolution will hurt, but it'll benefit us all later.

Replacing old US 1 with MA 1A between Dedham and the North End

2011-02-27T11:49:00.000-05:00

In 1989, US 1 was rerouted onto I-95/I-93 to prevent large trucks from clogging up the narrower parkways that wend through Boston. Nothing has replaced it so far, but here's a proposal: take the current Route 1A that ends unceremoniously in Islington (near Legacy Place) and extend the route onto former US 1.

The routing would be as follows:

- Dedham: Boston-Providence Highway, VFW Parkway
- Boston: VFW Parkway, Centre Street, Jamaicaway, Riverway, Boylston Street, Storrow Drive, Leverett Circle, Causeway Street, Merrimac Street, Congress Street, Hanover Street to Callahan Tunnel.

The additional distance would be about 15 miles - enough for cars to bypass the busy highway and enjoy a scenic route. The link to the map is here: Proposed MA 1A rerouting.

Show 'em the money, Adrianna

2011-02-23T20:34:00.000-05:00

I don't agree with the political content that goes with the Huffington Post, Adrianna Huffington has some 'splainin' to do. The Angelic One has more here at Red Mass Group. (There's an even better read from Truthdig.)

Classical exploitation of the lower classes to enrich the leaders is nothing new, but it is the fuel that fires revolutions. Explotiation knows no boundaries, but once people find out they've been rooked and used for financial and political gain, they get very angry very quickly. When you anger Adbusters - the pure progressive, anti-corporate outfit - to the point where they tell other bloggers to find more hospitable climes, then you know you've done something wrong.

At the very least, Adrianna should give these bloggers a share of the money, rather than acting like Marie Antoinette with a Greek accent. (What's Greek for let them eat cake, anyway?) Taking 10% of the sale - $31.5 million - and sharing it among the bloggers will be a great token of her appreciation and will give them a financial opportunity to continue blogging for her. If not, there are always more HuffPos with a purer ideology that can take over and fill the need to rant about subjects they care about.

I've been blogging here at Cleary Squared for almost five years. The irony is I do it for free, and I wouldn't have it any other way. I blog to make people laugh, make people thing, get a few things off my chest, and observe the little things in life. I don't set out to anger people, either - I lean to the right a little, but I don't quote Fox News as gospel (I just link to them). If I were paid, however, I'd expect those who are getting my words to be prompt and not have every excuse in the book not to pay me.

Show 'em the money, Adrianna.

Pain now, relief later - Petrorevolution in the Middle East

2011-02-22T19:56:00.002-05:00

Is the Middle East shedding itself of dictators, "royal" families, and religious fanatics worth the price spike at the pump? Yes, without a doubt. Unlike the Petrohysteria of 2007-2008, where oil and gasoline prices went up so investors could inflate prices, only to have them crash by the end of 2008, the reason why oil prices are very high now is that dictators in the Middle East - where the oil really is - are scared shitless of being overthrown by the people.

The revolutions began was Tunisia, then Egypt, and now Libya, where the despot Mummar Khadafi is at his last stand and will be deposed in due time. The dominoes keep on falling, and even the House of Saud, the biggest oil domino of all, is at risk of falling.

The real fear is not shutting off the oil, but who fills in that power vacuum and declares themselves the sole controller of oil. That entity could be militant Islam, Iranian mullahs, or anyone sympathetic to jihad. For the safety of the workers, oil has been shut down - reducing the risk of sabotage.

Remember the old exercise cliche "no pain, no gain?" If you undergo a strenous workout, your muscles hurt and ache what seems for days, but then they recover the next time. As soon as you workout again, you don't feel that pain and your muscles get stronger.

What's happening in the ME is that the people, long oppressed by dictators, have seen what demanding free elections, suffrage, and economic equality. Pure social justice - with its roots free of any Marxist-Leninist fillers - will come, but it won't be easy. There will be deaths, riots, and unrest - sometimes long after the minority families have been whisked out of their kingdoms, the dictators are handcuffed and hauled to the Hague, or and the paranoids are hung in the middle of the town square.

Whether or not we attain that $4 plus per gallon that was common in the summer of 2008 remains to be seen, but we might get close enough to cause concern. The offshoot of that is that paying more at the pump now (or reducing demand, which works just as well) will actually help us out later. New governments who are friendly to the world - ones who shout "Benjamin Franklin" easier than "Death to America" - will be pumping out oil, seeing that the revenues and profits go to the newly-free people, and not a bunch of criminal families, paranoids, and thugs.

Oil will return to the forefront as commodity that is speculation-proof and/or cannot be used as a weapon. It will be priced fairly enough to make a decent profit, yet not bankrupt people either through high fuel prices or high food prices. The artificially high prices we have now will plunge to levels we can all afford - not necessarily the good old days where we paid $1 per gallon, but maybe to the $1.50-$2.00 in 2008.

So instead of groaning about paying for high fuel prices, the best thing we can do is help the folks overseas by supporting their efforts to bring stability to the Middle East. The regimes are more afraid of their own people than trying to choke oil supply.

What we will finally end up with is a Petrorevolution, not Petrohysteria. Pain now, relief later.

Lara Logan shines a light on the Middle East's not-so-dirty secret on women

2011-02-17T21:59:00.001-05:00

Lara Logan's brutal physical and sexual assault in Egypt must be off limits from crude jokes and officious speculation. Jon Keller (and the commenters who responded) put a fine point on the Twitter twit Nir Rosen - but let me add something important here.

Jounalism can be a dangerous business. Certainly, Egyptians who have been under various flavors of dictatorships - friendly and unfriendly to America - deserve their chance to celebrate their revolution over Hosni Mubarak. Under the same token, however, journalists and newscasters cannot simply go to Egypt and expect the citizens to walk up to a camera, state that it wants to be just like America, and then sign Egypt's answer to the declaration of Independence.

In most cases, the Middle East's views on women are not the least bit liberalized (in the pure sense). Here in America, we have women journalists, women secretaries of state, and women Supreme Court members. In the Middle East, everything is done by men and the concept of suffrage and equal rights remains a concept that doesn't exist and is not up for casual conversation at the breakfast table.

Lara Logan is strong and tough, and she should be the example for all women to say, "I was brutally assaulted," because sure as hell the women of the Middle East don't have the luxury of the protections Western women have had against domestic violence for years - divorce, restraining orders, child welfare, etc. Middle Eastern women cannot fight back because religious laws make them almost sub-human.

Lara Logan will of course make a recovery from her physical wounds, but the mental wounds will take far longer. Not only was it right for her to come forward about her own assault, but it will shine a necessary light on the abuses that happen to Middle Eastern women. A different kind of revolution - one from women who shed their burqas and hijabs and chadors and declare that they will not be meek when they take down the oppression of the patriarchy that has dominated the Middle East for several centuries.

On a side note: As much as the American and international press wants to depict Egypt's revolution as the fall modern Berlin Wall, it's not exactly true. At best, the only thing Egypt has known since its existence is different flavors of dictatorship. Mubarak was not the same as Erich Honecker or any of the Communist dictators holding sway over Eastern Europe; there was no Egyptian version of Vaclav Havel or a playwright who secretly held plays mocking the Mubarak regime. There will be an illusion of democracy for a bit, but whoever the people will elect will determine their fate, and should they elect yet another hard-line dictatorship, this revolution and upheaval will be for nothing.

Cons for snow removal - a GREAT idea

2011-02-05T16:14:00.000-05:00

If there are prisoners and convicts who want to pay off their debt, I think having them shovel out the mountains of snow we've had this season is a terrific idea.

Most of the convicts who are on this detail are there for minor and non-violent offenses, e.g. larceny under $250, possession of drugs under a certain amount, etc. If there are residents worried about drug dealers and others shoveling out their walk, then they should organize their own snow shoveling crew instead of wagging their fingers and wringing their hands. Otherwise, let the cons work on the most legal of snow jobs and reduce the piles!

