Quote of the Day:

"Some people should just not be taught to read!" My son.

Technology: What's the Hold Up with Windows Vista?

Windows next operating system has been in the wings for a long time. Some folks have been test driving the beta version and have reported considerable success with it (see WXPNews.com). So why is Microsoft dragging its feet in bringing out the new version, currently slated for release in 2007, some six years after it released XP?

For an insight into some of the problems Microsoft is facing, read Joris Evers article, "Gloves Come Off in Symantic, Microsoft Dispute" on the ZDNet site. Symantic and Microsoft are headed into the courtroom over various technologies and the rights to their use which Microsoft wants to be an important part of Vista, and it isn't just the virus software. This situation could dramatically alter Microsoft's timetable for the release of the new operating system, or the form it takes when it is finally released.


The U. S. Economy:

Today's New York Times: "Wages and salaries now make up the lowest proportion of the economy since the government began keeping records in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960’s."

If you are trying to support a family, you cannot repeat this enough. Under the Bush administration, the U. S. worker has NEVER experienced prosperity. In the meantime, the rich just keep getting richer.


Bush Talks from Both Sides of His Mouth:

This is the lead-in to the story in today's Washington Post:

President Bush launched an initiative this month to combat international kleptocracy, the sort of high-level corruption by foreign officials that he called "a grave and corrosive abuse of power" that "threatens our national interest and violates our values." The plan, he said, would be "a critical component of our freedom agenda."

Three weeks later, the White House is making arrangements to host the leader of Kazakhstan, an autocrat who runs a nation that is anything but free and who has been accused by U.S. prosecutors of pocketing the bulk of $78 million in bribes from an American businessman. Not only will President Nursultan Nazarbayev visit the White House, people involved say, but he also will travel to the Bush family compound in Maine.

Just another example of the administration's duplicity.

NEWS FLASH — Productivity Up, Wages Down!

The lead story in today's New York Times reports that real wages have continued to go down while productivity continues to climb. Obviously the Times has an elite audience that has been removed from the world of work for a long time. The boom in productivity has been a direct result of stagnant wages for years. Most of so called "real wages" have seen increases only through the higher premiums paid for benefits by employers, when employers actually provide benefits.


Inflation Expected to Rise in Near Future:

Economists are expecting inflationary action in the near future as a result of global trends. The annual $700 billion dollar trade defficit is seen at the heart of the problem, which experts believe will be at least in part out of the hands of Americans in terms of being able to curb. For more, see today's New York Times.


Academics Proclaim "Big Stars Do Not a Big Box Office Make":

For years now Hollywood has banked on big name stars to insure the fiscal success of their films. However, recently academics have been study the situation and recently announced that there is no statistical correlation between the two.

Why is this important, aside from the fact that Hollywood is one of our most economically viable industries? Maybe because it is part of the whole notion about the necessity to have big stars on your team, whether in making a movie, fielding a sports team, or creating a corporate structure:

Note the following from today's New York Times:

Superstar economics, which has been used to explain the astonishing fees of top lawyers and the skyrocketing pay of star chief executives, dates back to the insight in the late 19th century of the British economist Alfred Marshall, who observed that “the relative fall in the incomes to be earned by moderate ability … is accentuated by the rise in those that are obtained by many men of extraordinary ability.”

The dynamic was explained by a University of Chicago economist, Sherwin Rosen, in a 1981 paper entitled “Superstar Economics.” Mr. Rosen posited that improvements in technology that would make it easier for top performers in a field to serve a larger market would not only increase the revenue generated by stars, but would also reduce the revenue available to everybody else.

However, the actual numbers don't seem to crunch that way. You've always got to suspect that the illusion might just be for the benefit of the person who creates it, kind of like the image the used car salesman creates for you when you step on his lot. Imagine the ramifications for CEOs. Maybe GE doesn't need to pay their CEO ten gazillion times more than their average workers.

The Good, the Bad, and, well, you know the rest:

While America is busily spreading democracy (code for opening new venues for various capitalists) around the world, we learn that "an analysis of the nation’s biggest mergers over the last 12 months indicates that the securities of 41 percent of the companies receiving buyout bids exhibited abnormal and suspicious trading in the days and weeks before those deals became public" (The New York Times).

Of course we all learned in grade school that capitalism was the process of developing a better mouse trap which would cause investers to beat a path to our doors so that we could start manufacturing the mouse trap and then marketing it to customers.

Ooops! Guess that's just not the case. Turns out that capitalism is mostly about arranging buyouts so that a company's stock shoots up in anticipation that the campany's real value will also improve—usually as a result of the company firing large numbers of its employees or renegotiating its contracts with said employees so that they no longer have health benefits.


The Business of Newspapers:

Today's New York Times offers a story of the Knight Ridder newspaper company that at one time was one of the leading publishers of newspapers in the country and one of the most profitable. It was also known for its excellent journalism, having won no less than 85 Pulitzer Prizes. For those interested in the state of American business and capitalism, this is a good place to start.

We've all heard far too often about how the Internet is changing the way things work, including or maybe "especially" the newspaper industry. News gathering/publishing entities depend on pushing advertising at us in order to pay for their costs in going about their business.

