Blame Game...

Read more! Ahh... the finger pointing has come into it's own on our national stage as lawmakers start to exclaim who is at fault for our current economy crisis. The House of Representatives voted down the bill for the bailout package. The GOP is raising hell against Speaker Pelosi and her speech yesterday claiming that was a big part of why the bill didn't pass. Not that the GOP ever was very good at math - while only 40% of sitting Democrats didn't vote for the package, 67% of Republicans didn't vote for it either. GOP leaders just couldn't close the deal within in their own party so I doubt that Pelosi had that much sway over those Republicans.

And as I was watching MSNBC this morning (where the numbers come from BTW), what killed the bill were the extreme right and left voters who didn't vote in favor of the package - they effectively canceled out the center-line moderates.

The thing is - the whole bailout package - it probably doesn't matter now anyway. Even though $700 billion is nothing to sneeze at - the markets dropped 8% yesterday to the tune of $1 trillion in losses. I don't know that even a revived bill would have any impact at this point without substantially upping the ante - to at least $1 trillion of taxpayer money. Being that the estimated budget income for 2008 is a little over $2.6 trillion, that's approaching half of what America retains in taxes.

Our economy is completely based on credit. Now stop and think about it - credit is the extension of funds based upon the credibility of future repayment. All institutions leverage credit lines based upon their certainty of future earnings and revenues (i.e. you take out a car loan at $400/mo under the reasonable assumption that you're employed and have income supposedly coming in over the term of the loan). Businesses of all sizes use credit lines (purchasing of inventory that hasn't sold yet - like stocking up for the holiday season before the items could actually be sold). Those companies that have the cash to lend to individuals or businesses make money off of their interest charged - which gets higher interest rates based upon the evaluation of the probabilty of recovery of extended funds.

Now almost everyone is familiar with how credit ratings work (to some degree or another). The higher the score, the more "credible" you are meaning by your history of management of credit you have demonstrated your ability to either repay the loan within the terms of the agreement or not. Credit can be used for direct consumption (like as a car loan) or for additional leveraging. For example, when home prices were skyrocketing, perceived equity was leveraged to allow people to borrow at lower interest rates to make a higher return (i.e. you mortgage loan was at 5% APR and you borrowed that money to make a return at 20% - netting a return of 15% on the borrowed money). It's very much like borrowing your brother's car and using it business trip where you received compensation for the use of the vehicle - you got to use other people's money to make money.

Businesses operate the same way and have credit ratings themselves. When a company is listed as "junk" it's basically stating that the probably of future earnings covering extended credit lines are near nil. It's not only turning a profit, but having sufficient cash flow internally to pay off obligations.

As entrepreneurs looked for more and more areas to make money, credit was squeezed out of every resource available. Consumer spending was maintained by individual credit card spending (and subsequent high balances) - even as wages remained flat or declined. Businesses were taking on more and more credit balances to buy inventory - big banks delved into estimated value of the housing market and sold mortgages to people who have no purpose in purchasing a home or worse yet - to those that were "buying up" to move another notch on the "keeping up with the Joneses" neighborhood swap.

Our economy - because it is based on future "tea leaf reading" of what the potential income and repayment of extended credit - is highly susceptible to irrational behaviors. Since no one can accurately predict the future, emotions come into play - and as they say, a person is smart - people are stupid. Widespread irrational exuberance or fears drive the actual outcome of the markets (the dot com and housing booms were exuberance - this "crisis" is fear). It's not that investing in businesses or banks have lost their legitimacy as money making ventures, it's just that people don't BELIEVE that they are.

So the House leaders who are trying to pass this bail out package voted ultimately against it for, what I believe, are two reasons:

1. Those that voted "no" were up for reelection in tight congressional races wherein they could easily lose their seat(s).
2. The collective leadership of our nation has absolutely no idea how the economy works because at the end of the day, it's based completely on collective emotional responses of (now) a worldwide scale.

We have structured our economy - from the grandest world stage to each of our own personal checkbooks - on reading the future. When the future becomes less stable (for the foreseeable time being) then people act irrationally. The bailout package is necessary only from the standpoint it shores up confidence and stubs the irrational behavior of the world economy - not necessarily to actually financially "help" these companies. The conditions attached to the bill are really political posturing - that's it.

We're all to blame so we need to stop pointing fingers. It doesn't matter nor does it affect our future. As the wonderful comedic sage Van Wilder stated: "Worrying is like a rocking chair: it gives us something to do but doesn't get us anywhere. Write that down." Pointing fingers does the very same thing.

What our country needs is something to believe in again and until that common goal is found, we're going to mire in our own self imposed depression.

Read more! Read more!

Religion (part 2)

Read more! Thanks to those of you who have either talked to me directly about my blog posting "Losing my religion" or who took time to write a comment. I've been wrestling with writing any more on this subject since then and as my friends and family have stepped up to give their opinion of direction it has given me a chance to pause and think.

In all honesty, there is a part of personality that would just like to tell people what they really want to hear - that everything is fine and that my religious life is back on track. To avoid the conflict of differences of perspective that I find myself on the short end of the debate team. I don't want to think I'm the only one out there that has deep rooted issues that aren't resolving themselves and taking short answers like "it's just the way that God made it" are, in my humble opinion, dismissive. But, maybe I am.

This grinds at a foundational, core values that all of us have in some degree or another. Belief structures that were indoctrinated into our early childhood years (or for some, later on in life) that seem to fill the holes in an otherwise very chaotic world. It has demonstrated to me that our lives are truly fragile - not only physically, but emotionally - as if one simple wind of change could derail an entire lifetime of belief of what is real and not real.

Or better yet that our interpretation of individual perspective. Such as if a crime was committed in front of several people and that each person that witnessed the event would have slightly different take on the facts that unfolded before them. I would argue that it's a similar circumstance at a church service with some that are experiencing a supernatural event and others that just don't seem to connect - even though they all saw the same thing.

And maybe part of my issue is the definitiveness of the Holy Bible. In that we are not to judge but only God the Father has that right. But, by our sinful nature, we are evidently prone to sin (since were were born into sin) to do the exact opposite of God's will. To say that good people who don't know Christ to spend their eternities in Hell seems ludicrous to me. In some ways, it would be better to have never heard the Gospel and live a good life than it it is to have had some indoctrination and not measure up. It's a life filled of could've, would've, should've that only seems to be erased by the blanket statement that God loves everyone so it really doesn't matter.

So God loves all of us unconditionally - but there are conditions of which we find ourselves in His good graces - living a Christ centered life and making ourselves as much like Christ as possible. Wherein Christ is God and wherein we can never measure up so there will always be a gap in performance. There will always be things of which we will need to be judged in our hour before the Lord in Heaven. So I hope we all have our rebuttals together (which won't matter anyway in that court).

For me, God has always felt like a national monument in which we get to travel to and admire from afar - like of Mt. Rushmore. But He's always somewhere other than where I am. I don't feel His presence, I don't feel like my prayers are being heard - I feel like I'm talking to myself or for the benefit of others. So a personal relationship with Christ is just about as foreign to me as having one with Mt. Rushmore.