Slaves of winter? Not really

2011-02-04T20:26:00.002-05:00

I've got to admit it's nice that Mother Nature has a sense of humor while she looks out for people.

To wit: on the evening of December 26 (I was on vacation that week!) and the mornings of January 13 and February 2, I've been delightfully woken up at the crack of 4:30 in the morning with this message:

"Good morning...[your company] is closed for business all day."

Between the ages of 7 and 15, having a school day off meant shoveling out, then going around the neighborhood and shoveling other people out. Between 16 and 18, however, a Boston snow day meant the shoe store calling me in early so we can sell boots (or listen to the psycho sisters argue and smoke). When I was in college, a snow day meant potential snowball fights, pulled fire alarms, and being cooped up in the dorms with friends. Then, the "lean" years of paying off college loans meant getting every scrap of cash into your pockets, sometimes going without, and a snow day would screw everything up. On the other hand, travelling to the boonies of Waltham during the April Fool's snowstorm of 1997 was a trip and a half.

Fast forward to now. The college bills have been paid off since 2008. I've paid off five credit cards, with the sixth being paid off in April. I don't work for those two psycho biddies anymore.

Yet, things have changed. This winter, the mountains of snow look intimidating. There hasn't been that day of 60 degree weather when college girls leave their ugly sweatpants and salt-encrusted UGGS at home and cavort around in a big off-the-shoulder shirt, skinny jeans with ballet flats, nylons optional (or the occasional daring girl who decides to doll herself up in a frilly miniskirt, peep toe heels, a colorful camp shirt, and flouncy blown-out hair). Mother Nature seems to be lining up every winter storm like Minnesota Fats placing a cue ball on the felt and shooting towards the Cape Cod Canal. Each and every time that 4:30 robocall comes along, I know I get an extra amount of sleep before trying to find out where to put the snow yet again.

Thankfully, however, winter is a season. Sure, the storms have been relentless, but the snowpiles don't last. They eventually melt. Rain comes along and does its tricks too. Rock salt washes away. The cars parking 40 inches out from the edge finally find their parking spaces. And soon enough, the day and night are equal length. The Marathon comes along. Daylight savings time makes its return.

Mother Nature doesn't want us to feel we're slaves under her benevolent dictatorship of weather. She does, however, want us to recognize that as much as we feel we have control over our lives, we don't. She's not sending storms out to get her jollies or because she's pissed at us. She's exhibiting her raw, pragmatic power - power that can't be elected, abrogated, negotiated, or pleaded with to stop. Her power just is, and it can't be overthrown.

Mother Nature will eventually reward us with a day that will lift us up. All she asks is that in the meantime we watch what she does.

Can the lottery be cracked? A statistician says yes...

2011-02-02T11:54:00.000-05:00

A statistician from Toronto has discovered that extended play scratch tickets (also known as "baited hooks") can be cracked to determined to be winners.

According to the article, extended-play tickets such as Bingo and Cashword and the like are not exactly random. There's a mention of singleton numbers that, if in a particular pattern, reveal a winner without having to scratch the ticket.

No wonder a $10 million winner in Texas (on a $50 instant ticket) won't talk to the press.

On the Whole (Foods), I'd prefer Trader Joe's

2011-01-20T18:34:00.001-05:00

I've never been to Hyde Square (after all these years coming from Hyde Park - and logically, it would make better sense for Cleary Square to be called Hyde Square, but that's just me), but it seems the closing of Hi-Lo foods in favor of a Whole Paycheck, er, Whole Foods, has raised a huge dander in Jamaica Plain.

I think the real competition will be between Whole Foods and City Feed and Supply, a local company on the other side of Centre Street. Eliminating the "diversity" and "bodega" red herring arguments, CFS fears that WF will lure its well-heeled clientele to its store with bargains. It's easier to bash WF for being "corporate" than accepting the challenge to compete against them.

I like Trader Joe's anyway. It has the great foods of WF and CFS without the uppity hipster attitude.

Quit Celebrating Yourselves! Part II: The Golden Globes

2011-01-18T19:46:00.001-05:00

I used to go to the movies all the time when I was younger, when the price of a ticket was $4 for a matinee and the concession stand's prices were quite reasonable. I saw Jackass 3D at the Showcase Cinemas in October and I was floored that the price of a 20 ounce soda was $5 and the price of a matinee ticket was $10. (Johnny Knoxville must have gotten a cut of the popcorn profits...)

Hence, when these the Hollywood royalty bitch and moan that they were picked on by Ricky Gervais early, often and accurately, I have no sympathy for them. I'm pretty tired of the psuedo-aristocrats who reside in Hollywood and can command $20 million a picture, have it be an ultimate box office dud at the Ishtar level, and then wonder why Gervais is reaming them for being less than three dimensional. Or when the sequel to a movie based on a overwhelming successful cable TV show is panned for being a wall-to-wall advertisement for obscene opulence, paired with whining about why men don't understand you. Or how a 80's superstar is going through hookers and blow like it was infinite. At least Hugh Hefner and his eighth child Playmate (whoops, future wife) were cool about Gervais' jibes, but Gervais kept unrepentantly whacking at raw nerves like Tony Soprano whacked rival crime families.

Which brings me to another point: if you're taking yourself too seriously and you can't take a joke at your expense, perhaps you don't know the difference between teasing and being flat-out mean. I've known both - my brothers do the former and former classmates have done the latter. If Gervais isn't invited back, it wasn't because he was bad - it was because telling the royalty at Hollywood the emperors and empresses wear no clothes or tattered clothes is like letting out a fart when curtsying in front of Queen Elizabeth II.

I've never understood Hollywood's MO - is it the money? The ability to preach your own warped gospels to the masses while not practicing it yourself? To put out 99 crap/mediocre/formulaic movies so critics can fawn over them while that one great movie that people will actually watch the critics won't touch for its "controversial subjects" which turns out to be firmly against Hollywood's political agenda? Or has Hollywood gotten so full of itself - witness the awards ceremonies it gives itself on a regular basis - that they feel the public will line up to the box office like automatons, fork over money to see their derivative pap, so long as the public is not allowed to offend the glitterati?

I think it's a combination of all of these factors, which is why Gervais was so keen to take the piss out of their over-inflated egos, over-inflated budgets, outlandish dogmas, and formulaic plots and screenplays - Gervais knows the American nerve and attention span better than Hollywood does and exposed these pretenders for who they were.

That's why these actors and actresses weren't laughing - they knew it was true.

Quit celebrating yourselves!

2011-01-15T10:14:00.001-05:00

David Brooks' article from the NY Times regards the tree of failure. (Thanks, KJ!)

Accomplishments don't always merit a parade and a $100 a plate testimonial dinner. There are people who are successful, but when they're complemented, the person demurs. "Oh, I'm not that great" is a sign of a humble person who, even though they're thought of as successful, consider themselves imperfect. When they do fail, they don't complain about it.

If we want to be better people, we have to - no, we must - stop celebrating ourselves. It's tough to do so, but civility takes a huge back seat when people are tooting their life's vuvuzelas to the point of obnoxiousness.

Take, for example, a wedding. It's a ceremony where two people (regardless of sexual preference) pledge their lives to one another through all things good and bad. There are people who arrange it in their back yard, wear their favorite suits and dresses, and then have a gigantic cookout. The total cost is under $1,000. Then there are those who have ceremonies running to the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the highlight of the wedding is the bridezilla spent the rest of the ceremony in the bathroom puking because she drank too much, because she found out her newly married husband was already cheating on her with one of the bridesmaids.