The hitch comes from the dirty little secret that every business person knows: Advertising dollars are finite.


On Education:

Today's New York Times contains an editorial on a subject we addressed recently, the failure of the Charter School concept to alter the quality of education in the U. S. The Times article focuses on what they consider the key factor—America's failure to recognize the value of quality instruction.

The truth is that America doesn't value education. During a brief period in our country's history, usually designated as the Cold War Era, education seemed to be one of, perhaps the most highly esteemed value. There are those who say that fear of communism pressured America to place such a high regard for education in our culture. However, the actual fact of the matter is that America was recovering from the Depression and World War II, and people quickly recognized that education was the one sure approach to achieve some security against the vicissitudes that those periods of time presented us with.

When the culture at large places a high value on education, people will demand that text books be the most up to date and accurate as possible. They will require their schools to hire the best teachers. And they will demand from their children the sort of acceptance of responsibility for learning that has not existed in this country since the mid 1970s.

Every teacher knows that good students will learn regardless of the quality of the teacher, while poor students seldom learn much of value even from the best teachers. This doesn't mean that we should accept poor instruction, but it certainly means that we must demand that our children become good students first. Then we can demand that teachers be better, text books be more than simply adequate, schools be safe (AND SMALL) and places that augment learning rather than simply warehouse our youth and serve as locations for sporting events.

As long as parents and the community at large place more emphasis on the high school football team's winning record and denying the theory of evolution in biology classes, education will never be more than a business, an entity that accumulates dollars for the benefit of a few.

Gearing Up for the Mid-Term Elections:

This in from the Washington Post:

Rep. Katherine Harris (R-Fla.) said this week that God did not intend for the United States to be a "nation of secular laws" and that the separation of church and state is a "lie we have been told" to keep religious people out of politics.

"If you're not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin," Harris told interviewers from the Florida Baptist Witness, the weekly journal of the Florida Baptist State Convention. She cited abortion and same-sex marriage as examples of that sin.

* * *

Harris told the journalists "we have to have the faithful in government" because that is God's will. Separating religion and politics is "so wrong because God is the one who chooses our rulers," she said.

"And if we are the ones not actively involved in electing those godly men and women," then "we're going to have a nation of secular laws. That's not what our Founding Fathers intended, and that certainly isn't what God intended."

Harris campaign spokeswoman Jennifer Marks would not answer questions about the Harris interview. Instead, she released a two-sentence statement.

"Congresswoman Harris encourages Americans from all walks of life and faith to participate in our government," it stated. "She continues to be an unwavering advocate of religious rights and freedoms."

Yup, this is the same Katherine Harris we remember so fondly from 2000. Just when you thought life couldn't get any better.

Tired of the silly stories you see me comment on here?

Here's a must read, if you're a member of the human race:

Africa Adds to Miserable Ranks of Child Workers.

Nope, I've got no instant comments on this one. Feel free to add yours. Of course we could just argue about whether Pluto is actually a planet or not.


Bush Administration Strikes another Blow to Increase Ignorance:

Evolutionary biology has been removed from the list of acceptable majors to be funded by the Department of Education. The department provides grants to low income students for study in approved courses.

A spokesperson for the department, Katherine McClane, denied there was any reason for the removal of the course, stating that it was a simple oversite. However, someone had to take the step to remove the course. Can there be any doubt about what motivated the action.

One wonders if the president gets a flu shot every year? Why, if evolution is an empty theory? Without evolution flu couldn't exist. Nor the shots that can prevent it. You can view the approved list here: http://ifap.ed.gov/dpcletters/attachments/GEN0606A.pdf.

Republicans in Washington Push for Fear:

The New York Times reported today that Republican leaders in Washington are complaining that the intelligence agencies are not reporting Iran as an imminent threat:

The new report, from the House Intelligence Committee, led by Representative Peter Hoekstra, Republican of Michigan, portrayed Iran as a growing threat and criticized American spy agencies for cautious assessments about Iran’s weapons programs. “Intelligence community managers and analysts must provide their best analytical judgments about Iranian W.M.D. programs and not shy away from provocative conclusions or bury disagreements in consensus assessments,” the report said, using the abbreviation for weapons of mass destruction like nuclear arms.

This is the same sort of abusive pressure that the administration employed in its aggressive runup to war with Iraq. Considering the failure of the Iraq policy, I confess to being a bit more than flabbergasted, but this certainly fits the story I was told more than a year ago by a Republican insider who insisted that the plan had been to go into Iran all along.

Technology:

Looking for another method of posting to your blog that will give you more choices about layout or let you compose posts without being signed in? The Windows Live Writer Team has developed some programs that might be of interest. You can download their beta version of Live Writer at

http://windowslivewriter.spaces.live.com/.

I was made aware of the program through the WXPNews site, which publishes a newsletter weekly. These folks, despite the name, are not affiliated with Microsoft. However, they do publish some interesting information that has helped me from time to time. (And they occasionally quote me as well.)

Quote of the Day:

"I've never seen anyone smile while dealing with their warts." — My son.