I do feel that religion (in any form) has and inherent need in all lives of humans. Even if a person is about as anti-God as possible, there still lies the basic structure of belief in something that we do not understand. Love is a perfect example (and typically used as argument fodder) in that we know it exists but isn't tactile (I would argue that it is since love can be transmitted directly through human contact - body language, physical touch, even words - spoken and written). Or parts of science - such as I can't see how a nucleus holds electrons and protons but all matter is made up of it (and I know that someone out there has seen it first hand). It is still a belief in something that sounds reasonable but I don't fully understand.

But when God isn't here in physical form(s) to interact with - it becomes as vague as worshiping protons around a nucleus - and that seems to take all of the steam right out of it.

And maybe I am a person that needs to touch, feel and interact. One had mentioned to me that I need to go where God is - such as volunteer at a homeless shelter. I mentioned to them that giving of my time to a worthy cause doesn't make me a Christian - especially where there are plenty of non-Christian entities that can do that very same work. And now on further reflection that it is still a trip to see God somewhere other than here. I guess I want to interact where He says He is (everywhere).

Now, to my deep rooted believing friends who have endured this posting to this point - I do not want to take away from any feelings of personal relationship that you may have or experience. I would like to believe that I am a unique case that may need further study to determine final outcome - and there is part of me that feels guilty for possibly being a vehicle for doubt in your own life. That is truly not my intention.

I don't know when (or if) this will resolve for me in any time soon. It makes it very difficult to attend church or volunteer with Christian organizations when I feel my own foundation is so shaky. It should be passion in which I can share with vigor, but for me right now, it's about as neutral as it gets. Like my brother says: "You're Switzerland" - it's true, but I don't like be a fence post sitter.

I'll keep you posted as this gets chewed on again for another while... Read more! Read more!

The downward spiral begins...

Read more! Well as of this morning the massive $700 Billion bailout package that will go to the House for vote today (and later to the Senate) has had a less than stellar impact on the markets. Markets overseas in Asia and in Europe were less than impressed by the proposed shoring up of US economy by the Federal Reserve when they started trading (Sunday) with their own opening bells. Today is the first day post bailout package for the NYSE to see US investors view the overall efforts by the government. As of opening bell, the NYSE was down 120 points...

Wachovia announced over the weekend that Citi will buy it out as well - that's another massive nationwide bank that is being absorbed by the remaining big bank club endorsed by the Federal Reserve.

My thoughts are mixed. I actually believe now that the government HAD to do make some efforts to slow the bleeding to keep the American investing public from completely packing up and just buying gold. I don't get the impression that this has actually hit "Main Street" yet - I think that this will play out by the end of the year (just in time for Christmas!). The companies that don't have cash flow working for them by dried up contracts, sales and other purchases that the US Citizens aren't really making now will start to affect operating budgets at all sorts of companies nationwide. Without cash available for most businesses, people will start to loose their jobs and unemployment will start to dramatically rise.

This will be the point when Americans really start to feel this impact from these banking institutions failing. When jobs are lost, underemployment rises from unavailable high end job availability and those that are left with jobs are feeling that they could be next in any possible layoff round. It causes economic shutdown. Our consumer nation grinds to almost a complete halt with non-essential purchasing dwindling down (if you're going to own stock, keep it in those things that people just can't live without) - I wouldn't put it in with any automakers if I were you.

In my experience with small business administration, most companies are are the brink of financial collapse - not unlike most households. Those who have stockpiled liquid assets will have a better chance of shoring up lost contracts and sales - or worse yet, covering for those that owe them a lot of money as receivables will inevitably increase as businesses try to hold on their money as long as possible and become tardy on debts.

It's a spiral that just keeps going and going until there is a point where mass public can start to feel comfortable again. If you look at how that affected those that grew up in the Great Depression, that can take a long, long time (my grandmother, at the time they moved out of their house who lived most of her life in abject poverty had over $10k in tightly rolled up bills stuffed inside a Thermos!).

There will be massive winners in these upcoming times. Those that have the means will be buying up failing companies (like we've seen in the banking industry) for super cheap amounts. Companies that would have sold for $1M will be on the blocks for $100k and those with the cash to wait out a longer recovery period will make crazy money when this levels out.

We are staring at the world's largest transfer of wealth in human history. Trillions and trillions of dollars will change hands before this is over with a crushing of the middle class and a dramatic rise in those who have - and those that have not. Read more! Read more!

Universal Health Care and the Value of Human Life

Read more! As a father and husband, part of my responsibilities is to make sure I've got adequate health insurance to cover the current and future medical needs of my family. Through my own career path, I've had some intimate knowledge of how parts of the system work - paying for the births of two children (one covered, one partially covered) and various well being checks. Fortunately, we haven't had any "major" issues that would just be devastating financially (like my blog "One step away" posted the other day).

Like most Americans, I've actually come to believe that comprehensive health care is a right of living in an industrialized and wealthy nation. That when a person works, that person should have some form of (at least) minimal health coverage. When the stats show that out of 300 million Americans (of which we've got around 120 million households), a good 1/4 to 1/3 do not have any type of coverage whatsoever. Basically meaning that they do not have any financing available to pay for health coverage so whatever health issues they end up having come from either emergency room care (the most expensive) or worse yet, they table any minor issues until they become massive and the cost skyrockets.

From this group of people that are either uninsured or under insured, those very expensive health care costs have to be picked up somewhere - either from all of us via tax dollars or through simply increased fees to those of us who do have insurance to pick up the balance for the health care business models. A good friend of mine who is a practicing physician claims that 40% of those that he treats he receives no fees for at all. When a business has only 60% paying customers, that extra 40% has to come from somewhere (typically from raising his base prices to cover the shortfall). Kind of explains why a couple of Tylenol in the hospital costs as much as a 90 day supply from an independent pharmacy...

I have supported the idea of universal health care for all Americans. I believe that we should have minimal basic well being and health coverage to aid with preventative care and take care of things like well baby visits and prenatal care before issues become so chronic that only the very latest technology and facilities can aid the patient. It seems that we have working models around the globe that we could take the best from those models (Belgium and France for example) and put them to good work in America. I think that a tax-based minimum available plan with simple pass through for medical businesses to handle everyone.

But I do have another side of my thoughts - mainly in the form of how Americans treat the notion of the value of human life. Only in our recent human history have we placed so high a price on the value of a single human life. It dictates immense feelings from everything from abortion, to how wars are fought, torture and even our societal view on suicide. We have pushed the technological envelopes to create health care at any expense to preserve human life. Even, in my own opinion, when it isn't necessary to do such.

For example, massively expensive intensive care hospital stays for terminally ill patients receiving the most elaborate and expensive treatments to prolong their lives by only a few short days or weeks. It doesn't really matter if the person is an infant or 90 years old - all life is sacred and every attempt to prolong that life will be taken - even when the family disagrees, the state can even step in to make that decision for them.

Everyone can point to a personal situation of a friend, family member or even yourself who was that person in question and if you didn't receive that special and expensive treatment, then that life (or yours) would have ended. I have a very good friend whose infant daughter was born with a heart defect and has had several very expensive surgeries to keep her alive. The result is a healthy and wonderful 5 year old girl - if those steps wouldn't have been taken, then she would be dead by now.

So where do we draw the line - or do we draw a line at all? The argument comes from even if we CAN do it, the question is SHOULD we do it.

It's really easy to think that way when it's other people's lives. What would I do if my one in my family was at that crossroads? Probably everything in my power to keep them alive until it was impossible to do so.