How about the kid who got straight A's throughout his career, bestowed a full four year ride to an Ivy League school, the class valedictorianship, and graduated summa cum laude from college, but the only job he had was one that barely paid his rent and grocery bill and gave him little discretionary income, and that job got eliminated because his company figured they could save money by sending his job to India? Meanwhile, the social butterfly who was lucky to get C's and didn't attend college has been promoted several times over because she worked her behind off, and knows that not everything is going to her way?

When we quit celebrating ourselves through excessive and unnecessary ego stroking and show people the benefits of humility and modesty, you will see vitriol, envy, and jealousy evaporate almost immediately. Those whose lives (and jobs) thrive on the underprivileged don't understand that those who don't have as much sometimes do quite well (or even better) without having it handed to them - they go out, work their two or three jobs, come home late, and don't have to worry about hiding their earnings lest the government reduce their benefits 50% ($1 for every $2 they earn). Self-serving monologues about so-called "justice" will become deep dialogues about "cooperation". No longer will people indulge in the game of "Someone Else Did It" just to stroke their own egos. And who knows? Pundits from both sides might share a beer because they like each other's company, not because they were forced to as a publicity stunt.

Then you will see real civility rise up and take hold.

A nation of Czolgoszs and Guitreaus

2011-01-12T15:27:00.002-05:00

Threats to politicians is nothing new, but in our day and age of instant gratification and equally instant scapegoating, the assassination attempt of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona and the murders of six others by Jared Loughner - including a child born on 9/11/01 - is not merely reprehensible, but should not be used as fodder for censorship, restoring the Fairness Doctrine, tightening gun control laws, and other goodies long desired by the wanna-be aristocracy. Ignorance and vanity won't solve this case any more than demanding Sarah Palin be tarred and feathered.

In fact, the "opponents" should school these critics on two assassins who actually killed two presidents in the 19th century for their zealous beliefs, their malignant narcissism, and their kinship with the same critics who want to shut up Rush Limbaugh.

Charles Guitreau shot James A Garfield in 1881 after Guitreau was spurned for repeatedly demanding an ambassadorship, insisting he helped elect Garfield. (Guitreau's defense was that, "The doctors killed Garfield, I just shot him," referring to the medical malpractice that occurred after Garfield's shooting when doctors dug around Garfield's body with unwashed fingers and ended up poisoning him) Guitreau often had delusions of grandeur that would make Kim Jung Il take notes. When he was convicted of the assassination, after pleading not guilty by reasons of insanity, his words to the jury after they convicted him were "You are all low, consummate jackasses!" Guitreau was hung in prison.

Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of William A. McKinley, displayed a zealotry and violent fanaticism that other anarchists warned that he was a "hot-headed crank" and possibly a spy for the government, and not to associate with him. Like Guitreau, he tried to plead insanity for the assassination, but the jury found him guilty and sentenced him to death by electrocution. Unlike Guitreau, however, Czolgosz thought McKinley was a threat, and he admitted as much in his last words - "I killed the President because he was the enemy of the good people – the good working people. I am not sorry for my crime."

Co-opting Jared Loughner with the left's bête noirs is grossly ignorant - or is it ignorance by design, for fear that their arguments that The Right Made Him Do It will crumble like a house of cards once the public discovers Loughner's love of The Communist Manifesto or Hilter's Mein Kampf? Loughner's original online manifestos (in which he refers to the reader as a "listener") also depict a vain and unstable man babbling about the government, and have that desire for attention similar to Guitreau's and Czolgosz's that would normally be dismissed even by that hardest of radicals.

The only way to neutralize a heckler's veto (and the grandstanding that follows) is to repeat the truth louder and louder until the heckler is either ignored or hauled away. The old adage that the way to fight abrogations of free speech is with more free speech must piss off grandstanding, publicity-hungry sheriffs-cum-hyperpolitical activists no end.

UPDATE: George Will also touches on the Guitreau/Czolgosz connections and the "explainers run amok." Plus a pretty darn good analysis on who's winning the PR battle from Forbes.

Success should NEVER be punished

2011-01-08T15:45:00.001-05:00

Amy Alkon leads a discussion on why the rich are penalized at high tax rates when the poor skate away without paying a single dime in income taxes, once their credits and withholding are factored in.

The poor, despite paying little to no income tax, actually pay much higher and very well hidden taxes on other things - well hidden by cowardly politicians who would face an enraged populace if they discovered that all the EITCs and withholding they got back from the IRS went back to the government via consumption. For instance - that $6 of generic smokes they got at the convenience store slams them with an effective tax rate of 58.5%. Or that their cellphone bill has taxes that have been collected since the Spanish-American war and tack on 10-20% in taxes. Gasoline taxes are 18.4 cents per gallon in Massachusetts - if you work 40 hours a week at minimum wage of $8 an hour and fill your 20 gallon tank at $60, you've just paid half an hour of your wages in tax. (When you factor in the federal tax of 24.4 cents per gallon, each hour you work you will pay that much money in gas taxes.)

On the other hand, the rich are paid very well because their value and success to their business warrants it. Sure, there are sports players that earn hundreds of millions of dollars in salary for each season, which is a few months a year. Sure, there are greedy bankster and baron robbers out there that have million-dollar bonuses. But others who are inventors, innovators, researchers - people who do a genuine service - deserve to be compensated handsomely. Some are so rich now that they take a nominal dollar salary per year, but they do so as a symbol to their employees that money doesn't matter.

The reason why there are calls for the rich to be taxed higher and higher doesn't involve money. There are people so insanely jealous and envious of others are guilty of not being successful themselves, so they demand the money be seized via taxes and inflation and given to others as a warped method of "justice." In East Germany, those who dared work privately and not for the state found their wages taxed at 90% - all because Karl Marx - himself a wealthy aristocrat with disdain for the lower classes - saw those same visions of serfs and feudal lords.

We don't live in the times of feudal lords, aristocracy, royalty, serfs, commoners, and peasants anymore, but there are folks who dream that a pecking order returns and people are put in their place. The other fantasy is that all are equal and none are exceptional - no one learns how to work hard to get ahead and all is provided by a invisible hand. (Love this quote about so-called "social justice" in the blog, though - "[Bec]ause if it were real justice it wouldnt (sic) require a qualifing word.")

Hence, not only should the rich not be an ATM for social engineering wonks, the rich should never, ever be punished for their success. Not all of them are going to drive six-figure cars and spend the entire summer in Martha's Vineyard burning hundreds and engaging in all-day insider trading deals. Most of them are humble; most of them donate freely to places and charities (the IRS is a government agency, not a charity). To sneer that the rich are "not paying their fair share" is a sign that the inquirer is either an ignorant moron, a control freak of the highest order, or is clueless of how things and people work. Of course, if you feel you're not paying enough to the government, by all means, write a check to the IRS to reduce the national debt (or, if you live in Massachusetts, check off the 5.85% "optional" income tax).

Otherwise, you're a jealous fucking control freak asshole.

The shadow behind the sunshine

2011-01-08T14:31:00.000-05:00

The story about golden-voiced homeless person Ted Williams (not to be confused with Teddy Ballgame, of course) is what I like to call a needle-in-a-haystack story. The current media adores and worships stories about redemption and victory over demons - which is great for ratings and circulation.

Ted Williams' less savory past, however, must not be whitewashed so that the press can keep the fantasy going. A much better journalist with a gimlet eye for bullshit would have long said, "Great, Ted's getting 14 million hits on YouTube and a deal as announcer for the Cavaliers, but I think there's a shadow behind all that sunshine." They would dig far deeper than the surface of homeless-man-made-good story and maybe prevent Oprah from co-opting his story so her new network can get "traction." (Oprah's other stunts include endorsing Barack Obama, Kentucky Grilled Chicken, and an author who was so plagarized that his bibliography came from Cliff Notes.)

