Climate Science

Whether you believe in "Global warming" or "Climate change" or "Manmade environmental swings brought about by our technological advancedments" (I just made that one up) or not, it shouldn't even be a "political" issue. Slapping a partisan label on it just detracts from the very real questions humanity must face, including "How should we treat the Earth?"

Climate Scientists
 - Katharine Hayhoe

 - Danny Harvey

Are we going Socialist?

A friend of mine shared this graph with me. It has lots of cool circles and proof. You be the judge:

Obama the Socialist

For the full story click here.


Since the election season started heating up last year, one of the biggest cries against Obama by many is that he is a Socialist. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Anne Coulter, Glenn Beck. The list goes on. McCain, during an interview, said that he didn't believe Obama was a Socialist. Of course, McCain isn't exactly the most Conservative of Right Wing politicians, and far from the farthest Right of the Republicans, but surely his words should have attracted some sort of dissuasion regarding Obama's Socialist Credentials?

Not necessary. One of the first rules of propaganda is that the more you repeat something, the more people will believe it is true. So let's take a quick look at Obama's policies so far and see how they stack up against Socialism.

First, a definition:
From wikipedia:
Socialism refers to any one of various economic theories of economic organization advocating state or cooperative ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and a society characterized by equal opportunities/means for all individuals with a more egalitarian method of compensation based on the full product of the laborer.

From dictionary.com:
–noun

1.	a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole.

2.	procedure or practice in accordance with this theory.

3.	(in Marxist theory) the stage following capitalism in the transition of a society to communism, characterized by the imperfect implementation of collectivist principles.

Now to the topic.

This is taken from an article by the editor of The Socialist magazine, Billy Wharton.
The funny thing is, of course, that socialists know that Barack Obama is not one of us. Not only is he not a socialist, he may in fact not even be a liberal. Socialists understand him more as a hedge-fund Democrat -- one of a generation of neoliberal politicians firmly committed to free-market policies.

Even more interesting, "Nationalization is simply not in the playbook of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and his team." Why would/wouldn't it be? Timothy Geithner is from the Federal Reserve (which is a topic of debate in and of itself). The Federal Reserve is a corporation that is heavily influenced by the Government but is still separate from the Government. While it is a great thing to believe that where a player comes from won't influence the new role they might have, that is somewhat naive. So what would the Fed and their cohorts gain from a socialist system? Nothing. Their main interest is money - maintaining money and wealth so they can maintain control.

Although, the Fed has been accused of being a socialist organization last year during the Bear Stearns crisis, it doesn't seem likely that the charge is serious or will stick.

So what exactly has Barack Obama been up to since taking office? Here is a brief list of actions taken:

Executive Orders
13489 - Revert Bush Presidential Secrets E.O. to the Reagan version
13491, 13492, 13493 - Reviewing detention policies, torture, and Gitmo.
Others include reviewing Faith Based Initiatives E.O. from Bush, Protecting the Chesapeake Bay, and removing limits on Federal Funding of certain types of Stem Stell Research. Click on "Executive Orders" at the top of this section for a full list of his E.O.s to date.

The Auto Industry
Great article from the Wall Street Journal about how Obama has given a lot of authority to a handful of ex-Wall Street chums the powers to handle the GM bankruptcy.

"A congressional abdication of authority of historic proportions has left the executive branch with nearly complete discretion over how to handle GM and Chrysler's restructuring. President Barack Obama has further delegated authority, giving effective control to this task force, which operates under the titular authority of a top-level interagency group headed by National Economic Council Director Larry Summers and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner."

Larry Summers looked to Milton Friedman for views on the Economy, and Summers wrote that while Friedman made real contributions to monetary policy, his real contribution was "in convincing people of the importance of allowing free markets to operate."

Hardly a group of Socialists at the helm of the whole crisis.

Health Care
From the previous article by Billy Wharton (Socialist Magazine)
"By mandating that every person be insured, ObamaCare would give private health insurance companies license to systematically underinsure policyholders while cashing in on the moral currency of universal coverage. If Obama is a socialist, then on health care, he's doing a fairly good job of concealing it. "

Further Thoughts

While there has been Government interference in recent events in the economic center, Obama is far from advocating government takeover of the economic system. Means of production are remaining firmly in private control, with perhaps some more government meddling. And you only need look at the actual individuals running these policies to see that Socialism isn't anywhere on their agenda- these are money men who believe in the Capitalistic society we have.

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation - Bad Investments?

Full story here

Turns out the Federal agency/corporation that insures 44 million American pensions made some bad choices in handling their portfolio last year.

"WASHINGTON - Just months before the start of last year's stock market collapse, the federal agency that insures the retirement funds of 44 million Americans departed from its conservative investment strategy and decided to put much of its $64 billion insurance fund into stocks.

