Historically Low Unemployment?

I keep hearing that the homeless issue is purely a drug problem.

There's not a single easy answer. But what we all need to keep in our minds is that homelessness, yes and drugs, are symptoms. We have a far larger set of problems that are the cause.

Our government boasts about historically low unemployment, but at the same time homeless camps and people reduced to sleeping on the streets or in their cars. That just doesn't jibe with low unemployment. The government calculates unemployment by definition, not by realithy. The definition refers to "People looking for work." Obviously this doesn't apply to the majority living on the street. It's pretty hard to look for work when you don't have an address, let alone a phone number. Or a place to take a shower. The official unemployment rate is nothing but smoke & mirrors.

There are many things that could end with a person, or family finding themselves without a home. When people feel like they've played by the rules, but due to health issues, or rising housing costs, or job loss, or just stagnant wages, they lose their place to live. When one is forced to live like this, and see no way back, they lose hope. When people have no hope, they turn to drugs or alcohol to get them through their miserable days. If I had to sleep on the street, I believe I'd try to medicate myself into painless stupor as well!

Far from trying to deal with the real issues, it seems to be easier to just lock them away. But that can't work as our jails are full to bursting already. If the cops issue a ticket for vagrancy or whatever the offense will be called, the offender will not be able to pay whatever fines, so warrants are issued. But that brings us back to the part where there's no place to warehouse them.

Without addressing the problems at the top, there will be more on the way.

Outsourcing & automation, not so much illegals, are taking people's jobs. As time goes on, more and more jobs will go this route. Even jobs that once seemed secure are no longer immune. Watched a presentation not long ago where a combination of robotry & 5G data would allow a surgeon to operate on a patient on the other side of the world. Autonomous vehicles will put truckers & other drivers out of work soon. Toss the mentally ill into the mix and explode the nightmare! Since Saint Ronnie shut down care for mental patients in the 80s we've decided that the police are the way to handle them. Back we go to the overcrowded jails.

So-called 'Conservatives' say we need to do something about mental illness rather than do anything about guns. They don't see the need for the infrastructure to care for other illnesses, but we're going to take care of people with a mental illness somehow. Like that isn't going to create a host of other issues, not least of which the inevitable legal challenges when someone feels they have been declared incompetent or the nightmare when someone is declared 'sane' and shoots up a kindergarten with his legal firearm!

Okay, rant over. Mine's the nice white jacket with the sleeves that buckle in the back. I'll just leave the soapbox over here in case someone else needs to use it. Perhaps for firewood.

How badly we are misled!

Recently found this chart which shows how badly we are focused on certain things to the detriment of things we really should be concerned about. The effect is significantly worse if one only follows one news source.

Life at Conception

If life begins at conception, are doctors creating a human soul when they perform in vitro fertilization? If so, then are fertilized eggs that are discarded human beings? If not, are embryos that get implanted and brought to term soulless after being born?

If the embryo is alive, yet it's not human, how could it's death by whatever means be considered a sin?

If a woman miscarries, should she be investigated for any possible complicity in the death? Perhaps by consuming alcohol or participating in strenuous exercise?

The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists estimates that over 80 percent of miscarriages occur in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, although they also say the numbers are likely considerably higher as many happen so early in the term that the woman was unaware that she was pregnant in the first place. So could a woman be held liable for the death of an embryo she was unaware that she was carrying?

Also,even though the nervous system is one of the first things to begin to form in an embryo, and at least in the case of the brain, continues well after birth, an embryo less than six weeks old has not yet begun to develop a brain, and by extension thoughts or feelings, how will it know if it goes to heaven or not? How can it even care? Even later, as the embryo at 13 weeks is less than the size of a pea pod, the brain would be about the size of a pea in that pod. What could it possibly be conscious of? It may show some reaction to stimuli, but then so will an earthworm. Does this indicate conscious life? Or the existence of a soul?

Whoever is promulgating this lunacy really appears to have not thought it through. But then, this whole discussion is meant to sway emotion, and not rational thought.

As a favorite YouTuber, Alan Melikdjanian AKA Captain Disillusion says: "Love with your heart, for everything else use your brain!"

Twofer

Two topics in one today: So called "Clean Coal" & our Corporate Media. First off let me direct you to this article over at Media Matters.

Should you not care to read it, in brief it talks about yet another toxic coal ash spill in North Carolina. It is an example yet again of the callous disregard on the part of the coal industry for the environment and human health. Another example (as if we need it) of the poisoning of the environment caused not just by big coal, but by the production and use of fossil fuels in general.