The homeless aren't always the genteel men with a hard luck story - something the press conveniently forgets. Many reporters will ask "why" they're homeless but "how" they got there is usually through crime, drugs, alcohol, and mental health issues. Some who profess to be homeless aren't homeless at all; they're scammers whose job is to part fools from their money via tales of woe, only to see their cash being used to pay for their drug/alcohol/gambling "fixes" - or, if they've committed a crime for which they're on the lam, any way of getting cash without being caught is important. I get suspicious when

Ted Williams' story could be compared to that of Horatio Alger's - at first, Alger's motivation was to highlight the lives of orphaned street boys, but once word got out that he regularly abused them, people quickly shunned him as perverted and stopped purchasing his books; when he died, he was forgotten. The same will happen to Williams should he slip back from his good fortune, or at least when a smarter reporter discovers his true story - the ones with the mug shots and the history of pimping.

Slow cleanup in New York - thanks to Sanitation Dept. protest

2010-12-30T09:46:00.003-05:00

Gotta hand it to Boston - Boston never, ever would attempt to the city as a way to protest budget cuts.

(One exception, tho' - can someone from the Boston DPW clean out that spot between the New York Fried Chicken restaurant and Tedeschi's? The one that currently has a 9-12 inch path to pass through? Or are chasing Southie residents for parking spots better game?)

New York's Sanitation Department, on the other hand, did.. The reason:

"In the last two years, the agency's workforce has been slashed by 400 trash haulers and supervisors -- down from 6,300 -- because of the city's budget crisis. And, effective tomorrow, 100 department supervisors are to be demoted and their salaries slashed as an added cost-saving move."

Now, cost saving measures are fine. Sometimes when the money's tight, you've got to cut somewhere. Crippling the largest city in America by acting like selfish, spoiled brats - ones who get everything because they can throw a huge tantrum otherwise - is not the way to protest tight money. The more adult way is to admit that with impending reductions in salary and workforce, they may not be able to their best, and if anyone is willing to help out, they certainly appreciate it.

Not only should there be a criminal investigation, the leaders who told the Sanitation Department workers to cut back should be arrested for gross negligence, breach of public safety, and grand larceny (via padding their paychecks with overtime when they did shoddy work). Sweet justice would be having these leaders be perp-walked through a snowbank and with a half an inch of slippery ice.

UPDATE: It seems that the slowdowns were targeted at the nabes of the "politically connected" in Brooklyn (Borough Park and Dyker Heights) in Brooklyn and Queens (Middle Village). Do nothing, have the public scream blue murder and then have the politicians "do something?"

Here's a recommendation for Medford native Michael Bloomberg: the next time there's a major snowstorm over 6 inches in New York City, declare an instant State of Emergency, where the National Guard is activated and is put in charge of all cleanup and safety efforts. Any subversion or sabotage during a State of Emergency will result in immediate arrest, and forfeiture of all salary and overtime during that State of Emergency.

Why DADT repeal was a huge win - and coup - for the military

2010-12-29T11:51:00.001-05:00

Jonah Goldberg's column with regards to the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell is great and worth a good read, no matter your political stripe or sexual preference.

Banning gays and lesbians from serving the United States armed forces was shortsighted at the very least, and repealing the Clinton-era law was necessary and will bring in more troops. What you do on the field of battle is far more important than what you do off the field. If you can pick off a stronghold that was seeming impenetrable, or you rescue hostages with zero friendly casualities, then who you cohabitate with afterwards is irrelevant.

The big winner of this repeal is the military itself. The military not only get more people to register, train, and volunteer to fight for America, but they also pulled off a neat little coup from those who are against wars. Ivy League campuses who were firmly against ROTC in the past now have that decision they prayed would never come up: bringing ROTC to campus against the wishes of the radical left, who are against armed conflicts that do not fit their dogma and ideology, or find more excuses not to restore ROTC, which will draw even more criticism from ROTC proponents.

But another thing not mentioned: the military gets a huge PsyOps (psychological operations) boost when an enemy who kills and oppresses its citizens over homosexuality discovers the American troops have people who boldly and without fear defend their country and can openly have a same-sex relationship. The American military doesn't have to fire a shot - just by dropping hints that the soldiers may or may not be what they seem rattles the enemy's mind.

As a straight man and ardent supporter of the American armed forces, Barack Obama and Congress did the correct thing by throwing open the door to those who were barred in the past. It is not a subversive move to let gays and lesbians serve in the military - and those who think otherwise will be surprised to see a more strengthened military, not a weakened one.

It's like predicting the exact shape of a snowflake!

2010-12-24T15:50:00.000-05:00

A small tip for those amateur weathercasters trying to predict the bulk, scope and shape of the upcoming storm: if you're hoping for the storm of the century so you can brag you predicted it first, let's hope you get a life afterwards.

Weather is unpredictable in New England, and all my life I've expected a few twists and turns. (Monday's "dusting" resulted in accidents and long drive times, and while the T was slow in some cases, it wasn't that bad.)

Amateur forecasting is fine. Putting excessive and unnecessary hype for bragging rights? Get a life. One person's "I predicted a whopper 30 inches in Boston" is an entire city digging out for days, no electricity, and massive chaos. One person's "2 inch QPF (quantitative precipitaiton forecast)" is another person's unneccessary trip to the hospital because they got chest pains from shoveling too much snow.

And the media loves a dramatic, drawn-out weather event - and it isn't restricted to snowstorms. Tornadoes, hurricanes, and floods mean beaucoup ratings and circulation boosts because Mother Nature is in a fine tizzy. The press is always looking for stories of "it took me X hours to get home on a trip that takes me Y minutes," but a constant diet of stories just to charge higher fees to your advertisers or to lure more traffic to your website in the future is pretty greedy.

If their predictions fizzle, i.e. if they predict a blockbuster storm and it turns out the only thing that occurs is flurries, then forecasters and the media get criticized for overhyping the storm, or on the other hand, if the storm was supposed to be minor and it turns out to be a blizzard, the media also gets blasted for their predictions.

Net Neutrality or Net Nationalization?

2010-12-22T21:31:00.000-05:00

The FCC is trying to have it both ways by voting in so-called "net neutrality."

Michelle Malkin makes a couple of good points from the right: the FCC, while demanding that all content be sent through without prejudice, could also demand that bandwidth be "rationed" (and in some cases, controlled outright by the FCC for perceived bugaboos like protesting, mocking or denouncing the government and any of its actions, or calling Barack Obama "Neumann Ears.") The FCC had no qualms keeping the Seven Dirty Words off the regular airwaves, so what's to prevent them from keeping pornography and government denunciation off the bandwidth? So Michelle Malkin is completely right: "[I]t's all about control. It's always about control (emphasis mine - ed.)"

On the other side: Dan Kennedy makes the case for "net neutrality" in his own elegant, easy to understand way. The pizza analogy is perfect, but let me take it a step further...I want to find out about the Monkees, but it's incorrect for my Internet provider to block the content because it's a huge fan of the Beatles. Or if I'm a fan of the Yankees in Boston, my internet provider can't say, "Sorry, only requests about the Red Sox are allowed." The FCC is telling providers: "You must provide internet content" and at the same time saying, "You must not block content" even if they disagree with it.

Sounds a lot like "The following statement is true: the preceding statement is false." A bureaucratic tautology, wrapped up in diktat.

Congress, when they reconvene in January, will likely strike this "net neutrality" ruling down because only Congress - not an unelected group of bureaucrats - can make those rulings. If the FCC's displeasure with the speed of the proceedings is too slow, then perhaps it's time to learn patience, rather than take the obnoxious and arrogant easy way out - by proclaiming themselves Internet cops.

At best, they're mall cops without guns but love a good power trip when they see one.

