Songs For America; Parts Three and Four

Ray Charles. They say he was colour blind.

1972.



Later.



God Bless.

We cannot be beaten. We can either choose to win or quit.

How To Lose Your Insurance Benefits

One of my buds has offered, until recently, full family health insurance coverage to all of his employees.

It was part of his contract to his employees.

This willingness to protect his employees and their families was a sacred trust to my bud. The story of the rock and the hard place is instructive.

When you have 70 employees, you're not a huge business. You're probably in the twenty to an hundred million dollars in annual sales. For most of us, a million dollars is a lot of money. And, there are a lot of businesses in Clatsop County that earn more than a million dollars a month in revenue. Most of these businesses don't proclaim their revenue flows. And a lot of people would be amazed at the folks who are turning those kinds of numbers. So, think about owning a business that is earning revenues of a million dollars a month. I know, it sounds huge. And wildly successful.

Thirty years ago, I worked for a company in Astoria that grossed more than $500-thousand dollars a month. That's thirty years ago. Back when a dollar was worth, well, let's just say, it only took $208. 10 to buy an ounce of gold. So, if gold is selling for $14-hundred dollars a month today, our monthly revenue stream would be running around 3.5 million dollars a month. Or 42-million dollars a year. That's a lot of cash. And that is a business in Astoria.

What has happened in the last 30 years?

It's gotten a lot more difficult to produce revenue streams that were available 30 years ago. Taxes, regulations; Astoria, and Clatsop County, even Oregon, have become places where change is ridiculed, admonished, resisted and decried. Most of us in the county heat our homes with natural gas, yet building a new natural gas line is viewed as a calamitous event. Fuckin' hippies.

While the hippies worry about natural gas, the channel of the Columbia River has been deepened up to Portland. The problem is, Portland has no transportation access since the policies of the State of Oregon have been to constrict the flow of traffic through Portland, rather than to improve the traffic flow. Just take a look at the ridiculous debate going on over the new I-5 bridge between Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington. The Bridge of the Clods. (Unwanted pop-up alert.)

Let's get back to my bud. And health insurance. And the arguments going on now in Congress.

I watched Antonee Weener tonight on television. What a weener.

This is a guy that has never had a job, never made a buck, never signed a paycheck. (See his bio here.) Whenever I hear a guy talk about stuff he of which he has no clue, I dismiss him. Antonee Weener is the most dismissable guy I've ever come across. He is all boot and no cattle. For him to offer advice to guys like my bud is laughable. Just as most of what you hear from the electronic media you come across, or worse, the laughable expressions you read in your local newspapers. These are people entirely bereft of world experience. None. Tabula rasa. But they will lecture you. They are part of the intelligensia. They are smarter than you. (And not afraid to share their views, since they have been told they are sciency and stuff.)

So my bud had full, family coverage for all of his employees. And what he found was, that his employees were using their emergency room benefits whenever one of his employees--or their kin--were coming down with an ague. Why?

Because their insurance policy would pay 100 percent of an emergency room visit, but regular doctor hours required a co-pay. They were driving the costs of the insurance company through the roof, in order to avoid a twenty dollar co-pay. The economics of a doctor's private practise are completely different from the economics of an hospital's emergency room. When I cut my hand off, I go to the emergency room. When I have a cold, I wait two weeks. But my bud's employees were taking their sick children to the emergency room for illness care in order to avoid a twenty dollar co-pay.

For Congressman Weiner to attempt to put forth the idea that ObamaCare would reduce health care costs for those covered under the plan is specious at best. Why wait for an office visit when a visit to an emergency room carries the same net cost, and no negatives? And why worry about the costs of ObamaCare when the costs are going to be absorbed by your employer?

I've given you a couple of example of businesses that I've either been associated with or know of. And their revenue figures are huge! Millions of dollars! I must be a rich guy! The corporations I've worked for have exploited their workers! Social justice! We must make The Man pay! It's one of our rights!

Posh.