The more important take away from this, however, is the complete lack of coverage, or even mention of this environmental tragedy in our network news broadcasts. They are content to keep us distracted with the crisis in the Ukraine, the pretty videos and heart-wrenching tales of triumph and defeat from the Olympics, and I see they have managed after all these years to capture "El Chapo." 

"panem et circenses"

Oh, noes. Not again!

Matt Taibbi, about whom I've written previously, has written a new piece about Corporate America's ongoing rape of the country. In 2004, the Bush government gave a tax holiday to major corporations to allow them to "repatriate" their offshore earnings as they are supposedly only subject to tax when they bring them back into the country. The deal that the lobbyists sold was that these huge sums of money, once put back into the American economy would be used to create jobs etc. etc.

Only, as we have seen, it didn't. The money was paid out in insane bonuses to top executives and shareholders, or invested in the Wall Street bubble in full steam at the time.

Now they are making noises about doing it again as part of the debt reduction package circulating the Hill as we speak. For the same reason as before, too. The businesses, suddenly flush with all that cash, will immediately begin building factories and office towers and solve the job crisis!

What could possibly go wrong?

Doing the same thing again and again expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.

Make some noise. Write or call your Congress-critter and tell them we need jobs, not more Corporate Wealthfare!

Read the whole article here:

Corporate Tax Holiday in Debt Ceiling Deal: Where's the Uproar?

WTF?

So, I am asked: "Why are you spending all this time blogging"?

That gave me pause. I mean, as of this writing, I have exactly one follower, who happens to be a buddy of ours and that's pretty much it. (Hi Billy, if you are indeed still watching this).

Well, here it goes:

We are always told that we're not supposed to discuss "religion & politics" with your friends or relations.

Usually, that's damn good advice. Anybody that has been at a say, a Thanksgiving dinner, that was ruined by that obnoxious Uncle Ray who pissed everyone off by refusing to shut up about subject or person X.

Yeah, yeah, been there, done that, and wanted to smother Unca Ray with the cranberry sauce. So what has this got to do with this blog?

Very simply; I like having a forum in which I can say what I really feel without fear of repercussion. It's not that I am a coward, just a realist. Right now, it's not event important that anybody else even reads these posts. It's just great that I can get this shit off my chest and kinda think out loud.

I need to keep my job, I have no other income. Also, and we'll discuss this in subsequent posts, I need to keep my employer-provided health insurance. Bottom line, unless I become a famous and wealthy writer, I need to watch what I do. (See posts about free press). Not looking for pity, just understanding.

Here is a place that I can bloviate about the current state of affairs without fear of repercussion. There are some that know my identity, and as time passes, I'm sure that more will know. Suffice to say, I am not some famous,  infamous, or even unknown individual trying to hide behind the intarwebs. I'm just a working guy that can't afford to jeopardize his job, so, for the time being anyway, I will try to maintain some small effort at anonymity.

And hopefully, say some of the things that would cause Unca Ray to cut off our inheritance.(as if there was any;-)) Also, because masochism runs deep in my family, I have left the comments on in this blog. I truly welcome your thoughts an suggestions. I welcome reasonable and polite arguments that contradict my own opinions. I will not tolerate flaming, trolling, spam, or outright BS however.

Let's get to know each other. I started. You all chime in!

Griftopia

I just finished reading the well-researched, often profane, and supremely eye-popping book from Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi which he calls "Griftopia".

Wow. Just...wow.

A lot of this book is about stuff that we may have already heard rumors and half-baked reports about. What Taibbi has done is to pull together all those rumors and facts and weeded through them for their underlying morsels of truth. He has taken research and reporting and woven a fact driven account of the intentional and ruthless ripping off of this country over the last twenty to thirty years.

So why should you read this book? I dunno, if you wonder at all about how we got to the crash of '08, or why gas prices keep balooning, even though there is no shortage of supply. What is "speculation" and why is it suddenly responsible for gas price increases? How do "Hedge funds" work and why all of a sudden do they earn so much freaking money? What is this dismantling of the regulatory environment that we keep hearing about, and exactly who is behind it? Sounds mind-numbingly financial and, well, boring doesn't it?

