And while I am at it, I detest Comcast as well.

I've been dealing with a "hi speed internet" connection problem on my home network that has been getting progressively worse. It's now to the point that, at many times, it's no better than a dial up connection. Bad, in other words. Bad and slow. So, I finally work up the energy to call Comcast, because I know it is going to be an ordeal. I sit through their damn automated menu system and push the right buttons, and I finally do get someone to talk to. Lo and behold, this is actually a nice, seemingly helpful person who wants to help me with my problem. Looks to me to be a bad wireless router. If the computers are right next to it, everything is fine. You get 40 feet from it, and things barely work at all. OK, I think I need a new router. After all, this is Comcast's property, they are "leasing" it to me or something. It's their equipment. Finally, the guy on the phone transfers me to someone else called "Xfinity Signature Support." I figure it's now their arm that supports the high speed internet stuff. After talking with this nice, helpful lady for about 10 minutes, I finally figure out that she is attempting to SELL me a support package, which I will have to pay about 20 bucks a month and a one-time sign up fee of $79. All to fix a problem with a service (high speed internet) that I am already paying for from Comcast, that doesn't work, and I want them to fix it. That's all. I am buying something from them that doesn't work. I want it to work. And they send me to some other "fee for service" part of their company that wants to sell me a 20 buck a month, plus a sign up fee, to fix something that doesn't work!

FU, Comcast. Jesus Christ, what happened to a customer focus in American business? Can't they do ANYTHING without trying to soak their customers just a little bit more? Goddamn..... Once I get my energy back, I am going to call back Comcast, and sit through their stupid automated phone menu that takes five minutes before you get to actually talk to a person, and demand someone come out and fix this without requiring me to sign up for some sort of "Signature Service."

The American business mentality sucks so bad. All they can do is think about how to make more money.

Perhaps the one thing that amazes me the most about Republicans is how they have decided that public schools and teachers are the enemy.

To me, this is a really unnerving thing. The one constant throughout someone’s life is that they had to go to school. For people of my age who grew up in non-urban settings, that meant public schools. They were there, you went to them. You may not have liked going to school, but that’s what you did. The teachers were, for the most part, pretty friendly and competent at their job. Even when I moved to a very small town in rural Alabama when I was in high school, there was the school. They did their best with the very few resources they had. Sure, you could bitch a bit about how things could be done better or the crummy buildings, but they weren’t “the enemy.” That would have made as much sense as declaring air or water the enemy, schooling for children was that ubiquituous.

O.K., fast forward to somewhere in the last decade or so. Public schools, in the minds of many on the conservative right, are about as popular as a coven of witches. They are there to “brainwash” your kids with all their talk of tolerance, multi-culturalism and other liberalist ideas (including evolution, of course). Teachers and teacher’s unions are a bunch of greedy, whiney slackers who are overpaid and just flat out terrible at their jobs. And, on top of all that, get three months off a year! Yes, I am sure we can all agree that teachers having to deal with all sorts of students on a daily basis, many of whom come from poor backgrounds, broken home, and may not even have enough to eat everyday, are just lounging in the lap of luxury on their $50K salary.

Worst of all, apparently, is the fact that schools are run…. by the government!! Horrors!

From Washington Monthly.

March, Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum expressed his disdain for public education. “Just call them what they are,” Santorum said. “Public schools? That’s a nice way of putting it. These are government-run schools.”

Campaigning in South Carolina over the weekend, Santorum went even further. (via Steve M.)

Rick Santorum, a possible candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, even raised the specter of Benito Mussolini’s Fascist Italy in a speech here Friday night while explaining why his grandfather emigrated to the U.S. His uncle, he said, “used to get up in a brown shirt and march and be told how to be a good little fascist.”

“I don’t know, maybe they called it early pre-K or something like that, that the government sponsored to get your children in there so they can indoctrinate them,” Santorum said.

There is a fair amount of this talk going around. At a home-schooling rally in Iowa in March, Ron Paul, Michele Bachmann, and Herman Cain — all Republicans who’ve expressed an interest in the presidential race — raised the specter of ending public education in the United States altogether.

This also includes far-right media. CNSNews’ Terry Jeffrey argued a few weeks ago, “It is time to drive public schools out of business.” Townhall columnist Chuck Norris has begun calling public schools “indoctrination camps.”

But I’d note for context that Santorum is a former two-term senator — and he just won a straw poll in South Carolina, which arguably puts him in the tier above folks like Paul and Cain. And in public, he’s comparing public schools to fascism.

Keep in mind, polls show that the American mainstream considers the public education system one of the nation’s most cherished institutions. When asked what areas of the public sector most deserve budget cuts, schools invariably come in last.

And yet, here we are.

"Indoctrination camps?" "Fascism?" And Santorum and Bachmann are not some penny-ante nutjobs. They are some of the "leading names" in the Republican Party and are likely to run for President. So, here's the situation, then. Some of the “most serious” of minds in the Republican Party are not happy with the publc schools. But rather than try to fix them, to put more resources into them so they have a fighting chance of becoming what everyone would like them to be, Republicans have decided that they want to destroy them. “It’s time to drive public schools out of business.” That’s pretty chilling stuff, by any measure.

One of my best friends from back in the 1980’s has become a ultra-conservative. His views apparently match everything I have heard off of Fox News and the Wall Street Jouranal. The unemployed are a bunch of lazy slackers. Unions should be demolished. He is supportive of everything that supports big business. It’s like he has become an entirely different person than the one I knew back then. I don’t like getting together with him anymore, because I know (even if we aren’t talking about it) that everything I hold dear is something is absolutely detests. It’s kind of hard to maintain a friendship with that kind of thing staring you in the face.

Last year, we were having drinks after work and he started off on a number of things that were apparently bothering him. Public schools was one of them. And he was really angry. I thought he was getting ready to punch me on several occasions. He hates paying taxes on public schools, even though his three kids went through their public school and came out of it very well, I think. Then, while he was on a roll, he came out and said what I really think he firmly believes, and that is the government has absolutely no business providing public education. He was for vouchers and private schools. So, once I could find the courage in the face of this anger and hostility, I asked him, “So, you are saying that you want every single kid in the country to go to private school?” He did an abrupt about-face but acted like he hadn’t, saying, oh, no, I just want to be able to opt out of paying taxes for something I disagree with.

That’s a nice thought, I guess. I would have really loved to be able to opt out of paying taxes that went toward two unnecessary wars, tax cuts for the upper 2% who don’t need any more than they already have, tax breaks for huge corporations who move their operations overseas and leave massive unemployment in many communities when they decide that they can get Chinese or Mexicans to work for 10% of what they pay American workers. But I don’t have that option.

But I find it amazing that Republicans don’t seem to understand what I think is a very basic fact. A highly educated population is good for the health of the country and ensures a future in an ever-increasingly competitive world. Do they really want to go back to the 1880’s, where most of the kids of this country just went to work when they were 10 years old and were functionally illiterate? Is that what they really want?

This is not a rhetorical question on my part. I see all the things that conservatives are attempting to tear down these days. The Republican governor in Maine wants to lower the working age for children, at the same time he wants to lower the minimum wage. Some states want to see the minimum wage abolished altogether. We’ve already discussed how many conservatives would like to kill public schools. And we all know how they feel about Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment insurance, and all other aspects of our current society that form a “social safety net” for those who are really in need. Do they really want to see a huge percentage of this country destitute? I just absolutely do not understand their larger vision for our society. All they seem to want to do is transfer even more wealth and power to the upper echolon of American society. But to what purpose? I have never heard anyone on the right even try to articulate their larger vision, past “smaller government” and “taxes are evil.” What do they really expect our society to look like in 50 years if those policies were really enacted?

As I have stated before in this blog, about the only answer I can come up with is that no one (aside from those really rich and powerful people behind these ideas) is even thinking about those larger questions. They have bought into the notion, body and soul, that Democrats and liberals are evil and must be destroyed. And that is not some sort of over-the-top hyperbole. That is really what they believe, and that is the only thing that really matters. That's it. The bigger picture, the one that will occur 50 years in the future, well, I guess that will take care of itself.

If that’s really the case, I am very fearful for this country if these people ever get total control of our government. Because they WILL find a way to never let go of the reins of power again.

