"I hate to say it but I told you so,
don't mind my preachin' to you,
I said don't trust him, baby now you know,
you don't learn everything there is to learn in school,
don't think I'm being funny when I say,
you got just what you deserved...
Laugh, Laugh I thought I'd die, it seemed so funny to me"
This 1965 hit from the Beau Brummels, obscure I know, struck a chord with me since it sums up my attitudes towards "independents" who voted for Barrack Obama. Our most scholarly of presidents and his brainy administration, 80% of whom have never worked outside of academia or the public sector, are proof positive that you don't learn everything there is to know in school.
And I don't really hate to say it, but I did tell you so, independent voters. After a year and four months of the monkey business known as the Obama administration, I offer two observations. One, the Republicans, specifically George W. Bush, found himself on the wrong side of the polls as he pushed the envelope of enumerated powers of the executive branch for what he believed, and the jury is still out, was the defense of the nation. Examples; the Patriot Act, wiretapping without a warrant, war in Iraq, overseas detention centers, Gitmo, torture. As the wars and the corresponding need for the policies dragged on, the nation grew weary. Fair enough, understandable. Come the election of 2008 the sought after bubble of "independents", highly coveted, threw in with the Democrats out of sheer exhaustion with Bush and the flexing of his federal muscles.
Two - the Democrats now banging themselves against the rock of "domestic policies" cap and trade, energy, health care, regulating wall street, out of sheer force of will, or thugery, feverishly push the federal government into every quadrant of each American's life, Main Street and Wall Street. Perversely, they manage to stay remarkably absent from the most vital of federal roles; overseeing immigration and securing the borders. Domestic policy has drained all energy and attention away from the primary role of federal government. Why has a man so fond of executive orders, same sex couple mandates to hospitals, abdicated his most obvious source of power? Is it too messy? Is he weak, or is he, my bet, conflicted? It is hard to be the president if too politically correct about "illegal aliens". And politically speaking the Hispanic vote is now the new "independent" vote and Barrack Obama, the most political of presidents, is shamelessly using the desperate plight of Arizona to exalt himself in the eyes of future Hispanic voters.
It is rather alarming, campaigning this early in his presidency. Let's not be fooled into believing he is campaigning for anyone other than himself. He has called his constituents unto him; the blacks, the Hispanics, the women. In doing so he refines his singular talent; stirring the racial pot. Rather odd for a post racial, bi-racial fellow. But boiled down, really what is the hub bub with this power grab by Arizona? Is the Arizona law more prone to abuse than the federal law? Are people, Hispanics afraid because they believe the state law will be enforced while the federal is not? Is e-verify a type of harassment that singles out Hispanics? Would one's civil rights be violated if asked to show a green card or visa if Arizona law enforcement asked to see them but not so much if asked by federal border patrol? How present are the Feds on any given day away from the border, in the towns where many illegals seek work? Is reasonable cause so complex that local law enforcement cannot comprehend its vagaries? Or are we being played by Obama and Democrats, Obama showing his solidarity, and I choose this word specifically, with the underdog, even those not legally eligible to vote?
Jan Brewer has cleverly flexed her own sovereign state's muscles and called Obama's and her predecessor's, Janet Napolitano, bluff. Napolitano, of famed zero credibility about anything, weakly protested that there was no need for this state law because the border had been stabilized on her watch. Hard to explain how that could be true in a state with 6.5 million people and anywhere from 600,000 to 1 million illegals on any given day. So, for all the disappointed independents who voted for Obama believing he was different and special and above the fray - I did tell you so. And now I offer a prediction - it seems you might not make it onto his dance card the next time around unless, must I say it, you are black, Hispanic or a woman. And I am laughing, a little.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Wisdom from Huckleberry Finn
The Citizens of Boulder County need to wake up, quickly. As of January 2010 the highly restrictive, and widely contested, FAR regulations are being enforced in the city of Boulder. Boulder County's evil twin "sustainability" measures have been in place since August 2008 and are gradually having the dual effect of slowing the number of permits issued in Boulder County and eroding private property rights. Not suprisingly, the one effect not being realized is containment of carbon emissions. The quasi-judicial commissioners are aware of these measures ineffectiveness; it has been well documented by the energy auditing community. Still, the citizens must carry on and come together in compliance with the pie in the sky Kyoto II.
