Just Call Me Diogenes

I caught President Obama's Inaugural Address on television while having lunch in Eleanor Rigby's Pub in Mineola, New York. This wonderful little enclave of Beatles memorabilia is always a fun spot, and is located near the court house where I sometimes ply my trade. I ate a sandwich fittingly called "Good Day Sunshine."

President Obama delivered his speech with his usual rock star cadence, with his now familiar baritone which sort of reminds me of Chuck D's intonations on the more successful and riveting Public Enemy tracks. And it was easy to be swept in the moment of pageantry, pomp, circumstance, and the glowing admiration of media commentators who were happy they backed the right horse, and that the American people agreed. At least we didn't have any discussions of the President's basketball prowess or the selection of the First Family pooch.

It was difficult to catch the nuances of policy presented in the speech over the noise, and people who thought themselves clever while making remarks like "I think it is great that we elected someone with the same middle name as our enemy," followed with the equally observant " and "his name sounds like Osama's too." Of course, it is even more amazing when these people with their bigoted remarks were actually Mr. Obama's supporters, who were rooting for him like they would root for Michael Jordan sinking a three point shot to ensure yet another title for the Chicago Bulls of the 1990s. But unlike MJ, the Constitutional limit of two successive terms proscribes an Obama "three peat."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/20/us/politics/20text-obama.html?pagewanted=3

But I have to admit that there was pageantry, as all across the land, in court houses and school houses and bars and pubs and in homes and work places and just about anywhere you can imagine, the Inaugural Address was received with the same kind of bravado one would express during a baseball game between the Yankees and Red Sox, and for me to some extent, it was the Red Sox with advantage, and Big Papi just drove the ball into the gap against Mariano Rivera.

As a Yankee Fan whose veins bleed pin stripe blue, and whose fondest sports memory in life is George W. Bush throwing at the first pitch in game three of the 2001 World Series at the Cathedral of Baseball, the past couple of months do feel like a Red Sox victory, as hardcore "Obama Fans" remind me of the more aggressive elements of "the Red Sox Nation."

A Presidential speech is a matter of subtle nuanced language. Each line is haggled over with significance, by advisers and those who would make public policy for an entire nation, as the transcript will be parsed. Each sentence contains a clue about how our leader feels about policy, history, and the direction our country will be heading. Such speeches are calculated as they reflect the "sum total inputs" from cabinet heads, and those making policy for the various presidential agencies. The one passage which caught my attention, even through the noise at Eleanor Rigby's, was this passage:

What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility -- a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character than giving our all to a difficult
task.

I am always weary of government officials who tell people that they owe the world something, a great obligation which they should seize gladly. Guilt and collective responsibility are classic methods of control. Remove the flowery Harvard Law School lingo, and it's translated to "Give me everything you earn and give it gladly, and do not be so cynical as to question my use of your money,"or you will become one of those "cynical discredited people."

You have an obligation to support yourself and family, and to obey the law, and the dictates of conscience, as well as to be honest and ethical in your business and personal dealings, but it really does not go beyond that.

The incredible growth of the government and government spending over the last several months, with one bail out after another, does not auger well for our society, as more institutions both public and private, will be accepting the reigns of a vastly empowered federal bureaucracy. This is not what America is about.

Just my humble opinion. Call me Diogenes.

Saturday is the best day to read the newspaper

Saturday is the best day to read the newspaper, since this is the day that the fewest people read the paper, and is the day when the politicians try to hide the worst news. Today is a good day for Saturday News.

In local news, County Executive Tom Suozzi held an "emergency" press conference late Friday afternoon to reveal that receipts from sales taxes would be dramatically lower than his budget people had forecasted, blowing "by his administration's estimates," a $100M - $150M dollar hole in a county budget which was already called for real estate tax increases. As an institution, Newsday appears to be a publication which tries its best to serve as the de facto public relations company for the County Executive, and indeed, its "spin zone" columnists in the online edition noted Suozzi's "bravery" for confronting this issue head on, when most reasonable people would agree that Suozzi was angling for Saturday coverage in the print edition.

Today's Saturday Print edition was interesting on the Suozzi LI Sales Tax story made Page 2, but was overshadowed by stories which reflected the malaise of the national economy in general, as well as a front page story on the finances of the Long Island Power Authority, an entity which only a decade earlier, Newsday championed as a savior of the Long Island energy market. Now, in the aftermath of a recent unpopular rate increase, Newsday focuses its attention of what it considers "excess spending at the authority."

The LIPA story and the Suozzi story share a common thread, and that is the formative role of Newsday in the creation of both the authority and the politician. Newsday knew, for example, that the public authorities in New York have traditionally been used for patronage hiring by politicians of both parties, and that LIPA, as a State agency, would be managed by a board of trustees selected by the major players in NY State Government, namely the Governor, and the leaders of both Legislative houses. Newsday also knew LIPA would not be subject to the routine scutiny of the New York State Public Service Commission, which oversees public utilities which are run by private businesses. Finally, Newsday knew that LIPA had a management agreement with Keyspan (now National Grid) to oversee the daily operation of the transmission and distribution system, and that LIPA purchased power from Keyspan generation plants. Now, they are shocked by the level of these contracts?

