THE 2012 UNITED STATES NATIONAL ELECTION

        We are all distressed at what we consider “abuses” in our entitlement system. Everyone has antidotal examples of generational welfare reliance.  There is clear documentation of public employees maximizing their retirementsby working excessive overtime during the last three years upon which their pension is based.  This is entirely legal.  Constrution workers have for decades worked during the summer and gone on unemployment every winter.  They represent that they are looking for work such that they meet the unemployment criteria.   If there is a flaw in the administration of that system, it should be addressed.  Otherwise, they are simply doing that which is legal and is in their best interests.  

        At a higher level of opportunism, Romney, Buffet and Gates pay taxes at a 14% rate.  Apple paid a 9.8% rate on income of billions due literally to laundering their income through multiple, traceable, legal  out of country accounts.  GE paid no taxes on their 2010 income.  All these tax liabilities were lower than what would be expected due to what are called “loop holes” in the US Tax Code.  What all the above actions have in common is that they are all legal.  The moral to the story is that every private person, every private corporation does that which is in its best interest.  Every person and corporation seeks to maximize all the opportuniteis the law allows.  This is human nature.

        The question is “What is the best solution?”.  It appears, according to Romney, Ryan and Grovner Norquist, reducing social benefits as well as earned and negotiated contractual entitlements while not touching the tax code other than reducing tax assessments is the promoted Republican Plan.  The Democrats take the position, apparently, that modifying tax loop holes on capital gains, oil subsidies, off shore bank and investment accounts, special corporate provisions together with increasing income taxes, particularly on the higher wage earners, is the route to take.

        The 2012 election will set the course the country will follow.  It will likely go a very long way in defining the future rights, prospects and possibly even the continued existence of the middle class.  Obviously, no one knows exactly what the future will bring.  Either path brings with it significant unknowns and risks.

THE VALUE OF A LIBERAL EDUCATION

            Robert J. “Samuelson’s editorial in the Washington Post on May 28, 2012 is a classic example of extreme over statement in order to validate a  Political position. His argument is simple:  Pre 1940, 5% of the privileged went to college. Starting with the GI Bill and continuing with subsidized state schools, now 30% have a Bachelor’ degree. However, he infers, increased access is a failure because 1/3 of graduates did not improve their power of “critical” thinking.  What about the 2/3 who did improve at this very valuable skill?  Would they be better off without it? His  recommendation is that there be more vocational training.
            John Henry Cardinal Newman wrote a very considered essay 160 years ago on this very topic.  Samuelson’s position was more eloquently postulated by Newman who asked: “Cautious and practical thinkers will ask of me, what is the gain of this Philosophy  [knowledge] from which I promise so much…How are we better for this master view of things? Does it not reverse the principle of the division of labour? to what then does it lead? where does it end? what does it do? how does it profit?  what inducements do we hold out to the …. community, when we set about the enterprise of  founding a University? [or educating the masses?]
            His answer is that “It has a very tangible, real, and sufficient end. Knowledge is capable of being its own end. Any kind of knowledge is its own reward.”   He quotes Cicero as observing that “all of us [are] drawn to the pursuit of Knowledge; in which to excel we onsider excellent, whereas to mistake, to err, to be ignorant, to be deceived, is both an evil and a disgrace.” Newman speaks “of a Knowledge which is its own end, when I call it liberal knowledge, when I educate for it, and make it the scope of a University.  His conclusion, at a time when “Liberal” was not a pejorative term, was that “All branches of knowledge are connected together.  There is a knowledge worth possessing for what it is, and not merely for what it does. ”                                         In contrast with the cumulated knowledge and perceptions of these and other intellectual giants, we are subjected to  the likes of a shill, Samuelson, who, no doubt, is paid to proselytize.  Sad!

DEMOCRACY – CAN IT SURVIVE?

The Italian “Prime minister”, aka an economic czar appointed outside the democratic processes was asked if Democracy can survive.  Is it a truly viable form of governance?     That is a good question.

The present incarnation of Democracy includes essentially unregulated, laissez-faire corporate exploitation combined with corrupted politicians who are in cahoots with the corporations. So long as the “system” remains compromised, there will be a lack of human progress.  There will continue to extreme suffering by peoples in America and in the world.  No group is immune.  The goal seems to be to protect the generational wealth of the select few.  As there is more money in the system, more are welcome into the club. The proviso, however, is that they must accept the mores of those more established.

