The uproar over the demise of the maker of Twinkies rather bemuses me, as I’m not sure why the welfare of our economy is so dependent on our ability to manufacture Twinkies. I guess it’s symbolic; the demise of a company that has been such a staple of the landscape for so long. Except that it hasn’t. The Hostess brand has only been around since 2004. If Interstate Bakeries was so critical to our financial infrastructure they would not have gone bankrupt and changed their name.
Some people are blaming the labor unions for this tragedy (?), some are blaming management, and yet others are blaming both. I’m going to go out on a limb, blame neither and say that dinosaurs naturally become extinct.
It is claimed that the company should have diversified its products when the existing product line began losing ground. I’m not sure of that. When you make Twinkies, how do you credibly introduce a healthy snack? It’s not going to fly and you’re just going to magnify your losses.
Rule of business: do what you do. Companies that drill oil wells generally don’t succeed when they decide to open up a chain of hair salons. Women don’t want to get their hair done by oil drillers, and hair salons stocked with drilling mud don’t draw well. Hostess did what it does until the need for what it does diminished to the vanishing point. So be it. They knew when it was time to quit.
Maybe the union should have made “just one more concession” to keep their jobs a little longer; times are tough and jobs are hard to get. But there comes a time to stand up on your hind legs and say that enough is enough. I cannot disrespect that.
I’m a union guy anyway. I’ve stood at the gates of a steel plant with an axe handle in my hand, staring down the West Allis Police Department. I’m not going to be very critical of a labor union saying that it will not accept yet more pay cuts.
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Technology Today
In the Google News technology section today the headlines all had to do with iPhones, Facebook and iPads. That’s what matters in American technology today. Meanwhile in China, a company is preparing to build the world’s tallest building, 220 stories high, and to do so in a mere 90 days. They recently completed a 30 story building, complete, in fifteen days.
Now that is technology that matters.
Now that is technology that matters.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Et Tu Brute?
The only thing worse than having the media condemn an organization is having the media ignore it. The San Diego Chargers have finally reached that nadir of ignominy. The local CBS television affiliate showed NFL highlights on the sports segment of its news last night and never mentioned the Chargers, and the Union-Tribune this morning had only one article about them, mocking the players who continue to assert that the team is still mathematically in the running to make the playoffs.
ESPN introduced discussion of the Chargers-Broncos game by saying that, “We come to bury the Chargers, not to praise them,” and at one point said of our quarterback that, “Philip Rivers is to turnovers as an ATM is to cash. He dispenses them.” Yikes.
ESPN introduced discussion of the Chargers-Broncos game by saying that, “We come to bury the Chargers, not to praise them,” and at one point said of our quarterback that, “Philip Rivers is to turnovers as an ATM is to cash. He dispenses them.” Yikes.
Paul Krugman Is An Idiot
Oh no, Paul Krugman is at it again. In a blog post yesterday he repeats his claim that America’s post-war economic boom had nothing to do with the fact that the rest of the world was lying in ruins and that we were the only nation remaining which had production facilities which were not rubble.
His first argument for debunking that claim is that the boom was “whole generation long, from 1947 to 1973,” and we all know that rebuilding Europe only took a couple of weeks. Actually, we don’t all know that; only Paul Krugman thinks that. His span there was a whole 26 years, and fully rebuilding all of Europe in terms of manufacturing and economic strength took considerably longer than 26 years.
“The Europe-in-ruins era,” he says, “was long over while the US boom was still going strong.” Hardly true, but even if it was, that does not rule out that rebuilding Europe was what got our economic boom started.
Then he goes on to say that his argument is irrelevant anyway (which makes me wonder why he made it, then) and introduces an even more ridiculous one, saying that while, “our competitors were in ruins for a while; so were our customers,” and that therefore, “we had nobody to trade with.”
Because everybody knows that when you destroy a country’s buildings and bridges, you also destroy its monetary wealth and its natural resources as well. Actually, everyone doesn’t know that, because you don’t. Only Paul Krugman thinks that, because the country he lives in has no monetary wealth. In America if you destroy a bank you destroy the “wealth" that was in it because that wealth was nothing other than numbers in a computer. The money in the banks in Europe that we bombed into rubble was largely gold, silver and other forms of real money.
Of course we had trading partners, you silly ass. They rebuilt, did they not? What did they use for rebuilding, each other’s rubble? They rebuilt with what they bought from us, and the return trade was natural resources and raw materials.
He then argues that in the post-war years we did “very little trading” and produces a chart of exports and imports, as usual not showing real numbers but illustrating them as a percentage of GDP. Whenever an economist wants to obfuscate, he throws numbers at you as a percentage of GDP rather than using real numbers.