That in my books is a load of horse manure! My personal suspicion is that Newsday purposefully timed the reporting on the LIPA story to overshadow what they knew would be a difficult story for their fair haired politican when the actuals on the Sales Tax receipts were reported. They knew he was having a tough time with his budget through his real estate tax hike, and that his forcast for sales tax receipts, which comprise 40% of the county's revenue, would be off by quite a bit. And that is a an election year for their fair haired and ambitious Democratic County Executive.

My other favorite Saturday story is a bit more frightening. An edited version of an AP release somehow found its way onto the bottom of page 21 of Today's New York Post. Vice President Elect Joe Biden's brother James Biden and son Hunter Biden was settled through "a confidential agreement."

The lawsuit invovled an allegation that the Bidens attempted to take control of hedge funds controlled by Pardigm Companies, and the plaintiff claimed that the Bidens "cheated him" out of money. Prior to working for Paradigm, Hunter Biden had earned seven figure salaries working as a lobbyist for the securities industry. A more detailed account of the background for this lawsuit is described in a Washington Post article from several months ago.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/23/AR2008082302200.html

The Washington Post story describes alawsuit filed by against the Bidens by their former partner Anthony Lotito Jr. in which a the deal was crafted to get Hunter Biden out of lobbying because his father was concerned about the impact it would have on his bid for the White House. Biden was running for the Democratic nomination at the time the suit was filed.

Hunter Biden was made president with an annual salary of $1.2 million, despite his inexperience in the hedge fund industry, the lawsuit said. Before that, he had been part of the Washington law firm Oldaker, Biden & Belair, which earned $1.76 million in lobbying revenue in the first half of 2006, according to Congressional Quarterly's CQ MoneyLine. One of its biggest clients is the National Association of Shareholder and Consumer Attorneys, a District-based group representing law firms specializing in investment and corporate law.

It would appear that the lawsuit against the Bidens should have been one of the biggest stories in 2008, especially since it was a campaign year in which Joseph Biden was focused on becoming our Vice President, a quest in which he would eventually succeed. It is amazing that in a year in which Sarah Palin was poked for even the most minor "offenses," Joe Biden was allowed to skate on this issue of his son's employement, both as a lobbyist and in the hedge fund industry. A Republican with this kind of baggage would have been forced from office.

Instead the resolution of this matter becomes another anonymous story to be found in some newspapers under advertisements for cat litter.

No wonder why Sarah Palin is pissed off. She should be.

Unorthodox Thinking on Health Care Delivery

Providing affordable, cost effective health insurance appears to be a national debacle. "Socialized" medicine, in which the government pays everyone's health care, would present an uncomfortable tax burden upon most Americans, which is the same burden that currently exists under employer plans. The young and those who do not utilize medical services subsidize the rest of society. Other than those who are blessed with governmental employers who eat most, if not all, health insurance costs, employees face a health deduction from their pay check which they have virtually no control over. They cannot opt for a high deductible plan and a large self-paid self insured retention which would afford cover only for the most severe conditions and expensive tests. Indeed, the current system as it stands represents "socialized medicine" since consumer choice is severely limited.

The experience of Massachusettes, which presents with the highest rise in the rate of insurance this decade according to the Boston Globe, is illustrative of how restaints on market forces and competition create higher costs. It appears that Governor Patrick is attempting to further interfere in a health care market place subject to fee schedule price controls and dictate the level of premium as well as the terms and conditions of the insurance policies.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/01/06/patrick_intensifies_states_push_to_curb_soaring_health_premiums/?page=2

Health insurance in the United States has its roots in the nineteenth-century sickness funds offered by industrial employers, fraternal organizations, and labor unions as well as the rise of not for profit groups plans as Blue Cross and Blue Shield in the mid-twentieth century. The health insurance contract is therefore not rooted in a need to defend and indemnify against litigation risk, as is your automobile insurance policy or your homeowner's plicy, claims which would be rooted in the common law of tort. This insurance arose out of the need for those interested in the labor market to provide a benefit for working people and their families, with medicare based plans as acting as the insurer of the retirees and medicaid as the insurer of last resort for the poor and disabled who cannot work.

Ultimately, insurance costs in the United States are increased by the mind numbing layers of federal and state regulation placed upon the medical and the insurance industry. What is needed is a depature from the traditional regulation of an insurance contract by the individual states, and a system of federalized insurance policies. Physicians, insurers, and the public should have to look at only one uniform system. In addition, this national system should allow for greater choice, such as medical savings accounts and high deductible policies which allow the consumer to pay $75 - $125 for an office visit, but also permits them place the money which would normally go to pay health care premiums which are not portable into a private tax deductible bank account. The consumer should also be free to shop for PPOs and other discount fee plans to pay for routine care.