Kinda says it all, doesn't it?

Here's a joke making the rounds on the internet....

Just in case you haven't seen this one.

A CEO, a Tea Partier, and a Union member are sitting around a table that has a plate with 12 cookies on it. The CEO takes 11 cookies and then leans over to the Tea Partier and says,"Psst. That Union guy is trying to take part of of your cookie."

If the country is in such a state of crisis, why is increasing taxes on upper 2% off the table?

And why can't we make corporations pay their taxes? That seems to be all that those who are supposedly "in charge" can agree on; we can't increase taxes on rich folks and we can't make corporations pay their taxes. That's it. We could NEVER allow that, for some odd reasoning. And forget oversight and regulations! Heck, the invisible hand of the market will take care of any abuses by insurance companies or major polluters...

But yet, when it comes to everyone else, boy, everything is on the table. Takeaways in wages and benefits, raising the retirement age, doing away with Medicare, Medicaid, "privatizing" Social Security, breaking unions, laying off teachers, government workers, police, etc... Anything and everything that can be heaped upon those who actually have to work to survive and make ends meet is automatically something that "must be done" in order to avoid this future catastrophe.

How did this happen? Why is this country so obviously set up to benefit rich people and richer corporations? Aren't those the very people who have benefited from living in such an open and democratic society? When did actual people become the enemy that must be vanquished?

I suppose this is THE major issue of the day that I do not understand. What the heck is this country for if not to benefit all who live here? Why is it that the powerful always seek more power and the rich will never be satisfied with all the riches they already have? They must have it all, even to the detriment of the rest of the 95% of the country? Is that what this is really about?

I am becoming more and more disenchanted with human beings as a species every single day. I am very attached to very many individuals. I am really becoming to detest my species, however.

UPDATE: Check this out from Whiskeyfire:

Compare income taxes received by the federal government from individuals and from corporations (their profits are treated as their income), based on statistics from the Office of Management and the Budget in the White House, and the trend is clear. During the Great Depression, federal income tax receipts from individuals and corporations were roughly equal. During the second world war, income tax receipts from corporations were 50% greater than from individuals. The national crises of depression and war produced successful popular demands for corporations to contribute significant portions of federal tax revenues.

US corporations resented that arrangement, and after the war, they changed it. Corporate profits financed politicians' campaigns and lobbies to make sure that income tax receipts from individuals rose faster than those from corporations and that tax cuts were larger for corporations than for individuals. By the 1980s, individual income taxes regularly yielded four times more than taxes on corporations' profits.

Since the second world war, corporations have shifted much of the federal tax burden from themselves to the public – and especially onto the middle-income members of the public. No wonder a tax "revolt" developed, yet it did not push to stop or reverse that shift. Corporations had focused public anger elsewhere, against government expenditures as "wasteful" and against public employees as inefficient.

Organisations such as Chambers of Commerce and corporations' academic and political allies together shaped the public debate. They did not want it to be about who does and does not pay the taxes. Instead, they steered the "tax revolt" against taxes in general (on businesses and individuals alike). The corporations' efforts saved them far more in reduced taxes than the costs of their political contributions, lobbyists' fees and public relations campaigns.

If Republicans and conservatives yearn for the "good old days", how about we take a step back to the 1940's on this issue? That's when America was truly great, wasn't it? When we were exceptional? How about American corporations start sharing the load?

No, of course not. I didn't think so.

And now, a word about American Exceptionalism.

There are many incredibly silly political conversations that are going out there right now, but I find this one about how exceptional America is to be one of the more silly ones.

Apparently, anyone’s patriotism and ability to be an effective leader can be called into question, in no uncertain terms, if that person does not express his or her heartfelt belief that the United States of America is the best country on the planet, both in the present and in the entire history of human civilization. Anything that falls anywhere short of that kind of unequivocal declaration can questioned on national television and in print without any hesitation or sense of embarrassment.

I have several thoughts about this. First, this seems like a different flavor of the same kind of thing that went on before the 2008 election where politicians were heavily criticized for not wearing a label pin of the American flag. That was enough to question the non-wearer’s patriotism and love of the flag. This is not some over-the-top charge on my part. I heard my older brother say exactly this.

This is just so extremely silly, I can’t find it within myself to come up with a serious attempt at refuting this nonsense. How can we people put such stock in such a superficial measurement of patriotism? Of course, the truth is that this is, yet again, one more blatant and transparent attempt to smear President Obama and Democrats with anything that Republicans can lay their hands on. If not this, then it would be something else.

The second point is that, even if all this stuff about exceptionalism is true, does that mean we should go around trumpeting it whenever we get the chance? Doesn’t that sort of fit the definition of a braggart? Whatever happened to being humble? Can’t someone (including a country) be great and humble at the same time? Going around, telling everyone who will listen about how great and exceptional you are seems to me have the stink of desperation and, more than likely, a deep but strong inferiority complex. Who, exactly, are we trying to convince that we are exceptional? The British? The French? All of the Arab world? More than likely, they are all laughing at us. No, it is much more probable that we are desperately trying to convince ourselves that we are exceptional and will go after anyone with a steel bristle scrub brush who doesn’t come out and say exactly what our pride demands. Our self-image must be maintained at all cost. Otherwise, who knows what might happen if people really started asking questions?

But here is the aspect of this stupid argument that I wanted to comment on. What, exactly, have we got, right now, to feel so damn exceptional about? What? We have a huge military, of course, with a yearly budget that is larger than all the countries of the rest of the world combined. So, with that, we could claim to be the biggest bully in the schoolyard, giving proverbial wedgies to anyone who might question our claim to superiority. But past that, what have we got?

Here’s where I think we are. We have a massive deficit. We owe many countries in the world lots and lots of money. Our country’s infrastructure, while once impressive, is now crumbling to the point of bridges falling down and electrical grids suffer massive failures because of relatively minor events. Some of our water and natural gas pipes are approaching their second century. There is hardly any investment going on in the country itself. All profits are funneled toward already rich owners and less rich “shareholders.” Everything is geared in this country toward making money for individuals. There is hardly any investment going on. What investment is occurring might actually be criticized as “pork.” Or it is said that the economic stimulus money has never produced a single job? Stimulus money from the federal government intended to kick start the economy and provide some badly needed upgrades in our infrastructure – such as high speed passenger trains or new tunnels between New York and New Jersey – are being turned down by state governments who believe that scoring political points is more important than investing in the country’s future by upgrading our infrastructure.

What do we have to be proud of at this moment? We have a scientifically illiterate population who think that loudly shouted opinions are better than facts and science is somehow the same as reading of palms or astrology. Most of our manufacturing base in this country has disappeared, and some on the right were arguing that we should let our domestic automobile industry fail, in order to placate their God of the Free Market. Our production of raw steel is very low now compared to the rest of the world. We have been surpassed by countries in Asia and elsewhere in the manufacture of electronic devices, both assembled ones such as flat screen televisions and the integrated circuits that drive them. We don’t produce cameras.

The only thing that we seem to be good at is building houses and selling them to each other. And, because of greed, hubris, mismanagement and lack of government oversight, our housing industry drove our financial system to the brink of total meltdown, which requirement immediate government intervention. We have no more customers for houses.

Certainly, there are some things that America still does that are world leaders. Boeing makes pretty good jet airplanes, although this last attempt has been pretty much a fiasco to this point, once again to due myopic fascination with the bottom line. Our automobile industry has certainly recovered and produces much better cars than it did in the 1970’s. We do really good military weapons. Lots of them, and at very expensive prices. And I will admit we are very good at building multi-million dollar sports palaces. The American people must have their circuses to go along with their bread, as long as the circuses are equipped with luxury boxes for the rich and powerful. So, I will agree that there still are areas where American ingenuity and productiveness are still cutting edge. But those seem to be getting pretty few and far between.

So, I will repeat my question. What, exactly, have Americans got that we should feel so self-confident and smug about? What? The rest of the world is eating our lunch in a number of other areas. Our attempts at being “the good guy” on the world stage haven’t done too well since Vietnam. I can’t see that anyone but the totally naïve or those with a political agenda could argue that our ventures into Iraq and Afghanistan have been anything but unmitigated disasters. We have spent over a trillion dollars in our wars with very little to show for our pains, other than thousands of American and ally causalities and hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths. Because those didn’t work out, we apparently have people like Bill Krystal who argue that we should go bomb yet another country in Iran.