America Begins to Awaken:

Years into the conflict that has been necessary only to the major oil companies and the banks, Americans are beginning to realize that the war in Iraq has nothing to do with terrorist actions against the American people.

A recent poll taken by The New York Times/CBS News indicates that 51 percent of Americans now no longer believe that Bush's war on Iraq has anything to do with the so called "war on terrorism" (sic).

As Americans abandon GM and Ford for Toyota in an attempt to contend with ever increasing gasoline prices, they are starting to clear their ears and wipe their eyes of the honeyed nonsense that has spewed from the mouths of the administration for the better part of a decade and to realize they've been had.

The big questions at this point: Just how much damage has been done and how much effort will it take to repair, if it even can be?


Charter Schools — Tax Payer Rip Off? Or Political Gerrymandering?

Recent studies of test scoring, comparing public schools with charter schools shows that either the charter schools fair no better at educating our children or actually perform worse. So what's the charter school business all about? Business, of course.

We taxpayers heard all about how charter schools would give us a choice and choice would inevitably mean competition that would drive school administrators and teachers in general to improve the quality of education across the board.

The truth is that we had about as much chance to win this one as the village idiot has to win "the shell game." You know that one — a con man sets up a table with three cups and you get to select the one with the pea under it. That's choice. Has anyone of you ever known someone who could regularly beat the con artist at this game? Uh-huh, thought not.

Charter schools, we are told, would perform better because they are run by business men, people who open and run them in order to make a profit. The way you make a profit in business is to sell your goods or services for more than their actual value; that is, you convince the buyer that the value of the item or service is greater than what you actually believe it is worth. Does this sound like a recipe for improving education?

So what then is the purpose of charter schools within the Republican agenda? To start with, Republicans have traditionally been the party of the business man. Creating charter schools generates more business votes.

Second, charter schools are by and large nonunion shops. Public schools have teachers who belong to one of the most powerful unions in the country, and they consistently vote for the Democrats. By promoting charter schools, Republicans seek to break the back of the teachers' union or at least to limit its power. Improving education has never been a factor in this formula.

On Sen. John McCain, Pesidential Candidate 2008:

"He has to be the leader of not just a movement, but the party,” Mr. McKinnon [Mark McKinnon, a Texas political media consultant who has worked for Mr. Bush for years] said. “That’s a whole different drill.” — Today's New York Times.

Many Republican voters find it difficult imagining that they would bother to come out to vote for the glib senator, whose smiles and jokes on John Stewart's The Daily Show seem to mark him as friendly to liberals. We recently heard from a Florida Republican insider who said at this point it appeared that many Republican voters would simply stay home in 2008 rather than vote for McCain, echoing what we have been told by Republican insiders in both Illinois and Pennsylvania.

When we asked our Republican contacts if McCain could sway the religious right by making the right overtures to the leadership, they were unanimous in their belief that the vast majority of the religious right would never vote for the Senator even if it meant that other rawly ambitious senator, the one from New York, ended up in the White House. And we thought it was the Demos who were the stubborn ones, as represented by their mascot.

Digitalizing the Health Care System — Will It Really Save Us Money?

For the past several years, the hot topic in health care costs has been the advocacy of recording all of our health care information in a grand computer network. This is supposed to save us money over the old fashioned pen and ink record keeping that currently is blamed for major increases in our health care costs. But will the digitalization of records really save us money? The New York Times examines the question in today's issue, with some interesting comments by leading health field experts:

While that is by no means a bad thing, it is also not the hoped-for fix for the nation’s rising health care bill.

“All the new information tools have enormous promise,” said Dr. Brian L. Strom, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, “but they will not necessarily drive down the overall cost of health care.”

* * *

“Information is a dual-edged sword, especially in health care,” said David M. Cutler, a health economist at Harvard. “Better information might blow apart some of the blockbuster markets in the pharmaceutical industry, for example. But it might also increase demand for other drugs in smaller, more focused markets.

“And if better information really helps us understand what is happening in health care,” Mr. Cutler added, “it could well lead to more care for more people and higher costs for the system as a whole.”

* * *

The electronic medical record, for all its promise, is no silver bullet for the nation’s health system. Placing too much faith in technology, skeptics warn, could be counterproductive. Dr. David Himmelstein, a physician and associate professor at the Harvard Medical School, said: “It encourages the belief that we don’t need real reform, all we need is computers.”

Sounds rather like the education thing. Computers were going to revolutionize the school system too. And maybe they did, but on the whole, does anyone believe our education system is producing better educated people than it did 30 - 50 years ago?

I.R.S. to Farm Out Back Tax Collecting Duties:

In response to the Bush administrations attempt to handicap the I.R.S in its efforts to collect delinquent taxes by drastically cutting the agency's workforce, the I.R.S. has decided to hire outside, private companies to begin the collection process for them. Anyone who owes back taxes of $25,000 or less will be pursued by these companies.

This will increase the costs of such efforts, making government even less efficient than it already is. But that seems to have been Republican policy dating back to the hypocritical Reagan administration. You will recall that Reagan campaigned on a promise to reduce government and to make it more efficient while doing just the opposite, creating the largest bureaucracy in history to that point, along with the largest increase in the national debt the country has ever seen.

