The People Have Spoken: But Will the Neoliberal Elites Listen?

"The American economy is no longer based on competition among more or less equal private capitalists. It is now dominated by huge corporations that, contrary to classical economic theory, control demand rather than being responsive to the demands of the market."  - 

D. Stanley Eitzen and Maxine Baca-Zinn, In Conflict and Order, p. 343.

That is the question that must be asked in the wake of an Associated Press- GfK poll on public attitudes toward Social Security, with the primary finding that 53% would rather see taxes increased than benefits cut. Only 36% opt for cutting benefits, by comparison. Well, duh? What would you expect when more than 48% currently rely on Social Security as their sole source of income, and 95% of these people (most infirm, disabled or well over 70)  wouldn't be able to work to make up lost benefits if their lives literally depended on it. So, we can say - according to the time honored cliche - they know what side their bread is buttered on.

In the words of one elder, 77-year old widow Marge Youngs, from Toledo, Ohio ('Poll: Raise Taxes to Save Social Security', Denver Post, today, p. 14A):

"Right now it seems that we're taxed too much, but if that would be the only way to go, I guess I'd have to be for it to preserve it. It's extremely important to me, it's most of my income."

Indeed. But let's first clear up one of Marge's misperceptions: we are NOT "taxed too much". This is imbibing the Repubs' (especially Grover Norquist's) kool aid. As a percentage of GDP taxes are their lowest in nearly 50 years.  Excluding Chile and Mexico, the United States raises less tax revenue, as a share of the economy, than every other industrial country.

THIS is the reality! So, common sense and rational response dictates that raising revenues- taxes would be the primo and foremost solution beyond making cuts which would have devastating effects. In fact, there are good arguments that Social Security benefits ought to be increased. (Especially with a large swatch of retirees not earning squat on interest bearing accounts, and food prices set to soar next year.)

Besides, the simplest solution of all would simply be to expose more of income to payroll tax collection. Currently, only the first $110,000 of income is subjected to the FICA (withholding tax). Obama in 2008 advocated raising the bar to all incomes over $250,000, but even this is chintzy given Social Security's projected shortfalls. The program is facing serious (but not overwhelming, like Medicare) long term problems, most engendered by congress critters pilfering and raiding the program - to the tune of more than $2.56 trillion -plus over the decades, mainly to cravenly hide the actual deficits. (See attached graph.)

The Neoliberal,  lying elites meanwhile want to blame the now retiring millions of Boomers for the Trustees' projection that Social Security will only be able to pay out 75% of benefits by 2033, but they are wrong. The "Boomer" problem was actually solved back in 1983 at the behest of then Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan, and agreed to by Ronald Reagan. To that end, the FICA taxes were increased to 6.2%. But the Neoliberal scum would have you believe that this was never done, or as Robert Samuelson once wrote me in a response email when I noted it in a letter sent to him: "That was nearly 30 years ago, look at all the inflation since." Oh yeah? How 'bout instead looking at all the massive thievery from the program the past 11 years? (See bottom green inset table for amounts raided since 2000).

Why do I refer to Neoliberal scum? Because that is what these miscreants are! They peddle the propaganda that "markets" must rule over all and sundry, but as the quote at the top discloses, "free markets" are a myth and have been since the 1920s-30s, or maybe earlier. Never mind, the Neolibs don't want anyone violating their precious Pareto optimality conditions, meaning no one ought to be collecting diddly simply by meeting a certain age requirement or breathing.

Perhaps the best summary take ever on the Neoliberal vermin was penned by Baltimore Sun columnist Jay Bookman more than 15 years ago ('The New World Disorder Evident Here, Abroad')

"The global economy has been constructed  on the premise that government guarantees of security and protection must be avoided at all costs, because they discourage personal initiative. In times of crisis, however, that premise cannot be sustained politically. In times of trouble it is human nature to seek security and protection and to be drawn toward those who promise to provide it. That is how men such as Adolf Hitler, and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin came to power, with disastrous consequences. "

This correctly sums it up, and why the Neoliberal -"pro market god"  Elites will likely ignore the latest poll, as they've ignored others. Thus, look for the Neolibs in both parties to recommend instead adopting a disgusting revision of the COLA, probably in the form of the despicable "chained CPI" which assumes when prices of say bacon go higher, the elderly will turn to Spam, when Spam prices go higher, they will turn to small pieces of beef jerky, and when those latter go higher, well they will turn to cat food. In other words, we call it the "Catfood Progression Indicator" COLA. You "progress" to cheaper and cheaper options as your grocery bills keep increasing.