Cities like Colorado Springs are so strapped for cash that they are letting parks fall into neglect and can’t afford to run street lights at night. Some places are replacing paved roads with gravel roads, because gravel roads are cheaper to maintain. A fire department in Florida sat and watched a fellow American’s house burn to the ground because he hadn’t paid his yearly fee to the fire department. Our colleges and universities are cutting staff and programs, yet charging more to the privilege of getting a higher education. Many conservatives are openly advocating defunding or abolishing outright the Department of Education. There is almost no interest in trying to upgrade and improve what is admittedly a sorry state of affairs in our public education system. A very large percentage of our post-graduate slots are filled with foreign nationals who will take their education back to their own country to improve it, rather than improve the United States of America.

What have we got to be proud of? Our constitution and democracy as a form of government? Many people on the right seem intent on tearing that apart while, at the same time, accusing Democrats and President Obama of doing just that. Many in our population cannot understand a simple, fact-based argument, or refuse to if it doesn’t fit in with their preconceived view of the universe. The earth is 6000 years old and mankind lived at the same time as the dinosaurs. Global climate change is some nefarious plot by the left-wing of America, which has also apparently enlisted many environmental and climate scientists from England, Germany and many other countries. The irrefutable truth is based on an observation that it continues to snow and be cold in the winter in places that are usually cold and has snow.

Misplaced pride is a very ugly thing, and this “debate” we are having in this country is an indication about how ugly and divisive it can be. I think I am paraphrasing this, but remember that saying, “Pride goeth before the fall”? That certainly seems like, to me, to be very applicable for the United States at this point in our history. Yes, we probably did have a lot to feel rightly proud of in our history. I think both World Wars are a great example. Although we did have a stake in the global picture, we also got involved where we might not have had to. The United States armed forces were a major player in helping to defeat Hitler’s Germany and all the atrocities is held. As an aside, we always seem to forget that the biggest battles were on the Eastern Front, between the Soviet Union and Germany. If those battles hadn’t happened, if Russia had fallen or had sat on the sidelines, there probably wasn’t any way the Allies would have beaten Germany. But that’s a different story for a different post that probably won’t get written.

My point was that, even if the United States was very damn exceptional in the past, that does not automatically bestow greatness upon us from now to eternity. Super Bowl champions must try to repeat their success every single year. Why should we assume that we, being once-exceptional, will always be exceptional? And how in God’s Name could anyone use that to beat upon their political opponents? It just makes them look like opportunistic, narcissistic morons who are too blinded by their own self-righteousness to see how silly they look.

There are several ways that the once-great can become less than great. One obvious way is for a total collapse due to some catastrophe, such as famine or war. Another one, less sensational but no less effective, is a long, slow slide into total irrelevance all the while believing they are still great.

“I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille.”

Hell is full of sludge, tar and oil.

I hope this is the fate that awaits oil executives who deliberately press on with risky oil drilling adventures with no real idea what do to if something goes wrong, even if government regulations require such a plan. This is the place for those who deliberately require their workers to work around their own safety procedures, and for those who threaten to fire any workers cleaning up the horrible mess left if they wear any sort of protective gear or respirators while working in a toxic environment that could harm the worker's health. This is the place for those who pretend to have the authority to arrest people if they attempt to take pictures of the environmental catastrophe, even though the President of the United States specifically requested them to allow open access to reporters and photographers. This is for the executives that "earn" millions and millions of dollars but will find every single way they can to wiggle out of their responsibilities to pay for damages and loss of income to thousands of workers in the Gulf, even after they said they publicly said they would.

There is no Hell great enough for these rapacious thugs of the oil industry. However, as we have seen lately, what really happens is, when the spotlight gets too great, they retire to the English coast and go race their yachts.

There is no justice in this world.

OMG, this is the end of the world as we know it!! But first, a bit about the ongoing NCAA realignment.

As I write this, the University of Colorado has jumped the Big-12 rapidly sinking ship and has joined the Pac-10/11 and counting. The University of Nebraska seems to be about to accept a bid to join the Big 10/11 and counting. All of this could change within the next few days, heck within the hour, so I wanted to give readers a context in which I am writing this.

Well, my take on all of this is that this is a bit like airlines charging exorbitant fees for checking your luggage. 1) To make outrageous sums of money. 2) Just because they can. 3) To keep up with everyone else who is doing it or will be doing it in the very near future. In each case, the welfare and well being of the main players in not the first or even the fifth priority. The airlines do not care one whit about sucking every penny they can from their customers. The conferences are intent on making as much cash as they can. The welfare of their “student athletes” is not really part of the equation here.

In the case of the conference realignment process, there do seem to be some very real and valid concerns here that are driving all this. With money tight all over (except for Wall Street CEO’s and hedge fund managers), it is pretty unreasonable for the universities of this country to expect taxpayers to fund their athletics programs. Even historically successful programs are hemorrhaging cash, and something must be done.

I won’t go further into the reasons behind all this. You can find that elsewhere. I just wanted to put down some of my thoughts and impressions here. I have two college degrees, one from a SEC school and one from a PAC-10 school. I had season tickets to the University of Washington men’s basketball for a number of years, before they started treating their season ticket holders and athletic dept. donors as major sources of revenue that must be milked dry each and every year. But I still watch them on television quite a lot.

Football is driving all of this, of course. Basketball is an afterthought, if even that. Just ask the Kansas and Kansas State, which may be left out in the cold. Having read some of their local papers, they are not at all pleased with this prospect of joining the Mountain West conference. The most hope they seem to hold out is that not all of the potential invitees from the slowly imploding Big 12 conference (Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State) will accept the invitation from the Pac-10/11 and they get picked up as replacements. Having read most everything that is being written on the subject on the west coast, I haven’t ever seen this one proposed as even a long shot possibility. I feel very badly for those schools that will be left out in the cold, just because they aren’t super-desirable. Not terrible, but the circumstances just weren’t “right” for the current situation. That sort of resembles my situation during high school, so I do have some empathy there.

Now, to the Pac-10 or whatever it will be called and whatever teams might end up joining. I can’t see it staying at 11. That just screws up a lot of things, primarily basketball scheduling. Utah seems to be most often mentioned as “Plan B” if “Plan A” involving the Texas and Oklahoma schools falls through. I’m not sure how Utah would feel about all this, being invited into a conference when they know they were Plan B. But hey, pride takes the back seat when it comes to increased money and prestige, no matter how badly you feel you have been treated.

And while I am on that note, I read a lot yesterday about how it was a “slap in the face” of the University of Texas for the Pac-10 to have invited and accepted Colorado FIRST, before Texas. As Steve Martin used to say, “Well, EEEXXXCUSE MEEEE!!!!” Jeez. Is this how this is going to go all the time? They got their collective panties in a bunch because the situation for Colorado was just right and Texas and its little brothers are waiting to see what Nebraska does first? I am really concerned that the Pac-10/11 will be bringing in a LOT of baggage with the addition of the Texas schools, baggage that ultimately led to the likely demise of the Big 12. Will this be an ongoing and continual soap opera? Will Texas actually accept a role where they are not the only “big dog” on the block? Hey, USC (even with the NCAA penalties imposed) is still a heavyweight. Even though, as a UW Husky fan, I don’t like to admit this, the University of Oregon with Phil Knight’s money is a wheeler-dealer. UCLA is one of the biggest names in college basketball. Washington, although down for many years in football, is still a major player, as is Stanford, California, Arizona and Arizona State. Will Texas accept being just “one among many?” I don’t know, but it doesn’t seem really likely, no matter how much money is involved.

I am also wondering about the potential for cultural differences. LA is pretty laid back about most everything, where football may be equal to religion, in terms of the importance it plays in people’s lives, in the state of Texas. How will people from Texas and Oklahoma deal with being in the same conference as those liberal bastions, Seattle and California’s Bay Area? What will they think of the trip to Pullman, Washington (home of WSU)? Pullman is very nice, for a small town with not a lot to do. It is home to Keith Jackson, football announcer extraordinaire, Edward R. Murrow, and the Giant Palouse Earthworm. But it is certainly not a travel destination in any sense of the word. How many people will make the trek from Lubbock, Texas, to Pullman, Washington, to see a football game?

