Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Our indispensable, but worthless, stuff

Our indispensable ,but worthless, stuff; Steve Jobs: 1984-type personal tracking; and Foxconn.
*****
George Carlin declared that we have too much "stuff". The stuff takes over our house, and we have to buy a second house just to store our stuff.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuL...).

The WSJ, a strong marketing and free-enterprise paper, wrote about census data that shows that US consumers spend at least $1.2 trillion annually on worthless stuff.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2011/04/2...

Monologuist Mike Daisey recently had a show titled "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs".
Daisey humorously suggested that Jobs has no qualms about "killing"..killing small tech. stuff to make way for a newer,more technically advanced product.
It used to be called "Planned obsolescence "....replacing, and upgrading stuff to keep us buying.

Jobs has recently announced that Apple will release at least $11 billion of its cash stash of close to $70 billion to guarantee his products have parts inventory worldwide.

What Jobs has not talked about is why his IPhones are tracking our movements, making 1984 totalitarian control look like amateur snooping.

What Jobs does not talk about is Apple's,and other major electronic manufacturers', concentrating their manufacturing in the Twainese-owned China factory city called Foxconn .(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn).

In this economic free-enterprise zone, almost 60% of our personal tech. stuff is manufactured by about 400,000 Chinese who have migrated from the rural land to the hugh factory complex.
These factory workers work very,very long hours,at very,very low pay.
Chinese management has to maintain constant suicide watches as the workers find the long hours intolerable.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/22/techno...

But you all, don't bore me with chat about IPhone tracking, landfill environmental electronic hazards,Foxconn suicides, and worthless stuff. I don't care. What I do care about is getting all those apps. for my IPhone and future IPad.

Email to Donald Trump

“Mr. Trump, The Donald if I may.
I understand you answer your emails personally; and hope that is the case with mine.
I want to join your crusade;your Presidental campaign.
I will volunteer my services ,go anywhere, and even buy Trump chocolates at Macys. If I wore ties, I’d also buy some of your ties at Macys.

I like your idea of building a $100 million ballroom in the White House. It will be the grandest display of wealth,splendor,hubris and greed ever. It will make Jackie's remake of the WH look like children's play. I will even help to build the ballroom, lifting those bricks,plastering the walls.

A new Gallop poll has 43% of respondents saying they are not sure where you were born. I say that is fuddle duddle. Release your birth certificate, the long form. That will keep those unbelievers quiet.

And stay with your claim that Obama's birth place is still unknown, and don't be distracted just because he released his long form birth certificate this morning.
Is it forged?
And why isn't his father's name on the certificate?

Is it because Bill Ayers is his father?
Ayers can fake his age easily; and if Ayers is Obama's father, that would explain why he likely ghostwrote Obama's Dreams of My Father.

I will gladly be your investigator on these issues.
I will go to Hawaii (can I stay in your Trump Hotel on the islands?)
Where are your Trump hotels over there?
Do they have Trump labeled towels?
Can I bring one or two back?

I will go to Columbia U. and Harvard and demand to see Obama's admission records and school reports.
Your yelling that Obama never attended college, and never left Kenya before the age of 40, is resonating with the voters. Or at least with me.

I will personally investigate Obama's claim that he is the Messiah, and doesn't need a birth certificate.

I don't care what the conservative talkingheads are calling you.
They can say you are a "tornado of noise and hair...that you are a malignant narcissist...an unembarrassable self-love machine."

Again,that is all fuddle duddle.

I can't wait to hear what these talkingheads say when, as POTUS, you go in and take Iraq's,Iran's and Libya's oil.

I would,however, urge you to agree to have Oprah redo your hair.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Paul Ryan's Path to Prosperity-Part 1

Paul Ryan's Path to Prosperity-Part 1

"I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference"
Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken
*****
GOP House Budget Chair Paul Ryan wants us to the take the road (path) less traveled.
His Path to Prosperity was released this week.
He gave the GOP radio address this morning, proclaiming gloom and doom if his path is not taken.
His plan is the opening salvo in what will be a contentious, bitter debate on the future of our “welfare” state.

And I say, bring it on.

The tax proposals should be put aside for now. But, in short, he is a supply-sider par excellance.
He makes Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand into flaming moderates. It is the ol’ horse and sparrow theory. If you feed the horse enough oats, some will fall to the ground to feed the sparrows.

He wants to cut the to personal tax rate to 25%; and ditto the corporate rate.

To Ryan, if you release the entrepreneurial spirit, jobs will be aplenty; a 1000 flowers will bloom.

But unlike Friedman, Ryan is not interested in these lower taxes bringing in more revenue. Instead, Ryan wants a small federal government, and to get there, he advocates cutting $7 trillion over 10 years.

Let’s get to the “entitlements” in Ryan’s path, beginning with Medicare.

Right now, Medicare is a rather efficient single-payer system. It is a defined-benefit program. And users pay about 25% of their medical costs. It needs cost controls; and evaluations of outcomes. But it is popular. All polls,among all age groups, show strong majority support for Medicare.

The young budget guru, number geek Ryan wants to make Medicare a defined-contribution system.

He wants to convert it from a single-payer to a for-profit insurance voucher system.
If his plan existed now, those reaching 65 would go into a private insurance menu (exchange) and choose coverage. The for-profit insurance provider would get a fed. voucher worth $8,000-10,000. There are about 48 million now on Medicare. A 10k voucher for each would give the for-profits 480 billion dollars (if my math is correct).

Assuming the 65 yr. could find an affordable policy.
Assuming the carrier could agree to take the patient.
Assuming there was some requirement to ignor preexisting conditions.
Then the 65 yr. old could enroll.
Once the voucher money is exhausted, the patient is on his(her) own.
Estimates suggest the patient could pay up to 65-70% out of pocket.
But the plan would satisfy Ryan’s,the Cato Institute’s, and the Heritage Foundation’s ideological requirements for patient choice.

The Ryan plan is ludicrous ,laughable, and lamentable.

Let’s get the debate on. And then let’s continue to walk down the path of existing Medicare, with cost controls.

NPR’s Need to Know had a good segment last night on Ryan’s Medicare and Medicaid path, complete with graphics.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/hea...
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