In terms of who is trusted more to protect Social Security, Obama and Romney poll almost neck and neck with the Mittster getting 44% support and Obama 47%. I suspect Obama is within the measured uncertainty mainly because of his ill-advised "Deficit Commission" which played directly into the Neolibs' disgusting hands and onto the Repuke -Norquist wicket. (Tabbing two Neolib whores, Alan B. Simpson and Ernest Bowles, to head this commission didn't help) Worse, was when Obamanites remotely mentioned using the Chained CPI as a "solution" - confirming many oldsters' worst fears that Obama might not be as protective of Social Security as he'd earlier let on. This has died down for now, but we are still reading of ominous news items that - if re-elected- Obama intends to "cooperate more" with Republicans next year on getting legislation passed. I thought we already proved that's a non-starter, Mr. Prez. I say if you win, use your "political capital" and tell the repups to fuck themselves. Drop the Nice Guy persona already! Keep up the Chicago tough guy shtick. You're gonna need it!

Sadly, too many of the young under-30 sprats have imbibed too much kool aid. One guy named "Jeff Victory" quoted in the D. Post piece blabbed, ignorantly:

"Barack has already shown he's going to give anything free out to everyone he possibly can. I'm going to go with Romney on that one."

Oh yeah? Then you deserve to suck on the shit balls that Romney will serve up and which you will be expected to live on, if you make it to 65 or 69 (if the Rs get their way and increase the age for full benefits). Another thing this moron misses is that Social Security is NOT welfare, it's not "free" - we have paid into it our whole working lives! Maybe we can make excuses that this moron saw the moronic new movie "Obama's America 2016" or some title to that effect. (What I couldn't believe is the report in today's paper that it reached number 8 at the box office with a $6.2 million take. I could not believe that many stupid people were willing to shell out good money to watch propaganda, especially from a Neoliberal hack named Dinesh D'Souza.  Then I realized most had to be Repubs, or Ayn Rand Groupies.

The bottom line is if Obama is re-elected, as he ought to be, he needs to lay out a serious plan to save Social Security and one that doesn't entail using "Republican " solutions! That would not be why we re-elected you, Sir!

A Time Cloak: Did Physicists Really Make Events Undetectable?

Sometimes curious papers appear in dry physics journals, whether Physical Review D, or in this case, The Journal of Optics. For the paper in question, the author – one Martin McCall of Imperial College, London, proposed splitting a beam of light into 2 components moving at differing speeds. Let one component have speed v2 and the other v1 and if v2 > v1 then the first component would build a lead on the slower one, thereby opening up a complete gap of darkness between them. In this way, any event occurring (or deliberately inserted) within the gap would be undetectable.


One would basically have a “time cloak”.

McCall went one step further, proposing the re-integration of the two components before the information-bearing total light beam reached an observer. (Keep in mind it is precisely light which makes events visible in time). In such a scenario, there’d be no way to determine or detect the darkness gap ever existed in the first place.

While McCall didn’t construct this device – he estimated 5-10 years to complete- he was correct in that ultimately a team of physicists led by Alexander Gaeta, did develop a device (which he called a “time lens”) that could alter the speed of light for a specific beam. Recall here, again, from my earlier blog that light alters its speed when passing through a material.

When transiting to a higher density medium, the velocity of light slows, and conversely increases in moving from higher density medium to lower. The time lens combined the two processes by intersecting a pre-existing beam of light with a laser just as the former passed through a glass fiber. Gaeta's original objective, however, had nothing to do with time cloaks. It was to slow down a light beam enough to measure rapidly changing phenomena such as in controlled explosions.

It was only after he’d read McCall’s paper he realized he could also use the time lens to speed up one segment of a light beam and slow down the other. Thus motivated, Gaeta and his crack team assembled a network of optical fibers with lasers and time lenses scattered along the route. On one auspicious say in April, 2011, Gaeta happened to send a light beam into one end of an optical fiber, then through his time lens splitting the beam in 2.


As McCall had earlier theorized, when the leading segment surged ahead a “time gap” was created and widened. By the time the split beam had traversed one kilometer (about five eighths of a mile) the time gap reached 15 trillionths of a second. At this maximal gap point the experimenters fired a laser across the conducting fiber, introducing a fiducial mark or marker.


Now, in the scheme of observation in a normal time sequence, when a laser beam impacts a beam of light, its color change indicating a change of frequency. In Gaeta’s team’s case, however, the created darkness gap worked to perfection. By virtue of the laser transiting the darkness gap or time gap the color of the beam remain unchanged, in other words the putative color change event was cloaked.

Now, the most intriguing part of the experiment: after transiting another time lens which had the reverse effect on the light components (i.e. speeding up the slower segment, slowing the faster one) the re-integrated beam reached its end point and with the exact same properties as when it began. Hence, no outside or independent observer would ever have been aware an intercepting laser was fired. THAT event was “cloaked”.