Yeah, if this happens as many people expect, I will probably pay some extra money to see Pac-Whatever sports on the new Pac-Whatever television network. I will probably still go to some games. But I can’t help but wonder what will happen to these soon-to-be mega-conferences that have truly terrible travel arrangements within the conference if the economy really tanks and real hardship continues and increases within the country. Sports, including college sports, in a commodity and, as such, is subject to discretionary spending by its consumers. Will these conferences be able to survive in their bloated states when the customers are no longer beating down the doors because they are too concerned about their own survival?

I have lots of mixed feelings about this. At least my teams will not be on the short end up the stick after this coming nuclear war. My schools will still be part of a major conference, which is a lot more than can be said of many schools that are now part of the Big-12, ACC and Big East. It might be exciting to see Oklahoma and Texas coming to play in Seattle on a regular basis. But something fundamentally is changing here, and that never really feels good unless your current situation is truly terrible. And, truth be told, our current situation regarding college athletics is not terrible. At least for the consumers of the product, it isn’t terrible.

I can’t help but think we are all making a huge mistake, one that we might end up regretting in the long run. The influence of huge money is ruining many aspects of our society. College athletics is no longer pretending to be about anything but making as much money as possible. That doesn’t feel very good. "Student athlete?" Phht. Don't make me laugh. As someone else somewhere on the web said yesterday, we might just as well call these professional football teams that are stationed near colleges.

UPDATE: Yes, well, I rather suspected that things would not turn out as predicted. Texas and the rest have decided to stay with this Big "12". Texas got lured by the promise of a bigger pot of money. They will have their own television network, which I understand would not have been allowed if they joined the Pac-10. There were a lot of other factors, mostly about money. And it appears that someone fabricated a reason to blame the Pac-10 for the deal falling apart, claiming that the Pac-10 all of a sudden wanted to include Kansas instead of Oklahoma State. The Pac-10 commish says this is not true, and I believe that. If they wanted Kansas, that would have been their going in position. They didn't really want Baylor and had no problem about aiming at Colorado instead.

Anyway, the Pac-12 now includes Colorado and Utah. Not necessarily a blockbuster, certainly not a "Super Conference." I would really rather have stayed at 10. But you know, if the Pac-10 was really intent on expanding, I am not at all unhappy with this deal. We have two schools that really wanted to be part of the Pac-10, and I think they will fit within the culture of the Pac-10 very well. They most certainly won't demand that everyone else cave into their demands, which is what I believe probably would have eventually happened with Texas. I read some columns out of the newspapers in SLC, and they seemed overjoyed to now be part of a BCS conference. Welcome, Colorado and Utah.

Now, is this nonsense about done with? Can we stop now?

It's really nice that President Obama takes responsibility for the Gulf of Mexico disaster.

I am wondering just what the hell that means, tho. Does he have an army of deep sea submersibles and giant robots ready to staunch the flow of oil by stuffing material from neutron stars down the pipe at a depth of a mile below the surface? Is he going to order the use of some of our stockpile of nuclear bombs to bomb the open wellhead and shut down the flow of oil?

If not, I am not sure what the hell the President is going to do about this. It is an unfortunate fact that the people who have the most knowledge that might be able to help us out here are the same flippin' people who got us into this mess in the first place. It isn't like the federal government has the technology at hand to fix this.

Now, of course, if this had happened during the Bush administration, we could have had Karl Rove just conjure us an alternative reality of their own making, where millions of barrels of oil weren't going to contaminate every single beach and marshland on the Gulf Coast, kill off all marine and animal life in the area and generally fuck up the environment for decades to come.

So Rand Paul thinks that accidents just happen all by themselves?

Here is a recent quote from Mr. Paul on the ongoing BP-caused ecological disaster.

What I don’t like from the president’s administration is this sort of, ‘I’ll put my boot heel on the throat of BP,’ ” Mr. Paul said, referring to a remark by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar about the oil company. “I think that sounds really un-American in his criticism of business. I’ve heard nothing from BP about not paying for the spill. And I think it’s part of this sort of blame-game society in the sense that it’s always got to be someone’s fault instead of the fact that sometimes accidents happen.”

I cannot begin to explain how many misguided notions and outright lunacy those few sentences contain. And to think that this is from who will probably be a U.S. senator by the end of the year is absolutely frightening.

But let’s talk about that bit about accidents “happening.” Paul’s quote makes it sound as if accidents don’t have a cause. They sometimes just appear for no reason and are totally unexpected. This is absolutely incorrect, and this is a very ridiculous thing to say about very complex, man-made technology. This happens to be an area that I know something about.

Since the beginning of the 20th Century, there has been a study of industrial accidents -- why they occur and what can be done to prevent them. If you put in the correct search words, you can find all sorts of books on Amazon that talks about accidents and their causes. This is a very specialized field of study done by a number of very dedicated and intelligent people. Accidents do not just “happen.” There are causes, usually multiple ones, for every serious industrial accident. The response of our society has been to mandate certain safeguards and minimum acceptable safety standards by the Code of Federal Regulations. Every important and potentially hazardous industry in this country is regulated in this manner – aviation, railroads, finance, drugs, mining, nuclear power… The list goes on and on. We do this for the common good of the American people.

When things start going wrong is when companies start taking shortcuts or bypassing these regulations. This is not to say that these regulations are perfect and, if followed, would prevent every accident. That is not true. But it would be much less likely that a catastrophic accident occurs if the appropriate regulations are followed. And, of course, there is always the inevitable pushback from the industry and their lobbyists. Money and political pressure can do wonders to weaken and even remove protective legalization. Alternatively, companies can just ignore the rules and fight tooth and nail when challenged. This appears to be what Massey Energy was doing when a coal mine they owned in West Virginia, the Upper Big Branch Mine, experienced an explosion that killed twenty nine workers. From Wiki:

In 2009, the company, Massey Energy, was fined a total of $382,000 for "serious" unrepentant violations for lacking ventilation and proper equipment plans as well as failing to utilize its safety plan properly.[18] In the previous month, the authorities cited the mine for 57 safety infractions.[19] The mine received two citations the day before the explosion and in the last five years has been cited for 1,342 safety violations. The CEO of Massey Energy, Don Blankenship, has received criticism for his apparent disregard of safety.[20]

Accidents do not “just happen.” There are causes. They might be from heretofore unknown or truly unexpected causes, but there are causes. In the case of the catastrophic explosion about the Deep Horizon oil drilling rig and subsequent oil release from the bottom of the sea floor, it appears that many regulations were not complied with and many warning signs were ignored. Yet, BP and Transocean pressed ahead. The most important considerations were schedule and cost.

There is a concept called “magical thinking.” I even wrote a post about it myself a while back. But this concept seems to have taken firm root in the boardrooms American corporations and the front line management of American industry. The thinking seems to go, “We don’t need to follow these regulations. They are not doing any good and just costs us money to follow them. Nothing bad is going to happen. Trust us.” That’s what it can be boiled down to. “Trust us. Nothing bad is going to happen.”

This is the thinking that has given us the worst ecological disaster in American history, which no one knows how to fix. Even if these geniuses figure out how to stop the huge flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico today, we will still be faced with decades of the effects of the oil that is already there. This thinking gave us the worst financial meltdown this country has seen since the Great Depression. This thinking gave us twenty nine dead miners in West Virginia.

Accidents occur for reasons, and regulations have been put in place to reduce the likelihood of something going terribly wrong because of the reasons that we know about. Willfully ignoring these regulations in the chase for ever-expanding profits for people who are already rich is obscene.

The corporations in this country, along with the government agencies that are tasked with oversight, need a drastic change of focus and purpose. Regulations are not evil. Accidents do not “just happen.” Unfortunately, I believe that this country is too far gone. Huge corporations are too voracious, too powerful, too willing to do whatever it takes to retain and expand their profits. Following rules are for little people.

It seems to me that Mexico has a very large coastline on the Gulf of Mexico.

That might be one reason it is referred to as "The Gulf of Mexico." So, if huge amounts of oil and dead birds and sea life start showing up on Mexico's beaches, I am wondering what they might do. Can a foreign country claim more than $75 million in liabilities from BP?

