What is a Real Friend Worth?

 I use a BlackBerry and like iPhone, it has a million apps for all kinds of arcane uses. Here is one that is self-explanatory:


OutOfBattery - Someone wants to borrow your BlackBerry but you don't know how to say no? Don't worry, OutOfBattery can display on your screen an empty battery with just one click.

Unless your friend habitually uses your phone to call his girlfriend in Singapore, this is a pretty cheesy app and anyone who puts it on their phone isn't much of a friend. Sheesh.

But That's Hypocritcal!

Well duh! Sen. John Kerry (D - Massachusetts), one of the Senate's leading proponents of taxing pretty much everything, has home-ported his yacht in Newport, Rhode Island and thereby saved $437,500 in sales taxes that Massachusetts would have collected and $70,000/year in excise taxes. What??!! He doesn't want to "invest" in his own state. Imagine - a hypocritical politician!

bostonherald.com/track/inside_track/view.bg?articleid=1269698

Counterpoint

Back on May 27 I posted on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's call for the world to respond to the North Koreans "unacceptably" torpedoing a South Korean patrol boat. The Norks puckishly replied that she was not very intelligent and a "funny lady." Don't you just love the sound of crickets at night? And the results of such a firm application of soft power?

Thought for the Day

I couldn't have said it better myself. (Click on the image).

Read This Article

I can't say it more plainly than that. My blog of May 19, 2010 posted on how elites in this country are using a so-called "living Constitution" as a vehicle for entrenching their power and turning this country into a place very different from what America has been historically. Professor Emeritus Angelo M. Codevilla of Boston University's School of International Relations has written a brilliant, even seminal piece, expanding on this theme and explaining the morass into which the United States has fallen and how it has happened. It is a long piece, but absolutely crucial for every American who is concerned about our future to read, digest, and act upon. I count myself as a Country man and I hope that others of my countrymen will arise and begin the process of restoring America to the singular country foreseen and planned for by the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

spectator.org/archives/2010/07/16/americas-ruling-class-and-the/

Looking at the New Models

My dad used to pore over the new car ads every Fall and see what marvels Detroit was bringing out for the new model year. Most of the fun was in the looking, but every 3-4 years he would actually buy a new car and we would proudly motor through town enjoying the newest advances like air conditioning, seat belts, and power door locks. Necessity did underlie the ritual, though, because a car is a necessity in America and they do wear out at some point.

The same is true of military weapons systems and much of our equipment, big and small, is wearing out from age and usage in multiple wars over the last 20+ years. Here is an article by a defense analyst that focuses on the Air Force. Air supremacy is an absolute must in any conflict. If you don't have it, you lose - end of discussion. The F-22 was the designated successor to the F-15, which has given the U.S. air superiority since the late 1970s when it was introduced. The Obama Administration canceled the F-22 just when it was ready to go into mass production. The F-35 was designed to be a cheaper complement to the F-22. It is running into huge budget overruns. We need tankers to gas our aircraft in flight, but some of the KC-135s in the fleet are 50 years old and literally held together with duct tape and baling wire. It's not a pretty picture and if we get into a "hot" war with an adversary with a decent air force, it could be a real problem.

The Pentagon bears part of the responsibility. It tries to make combat aircraft the equivalent of Swiss Army knives with a gazillion different bells and whistles. This adds significantly to the development cost and often to a lessening of the aircraft's ability to perform any particular mission well. Even with tankers, the Pentagon has been dithering for years. As the article says, there are two perfectly serviceable models out there - just pick one!

Another part of the problem is Congress and the White House. Even though national defense is one of the critical Constitutional obligations of both branches, it doesn't generate the votes that pork does, so dollars that we should be spending on replacing old aircraft instead get spent on bridges to nowhere, handouts to favored constituents, etc.

Finally, we the voters who let politicians get away with this stuff are ultimately at fault. We got caught with our pants down at Pearl Harbor but, because of our oceans, still had a year to ramp up military production and ultimately defeat the Axis powers. With ballistic missiles, missile-launching subs, etc., the oceans no longer afford us the luxury of time. We need to be prudent on military spending, we need to insist on value, but in the end, when we send our children in harm's way, we need to give them the best equipment in the world and we need to win.

(Ed. note - the link I originally provided to this article, "The Air Force Needs a Serious Upgrade", linked to a subscriber-only page at The Wall Street Journal. If you are not a subscriber, google the headline and you will be able to find the entire article posted elsewhere. I apologize for the inconvenience.)

