Thirty Years Unseen

The motto of deregulation that has been the undertone of the financial industry for the past 30 years has been proven a) not to work and b) a mirage.
Financial institutions are facing serious trouble. Bad assets are slowly crumbling the powerhouses on Wall Street. People are losing money on the stock market and the foreclosure rate is scary.
Clearly "deregulation" has failed. The government however, has jumped in. Proving that deregulation was not so much in use for the benefit of the country but more for the benefit of big business, news flash right? Big business will continue to have the benefit of the doubt, even after failing miserably.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Chairman of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke in conjunction with the Bush administration have proposed a $700 billion dollar bailout. The proposition was for the government to buy the bad assets that are plaguing Wall Street.
Being the money huungry force that Wall Street is, lobbyists for the financial industry are already trying to find ways to cover all forms of troubled investments, not just bad morgages, according to the NY Times.
Something must be done.
Simply bailing out the financial industry is like giving them a carte blanc to start all over again carefree, make ridiculous sums of money and when they screw up, the good ol' boys in Washington will bail them out.
Congress said that to pass the bill suggested by the administration, it must meet three requirements: limit executive compensation, reduce foreclosures (help average Americans) and make the comptroller general and Government Accountability Office monitor future procedings.
This is a noble idea, but it has a couple flaws.
First, something has to be done and we all know the George Bush is arrogant enough to veto a bill if he doesn't get want he wants. Tacking on special requirements will slow the process, forcing Congress to remain stagnate like it has been since Democrats took over. If the Democrats want to help people, they should really take small steps toward a larger reform. One bill cannot save the market, make regulation policies and save people from foreclosure.
The second problem, and most alarming, is how will the government pay for their newly acquired $700 billion in bad assets?
Taxes.
Probably not taxes on financial institutions considering the majority of tax revenue comes from the "average American," and certainly not from those who can afford to pay more taxes if John McCain is elected. The burden of the $700 billion will fall squarely on the middle and working class of society.
What happened to lesson we all learned in elementary school about being responsible for our own actions?
Thanks Washington, glad to see your doing your job and protecting the interests of the American people.

-The Colonel

2008 Presidential Politics re: 1972

In an Op-Ed piece today in the New York Times, David Brooks makes the argument that the way to win the presidential election this year is to be the weirder candidate - the one that surprises voters the most. He talks about how Obama, throughout the primary season, was the weird candidate - he ran an essentially unconventional campaign using the internet in ways not seen before (and in ways that the Dean campaign of '04 attempted, but fell short on). He was running a campaign of change. Now, however, it seems that his platform of outright "change in Washingtonian politics" has regressed into "change from a Republican president to a Democrat." The rub is, that's simply not change. At least, it's not change in the fundamental sense that Obama stressed so much during the primaries.

Unfortunately, someone has latched onto this idea of fundamental change in the way things are done in Washington - and it's coming from the presidential candidate of the same party as the current president. McCain is, quite suddenly, the Change Man. It seems to be working, as some polls show him gaining an edge on Obama.

Mr. Brooks gets all of this, and points it out in his column. He does leave out something, though: this has happened before. In the 1972 presidential campaign, George McGovern ran a wildly successful primary season that saw him transform from the fringe candidate who happened to be popular with the youth vote into the darling of Democrats in America. He beat out a more widely known candidate (Hubert Humphrey) on a platform of - you guessed it - change. Fundamental change in the way business is done in Washington. After securing the Democratic nomination for president, however, he subsequently attempted to unite the party by playing nice with other Democrats who, not long before, had been derisive of his entire campaign. He also chose an entirely mainstream senator as a vice president - a moderate - alienating much of the more liberal new voters who got him the nomination in the first place. By reneging on his promises of real and fundamental change he allowed Nixon, the Republican incumbent, to make a few smart moves and take the election in a landslide.

Obama, with his choice of Senator Biden as vice president, has made the exact same mistake. The election season has sounded and felt familiar, but previous to reading the Brooks column this afternoon I hadn't realized why. Anyone can promise change when it is safe to do so. Few can deliver on it when doing so means taking a political risk - even when not doing so constitutes a bigger (albeit seldom recognized) risk.

-The Ambassador

Know Your Friends

Alright. There's been quite a length of time since the Colonel and I last posted anything up here, but now that the school year is soon to begin I thought I would get back into the swing of things with some comments on a recent development in world affairs. It's been a topic both on and off the campaign trail, though the implications are obviously much farther reaching than that.

Earlier this month, Georgia invaded South Ossetia. Of course, since Georgia (under President Saakashvili) has doubled it's troop commitment in Iraq, they have been staunchly supported by the Bush administration and almost every right-winger here in the states - much like the dictatorship of Musharraf was supported in Pakistan due to his vocal support for the war on terror. Before we jump to conclusions about the uncalled-for aggression on the part of the Russians, we should perhaps examine more closely our relationship to this "democracy."