According to The New York Times,

The private debt collection program is expected to bring in $1.4 billion over 10 years, with the collection agencies keeping about $330 million of that, or 22 to 24 cents on the dollar.

By hiring more revenue officers, the I.R.S. could collect more than $9 billion each year and spend only $296 million — or about three cents on the dollar — to do so, Charles O. Rossotti, the computer systems entrepreneur who was commissioner from 1997 to 2002, told Congress four years ago.

I.R.S. officials on Friday characterized those figures as correct, but said that the plan Mr. Rossotti had proposed had been forestalled by Congress, which declined to authorize it to hire more revenue officers.

So here's the dirty little secret: The idea that privatization is the way to save American's money is at least sometimes a complete fallacy. The effort is really an attempt to funnel tax payers' money into private hands. Like the administration's lie about social security.

Technology:

While most of the hot talk of late has been about batteries bursting into flames followed by Apple abandoning its hardware for Intel processors, some of you might still be curious about Linux, that other operating system.

For several years now, those of us who have shared this curiosity have been aware of DistroWatch, a site devoted to providing a host of information and links to free downloads of Linux and BSD distros where we can learn and try out various brands.

You can download a variety of distrobutions of Linux from the site, including live CDs, that will allow you to experience first hand what Linux is like, without ever needing to install anything to your hard drive.

The process is fairly simple, as long as you have a CD burner with software to change IO images into the format that will make the files viable. To learn more about this process, we suggest Ross Laver's "How to Burn an ISO Image" over at Ibiblio.

You will need a broadband connection for the download, and your computer must be set to boot from the CD drive before the hard drive. This is done by resetting the bios on the computer. If you don't know how to do this, then maybe you're not ready for this techy stuff anyway.

If you are okay with all of this, we can recommend both the Knoppix distro and the Ubuntu distro as good places to start learning more about Linux. If you aren't familiar with what's happened in the Linux world over the past few years, we think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Bush's Reaction to Democrats Following Judge's Decision on the Unconstitutionality of Warrentless Wiretaps:

The Washington Post reports,

President Bush concluded a discussion on the economy with a challenge to Democrats, many of whom had hailed U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor's ruling that the NSA's wiretapping efforts violate both the Bill of Rights and federal law.

"Those who herald this decision simply do not understand the nature of the world in which we live," Bush said after meeting with his economic team at Camp David. "This country of ours is at war, and we must give those whose responsibility it is to protect the United States the tools necessary to protect this country in a time of war."

The "governing through fear" rhetoric is starting to sound even more like that other leader who came to power 72 years ago (see entry at bottom of today's entry). Even Republicans are beginning to grow weary. Key Republican grass roots leaders have informed us that the base is growing tired and dissatisfied with the Bush leadership. They expect not only a change during the coming elections this year but also in the 2008 elections.

Marine Officer Calls Killing of Women and Children Routine:

"I thought it was very sad, very unfortunate, but at the time, I did not suspect any wrongdoing from my Marines," Lt. Col. Jeffrey R. Chessani, commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 1st Marines, said. (Reported by The Washington Post.)

Col. Chessani was the commander of the battalion involved in the Haditha killings last November. "I did not have any reason to believe that this was anything other than combat action," he added. The quotes were provided to The Washington Post by someone sympathetic to the enlisted men involved in the action, according to the news story.

The story portrays a commander who bought any story his subordinates provided him and was completely disengaged with the actions the troops under him were taking.

Those of us who are veterans will recognize the pattern.

Music Row, Nashville, TN:

The New York Times reports on an undercurrent of the status quo in the "Country Music" money making machine. For a number of years now, the marketers of country music, once thought of as a form of American folk music, has identified its clientel as solely bought and paid for Republicans conservatives. According to the Times, some of the musicians are starting to become unhappy with this particular status quo that advocates supression of free speech and violence against dissent, i.e. the Dixie Chicks.

Could it be that an industry that has exploited sentimentality is no longer going to following in lock step the marketing of its products by draping their salesmen in red, white and blue cloth? That's unlikely, but the fact that a few of the musicians are now comfortable enough to complain indicates a crack in what had appeared to be a solid block.

Today in History:

On today's date in 1934, Germany granted Adolph Hitler sole executive power, giving the world a new meaning for the word "Fuhrer."

"24" It Ain't:

Those of us who are fans of TV shows, like "24," that make use of dazzling high tech magic that helps to solve crimes and protect the nation from terrorists and the like need to keep in mind that Hollywood creates a fantacy world.

Today's Washington Post gives us a story about the 170 million dollar fiasco that was the computer upgrade for the FBI following 9/11. As you might already know, it didn't work. The good news is that the government has let new contracts to the tune of 425 million dollars to correct the problem. Completion date is expected to be in 2009, just in time for a new administration to take office.

