On Redefining Illiteracy and Innumeracy
Posted: August 26, 2009 Filed under: A My Pet Goat Moment, The Media SUCKS, Voter Ignorance | Tags: Bernie Sanders, Glenn Beck and the Becksters, Keith Olbermann, Misinformants, socialism Comments Off on On Redefining Illiteracy and Innumeracy
I’ve been highly frustrated recently by the appalling level 0f uncivil discourse at town hall meetings. Here’s the latest experience for Howard Dean as reported by the Hill. Yesterday, I watched Senator John McCain’s meeting and his was booed several times for making statements that were true by definition. The hatred in the air is palpable even over a TV screen. What reasonable person could argue with something that is true by definition? It’s the most basic proof of all.
Well, we seemed to have lost our ability to present opposing viewpoints with the use of logic, data, and information. I was thinking about this on my drive across the bayous to campus this morning for several reason. First, I had a run-in with a group of Beck worshipers (yes, he’s a loser babee, but he’s not the singer). Second, I’m in my first set of lectures where I have to set up some definitions so we can move forward with the rest. That’s when I figured it out. There’s an entire misinformation industry out there making money on confusing the intellectually vulnerable on standard definitions. It’s now so bad,that you can say that’s untrue by definition or it’s a tautology and folks will tell you it’s just skewed data or your opinion.
How can you possibly reason with any one who thinks your data is bad because their basic definition is flawed? How do you debate some one who has refitted and redefined a definition to match their argument rather than some one who looks at the definition and tries to fit the argument to the definition? Well, you can’t. Especially when they actually believe that the generally excepted definition is arguable. To me, this redefines both illiteracy and innumeracy.
When we are very young toddlers, we start learning to posit definitions with the help of our elders. Every one who has seen a toddler call every four legged furry animal a doggie has seen this happen. We say, no, that’s not a doggie, that’s a kitty or a horsie or a moo cow, until the toddler can put the animal into the correct set. The correct set is the universally agreed upon definition of the term. The toddler does not argue that your definition of kitty is your opinion. We’d never be able to communicate with any one if we each had unique definitions for every word. Yet, there are those with political and personal agendas that would make it so.
This is what has happened in political discourse. The generally accepted and agreed upon definitions of socialism, 
fascism, liberalism, racism, and other related terms are now malleable and debatable. Glen Beck is one example of a person that redefines and distorts these generally accepted definitions for a living. He’s the reason I beat my head against the wall whenever I have to tell person, that by definition, Barack Obama is not a socialist or a fascist. Keith Olbermann is another example. He’s the reason I beat my head against the wall whenever I have to tell a person, by definition, that Bill Clinton is not a racist. These ‘misinformants’ have completely made up their own definitions. As a result, those of us that follow the traditional, universally agreed upon definitions set up by scholars in the fields cannot have a civil discourse with any of their minions.
Here, let me show you. I’m going to borrow the Merriam Webster Dictionary of definition of Socialism. It’s short and sweet.
Main Entry: so·cial·ism
Pronunciation: \ˈsō-shə-ˌli-zəm\ Function: noun Date: 1837 1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
2 a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property b : a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state
3 : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done
Take a good look at that definition and tell me, just once, when anything Barack Obama has said or done to date has had anything to do with advocating collective or governmental administration of the means of production and distribution of goods. He didn’t do it with Chrysler, he didn’t do it with GM, and he hasn’t done it to any financial institution that was held in momentary receivership, given TARP funds, or pushed towards bankruptcy. What he has done has been to take public funds and pour them into privately owned means of production and distribution of goods. GM is still owned by stockholders and now, very much, by its unions who have been enriched by tax payer dollars. All those financial institutions have not been nationalized but they have been given sweetheart loans. If he was a socialist he’d have jumped at the opportunity to grab their assets and he did nothing of the kind. If anything, he typifies cronyism. He is not a socialist.
I lifted this from the Black Agenda Report!!!
Also, the socialists themselves don’t claim him. I’ve been reading the very left leaning Black Agenda Report for months. They can’t stand him. The one openly socialist Senator we have, Bernie Sanders, doesn’t agree with Obama’s policies on health care or corporate bail outs or trade. Heck, even Socialist activist John Pilger thinks he’s a “clever corporate marketing creation.”
So, give then definition above and the data below it, can I get a shout out that BY definition, Barack Obama is NO socialist !