If a patient only requires or only chooses to require minimal health care intervention - which is her right - then she should not have to go broke for paying for everyone else's care, but she should have the right to protect herself by saving for a rainy day, and only utilizing insurance to pay for those things which would otherwise leave her financially devestated.

Our current system of financing health care is morally bankrupt and woefully ineffective. It creates artificial markets and vast opportunities for waste and fraud. Huge amounts of money is pumped into healthcare from a variety of private and public sources, with little or no oversight other than fee scheduled which act as price controls. Indeed, one sees the rise in "unnecessary" testing as a means to act as an additional profit center for patient visits, particularly in areas involving automobile no fault insurance coverage, where a doctor may be paid only $115.00 to do make a patient perform a range of motion examaintion free standing in his office, but if he hooks his patient up to a machine, can charge several thousand dollars to the same insurance company.

The health care crisis is one which is not being resolved by through our current political system. The Democrat wants to socialize medicine to satify supporters with free health care, and to take care of various special interest groups. The Republican will cling to notions of federalism without acknowledging that the many innovative health care products which can be created through private sector means are frustrated by multiple levels of state and federal regulation.

Indeed, President Elect Obama has in the past been accused of borrowing speeches from Mr. Patrick. Lets hope that he does not borrow Mr. Patrick or Mrs. Clinton's views on healthcare.

Flakes, Flakes

Today, I think back to my youth listening Frank Zappa and his classic double album Sheik Yerbouti. In the song "Flakes," Zappa describes people who would be aptly described as well "flakes." "California's got the most of 'em... boy they've got a host of them," the maestro sang in my adolescent past.

Typically, when you think of Flakes in California, you reflect upon the rantings of Michael Savage on talk radio about his native San Francisco. Or you think of what a tool Nancy Pelosi is. Or how anyone with a mind could elect a couple of battle axes like Boxer and Feinstein to the Senate. Or even the recent acquisition of Manny Ramirez by the LA Dodgers this summer and you think, yeah they're flaky, but then again NY has a A-Rod, Madonna, and Charles Schumer, and also elected a felon State Comptroller (Alan Hevesi who resigned) and there is always our legendary former Governor, Client Number 9.

I think back to the song Flakes when I read that the California nannystate wants to regulate your wide screen television now because it is "an energy hog." I see this continued nannystate activity by the California Regulatory bureaucracy to be an affront to economic liberty on both a macro and a micro scale.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tv3-2009jan03,0,2869589.story


Amazing, the article in the LA Times references how California's regulatory state would become the national standard in a number of areas. Of course, the article does not mention CAFE standards in the automobile industry, which has inhibited consumer choice and which are largely to blame for Detroit's current malaise. Of course, the Energy Commission Grand Pubbah blithefully adds, Refrigerators and air conditioner manufacturers have grown up with standards, and, now, they are generally considered successes."

Didn't Mr. Energy Commissar read in the papers that GE was looking for bailout money just like the Big 3 Autos. Coincidence? http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com/2008/11/12/will-the-ge-capital-bailout-make-a-gm-bankruptcy-easier/

It doesn't take a PhD to figure out what is going on here. The California regulatory state comes up with its goofy standards which make people feel good about the environment or whatever is the flavor of the month but which kills our country's ability to compete. It doesn't matter how much of a whiz Ford becomes at finance or insurance and it doesn't matter how well heeled GE is at backing commercial paper (holders and holders in due course, I just had a flashback to my law school courses on Articles III and IX of the Uniform Commercial Code). In the end, these companies have to make products, such as cars that people want to drive and appliances that people want to own. If they cannot compete with Japan, the Asian Tigers, or manufacturers in the emerging world then I cannot see how these entities will remain viable in the long term.

The ironic proof of my pet theory is contained in the article itself. The gentleman who just made a fine haul at what appears to be a warehouse store bought himself a 40inch Samsung television set.

American industries need to compete successfully. "Give a man a fish you feed him for a day. Teach a man how to fish and you feed him for a life time." Why is it that this nation has collectively lost its common sense.

The lyrics for Flakes come back to me now I I finish off this rant, "We are millions and millions"/"We're Coming to Get You"/"We're Protectec by Unions, so don't let that upset you/You might call us flakes or something else you might coin us"/ "but we know you're so greedy that you'll probably join us."

"We're coming to get you."

"We're coming to get you."

"We're coming to get you."

fade

How Lame is Al Franken

Talk about a man with a sense of entitlement. Al Franken was to talk radio what Magic Johnson was to talk shows. How did anyone even vote for this clown? Did the cast of Fargo get to vote twice or something? Talk about a momumental amount of energy and waste purportedly dedicated to finding votes for Al Franken. It is almost comical if not sad. Read on. I can't write about this anymore.

http://ballotbox.governing.com/2009/01/recount-how-did-minnesota-do.html