Then there is the incredible irony of J. P. Morgan, who is “too big to fail”, taking advantage of the lack of oversight and loosing so much money on a hedge that they can only admit to a 2 billion dollar loss though it could be upwards of 5 billion. Their position is so complex, so they say, that mere mortals are not sophisticated enough to comprehend. Isn’t that the rationalization Religions have been selling for the last 4000 years?  Of course, they want less regulation so they can risk for big gains and let the government and taxpayers assume the risks of loss. Are they nuts? Or do they just think we are stupid?  No doubt, it is the latter.

Romney is the poster boy for that group. He knows the owners of professional sports teams and is hosted in their private boxes.  He cannot identify with nor has he any connection to the common man, eg, the 99%.  He wants to “represent” them/us.  He actually simply wants power and status.  It’s for him and his ego. He has never, so far as published reports go, ever demonstrated any empathy or even consciousness of the masses.

The issue here is not between Democracy and unfettered corporate exploitation.  It is between Masters and Servants, Freedom and Slavery.

We are a single species separated only by 50,000 years

We are a single species separated only by 50,000 years. The dominant and most consistent theme of our humanity is self interests. While aggression may be intergral to our nature, we as a species should not tolerate unbridled killing and torture of our brethern. Nevertheless, on the world stage, a majority of societies still literally kill and imprison those who are in their way, advocate or hold different values or religious ideologies or merely disagree with that which particular governments, corporations or even individuals in authority want or decree.

Governments should and may manage their individual societies. Local governments should be able to manage and police their local populations. However, the concept of national “sovereignty”, when considered in conjunction with ” human rights”, is an obsolete concept. Governments at all levels worldwide should guarantee that which is “inalienable”. The United States Declaration of Independence defined it broadly as ” life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness”. That would seem to be a reasonable starting point. Inherent in those precepts would be freedom from slavery & physical oppression.

We must evolve intellectually, ethically and morally from the now primary and accepted goals of self-agrandisement, preservation of power and accumulation of assets. There is a desperate need for a present day Code of Hameradi, Justinian Code, Ten Commandments. World society would seem to require a centralized world government with a clear set of values that apply to all mankind, regardless of their location on the globe, religious aspirations or inherient wealth.

These concepts appear to have first been seriously advocated by Woodrow Wilson. His League of Nations concept was enlightened. Unfortunately, the majority of the mankind, dictators and despots were not ready to accept the idea in 1918. Nor still today are the majority of nations ready despite the infra-structure of the United Nations. The United States could better use its global power and dominance, not to engage in wars of economic aggression, by contributing its police powers to the United Nations and the World Court.

Aliens on Earth? What if there are no other cognizant life forms?

The US government just admitted to spending millions on attempting to discover or prove that alien exist or more precisely, have visited the Earth.  Other than a few fuzzy photos, there has been no evidence produced.

Here’s a risky thought:  “What if there are no other cognizant life forms anywhere?” What if humankind is the lone sentient or cognitive species in the galaxy?

“Sentient” is defined as beings or species that build things, communicate by writings or phones or possess similar technological capacity. Trees and plants, for example, are certainly living organisms and an integral part of the Earth’s construct. However, it is generally accepted that trees are not sentient.  In a like manner, animals, bacteria, birds are clearly alive and they learn. However, what have they built?

Life has existed on Earth in millions of different forms over the last 600,000,000 years. Technical developments have only come to pass in the last few thousand years.  Expand this to what we can see and hear.  There is nothing.  No evidence off the Earth.  What if there are no sentient life forms other than Homo sapiens anywhere else in the galaxy? What if technological developments exist only  here on Earth? There is no empirical proof of any technology other than what humans have developed.  What if there are no comparable alien intelligences or gods? What if there is only the now and humankind and what can actually be seen, touched, felt and hear?

The possibility exists that humankind may be a supreme species. Maybe humankind alone is responsible for itself. Such a permutation would certainly impact on our rationalizations, our values, our view of existence. What would be our purpose if we were the lone sentient species in our cognizable universe.  It is an interesting thought.