I am actually very sorry I feel this way, but I find myself somewhat hoping that the beaches around Miami and St. Pete get really fouled with oil. That should get someone's attention. Finally. I have had it with these cretins that are trying to minimize this catastrophe.

I have maintained, for quite some time, that the stock market is just legalized gambling.

If you know what you are doing, there are opportunities there for you to make a killing. There are also opportunities for you to lose your life’s savings, even if you do know what you are doing. I remember one person at work was very offended when I said that during a discussion. "No, it's not!" It was like I had insulted his mother. That was the depth of his reaction. But I think I have been proven to be correct. The stock market is just one big roll of the dice, in my mind.

May 6, 2010 is a case in point. Getting near the end of the trading day, The Dow Jones Industrial dropped almost 1000 points. It was in total freefall. Brokers were panicking, CNBC “analysts” were panicking, and certainly those people heavily invested in the stock market that set up their Blackberries to get programmed alerts if certain things happen were panicking.

From HuffPo:

At this point no one knows why. Some say it was sudden burst of worries about Greece's debt and the increasing possibility of a default that might cause a run by global investors. Others point to a "trading error." Giant high-speed computers generate millions of trades based on instructions embedded in computer programs designed to move fast enough to beat everyone else. So when there's a glitch in one of them it can immediately spread to all the other programs designed to move just as fast. Some say it was an erroneous trade entered by someone at a big Wall Street bank who mistyped an order to sell a large block of stock, and that the big drop in that stock's price (Procter & Gamble?) triggered "sell" orders across the market.

Regardless of why it happened, it's further evidence that the nation's and the world's capital markets have become a vast out-of-control casino in which fortunes can be made or lost in an instant -- which would be fine except for the fact that most of us have put our life savings there. Pension funds, mutual funds, school endowments -- the value of all of this depends on a mechanism that can lose a trillion dollars in minutes without anyone having a clear idea why. So much of the market now depends on computer programs and mathematical models that no one fully understands, so much trading is in the hands of a few people whose fat thumbs or momentary carelessness might sink the economy, so much of global wealth now depends on who can move their money quickest at the slightest provocation -- that we are toying with financial disaster every day. The luck or foolishness of a few traders, and inside knowledge and information that some possess and others don't, combined with ultra high-speed computers, put us all at the whim of a system whose risk is way out of proportion to any public benefits.

The stock market now is just one more out-of-control element in our out-of-control society, and this event, if there was still a doubt after the the Big Meltdown of 2008, should give absolute proof for anyone willing to actually see. That’s the problem, though. There are very few people who are willing to actually see what is going on and to take action. There are too many vested interests that want to maintain things exactly the way they are.

This is just such an obvious indication (to me, anyway) that we have lost control of the beast who once served us so well. If this article is true and no one really knows what happened, or if they do know for certain that it was some sort of “error” on a big trade that triggered all sorts of computer programs to automatically kick in with their sell orders, then we have big trouble on our hands. This is Frankenstein’s Monster. We will never know when it will turn on its “Masters.”

The stock market is a very strange thing, in my mind. It’s original intent was to provide industry the working capital it needed to invest in itself. Money has to come from somewhere in order to expand. Therefore, stocks and stockholders were invented as a way for the company to obtain the capital it needed and for the stockholders to have an investment in that company. I wasn’t around back then, of course, but my understanding of the early Twentieth Century mindset is that stocks were regarded as long-term investments. They were something to be held on to, rather like U.S. Savings Bonds are today. The stock market was not really invented for people and corporations to make a quick buck or huge fortunes by manipulating their holdings on a daily basis. But that’s what it has become, and everyone has gotten in on the game.

I haven’t trusted the stock market in a long time. I have had almost 100% of my holdings (mostly two 401K accounts) in bonds and stable growth funds. Yes, I know that is terribly, terribly conservative. Financially, that’s who I am. If I don’t understand something, I don’t get involved. And I certainly didn’t understand what was going on in the late 90’s and early “aughts.” As a result, I wasn’t pulling down 15 to 20% a year on my investments, like everyone else in this country seemed to think was some sort of God-given right. If they weren’t making that much, there was something terribly wrong and they were going to go find somewhere else to put their money. I have talked to those kinds of people, so I know that mindset existed. However, all these mutual funds and other types of investments that were packaged such that people thought their investments were diversified all collapsed pretty much at the same time, for the same reason. Many people lost 50% or more of their investments, which they had regarded as safe. My investments, on the other hand, kept plugging away at their usual very slow growth, without a single drop in value through this period. Who knows? Maybe I would have come out about the same if I would have been making all sorts of money on my investments and then lost it back. I might be just about in the same place as I am now. But I know that I didn’t really want to experiment with what I see as my retirement. That is not a place for me to be playing around in something I know that I don’t understand. But yet, I seem to be one of the few people in the country who thought like that. Even now, people and companies are still trying to find a way back to those heady days of 20% return on investments. Maybe so. Maybe those days will return eventually. But I know one thing. Until I can be convinced that our financial system isn’t some sort of out-of-control monster that will turn around and devour its “master” without warning, I know that I am going to remain a very conservative investor.

UPDATE: Via Attaturk.

Reports from CNBC and our own sources suggest that it was a Citigroup (C) trader that accidentally entered a sell BILLION-size sell trade, when they meant to do million.

Since the market came back and only ended down over 3%, all the focus now is on what happened. There's going to be an investigation into Proctor & Gamble (PG) trading, Accenture (ACN) and the market as a whole.

O.K., this pretty much makes my point. Any time we can experience an almost instantaneous meltdown of the Dow Jones due to a single keystroke error, then this system is really screwed and we are f*cked. I don't care if the market recovered pretty quickly. This is a screwed up system. One more thing in our society that no one really understands, but is yet entirely of our making.

UPDATE II: It appears that people who should know still have no idea of what caused this instantaneous crash and almost as instantaneous recovery. People, human beings, are going through a huge number of trades to try to figure out what happened. They don't know. I am very intrigued by several reports that a number of trades were "obviously in error" and were being cancelled. Really? Now, just how do people know that? We couldn't tell with the Florida ballots in 2000. What makes for an "erroneous trade"? And how do you "cancel" them without screwing over someone else? Maybe it was because some huge corporations lost lots of money, and that is what made their trades "erroneous?" I wonder if the little guy is getting as good attention.

This all reminds me of that old movie "War Games", where a computer sort of takes over and mixes reality and a test exercise to the possible elimination of the human species. Rather silly movie, if nothing more than the presence of Matthew Broderick. However, the part about the computer taking over and causing vast destruction, without the slightest comprehension by the people who designed the computer and without a hope in hell of heading off the catastrophe? That seems really plausible right now.

On Human Nature, Safety Critical Industries and Big, Big Money. Part 2.

I rather promised a Part 2 to this post without really having a plan on what I would write about. I was on a roll and felt I could have kept going. Therefore, Part 2 was promised without really having been thought out past a few points I wanted to make. I’ll just start it running and see where we end up.

I just cannot understand what motivates people in safety critical industries, as well as other important industries such as finance and energy, to act as they do. These people are obviously oblivious to the fact of the damage they are doing to other individuals, families, communities, cities and the entire country. Even when confronted with their misdeeds in front of Congress, even though their misdeeds may, in fact, have been legal but sure as hell look to be immoral and unethical, they appear to be confused as to why anyone would actually suspect them of such actions. Sure, they and their company were making millions/billions, but that’s really beside the point. They would NEVER do anything that would potentially harm anyone, even though such statements look to come from a different universe in light of everything that has happened.

My little electrical co-op here in Washington State was responsible for finally getting tapes and documents from Enron released to the general public. Not only did these documents and tapes show that Enron had been systematically bilking the entire west coast for billions by manipulating the energy markets (such as demanding operators of electrical plants to take them off line for “maintenance” during critical times), they were enjoying themselves while doing it. They made fun of “Grandma Millie” who was going to be in dire straits because of their actions. They were laughing about it. From CBS News:

One trader is heard on tapes obtained by CBS News saying, "Just cut 'em off. They're so f----d. They should just bring back f-----g horses and carriages, f-----g lamps, f-----g kerosene lamps."