In Other News:

The nation waits with baited breath to learn if the Bush administration will honor the judge's finding that its wiretapping practices are unconstitutional. Bush has already stated that he believes the court is wrong, that the practice is constitutional. Does that mean he will simply ignore the court's ruling? He's ignored the congress when they've passed laws he didn't like, so why bother following court rulings?

Will he follow the Constitution in January 2009?

Breaking News:

The Washington Post reported today that hiring of Democrats among lobbying firms in the nation's capitol is on the upswing, indicating that K Street expects a shift after the coming elections. Lobbyists, as you no doubt recall, have no party affiliation other than the one they buy at any particular time. (Or is it "lease"?)

The Birth of Nostalgia:

Thirty-seven years ago today, Woodstock came to an end.

Iraq:

Analysis of the violence in Iraq indicates a strong upswing over the course of the past six months. The Bush administration is now preparing for the eventuality that the new government in the country will not survive. It appears that the Bush Iraqi spin of the last five and a half years is starting to wind down.

In the U. S. Senate, Senator Jown W. Warner (Republican-Virginia), chair of the Armed Services Committee, stated that the authorization for the use of armed forces might need to be re-examined. Warner has been a strong supporter of Bush to date. His comments indicate a strong shift in congressional support for the administration.

If the war in Iraq is defined by congress as a civil war, the U. S. involvement will become untenable in the eyes of most citizens. It would appear that events in Connecticut have reverberated within the Rupublican party as well as among Democrats.

Bush's Conundrum:

El Presidente claimed yesterday that he had made the country safer in the wake of the arrests in England, from terrorists (although he was unable to explain how). But he also argued that he and only he could keep us safe from the constant threat of "the evil doers."

Bush's base depends on a constant state of stress from the unknowable forces of evil surrounding us, but the base's faith in him depends on him protecting us. Bush has sold himself to us as the hired gunslinger brought in to clean up the town, but if he succeeds at cleaning up the town, we don't need him anymore.

Ooops! Does this explain our Iraq strategy? Are we living in a Hollywood film? Will Gary Cooper save the town from the bad guys, only to toss his star into the dust at the end of the movie and ride off into the sunset with his blond princess?

Can any of us really imagine Georgie Boy willingly riding off into any sunset?

By the way, according to Maureen Dowd, over at the New York Times, El Presidente is spending his vacation time at the ranch reading Albert Camus. One wonders who is explaining Camus to him?

More Conflict between Bush and Governors:

The New York Times reports

In an unusual act of bipartisan and regional unanimity, 51 governors have joined to voice their strong opposition to legislation to let the president federalize National Guard troops in a disaster without local authorities’ consent.

The governors are objecting to a provision hidden in legislation drawn up in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, meant to speed up federal response to disasters. It should be recalled that Bush ran as a states' rights candidate in both of his campaigns.

Send Us Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Hungry …

The population of the U. S. recently topped 300 million. The big news—immigration is responsible. The birth rate in the U. S. reached 2.1 per couple some time ago, which means we stopped having population growth as a result of new births and reached a balance in terms of reproduction. But immigration increased in the U. S. throughout the 1990s, and it has continued to increase during the first decade of the new millennium.

Immigrants now make up 12.4 percent of the total population in the U. S., as opposed to 11.2 percent just six years ago. The total immigrant population is now 35.7 million, a number larger than the population of California, the largest state by population in the U. S.

Even bigger news is that the states showing surprising increases in new immigrants are not the traditional ones, like California, but places like Georgia and Indiana.

Another very interesting census factoid has to do with education. In 1940 only 4.6 percent of the American population held a bachelor’s degree. As of this year 27.2 percent of the population hold's a bachelor's degree. We have become a significantly more educated population (at least in terms of certification, if not in terms of actual literacy).

Split in Republican Party over Medicaid:

The Bush administration has declared war with the states with its Medicaid regulation, bringing it into direct conflict with Republican governors of several states:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, a Republican, said, “The administration is attempting to reverse decades of federal Medicaid policy through the regulatory process,” less than a year after “Congress rejected these misguided cuts.”

In Missouri, Gov. Matt Blunt, a Republican, said the change “could mean a loss of more than $84.9 million” for his state. That, he said, would “jeopardize the continuity of care for Medicaid recipients” and set back efforts to improve care in nursing homes.

Gov. M. Jodi Rell of Connecticut, a Republican, protested the White House plan in a letter to Mr. Bush. She said the effects would be “disastrous” in states like Connecticut, which relies on fees collected from nursing homes to help pay its share of Medicaid costs.

(New York Times, 8-13-06)

Fallout from the Gates Foundation:

As Bill Gates struggles to find ways to spend the windfall money from Buffett's billions, the Bush controlled government is using the press's gaga attitude to justify playing Scrooge:

In its 2007 budget proposal, for example, the Bush administration eliminated a $93.5 million program to underwrite the development of smaller schools, specifically citing the increase in support for those schools from “nonfederal funds” from the Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. (New York Times, 8-13-06)

The irony is that government financing of social programs amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars annually, making the Gates Foundation money miniscule by comparrison. Private foundation support of social causes will never approach what governments can do to improve the human condition.