So the crux of universal health care isn't just tied up in those who do not any financial coverage at all, but also in the overall thought of what is reasonable care. But someone has to determine what that "reasonable care" really is and all of us would have to adhere to it. It is very possible that with a universal health care program, the wealthy are the group that get to enjoy those special treatments because they have the resources to do such giving them the entitlement to them and that the crack baby who didn't have a chance in the world will have to deal with those resources that they have given to them by the state. Is that the line that's drawn? Who can afford what?

That seems to me what the value of human life really would be tied to. I don't know if I like that very much. Read more! Read more!

Stimulate the economy

Read more! OK - I've been thinking as I'm procrastinating this afternoon (I hate paperwork!): I think the way to kick start our economy might be a rather simple idea, but it's worth talking about:

As everyone is accutely aware that the mortgage industry is at a standstill with prices of homes dropping and a huge inventory of homes that are in foreclosure (and there will be more to come as the prices drop). Banks that have written off the bad debt in the last 12-24 months are still sitting on these off-book assets (once a company writes off the debt as an IRS loss to the company, crazily the company still retains the asset off book - meaning it's not on the office ledger - so any income from selling the asset is deemed as positive income to the company. Weird and strangely legal...). They are trying to sell the bank-owned homes at relative market prices - with some slightly at a really good deal. With the overall market sliding down to somewhat stable in the last 6 months. All things are stagnet. The banks have their billions in homes that they own with no revenue streams attached to them - unable to sell to anyone since those individuals can't get loans to buy the home anyway. It's locked down.

I think that the banks should lump them together (like they did in the S&L fallout in the early 1990's) and sell them at fire sale prices en masse. Take Las Vegas for instance which has one of the highest foreclosure rates in the nation (and inventory of foreclosed properties) - if the banks used an auction to sell off huge blocks of homes - for crazy prices - like a $400k house for $50k each, but the buyer has to purchase a thousand at a time ($50 million in a hunk). The banks would post immediate revenue and the wholesaler buyer gets a steal.

That new wholesaler could sell it to a middle man for $100-125k each - making a cool 100-125% on their money (probably instantly from the time of the purchase). That middle seller would then relist the homes for another 100% increase for a final listing price of $200-250k - about $150k under the previously listed price.

Now, the final purchaser would be inticed to purchase the home for under market value and then take occupancy - or take it on as a rental that would actually cashflow. The trick is that it would automatically deflate the value of the other homes in the neighborhood under our current home valuation scheme.

Currently there are approximately 1.5 to 2 million homes that are in the foreclosure inventory (could be as much as 2.5-3 million!). If the average home sold for a fire sale price of $50k, that would infuse $100 billion back into the system from the original purchase and another 300-500 billion by the time it was all said and done.

Now, the immediate question would come up about what affect this would have on current people who already own homes in affected areas. It is possible to think of it as a disaster relief package (not unlike a hurricane or earthquake). The government could issue disaster relief packages to homeowners in the hardest hit areas (those that have the greatest decrease in home values that are at least a decade away from posting positive flow from their loss). This could be funded with a special federal "sales tax" that is attached to the fire sale event. Make it 20% of each transaction. That would mean that the original buyer would pay $10k, the secon buyer would pay $20k and the third buyer would pay $40k. Keeping the overall value well under the "market" but would gross total of $70k per home transaction from wholesaler to final occupant.

That would allow for $140 billion in taxes to come in which could be used to fund the "disaster zones". Say 15 million households were affected by this - would net approximately $10k per household - cash. This would be weighted by the percent of overall drop in prices post shake out, but in the end would stablize the housing market, fill inventory and infuse cash to not only lending institutions, but also to the private citizens who are affected by the overall drop in price.

It's a win-win-win from where I see it. It eliminates inventory, stablizes the market and creates moving cash - which is where money is made! Let's get on it! Read more! Read more!

One step away...

Read more! Peter Gosselin was the guest today on NPR's Talk of the Nation talking about his book: "Highwire: the Precarious Financial Lives of American Families" wherein he was discussing the case studies of families across the country who have found themselves one financial episode away from ruin.

These weren't just low income families living off of minimum wage, these were middle to upper-middle income households that suffered an unexpected illness or financial set back that catastrophically destroyed everything that they worked for.

Gosselin went on to discuss that these families actually had taken out precautions against these types of things: i.e. in the form of (what they believed were) proper insurances and savings. But when a woman who was an insurance agent (selling health insurance no less) was hit with MS, the very same insurance she was selling and had as personal coverage denied covering the illness. It took her 4 years and attorney's fees to have them reverse the decision.

Maybe this partly plays into areas covered by Michael Moore's "Sicko" about the atrocities of health insurance coverages in America (never mind the 60 million who don't have coverage, but what about those that dutifully pay for it and have shit for coverage or insurance companies that deny rightful claims!), but what actions are each households in America taking to hedge against possible future calamity?

My wife is a stay-at-home mom but has career experience as a teacher so if I lost my job, she possibly could go back to work if it turned out to be a terrible loss. And I have life insurance, health insurance, disability insurance, cash savings, retirement savings, etc to help plan for reasonable future of possible events. But where do we draw the line? Or to ask a better question, do I really know what my policies actually state that if something did happen that the monies I've been paying each month aren't just toasted due to lack of coverage?

The answer is that I don't really know. It's a little scary - I try to do my due-diligence and meet with my insurance providers and read their pamphlets of information, but unless you're an expert in contracts and/or the health insurance provision schemes it's a bunch of very tiny print that changes (literally) monthly.

I've had several job changes over the last few years - enough to make our household a little calloused to the fears that come from massive change. I can assure you it's manageable, but it still doesn't take away the overall fear that you don't really know what's going to happen in the near or even long term future.

With the instability in the markets and the very real potential that the money that I'm putting into my retirement savings each month would actually be better served going under the mattress. Who knows what my retirement picture will really look like. The experts don't really know what the picture of Wall St. will look like in the next 18-24 months so Ryan in Podunk Boise will have to just deal.

And maybe that's the real problem - our social networks of blending at least the availability of resources seemed to have dissolved into a free-for-all capitalist only driven society (which I blame squarely on the Republican administrations starting with Regan). Gosselin even spoke about the minimum requirements we have to one another as framed in the Mayflower Pact stating what individuals must do and what a community must also provide.

There are things that maybe we're just not entitled to - such as a risk free life. I've stated in earlier postings that companies need to recognize their moral obligations and avoid the moral hazards of making decisions without consequence. The same goes for us as the American individual. We need to take the steps to be in due diligence, but also for those steps to be honored by those companies who appear to provide the proper insurance to follow through when they are called upon. It's a basic contract agreement - I pay you this to have this type of service in return. Our risk is that we'll pay for years and never use it - their risk is that you may pay only for a short while and have to shell out cash.

It's time that we all take the steps to make good decisions and use the resources that are around (and available!) to each and every one of us. We should push our legislators to SIMPLY the process of obtaining adequate safety nets and when those nets are in place that they will be honored.

Has anyone else ever mulled this over? Read more! Read more!

What to do about Iraq

Read more! This war has long since perplexed (and vexed) me on what to do. It has been proven that we as a nation were duped into false reasons for justifying the initial invasion in Iraq post 9/11. I believe that we (as citizens) were outraged by the scale of the terrorists attacks on NY and DC and that we hopped into a hornets nest without really thinking much about it.