Nonetheless not all physics research venues were impressed. The editors of the journal Nature (to which Gaeta originally submitted his claim) demanded a time gap be created at least three times larger than the one in the experiment, or 45 trillionths of a second. They deemed the experimental value too low (and likely too much within the standard errors) to be worthy of publication.

Not to worry, on borrowing equipment from six other labs, and scouring Cornell’s Physics labs for amplifiers, Gaeta and his team got the time gap up to 40 millionths of a second, and a light sensor in the experiment confirmed the cloaking of the event. Of course, with all that effort and a fine result, Nature finally accepted the paper for publication.


Gaeta’s next goal? Increasing the time cloak to billionths of a second extent, which will require twenty times more power. Is there a possibility to have macro-scale time cloaks (on the order of minutes) for events, say to enable a team of black ops to carry out an assassination and then cloak the event? Doubtful! The power required would likely be larger than all the physics labs and amplifiers on the planet could provide.

Not to worry, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is partially funding time cloak research to see what more can be done in terms of expanding the time gaps.


Stay tuned!

Conservatives Donate More to Charities Than Liberals? So What's the Mystery?

The local Libertarian rag today again makes much ado about nothing with its fatuous editorial entitled ''Conservatives Give More Than the Left' (p. A17) citing endless percentages, stats from The Chronicle Of Philanthropy, and to the final end of bloviating that "10 Republican leaning states" give more to charity than the "ten most left-leaning states" (nine of which went to Obama in 2008).  First place goes to Willard Mitt's Mormon haven of Utah, which is no surprise since much of that "charity" (As a Rachel Maddow report noted some 6 weeks ago) ends up in political coffers, and probably 60% of Mitt's "donations" fund his own campaign. 2nd place went to Washington, D.C. home to "large numbers of Baptists and Catholics" - but the Gazelle fails to note it's also part of the 4th wealthiest region in the U.S. - together with Howard County, Maryland- home of thousands of lobbyists earning over a quarter million each per year.

The "top five" philanthropic states are rounded out by Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee. The Gazelle explains this by being in the Bible Belt and the fact that "Believers are encouraged to give and not just to neighbors".

But therein lies the rub. Unstated is the fact that too many of these religious charitable givers are also hard core individualists who'd rather see their kids get Rickets or be malnourished than take a "handout" from government. (Yet, incredibly, red states with military outposts are quite content to grab as much as they can.)

But that's exactly why pro-government liberals donate less, because they sure as hell don't wish to create even more of an excuse for government to do less and abdicate its own responsibilities, i.e. to "promote the general welfare" - using the tax commons. The reason is that charity alone will never fill the enormous holes created by recession and major economic dysfunction, most of which is endemic to a Darwinian system used by the wealthiest against everyone else. (Based on the Pareto Distribution and Pareto "Optimality")

An article in the Free Inquiry issue of January, 2009, entitled 'The Future of Religion' highlighted the problem. The primary finding is that religious belief and activity (inlcuding charitable giving) is a superficial coping mechanism easily cast aside when the majority in a given society enjoy true (not faux) democratic government, and a secure, comfortable and middle class lifestyle. Those who claim the universality of religion or that it is integral to human nature commit the basic selection effects error, in that they conveniently overlook the data showing broad secularization of western Europe, Anglo-Australia, Canada and other developed nations.

Since the U.S. is a nation which is now seeing that lifestyle eviscerated, because of  globalization (outsourcing of jobs), austerity attacks based on tax cuts (reactionary Keynsianism), and military adventures, then it follows that inequality is mestastasizing, and people are becoming more and more dependent on religion....and religion's purse strings.  In fact, the article shows the primary reason the U.S. is a statistical outlier in religious belief (relative to the European advanced nations) is income inequality (as measured by the Gini coefficient).  This index has seen inequality increase ever since Bush Jr. was handed his presidency, compliments of the five Supremes, in 2000.

Meanwhile the U.S., with its historically lower taxes, fewer public safety nets, and more poor than rich (by more than a 25:1 ratio) displays a greater disparity than any other nation. Moreover, it displays a much greater social pathology. Understanding the basis of this pathology doesn’t take a genius. As anyone with more than air between the ears can see, on examining state by state budget deficits now exploding, in every case “re-balancing” is being done on the backs of the poor, the disabled, the elderly and the homeless. The results are predictable: loss of health care, loss of jobs and loss of overall security, as well as increase in drug use, violent criminality and prostitution.


