Monthly Archives: October 2009

Robber Barons

This must be like part 17 in the series, but here we go again.  It seems as if the rich just keep getting richer at the expense of us little guys….

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. launched a full-fledged price war with Amazon.com Inc. and a nation of book retailers, lowering online prices on certain highly anticipated hardback titles to $9.

How DARE they?!  These evil greedy corporations are getting rich off the backs of the common man.  I mean really, reducing the price of books in an effort to gain market share!  What is this world coming too?

We Have A Lot of Work to Do

I don’t know what makes some people tick.  Some folks don’t like ham and cheese sandwiches.  Others don’t like pepperoni pizza.  And other still don’t like vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate syrup and spanish peanuts.  I just don’t get it.  Some people just don’t get it.

But one thing I have always taken heart in is that each succeeding generation will be more racially tolerant than the preceding.   I want to not react by color.  I expect my kids not too.

With that said, this is SO disheartening:

NEW ORLEANS – A Louisiana justice of the peace said he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple out of concern for any children the couple might have. Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, says it is his experience that most interracial marriages do not last long.

Of course the justice claims he’s not racist:

“I’m not a racist. I just don’t believe in mixing the races that way,” Bardwell told the Associated Press on Thursday. “I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom. I treat them just like everyone else.”

Dumbass.

Unalienable Rights

Or so it is in part:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

I posted the other day about a conversation I had with colleagues of mine that are from Europe.  During that conversation I was stunned to learn that they honestly felt that health care was such a right.  Imagine my surprise when I saw this new bit of news:

(CNN) — Finland has become the first country in the world to declare broadband Internet access a legal right.

Starting in July, telecommunication companies in the northern European nation will be required to provide all 5.2 million citizens with Internet connection that runs at speeds of at least 1 megabit per second.

“We think it’s something you cannot live without in modern society. Like banking services or water or electricity, you need Internet connection,” Vilkkonen said.

It is a view shared by the United Nations, which is making a big push to deem Internet access a human right.

Unbelievable.

America was founded on the concept of Liberty.  Liberty to pursue our own benefits, or not.  The Liberty to claim my life as my own.  In short, these rights would be as true today, tomorrow as when they were written 230 or so years ago.  These rights will protect our citizens and can be spoken to as it pertains to those citizens 10-20 or even 50 years from now.

So tell me, how are these “human rights” being considered by  the UN to be delivered if not by curtailing another’s rights to pursue their own liberty?

At Least This is Honest

Mr. Obama has announced that he would like to take money from me and give it to the elderly.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama called on Congress Wednesday to approve $250 payments to more than 50 million seniors to make up for no increase in Social Security next year.

The White House put the cost at $13 billion.

While it’s maddening that Obama continues the worst practices of the previous administration [all the while blaming them] at least he isn’t trying to trick me into thinking that he’s doing something brilliant.  You know, like legislating lower prices.  Here he is admitting that we’ll have to spend tax payer dollars, $13 billion of them, for his decision.

Thank you, Mr. President, for being honest.

Love,
-pino

Econ 101: A Lesson in the Tender Mercies of Medical Care

So, it turns out that while you may be able to legislate price, you can not legislate costs:

For years, Mayo Clinic officials have complained that Medicare and Medicaid pay less than what it costs to treat patients.

Now they’re doing something about it.

In the past week, the Rochester-based clinic said it will stop caring for 50 Medicaid patients in Montana and Nebraska starting Jan. 1, unless they have a rare disease that can’t be treated elsewhere. Also on that date, a handful of Mayo’s primary care doctors in Arizona will opt out of Medicare, forcing some 3,200 patients to pay out-of-pocket or find new providers.

Really!?!

You mean that when government imposes price ceilings you get shortages?  Who would have thought that?

The difference between prices and costs is not just a fine distinction made by economists. Prices are what pay for costs — and if they do not pay enough to cover the costs, then centuries of history in countries around the world show that the supply is going to decline in quantity or quality, or both. In the case of medical care, the supply is a matter of life and death.

When politicians talk about “bringing down the cost of medical care,” they are not talking about reducing any of these costs by one cent. They are talking about forcing prices down through one scheme or another.

-Thomas Sowell

It is a law as sure as gravity; when you artificially reduce the price of something below what the market would otherwise demand, you will get less of it or worse of it.

Count on it.

Postscript:  For added fun, here is a foretaste of the feast to come:

“Both of these moves are very difficult for us to make,” said spokeswoman Shelly Plutowski. “Both point to the fact that we as a country need to change the way we pay for health care. Mayo Clinic and other providers lose money on every Medicare patient we see, and the same goes for Medicaid.”

Last year, it cost Mayo $840 million more to treat Medicare patients than it received in payments, Plutowski said. The clinic also lost $100 million treating Medicaid patients, she said.

Dad Talk to Jeff Latta

Okay, so yesterday I posted on the plight of the 53 year old retired man that can’t afford his $1,000 mortgage.

The story reads that his mortgage is 93% of his pension.  I managed to do the math and calculate how much this guy would have left over.  What I didn’t do was calculate what he made per year; $20,640.  And his mortgage?  Well, assuming he has a 7% rate and given a $1,600 payment, that means he borrowed $240,000.  That, ladies and gentlegerms, is a QUARTER OF A MILLION DOLLARS!  And brother is making a cool 20k a year.

I hereby make this covenant with you, gentle reader.  I will not, I swear to you, I will NOT raise my son to think that it’s okay to borrow $240,000 and then retire at 53 knowing your fixed income will be $20,000.  And more than that, he will not ever, EVER, consider it someone else’s burden to pay for or bail him out of that dumb ass decision.