To try to put our military into perspective - we have the most advanced capabilities ever to be known in the history of combat. Short of tossing shear numbers at us, we can solidly defeat any and all nationally backed offensives with our combined efforts in air, sea and land forces. It is truly unmatched.

What we cannot do is use this "tool" to hunt for mosquitoes. It's like the 240 lb linebacker who is trying to ward off an gnat attack. All you can do is run away.

But here we are - in the middle of it all with our pants around our ankles and nowhere to go. If we stay, we lose the hearts and minds of the people. If we go, it collapses immediately into civil war and genocidal rage that would then become the literal harbor for broods of future US haters to cultivate.

The only real reason that can logically be derived from all of this is the oil resource. Since 1971, we have exceeded our own internal capacity to produce oil for our national consumption. Shortly there after in 1973, OPEC came into full with the finalized nationalizations of private oil companies into countries such as Iraq and Saudi Arabia. With the embargoes that forced the rations in the mid 70's, OPEC learned a valuable lesson which is to keep the taps open.

What Americans really don't realize is that with that amazing flow of oil out of the mid east and the subsequent flow of cash back to those nations, we have amazing clout over what they can do. Those countries, by-in-large only have one thing to sell - oil. Carpets and pottery aren't going to make up for a $70B shortfall in revenues. OPEC has no intention of losing America as it's best customer.

And with that cash that feeds the top 1% of those nations, it goes to their royal families and their Ferrari's and palaces with most of their infrastructure (roads, schools, etc) funded directly from government subsidies. When the oil price is high, the profit margin is high so there is more money to go around (Iran is set up this way and why gasoline there is only around $0.50/gal). But, they can't make it go too high or demand drops and so does the price. So OPEC nations strive for a sweet-spot per se.

From a national security standpoint - America will never be "energy independent". To make significant strides to be oil independent would mean to cut our consumption by 2/3rd's (we roughly use around $10M barrels/day) to what we can produce internally. But since oil is a commodity, the price drops with lack of demand so if we push down a path of high fuel cars and alternative fuels, oil drops significantly and the incentive is immediately gone. Why invest in expensive alternatives when gas is $1.25/gal?

Our national infrastructure is completely dependent on automotive and semi-trucks for transport of people and goods. To make significant changes would be to completely retool cities and interstates, etc. Trillions upon trillions of dollars (which, in turn, buys a whole shit load of oil).

To keep prices artificially high, we would have to impose high tariffs on imported fuels which would only have a negative impact on our morale and economy (why is gas at $5/gal/ Well, the damn government sets the prices so high...).

So back to what going to happen in Iraq. We're going to stay and we're going to get a huge cut of the oil that is produced. We're going to justify it due to the $5-7 Trillion we spent "liberating" the nation and the only thing that the Iraqi's can do to "repay" this debt of gratitude is to share a portion of the loot that comes out of the ground. Our national security and economic security depend heavily on whether or not we can obtain the riches that are in those sands.

What is criminal about this is that our nation will have been lead down the path of belief that we were there for democracy and rightful vengeance on a nation that harbored terrorism that struck us cold. But in the end, it was a excuse to secure the rights to oil. Afghanistan - who was the root of the Al Qaida stronghold hasn't had nearly the attention as Iraq because poppy seeds do nothing for our economy (unless we become drug lords as well). Hence the lack of attention.

Our choice is to drastically change our energy consumption and use. If it is not economic, it has to be ideological and one that can be framed so that all Americans can unite and stand behind it. if not, what's stopping us from invading Venezuela? Their dictator is a prick too... Read more! Read more!

Moral hazard...

Read more! AIG was bailed out by the Fed yesterday. AIG has over 1.1 TRILLION in assets and needed a bridge loan of $85 Billion to keep the cash flowing since it's being called on the "insurance" it wrote for the mortgage backed securities that have all failed. The Federal Reserve thought it prudent to keep this company going along instead of letting it fail.

Both Senators McCain and Obama have denounced the bail out wherein the Fed had originally decided not to help the insurance giant, but then changed it's position when AIG couldn't obtain the tens of billions required from the private sector (seems like no one has that kind of money these days).

Now in this case, the Fed got something in return - some 80% of the company and they got to fire all of the leadership plus they have veto power for large decisions. And AIG has to repay the loan within the next 24 months. Basically this infusion of cash allowed AIG to gain more time to tap it's huge asset base and sell enough to pay off the Fed's loan. If AIG can stay solvent in this time period, the taxpayers who fronted this (all of us, by the way) will gain a positive return on our investment.

If AIG fails to become liquid enough to pay off this loan, then we've basically took $85 Billion and burned it in the street (in comparison to the Iraq War: we have dropped as taxpayers around $3 TRILLION on Iraq with estimates of around $5-7 Trillion if you include Afghanistan - Bush sold us on Iraq with a prewar estimate of $50-60 Billion - that's off by a good 100 times - figures courtesy of the Huffington Post - March 19, 2008 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/19/iraq-casualties-iraq-cos_n_92303.html)

Like they say, a Billion here a Billion there - sooner or later you've got real money.

The problem isn't in that we don't have the money (well hell, we'll just print more!), it's that we've sent a very clear message to corporate leaders in that your company is deemed too big to fail, we've got your back. Lehman Bros. wasn't large enough so we let that one go (Merrill Lynch was purchases by B of A). But what about GM or Ford or United? We're telling those companies that there IS a chance that we'll cover you if you get too far into a corner - and that causes the moral hazard.

The motivation to keep your choices as a CEO above board and taking the appropriate risks is greatly diminished by bailing out another company. Basically we've told American corporations that you can enjoy the fruits of your risk taking and the taxpayers will pay for your losses.

Golden parachutes, hand picked board of directors, inbreeding of rock-star CEO's that have made several lifetimes of fortune in their "leadership" positions yet seem to have no obligation to the thousands of investors who have placed their faith and their money with their tenure.

Sometimes tough love is what we need to offer and we should have let AIG feel the brunt of its decision making. It would have sent a clear message to GM and others who are contemplating their own financial woes - get your shit together or it's over.

Capitalist markets require everyone to face the consequences of their actions - it's actually what regulates the industry by staying within the rules. If some companies find themselves above the law (or rules in this case), then with consequences suspended the tone of the decisions are forever changed. It's a place where we cannot let our country go. Read more! Read more!

Motivation...

Read more! Motivation is process of moving from pain to pleasure. So to be "highly motivated" that is literally stating that there is significant pain to suggest quick resolution to a less painful environment.

I think about motivation a lot these days. Whether it's my own motives or how we as a collective society chose to move. Motivation comes in many different ways - in the spy world the acronym M.I.C.E. is used. M (money), I (ideology), C (coercion/compromise) and E (ego) are the basis factors for why a person would be willing (or in the case of coercion/compromise - unwilling, but required) to turn against their state to give away secrets to other nations. I believe that those same basis factors are for why an individual or group would chose to do anything that is past the status quo.

For instance - how would change really happen to a group of people? How could you convince say a million people to do something different?

First, there has to be just cause. Without a solid, logically framed reason, people will find fault and be dismissive. That same logically framed reasons doesn't have to be well intended (like spying for another country) or it can be for the benefit of the group (usually at the sacrifice of a minority).