And when describing his reaction when a business owner complained about high energy prices, another trader is heard on tape saying, "I just looked at him. I said, 'Move.' (laughter) The guy was like horrified. I go, 'Look, don't take it the wrong way. Move. It isn't getting fixed anytime soon."

California's attempt to deregulate energy markets became a disaster for consumers when companies like Enron manipulated the West Cost power market and even shut down plants so they could drive up prices.

There was quick reaction in Washington to the Enron audiotapes first aired by CBS News last night, and the tapes have become part of the debate over the President's massive energy bill.

"People were talking about market manipulation. People were talking about schemes, people were making jokes," said U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.

"While the president would like to have an energy bill, I'd like to have an energy bill that protects consumers," said Cantwell.

Consumers like Grandma Millie, mentioned in one exchange recorded between two Enron employees.

Employee 1: "All the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in California?

Employee 2: "Yeah, Grandma Millie man.

Employee 1: "Yeah, now she wants her f-----g money back for all the power you've charged right up, jammed right up her a—for f-----g $250 a megawatt hour."

I just do not have the words to describe what I feel about such people. But they obviously thought nothing of it. It was high school all over again, where the “cool kids” would act maliciously toward a student or group of students, just to show their power over that student/group. To me, it appears to be nothing more than group psychology at work. I keep thinking back to that now rather famous/infamous experiment at Stanford University. That showed that under conditions that were not all that challenging to set up, you can get people to act in very unexpected and dehumanizing ways toward their fellow humans. Once you set up the ‘norm’ for your group in charge, whether they be a group of
“prison guards” in a psychological experiment or a bunch of energy traders for one of the largest companies in the country, you can get them to do whatever you want them to as they understand the rules to be within that group.

The point I am making, I believe, is that American industry today is nothing more than an extension of that Stanford experiment. All who become members of this controlling group are expected to act and think in a very certain way. Part of that is that they really don’t care about their customers, their employees or their country. All that matters is that the amount of money and power that their group amasses is maximized. As that chilling line from the movie “Alien” goes, “All other priorities are rescinded.”

These are social mores we are talking about here. What is now commonplace would have been unthinkable in the past. We have gone back in time, back to the Gilded Age. I have done some reading about the conditions in the mines back then and why the mining unions became so militant. The robber barons of that era thought nothing of subjecting their “employees” to extreme dangers, all in the name of making huge amounts of money for themselves. The employees themselves saw none of that. It all went to the wealthy overlords of corporate America. That’s the same thing that is going on today.

Things really didn’t begin to change in this country until the Great Depression, which knocked some sense into a few people who took it upon themselves to try to correct the system. FDR implemented the New Deal, which dealt with several concerns such as newly devised banking regulations such that the Great Depression would not be repeated and for economic relief for the millions of unemployed. It’s no wonder that conservatives these days are attacking the New Deal and are trying to blame FDR for the Great Depression. It just doesn’t fit in with their narrative that has become part of their paradigm in their control group. Therefore, it must be attacked. History must be made to change.

I could meander around like this for several hours if I kept at it. I will try to put some sort of conclusion or observation on this.

The point is that all these problems that we are seeing in society today are mostly self-inflicted. There is one group who has become very used to holding the levers of power in this country. Their norm is to maximize their profits in any way they can, all other considerations be damned. Those considerations are outside of their paradigm. What I do not get is how they are able to convince themselves that those concerns aren’t their concerns and that their actions can and often do cause suffering across huge swathes of the population. How can they not understand this? What rationalizations are they using in their minds to justify their actions (such as cutting off insurance coverage to cancer patients who have paid their premiums religiously)? I am convinced that I could never act in that way. So, what is it about the human species that allows this “group think” to take over in a way that is ultimately detrimental to us all? The quest for profits is that strong, even when they already have amassed huge amounts of wealth already? The cost of human suffering is somehow worth it to them, since it isn’t they who are suffering?

I am not at all impressed with the human species. We have advanced far from our origins in the plains of Africa, but to think that we have really become a civilized race is to be deluding ourselves about our nature.

On Human Nature, Safety Critical Industries and Big, Big Money.

I’ve been really suspicious about the commercials that British Petroleum has been running on TV lately. You know the ones, where there are a bunch of “everyday Americans”, talking about the need for “common sense” energy. One of the things that is always mentioned is, of course, drilling for more oil domestically, which means off-shore oil wells. I have always felt that these actors, who were obviously paid and have rehearsed their lines, would include potential energy sources such as biofuels and wind farms as sops. Those are just throwaway lines to make BP look like they care about diversity. I wonder how many wind farms and biofuel projects that BP really has going right now?

No, their main goal was to open up America’s coastal waters for new oil drilling. That’s the entire point of those commercials. BP couldn’t give a crap about developing wind or solar farms. Those produce electricity, which, unless I am severely mistaken, BP doesn’t market.

BP and all their Big Oil buddies were succeeding in their plans. President Obama had already stated that his administration was opening many areas in the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico to more drilling. “Drill, Baby, Drill” goes the refrain. Sarah Palin’s most outstanding accomplishment in the modern lexicon. Thanks to these commercials, and a whole lot of money funneled to politicians (Republicans and Democrats alike), Big Oil had won. They were getting their prize, and they essentially didn’t have to do much more than that.

That is, they had won until BP shot itself, along with the rest of the country, in the proverbial foot by the explosion and sinking of the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform, which killed 11 people. That would have been bad enough all by itself, but now we are left with an open spigot spewing out crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Unless a super-human effort is made to stop it, the resulting slick will foul the beaches of Louisiana and Mississippi within days. Current news stories indicate that the entire pocket of oil might just gush out into the Gulf before the geniuses at BP can figure out how to cap the wound.

I didn’t trust BP before this accident, and I certainly don’t trust them now. The company apparently refused to include a half million dollar safety device that is designed to stop this specific accident from happening. Brazil apparently mandates such safety devices for drilling around their country. Shell Oil apparently includes such devices on their wells, even though the U.S. government doesn’t mandate they be used. The story I saw said that BP didn’t include such a safety device because it was too expensive.

I would bet that BP easily spent a half million bucks on lobbying congressmen. There’s something more than just saving every single dollar that they can. BP and a whole lot of other companies in many other safety-critical industries (such as coal mining) refuse to include basic safety features for their operations and their employees just because they can, because they don’t want anyone to tell them that they must. It is against their principles. No one is going to tell them how to run their business! And that includes, in their minds, including a bunch of unnecessary stuff related to safety that would only slow things down, even though the money and effort spent wouldn’t amount to a drop in the bucket of their overall operations. And besides, what could happen? Trust us. We have it all under control…

I believe that’s what’s behind this. All the news in the last few months about industrial accidents has all include information about the company’s efforts to avoid government oversight and regulation. All of them. The case against the owner of the Sago coal mine in West Virginia is well documented. It was a matter of principle for the owners. They were not, under any circumstances, going to let the government tell them what the must do. Period. I have seen reports of the same thing going on with this and other BP drilling rigs. There was a recent explosion of a Tesoro petroleum refinery in Anacortes, Washington that killed seven people. That plant had a history of safety violations. It is also an unfortunate fact that companies with a history of safety violations, like BP, Sago and Tesoro, always seem to be able to fight against the fines and required fixes, where they end up paying chump change. The result is that nothing happens. Until something really terrible happens, like an oil platform explosion, a coal mine explosion or a petroleum refinery explosion.

That’s how it goes these days. These huge corporations are the ones that actually run the country, given their army of lawyers and lobbyists and a sea of cash they are quite willing to spend on fighting regulations and oversight. They don’t mind spending millions, even billions, to fight against regulations when what they are fighting against would seem to be less expensive in the long run.

This is a matter of principle for them, these “giants of industry.” Nothing is going to change in this country until we have a very large change of perspective. In the 80’s, this was referred to as a “paradigm shift.” We don’t use that term anymore. But that is what we need. But given human nature and the huge amounts of money we are talking about, there is almost a zero chance of that happening.

Part 2 of this later.

Wellpoint Executives are soulless ghouls.

I usually do not wish physical harm on anyone, even those who would seem to most deserve it. However, I am making an exception with the monsters who came up with this one. From Watertiger.