Believers, especially in the Bible Belt, will then attempt to fill the gap because they accept that: 1) their Bible tells them to do so, and 2) they detest the very thought of the government doing anything for them, or their kin, neighbors. Hence, their charitable giving is believed (falsely) to have kept the government to a minimum. But it hasn't. The truth is there are now 45 million on food stamps,  up 58%  from 2008(according to The Economist, 7/28/12, p.23), and 54 million on Medicaid, up 21% over the same interval (ibid.). The amount of charity that would be needed to leave government out of the picture is actually some twenty five times more than the actual volume of charitable giving!

Hence, Leftists giving more will not alter the landscape or make it more hospitable. What is needed is MORE government assistance, in extending and increasing food stamps support, as well as unemployment insurance ....given that nearly 14 million are still looking for jobs.  Ironically, in spite of this, Americans claim levels of satisfaction and happiness similar to those in the Euro-secular advanced societies. This clearly suggests, as noted by the FI piece, that Americans use religion and their religious (or spiritual) beliefs as a form of self-medication to alleviate the chronic stress attendant on the knavish, neo-Darwinian society they inhabit.  Giving donations for their capitalist oppressed neighbors therefore enhances this feel good sense, despite the fact it simply isn't adequate to the task.

For example, to make charity ends meet and fill the gap in the absence of the government, those rich Catholic and other lobbyists in DC would need to give about 14.9% of their income, not the cited 7.7% Similarly, all the other alleged generous conservo states would need to at least double up on their giving. In the end, with a new recession, even that couldn't be sustained, and we saw how food pantries emptied  their stocks in weeks after the 2008 recession and stock market collapse - and were hard pressed to refill them. 

At least the local rag did get the perspective on us progressives correct:

"Most blue staters are not heartless wretches who want to horde money. Instead they want government to raise taxes and resdistribute the wealth."

Bingo! You got it, Sparky!

Want To Vote Romney-Ryan? Better Have $1 MILLION Saved!

Watching the morning news this morning I almost laughed so hard that my toast nearly was ejected across the room. It appears while "seniors in Florida" don't desire any major changes in Medicare, by something like 64%, the actual polls don't bear this support out. We know Romney and Ryan intend to implement a voucher plan for all those under 55 but these seniors still plan to  vote for that pair by nearly 61% to 39% over Obama. What gives? Are they all suffering from dementia or just slow on the uptake? (One of the analysts on MSNBC observed with great pith and moment that "seniors still haven't connected the Ryan plan with any changes to Medicare")

Of course, many seniors will fall for the selfish meme that "they" - have nothing to fret over if they're in the goodie age bracket of being 55 or over. This is a crass, narcissistic mindset, as I observed before, because by taking such a myopic stance these seniors are spitting on their nieces, nephews and progeny who will be hostage to the Ryan voucher system.

But let me examine the consequences of a Ryan plan in more detail, say for a "marginal" couple (one of slightly different ages).   The real case I will be looking at,  was outlined in an AP story today. Mike, the older O'Malley is 55, and Sharon is 53. As the piece notes:

"Under Ryan's plan, Mike, the older O'Malley would qualify for traditional Medicare in about another decade. Nothing would change for him."

The piece notes that Mike ecstatically replied: "Well, I'm covered."

Yes, indeed, you are. But what of wifey, Sharon? According to the AP piece:

"But Sharon in the new program, would have decisions to make. Whichever way she chooses, eventually she might have to pay more for health insurance than Mike, if costs grow faster than the amount the government provides"

Good! We have a fiducial mark! Now, let's cut the crap and acknowledge that based on the history of medical costs in terms of treatments, premiums, prescription meds the past ten years, the probability of such costs not going up is about the same as space aliens  landing on my lawn tonight and inviting me to go on a jaunt to Zeta Reticuli. In other words, essentially zero.  In fact, medical costs overall have risen at an average annual inflation rate of as high as 14% and as low as maybe 9%. Let us assume a median rate then of about 12.5% for the forseeable future, well into 2040 for the "Ryan plan" seniors like Sharon. (Assuming the Romney-Ryan axis gets in, which believe it or not, one computer model from the Univ. of Colorado has actually forecast. I don't buy it, of course, unless the Dems sit on their butts and don't react to all the nascent GOP voter suppression tactics.)

Right now, seniors on Medicare are advised to have at least $250, 000 or a quarter million saved - to cover just their extra medical costs. These are things the senior must pay which the gov't won't. Let me give a bit of a rundown now for myself. I am paying $4,900 out of pocket a year now, for the Medicare standard premium ($100 a month) and the balance for a Medicare "Plan F" supplement, and the Prescription D drug plan.