I swear to you.

Now, son…about that whole pumpkin farm thing you got goin’ on…..

Cause Ya Have to be Legal to Work in the White House

I’m actually surprised they stopped at reduced penalties and no jail:

WASHINGTON – Some 7,500 international tax dodgers have applied for an amnesty program that promises no jail time and reduced penalties for tax cheats who come forward, the Internal Revenue Service announced Wednesday.

The program is part of a larger effort by the Obama administration to crack down on Americans who evade U.S. taxes by hiding assets in overseas accounts.

I mean, most of his staff fit this bill.

The Mind of the Leftist

I am working on a project at the office with some colleagues that are not from the United States.  During lunch we had some time to chat and so I took the opportunity to ask them what “the world” thought of Obama’s Nobel.  They grinned, a bit more sheepishly than I thought they would, and admitted that it was, indeed, a little early for him to win.  So far so good.

With my toe firmly in the water, I decided to get their take on Universal Health Care.  I felt that their insights would be useful, one being from Italy and the other from Slovakia.  Before I go on, I should say that these guys are some of the most educated people I have worked with in a long time.  And while they have recently been at the Northeast Ivy; Harvard, they have degrees in the sciences as well.  In fact, the Italian has his PhD in physics.

So, imagine my surprise when these two highly educated scientists came down in favor of universal health care.  And more than that, they both felt it is a right as citizens to have this health care provided to them.

I am stunned.

Leftists are everywhere.

But I Voted For Him

And now I want me money.  Or so goes the general consensus if you read the Reuters article describing the Home Rescue Plan.

Obama, grappling with the worst U.S. housing crisis since the Great Depression, pledged to help as many as 9 million families keep their homes by reworking their mortgages.

Let’s not forget that the whole reason those 9 million families are struggling is because the government “pledged to help as many as 9 million families keep obtain their homes by reworking cheating* on their mortgages.

Eight months later, the plan is plagued by delays, red tape

delay and red tape?  A government program defined by delay and red tape?  Come on!

some critics say, a reluctance by banks to do their part.

Riiight.  Cause last time the banks “did their part” a housing bubble was created, then burst and we were plunged into this problem.  After which the banks were rewarded for “doing their part” by having themselves taken over, vilified, their CEO’s fired and then their pay limited.  Honestly, why wouldn’t the banks “do their part?”

Just 17 percent of eligible borrowers have had their loans modified and monthly payments cut. Hardly any have been given a cut in the amount they owe on homes which are now worth less.

Huh.  Weird.  It doesn’t seem that banks want to lend money to people who demonstrate that they can’t pay money back to banks that lend them money.  Bitches!  Oh, especially hard hit are the owners who have negative equity-who would have guessed?

For homeowners like Jeff Latta, there was no help at all.

Latta, a 53 year-old retiree, pays $1,600 in monthly home payments that eat up 93 percent of his pension and he struggles to make child support payments.

So, a 53-year-old man decides that he wants to quit working at 53 [at least] and discovers that he is having trouble paying the bills.  Unbelievable.

To help pay his mortgage, Latta has slashed his bills by hunting for food in the wooded hills around his town of Albany in southern Ohio, and growing his own vegetables.

Serious.  I wonder if “slashed” means the same thing in Reuters talk as it does in Pino talk?  However, to his credit, Mr. Latta is doing a lot more than many other folks in his condition.  But let’s be honest here, if $1600 is 93% of his pension, he has $120 left over.  No vegetable is going to cover that gap.

In March, Latta heard about Obama’s Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP, that allows mortgage payments to be reduced to 31 percent of a homeowner’s income.

Awesome.  Because you can just legislate away the annoying aspects concerning the laws of Economics.

Latta applied for a loan modification but was rejected. His bank said his income from selling pumpkins and firewood — a net of $906 in 2008 — was too high.

Serious.  Even HAMP must know on some level that this is just silly; it’s designed to fail.

That banks lent irresponsibly in the U.S. property boom is irrefutable. As San Diego-based realtor Steve Rodgers says: “If you could fog a mirror, they’d give you a mortgage.”

While this is true, it is also true that banks were forced to carry a required portion of their lending portfolio in this low income high risk demographics.   To say that they did this on their own is disingenuous.

Look, in the end I feel bad for Mr. Latta.  But check this out, if you make $1720 a month you can’t afford to live in a house.  Move to an apartment.  Or a smaller house.  Or something.  And more advice?  Give up on the pumpkins and firewood and move to Raleigh; they have work there.

12,000 Jobs Created

Minnesota is reporting that they have saved or created nearly 12,000 jobs due to the stimulus package. That’s more than 1 per lake, and Minnesota has a lot of lakes!

So, how much stimulus money did Minnesota get? About $4.7 billion.
How much has Minnesota spent? About $1.6 billion.
So, at this rate, how many jobs is Minnesota predicting? 35,000.
And the White House, how many did THEY predict? 66,000.

So, even using their own numbers, the White House and Minnesota is falling short by 47% of the predicted total, or 31,000 jobs.

And the jobs that WERE created? Let’s see:

  • $16.6 million to put 5,800 youth to work over the summer.

So, let’s see.  The state spent $16.6 million to hire a bunch of kids for the summer?  And that counts as a job saved or created?  So, really, what Minnesota is saying is that they saved or created 6,200 jobs.  5,800 high school kids having summer jobs doesn’t count.

Way to go Minnesota!