No? Are you going to give me the guilt by association argument? He knows a few socialists, therefore he is a socialist? (In that case I should be a Christian and a Republican because most of the folks I know, work with, live by and are related to are those and I’m neither.) What else can you do? Well, if you’re a Glenn Beck Acolyte you will take his misdefinition and tell me, just wait because I will eventually be proven wrong or that my data is skewed or that I really don’t know a thing about real socialism. I was even told by several Becksters that my data was skewed and my facts were wrong when I sent them to look at the CIA website containing the CIA factbook. I was told that all sites can be hacked. What do you say to people that think the CIA website can be hacked and that they manipulate their data to make Cuba look good?
Anyway. I picked this example, but I could’ve just as easily deconstructed the Bill Clinton is a racist meme which I just
One of the Media Ministers Of Misinformation
may do when I get pissed enough about that too! This is the deal. We are letting a few on air personalities turn people into illiterate and innumerate shrieking morons. It’s a problem when you’re in a democracy. I may have a captive group of students with whom I can reasonably demonstrate what socialism is and is not because that’s part of my job. But how do you reach the millions of folks that listen and watch these gasbags? They all need to be removed from whatever airwaves because they’re damaging the democracy for their own personal gain. Their corporate masters need to be boycotted and punished for profiting from the proliferation of ignorance.
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Shoot the message and the messenger
Posted: August 14, 2009 Filed under: Health care reform, Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us, president teleprompter jesus, Surreality, The Media SUCKS, Voter Ignorance | Tags: Big phRMA, healt care town hall meetings 1 Comment
For some one who was supposed to be the nation’s hip professor with that smooth oration style holding us all rapt and breathless, President Barack Obama sure has turned into to the teacher who has lost control of the classroom. I can’t recall any president–other than LBJ on Vietnam–that has rolled out a major policy and lost the conversation so quickly. It’s not that great of a leap to see remnants of “Hey, Hey LBJ, how many babies did you kill today?” in the faces of seniors who have some how been convinced that discussing living wills puts them in danger of being set out on the ice floes by their government. How did this administration lose control of this conversation so rapidly?
I would speculate that the major players in the debate did not want a repeat of the “HillaryCare” episode so they may have concentrated a bit too much on not repeating a similar process. There were no blue ribbon panels meeting all over the country and no attempts to set up a health care czar. Instead there was this via Bloomberg: “Six Lobbyists Per Lawmaker Work on Health Overhaul” and this from Jane at FDL : Memo Confirms Deal Between phRMA and White House. With this White House–as with Richard Nixon’s–it’s always about following the money. Before the bill even hit the Congress and the people, it was morphed into something that is said to be setting up windfall profits for the people who profit grandly already from the ill among us. Given that, now we’re supposed to buy it as a foot in the door to the real thing. Excuse me for my lack of trust. I’m just not buying that passing this thing will lead to anything but corporate windfall profits and a win in the Obama column.
That’s six lobbyists for each of the 535 members of the House and Senate, according to Senate records, and three times the number of people registered to lobby on defense. More than 1,500 organizations have health-care lobbyists, and about three more are signing up each day. Every one of the 10 biggest lobbying firms by revenue is involved in an effort that could affect 17 percent of the U.S. economy.
These groups spent $263.4 million on lobbying during the first six months of 2009, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based research group, more than any other industry. They spent $241.4 million during the same period of 2008. Drugmakers alone spent $134.5 million, 64 percent more than the next biggest spenders, oil and gas companies.
“Whenever you have a big piece of legislation like this, it’s like ringing the dinner bell for K Street,” said Bill Allison, a senior fellow at the Sunlight Foundation, a Washington-based watchdog group …
We now have a botched roll out, a messy misunderstood plan, and rooms filled with shrieking constituents of all shapes, sizes, and flavors. Is any one buying this as a national conversation?
When Deficits Matter …
Posted: August 11, 2009 Filed under: Global Financial Crisis, The Great Recession, The Media SUCKS, U.S. Economy, Voter Ignorance | Tags: Automatic Stabilizers, Bill Clinton, Deficit Spending, Dick Cheney, fiscal policy, Government expenditures, J.M. Keynes, The New Deal Comments Off on When Deficits Matter …
There’s a lot of misunderstanding in popular culture (most started during the Reagan years) about deficit spending and the public debt. Deficits tend to increase naturally during bad economic times due to what we economists call automatic stabilizers. These are spending programs (most of which were built into the economy during the New Deal) that adjust as the business cycle changes. Taxes naturally go down during a recession because less people are making money and business earn less revenue and sell less. Government expenditures go up because people rely on unemployment insurance and other government programs more during bad economic times.