Here's the problem with guys like Weiner. They have no clue what the costs of inventory are, what the opportunity costs of inventory are, what competition means, how to organize a business, or, what margins are. Weiner, like most Democrats, have never had to write a paycheck. They just look at the millions of dollars out there and figure that lying to a vast majority of their constituencies means that they will be elected and re-elected. Dumb, and dumberer. The problem we, in the productive sector of our society, face is this complete inability to see that going into business requires a certain faith; in our product, our service, our abitilities and our willingness to spend money on ideas that may or may not produce a profit. This is a totally different model than the one adopted by governments. Governments may compel. Governments may punish. Governments may harrass. Governments may destroy.

But governments will never create.

Governments, whether they are local, state or national, can claim some creativity. The best example I can think of is NASA; reflective tape, shoes that don't have shoelaces, robotic arms. The F-22.

Other than these examples, I don't know of any thing else of value (TVA, sure, Bonneville...etc.) that has been "created" by government that is worth having. Green Technology? Boggling. The costs have been so mired in subsidies that there is no rational yard-stick with which to measure the billions of dollars wasted on this nice sounding thingy. Rational decision-making has been replaced by a meme of science. Like, if we don't, you know, do something, then, well like, you know, we won't have the science and investment, you know, like to have something sustainable.



My bud had to end his commitment to his employees. The costs of providing his employees was outpaced by the stupidity of his employees. Their "self-interest."

Thinking that ObamaCare will reduce costs is a fool's errand. The CBO numbers do everything but consider the impulse of average, avaricious, idiotic people, who have been told that by using their access to ObamaCare, our nation will save billions of dollars. Emergency room visits will skyrocket. I know it. You know it, too. Baby sick? Emergency room. Tooth-ache? Emergency room. Lost a hand? Emergency room. Private practise doctors?

When you think about all the bubbles in the economy in the last thirty years, and you look at the antecedent legislation that created those bubbles, is it wise to rely upon the competence of someone like Antonee Weener? A guy whose whole world has circled around the flush of congressional competence?

I do have a suggestion. If your company still provides your employees with medical insurance benefits, take the time to talk to an insurance advisor with medical insurance benefits experience. Chances are, he or she will advise you in ways that may not benefit them. You may find that your best choice is to delete your employees' medical insurance benefits. And rely upon ObamaCare.

Here's the last bit of this post. Fifty-five employees. Each making 35 to 55 thousand dollars a year. Average wage expense? About 2 and a half million dollars. Against sales of ? And, a margin of mark-up of 3 to 5 percent? It's becoming hard to imagine why anyone would want to invest in a business in this country, let alone our state, and particularly, this county. Return on investment is being totally ignored by our "elite" political class. Antonee Weener is just one of the more egregious examples of this dedication to stupidtude. In Oregon, we have our own models.

Too numerous to mention. (But, we can start with Portland's mayor and end with our local state representative. And, state senator. But I'm being gratuitous. We all know their number one concern is the elderly, the poor, the kids and education.)

Listening to the Democrat Colloquy

Democrats. Their brothers in socialism in Europe--advanced countries these--have "a better" health care system than ours. I'm listening to Representatives Frank Pallone and John Garamendi (on C-Span) explain how socialism promotes job growth.



This is a chart of bond spreads in Europe. From Calculated Risk.

"Clearly investors are pricing in a haircut."

And Democrats decry efforts to put our country back on a sound financial footing. "But we're promising you everything!" Can't pay for it, 'cause promising is cheap. (Reminder, send note to new Oregon governor.)

Fuelled By Unbalanced Media Reporting

This, according to the British Medical Journal.

You've probably heard the hype about vaccinations creating developmental problems in children. There's even a "movement" out there of "concerned mothers" who are holding their children's health hostage by failing to innoculate their children. Why?

Because of fraudulent "scientific research."

Will you read about this in the Oregonian or the Daily Astorian?

Prolly not. Imagine having to tell your base that another Moonbatty idea is just a moonbatty idea. That's not what polite people do. It's up to us rightwing cranks to point it out.

Now, about that Al Gore thing...