Covered in my Plan F so far have been seven sessions prescribed (by my primary doc) for physical therapy (pulled back muscle)  at $180 per session, and a $985 prostate biopsy. Not covered have been expenses for new eyeglasses ($375 - including eye exam) and dental work (new crown) including two dental cleanings, for about $1,500. As people can see this isn't chump change, and nooooooo.....you don't get to say you will "do without" the dental work, or the glasses! Also not added is $500 for deductibles for Part F and Part D plans. Oh, I also forgot $175 for dermatological exam and about the same for ENT exam and vacuum cleaning of the right ear.

Anyway, the total costs via traditional Medicare come to $5, 900, and if the total is added up - as it would be for voucher recipient who's allotted a fixed amount of money each year: $9, 870.

In other words, if you are awarded a $10,000 voucher - as Sharon is liable to be (I believe the $15,000 is total bunkum given a Ryan-Romney ticket and their doubled down Bush tax cuts will have compiled another $10-15 trillion in deficits by 2023 - even if the Ds get back in in 2016) you will have used up almost all your allottment. And that is based on costs THIS year! In fact, Sharon will not be on it for another twelve years, meaning 2024.

Projecting her annual medical costs by then (from a similar layout of needs such as I had, but excluding the prostate biopsy) we come to $13, 333. And that's just her first year.

Bear in mind also, I am making ginormous and likely totally fantasy -based assumptions. The first is that the actual voucher given her IS really $10,000 and not $7,000 or $6,000 ("Oops! Sorry, folksies, the deficits the last five years have been much bigger than we planned, 'cause of all the Bush tax cuts we extended!")

The second assumption is that she's actually able to obtain a private insurance plan! Bear in mind, for what it's worth, if Romney -Ryan get in and have the benefit of a large enough GOP edge in congress, they plan to kill "Obamacare". That means insurance companies will again have "pre-existing conditions" on the table, and for her own sake, Sharon better not even have one pre-cancerous mole!

More likely, insurance companies will hedge their bets on taking chances by adding a large deductible - similar to the ones I encountered while seeking private plans when I was 63-64. The lowest one I could find was $5,000.

If then this is added to the tab, we come up with $18,333 for Sharon's first year of being on Ryanized vouchers. That means she will have to cough up $8, 333 out of her own pocket. Project that ahead for 30 years, as do most financial planners, and it comes to $249,990. But this isn't factoring in enhanced medical inflation owing to the "Boomer demand effect" (recall the law of supply and demand!) - and bear in mind the demand for medical care will likely explode with all us geezer Boomers also seeking it. I don't think, in such a case, that 15% a year inflation is too much.  Assume then a "steady" medical inflation uptick rate of 15% per year, and you obtain the new total that Sharon will need to save up to cover 30 yrs. of out of pocket expenses as: $1.12 million.

Ok, look, some nabobs and nitpickers will assert this is "exhorbitant", and I do agree- but don't blame me- blame Ryan's voucher system. Nonetheless, it's still a practical estimate since one huge item I've left out (to reinforce that), is the cost she'd have to absorb for any major operations, say like open heart surgery, or hip replacement or whatever.

Right now, under standard Medicare, those major operations are covered up to 80%, meaning the beneficiary pays 20%. So for a major cardiac operation, costing say $750,000 in 2026, Sharon would have to cough up $150,000. BUT, that'd be under traditional Medicare! Under Ryan's voucher system, that wouldn't apply and there'd be no regs to cover patient costs. I suspect a good estimate is the patient contribution would be 40% so she'd have to pay $300,000 for such an operation. If she got breast cancer, and needed a 6-12 week chemo regimen as well as surgery (mastectomy) , the cost would likely come to over $280,000. But in my calculated scenario for out of pocket expenses, I am excluding all such major expenses  Hence, by way of the typical "Fermi problem" while some factors may be over-estimated, others are under-estimated to compensate.

Here's the real kick in the gut, according to Bonnie Burns, a 25-year Medicare couselor in charge of advising people about benefits and quoted in the piece:  The spouse with the Ryan voucher plan will suffer from "health care envy". Well, you don't say, Bonnie! If I had to pay hundreds of thousands for health care more than my spouse I guess I'd be envious too! Question is, why don't today's seniors simply avoid that fate altogether and not vote the Rich Guy ticket?

Bottom line: Sharon better have saved a lot of moola  (just for her medical care) by the time she turns 65 if the Romney-Ryan axis prevails in November! If not, she better hope hubby Mike wins a lotto, or leaves her with the equivalent of a lotto-magnitude life insurance policy....if he croaks before she does.

Now We KNOW Catholic Bishops Are Repug Stooges!