Switching from a heavy reliance on bonds, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation decided to pour billions of dollars into speculative investments such as stocks in emerging foreign markets, real estate, and private equity funds.

The agency refused to say how much of the new investment strategy has been implemented or how the fund has fared during the downturn. The agency would only say that its fund was down 6.5 percent - and all of its stock-related investments were down 23 percent - as of last Sept. 30, the end of its fiscal year. But that was before most of the recent stock market decline and just before the investment switch was scheduled to begin in earnest."

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) is responsible for making pension payments should the pension fund that an eligible person receives default. If there isn't enough money, they won't be able to make the payouts.

Press Release from the PBGC regarding the investment strategy which was voted on on Feb 12, 2008, under the new Republican Director Charles E.F. Millard.
http://www.pbgc.gov/docs/bna-investment-policy-summary.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_E.F._Millard
Director Millard was formerly a managing Director at Lehman Brothers and was part of Giuliani's cabinet.

An overview of PBGC:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pension_Benefit_Guaranty_Corporation

The PBGC is a corporation that has as it's board of Directors the Secretarys of Labor, Commerce and Treasury. That would make the people who voted on the investment strategy Elaine Chao, Carlos Gutierrez, and everyone's favorite Hank Paulson.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elaine_Chao
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Gutierrez
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Paulson

So does this bear further investigation? Most likely. Will it be exposed? Probably not.

Historical Figure for the day - 3/27/2009 - Miyamoto Musashi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miyamoto_Musashi

The Book of Five Rings is probably the 2nd most well known Asian literature relating to war and battle, the first being The Art of War by Sun Tzu over 2200 years ago. BoFR (Book of Five Rings) was written in around 1645. Miyamoto's life is somewhat of an enigma. One of the most well known facts is that he spent his life dueling, quite successfully. A fascinating film called "Miyamoto Musashi" was released in 1954 - this movie portrayed him as a young and wild, undisciplined man who eventually grows into the master that history remembers him as.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Five_Rings
The Book of Five Rings is a treatise on not just the art of battle and swordsmanship, but of the other arts that complete a man - poetry, calligraphy, religion and music. A complete warrior is complete in his life as well as his grasp of the martial arts. Regardless of the reality of the man Miyamoto, the Book is definitely a must read for any philosopher or wanna-be Samurai. Good insightful thinking.



Further study:
Miyamoto Musashi (1954)


Buy a copy of The Book of Five Rings:

Historical Figure for the day - 3/26/2009 - James Forrestal

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Forrestal

Forrestal got his start in the military in the Navy, and ended up as a navial aviator. He later entered the political arena and ended up as the Secretary of the Navy, and in 1947 became the 1st Secretary of Defense under Truman.


"During private cabinet meetings with President Truman in 1946 and 1947, Forrestal had argued against partition of Palestine on the grounds it would infuriate Arab countries who supplied oil needed for the U.S. economy and national defense. Instead, Forrestal favored a federalization plan for Palestine. Outside the White House, response to Truman's continued silence on the issue was immediate. President Truman received threats to cut off campaign contributions from wealthy donors, as well as hate mail, including a letter accusing him of "preferring fascist and Arab elements to the democracy-loving Jewish people of Palestine."[5] Appalled by the intensity and implied threats over the partition question, Forrestal appealed to Truman in two separate cabinet meetings not to base his decision on partition, whatever the outcome, on the basis of political pressure.[6] In his only known public comment on the issue, Forrestal stated to J. Howard McGrath, Senator from Rhode Island:

"...no group in this country should be permitted to influence our policy to the point it could endanger our national security."

Forrestal was responsible for some racial integration in the Navy. He also had an aircraft carrier class named after him ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Forrestal_(CV-59) ).

Historical Figure for the day - 3/25/2009 - Charles Guiteau

There have been 4 Presidents of the USA assassinated in office - Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, William McKinley, and John F. Kennedy. There have been numerous other attempts, but these 4 were the only successes. Two of the assassins are quite famous, John Wilkes Booth (Lincoln) and Lee Harvey Oswald (JFK). The other two, like the presidents they assassinated, are more obscure references.

Charles Guiteau is one of the obscure assassins, and in some ways he is considered to not be the actual assassin - he just shot the President. The doctors who tended to Garfield were clumsy, and did horrible work at trying to help the shot President. Guiteau himself said "The doctors killed Garfield, I just shot him".

Guiteau was an unstable sort from Illinois, although he had a lot of exposure to a religious sect in Oneida, NY through his father's involvement. The instability led him to over imagine his own sense of importance, and believed that some political work he had done had helped win Garfield the election in 1880. When Guiteau was turned down for a cabinet post or an ambassadorship, his instability led him to shoot Garfield in revenge.

Garfield was shot on July 2, 1881 but did not die until September 19th of that year. Guiteau was tried and found guilty, and was hung on June 30, 1882.