One after another, shortly after a diagnosis of breast cancer, each of the women learned that her health insurance had been canceled. First there was Yenny Hsu, who lived and worked in Los Angeles. Later, Robin Beaton, a registered nurse from Texas. And then, most recently, there was Patricia Relling, a successful art gallery owner and interior designer from Louisville, Kentucky.

None of the women knew about the others. But besides their similar narratives, they had something else in common: Their health insurance carriers were subsidiaries of WellPoint , which has 33.7 million policyholders -- more than any other health insurance company in the United States.

The women all paid their premiums on time. Before they fell ill, none had any problems with their insurance. Initially, they believed their policies had been canceled by mistake.

They had no idea that WellPoint was using a computer algorithm that automatically targeted them and every other policyholder recently diagnosed with breast cancer. The software triggered an immediate fraud investigation, as the company searched for some pretext to drop their policies, according to government regulators and investigators.

Once the women were singled out, they say, the insurer then canceled many of their policies based on either erroneous or flimsy information. WellPoint declined to comment on the women's specific cases without a signed waiver from them, citing privacy laws.

I do not know how these people live with themselves. This is what we have come to? Making as much money as they can now requires that insurance companies find excuses to drop people from their coverage just when they most need it? Oh, we all knew that is what the giant insurance companies were doing all along, but this really hit home. These women are suddenly faced with the fight of their lives, but one that they have reason to think they will be successful, and they find their insurance has been cancelled. Even if they find a way to pay for extended and expensive treatment and they successfully fight their disease, their entire family may end up being bankrupt. No home, no savings, probably no job. Just so some giant insurance company can make just a bit more money on top of the billions and billions they are already earning, and thereby satisfy their “shareholders” and their CEO and executives can get their blood money bonuses? That’s what this is all for? And this is on TOP of the fact that Democrats are trying to change the system and these insurance companies know that the Obama administration has asked them to stop doing inhuman crap like this. They KNOW this is wrong and people want them to stop it, and they can’t help themselves.

These people have no souls. They are inhuman monsters.

And I will bet that Sarah Palin will continue to talk about “Obama’s death panels.”

I hate this country.

Here’s a good question for those who wish for a smaller, almost non-existent government in the United States.

I saw this question posed somewhere on the toobes at some point this week. I wish I had saved the address. I think this is a very good point.

To all those ultra-conservatives who believe that the federal government in the U.S. should be really tiny (e.g., Grover “drown it in the bathtub” Norquist), what exactly do you think would happen next? What form of society do you really want to have?

Do you, for instance, think that there would all of a sudden be a Garden of Eden where all us lovely individuals with lots and lots of freedoms from government would just get along swimmingly? Would all multi-national corporations suddenly behave themselves and have their customers’ satisfaction, money and safety in mind as their first priority? There wouldn’t be any big businesses that would, say, dump tons and tons of pollutants into rivers and lakes so that the entire region would be so polluted that human life might be endangered? Would, perhaps, financial institutions really care about their customers such that their financial interests were protected? Would insurance companies really insure everyone who needed insurance, or would they cherry pick those who didn’t need it? Would airlines, for instance, set up their own air traffic control system so that airplanes wouldn’t run into each other in the air or on the ground? Would electrical power companies build nuclear power plants that were really, really safe, so that an accidental release of radiation could never happen?

What do these people expect would happen if government really stopped paying attention to anything but going to fight wars overseas? Is this really what those people want? These huge corporations have proven, time and time again, that they only thing they care about is making massive amounts of money, and they don’t really care if they being unethical, unsafe or downright evil to do it. All they care is making tons of money, as fast as they can.

Is this really what the proponents of itty-bitty government really want to unleash on our society; a total abdication of oversight of huge corporations that affect our daily lives much more than does the federal government? That is what they want? You think that the rich and powerful would just sit back and “do the right thing” just because there was no federal government to check whether or not they were following the regulations?

That is a rhetorical question, of course. No, these cutthroats would not sit idly by. They would find every single method of being the “big dog” in the country, and if it means that normal people must exist in poverty, in hunger, in the cold and dark, for them to do it, well, that’s capitalism, the best economic system in the world!

Comcast blocks CTV's coverage of the Winter Olympics.

That's just great. NBC gives us really crappy coverage, but Comcast is going to make sure those of us near the Canadian border don't get to watch the Olympics on the Canadian network, which provides far superior coverage. Hell, on the west coast, NBC even refuses to show the Olympics in real time. Everything is delayed. So, even though Seattle is 100 miles or so from Vancouver and is obviously in the same time zone, we can hardly watch anything in real time. NBC must be allowed to package up the Olympics so that they appeal to NBC's ideal viewer. Lots of human interest, mostly all American, put all the high profile sports in prime time, even if that means delaying them for hours or even a day. It was not unusual for me to know exactly who won an event and probably even watched it on CBC before NBC ever got around to showing it.

THIS IS WHY THE COMCAST/NBC MERGER WOULD BE A HUGE MISTAKE! Media outlet providers, such as cable television or high speed internet providers, should NOT be allowed to own the content providers. This is such an obvious example of what will happen if the merger is allowed to proceed. NBC and its sister networks (MSNBC, CNBC, a few others) will be favored over the other networks and those other networks may find themselves blocked.

You don't think that would happen? I do. The avarice of U.S. corporations knows no bounds. They will do anything they can get away with in the chase for as much money as they can possible extract from the system.

I have just one question for Comcast and NBC. If NBC's coverage is so superior, so wonderful, as we are told every two years, then why are they both so threatened by the possibility of viewers going elsewhere? If NBC's coverage were that great, wouldn't we all watch the Olympics on NBC? We wouldn't need to go elsewhere.

UPDATE: Boy, am I pissed of at NBC. I knew the results of last night's short track speed skating at about 7:30, thanks to the "crawlers" on ESPN during a basketball game. But NBC didn't get around to showing it until almost 11:00 p.m. Does NBC really think that no one knows the results? Seattle is about 160 miles from Vancouver, and is in the same time zone, but can we watch the event live? No, of course not. And NBC obviously think we are hanging on every work out of Bob Costas and his guests in their sit down studio. Talk some, show some commercials, talk some more, show some more commercials, show Apolo Ono tying up his skates, show some more commercials, THEN show the race. God, NBC sucks. I hope they lose 100 million dollars.

UPDATE 2: I was in error here. The Canadian broadcast is on CTV, not CBC. And my cable doesn't carry CTV. So, I don't know exactly what was the newspaper story I saw where Comcast was blocking the Canadian broadcasts. But I still haven't changed my opinion of NBC's coverage. It sucks. NBC would rather show Bob Costas TALKING about sports rather than actually showing sports. Cripes. I will say that I do like the fact that the announcers for the ice skating events have toned it down. They aren't talking ALL THE DAMN TIME like the usual do. NBC would provide commentary to a symphony orchestra if they could.

UPDATE 3: I do like to watch curling. That's a pretty cool sport. Sort of chess and bowling on ice. And I think I am in love with the Japanese curling team....

FU, e-bay.

No, really. Just Fuck You. Several times.

I used to be somewhat active as both a buyer and seller a few years ago, but haven't really done anything lately. I had been wondering why pretty much all sellers only advertised Paypal as their only accepted means of receiving payment. When I was looking at bidding on something this week, I had noticed one of them had a statement, "We only accept Paypal per e-bay payment policy." My reaction was, "What?!" I went and looked, and sure enough, their payment policy page has a list of what is acceptable now and what is prohibited. And asking for payment via check or money order, except on a very small list of categories, is prohibited.

There apparently is a raging discussion on a number of e-bay posting boards which I skimmed through yesterday. A lot of people are upset about this. I refuse to have a Paypal account, as I have heard some people have had bad experiences with it. My wife used to have an account which was hacked and some crook ran up hundreds of dollars on it charging tickets to concerts. We didn't have to cover any of those, as our CREDIT CARD company (not Paypal) called us up and asked if these were valid charges. So, no. I don't trust Paypal or any electronic payment method at all.

e-bay's rationale for going this way is pure BS. "It protects both the buyers and sellers!" Oh, bull hockey. Money orders, if you don't trust personal checks because people can and do bounce checks, are perfectly safe. There is no reason to require this, other than perhaps the fact (and I didn't know this until yesterday) e-bay just HAPPENS to own Paypal. Gosh, what a coincidence! And Paypal charges $45 a year to have an account! How about that?