Secondly, the pitch is delivered to the weakest of spots - or in a group - on multiple "fronts". People choose to change (or move) from a present position with those core MICE factors. Money or Ego or Ideology (or some combination of the three) with the last resort of Coercion (making someone do something against their will by withholding punishment). If we have monetary compensation or reward from changing our behavior then that might be the crux. Or maybe we have and ideological cause that we adhere to that is the change (such as in religion) or our egos are at stake such as I must show up to work on time or someone might think bad of me (not all ego driven motivations are egotistical per se).

In my opinion, Americans haven't been challenged to change in recent years. I find it very interesting that the Greatest Generation - that generation that came together to fight in the last great war (WWII) were motivated by both Ego and Ideology - with a touch of Coercion from a direct threat from the Japanese and Europe - spawned the generation that is running us into the ground. Their children (the baby boomers) are the direct generation that are in charge and running the large corporations and in high level positions in government. That same generation that found solidarity to fight and ration itself through the great war had children that found that selfish motivations and hedonism was a much better course.

Maybe that was the start of that movement (motivation) of the Baby Boomers down this path - those painful years of their parents in the Great Depression and then living through the war and subsequent cultural repression that lasted in the 50's and early 60's until they just had enough constraint and wanted to just be free (drugs and the introduction of "the pill" were fuel in this fire).

I am from the next generation - the one they can't seem to put a name to. Generation X that grew up with enough lack of technology that video games were things you went to an arcade for and the paranoia hadn't fully grasped the free roaming as a child. But my generation hasn't been tested in fire yet.

I see the coming warning sirens of a great change - one that will happen at the greatest pace in human history - with massive transfers of wealth and instability as fall out from our parents guidance to this point.

Some people will think the best course of action will be to just stand still and let the storm roll over and thus continue on our fat, happy ways. But I firmly believe that the better metaphor is to liken our journey to being in a vast ocean and that we must row to get to somewhere that still lies over the horizon. And that maybe, with enough collaboration, we could see the storms and pay enough attention to steer away from them, or at least hit the weakest part of the storm.

I feel that the coming motivation will be so radical that it is incredibly difficult to even think about how to prepare for it. It will force us to all rethink our resources and reaffirm our foundational core beliefs. Maybe take better care of ourselves, save a little bit more money and make responsible financial choices that are based on long term survivability and not short term hedonistic choices.

That of our grandparents who saved their money to buy a car or a home (with cash no less!) who knew the pain of a nation on it's knees and that even in the depths of national financial despair great things can emerge with enough motivation (the Tennessee Valley projects, dam construction, etc). And the vast investment in proper infrastructure by tapping the national resources of trained peoples post WWII in the building of the freeways and transportation networks.

I think that my generation will endure great pains and will eventually rise like the Phoenix from the ashes like my grandparents did. We will do it by taking greater care for our children and through taking care of our parents - who got us into this mess to begin with.

Our motivation will be great because in the end we will have no choice. In the next twenty years, my generation will be the one leading policy and the government and they will have endured much. Read more! Read more!

Where's the panic?

Read more! I've been listening to a lot of news radio lately (go NPR!) and guest after guest after guest have nothing but bad news and bad feelings about this latest crash on Wall St. Most financial analysts are thinking that the clouds may part sometime in 2010-2011 before we start to see some type of recovery.

But the NYSE hasn't really collapsed (it's been kicked down, but it's far from doomsday) as they thought they would even with AIG on the ropes and WaMu barely keeping it's head above water. Maybe it's because the FDIC has done it's job by keeping people comfortable with their actual liquid assets (i.e. checking accounts) accessible. And maybe that even though the first line of the general public's notion with all of this financial crisis is that it's so far above the heads of the average person that no one really knows what to think and/or do.

The thing that will affect people directly is in their long term retirement savings. Portfolios of all types are being hit by the downturn in the markets which means that pension funds and mutual funds that Americans have their retirement savings in are diminishing and investments that fund philanthropy such as scholarships for colleges and trusts that donate their proceeds to charitable causes will start to see less and less available monies.

And maybe the general public just doesn't care if a bunch of Wall St. tycoons are losing their collective asses.

My gut is telling me that this will start to pinch us in the next 90 days. When companies start to slow down work and people start losing their jobs right before Christmas. I believe that by the first of the year the repercussions of this shake up will finally reach John and Jane Q. Public.

But that's just a guess. As with all things that are incredibly complicated - such as mortgage backed securities - you literally need to have a PhD to navigate the complexity of it all. In a nut shell (and this is just what I've gathered - I'm no expert), credit was extended in mass amounts to companies based on the collective collateral of the value of homes - kind of like a massive home equity loan. When mortgage prices fell due to the housing peak and subsequent decline, the collateral that the finance companies used to sell/loan out to others collapsed as well - leaving loans with nothing to back them. Financial institutions were 'upside down' in their loans and were defaulting en masse.

The thing is that the investors that are losing is the entire planet. Countries invest in other countries and with the US being as big as it is, we're the place to put a good share of your cash. If our system collapses/recedes, then all nations do as well.

I think why there isn't really a panic is that there isn't another nation looming to take advantage of this financial shortfall. China, as old as it is, is not in a position to take the lead as a superpower. The US is still sitting in the #1 spot with no apparent heirs.

And that is what I really think is at the core problem of this. In our growth patterns in the 50's and 60's, we had the Soviet Union as our chief rival and collectively worked against that threat (real or perceived). We don't have that chief 'threat' at this time to inspire competition. We became fat and lazy by being the biggest dog on the block.

I'm curious to see what plays out. Especially with AIG in trouble (they sold the insurance against those mortgage backed securities so now with everyone defaulting, they don't have enough cash to cover all of the claims). My hope is that the government will choose NOT to bail out AIG as painful as it may be. We have to let people feel the full extent of the pain for real change to happen. My wish is that with the inevitable regulations that will come up with the next administration that the lawmakers don't go too far. Read more! Read more!

The falling of giants...

Read more! As of yesterday in New York, two more giant financial houses just came falling down. Lehman Brothers, who was founded 158 years ago with assets around $690B and Merrill Lynch, founded 94 years ago with assets over $1 Trillion are no more. With the credit crisis in full swing, these two companies were dissolved over the weekend terminating their long, storied histories.

Merrill Lynch was sold to Bank of America, who will now be one of the world's largest companies in finance and Lehman Bros. who filled for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Protection. With a few signatures, they were gone.

I really don't care too much about either company personally. I don't have any investments with either one (and no one should worry if they're bank deposits, they'll be protected by the FDIC - it sucks if you've owned stock in either one). At one time on Wall Street, there were five large banking institutions, now there are only two (with the fall of Bear Sterns earlier). What's amazing to me was that a select group in the company leadership (both active and boards appointed) allowed this to happen. That making money today without pause to think of future consequences is what allowed these companies to find their way to this point.

The credit crunch is blamed. Mainly because banks don't have the same liquidity (available money) as they did even 12 months ago. The thing is that the credit crunch was brought on themselves by being greedy.

By law, incorporated companies (and especially those that are publicly traded) HAVE to make as much money as possible for their shareholders. That means that they are LIABLE to take those risks that produce the best available returns in the fiscal quarter in which they're operating. When banks started expanding out into (at first) marginal borrowers for money (both for home purchases and for businesses) then taking bigger risks by diluting their investment pools by taking on sub-prime borrowers.

For those who haven't put one-and-one together yet, "sub-prime" are people that had no reason to be borrowing money from anyone. Most children know that you don't lend money to people who can't pay you back, yet these huge institutions did that very thing. And now, after the fall out of those choices, those same companies are gone.