Santa is not fat (at least not the way I see him)

2010-12-21T21:33:00.000-05:00

Dismissing Santa Claus as being too damn fat is a sign that someone wants to change the image without understanding the reason why he exists. First of all, Santa Claus is an allegory. Santa Claus represents generosity, happiness, and altruism, and above all giving to others that may not have much. Second, altering Santa's image to someone who is a perfect weight and height is nice on paper, but taken to an extreme, an anorexic Santa who obessesses on calories and exercise to be someone's ideal image of thin is precisely the wrong message to send to children.

To quote the author of the article:

That’s right: a hundred years or more ago people could be “fat and happy,” because being thin was associated with negative realities: poverty, starvation and illness. (Emphasis mine - ed.)

But in a way, the author does make a good point. Santa has been a time-tested marketing tool, but in these modern days eating too much brings on a negative image. But that shouldn't mean ol' Saint Nick should be used as a marketing tool for people to exploit and abuse - then the message mutates into propaganda that can be bent and shaped at will into a warped, nearly unrecognizable message. (Maybe it's great for Santa to workout with Richard Simmons at his Beverly Hills gym, or to have recipes for vegetables and fruits, but kids would be justifiably horrified to see Santa arrested for protesting against fur or being used to raise funds for radical far left/reactionary far right causes.)

Perhaps after Christmas, he's walking the reindeer and cutting down on the fat he put on before Christmas. He'll take the milk and cookies, even if the milk is soy and the cookies are vegan. But don't ruin the symbol of Christmas by telling Santa he's too damn fat. If you want an image of Christmas that doesn't involve Santa...perhaps the baby Jesus in a manger would be more appropriate?

Could smoking go the way of the dodo (or Milli Vanilli's career)?

2010-12-19T11:11:00.000-05:00

Kyle Smith of the New York Post has a great article and a sobering thought: what if smoking became extinct?

Extinction happens when something dies off or is no longer useful, and there is no further progeny to advance the species forward. Steller's sea cow was made extinct when Russian sailors slaughtered the mammals by the millions. Milli Vanilli's career became extinct when they were exposed as frauds for lipsynching.

For smoking to become extinct (or at the very least, outlawed) in the United States, the FDA would have to declare tobacco, nicotine and all its counterparts dangerous for human consumption, and the distribution and sales of such a product would cease immediately and hence become illegal. Then smokers would have to give up their habit, or illicitly seek out their fixes.

The state and federal governments rely on smokers to bring in non-income tax revenue for their state coffers, and choking off their supply of interest-free loans would force them to find other items to tax to make up for the loss of revenue, or force them to rely less on the citizens via their pocketbooks.

While we're at it, outlawing tobacco would also mean outlawing smoking cessation items, like nicotine patches and gum, and moreover, smoking cessation programs as people would no longer have the need to quit - they'd ALL have to go "cold turkey" to get over their addiction. Drug companies would also see their revenues plunge considerably as they would no longer be able to produce smoking cessation drugs.

And for the piece de resistance: even if you've quit smoking for decades, it doesn't mean cancer will be completely avoidable. In fact, you could quit your two-pack a day smoking habit for 25 years and still be at risk for getting lung cancer. The promise that you'll be the picture of health after a year of not smoking is a total lie. Your health might improve, but it won't return to your pre-tobacco days.

Smoking won't be extinct until the state and federal governments decide the revenue they're getting from smokers is blood revenue, and that continuing to collect taxes from such a venture is admitting you're much an addict to taxes as the smoker is to smoking.

Hey Hollywood - your plastic mannequins ain't any better

2010-12-14T21:41:00.000-05:00

As a teenager in the '80s (1984-1990) the teenage girls I knew worshipped fashion that are now the focus of '80s costume parties.

You knew a teenage girl wore heels without nylons (pantyhose, knee-highs and the occasional foray with stockings were the rule, not the exception as they are today) when she came in the next day in Keds - accompanied by the three-layer Band-Aid treatment to hide the raw flesh that the leather of her stilettoes rubbed against. Also, their hair not be in that lazy knot that passes for an updo; banana clips were the way to keep their limp hair from falling around their eyes (which, if they shellacked their bangs the right way, they could still see). There were also some girls who wore tight spandex pants that had vents on the side, and of course there were one or two girls who advertised that they wore drugstore knee-highs once they sat down and their pants legs rode up.

Hollywood thinks that even today, Boston girls not living in the plush nabe with a letterman boyfriend are some kind of alien nympho creature that tries to "scoop" (pick up, for lack of a better word) any male they can get their hands on. All they have to do is stride up to a guy with a bad Boston Accent, in their frosted denim skirt and ultra-teased hair, and the boom-chicka-wah-wah commences, right?

Uh, I don't think so. Not the women I know.

The women I went to school with grew out of that hair-with-a-clearance-height requirement. They have tweens and teens of their own, and don't have time to fiddle around with Z Cavaricci and spike heels anymore. Some have gotten out of the Boston Vernacular and fit right in with southern accents, other languages, etc. They traded their frosted pink lipstick, black eyeliner and cobalt-blue eyeshadow for easier-to-maintain earth tones and nude lipstick - if they bother to put it on anymore.

They've also forsaken that AquaNet for natural conditioners; have bone-straight hair vs. the shoulder-length poodle cuts/Louise Brooks bobs/wildly assymetrical hair bombs; and the only time they don their heels is at their friend's weddings, not during school assemblies to try to attract members of the football team. Even the teenage girls of today are more comfortable in Uggs and a messy upknot than a well-bespoke suit and sensible shoes.

I also want to blow away another stereotype: Boston girls with Boston accents are not easy girls, aka "hoodsies." They were not easy to pursue; in fact, they were damn difficult and they loved the chase. If Hollywood is thinking that casting women as what I've described above will launch a thousand lotharios to Boston, the directors/producers will have that myth shot even before they get out of the airport terminal.

Maybe instead of having movies that have Boston women abusing the broad "r's" and batting their mascara-laden eyes at their paramours, there will be movies that have Boston women as intelligent, inquisitive, and triumphing over difficulties. Until then, Hollywood should lay off the Boston chick stereotype - the one with Aquanet and tight pegged jeans shutting off the oxygen to their brains.

Pat Burns Tribute

2010-12-11T20:58:00.000-05:00

The fantastic tribute to the late Pat Burns, courtesy of the Montreal Canadiens.

"How do you spell your last name, Mr. Jablonsky?" "S-m-i-t-h"

2010-12-11T20:45:00.000-05:00

"National" is usually a short-hand term for "government." When all of the ailing railroads were taken over by the government, the name that they settled upon wasn't "The National Railroad Passenger Corporation" (try saying that quick!) but "Amtrak."

The reason why proponents of a government owned and operated healthcare scheme call it "single payor" or "public option" is that the public would recoil in horror if they found out that the state via the government - not the individual or physician - would have total control over health decisions. Thus the two euphemisms Hub Blog lays out are ones that don't sugarcoat as much as use mask the bitter flavors heavily - but any smart person would find out the rank and bad flavors anyway. (E.g. even if you slather liver in onions, you can still taste the liver.)

Also, "Medicare" and "Medicaid" are already in use, so something like "Amerimed" or "US Health Payment and Insurance Systems" would indicate the government-owned, government operated healthcare system. You;d have to have a catchy name to mask the true intent of the results.

Full Disclosure: I work for a health insurance agency in greater Boston and the opinions listed herein are fully my own and do not reflect the company I work for.

The Pleasure Killers

2010-12-08T21:32:00.001-05:00

I read the piece about the Bush Tax Cuts in the New York Times (link: and you're saying to yourself, 'hmm, he usually quotes the New York Post or Fox News' - there's not everything in the New York Times I disagree with, and this one's pretty good) and how Obama's deal with the Republicans on keeping the current tax brackets and plus an added bonus of cutting the payroll tax by 200 basis points, or 2%. President Obama could well have left everything as it is, or even hiked taxes to the levels he feels people should pay (not what people are willing to or afford to pay). I'm not sure what the result would have been, but if there were no extra revenue (or a sharp decline in revenue), then the government would have hiked them even further, engaging in a vicious cycle of tax hikes and revenue drops.