Well, maybe the Catholics ought to maintain more control of their media outlets, because these days there's nothing a media center can broadcast that won't be picked up by a secondary source. And so we have the spectacle of the Eternal Word Television Network  (EWTN) leaked word of Cardinal Timothy Dolan’s forthcoming benediction and appearance at the GOP convention last night in a press release. This is related to  Romney’s exclusive appearance, to be aired tonight, on the program “The World Over.”   Note: EWTN, was founded by the nun Mother Angelica in 1981, and had been recently acquired the National Catholic Register (“America’s most complete and faithful Catholic news source”), which sued the Obama administration in February, charging the contraception mandate "violated its First Amendment rights".

This was not that long after the miscreant Tim Dolan himself proclaimed, concerning the proposed contraception provisions in the Affordable Care Act ('Catholics Hit Rule on contraception', WSJ, Jan. 27)

"It is a literally unconscionable attack on religious freedom"


Don't they ever learn! Bear in mind, "religious freedom" is the last refuge of religious scoundrels, and bullies. They have no more respect for liberty or freedom  than the Nazis had for the Jews at Auschwitz. Indeed, these same asswipes helped to rescue Nazi-SS butchers along ratlines to South American during and after World War II.

For those who may be interested, this site 

- with excerpts from the book 'Blowback: America's recruitment of Nazis, and its disastrous effect on our domestic and foreign policy' by Christopher Simpson, Collier / Macmillan, 1988- is very informative. Particularly in the Vatican's role in smuggling Nazis out of Europe - with U.S. (CIA, actually then, OSS or "Office of Strategic Services') assistance. Also the role of Intermarium is clarified. I do hope people-readers find it ironic that a cabal that helped Nazis and SS butchers escape would proclaim so much moralism now with birth control! Or more accurately, allowing non-Catholic women (mainly workers at Catholic institutions) to access it.

Keep in mind that Roman Catholics are perfectly entitled to mandate the withholding of contraceptive services for their own Catholic members, but may not do so for the general public that has no other alternatives or recourse than to go to a Catholic hospital, or work at some other Catholic institution - say like a school. Hence, if I as an atheist am teaching at such a school, I need to be able to secure these contraceptives for my wife if she should need them. To say I can't based on the fact the school is religious, is an infringement of my rights as a citizen. And certainly, if the Catholic Church is to continue to enjoy tax free status as a religion, it needs to keep its nose out of issues that don't concern it, namely those affecting non-Catholic citizens, irrespective of where they work.

Anyway, the just leaked EWTN news makes it clear that Willard Mitt (the selfsame a-hole who intentionally walked a blind teacher into a door while a preppie) intends to make the same bogus, irrational and unsupportable arguments as the National Catholic Bishops Conference and their lackeys and stooges (the same lot that bullied the nuns belonging to The Leadership Conference of Women Religious.) Thus watch these fools focus on the notion of "attacking religious liberty" and "religious infringement" despite there being no such thing!

What will come out of it, however, is that the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops and their toadies are attached at the hip to the Repukes, the same lot that plan to destroy Medicare for anybody younger than 55, so that they will need at least a million extra bucks saves to partake of health care. (See my next blog).  Also, the same lot that has full intentions to destroy the poor - cutting food stamps, and ripping away Mediaid - so millions of kids will not only suffer malnutrition but outright starve as their frail bodies waste away-  while tens of thousands of rich pigs dine each night on caviar after their rose wine wraps.

These are, remember, the same vile pigs and oafs who moved child molesters around from parish to parish so they wouldn't face justice. And now their victims are still trying to seek justice. Why would either of these odious groups - the USCCB or the Repugs have anyone of integrity backing them? That is a question that remains to be answered. Right now, the only one I can think of is that millions are suffering from "Obama Derangement Syndrome" and perhaps need to ask for some electro-convulsive therapy at the first opportunity.

And certainly before November 6th!

HDR Radiation Treatments: 2- 3 Weeks Away

Readers following my earlier blogs to do with the progress of the assorted tests, prostate biopsy and end finding of cancer, may be wondering whatever happened to the HDR (high dose rate) brachytherapy treatment - which I assumed I'd have within a week or two. Well, not quite at the particular site chosen for this treatment! Evidently, they are backed up "for months" - based on a phone call yesterday from one of the staff  drs. - but she also offered that the Chief Radiation Oncologist might be able to find a spot for me within 2-3 weeks. (Okay, 2 is probably optimistic.)

She emphasized that, having reviewed the pathology slides (sent to the site from the local urologist) there was "no need for urgency" and sometimes schedules were delayed for months. However, since my wife is already known at this particular site, there is the chance - actually good chance- we can get this taken care of before the month of  September is out.