The Daily Camera has reported that property values are down for the first time in 26 years in Boulder County. The real estate market has been over-valued both locally and nationally for the past five years and Boulder is not immune to corrections of the market. Locally our community has better withstood other downturns and it is worth asking what makes this real estate recession unique. I assert in heavy measure our local government is to blame. The sustainability/green measures taking affect concurrent with this downturn have generated only negative results; job losses and company foreclosures for businesses in the construction industry, architects, cabinet makers, painters etc. Permits are harder and more expensive to get as the compliance bar has been raised; some people have bypassed the permit process altogether. Most significantly, is the decline in property values and private property rights. For people who support these measures because you think people with big houses are profligate consumers and should live om some other town, be careful what you wish for because in Boulder you are going to get it.
As a builder I view the world through my prism of self-interest, which is obviously one reasons why I reject these measures. Empty political gestures such as Boulder's compliance with Kyoto tend to irritate me. The primary reason I reject the measures,however, is they are a ruse by the county to achieve their cherished objective; affordability. As of December 31st, 2009 one modest north Boulder property lost approximately 1000 square feet of development rights over night. A second story for this home is now not possible. In my assessment this is a "taking"; a violation of the fifth amendment. Private property has been taken in exchange for a benefit to the "community" and the property owner has not been compensated. Some people shrug this asset loss off as no big deal. Until they want to refinance their home or borrow against the equity they thought was there. It isn't there any more.
I live on a six acre property and was told by the County that the median size home for my parcel is 4700 square feet; a floor area ratio of less than ten percent. If I lived in the city it would be 45 percent. Why this discrepancy? The residents of the city, who support the restrictions in the county, like to think of undeveloped private property as open space. Shame on them. The county commissioners attend to maintaining an "affordable housing stock" and now restrict growth as a way of slowing prices. Shame on us for letting these people keep their jobs. The results so far? 1.For every permit issued in the County in the first half of 2009 a coal burning plant in China became operational. 2. A widening chasm between the haves and have nots in the County, with large homes escalating in value and smaller homes falling in value. 3. The County Commissioners, led by the ever smug Will Toor, hide behind the fig leaf of sustainability, while committing to affordability at the expense of private property owners. Well. I know how Huck Finn felt when he said to his pal Jim, "I too have known the boot heel of oppression". I am just a little suprised by who is wearing the boots; the residents in the County who voted for these measures.
The Daily Camera has reported that property values are down for the first time in 26 years in Boulder County. The real estate market has been over-valued both locally and nationally for the past five years and Boulder is not immune to corrections of the market. Locally our community has better withstood other downturns and it is worth asking what makes this real estate recession unique. I assert in heavy measure our local government is to blame. The sustainability/green measures taking affect concurrent with this downturn have generated only negative results; job losses and company foreclosures for businesses in the construction industry, architects, cabinet makers, painters etc. Permits are harder and more expensive to get as the compliance bar has been raised; some people have bypassed the permit process altogether. Most significantly, is the decline in property values and private property rights. For people who support these measures because you think people with big houses are profligate consumers and should live om some other town, be careful what you wish for because in Boulder you are going to get it.
As a builder I view the world through my prism of self-interest, which is obviously one reasons why I reject these measures. Empty political gestures such as Boulder's compliance with Kyoto tend to irritate me. The primary reason I reject the measures,however, is they are a ruse by the county to achieve their cherished objective; affordability. As of December 31st, 2009 one modest north Boulder property lost approximately 1000 square feet of development rights over night. A second story for this home is now not possible. In my assessment this is a "taking"; a violation of the fifth amendment. Private property has been taken in exchange for a benefit to the "community" and the property owner has not been compensated. Some people shrug this asset loss off as no big deal. Until they want to refinance their home or borrow against the equity they thought was there. It isn't there any more.
I live on a six acre property and was told by the County that the median size home for my parcel is 4700 square feet; a floor area ratio of less than ten percent. If I lived in the city it would be 45 percent. Why this discrepancy? The residents of the city, who support the restrictions in the county, like to think of undeveloped private property as open space. Shame on them. The county commissioners attend to maintaining an "affordable housing stock" and now restrict growth as a way of slowing prices. Shame on us for letting these people keep their jobs. The results so far? 1.For every permit issued in the County in the first half of 2009 a coal burning plant in China became operational. 2. A widening chasm between the haves and have nots in the County, with large homes escalating in value and smaller homes falling in value. 3. The County Commissioners, led by the ever smug Will Toor, hide behind the fig leaf of sustainability, while committing to affordability at the expense of private property owners. Well. I know how Huck Finn felt when he said to his pal Jim, "I too have known the boot heel of oppression". I am just a little suprised by who is wearing the boots; the residents in the County who voted for these measures.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
The New Working Class
In the matter of health care I would like to propose the following modified definitions:
1. Working Class - any individual earning greater than $200K/year or family/couple filing jointly earning greater than $250K/year. These annual incomes are not to be indexed for inflation, ensuring growth in the ranks of the working class, thereby securing revenue flows to the Elites and Uber-Elites. Working class is synonomous with the following: net tax payer,private sector employee, minority.