Allow Me to Self Insure

Have you ever borrowed money?

From a commercial lender. You go in, you give them your financials, they check your Beacon Score, and you either get your loan, or you don't. Pretty cut and dried.

Let's just put it this way; if you need the money, you won't get a loan.

Financial regulation has increased the cost of lending money. Banks won't give you the type of return on your investment that they have historically, since the cost of money to banks through the Fed are at historical lows. Why would a bank take a risky loan, when they can make money on the spread from fed rates and prime borrowers?

Insurance companies view the market in much the same way. Why insure against risk with a pool of high risk applicants? Let somebody else to it. The cash is in higher returns, not lower returns.

Congress needs to provide an alternative to the current system. The current system rewards large companies who provide their employees with health insurance. Small companies can't afford to pay the kind of insurance premiums that large companies can pay. Health insurance costs are too high for small companies to adopt. But individuals are penalized when they attempt to pay for insurance themselves.

What I suggest is simple. Allow individuals to place money into accounts that are defined as health savings accounts. Any dollar put into such an account would be pre-tax. That is, the amount placed into a health savings account would reduce the taxpayer's annual income. Put in $500 bucks? That five hundred goes in, tax-free. Put in $10,000 bucks? That amount goes on to line 44 of your 1090, and you don't pay tax on that amount of income.

After five years of saving $10,000 bucks a year, you've got a nice little "health nest egg" of $50-thousand plus. Since, for that much cash, banks would be willing to pay interest on your balance. Imagine what slathering would occur if you were an insurance company exec. If you had 50-k of your own cash in the game,what would be the actuarial cost of providing you with "secondary" insurance? Most of the use of your health account would be for small expenses; whether they were annual check-ups, dental procedures, or the occasional bump in the road. You don't access your "insurance" until the funds in your account are depleted.

What would be the annual cost of health insurance, if each of us had $50-thousand in the bank for medical costs?

The additional feature of such an account would be the effect of having such an account during a downturn in the business cycle. If I had an account with fifty to an hundred thousand dollars, and the business cycle was putting business into the tank, I could make a withdrawal against my health savings account, with the penalty of paying the taxes against such withdrawals. Revenue to the government would actually go up as a result. And I would have the cash to continue my business operations; I wouldn't have to fire people, reduce my inventories, or miss payments. it would be my choice, my decision.

I know that politicians think they are smarter than me. They know it. I've heard it. But simple solutions to the health care problem, and how to deal with the "greedy" insurance companies exist. Unfortunately, the system as it is creates a lot of discord. We could end the discord. But why would lobbyists spend hundreds of millions of dollars if we actually fixed the system? ( And how much of those hundreds of millions end up in politicians' pockets?)

Fixing it is easy.

Letting markets work is easy.

You simply have to have faith in people and their own common sense. I believe in your common sense. I'd make a terrible politician.

The New "N" Word

There's a chance that we'll find ourselves again facing the "N" word. The House has the chance to apply a "Nuclear Option" reminiscent of the nuclear option advanced in the face of a Senate minority that obstructed the majority in the Senate from confirming judicial appointments during the Bush Administration (43).

The last Congress has put us into a place where the legal limits or our nation's debt must be increased to meet the debt requirements of those congressional actions. The debt ceiling must be increased, or the Nation won't be able to meet its commitments.

I'm going to offer you a simple statement; you can't s(*t money. It has to come from somewhere. For years--decades--we've lived in a world where there will always be enough money. My mom and dad don't understand where this type of thinking came from. They lived during the Great Depression. There is an end to money. When there is no more, there simply is no more. For decades, since the Johnson Administration, there's been a belief that we can simply tax the rich in order to pay for the choices our congresses have made. It took Ronald Reagan to fix that mis-belief. And yes, he drove our economy against the wall with deficit spending. Until the foot was taken off the accelerator of increasing debt.

If Congress fails to increase the debt ceiling, there will be chaos. Uncharted territory. You and I will be okay, since our currency will still be operational. The costs of bread, electricity, most of the things that you and I need for our day-to-day, won't change as a result. What will change is our ability to shift our debts to foreign investors. The gravy train will have arrived at the station. There will be no more free rides. We'll become a cash basis economy.