As some readers may know, I elected to have this (radiation) treatment rather than surgery because I'd read way too many accounts of long term (5-6)  months'  tortuous recoveries and side effects, including having to use catheters, incontinence, erectile dysfunction, dysuria and other problems - usually arising from the surgeons (even robotic) having to cut into key nerves and the urethra then patch it back. (After all they are removing a whole gland here). I wanted instead, a treatment that would free me up from such adverse effects within days or weeks, or eliminate them altogether. Hence, chose HDR monotherapy.  I also elected this over the LDR seed variation for the reasons cited in this abstract.

Basically, it entails - to briefly summarize- first getting a whole bunch of medical interviews and exams done, then immediate preparations (including enemas, etc,....again!) followed by imaging  - which may include Catscans, MRI - and definitely entails introduction of an ultrasound device as the prostate is located and Ir 192 needle placement computed and confirmed. After that's done, based on the model needle projected positions, a small "template" with the needle positions integrated into it, is "sutured" to the perineum.

The first treatment then follows with the 12 or so radioactive needles (enclosed in thin plastic catheters or 'sleeves')  introduced through the template's holes into the prostate. Yeppers, it does or would hurt like holy hell, which is why they give you an epidural  (local ) anesthesia. The treatment lasts 5-10 minutes (after all it is HIGH dose rate, so they can't leave 'em in too long!) and then you go back to your hospital room and wait for the next. Usually within 12 hours. All the time you cannot move about the place, or amble to the bathroom,  so you have to have a Foley catheter inserted.

The same 5-10 min. treatment then follows, and usually - this is enough. You're then discharged once they determine that: a) you can pass urine without the catheter, and b) the urine is clear, no blood.

The chief radiation oncologist will return from vacation on Tuesday, and when he does it's likely we will be able to narrow the time for treatment, or when to expect it. Until then, I will keep the blog rolling!

CBO Report: Presents the U.S. With a Lose-Lose CHOICE!

In one of the Star Trek movies, I believe 'The Wrath of Khan',  a computer-generated simulation test - called the "Kobayashi Maru" -  is given to a budding young Star Fleet cadet. The test ends in disaster with all on board annihilated by Klingons, and it's only afterward the cadet is informed it was really a "no win" situation. In other words, whichever strategy she selected would also have ended up in major loss, including destruction (or boarding) of the Enterprise.

This resonates with an article entitled 'When to Choose is to Lose' which appeared in the Sept./Oct. 2007 Psychology Today (p. 69) noting that in an era of downward driving indicators, i.e. deficits, unemployment for economics, it is essentially impossible to make a single "winning" choice that maximizes gains and minimizes losses. As the author of the piece notes, striving to maximize your choices, only makes sense when they are obvious and few - not otherwise.

This also correlates (and indeed is indirectly based upon) author Barry Schwartz's ('The Paradox of Choice') take on "opportunity costs", "upward counterfactuals" and "downward counterfactuals".  To be brief here, because I want to get on to the just released Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Report, "opportunity costs"  (p. 120) entail the costs involved when we must pass up another option. In other words, the benefits that would have likely accrued with that other option, are passed up and hence interpreted by us as "costs".

According to Schwartz (p. 154) , "upward counterfactuals are imagined states that are better than what actually happened, and downward counterfactuals are imagined states that are worse"

A circumstance for downward counterfactual thinking might be a guy who's done reasonably well for himself - has a decent, fairly good paying, steady job but fancies a better, more responsible position, say higher up. But in an environment of high unemployment, and tight fisted corporate money,  he imagines being flat turned down and moreover told not to expect any such positions in the future - and hence contents himself with his current station.

By contrast, if the guy engages in upward counterfactual thinking he imagines not only getting the higher position but a lot more money, plus perks, to boot.

But what if the guy then doesn't get that job, as his upward counterfactual imagination implodes? Then we can say he will likely be quite depressed at the outcome. As Schwartz notes, it is only in the case of the upward counterfactual thinking where the success is denied that diminishes the guy's sense of achievement. He concludes,  ibid.:

"So generating downward counterfactuals might engender not only a sense of satisfaction, but a sense of gratitude that things didn't turn out worse."

Now, let's flip to the just issued CBO report , the main highlight of which is a projection of only 0.5% growth next year, and 9.1% unemployment, if the "fiscal cliff" isn't avoided. Thus, the CBO warns that unless congress acts, i.e. to approve extending all the tax cuts, including payroll tax cuts - the nation will likely be thrust into a 2013 recession with "2 million jobs lost".

This is the part of the report that the Neoliberal media has played up, as on MSNBC this morning. Not reported, or not emphasized is the other part of the report, which is well summarized in an AP release on it:

"While extending the tax cuts and avoiding the spending cuts (i.e. to the Pentagon via sequestration) would keep the economy stronger over the next two years, continuing those policies would produce annual budget deficits averaging almost $1 trillion for the next decade. That would produce debt totalling nearly $10 trillion for the period- pushing the government's cumulative debt to nearly 90% of the economy by 2022."