I believe we need to reward companies for LONG TERM performance and not focus so much on the short term quarterly reports. These companies sold out their investors by basically setting them up for failure. These are skilled professionals, so I'm not going to accept excuses for non-performance on projection models - what I think really did them in was that they, deep down, believed that the government would step in and not let them fail.

It was a hard decision by our lawmakers to not provide bailout assistance and basically stand back to see what happens with this mess that we've just been handed. They tried to infuse Bear Sterns with taxpayer cash (the Federal Reserve was called into shore it up this spring) to no avail and to considerable backlash from taxpayers. The bailout of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae was required due to the pseudo government backing of those companies - Lehman and Merrill didn't have that ace up their sleeve.

People want to believe that the worst is over - I don't think it is. We've got a who mess of hard choices to make in the next 2-4 years to recover from this. The next get-rich-quick-scheme may help with a boom in speculative investments, but the reality of it is that we (we as in the taxpayers) will have to pony up for these things. A costly war overseas and indigestion from failed companies that we now own (we're not quite to nationalization of companies, but getting close with each bailout). The revenue has to come from somewhere - you and I.

Just like a household that is upside down in debt, sacrifices and hard choices are in order. Marginal government programs will need to be eliminated, mainstream government programs thinned down (which means loss of jobs for government employees), contracts to upgrade put on hold.

The other side of this is that the government really needs to be pushing for parody in trade imbalances with other nations. Countries like China and Saudi Arabia that send us 10 times the deficit in products and oil for every one that we send back to them. We have to embargo/trade restrict these financial transactions.

Cutting our addiction to oil (especially foreign provided oil) would help quite a bit - the key to that is to keep the price of oil very high (even by placing very tariffs from foreign produced oil). Because the very nature of oil is based as a commodity (prices set on supply and demand), the more we focus away from using oil, the cheaper it actually becomes. Eventually, the oil is cheap again and we lose focus and revert back to using it (i.e. the rise of the SUV from the crisis we had 20 years earlier with OPEC). This would prove to be especially painful with a real long term focus of being domestically solvent.

I don't know if our society is actually prepared to make such a long term investment and stick with it. We're barely 7 years out of 9/11 and it's a distant memory and the causes for being in Afghanistan and Iraq (that one is dubious) are nearly forgotten.

To me, all of this economic strain is really stemmed from our lack to see past the skin on our nose. That is what is most truly frightening for the future outlook of American society as we currently know it. Read more! Read more!

Irrational fears

Read more! On my flight back from Seattle yesterday, I sat next to a woman who we instantly started up a conversation. Usually on my flights, I zone out with my ipod or read but this gal clearly wasn't going to let this happen so I went along with it. She was a grandmother in her early sixties who was on a trip to go meet up with her sister-in-law for a road trip. We got to talk about a lot of things on the 90 minute flight, and politics came up.

She's from Seattle which is a hot bed of liberals and she's about a conservative Christian as you can get. Raised in the Midwest (Indiana), Catholic and married to a Boeing worker for the last nearly 40 years. She served in the Army out of high school and was an X-Ray tech before committing to being a stay-at-home mother.

We were talking about the gubernatorial race in Washington and how she felt that Gregoire had "bought" her election by paying for two subsequent recounts (past the initial one paid for by the citizens of Washington). I knew nothing of this other than it spurred me on to ask what she thought of the upcoming presidential election.

She flatly told me that Barack Obama scares her (with genuine fear in her eyes). I asked why and she recanted that it all spurs from the blip of controversy over whether or not Obama would say the Pledge of Allegiance (this made the news last year). I then asked her that maybe it was taken out of context and that he has also sworn oaths for his seats in the Illinois State legislature and the US Senate and that those should fall as proof to his duties. She told me it didn't matter.

What was really interesting to me was that how one incident is the crucible for one person's overwhelming opinion. Or more in that how John McCain seems to have won over an entire segment of our society by preying on their fears as white, Christian conservatives. In that he's Republican (how this group became the standard bearer for Christians is absolutely amazing to me and how blindly they group as a whole follows it) and that he has some interesting stories of faith (but not examples of his own).

I know that this presidential election will be close. There will be a huge segment of society that will vote party lines because they feel that the Republicans are the embodiment of Christianity yet I rarely have seen Christian motives from the group. Poor fiscal management, alienating the poor, giving the best options to our wealthy in a thought that it will trickle down (it does - just overseas to non-Americans). Where is the Country First that McCain talks about? How is it that the Republicans can blame it all on the Bush Administration and the rest of them had nothing to do with it? I find that argument the weakest in that the Republicans as a whole SHOULD have stepped up and ousted the guy if they felt he was doing such a crappy job. It's really ridiculous the entire platform for "change".

Sometimes the best person for the job is the one that is the most unlikely. Even if you don't agree with the entire ideals package. I just hope that whoever wins that the weight of the nation is realized and it is put to use to actually do something before it's too late. Read more! Read more!

Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac...

Read more! Some of you out there have heard of these two giants - probably in reference to the last home you purchased (if you even heard about them then) or more recently when the US Government started down the path of bailing out these organizations.

What you may not know is that Both Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac are two of the largest companies in the history of the world (with the possible exception of the East India Trading Co if you can calculate the exchange rates properly). Their combined debt from the failed mortgages that they have is more debt than every other country on the face of the earth (save for the US of A). 10 Trillion Dollars.

These institutions were private sector brokerages - basically they were created in the Great Depression to open up liquidity for banks to loan money for new home purchases. Banks could only lend out money they had and if they had too many mortgages on the books, they were asset rich but not with cash. Fannie Mae would then buy the mortgages from the banks so the banks would then have the cash to lend out for more homes. Hence why they got to be so huge without anyone really knowing it.

They were a pseudo government backed companies that implied that those mortgages purchased by Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac would be covered by the good graces of American tax dollars if they should fail (similar - not quite - but close to the FDIC insurance that each bank has for your deposits).

Well here we are - 80 years later and now we've got a big mess on our hands. Why the government has to step in is that many industrialized nations have invested large sums of their own portfolio of cash assets into these organizations just because they were supposedly backed by the government. China, Great Brittain, and others have some 10% of it's assets tied up in this and if we let them collapse, it would literally send the entire world economy into a freeze - making the Great Depression look pretty small in comparison. So, in effect, our government and our tax dollars have to bail these companies out.

This sucks on many levels - Our debt is huge already and now taking on this debt makes it even worse (thankfully our Gross Domestic Product - GDP isn't tied to our debt!).

What this really signals out to me is that our growth as a nation has been leveraged almost entirely on credit. We have taken loans from our partner nations, we have stretched our collective purchasing power based upon institutions like Fannie Mae who took on more and more risky mortgages because they HAD the backing of the government (no real accountability when the entire company has a golden parachute). All of the way down to our own individual households that have too much credit card debt - paying for past purchases from the potential of future earnings.

The trade deficits don't help us at all. We are importing too many consumables (toys from China, oil from the Saudi's, etc.) and not sending enough back to them to make the "trade" part effective. It's basically like buying 10 items to every one we sell them - if you practiced that in your own spending, you can see that very quickly you don't have the cash to keep that up for very long before you've maxed out any and all available credit lines.