Saakashvili took office in early 2004, vowing to bring Georgian economics into the modern world and to stop corruption. While he has undoubtedly helped the Georgian economy leap forward with his devotion to free markets - and corruption with government has visibly decreased - there are still unanswered questions as to some of his decisions. Saakashvili's human rights record is, at best, questionable. Soon after ascending to the office of the president, he claimed that massive coordinated prison riots were being set up by criminal masterminds and therefore ordered a "shoot to kill" in the event of anything that remotely resembled instigation of riots in the prison system. In his inaugural statement, according to his own website, he stated that it was time for the government to be afraid of the people. He also has declared a state of emergency and ordered police force on relatively small political protests, leading to denunciations from organizations inside and outside Georgia.

Up until extremely recently, Saakashvili has supported a "diplomatic resolution" to the South Ossetia question. It was, however, Georgia that invaded South Ossetia, triggering the military response of Russia. As Mikhail Gorbachev pointed out in an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times, Russia didn't need to do this to "assert dominance" in the region, as some western officials and pundits have claimed. Much of South Ossetia was under attack long before the Russians arrived.

Unfortunately (and though I hate to agree so heavily with Gorbachev . . . he was far too friendly with Reagan), this issue has been painted as black and white in the western media. Instead, it is intensely multi-faceted, with at least as many sides as the still-poorly-understood relations between various religious sects ethnicities in the Middle East and South Asia.

As far as the presidential campaign goes here in the states, Mr. McCain has advocated for the removal of Russia from the G8, while Mr. Obama has been somewhat more cautious. Mr. McCain's proposal is, frankly, ridiculous. If his idea of diplomacy is a knee-jerk reaction to cut ties when this kind of situation arises, how will he react to even more subtly shaded relationships in other parts of the world? It doesn't exactly inspire optimism.

The Cold War is over. Russia knows this, and recent actions in no way indicate a return to "a desire to rebuild the empire." It is the U.S. that has so far failed to treat Russia as potential partner, and without the recognition of this possibility (however distant), no real progress will be made.

-The Ambassador

Blood Nationalism

The new voter ID laws proposed in Missouri are, for starters, unconstitutional. They put unfair demands on voters to provide identification that they may not be able to obtain due to economic factors or other mitigating circumstances. Although a similar law has already been upheld in Indiana by the Supreme Court, this in no way proves its constitutionality. A biased and partisan Supreme Court does not follow the spirit of the constitution and certainly doesn't work in the way it was meant to. The Missouri secretary of state himself says that the law could disenfranchise up to 240,000 legitimate voters in a state that has historically been crucially relevant in presidential elections. Many of these voters are the poor and already disenfranchised, which is to say: they'll probably be voting Democrat come November. Or, at least, they will be if they aren't unlawfully barred from doing so. In an election year where the chances for a Republican win look so slim, is it any surprise that these actions are being taken? It shouldn't be.

However, there is an even more frightening side to all of this. By placing ever stricter limitations on who can and cannot vote, we are also limiting more and more who can be labeled a citizen, a member of the nation. What happens to groups within a democracy that have no voice? Who do they turn to? The last time this kind of limitation on voting occurred, it was under a system of laws called Jim Crow. These laws have no place in the U.S., or any country calling itself a democracy. Although, when you think about it, what do you call a country that has as its president a man who lost the popular vote but was bumped into office regardless due to the decision of a Supreme Court staffed by his own father? I'm not sure, but I don't think the term is "democracy."

-The Ambassador

A follow-up and A new identity

I said I would post a new entry everyday...and by that I meant every week day comrades. Anyway I am a man of my word.

First of all, I want to announce the new name by which my partner is enlightening the world will now by known as (provided he is accepting of it). David will hanceforth be known as Ambassador. The decision was made after much deliberation and discussion, which I fear puts me on the brink of schizophrenia. However, in response to that, I think it is fair to say that, if not for intelligent debate (discussion), no matter what level of sanity it poses, what would there be? Not a whole lot.

Now I'd like to say a few more things about stem cells.

Although I raised concerns with my last entry, I do not want anyone to think that I am somehow condemning stem cell (and genetic, for I have learned recently how closely they are tied to one another) research. I think it is also important for people to understand what it is and how it works, so I urge everyone to read up on it. NIH.gov does a decent job giving the basic information.

The U.S. government will spend approximately $80 million this year funding research institutes as part of the ENCODE program. The goal of ENCODE is to use the information they learned by decoding the human genome to make progress in health related fields. The hope is to cure such diseases as alzheimers and cancer, among others.