The Sins of the Father: The High Cost of the Criminal Justice System:

“The father gets a three- or five-year sentence, and the family structure disintegrates. Mothers try to survive on state aid or work multiple jobs, and you see kids practically raising themselves, which perpetuates the problem.” — Rev. Jeffery A. Williams, pastor of the 800-member Cathedral of Life Christian Assembly in South Providence, RI.

Republicans Gleeful Over Arrests in England:

Reports from around the U. S. indicate that Republicans view the recent news of the arrest of 24 British citizens as a great opportunity for their political advantage in the coming midterm elections. In Washington, the White House now believes it has a distinct advantage in furthering its eavesdropping agenda, as well as retaining its misuse of power in Guantanamo, where people are being held illegally without trial or charges.

More arrests and perhaps terrorist actions are expected to take place in the run-up to the fall elections, as the Republican party has little else to convince voters not to turn the party that has become the most corrupt party in history out of office.

Irony or Contempt?

Six southern states in the U. S. are considered "dry states." These are states that still have some form of prohibition with regards to alcohol, or at least its sale. Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, has gotten into the "package" business in a big way of late. Why not? They want to be your one stop shopping site.

So here's the rub:

Wal-Mart, based in a dry county in Arkansas, forbids drinking at events held at corporate headquarters. But the giant retailer has made a push in the last year to sell more liquor, along with beer and wine, in its stores. (New York Times, 8-12-06)

In other words, Wally World wants you to become a drunken sot in order to increase their profitability, but they ain't willing to participate in the consumption of demon rum themselves, knowing full well its debilitating effects on the work force. Ah, American entrepreneurship at its finest! Tin shacks on acres of asphalt — ain't life grand.

Condom Use Lowers HIV Rate in Thailand:

Thailand, the first Asian country to report an outbreak of HIV/AIDS, has successfully reduced the rate of growth of the dread disease through its 100 Percent Condom Campaign. According to Chris Beyrer and Voravit Suwanvanichkli,

public health officials aggressively focused on bars, brothels, nightclubs and massage parlors for condom education, promotion and distribution. Sex workers were likewise offered counseling, testing and treatment. The openness of sex venues there and health officials’ access to the women in them made this a relatively simple intervention.

Venues that did not agree to require condom use were shut down. Signs appeared over bar doors saying, “No condom, no sex, no refund!” And the government put resources behind the effort, distributing some 60 million free condoms a year.

A wider national effort was also under way. Condoms appeared in village shops and urban supermarkets, and frank H.I.V. education was introduced in schools, hospitals, workplaces, the military and the mass media. Thais worked hard to reduce fear and stigma and to support those living with H.I.V.

* * *

The 100 Percent Condom Campaign proves that H.I.V. prevention efforts can succeed by focusing on at-risk populations, providing tangible services and making healthy behavior, like condom use, social norms. Cambodia, the Dominican Republic and other countries have successfully adopted the Thai model.

In the U. S., however, the Bush administration continues to insist on a policy of "no sex outside of marriage, and then solely for the purposes of producing children." They have this "base" they have to appease at all costs.

Food for Thought:

Quietly a growing movement for mandatory voting is taking place. Norman Ornstein, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, makes an argument in today's New York Times, to develop such a requirement based on the Australian example.

In Australia, voters are required to vote, and receive a small fine when they do not. Ornstein points out, however, that approximately 3 percent of voters in the land down under spoil their ballots, and that is perfectly legal.

Ornstein's principle argument for mandatory voter turnout is that current U. S. politics has become so devisive in part because only those voters on the extremes in each party, the base, vote in elections.

The freedom not to vote has long been as sacred a freedom as the right to vote. Maybe it is time to rethink this freedom.

Does Music Move Your Kids to Teen Sex?

In yesterday's ZDNet Education IT Blog, the technology folks address the issue of what might be the strongest influence on teens to become involved in early sexual behavior. The conclusion: music.

The Blog cites several reputable studies including one by the Rand Corporation as reported in AP reports. Other sources include "NPR's Talk of the Nation, [where] researcher Carol Pardun emphasized that while kids may occassionally encounter porn online, they are being exposed to sexual content in media almost continually."

The general consensus seems to be that attitudes portrayed in the music early teens listen to tends to create a mind set in which young people see behavior which their parents would readily deem inappropriate as the norm.

Thus, the report concludes, "No wonder, then, that teacher Andrew McNamar was troubled by his teenage students dressing like 'sluts,' while the girls themselves were shocked and hurt by this characterization. To them, they were just dressing in style. To him, their dress presaged nothing good."

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has urged Windows users to plug a potential worm hole in the Microsoft operating system:

Now even the Dep. of Homeland Security has gotten excited about plugging holes in the Redmond operating system. In a first ever move the HS said, "Users are encouraged to avoid delay in applying this security patch." The fix is addressed by the following Microsoft path: Microsoft's MS06-040. Tuesday, just passed, was this month's "patch Tuesday." This flaw, by the way, does not require any user interaction. In other words, you don't have to open a malicious email attachment or visit a bad Web site in order for your machine to be exploited.