That cancer tumor in your brain is nothing to worry about because “it’s only 2% as large as your brain” will make a patient feel much less worried than telling him that the thing is the size of a golf ball. That’s what economists do with our deficit; the idea that it’s 8.6% of GDP is easier to swallow than knowing that it’s $1.3 trillion, or that it’s 43% of the federal budget.
I am always suspicious of overkill, such as when someone makes multiple arguments to refute one point, especially when, as Krugman does here, you toss in a few gratuitous insults at people who don't agree with you. If you know that you are right and the other person is wrong, you only need to make one argument to prove it.
His first argument for debunking that claim is that the boom was “whole generation long, from 1947 to 1973,” and we all know that rebuilding Europe only took a couple of weeks. Actually, we don’t all know that; only Paul Krugman thinks that. His span there was a whole 26 years, and fully rebuilding all of Europe in terms of manufacturing and economic strength took considerably longer than 26 years.
“The Europe-in-ruins era,” he says, “was long over while the US boom was still going strong.” Hardly true, but even if it was, that does not rule out that rebuilding Europe was what got our economic boom started.
Then he goes on to say that his argument is irrelevant anyway (which makes me wonder why he made it, then) and introduces an even more ridiculous one, saying that while, “our competitors were in ruins for a while; so were our customers,” and that therefore, “we had nobody to trade with.”
Because everybody knows that when you destroy a country’s buildings and bridges, you also destroy its monetary wealth and its natural resources as well. Actually, everyone doesn’t know that, because you don’t. Only Paul Krugman thinks that, because the country he lives in has no monetary wealth. In America if you destroy a bank you destroy the “wealth" that was in it because that wealth was nothing other than numbers in a computer. The money in the banks in Europe that we bombed into rubble was largely gold, silver and other forms of real money.
Of course we had trading partners, you silly ass. They rebuilt, did they not? What did they use for rebuilding, each other’s rubble? They rebuilt with what they bought from us, and the return trade was natural resources and raw materials.
He then argues that in the post-war years we did “very little trading” and produces a chart of exports and imports, as usual not showing real numbers but illustrating them as a percentage of GDP. Whenever an economist wants to obfuscate, he throws numbers at you as a percentage of GDP rather than using real numbers.
That cancer tumor in your brain is nothing to worry about because “it’s only 2% as large as your brain” will make a patient feel much less worried than telling him that the thing is the size of a golf ball. That’s what economists do with our deficit; the idea that it’s 8.6% of GDP is easier to swallow than knowing that it’s $1.3 trillion, or that it’s 43% of the federal budget.
I am always suspicious of overkill, such as when someone makes multiple arguments to refute one point, especially when, as Krugman does here, you toss in a few gratuitous insults at people who don't agree with you. If you know that you are right and the other person is wrong, you only need to make one argument to prove it.
Friday, November 16, 2012
Symbolic Line In The Sand
President Obama has drawn a line in the sand over “taxing the rich.” He has drawn this line because, according to him, “we cannot afford” the tax cuts for the rich and because “it is only fair that people like me,” he says, “who can easily afford it, should pay a little more” in order to reduce the deficit.
This is absolutely thrilling his supporters almost to the point of orgasm, not because anything will actually have been accomplished, as I will proceed to illustrate, but merely because he will have scored a point over Republicans and the evil rich. Accomplishing anything is irrelevant in today’s politics; scoring symbolic points is everything.
This magnificent victory that Obama is purportedly going to win over Republicans and the evil rich will, according to the Congressional Budget Office, net $823 billion dollars in ten years, which will reduce the $1.3 trillion deficit by almost two thirds. Oh, wait. I forgot that we cite the deficit in one year numbers and modifications to the deficit in ten year numbers so that taxpayers will think that we are making changes that are actually significant. So this thunder and lightening and the line in the sand is over $82.3 billion per year, which will reduce the deficit by 6.3% in the coming year. Well now, isn’t that one hell of a victory!
That’s assuming that he actually scores the victory. Notice that the line is in the sand, not jackhammered into concrete. Obama only draws lines in sand, where they can easily be erased.
This $82.3 billion tax cut that we cannot afford is exceeded by the Obama payroll tax cut which amounts to $100 billion per year according to the Trustees Report of the Social Security Administration, which does report in one year increments. How is it that we can afford $100 billion per year in Obama tax cus, when we cannot afford $82.3 billion per year in Bush tax cuts which were there first?