Then, there is discretionary fiscal policy that the government undertakes to offset the business cycle. The Keynesian framework suggests that the government should deficit spend by increasing its direct spending or lowering taxes during bad economic times and then quit spending and decreasing taxes during good times.
Neo-Keynesian economists (like me) never suggest running perpetual deficits which build up our government debt over time. The debt accrues interest and it can eventually become a substantial part of current government outlays if the interest rates are high enough or the debt becomes a big enough percentage of current output (GDP). A huge deficit and/or debt can eventually impact a growing economy. We appear to be on the path to that result now.
The “deficits don’t matter” meme that came from the likes of vpResident Evil Dick Cheney is anathema to neo-Keynesians despite Republican falsehoods to the contrary. It’s pretty much why we saw Democratic President Bill Clinton try to address the excesses of the Reagan Administration (the real tax and spend president of the 20th century) during his administration. The deficit management program during the Clinton years was very much in keeping with what neo-Keynesians believe is a responsible approach to fiscal policy. When the economy is good, you increase taxes to suppress the tendency for the economy to create inflation and you take advantage of the incoming revenues to lower the debt and run a surplus.
The surplus does double duty since it is essentially “government saving”. It takes the government out of the bond markets and provides more money for the private sector to grow. Hence, there is a role for surpluses during boom times. Government surpluses tend to funnel money to private business and suppress any inflationary pressures in a fast growing economy. Plus, they can be banked in rainy day funds to be spent during bad economic times.
So, that’s the Keynesian fiscal policy theory in a tiny nut shell.
So what does this mean? It’s a link to a Reuters piece called “Obama to raise 10-year deficit to $9 trillion”.
The Obama administration will raise its 10-year budget deficit projection to approximately $9 trillion from $7.108 trillion in a report next week, a senior administration official told Reuters on Friday.
The higher deficit figure, based on updated economic data, brings the White House budget office into line with outside estimates and gives further fuel to President Barack Obama‘s opponents, who say his spending plans are too expensive in light of budget shortfalls.
The White House took heat for sticking with its $7.108 trillion forecast earlier this year after the Congressional Budget Office forecast that deficits between 2010 and 2019 would total $9.1 trillion.
“The new forecasts are based on new data that reflect how severe the economic downturn was in the late fall of last year and the winter of this year,” said the administration official, who is familiar with the budget mid-session review that is slated to be released next week.
“Our budget projections are now in line with the spring and summer projections that the Congressional Budget Office put out.”
The first thing I’m hoping it means is that the Obama administration is going to quit putting out rosier-than-rosy scenarios (and even more hopefully, quit using them for fiscal policy decisions). In other words, my fervent prayer is that they’re getting real. Second, it means this:
Record-breaking deficits have raised concerns about America’s ability to finance its debt and whether the United States can maintain its top-tier AAA credit rating.
Politically, the deficit has been an albatross for Obama, a Democrat who is pushing forward with plans to overhaul the U.S. healthcare industry — an initiative that could cost up to $1 trillion over 10 years — and other promises, including reforming education and how the country handles energy.
Why, after years of deficit spending by federal government, are we in danger of becoming a developing nation? Why are we seeing a continuation of what is essentially, Reaganomics (a failed economic hypothesis, but a popular ideological and political meme) instead of retreat to the proven theories of macroeconomics?
Business Week Declares the Winners in Health Care Reform
Posted: August 7, 2009 Filed under: Health care reform, The Media SUCKS, U.S. Economy, Voter Ignorance | Tags: Health care reform, health insurance industry, UHC 2 Comments
Business Week suggests you get to know your Insurance CEOs and I agree... UHC's Hemsley (a high flying member of the bonus class)
And guess what… it isn’t you and me. Here’s the front page story from August 6th, 2009.
All this back and forth on rw/lw blogs about whose grass roots are nuttier or meaner or better organized is cute, but while this debate on how many wingers can fit on the tip of a town hall meeting goes on, the real health care anti-reform is happening on K Street. The circus only stops you from looking at the men behind the curtain. Not one teabagger or ACORN rent-a-protester or you or the rest of us are part of the real conversation. Shouldn’t our focus be on why the Health Insurance is happy about what’s going on? Uh, maybe while you’re all throwing memes at each other, some one should be watching the pile of money on the floor that’s disappearing before our very eyes? The Democrats have the votes to make this pass. BUT, wtf are they passing? You really think this is an obsequious foot in the door?