The AP release goes on to state that while the "fiscal cliff" (ending the Bush tax cuts, payroll tax cuts) would "cause quick economic damage" it would produce more deficit reduction."

The release goes on to cite a drop from a deficit of $1.1 trillion this year to $641 billion next year.

The point is the CBO report is actually presenting us with a CHOICE, not a simple doom and gloom message. The problem is that it's choice that entails loss, one way or the other. It's like an economic Kobayashi Maru test.  If congress elects to avoid the "fiscal cliff",  which I've already noted as an overblown and over-hyped threat, e.g. see my earlier blog ,  then all will be well for two years, except at the cost of adding a trillion in deficits each of the next 2 years. If on the other hand, congress lets ALL the tax cuts expire (as they should) we at least put a major dent in the deficit and have more downstream revenue with which to work, but at a possible cost of minor recession and 2 million more out of work.  Lose, lose.

Or is it?

I happen to accept, instead of the dire forecasts of the CBO, that allowing the fiscal cliff to manifest will actually be a boon and generate more jobs. This evidence was first cited by authors James Medoff and Andrew Harless, The Indebted Society, 1995, 'Let Them Eat Cake', when they looked at actual data (over decades) and found (p. 87) that "high tax rates are associated with higher productivity growth.  There is a consistent and strong relationship".

The higher productivity growth was also in terms of real job growth, with companies investing in more plant, as well as labor. The benefits cited in the Medoff and Harless analysis were reinforced in the (2010)  Financial Times analysis of the Bush tax cuts, which found - contrary to the mythology spread  - that the years of the Bush tax cuts marked  "the weakest decade in U.S. postwar history for real, non-residential capital investment. Not only were the 2000s by far the weakest period but the tax cuts did not even curtail the secular slowdown in the growth of business structures. Rather the slowdown accelerated to a full decline”

This is pretty glaring and definitive. It shows that congress, by buying into the media and Neoliberal malarkey of a tax-cut based "fiscal cliff" could be engendering a real one that will haunt us for generations, as well as creating mammoth deficits. 

The real conversation then, ought not be about the "fiscal cliff" but about taxes and why they are needed. Excluding Chile and Mexico, the United States raises less tax revenue, as a share of the economy, than every other industrial country. Can we live with this choice? Should we? If we do, it means that other downstream options will have to be severely circumscribed - including social insurance benefits (called "entitlements" by the Neoliberal press.)

Sadly,though the nation’s fiscal challenge has taken center stage in the presidential election campaign, raising more taxes from American families remains stubbornly off the table. It appears Americans - too many- inhabit a deluded landscape where they believe they can have their cake and eat it. Where they can get tax cuts every year, and still not be deprived of full Social Security or Medicare which they "paid into".

In addition, politicians trapped in this low tax memetic environment appear to endlessly pander to voters. President Obama is willing to accept higher taxes on families earning over $250,000 a year. But he is going nowhere near higher taxes on the middle class. And Mitt Romney and his vice-presidential pick, Paul Ryan, are moving decidedly in the opposite direction. Not only do they want to extend indefinitely the tax cuts passed by George W. Bush, but they are also calling for a piñata of additional ones, and would cut social spending in return.

When at last will Americans figure out that their choices cannot be maximized in this economic environment?  There are "opportunity costs" whichever way they go. The best option they have now - in my opinion - is to press politicos to ignore the CBO report in its recesssion forecasts, and let us go over the hellacious and mythical - "fiscal cliff' - if for no other reason to put a dent in the deficits now, so austerity hawks won't use them later to kill social programs!

Yes, this is downward counterfactual thinking, but as author Schwartz observes (ibid.) we ought to be inspired to do more of it, not less. In other words, downward counterfactual thinking induces us to "be grateful for how well we've done this time" or what we have. If we have (currently) fairly decent future Social Security and Medicare benefits why on Earth would we risk them for cheesy tax cuts that only generate mammoth deficits?

The truth, my friends, is "fiscal cliff" or not, the politicians in Washington all know that we face a long-term fiscal crisis. By 2020, 70 million Americans are expected to be on Social Security, up from 45 million in 2000. The ranks on Medicare will swell to 64 million, up from 40 million in 2000. Virtually every economist knows that just maintaining Medicare and Medicaid benefits will require raising taxes on the middle class.
Now it's up to Americans to push policy in the direction of jettisoning ALL the tax cuts.  Tell your politicos and congress critters to ignore the Neoliberal siren calls and do the right fiscal thing for once!