Obama claims adamantly that this is not “taking from the rich to give to the poor.” I would possibly have no real objection if it was that; if he admitted to it and if it was indeed to the poor. But he does not admit it and it is to the middle class, not to the poor. The poor never enter into any political discussion these days, and certainly not into this one. Obama, who used to work for the poor, doesn’t even seem to know that they exist today.
Instead, we get this bogus argument about how “we can’t afford” one tax cut, and he replaces it with another tax cut, a larger one, which he claims is essential and omits entirely from the affordability discussion. Needless to say, his supporters are entirely on board with that.
The shift in taxes may actually be the best policy, but the method is dishonest and, worse, stupid. What should be done, if this is actually the needs of the nation, is the introduction of a comprehensive new tax policy, as has been done by previous presidents of both parties. Obama is trying to obtain a new car by changing one part at a time on his old car.
Policy is what leadership is all about, and Obama is still doesn’t get that. He is endlessly tinkering with details and never provides an overriding policy that tells us where he wants this nation to go. After four years in office, he is still looking for a parade to form so that he can get in front of it and call himself a leader.
This is absolutely thrilling his supporters almost to the point of orgasm, not because anything will actually have been accomplished, as I will proceed to illustrate, but merely because he will have scored a point over Republicans and the evil rich. Accomplishing anything is irrelevant in today’s politics; scoring symbolic points is everything.
This magnificent victory that Obama is purportedly going to win over Republicans and the evil rich will, according to the Congressional Budget Office, net $823 billion dollars in ten years, which will reduce the $1.3 trillion deficit by almost two thirds. Oh, wait. I forgot that we cite the deficit in one year numbers and modifications to the deficit in ten year numbers so that taxpayers will think that we are making changes that are actually significant. So this thunder and lightening and the line in the sand is over $82.3 billion per year, which will reduce the deficit by 6.3% in the coming year. Well now, isn’t that one hell of a victory!
That’s assuming that he actually scores the victory. Notice that the line is in the sand, not jackhammered into concrete. Obama only draws lines in sand, where they can easily be erased.
This $82.3 billion tax cut that we cannot afford is exceeded by the Obama payroll tax cut which amounts to $100 billion per year according to the Trustees Report of the Social Security Administration, which does report in one year increments. How is it that we can afford $100 billion per year in Obama tax cus, when we cannot afford $82.3 billion per year in Bush tax cuts which were there first?
Obama claims adamantly that this is not “taking from the rich to give to the poor.” I would possibly have no real objection if it was that; if he admitted to it and if it was indeed to the poor. But he does not admit it and it is to the middle class, not to the poor. The poor never enter into any political discussion these days, and certainly not into this one. Obama, who used to work for the poor, doesn’t even seem to know that they exist today.
Instead, we get this bogus argument about how “we can’t afford” one tax cut, and he replaces it with another tax cut, a larger one, which he claims is essential and omits entirely from the affordability discussion. Needless to say, his supporters are entirely on board with that.
The shift in taxes may actually be the best policy, but the method is dishonest and, worse, stupid. What should be done, if this is actually the needs of the nation, is the introduction of a comprehensive new tax policy, as has been done by previous presidents of both parties. Obama is trying to obtain a new car by changing one part at a time on his old car.
Policy is what leadership is all about, and Obama is still doesn’t get that. He is endlessly tinkering with details and never provides an overriding policy that tells us where he wants this nation to go. After four years in office, he is still looking for a parade to form so that he can get in front of it and call himself a leader.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
Wherein I Engage The Drivel
I have not been writing much because the drivel which is in the news and which is being discussed today is for the most part supremely uninteresting. Jobs was in the discussion so long as Obama was campaigning for reelection, but once that was decided he is right back to deficit reduction and doing so by stepping over dollars to pick up dimes.
He is, for instance, totally unwilling to make any meaningful reductions to the massively overfunded “national security” feeding trough, but is adamant on making “those who can afford it pay a little more” to cut the deficit by a whopping 8% this year. As is the favorite ploy by both sides these days, he cites everything in ten year figures to make them sound like meaningful numbers, even though we only budget for one year at a time when we budget at all, which we have not done since the Democrats assumed control of Congress.
Obama only submitted one budget to Congress, a budget which not even Democrats would vote for and which was rejected by a Democratically controlled Senate 99-0. To avoid similar embarrassment, he has never submitted a budget since, and the only tax policy he has proposed is to extend the “Bush tax cuts” minus one bracket. That, after extending them
in their entirety for two years to assure his reelection.