I'm not going to pretend that I don't like what happened. I'm middle class and I'm not going to complain. The Republicans tried every way to Sunday to get something moving, and it took the near shutdown of the government (well, that and Election 2010) to get Obama to at least concede that raising taxes is not the way to return to prosperity.

The comments, on the other hand? Save for one or two good comments, either Obama is the second coming of Bush, Obama should have had more cojones, the Republicans are the Party of No, the rich get away scot free with this, and so on. Oh, and a smattering of how he's a one term president. Childish, insecure, ignorant, arrogant, get-the-venom out stuff.

My thought is that there are still a ton of people who hate George W Bush and what he stood for. I'm also not going to pretend I didn't like him. Unlike Obama, who I feel surrounds himself with czars, bureaucrats, nanny-staters and the-bus-doesn't-stop-there radicals, Dubya was a steadfast and principled man. Often he was wrong as he was right. He too let himself be led by the nose by his advisors, but when he was correct, damn, you had to respect his tenacity, even though you were marching through the streets demanding he be dragged to the Hague in front of the World Court.

It leads me to a good question: some people can't stand others being happy, prosperous, and self-sufficient AND self-reliant. There's a streak of Puritanism that permeates through certain social circles that happiness and wealth is a sin, one that must be atoned for with brutal acts of contrition. But within that streak is a rank hypocrisy: it's OK for you to be happy, but not for someone else, and even if you die trying, you're going to prevent someone from their dreams.

It's a toxic stew of jealousy, resentment, and selfishness that rots the soul. It's the basis of moral panics that end up hurting people more than they help because the person trying to control the panic ends up overcompensating and snowballing unintended consequences.

Take for example the "obesity crisis." If a person is slightly overweight, the most simple way of doing so is to eat less and exercise more, not to tax items sky-high because someone (Michelle Obama? Mayor Mike Bloomberg? Deval Patrick?) is afraid that it might lead to being obesity. If you're exercising and eating right, the occasional donut won't kill you, nor will the daily cruller resign you to the pits of a fat camp. And, those extra tax revenues because you're slapping a dollar on a soda may be a smokescreen for trying to fatten (pun intended) the state coffers. True, morbid and gross obesity exists, but trying to eradicate it by controlling food, and in turn trying to control people, is the ultimate fools' errand.

The same thing goes for taxes. If you're a successful employee and make your company the best it is, why in heaven should you be penalized for it through high taxes? That's the whole gist about keeping the Bush Tax Cuts - if there are people so resentful and jealous of others success that short of running them over with your car or hiring a hit man to liquidate them your feeling is that the money must be taken away from them "for the greater good" (a healthy, steaming pile of total, absolute, pious, self-serving bullshit), those people should be given something to do that will keep them away from the editorial pages.

How about helping the people who should get a lift up from the depths of trash TV and shady lawyers? No one's going to be Oprah right away, and there will be weeks of your bank account being very lean, but it's better than handouts and bailouts. And happiness and success does come, so long as you work hard and you're patient - and anyone who tries to get in your way should be avoided at all costs.

There are people who still take their anger, guilt, bitterness, and disappointment on others because they cannot control things. It is a religion all its own, and it makes Puritanism look downright hedonistic. The ones who try to kill happiness have never been successful anyway - because happiness and success always seem to win, don't they?

UPDATE: Despite the House not deigning to vote on it and Bernie Sanders (S-VT) deciding it would be a great idea to read from the telephone book as a way to filibuster (maybe he did, maybe he didn't), this tax deal will go through with a lot of noses held, because if it doesn't, the Party of No will have a D next to it.

UPDATE #2: China is in a hefty snit because the Nobel Prize committee awarded Liu Xiabao the Peace Prize in absentia. The three signs I take out of this are (a) even farthest of the far left are demanding his release from Chinese prison, (b) it takes away the spotlight and attention from a like-minded Canberra Julian of W_______s, and (c) China must be really shit-scared of losing its power to ramp up the manipulation to sub-light speed, all because a dissident had a manifesto that wasn't one endorsed by a German aristocrat with money guilt.

Some requests - Obama had to do it - and KJ's back!

2010-12-07T22:57:00.001-05:00

1. Ever since the death of hockey coach Pat Burns (and re-seeing the ravages of cancer from my father - the technical term is "cachexia" but it's the simple act of wasting the body away), I've wanted to pass along news that a hockey arena is being made in his honor in Stanstead, Quebec, Canada. Burns was the head coach of the Bruins from 1996 to 2000, but his legend lives on. Go forth and give the ol' former Hull (whoops, Gatineau) cop and three time Jack Adams trophy winner his due - donate (I think you can donate in US dollars) at http://arenapatburns.com/

2. I give Obama credit: keeping the Bush Tax Cuts and lowering the FICA tax by 200 basis points (2 percentage points) makes him dead meat in the eyes of his donors, voters, bundlers, czars, flunkies, members of the We Want America to Die a Slow And Painful Death (or if that doesn't work, annoy it) Fan Club, and others. It doesn't make him a hero, either - Congress could have avoided this drama several months ago instead of jockeying to keep their jobs - but the other alternative is to have America as a full-blown ultra-fascistic dictator state where wages abolished, and everyone bows down to the Dear Leader lest they be outcast into a painful, slow, soul-sucking death...which is the ultimate dream of his donors, voters, bundlers, czars, flunkies, and members of the We Want America to Die a Slow And Painful Death (or if that doesn't work, annoy it) Fan Club. Hey, it works for North Korea, doesn't it (if you can avoid the famine, starvation and wall-to-wall wacky-with-a-side-of-malignant narcissist propaganda)?

Yet these so-called cultured, diverse, and tolerant people have pure disdain, not solidarity or support, for impoverished people. No, let me correct that - they want to be rulers of the impoverished and dictate them like the stupid trash-TV serfs like they are.

Want to really eliminate poverty? Treat the poor like decent human beings and not like stock characters from Jerry Springer. Then, get your ass out of your hybrid car and your hands off the soy latte help the poor out with a hand up, not a hand out. Karl Marx's "from each according to his own ability, to each according to his own needs" doesn't translate to "if you're busting your ass on 80 hours days, you should be forced to give it to someone who does diddly squat." I interpret it to say, "Share what you have or what you know with someone who has nothing or very little, but make sure you don't overdo it." (It certainly makes more sense than Marx tossing around "proletariat" and "bourgoisie" like the Seven Dirty Words!)

3. The Pointy Universe makes its 1 liter wine glass (sorry, KJ - you could put the entire Charles River into that wineglass) return to the blogging path. KJ talks about her new "set," which is not just the new web re-design she put up. And by "rack" she's not talking about pool tables, either.

They'll never learn...

2010-11-25T18:02:00.000-05:00

Hub Blog has it right on Senate President Therese Murray: either she's ignorant of previous convicted solons who've stood in front of microphones announcing their resignation from their positions for "inappropriate behavior," or she's employing the Marie Antoinette defense, i.e. "let them eat cake," which resulted in her beheading by the architects of the French Revolution. See: Sal DiMasio, Tom Finneran, et. al.

They legislators will know its civil and ethical when the investigators burst into the Legislative offices with sheaves of subpoenas and evidence bags. By then, that smugness will be wiped clean and it ain't just a criminal matter anymore.