Living with fiat currency, you expect sound fiscal and sound monetary policies. The last four years--since the Democrats gained control of the House and Senate--have allowed us to experience the most profligate expenditures in the history of our nation. Unparalleled. Simply, never before have our expenditures outstripped our economy's growth, or our revenue stream based upon taxation. Ever.

The Democrats have put us in a place we've never been before. We've watched as children have taken to the streets in France and Greece, complaining about tuition fees. We've watched as union workers in France, Germany and England have refused to pick up garbage. Or mine for coal. Or work.

We're at our crisis moment now. Do we want to be more like England? France? Germany? Greece? Spain? Portugal?

Hell no.

We're Americans. Let's deal with this today.

Want an extension on debt ceilings? Agree to a repeal of Obamacare. Simple. Do the right thing, and we'll do the right thing. Oh, and by the way, the economy will be fixed by year's end. All except the housing thing, just because the way we're dealing with our housing problem right now is extending the problem, on attenuating the problem. Funny. You'd think "policy makers" would understand the effects of their policies. (But they can't do the math. What were you thinking?)

The new Nuclear Option.

I hope they do it.

A Song For Americans; Part Three

The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy but cannot disjoin them. (Thomas Jefferson.)



The Left has a problem. In order to promulgate their agenda, they need to minimize the Roussellian and Newtonian ideas of Origin. The promotion of an agenda that attempts to minimize the human from the process of the human race is pretty big stuff. At this juncture, they've been successful in a lot of ways. We end up questioning some pretty basic stuff. Just look at the Global Warming thingy. There's an important post over at Wm. Briggs. Read it. If you don't understand it, mention it in the comments here. Yeah, it's that important. You don't want to walk away from this post without understanding Wm's post.

It really doesn't matter to me how convoluted or obscure your arguments for Global Warming may be. Really. It doesn't. No one with a background in statistical analysis, whether physicist or mathematician would accept most of what has been advanced as "proving" Man Made Global Warming. They couldn't. Just to start, how are the endogenous variables determined? You have a clue? I do. Randomly, at best. One of the advantages of grad school is learning that there are "data miners" out there who do their best to advance based on regressions that are fit to theses post hoc. It's like taking money for sex, wearing lipstick and high heels, but refusing to call yourself a whore. This is the major body of science today. It's especially silly when you view a lot of the work in the social sciences. Sociology majors looking for "significance." Really. It's both boring and obnoxious. My favs are MSW's. Absolutely no clue.

Dr. Johnson refuted a lot of this years ago. And the essence of Dr. Johnson's refutation is critical for each and every one of us. If you sniff bullshit, chances are there are bovines nearby. (Or were.) Educators, specialists, politicians, all expert bullshit dispensers. If there were a craft, we'd have to applaud the craftsmen.

But I have noticed one dominant trait amongst all these bullshitters. What you and I would call a "learning disability." These guys--not stupid--found out years ago that they have no ability to read. Literature, texts, all these are lost on these guys. One of my favourite tests is to simply ask, "what are you reading now?" And watching blank looks.

I don't have a problem with the fact that people are different. I don't mind that people I know, work with and for have a simple problem; they think differently than I do. Most of education up until the 1990's was based on a simple model. It required reading, writing and arithmetic. That model has been displaced by the current model (0ne that requires self-esteem) since actually teaching reading, writing and arithmetic required teachers who were capable of performing the tasks of reading, writing and arithmetic, demonstrated by a mastery of these crafts, themselves.

The transition from merit based education--for both educators and their studentry--to a system of socially defined outcomes, such as self-esteem, were the result of unionism in education during the 1960's. Once unionized, the education industry became dominated by employees who were more concerned with benefits and pay than performance. For years, educators cried, our education system was unable to attract the best and brightest due to poor wages and small budgets. Which was a lie. People who enjoy teaching will do it at the drop of a hat. It's in our blood. Buy me a beer. There. Better.