Time to Vote with Your Feet

Bank of America to roll out online account with $8.95/month fee. Woo-hoo! Be still my heart! Bite me.

news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100715/wr_nm/us_bankofamerica_fees

Eurabia 2010

Mark Steyn wrote in America Alone that large parts of Europe would become Eurabia by 2020 or so because of the large influx of Muslim immigrants into many European countries. Their high birthrates coupled with the natives almost non-existent birthrates guaranteed growing and then decisive political power for the Islamic imports.

Here is how this scenario is unfolding in Sweden. Malmo is Sweden's third largest city with a population of just under 300,000. About 15% of the population are Muslims and they, along with local leftists, which is about everybody else in Sweden, are making life very unpleasant for the 760 Jews that still call Malmo home. Most of the Jews came here after surviving the Holocaust. The whole article is well worth reading, but this snippet gives you some of the flavor:

"Because he is the most visible Jew in Malmo, with his black fedora, tzitzit and long beard, Malmo’s only rabbi, Shneur Kesselman, 31, is a prime target for Muslim anti-Jewish sentiment. The Orthodox Chabad rabbi said that during his six years in the city, he has been the victim of more than 50 anti-Semitic incidents. An American, Kesselman is a soft spoken man with a steely determination to stay in Malmo despite the danger.

Two members of the American Embassy in Stockholm visited him in April to discuss his safety. From Keselman’s account, they had good reason to worry.

The rabbi recalled the day he was crossing a street near his house with his wife when a car suddenly went into reverse and sped backward toward them. They dodged the vehicle and barely made it to the other side of the street. “My wife was screaming,” the rabbi said. “It was a traumatic event.”

86-year-old Judith Popinski says:

“Malmo reminds me of the anti-Semitism I felt as a child in Poland before the war,” she told the Forward while sitting in her living room, which is adorned with Persian rugs and many paintings.

“I am not safe as a Jew in Sweden anymore,” a trembling Popinski said in a frail voice. But unlike others, she intends to stay in Sweden. “I will not be a victim again,” she said.

I hope not, but don't count on it. If you have been considering a trip to Europe you may want to move up the schedule - in another 10 years you may not recognize the place.

www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jews-reluctantly-abandon-swedish-city-amid-growing-anti-semitism-1.301276

Just Checking Out the Neighborhood

China has been quietly infiltrating our neighborhood in Central and South America. Now we are returning the favor with some retrofitted Trident subs that carry up to 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles each. While the three subs are a message to the Chinese, it's a flat out warning to North Korea. I'm guessing this is a move by Defense Secretary Gates on his own, since it is so out of character with the rest of this Administration's "foreign policy." Glad somebody is still awake and paying attention in DC.

news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599200237800

Oregon's Economy May Be Heading Down. Again

An economist from UO says we may be heading back into the ditch. Quick, take some more money out of people's hands via higher taxes - I'm sure it will help!

www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2010/07/leading_indicators_suggest_ore.html

Obamacare Beta

The picture to the left depicts what Obamacare promises. The picture below shows what it will deliver. How do I know? There is already a beta out there for all to observe and the results thus far aren't pretty.

The headline of this WSJ article is "The Massachusetts Health-Care Train Wreck" and it is very descriptive of what is happening as the health-care program that President Obama has called "almost identical" to his own unravels. Already, 3 of the 5 biggest non-profit health insurance companies are under financial oversight due to losses, which total $116 million. The politicians response: deny rate increases and "order" them to provide services below cost. Any guesses on how long this will last? They are also contemplating ordering doctors to participate in a state system that regulates what doctors can charge as a condition of getting a medical license in Massachusetts. Any guess where doctors won't stay? Now you see the imperative for national health care - you eliminate places where doctors can go to practice and they have to participate in your state-controlled system. Of course, they can't make doctors practice or bright people go to medical school, which will be the very predictable next step by the docs and in the deterioration of the American health-care system.



online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704324304575306861120760580.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

And So It Begins

But wait, I thought it was supposed to get better!

CHICAGO (AP) — Hospital emergency rooms may grow even more crowded with longer wait times under the nation's new health law -- which provides insurance coverage for 32 million more people.

It would seem these patients would now be able to get routine health care by visiting a doctor's office, but it's not that simple.