Users whose machines are set up to automatically update (provided those machines are left turned on) are automatically updated. However, the complete installation requires a reboot. Some users seem unaware of this. Others seem to be unaware that their machines need to be turned on in order to receive the updates.

The particular flaw in question could allow someone to gain complete control of a user's computer. The government's concern, of course, is that a particular hacker might gain control of thousands of Windows computers and thus have a super computer that would be very difficult to track.

Lieberman Concedes in Connecticut:

Sen. Joe Lieberman, Al Gore's VP candidate in 2000, conceded to Ned Lamont late last night in his bid for re-election in the primary run-off for the Democratic party. The question now is what that might mean for the coming mid-term elections. Lieberman has stated that he will run as a third party candidate in the fall elections. Are the Demos about to face the same problems they did in the late 1960s and early 1970s when the party that had come to dominate Washington politics split over Vietnam and civil rights?

The analogy doesn't seem to be quite appropriate this time around, as the Republicans seem to have their hands full with their own problems: corruption beyond anything the Demos have ever managed to achieve, and a split between more progressive leaders like The Gubonator in California and the ultra conservatives who would prefer to see our society slide back into the dark ages.

Technology and Ignorance:

"What? Somebody is spying on me?" AOL has been caught revealing the search habits of thousands of its users, and low and behold, these poor folks didn't have the slightest idea that somebody was watching their every key stroke!

You can read about it in today's New York Times. So much for "computer literacy."

Ohio, Republicans, and Voter Registration Fraud:

Republicans, especially in Ohio, have been complaining greatly about voter registration fraud. The truth is that regardless of how much or little voter registration fraud has occurred in Ohio, none of it has affected the outcomes of the past two elections. The New York Times reports the following:

Mr. Ney, the Ohio congressman, cited news media reports of “thousands” of cases of voter registration fraud being investigated by local officials. But a separate study last year by the League of Women Voters found that voter registration fraud did not necessarily result in fraud at the polls. Out of 9,078,728 votes cast in Ohio in 2002 and 2004, the report said, only four ballots were fraudulent, according to statistics provided by officials from the state’s 88 county boards of elections. (Emphasis added by me.)

In other words, all of the complaints made by Republicans in Ohio (the wanna be northern Florida state) amounts to little more than Republican class war fare. And, oh yeah, the guy who runs voter registration in Ohio is also the guy who wants to be the next Republican governor of the state. He happens to be 11 points behind in the polls at the moment. Could it be that Ohio Republicans are planning on stealing yet another election? Surely not!

Bush Vacations at Crawford Ranch:

El Presidente is off to the ranch again this August, but unlike last year, he plans to stay for only ten days. Last year he spent the month on his 1,600 acre spread (purchased with daddy's money), while New Orleans drowned in a hurricane.

This year there are more serious problems facing our commander in chief: the November elections. The Republicans may end up struggling to hold onto their majorities in both houses, along with a few governorships, what with the war for oil gone seriously awry and the overwhelming number of scandals that have beset their besotted leadership.

The New York Times reports that

Mark Knoller of CBS News, whose statistics on presidential trips to Crawford are so comprehensive that the White House refers inquiries to him, said the current visit was Mr. Bush’s 59th trip to his ranch since taking office; as of Saturday, he had spent all or part of 384 days there.

While the rest of America is working longer hours for less pay, El Presidente has taken more than a year of vacation during his six years in office.


Hiroshima:

Sixty-one years ago today, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Japan, becoming the only country to ever use nuclear weapons against an enemy in war. The debate over the rational of this act has not and will never be resolved.

Looking for a Good Read on the Web?

Try the Chicago Tribune's News Specials. The current lead story, "A tank of gas, a world of trouble," provides a good read. Here's an excerpt:

What are the hidden costs of America's imported oil? The answer is complex. It may ultimately be unknowable. But this hasn't daunted the likes of Milton Copulos.

A tenacious economist with the National Defense Council Foundation--a right-of-center Washington think tank--Copulos spent 18 solid months poring over hundreds of thousands of pages of government documents, toiling to fix a price tag on America's addiction to global crude. He parsed oil-related defense spending in the Middle East. He calculated U.S. jobs and investments lost to steep crude prices. He even factored in the lifelong medical bills of some 18,000 U.S. troops wounded in Iraq as of March. (About $1.5 million each.)

Copulos is a highly respected analyst in Washington. And his exhaustive findings flabbergasted the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this spring.

The actual cost of gasoline refined from imported oil, according to Copulos?

Eight dollars a gallon.

When he isolated the hidden costs of Middle Eastern crude in particular, the price jumped to $11. This included a war premium that swelled the Pentagon's spending to protect all Persian Gulf oil to $137 billion a year. In a truly transparent economy, by Copulos' math, filling up Rodriguez's Jeep would run about $230.

Consumers don't dodge the bill for all these masked expenditures. Instead, they pay for them indirectly, through higher taxes, or by saddling their children and grandchildren with a ballooning national debt--one that's increasingly financed by foreigners. The result: Unaware of the true costs of their oil habit, U.S. motorists see no obvious reason to curb their energy gluttony.

"Gas isn't too expensive," said Copulos. "It's way, way too cheap."