Of course it could be worse. We could have elected McCain four years ago, who was so busy attacking Obama over the Benghazi affair and demanding a “Watergate style” investigation into it that he forgot to attend his own Senate committee hearing on the, um, Benghazi affair. The man may be just a bit past his prime.
There is, however, a question in my mind that Obama even has a prime.
Correction: Requiring “those who can afford it," that is to say "people like me" (Obama), to "pay a little more” will actually cut the deficit only by a whopping 3% in the coming year. Three. Precent. With him taking stands like this, I no longer have any question; he has no prime.
He is, for instance, totally unwilling to make any meaningful reductions to the massively overfunded “national security” feeding trough, but is adamant on making “those who can afford it pay a little more” to cut the deficit by a whopping 8% this year. As is the favorite ploy by both sides these days, he cites everything in ten year figures to make them sound like meaningful numbers, even though we only budget for one year at a time when we budget at all, which we have not done since the Democrats assumed control of Congress.
Obama only submitted one budget to Congress, a budget which not even Democrats would vote for and which was rejected by a Democratically controlled Senate 99-0. To avoid similar embarrassment, he has never submitted a budget since, and the only tax policy he has proposed is to extend the “Bush tax cuts” minus one bracket. That, after extending them
in their entirety for two years to assure his reelection.
Of course it could be worse. We could have elected McCain four years ago, who was so busy attacking Obama over the Benghazi affair and demanding a “Watergate style” investigation into it that he forgot to attend his own Senate committee hearing on the, um, Benghazi affair. The man may be just a bit past his prime.
There is, however, a question in my mind that Obama even has a prime.
Correction: Requiring “those who can afford it," that is to say "people like me" (Obama), to "pay a little more” will actually cut the deficit only by a whopping 3% in the coming year. Three. Precent. With him taking stands like this, I no longer have any question; he has no prime.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
CBS is Today's Idiot
CBS Evening News had a real knee slapper on the “fiscal cliff” last night, which they explained thusly: “The government needed to borrow money to pay its debts, and the Republican Congress gave permission, but it came with a price tag; a $1 trillion spending cut and the expiration of the Bush tax cuts at the first of the coming year.”
There are so many things wrong with that statement that it’s hard to decide where to start. Let’s start with pointing out that “the government” that needed to borrow money and Congress that “gave permission” are not two separate entities as the statement implies, they are the same thing.
The spending cap deal did not cause the ending of the Bush tax cuts, they were already scheduled to end two years ago, and the deal actually extended them for two years, which was a self serving move by everybody involved to put off dealing with them until after the election.
CBS is apparently unaware that the Democrats have had control of the Senate since 2006, and still do have control of it, so it was not then and is not now a “Republican Congress.” In any case, it was not Congress that imposed the spending cap deal, it was a deal negotiated between Congress and the White House and was agreed to by the President before either house of Congress passed it.
Not to mention that the government needed to borrow that money because of spending mandated by Congress, so the whole argument about borrowing is a bit insane. Congress passes bills authorizing programs that cost money, does not provide income with which to execute those programs, and then tries to deny permission to borrow the money, apparently expecting the programs which it created and approved to be executed with money pulled out of someone’s backside.
So, in slanting the story to make Republicans look bad and the current administration look good, CBS managed merely to make itself look idiotic. Almost as idiotic as the anchor grandstanding in the middle of a storm and managing only in getting himself eliminated from the program when the power failed.
There are so many things wrong with that statement that it’s hard to decide where to start. Let’s start with pointing out that “the government” that needed to borrow money and Congress that “gave permission” are not two separate entities as the statement implies, they are the same thing.
The spending cap deal did not cause the ending of the Bush tax cuts, they were already scheduled to end two years ago, and the deal actually extended them for two years, which was a self serving move by everybody involved to put off dealing with them until after the election.
CBS is apparently unaware that the Democrats have had control of the Senate since 2006, and still do have control of it, so it was not then and is not now a “Republican Congress.” In any case, it was not Congress that imposed the spending cap deal, it was a deal negotiated between Congress and the White House and was agreed to by the President before either house of Congress passed it.
Not to mention that the government needed to borrow that money because of spending mandated by Congress, so the whole argument about borrowing is a bit insane. Congress passes bills authorizing programs that cost money, does not provide income with which to execute those programs, and then tries to deny permission to borrow the money, apparently expecting the programs which it created and approved to be executed with money pulled out of someone’s backside.
So, in slanting the story to make Republicans look bad and the current administration look good, CBS managed merely to make itself look idiotic. Almost as idiotic as the anchor grandstanding in the middle of a storm and managing only in getting himself eliminated from the program when the power failed.
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