They are doing this just because they can, and it opens up all new "sources of revenue" (i.e., screwing your customers) to them. This is the same rationale as airlines charging $$ for people to pay for checking bags when flying. For a family going on vacation, this can add up to hundreds of dollars, if they check them both ways (which is pretty much a given, I would say).

I absolutely detest Corporate America these days. They are all about screwing their customers and grabbing as much cash in as little a time as possible. This thinking is now so pervasive, we hardly even notice it anymore.

I have pretty much decided to avoid flying whenever I can. Sometimes I can't, but sometimes I can. I am either asking to attend business meetings via a web conference (which has been remarkably successful) or taking the train. Yeah, taking Amtrak for long distance travel takes a while, but it sure is a more sane and civilized way to travel than the zoo that is commercial air travel. And I guess I am now going to boycott e-bay. Screw them.

Poster from Very Demotivational.

Boeing continues its exodus from Seattle.

Boeing has just made the decision to set up a second 787 production line in South Carolina. Actually, “just” is not an appropriate use of the word here, because many believe that Boeing management made the decision quite some time ago and was just playing the leverage game with SC to get more favorable terms. They played the same game as many owners of professional sports teams do. They set up a conflict between the current home and some other location that is just lusting after whatever it is. The owners then use the conflict to pull a power play and use their toy as a bargaining chip to see who is going to give them the most favorable terms. Sometimes they stay (like the Seattle Seahawks that almost moved to L.A. and the Seattle Mariners that almost moved to Tampa) and sometimes they go (such as the Seattle Supersonics, that did move to Oklahoma City). Who is going to give the rich owners even more goodies?

But, for Boeing, the die was cast long ago; Boeing was going to South Carolina. Boeing management had had its fill of strikes by the Machinists Union. (SPEEA, the engineering union, went on strike over 10 years ago and it had a significant impact, but by making membership in the union mandatory for all engineers, that union has effectively been neutered. It will not strike again.) It didn’t matter if there were valid grievances or not. They didn’t like the strikes. This follows their move of corporate headquarters to Chicago a number of years ago. Boeing is, without any doubt, no longer one of the fixtures of the Pacific Northwest.

I have absolutely no doubt that whenever Boeing decides to build their next airplane, such as a replacement for the long-in-the-tooth 737, it will also go to South Carolina. Boeing can make a ton of money by selling the land that the 737 plant current sits on, and they can go somewhere where the infrastructure will already exist, complete with a non-unionized work force.

I’m not going to try to do an analysis here. It’s just one more example of huge corporations existing for themselves and their shareholders. They do not exist for the benefit of their workers or their communities. Those things are seen, more often than not, as the enemy. I don’t know why this should be. Why are people who buy stocks in a company more important than the people who put a huge chunk of their lives into it? To me, that’s an astounding business model and one large proof that, in today’s America, the almighty dollar is the only thing that matters.

I could write some major paragraphs about the 787 program itself, which has been an unmitigated disaster for Boeing. It is over two years late and the first airplane still has yet to fly. It is not a coincidence that this is the first major airplane program undertaken by the company after its supposed “merger” with McDonnell Douglas, in which McDonnell Douglas essentially bought Boeing with Boeing’s own money, and, with the exception of Alan Mulally, who is now departed and the CEO of Ford, put in ex-McDonnell Douglas people into upper management. The program has been mishandled from the beginning, and it is because of how Boeing is now run. But yet, moving to South Carolina is seen as being “in the best interests of the company.” The workers who will lose their jobs were not the cause of this fiasco, yet they are the ones that will suffer.

Seattle will survive this blow, and the blow that will come in the future when the 737 replacement is also built somewhere else. The Pacific Northwest is a pretty vibrant area in a lot of different ways. We still have Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks and some other high-tech businesses. But continued losses such as Washington Mutual (see my earlier post on that subject), major parts of Boeing and the Seattle Supersonics does feel like we are absorbing some major punches in the gut. We are slowly losing what has earlier defined Seattle. Things come, things go, but the quest for the almighty dollar remains.

(Disclaimer: I worked at Boeing for 19 years, before moving on about 9 years ago. I still work in commercial aerospace. Nothing I have said in this post came from any sort of inside knowledge. Everything is readily available from public sources, such as newspapers and the internet.)

Washington Mutual (WaMu): a prime example of the greed and arrogance of our financial institutions.

Every once in a while, a print newspaper actually does some fine investigative reporting. The Seattle Times is running a series on Washington Mutual, which started out as a local home loan business but eventually become one of the main dominoes that contributed to the economic meltdown of the last two years. It is unfortunate that the investigative reporting here is taking place AFTER all this had gone down. Investigating something that has already happened is much easier than investigating something that is currently going on which could have some significant downsides. However, that said, I would still highly recommend this series. Part 1 is here and Part 2 is here.

It’s (unfortunately) a very predictable story. WaMu started out as a small company that had firm principles and treated their customers and employees fairly. However, new management came in, took over, and decided that the only thing that mattered was to grow the company and make huge amounts of money, no matter what.

One very important instrument in how this was accomplished is known as an “option ARM.” Adjustable rate mortgages are iffy enough, if the borrower doesn’t understand what he is getting into. However, these loans came with additional choices. You could pay the entire monthly premium plus the interest, you could pay part of the premium, or you could even pay none of the premium. Heck, you could even pay only a portion of the interest due for that month. The outcome of anyone doing this, of course, is that the amount you owe the financial institution goes up, not down. And when the loan hits a certain benchmark, all options are cancelled and the borrower is stuck with essentially a fixed rate mortgage that has a much larger monthly payment than their original standard fixed rate loan.

All of these nasty little details were hidden in the fine print of the contract, of course. And because the mortgage brokers that WaMu used to sell these loans got very large commissions, they never felt a lot of pressure to tell the potential customer anything that might frighten them off. Rather, these loans were pushed as a great way to save money!

Read this little snippet from one of these stories in the Times:

WaMu did not reward brokers for getting its customers the best deal. Just the opposite. The worse the terms were for borrowers, the more WaMu paid the brokers.

Look at that again. WaMu knowing pushed a business model (through unregulated brokers) to sell their option ARM product to people who they knew could not afford the ultimate outcome. In a number of cases that are documented in these articles, a borrower ended up with a higher monthly payment from the same lending institution than with the original loan! That is unconscionable, in all senses of that word.

However, WaMu didn’t really care. They were making money hand over fist. One big reason they didn’t care is that these loans, which were very aggressively pushed, were also constructed to be sold as part of a package. That’s a very fine business model. They reap huge benefits for risky loans, but because they sell them as “investments”, they take none of the risk for these loans that they knew a large percentage of them would never be paid.

That is the face of today’s financial industry in America. That mindset is all that is necessary to believe that the CEO and upper management are deserving of huge bonuses, when their customers and their own company are going through very tough times. People cannot get out of mortgages they can’t afford. Working families are being evicted from the houses they have lived in for years. What might happen in the future was not a concern to the executives at WaMu, because that was in the future. The only thing that mattered was raking in as much cash as possible in as little time as possible.

Of course, this is the same description that can be applied to any pyramid scheme, where the only thing that matters is to be on top of the pyramid. By the time the entire thing collapses, you have yours and that’s all that matters.

I am always at a loss about how to wrap up a post on something like this. Some pithy insight, some clever reference… But it’s difficult to even contemplate the overwhelming greed and hubris. And, not only that, it's institutionalized greed! It was their business model, just as is the practice of canceling insurance policies of sick people, sometimes VERY sick people, just when they need financial assistance. "Why, that's required if we are to make money. Don't you want us to make money? You must be a socialist...."

This is the one of the faces of the current Republican Party. This is what Republicans stand for, and this is what they are fighting so hard to preserve in their battle against healthcare reform. They are for the top of the pyramid making as much money as they possibly can, by whatever means they can.

Why the other faces of the Republican Party, the fiscal conservatives and the family values Christians, put up with this, I have no idea. The financial institutions in this country are certainly not structured to benefit them.

Oh, yeah. Now I remember. Democrats and liberals are evil, are pro-terrorist and anti-American, and Obama isn’t an old white guy.