As the health reform fight shifts this month from a vacationing Washington to congressional districts and local airwaves around the country, much more of the battle than most people realize is already over. The likely victors are insurance giants such as UnitedHealth Group (UNH), Aetna (AET), and WellPoint (WLP). The carriers have succeeded in redefining the terms of the reform debate to such a degree that no matter what specifics emerge in the voluminous bill Congress may send to President Obama this fall, the insurance industry will emerge more profitable. Health reform could come with a $1 trillion price tag over the next decade, and it may complicate matters for some large employers. But insurance CEOs ought to be smiling.
Executives from UnitedHealth certainly showed no signs of worry on the mid-July day that Senate Democrats proposed to help pay for reform with a new tax on the insurance industry. Instead, UnitedHealth parked a shiny 18-wheeler outfitted with high-tech medical gear near the Capitol and invited members of Congress aboard. Inside the mobile diagnostic center, which enables doctors to examine distant patients via satellite television, Representative Jim Matheson didn’t disguise his wonderment. “Fascinating, fascinating,” said the Democrat from Utah. “Amazing.”
Okay, did you take a deep breath long enough to read that highlighted line? Do you realize that all we’re doing with the current format is giving these guys new customers to fleece with their 30% mark-up? Is that a good deal? That’s worth a symbolic vote for single payer and an inkle of a public option? A few more folks in 2013 join the fleecing of the ill while it’s paid for by throwing children off SCHIP and removing benefits from Medicare? Are liberals really fighting for THAT? Are conservatives thinking THAT’s socialism?
What fresh hell is this?
It’s just a little bit of Policy Fail Repeating
Posted: August 6, 2009 Filed under: Bailout Blues, Equity Markets, Global Financial Crisis, president teleprompter jesus, Team Obama, The Bonus Class, The DNC, The Great Recession, The Media SUCKS, U.S. Economy | Tags: bad bank, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, homeownership, James B. Lockhart, mortgage origination, secondary market for mortgages, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner Comments Off on It’s just a little bit of Policy Fail Repeating
When you let lobbyists make public policy, failure is an acceptable outcome. That’s because the point of the policy isn’t the public and isn’t necessarily doing what will work. The point of the policy is to enrich and perpetuate the entrenched interests. Every other possible goal becomes expendable including those that have to do with protecting the public purse and welfare.
Imagine my lack of surprise when I saw that the creation of a “bad bank” policy is back in today’s WaPo headlines. Go take a look at “U.S. Considers Remaking Mortgage Giants:’Bad Bank’ Would Wipe the Slate Clean for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac by Taking Their Toxic Loans” and weep. This administration will reward bad players as long as there is a political reason for them to exist. So, instead of real reform of Fannie and Freddie, they’re proposing a solution that sweeps past mistakes under the rug and allows these failed institutions to operate in the same irresponsible way that brought them their current fate. There is no such thing as the discipline of the market or the bankruptcy court when you’re big enough to hire K Street impresarios to keep your show running and the federal government enables you.
The Obama administration is considering an overhaul of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that would strip the mortgage finance giants of hundreds of billions of dollars in troubled loans and create a new structure to support the home-loan market, government officials said.
The bad debts the firms own would be placed in new government-backed financial institutions — so-called bad banks — that would take responsibility for collecting as much of the outstanding balance as possible. What would be left would be two healthy financial companies with a clean slate.
The moves would represent one of the most dramatic reorderings of the badly shattered housing finance system since District-based Fannie Mae was created by Congress to support mortgage lending during the Great Depression. Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, based in McLean, have government charters to buy home loans from banks, which they then repackage and sell to investors. The banks can then use the proceeds to offer more loans to home buyers.
The leviathans became emblematic of the financial crisis when they were effectively nationalized in September amid a market meltdown that revealed much of their holdings to be troubled. The government has since pledged more than $1.5 trillion, including $85 billion in direct aid, to keep the mortgage market working through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
The proposal, which is preliminary and one of several under discussion, is scheduled to be taken up by the White House’s National Economic Council on Thursday.
What about the Japanese lost decade and all the papers and studies written about the bad bank policy did these folks miss? Well, of course, you do know that the head of the “White House’s National Economic Council ” is La-La Summers, right? Mister, I got mine from Wall Street? Let’s look at the other players who buy into this. I’ll just highlight them so you can see that it’s basically the same players that had some kind of supporting role in the original failure. Why does Washington D.C. continue to reward the very same people and players? It has too be some thing pathological.
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