That's where we are now - we're maxed out with a nation sitting on a pile of debt. We are forced to dig deep to get out of this hole - that means that we have to close tax loopholes and everyone will have to pay more in taxes to pony up to pay it off.

Unless America can somehow dig up the next greatest series of innovations that the world will do/pay anything for to posses, then we find ourselves being slaves to the very nations that have lent us the money and we will have truly lost our bargaining at the world table.

We'll have to stand by to see how this one turns out... Read more! Read more!

Male Elementary Teachers...

Read more! This was another interesting snippet from NPR today at lunch (Talk of the Nation). It was the lack of male teachers (less than 10%) in elementary schools. My father was an elementary teacher (who later became a principal) as well as my maternal grandfather (same story).

The recent consensus was that men don't go into teaching at the elementary level due to the perceived lack of "respect" and financial gains. It's true that many men fear that going into that profession is possibly weaker than pursuits in more male mainstream professions such as medicine, engineering or construction. But what a waste of talent that is not being given the right opportunities to share their abilities as full-time teachers.

Many of the callers commented that they were single moms who wanted a male teacher for their children so that they may have a steady male role model available to them in their lives. It seems reasonable to me that this would be a great avenue for men to serve (indirectly, though).

One of the "roadblocks" as point of discussion was the perception of safety - as if a man who is interested in teaching at the elementary level would somehow be equated to a pedophile. Amazing that our lives have been shattered so grandly by so few to the point that men would rather just stay away than serve. The guest even commented that it was socially safer for a boy scout leader to take a bunch of kids into the woods for a weekend than it was to have a professional male educator in front of the classroom.

And I use the term "serve" very generously here - you don't go into teaching to become financially wealthy. Many men can make much more doing work that doesn't require the same level of training or education (or the BS involved). For example: the starting wages for a first year teacher in the Boise area is around $30k (or roughly $14.50/hr) and still requires at least a 4-yr degree and a strong push towards a masters. By contrast, an architectural drafter with a 2-yr degree from ITT can start at $14/HR and within two to three years be around $18/HR ($37k) and by 5-8 years be around $20-22/HR ($45k).

Plus, as added insult in this example, after 8 years in the State of Idaho, that drafter can sit to take the ARE (architectural registration exam) to become a licensed architect. A Project Architect can be making north of $80k with 15 year's experience. All on 2-YR's of official college education. A teacher with their masters and several credits past that would only be knocking on $40-50k/yr with infinite more headaches for the salary for the same amount of time in service.

As someone who is linked to so many outstanding people in this line of work - those that undertake this challenge of educating our youth are truly called to service not unlike being called to the clergy. It's a service whose rewards are not tied to monetary compensation, but to those experiences in investing directly into our youth. It is a sad commentary on our social values that we do not recognize the importance of this and set our priorities straight. God knows that no one in our current leadership (government, business, etc) got there without a quality education. Read more! Read more!

Media bias...

Read more! I love NPR. This morning, they were talking about the supposed media biased opinion from MSNBC (subsidiary of parent company NBC/GE) who leans more in the liberal direction with show hosts Chris Matthews and Keith Oberman. Now, I personally don't like either of these shows - I don't find them interesting enough (but I do miss Oberman on ESPN), but MSNBC had been running these guys as anchors for their election coverage. Which, with their backgrounds, pretty much sets up some sort of biased opinion seeping through especially when both are OP-ED types and not necessarily journalists in the pure form.

Post the RNC in Minnesota, the Republicans were calling MSNBC out on the carpet due to Oberman's comments and "leading" of the viewers. I actually agreed with NPR's comment that people have the right to choose and in this day and age they can exercise their right to choose to turn the channel (what a concept!) if they don't like what they're hearing.

I find the whole unbiased reporting rather funny. For ages, newspapers (traditionally before TV) were completely rooted in biased opinion and backed particular candidates and their issues as gospel. This went all through the 18th and 19th centuries in America. Then with the rise of TV as the main quick media source, the Walter Cronkites of the world championed unbiased, fact-based reporting.

With the rise of blogs - the OP-ED is back with commentary as biased as biased can be. Who cares about the facts? As long as it's in a format that I agree with.

What bothers me, and really what is probably irking the McCain/Palin camp is that news agencies that claim to be unbiased in their fact reporting who then insert ratings generating commentators to spice things up a bit. It's false advertising and undermines the entire credibility of agency. If MSNBC is guilty of this, they need to reconsider very quickly.

Of course, it would just be great to not have any talking heads at all. Just have some cameras in the room so we can just watch what's going on. In a recent issue of Tennis Magazine, there was an article about tennis commentators and how they just yap and yap just to fill the void. Our TV news agencies tend to do the same since they need to fill that void when there really isn't anything to say at all.

Even with Dish TV and cable's myriad of choices for information - it's still in a programmers box and lacks customization from the eventual end user. The Internet tends to have much better capabilities of this and maybe some in our not-so-distant future we'll be able to hand pick what we want to see at the minute we want to see it.

But then again, we would then only be looking for what we want to hear and know about without entertaining the big picture. That doesn't sound much different than 18th Century newspapers to me.

UPDATE: MSNBC updated this afternoon that Oberman and Matthews were pulled from election anchor coverage but will retain their talk-shows. Read more! Read more!

When do we stop having morals?

Read more! This was a question that was posed to me from a friend of mine at coffee this morning as we were discussing the right-wing vs. left-wing aspects of the morality in America. He is a staunch conservative Christian who is anti gay marriage, anti-abortion, etc. who doesn't feel that we should institute the ten commandments at the only laws in the land, but that we should abide by the rules set forth in the Bible. His fear, and rightfully so, is that his children (who are in their teenage years) are becoming more and more cynical due to the overexposure to the immoralities that culture has traditionally shunned. Too much sex, language, violence and slang talk that, in his mind, constitute the embodiment of evil.

I can't really argue with him too much on this point. Cable TV stations that cater to young adults and teenagers (MTV in particular) seem to have degraded themselves into cheap trick entertainment (there is a new show on MTV called "Busted" wherein kids recount their "hilarious" entanglements with the law - which only seem to promote that it's OK to run afoul every now and then). His point was that when is has our society gone "too far" wherein we don't have a moral base to steer people away from bad behaviors and/or evil.

I guess I've always felt that people are accountable for their actions and that if they choose to flush their lives away, then so be it. But then again, having a moral basis is what keeps people working together. If we didn't have moral (or ethics) then what's keeping people accountable to show up for work, hold contracts in place or generally abiding by the unwritten rules that keep society stable? If those weren't in place, then it would seem to me that we're a short step away from an anarchist state where the free-for-all burns out quickly into a disaster.

In that we have to hold certain values dear to our collective hearts or our society just doesn't function - such as men and women who voluntarily serve our country in our military, schools and the myriad of social programs nationwide. That if we did slide too far into individual isolationism, then what happens after that? We are all inextricably linked to one another in that the unwritten social norms act as the glue that keeps us from spinning apart.

But where is the room for tolerances such as gay marriage (or unions) or women's right to equal work for equal pay? Those things weren't even considered 50 years ago and now we're on the verge of changing state constitutions (which, is crazy, since we currently don't define traditional marriage in state constitutions now either!). Is it a sign of true degradation of our social values to consider that it is actually OK for a gay couple to be able to access health insurance or adopt a child or that woman's place isn't just in the home, but on the battlefield or in the board room?