Or, as he put it to senators, quoting the cartoon character Pogo: "We have met the enemy and they is us."

Keep in mind the Trib is a Republican voice.

Transformation:

The New York Times on former First Lady Clinton re-inventing herself as a presidential candidate:

[W]hile skillful repositioning and adaptation to changing circumstances have enabled her to avoid political damage, they have also exposed her to a line of criticism that has come to dog her in the same way it did her husband during his presidency: that she devises policy positions to shield herself from attacks from the left or right and surrenders principle to political flexibility.

Sen. Clinton has set for herself a difficult task: becoming the first woman president of the U. S. while running on a ticket that the opposing party has successfully defined as left of center. (Of course we all know there is NO political LEFT in this country, just somewhat right of center to far right of center.)

In order to become the head of a, so called, first world country, a woman must demonstrate that she is tough enough not to blink an eye at human misery.

What Is the Bush Administration Afraid Of?

A Senate committee headed by Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas (the state that lives by science—agriculture—and denies it) has completed the first two parts of its investigation into "prewar intelligence." According to the New York Times, Sen. Roberts "chastised the White House for efforts to classify most of the part that examines intelligence provided to the Bush administration by the Iraqi National Congress, an exile group."

For some reason, the Bushites don't want the public to know much about the relationship it has with this group: '“I have been disappointed by this administration’s unwillingness to declassify material contained in these reports, material which I believe better informs the public, but that does not — I repeat, does not — jeopardize intelligence operations, sources and methods,' Mr. Roberts said in a statement issued Thursday."

Sen. Roberts is at a loss to explain the White House's reticence.

In other news from the Times:

"I believe that the sectarian violence is probably as bad as I’ve seen it, in Baghdad in particular, and that if not stopped, it is possible that Iraq could move towards civil war."
GEN. JOHN P. ABIZAID, commander of American forces in the Middle East.

Apparently even the generals now have to admit that Iraq is in a state of civil war.

Sneak Attack Fails:

The senate voted down the bill to raise minimum wage when the Republicans attached their beloved amendment to do away with the inheritance tax on the super rich. It might be hard to understand why the rich need this when the administration has already gutted the IRS's power to inforce the collection of these taxes and so much of the money is being hidden in off shore accounts.

Cuba & Fidel:

Have you enjoyed listening to Fox News swooning over the possible end of Castro's control of Cuba? Have you noticed them mooning over the wonderful country Cuba was prior to Fidel's rise to power? Cuba was, as any fool knows, one very corrupt country prior to 1959. In fact it was a stronghold of corruption from the moment the U. S. "liberated" it from Spain. The inequality between rich and poor in that country set standards long lusted after by the super rich in the U. S.

The folks at Fox News must be pining over to a return of prostitution and gambling, but more likely they are the mouth pieces of the super rich who long for one more off shore site to hide their money in from the tax collector.

The big question has to be "What happens to the handful of powerful sugar magnets who have engineered the decades long boycott?" Has the Bush administration abandoned these powerful influence buyers?

With the push to expand off shore drilling throughout the Carribean, dare we guess that the forces behind Bush are longing after a friendly island from which to base operations?

Sea Change:

No, not global warming, Al, population shift: Today's New York Times reports on a major sea change occuring in the south, focusing on one county, Atkinson Georgia, where Hispanics now outnumber African Americans and have become the largest minority. According to the Times,

In 1990, Hispanics accounted for 3 percent of the residents in Atkinson County, census data show. By 2004, Hispanics had eclipsed blacks and become the largest minority, with 21 percent of the population. County officials, who say illegal immigrants have been undercounted, believe Mexican immigrants and their children may actually make up a third of residents. (Whites and blacks now account for about 60 percent and 19 percent of the population.)

How does this make the good ol' boys feel?

Elton Corbitt, a white businessman whose family has lived here since the 1800’s, said immigration threatened everything that matters — the quality of schools, health facilities, neighborhoods, even the serene rhythms of small-town life. And he fears that white Southerners here may ultimately become outnumbered or irrelevant.

“The way the Mexicans have children, they’re going to have a majority here soon,” Mr. Corbitt, 76, said.

“I have children and grandchildren,” he said. “They’re going to become second-class citizens. And we’re going to be a third world country here if we don’t do something about it.”

This is but one voice, and we all know the Times likes to make us southern types look foolish. Nevertheless, the article makes for good reading if you want to live with your head out of the ground. The demographics of the U. S. is changing in a dramatic fashion. The world as you know it …

Senate Report Identifies Massive Tax Cheating among Super Rich:

Two of Bush's biggest financial supporters have been identified among the super rich who have been swindling America out of its tax money due to the tune of at least $70 billion. Texas businessmen, Charles and Sam Wyly, have been identified as participating in the off shore scams that have stolen billions of taxes from the government. These people are some of the same people behind the war, who happily send other people's sons and daughters off to fight for oil under the pretext of protecting us from terrorism. And they won't even pay their fair share of taxes while the country heads ever closer to bankruptcy.

You can read more about it in today's New York Times and the Washington Post.

You're known by the company you keep, el presidente.