2. Elites - any individual currently employed by one of the following; United States federal government,one of the 50 so called sovereign states, excluding New Jersey. The elites' health insurance and pensions are paid by members of the working class. Elites is synonomous with: net tax receiver,growing majority, public sector employee
3. Uber Elites - any individual currently employed by the SEIU, General Motors, or the state of New Jersey teachers union.
Having defined the terms for this purposes of this blog I move on to basic math, again, It is curious; when members of the working class object to a new tax of 3.8% on "unearned income, e.g. revenues such as the sale of stock, rental incomes, real estate transactions, the elites, who authorized this new tax, are put off and annoyed by the outcry. The outcries are destabilizing to the elite's franchise; government. Yet when the foolishly brave Chris Christie suggests that the Uber Elites in New Jersey, the teachers union, pay 1.5% for their own health care a mass email is circulated to 17,000 Uber Elites praying for the Christie's death. This is not deemed an aggressive destablilizing act. The head of the New Jersey Teacher's Union, Barbara Keshishian, was incredulous when Christie inquires if the author, Joe Coppolla has been fired. "For what", she inquired.
I am impressed by the brazeness, if not the stupidity of Joe Coppolla, who defended his email as "a joke, not meant to be public", (I wish 17,000 people read my blog) but that is neither here nor there. As a member of the working class
I stand accused of being a greedy, cold slave to the free market if I protest the 3.8% tax to pay for other people's health care. What is the appropriate accusation for the teachers union of New Jersey as they stubbornly resist shouldering their own financial burdens, namely, paying for a tiny portion of their own, untaxed, health care benefits? Stubborn might be accurate, or maybe childish. What I think works best is entitled. The teachers union of New Jersey is entitled to benefits paid for by others,the working class, even as the revenues streams run dry. New Jersey has had 115 tax increases in 8 years and the state's revenues continue to go down. What is going up? Well the budget for the states public schools has increased 11% over the past year though enrollments have increased by only 6%. That is some crazy math. Further, this very modest shift to the employee of 1.5% for their own health care, coupled with a freeze in pay, could save the working class in New Jersey 850 million dollars. It could also prevent the necessity of cuts related specifically to the classroom. New Jersey pays an incredible $22K/student/year in the city of Newark and a 1/4 of enrolled students graduate. Where oh where does the money go? A civil servant in New Jersey, having contributed $120,000 towards his defined retirement plan can retire at age 49 and, if he lives to the age of 85, can extract a total of 3.2 million dollars in benefits from the working class. Marx would be tickled.
1. Working Class - any individual earning greater than $200K/year or family/couple filing jointly earning greater than $250K/year. These annual incomes are not to be indexed for inflation, ensuring growth in the ranks of the working class, thereby securing revenue flows to the Elites and Uber-Elites. Working class is synonomous with the following: net tax payer,private sector employee, minority.
2. Elites - any individual currently employed by one of the following; United States federal government,one of the 50 so called sovereign states, excluding New Jersey. The elites' health insurance and pensions are paid by members of the working class. Elites is synonomous with: net tax receiver,growing majority, public sector employee
3. Uber Elites - any individual currently employed by the SEIU, General Motors, or the state of New Jersey teachers union.
Having defined the terms for this purposes of this blog I move on to basic math, again, It is curious; when members of the working class object to a new tax of 3.8% on "unearned income, e.g. revenues such as the sale of stock, rental incomes, real estate transactions, the elites, who authorized this new tax, are put off and annoyed by the outcry. The outcries are destabilizing to the elite's franchise; government. Yet when the foolishly brave Chris Christie suggests that the Uber Elites in New Jersey, the teachers union, pay 1.5% for their own health care a mass email is circulated to 17,000 Uber Elites praying for the Christie's death. This is not deemed an aggressive destablilizing act. The head of the New Jersey Teacher's Union, Barbara Keshishian, was incredulous when Christie inquires if the author, Joe Coppolla has been fired. "For what", she inquired.