I don't think there actually is a "line in the sand" that we can draw at any point in our history to say that THIS is the baseline for our societal moral structure and never shall we deviate from it. Our human experience is just too fluid and that, over time, things just have a way of working out. Just because a nation allows the creation of laws to protect civil rights of minorities (of color or sexual orientation), doesn't mean that it has now legislated that everyone must now become gay or that it degrades my marriage in any shape or form.

Do I think that some of our entertainment has gone over the top? - yes. Is it necessary to have to air shows like "My Super Sweet Sixteen" or WWF Raw or the other soft porn shows making their way onto national networks? Probably not. I can tell you that I don't want my daughter to be watching any MTV nowadays and I consider myself to be a rather tolerant person. MTV's list of positive virtues (such as getting kids out to vote or have safe sex) versus the long list of negative programming (shows like The Real World or Next) that only appear to foster negativity, cynicism and strife amongst the most fragile and impressionable amongst us. It truly is sad that there are a group of people that are making a mountain of cash off of this very notion at the expense of our youth.

We spend our entire youth trying to ditch our innocence to only spend our entire remaining lifetime to regain it. And as with all truly wonderful gifts, we don't really know what we had until it's gone. A social values structure is something valuable to protect, but with all relationship based notions, it's always best to pick your battles and strive for the ultimate common ground affects us all and relay that social ground work. The conservatives and the liberals need to come a long way to find that common ground and not spend 90% of their time talking about 10% of our common issues. Read more! Read more!

Losing my religion

Read more! Well, well, well. I've reached that treacherous crossroads on my spiritual life where I have spent enough time questioning God and his presence on earth to the point where I'm not sure what to think.

I was born and raised in a conservative Christian home within a multi-generational Christian family. All of my friends around me growing up and through my school years were all in this same boat/perspective. And now, after all of these years, I am wondering what in the hell have I been doing with my time.

It's not like I've encountered some empirical evidence that God is dead - or never was. It is that for something that I've just practiced for most of my life, just never has felt solid for me.

I've tried, committed, gone to meetings, attended church. I know all of the proper things to say and when to say them. I can pray in a group and make it sound all passionate. But it has always felt empty to me. Like hollow promises or better yet just like those trick posters with the dots that some people can just "see" the boat or the airplane but I just see the dots (I honestly can not see how those work).

And, I guess (because I haven't wanted to actually do anything past this point), I'm tired of pretending to have passion about something I just don't feel about. I've even had friends give me books about what to do when I don't desire God. I don't even desire to read the book. How sad.

But Christianity has the real lock on it all. Like every religion on Earth, there is the "bet-the-farm" clause: if you don't believe this holistically, then you are to spend eternity in hell. The Muslims have it, Christians, everyone. But a "relationship" in that context is very much like a marriage where the husband tells the wife: "We can have a wonderful relationship together, love and adoration, or we can just coexist. But if you ever leave me - I'll kill you". And it's just about as flatly delivered as that.

In my experience, evangelical Christians sing and praise God every Sunday, read the Bible, have special bible studies, Sunday schools and the like - but I have not seen the response from God. My mind thinks - why would God even enjoy this? It's a narcissistic behavior of which we, as humans, are not to indulge in. And for all of the evidence that we are to take without question - the Holy Bible and it's stories, it just seems that it works best in a context of illiterate, non-educated peoples where hope is just about all they can ever wish for in their miserable existence.

It's not that hedonism is the way to go - I believe that we Americans have imbibed a little too long on the creature comforts of life (I am truly guilty of this) - but where does God fit in now? Maybe we are set up for a grand experiment like the character Constantine eludes to where God is "just a kid with an ant farm" and he just watches casually from afar.

I can't even really bring myself to think much along these lines as my lifelong indoctrination won't let me dwell on heresy for more than a minute or so as for fear of being struck down by God Himself. To announce that God is Dead is tantamount to saying humankind has been a ship lost at sea for it's entire existence. Having God in place gives us at least some form of grounding - a beacon, no matter how faint, that gives us some focus lest the sea swallow us up.

There is a part of me that thinks that upon my death, and the great mystery is revealed to me, that the conjured images of heaven and hell just won't be there. That I will have a chance to have part of my life force reunite with my passed loved ones until my energy fades into non-existence once the people on Earth who knew me don't any more. And at that point there won't be any reason to exist anyway - no matter in what form.

And maybe that really isn't a bad way to go out - and that eternity, no matter how grand it is portrayed in a heaven sense, just would be boring after a few thousand years and every conversation you've ever wanted to have has happened and every book or piece of knowledge has been consumed. What after that? It starts to look a lot like hell in the form of boredom.

I should stop here - this subject is far too big and complex to summarize into a tidy blog post - but it will be visited from time to time as I deal with this. Read more! Read more!

Purple State

Read more! I have to admit - this is the first year that I've ever contributed to any political campaign. I currently reside in one of the reddest of red states in the country and have found myself leaning heavily towards the blue side of things. So I've donated $100 towards Obama's campaign thus far.

Maybe it's my age and these things are now more important to me, but in the end, I really am tired of the conservative rhetoric that seems to say a lot about nothing. It's not that I agree with the entire Democratic Party platform - I don't see eye-to-eye on abortion for instance - but at least they are willing to put the issues on the table and get to work on them. And even with several ultra conservative Presidents in the White House, Roe v. Wade is still the rule for the last nearly 40 years. So I'm finding a "stand on abortion" is really a lot of hot air. If people really cared, it would be dealt with and not a question that has become eerily similar to "What team do you support for the World Series?"

I strongly believe that we do have social responsibilities to one another. That we can only find success through teamwork. The Republican ultra-conservatism has devolved into social isolationism: that all you'll ever need is to work hard, love Jesus, read the Bible and carry a large handgun and everyone else, if they follow that tenant, will be OK in the end. It truly is foolish to go about a life that way -and especially when you take into consideration that the Bible mentions God/Jesus being with the poor around 2,000 times, seems to me if you were an actual "Christian" you'd be striving for that on a daily basis.

We are obligated to help one another out. Not in the sense that we subsidize people who are capable but unwilling to help themselves, but putting forth our very best effort to allow for a social system that anyone can find a path to their own version of the American Dream. It is a tapestry of choices that actually allows for success - not the one-size-fits-all approach that the social conservatives preach.

Listening to Obama's speech and then to Palin's last night - the juxtaposition couldn't be more clear. Obama is willing to stand up for himself, but stay focused on the actual issues wherein Palin (and I suppose McCain's will tonight as well) didn't really say anything at all. She spoke of her personal life to introduce us to her and her family, her background as an executive as mayor and of the state, but really nothing that stood out to me that she has any idea of what the issues are that affect all of us in this country. What is the plan from the Republicans? I couldn't even begin to tell you.

It's not that the Democrats have the ultimate silver bullet, but Obama (to me) appears to be able to work together with everyone necessary to at least accomplish something. McCain/Palin look to me like the old man with his old ways and his gun-toting, conservative Christian female running mate who appears more to be pandering for the lost Hillary supporters who are too unwilling (or racist) to vote for Obama.

So I find myself a bit blended these days. In the local elections, I'm sure I'll have my share of Republicans who I'll support and those Democrats too, who I feel will do a better job in the office. But in the end, I am supporting the best method of creating the future infrastructure so my children and my grandchildren can find success. If that means taking it in the shorts now, so be it. Read more! Read more!