There's a shortage of front-line family physicians in some places and experts think that will get worse.

Also, the study finds that people without insurance aren't the ones filling up emergency rooms. The biggest users of ERs by far are Medicaid recipients. And the new law will increase their ranks by about 16 million.

Rand Corp. researcher Dr. Arthur Kellermann predicts newly covered patients will be less afraid to go to the emergency department if they're sick or hurt and their resources for treatment are limited. As he puts it, "We just don't have other places in the system for these folks to go."

www.kgw.com/lifestyle/health/97656294.html

A Couple of Kids Enjoying Summer

Well today is a milestone birthday for my best friend, Bill Brooks. We met in grade school during the summer between 5th and 6th grades. He went to Hawthorne School and I to Washington, but we only lived a few blocks apart as the crow flies. Sometimes you just click with another person and click we did. We would leave our houses on summer mornings to fish, do paper routes, play baseball, and any number of other things, and return home in time for dinner. Just a couple of kids enjoying summer.

As we got older some of those things occasionally got, shall we say, more mischievous. We were never malicious, but more than once there were "Oh *#>@!" moments when one of our "experiments" went awry. Blowing his family's trash burn basket to kingdom come as his mother walked through the front door with an arm full of groceries and a clear view through their picture window of the rather massive explosion comes to mind. Timing was not one of our talents.

High school saw some changes, most noticeably girls. He helped me through getting seriously trashed by a young lady. We played sports - him football and wrestling and me football and baseball. Our adventures continued in high school, now with cars and disconnected odometers (his) so that his parents wouldn't know how far we had driven, girls, a trip now and then to the ER, and assorted other activities which I will not mention to protect the guilty. His family moved during our junior year to a more upscale suburb some distance away, but we still hung out when schedules permitted.

Upon graduation, we went our separate ways - he to the U.S. Army and me to getting married and Hawaii. But within 2 years, we were on our way to visit he and his wife at the Defense Language School in Monterrey, CA and they to Salem for a July 4th celebration replete with bad Chinese food. Since then, we have not only stayed in touch by phone, but regularly traveled back and forth to refresh our friendship - Alaska, Oregon, Idaho. The toughest visits were going to Seattle and visiting him in the chemo unit at the UW Hospital tied to to 5 bags of multi-colored poison at a time. Tough times, but he's a tough guy and he has thankfully long since passed the 5-year cancer survivor mark.

Friendship is a good thing. So we'll continue on fishing, hunting, swapping stories about kids, complaining about politicians, recalling stories about our adventures back in the day, and generally doing the things that friends do. Just a couple of kids enjoying summer. Happy milestone, friend.

Remember

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." John 16:33

Not Now, Not Ever

“We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work.” A Republican senator in 2010? No, these are the words of FDR's Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau before the House Ways and Means Committee in 1939, 7 years after FDR took office, confessing the failure of Keynesian economics and the Roosevelt Administration's approach to solving the Great Depression. Indeed, it was only WW II that pulled the U.S. out of the doldrums. And it has not worked any better in 2009-2010.
www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=30331

To get an accurate look at the current performance of the American economy, let's turn to a British newspaper. www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/7871421/With-the-US-trapped-in-depression-this-really-is-starting-to-feel-like-1932.html Some statistics jump off the page at you: the U.S. workforce contracted by 652,000 jobs in June, one of the sharpest contractions ever; home sales down, retail sales down, factory orders dropped at their fastest rate since March 2009; the percentage of the working-age population shrank from 58.7% to 58.5%; 8 million jobs have been lost. (Joe Biden has said, incidentally, that we will never get those jobs back). Quoting Democratic economist and Clinton Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich:

"The economy is still in the gravitational pull of the Great Recession," said Robert Reich, former US labour secretary. "All the booster rockets for getting us beyond it are failing."

Wrong booster rockets!

The Democrats have spent $862 BILLION in stimulus (Keynesian) spending to get the economy moving and it hasn't worked because it is the private sector that creates wealth and it is tax and monetary policy that the private sector responds to. If businesses know that they are going to be able to keep more of their money over the long term, then they will spend to add equipment and employees. They simply will not take the risk, however, and then give the profits to the government in the form of taxes. Unfortunately, most of the Bush tax cuts are due to expire this year and taxes will head up much higher than they are today. Jobs, investment in plants and equipment? Hah! Strap in because this is going to be a rough, long and nasty recession because a majority of the powers that be are too ideologically invested to take the necessary steps to get us out of it.