I am impressed by the brazeness, if not the stupidity of Joe Coppolla, who defended his email as "a joke, not meant to be public", (I wish 17,000 people read my blog) but that is neither here nor there. As a member of the working class
I stand accused of being a greedy, cold slave to the free market if I protest the 3.8% tax to pay for other people's health care. What is the appropriate accusation for the teachers union of New Jersey as they stubbornly resist shouldering their own financial burdens, namely, paying for a tiny portion of their own, untaxed, health care benefits? Stubborn might be accurate, or maybe childish. What I think works best is entitled. The teachers union of New Jersey is entitled to benefits paid for by others,the working class, even as the revenues streams run dry. New Jersey has had 115 tax increases in 8 years and the state's revenues continue to go down. What is going up? Well the budget for the states public schools has increased 11% over the past year though enrollments have increased by only 6%. That is some crazy math. Further, this very modest shift to the employee of 1.5% for their own health care, coupled with a freeze in pay, could save the working class in New Jersey 850 million dollars. It could also prevent the necessity of cuts related specifically to the classroom. New Jersey pays an incredible $22K/student/year in the city of Newark and a 1/4 of enrolled students graduate. Where oh where does the money go? A civil servant in New Jersey, having contributed $120,000 towards his defined retirement plan can retire at age 49 and, if he lives to the age of 85, can extract a total of 3.2 million dollars in benefits from the working class. Marx would be tickled.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Alice, in Alice in Wonderland, had an argument with the Red Queen who made an absurd comment which Alice declared 'impossible". The Red Queen, queen that she was, said she made a point of believing six things that were impossible every day before breakfast. This was funny, in the book Alice in Wonderland, but it is not very funny when Barack Obama, of legendary intelligence, behaves more like the Red Queen than the leader of the free world. The following quote by Peggy Noonan, a presumed conservative, asserts,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704094104575144070064980374.html?KEYWORDS=peggy+noonan
Who, other than those committed to believing the impossible, believe that ObamaCare will expand coverage for the uninsurable, e.g. people who are very sick, snuff out waste and fraud from Medicare without restricting coverage at the same moment in time when 10,000 new retirees are joining Medicare ranks, without adding one dime to the federal deficit?!? When social security was signed into law there were17 workers for every retiree; today there are three. Piling new entitlements onto this system on the verge of collapse is not "intelligent" - it requires only basic math taught in the fourth grade to conclude that this new entitlement is "impossible".
Noonan's point is that there is a growing divide in this country between "those in the cart and those pulling the cart". This health care bill has metaphorically filled the divide with fire and barbed wire and Molotov cocktails - the gap is a minefield and cannot be bridged. Why is that? Because the people pulling the cart are angry as more people climbing into the cart make it ever harder to pull. The people who favor the massive expansion of entitlement programs, Barrack Obama for example, have decided that writing legislation and creating a legal right to something, health care, is equivalent to a constitutional right, freedom to practice the religion of one's beliefs. Entitlements and constitutional rights are not comparable because an entitlement can only be bestowed on a person by the coercion of the people funding the entitlement. Hence the anger and the rage and the Tea Parties, all of which by the way are protected by the Constitution. Leading me back to Noonan's concession that the administration, bursting with the best and the brightest, does not know the temperature and how it is that they have managed to raise it. I offer a counter explanation, the administration is full of Red Queens, who apparently wake up every day looking for six new impossible things to believe before breakfast.
The End of Satire
As a brand new blogger it was necessary to choose a name for my blog that provided insight to things I might be interested in discussing here. My mind,when faced with this decision, went deadly blank since, I confess, I am not creative, especially when it is important to be creative. That said, I do sport a bumper sticker on both of my cars "FORGET TIBET FREE BOULDER COUNTY". This sticker is neither original or literal ; it is ironic and satirical. Satire and irony are necessary to provoke thought, expose hypocrisy and preserve intellectual honesty. I mean no harm to the people of Tibet but I do want the citizens of Boulder to wonder, as they sit behind me me at a traffic light - why Free Boulder County? Aren't we free? Well - considerably less so than we used to be and, I will assert, more liberties will be lost before any are restored. The progressives are running the show and many Americans do not fully comprehend the changes in store for all of us. Hence my bumper sticker, the metaphorical poke in the eye to the poor guy stuck behind me in traffic.
Is satire dead? No, but it is running for its life. Intolerance for opposing points of view, expressed satirically, strikes a nerve now that does seem to reflect an "off with his head", mindset by people on the other side. There is hope, though, for the mood of the nation is restless and the Internet remains, remarkably, free from censorship and government intrusion. So -now I throw my hat into the blogoshpere for kicks! Here goes!
Is satire dead? No, but it is running for its life. Intolerance for opposing points of view, expressed satirically, strikes a nerve now that does seem to reflect an "off with his head", mindset by people on the other side. There is hope, though, for the mood of the nation is restless and the Internet remains, remarkably, free from censorship and government intrusion. So -now I throw my hat into the blogoshpere for kicks! Here goes!
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