It's not. In fact it's a riveting read. Taibbi manages to get the interviews, pull together the documentation, and interpret the results in a manner that's as easy to read as, well, Rolling Stone. And yet, damn, I can't help but wonder how it is that a reporter for a fan-mag ends up writing about some of the biggest financial and political frauds in the history of the country.

Simple. Taibbi was assigned to follow the '08 election campaigns for the paper. In doing so, he heard and saw things that surprised him and piqued his curiosity as a reporter. Stuff that other, more mainstream colleagues knew, and in some cases, joked about. He decided to investigate further, and Rolling Stone encouraged him in doing so. None of the big outlets that we depend on for our news would dare touch it. They depend on the perpetrators either directly or indirectly for their revenue. Rolling Stone suffers from no such constraints. Again, our much vaunted Fourth Estate has abandoned it's mission of reigning in the more egregious violators in our government and industry.

The truly gut wrenching part of the whole picture is that all Americans should be screaming bloody murder about the crimes that have been, and are still being committed. Our courts should be fully occupied with bringing the people that wrecked the world's economy to justice and returning the stolen trillions(yes, that's trillions!) to the victims. Instead, not only have the criminals been given a free pass and a bailout, but they are still doing the same legalized roulette at the expense of taxpayers. Then they are given tax breaks for doing so.

Pick up a copy of Griftopia. Or go down to your local Library(remember what those are?) and check it out. It's a great read. In fact, it should be required reading for high school kids.

Oh, and here's a link to Taibbi's blog

I'm getting nervous

There I was, putzing along down the cyber highway, and I happened to pass by Glenn Beck's "The Blaze." I stopped in to see what's going on with the Tighty Righties these days and oh, boy. The stuff ya see over there makes a fella wonder who's living next to ya.

I know that the comments on left wing sites aren't always peaches and cream, but some of the comments on Beck's site really raised my hackles. The articles themselves are about what you'd expect, but the commenters really can be spooky. Here's a few below the break (emphases mine):

Required Viewing

This video ought to be shown to every climate change denier. Maybe it would penetrate their thick skulls...Nah.

I don't get it

Even after all the evidence, Climate change deniers are still convinced that there's some conspiracy to either:

a) take away 'Our Freedoms" (this deserves its own post)
and/or
2) make climate scientists/Al Gore rich

I mean WTF? All these scientists busily conspiring on this massive scale to con the world so they can be wealthy? Yeah, right. That's just absurd. And Al Gore is already rich. Sure, wealthy folks can be counted on to try to get more wealthy, but this?

As we (and everyone else) are talking about Weiners

This post from Salon.com really nails it.

"I don't know, call me old-fashioned or crazy or both -- an irrelevant congressman's bizarre behavior in a silly 140-character-limited medium strikes me as a tad less offensive and less worthy of media focus than at number of other less-covered stories that broke at the same time as the Weiner Scandal. I think these 10 stories from this week are far more offensive -- and involve what should be considered more egregious infractions -- than Anthony Weiner's half-naked sexts."

Read more At Salon

Weiner, Wiener

The national media, having nothing else to report, has for days now focused the country's attention on Anthony Weiner's wiener. While I do think that Weiner was an idiot of the first magnitude for what he did, and for lying about a supposed 'hacker', this is a bit much.

We have huge problems with our deficit, with the perpetual gridlock in Congress, with the massive fraud perpetuated by Wall Street, the corporate takeover of government, two and a half wars, etc, etc. I could go on and on. 

But that's not my job.

That is the job of the media. The fourth estate. Guaranteed by the Constitution to protect the citizenry against the malfeasance of the ruling classes. Unfortunately, they are now as much of the problem as the solution. The type of reporting that goes on in most of the media used to be the purview of supermarket tabloids. Thanks to unbounded, and largely unregulated capitalism, most of the media is, if not owned by, at least influenced by the very corporations that they need to be reporting on.

When Con Agra or Monsanto buys a vote in Congress, if it is reported at all, the reporting is a watered down version of the facts. The Nightly News is going to be careful not to bite the hand that feeds them when they depend for their existence on ads for Cheerios and Toaster Strudel.

I don't know the answer to this one. I'd like to say break up the mega-corporations to reduce their influence, but I know that's unrealistic. I wish I could encourage others to seek out alternate news sources, like the BBC and Al Jazeera, or get on the internet and check out the news aggregators like Huff-Po, Salon, yes even Drudge or National Review. But that won't happen either. Even those that do check out unconventional news sources tend to go to the one that fits their wordview and exclude those that don't.