Further Thoughts on Foreclosures

Thinking further about Oregon being #3 nationally for home foreclosures, it is of course related to jobs. I am betting, however, that another structural factor is in play in this ranking that either hasn't been analyzed or at least has not been publicized - Oregon's land use system.

As the picture shows, Oregon law since 1975 has required cities to adopt urban growth boundaries (UGB) and prohibit most urban development outside them for the purpose of preserving farm and timber lands. The problem when you do this is that it causes an artificial price bubble for the land within the UGB. Basic economics says that when there is a shortage of a desired good or service (in this case developable land), the price will go up. In Oregon's case, buildable land prices went up not just because people had money from full employment, but they also went even higher because of the restricted supply of land. Unfortunately, the higher prices go up, the farther they fall in bad times and, voila - Oregon gets hit with a double whammy.

Objective economic study would have to be done to validate my hypothesis, but studies already exist showing higher home prices in Oregon, particularly the Portland area, than in other similar parts of the country. There is no free lunch. At some point there is always a collision between politics and the real world of economics. I'm guessing we are looking at the wreck.

We're #3, We're #3

Alas, more evidence of the brilliance of our state economic policy - Oregon is #3 in the nation in home foreclosures. The headline of the article says the foreclosure rate fell, but then you read further and find it actually climbed 20%. The state economist ties it to lack of job growth. No! Really??!! You mean like the person I talked with in the last few weeks who moved his two manufacturing businesses to Nevada because of Measures 66-67? He only took 50-60 jobs with him, but how many others have done the same? Keep it up Oregon and pretty soon we'll have nothing but trees - and weeds, and rusting cars and buildings. A lot like say, Detroit - Michigan, that is.

www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2010/07/oregon_forclosure_rate_falls_2.html

In Honor of Independence Day

It's the 4th of July and time to consider the political and economic miracle wrought by our forefathers. Their political genius and the blood, sweat and tears of that and succeeding generations has created the most dynamic and free society the world has ever seen. Freedom is not free, though, and its continuation depends on the efforts of each succeeding generation and that is a cause for concern.

There is a war going on for the soul of this country. There is a large group of people who do not believe in inalienable rights that pre-exist the government, who do not believe in limited government, who do not believe in the basic decency and good sense of the American people. The war is political, cultural, religious and in every other aspect of American life. When you strip away all the camouflage, the want control - they want power, to run every aspect of our lives.

My concern is not that such people exist, for they have always existed in every society throughout history. No, my concern is that the rest of us have become lazy, too wrapped up in our lives to do anything about it. There is no "they" who are going to fight this battle for us. Our sons and daughters in the military can keep us safe from enemies abroad, but can they count on us to bestir ourselves to deal with those who would harm us domestically?

The Founding Fathers founded a republic that reserved to the people the right to change the course of government. If we the people, however, cannot be bothered to find quality candidates and then support them financially and by giving our time, then freedom will eventually die and frankly, we will deserve it. Every other American generation has had to sacrifice to preserve our freedom and it is now our term. With God's help, we will rise to the challenge. Heaven help us if we do not.

But All I Said Was ...

Words matter. They matter between people, they matter in legal affairs, and they especially matter between nations.

Victor Davis Hanson gives a brief review of how sometimes a very few words have meant the difference between war and peace. For example, Secretary of State Dean Acheson (Truman Administration) left South Korea out of a public review of U.S. defense policy and a few months later the North Koreans, supported by the Chinese, rolled across the border en masse triggering the Korean War. More recently, George Bush's (H.W.) ambassador to Iraq told Saddam in 1990 that the U.S. did not believe its interests were affected by his dispute with Kuwait. He invaded a week later.

The Obama Administration is gushing words in diplomatic circles like the broken Gulf oil well. I don't think there is a nation anywhere on earth that he hasn't apologized to for some imagined slight or "dastardly" act committed by the U.S. He is behaving like Neville Chamberlain on steroids and, if you remember the end of the story between Chamberlain and Hitler, the story did not end well. This one won't either. Words matter and some tyrant somewhere is going to be emboldened and pull the trigger. Real people are going to get real dead. Then we will see whether Obama realizes the error of his ways or if he thinks the U.S. really should act like Lichtenstein.

townhall.com/columnists/VictorDavisHanson/2010/07/01/even_a_few_words_matter