Best Buy without the harassment - maybe

2010-11-25T17:16:00.002-05:00

Here are the pros and cons of the Best Buy Express kiosks at MBTA stations:

Pros:

- No obnoxious upselling from Best Buy employees or Geek Squad employees.
- If you know exactly what you want, it's in your hands within minutes.
- Costs are about the same as the store.
- Popular items

Cons:

- No cash - credit cards only.
- Placing them in high-traffic areas may cause even more congestion during rush hour.
- Potential for breaking into the machine and looting it, especially in a high-crime station
- Returns and problems? You've got to go to Best Buy.
- Potential for price gouging, or items being significantly more expensive than a regular Best Buy
- Limited selection; if you need accessories or want games that the kiosk doesn't have, off to Best Buy you go
- Possible restocking fees requiring a trip to Best Buy
- Potential for theft after purchase
- If the item has to be recharged, you have to wait until you get home

Arrogance and sour grapes are in aisle eight - and before you ask, we're out of smugness and self-satisfaction

2010-11-12T20:36:00.000-05:00

In the jungle of chain stores and other homogenous markets, local stores fill in a huge gap when your chain store doesn't carry specialty food items, or food grown or produced to higher moral standards. If you want to buy something that was produced in a painstakingly-special way, you're going to pay more for it.

Don Otto's in the South End closed its doors because no one was buying the $8 eggs or the $25 per pound steak. That story would end there had the owners not decided indulge in a self-righteous, self-indulgent, obnoxious farewell speech (Universal Hub has part of it here) and lambasted the public, blaming them for their demise, when it was their overpriced goods and their less-than-helpful staff who rode the store to the ground.

Several lessons can be learned from Don Otto's demise.

1. Just because your neighborhood is full of rich people, it doesn't mean they'll clamor for your goods. Certainly, the SOWA district has become more upscale and gentrified, but even the most pretentious of people will head to the local supermarket and get what they want. It wasn't that $8 eggs won't be bought, but the $8 eggs didn't have that demand that the $2 eggs do. And you can't assume someone will buy a $16 bottle of super virgin (to the point of immaculate conception) olive oil just because you think they need it. They can make do with the $4 bottle of plain not-so-virgin-but-enough-for-a-meal olive oil.

2. Just because you label something "sustainable", it doesn't mean you get carte blanche to manipulate the definition.
"Sustainable" is quickly becoming a overused, trite cliche, slapped on an item to appear as if it was untouched by the common man - at least the one who hasn't had an Ivy League education and hasn't sent their children to upper-class kindergarten. The quicker the definition of "sustainable" as "so over-expensive I can charge quadruple for it" is retired, the more accurate definition of "long lasting/natural/fail-safe/environmentally sound" can take over.

3. Don't gouge your customers.
If you're going to offer steak at $28 per pound, at least throw in the steak sauce, the vegetables, and a good wine choice, plus a dessert or fresh fruit if necessary. Then, the shock of the $28 per pound steak is diminshed, albeit at a slight loss - you'll be guaranteed a return customer if you don't try to shake them down for every penny they have.

4. Never insult your customers.
"You may not always get what you want but you will get what you need" is a surefire way of having your doors close so fast it'll make your head spin. No good business is so arrogant to even whisper these words. It also hides a bitter and arrogant translation: "Don't tell us what to sell, but buy what we assume you want." The checkered pasts of one of the owners also didn't help their case; walking out without paying for your food is not only a sin, it's a felony in some states. If a customer has a suggestion or can't find their favorite item, rolling your eyes, clucking your tongue, or disinterest will result in that customer telling his friends how rude and unyielding your store is, and by word of mouth you might as well start holding your "store closing" sale.

Bread, circuses and Bill O'Reilly

2010-11-10T21:02:00.000-05:00

I have to admit that Jon Keller has a huge point when it comes to cable "talk" shows.

Unless you're bored, like to watch people talk down one another, or are a huge fan of the people Jon mentioned, the shows are not worth watching. (OK...I confess I've been a reader of the New York Post for the past 14 years and I know a lot about New York City.)

I'll watch Bill O'Reilly, but only occasionally. Glenn Beck is too loud. Keith Olbermann is a raging lunatic. Sean Hannity is too rah-rah for the Republicans as Rachel Maddow is rah-rah for the Democrats. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are left-leaning comedians masquerading as serious journalists.

That's the whole problem with journalism and news today, begging Jon's pardon. The warped definition of news today is meant to be one of three things: public relations, gossip or fiction. Whoever the editors are in those newsrooms obviously have learned from the tabloid school of journalism: whatever is sensational is what leads.

Take for example the National Enquirer. who put forth a story that Michael Douglas might have three months to live due to declining health from throat cancer. Any responsible news organization would give the man at least a modicum of dignity. The Enquirer's headline underlines their so-called concern for Douglas' health:

MICHAEL DOUGLAS ON HIS DEATH BED

- Friends fear

The "friends fear" is about 1/8 the typeface than the headline. What Michael Douglas should do is come forward and tell the public - not the yellow-journo twits at the Enquirer - his status, how he's doing, how hard chemotherapy and radiation are to the body, how cancer is affecting his family, and he'll keep everyone posted. The reporter who does the responsible thing and reports his illness responsibly will probably get run over by the reporters and paparazzi getting a rumor that [insert obnoxious ingenue here] was showing how natural air conditioning works as she gets out of her expensive automobile, and the car isn't even turned on.

When journalists go "outside the box" - away from their biases and their ambition for glory - that's when the real stories come out and make history. But that requires grunt work, getting behind the scenes, and not being seduced by a rumor or a airhead built on plastic surgery and a string of feckless lotharios. That's when they earn their Pulitzers and in the bargain break up a drug ring, put a long-time crooked politician behind bars, and reunite a long-lost daughter with a father.

For those of you not interested in the minutiae of the Kardashians, the drama of pregnant teenage moms, scripted/fixed/too-good-to-be-true reality shows, and other easy-to-swallow emptiness, I strongly suggest watching the Jim Lehrer report on PBS (channel 2 here in Boston). The only situations reported on the Jersey Shore are dealt with in a fair, concise, and straightforward manner, and don't involve Snooki. It might be a little boring at first, but trust me - watch it for a week and you'll be snickering to yourself, "what kind of crap news is this?"

Juan Williams pulls back the PC curtain and freaks out the narrow minds of NPR

2010-10-21T21:48:00.000-04:00

Juan Williams deserves a TON of credit for telling the truth about National Public Radio.

Williams committed the simple sin of saying out loud what the rest of the elitist, fully white, upper middle and upper class editorial boards of NPR wouldn't dare say in public, but probably do well behind closed doors. (Even more telling is that Williams was the only black correspondent.)

Who will this brouhaha hurt the most? At the very least, moderate Muslims who have been yearning to break free from the stereotype of fundamentalist militancy have been pushed back into a corner - the ones who want to prove that the abaya, hijab or burqa, or the four fingers of beard the men must wear, is no way linked to the more malignant strains of Islamic worship - and assure them that while their religion is Islam, their nationality is American. Thanks to NPR's firing of Williams, that conversation gets drowned out by clueless upper-class twits.

But the real hurt that will come will be on NPR itself. When free speech is determined by an unelected upper echelon of white elitists, and that money comes from public taxpayers, a new Congress will be loathe to fund an entity whose primary focus is to make sure the right words come out of the right mouths, and any word not in the Approved Vocabulary of NPR will be grounds for immediate termination. Congress defunding NPR would force it to pledge even more from its listeners, and if you don't have the money, your license to broadcast gets ripped up and tossed out in the trash.

Williams should keep on talking about his now-ex-colleagues, how they love to insult those who aren't like them, and then tell the public to avoid donating a thin rusting penny to their organization because they are malignant narcissisists who only care about their own ideology and not giving a complete story. Oh, and donations from well-heeled, like-minded people.

Williams did everyone - including Muslims - a favor by pulling back the curtain on the narrow minds of NPR, who proved to the nation that the antidote to curtailing free speech is even more free speech - and that political correctness is worse than any nuclear weapon on the planet.