Now we have the Union/Government complex to defeat. Those who have the power to reform education are hostage to the unions that pay for their political campaigns. "Beware the Military/Industrial Complex!" Repeated daily in our public schools. I don't know if you've noticed, but the "military/industrial complex" isn't really on our radar screen today. What is, is the attempt to change our attitudes towards ourselves. The split is between those who view themselves competent to run their own lives, with those who view themselves indispensable in running our lives for us. Hence the need to run down religious beliefs.

"The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy but cannot disjoin them."

We are people. With all our failings, our weaknesses, our sin, we are perfect. We cannot abjure that which composes us. Amongst our strengths, our weaknesses, our loves and our petty hatreds, we are human. We are perfect. Amongst the angels. (See Paradise Lost.)

We always forget the battle that occurred after our Creation. The strength of humanity was lost on Lucifer. We are weak, stupid, dumb, inartful, ridiculous, vane, cowardly, impecunious, greedy, sinful, jealous, adulterous, murderous, proud and perfect. There is a certain Comedy Français about life that most of us never get. What gets us by is another curious trait of humanity; curiosity. And, hope.

"The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy but cannot disjoin them."

This is what we call priors on the Right. You cannot separate from me the gifts that were given to me because of what I am. A Human. I can no more accept your agenda to become greatfully stupid, than I can escape the fact that I will be weak, stupid, dumb, inartful, ridiculous, vane, cowardly, impecunious, greedy, sinful, jealous, adulterous, murderous, proud and perfect.

What you view as a bug, I view as a feature. I am human. I think. I know. And no amount of attempt at telling me what to do or what to think will change this. So, why don't you give up, huh?

Miserably Inept

The State of Oregon is spending thousands of dollars to advertise a program which is so inept, it boggles.

You can find a link to the state's website here.

"Will homeowners who receive Mortgage Payment Assistance have to pay it back?

"It depends, but it is unlikely. Mortgage Payment Assistance payments will be five-year, forgivable, interest free, non-recourse loans. OHSI will defer all payments and forgive 20 percent of the balance each year."

What is the motivation behind the program? It's "Obama Money." It comes from Treasury. Treasury submits a chit to the state, and voila! money appears. BTW--you're probably eligible. And the cool thing is, once your application is accepted, the outcome is determined by lottery!

So, if you'd like five years of living large, make sure you apply.

Will this impact the need for the market of housing to settle? Not really. Haircuts are being delivered daily. This is not the housing market you were looking for if you need to sell. Here's an hilarious article on condominiums in Washington state.

"In addition to the more than 400 unsold units, he said, more than 100 units remain on the market at Washington Square, the towers' closest high-rise competitor in downtown Bellevue."

Okay. For the five-thousand Oregonians who win the mortgage lottery, it's gonna be cool. Moral hazard? Not for thee!

But will it impact prices in the housing market. Prolly not. Which is a moderate statement compared to my closely held belief that it won't help a wit. But don't take my word for it. Here's Mort Zuckerman; “That’s what’s going to put downward pressure on residential prices,” Zuckerman added, “And in my judgment, that’s going to continue for several years.”

So, free mortgages for five years, and then you're still underwater. What then? If you can't make the payment today, why would you think that you'd be able to make a payment in five years? I mean, you're not going to be saving any money. If you could, you'd be making your mortgage payments today, right? So, in five years, another five thousand homes will be going through foreclosure, just as the market approaches some level of clearing.

Market Clearing Price

View more presentations from matt.

Millions down the drain. Another price shock in five years. Adding to grief and misery.

Markets want to clear. Leftists think they are more powerful than markets. Not true. But who cares. "We're doing good." That's all.

A Song For Americans, Part Two

The server really balks with this at the start...so let it load while you pause the audio.

Then turn it up, have a cup of coffee and a smoke, and be proud that you are an American.

A Song For Americans

Don't watch the video. Do something else. Let the music run in the background for awhile.

Enjoy.

You're an American.

God Bless, and Happy New Year!