At first glance, $80 million seems like a ton of money. It is in fact a ton of money. But lets keep in mind who we are talking about. For a country the has an $11 trillion GDP, a $3.1 billion proposed budget and has spent alomost $600 billion in Iraq over the past 5 years, $80 million is nothing. The San Fransisco Chronicle published an interesting story regarding Iraq war spending, check it out here http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/03/09/INEMVEVHK.DTL .

Regards,

Colonel

So the other day, I was generously given the chance to sit in the breezy hallway outside Lecture Center Seven at SUNY Albany and talk to a professor of microbiology. His title to be more precise is "Assitant Professor" which suprisingly does not mean at all what it sounds like. He is in fact the director of UAlbany's School of Public Health, and a lead researcher at the Gen*NYS*is Center for Excellence in Cancer Research. He told me that he approaches his research on a genomic level...meaning he plays around with the "regulatory code" trying to figure out how and why certain proteins binding in the replication of DNA can effect and cause mutations in genes, ultimately leading to cancer.

Fascinating stuff, really. I have no idea what most of what he said meant, but i did get the jist of it. Basically, we are really really really close to understanding the human genome so well that we will be able to pin point mutations that will cause cancer and other such diseases.

On the bright side, this is great. This knowledge will eventually lead to cures for cancer or whatever disease of your choice. But don't get the champagne out too fast. This ability to detect people's predisposition to developing diseases is a very very scary thought. This knowledge, in the wrong hands, could have consequences that will go beyond the simple issue of employment. I mean really, what company is going to hire someone who has a mutation on the seventh chromosome (completely chosen at random and there is no scientific basis for my choice, but it is to make a general point) which we know will lead to the development of lung cancer roughly at age 40? Probably not many.

This is not too terrible of a concern, however, because of the stringent doctor-patient confidentiality codes. For example, I know a woman who had cancer 10 years ago and was job searching five years ago. She was able to go through the job hunting process without telling her possible future employers that she was a cancer survivor. We'll see where all that goes. It seems now-a-days you can get just about anything on the internet.

The real scare is eugenics. Who is to say that it won't become law for everyone to have genetic testing done? You could argue the cost will prevent this from ever happening, but already it is only a few thousand dollars and anyone who is curious enough (and has a decent pocket book) can have their own genome mapped.

You may be saying that I am a lunatic, and I am, but not on the eugenics score. I advise anyone who does not beleive eugenics is still practiced in the United States go to Google and search "Norplant" and "eugenics." Nor plant is a drug, well more like a device, that is implanted in women that prevents them from getting pregnant for 5-7 years.

Anyway, if you do indeed Google this, you will see stories about state legislatures trying to pass laws suggesting that women on welfare also go on Norplant. There is also a somewhat famous story (and I hesitate to say famous because I had never heard about it until the afore mentioned researcher told me about it) in which a young woman in Alabama was charged with child abuse. She was a single mother of 5 and lived in poverty. The judge gave her the option of choosing to go to jail, or go on Norplant.

Stem cells have the potential to be life saving, but unless the knowledge is used responsibly, we could be in serious trouble, as my microbiologist researcher told me, "There will be human cloning, without a doubt, and I don't know if the ends justify the means."

Until tomorrow,
Colonel Brian

p.s. - sorry Dave I have yet to think of a good name, but one is on the way, I swear

reflection

To mist Dave, the elitist drunken political theorist whom I respect and addorn:

i had a blog post all written out right? like free hand pre-computer style. when i went to sign in to our blog, i had completely forgotten the email address we use for signing in. the password is unforgettable, and ingenious i might add, nicely done.

however, this dilemma caused me to retrace my cyber steps over the past, shit i dont know...approximately 2 or 3 months, and i eventually found an email of interest. it was from none other than DAVE (well since i dont know if we use last names around here...) ********* all in capitals, i said "alas, my search is complete, this email shall hold all the information i am seeking." well, it didn't.

instead this email opened my eyes to the excitement, the absolute bliss and passion that we shared when creating this blog. it was an email in which you called me "colonel" (which i fucking love and have yet to counter that with a name as remarkable for you) and you were telling me about your first entry. you sounded (if thats possible via email) excited and i know i was excited when i read it. the point is, what happened? absolutely nothing. we have done shit since the day this motherfucker first took off.

we sit back and criticize all of those around us. as deserving of criticism as they are, we are no better. we are wastes of human intellect, something which, i beleive, we both value immensely. we need to get our heads back into this.

that being said. i vow to post a blog everyday from now until we take our trip, which i feel is inevitable, every single fucking day. Though i may be drunk right now, hold me to this shit because i t hink we have something here and i think we could bring upon this sedate society a change that is not only inevitable, but absolutely necessary.

until tomorrow (and i promise i will have a post up within 24 hours...and a sweet nickname for Dave),

Colonel Brian