Election 2010 - short analysis and a few predictions

2010-10-12T21:24:00.000-04:00

The Election of 2010 is probably the most important one in 16 years, when the Republicans got control of both House and Senate. The Democrats regained control of both in 2006, but four years later, the Democrats are finding themselves in endangerment territory again.

I'm going to offer some predictions and see how they play.

1. As the welfare abuse angle (recipients using EBT cards for cash) is now playing out, I think this gives Charlie Baker a little bump. I think this governor's race is too tough to call, but watch in a week or two when Tim Cahill decides perhaps this run as "independent" reaches a crisis point and Cahill makes a decision to finally leave the race, or to stay in and let further controversies and scandals erode his character. No one is definitely above 50% of the vote, however, but if Patrick is elected with 45% of the vote or less, that would indicate a lot of held noses by the Democrats who don't like him but don't like Charlie Baker either. It also wouldn't give Patrick a mandate to run willy-nilly over the state, but would certainly humble him enough to turn the reins over to Lt. Governor Patrick Murray should a position in Washington open up.

2. Question 1 (repealing the alcohol tax) will not pass. Massachusetts still injects Puritan values when it comes to liquor, including no happy hours, no more than two beverages at once, and no pitchers, but the double taxation of liquor (excise and sales tax) is too much money for the Legislature to pass up. I'm thinking adding the sales tax onto liquor was a revenge move from the Leglislature after the liquor and package store lobby thwarted the attempt to sell beer and wine in convenience stores and supermarkets (actually, what would have happened is that the licenses would have expanded throughout the town, rather than possessing three to four licenses to sell; you actually can buy beer and wine in convenience stores and supermarkets where the local leaders allow it), and you can bet there were some hacks who wanted to get beer and wine at their local CVS, and when they couldn't get it, they sicced the 6.25% sales tax on liquor for consumers to pay.

3. Question 3 (reducing the sales tax from 6.25% to 3%) will pass with a huge margin - comfortably above 50%. Hiking the sales tax last year by 25 percentage points (and cities and towns adding an 0.75% meals tax option, bringing the tax to 7%) was a desperate move to get more money - only a sales tax is regressive and hits the poor more than it would the rich. New Hampshire is thrilled to get the business and sales from Massachusetts residents fed up with paying through the nose, but even a 3% sales tax won't prevent voters from slipping past the borders for cheap cigs and fuel. I think this will be the ballot question that finally succeeds versus the income tax repeal of 2006 because (a) voters are finally fed up with the state Legislature spending beyond their means and (b) with increased sales from a reduced sales tax (a 52% reduction), tax revenues will increase more.

4. The Democrats will lose the House by a margin of more than 50 seats, but will keep the Senate by less than three seats OR lose by two seats. The best case scenario would be for the House to barely survive by 20 members or less, but the ultimate worst would be a loss of 75 seats or more. Either way, the House will "drain the swamp" of Maxine Waters, Charlie Rangel and Nancy Pelosi once the elections are over.

5. The Senate looks more like a 50-50 tie, but either party could be the winner with a 2 or more seat margin. Joe Biden would be the tiebreaking vote for the Democrats, but a Republican House and Senate would bring about a better change and force Obama to abandon a lot of pet policies.

6. The post-2010 Election may involve a total shakeup of the Obama cabinet. Obama, seeing that the public is not keen on his policies, may ask Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton to change places - Joe Biden as Secretary of State, and Hillary Clinton as Vice President. The reason? Thinking ahead to 2012, Joe Biden would be a liability to an Obama re-election (he's not called Baghdad Biden for nothin') while Hillary Clinton has the moderation and steady hand. In fact, I would not be surprised if Hillary not only accepts the offer to be the VP, but will be the architect to revive the Obama administration, even if it means forcing Obama to the center and telling his numerous flunkies or czars that their services are no longer needed and that in order to get the nation out of its economic funk, Tim Geithner and Ben Bernanke will have their resignations on her desk the first morning she's sworn in and she will head a nationwide search for a Treasurer and a Federal Reserve Chairman who are in tune with regular citizens, not the bankers of Wall Street - especially ones who are not afraid to hike interest rates and break the money printing press. Clinton will also demonstrate to Health and Human Services Secretary Katherine Sebilius that there's only one bitch in Washington and that's the one who rides Air Force Two.

7. This election is all about President Obama. Voters excited and thrilled for the first post-Civil War African American president to be elected are now seeing the real Barack Obama - the radical, hard-left "community organizer" that critics frequently warned about him. Whether or not he's an American citizen is immaterial. He would have been better off spending a couple of terms as a junior Senator and matured. What he doesn't understand (nor does he seem to care to) is American exceptionalism, which is the top American value other nations strive to attain. That motivation to succeed and achieve wonderful things, and to have someone so tone deaf and arrogant not to learn that (and instead make America into a more fey Europe West) is about 80% of the reason why voters are so pissed off. Obama is a superb orator and can rally a crowd with a snap of his fingers, but his arrogance, his insular Mafia-like inner circle, his relentless campaigning and entertaining (and numerous getaways to exotic locations by the First Lady) is why those who were so enthusiastic for voting for him are now turning against him, and if not against him, the incumbents being booted to the unemployment line by proxy.

Coupled with unemployment that has remained above 9.5%, a plunging dollar, and the constant bailouts of the politically connected, such as Wall Street and unions, it's no wonder when former critics stroll by pictures of George W Bush saying "miss me yet?" even the ones who hissed at him as Chimpy Bushitler yearn for the days of Dubya's miscues and gaffes and wish they didn't call him a fascist. Even with this election, Obama won't budge, but the voters will be glad to show him the error of his ways in 2010 and possibly the door in 2012.

But it's fun watching the elites getting tickets for speeding!

2010-10-08T21:27:00.000-04:00

Steve Crowder has a conspiracy theory: the leftists want everyone to eschew their cars and ride public transportation.

I've been a satisfied public transit rider for over 26 years. Unlike the people in New York who have to fork over more money on December 30 for higher train fares, Boston's last fare hike was in 2007 - and it's still pretty cheap.

The delicious irony is that the leftists so desirous of "diversity" and "tolerance" would never set foot in a public transit vehicle. The riders are the "unwashed masses," the unenlightened, and would be deemed dangerous if they set foot in a car.

Hey, turnabout is fair play, though, right? Every time I see an elitist on the Turnpike hanging their head in shame while nine or ten emergency response vehicles light up the highway, it's either (a) the woman announcing that it's a VERY BAD IDEA putting on makeup and ending up looking like Emmitt Kelly AND trying to wrestle down her $8.50 pair of DKNY off-black thigh-highs because the silicon gave her contact dermatitis AND her toes have blown up to the size of small olives, or (b) it's the Type A business douchebag cold calling Sydney, Australia with his cellphone in his hand while his secretary (the one who he's been trying to bang while his shrewish wife is off on some kind of environmental "retreat") is making "arrangements" - most of which should be done in a no-tell motel and none of the evidence should be present when picking up his wife from the airport.

The same elitists who crow about "saving the environment" find their Prius' keyed by a bicyclist, with the words "Die Hypocrite" or "Share the Road, Asshole" or other NSFW bromides. They're the ones who find themselves Denver Booted for parking in the wrong spot, get ticketed in the high triple digits for speeding (be thankful they aren't in Europe, where their fine is keyed to their income), pay through the nose for gasoline, and when the engine dies, the tires blow, or other indigities happen, they don't blame their own stupidity.

Meanwhile, my bus has just dropped me off, and I'm at the front door of my business while you're wrangling for a parking space. Sure, you're going to get the occasional bum whose expiration date is well past, or the crazy lady who mumbles and mutters, or the gangs of kids who horse around and intimidate other passengers. The buses will either come early, come late, pull away, or not show up at all, and sometimes getting from here to there takes an hour versus fifteen minutes, but unlike being in your high-end, high-maintenance advertisement for snobbery, I'm paying a lot less to get around than you are.