Grape Harvester, Front View
Grape Harvesting Under a Full Moon
Here’s a quote from a recent New York Times article online that is worth repeating:
“From a budget perspective, that means ending and reversing the misguided focus on the deficit. It was never wise or necessary to cut the deficit while the economy remained weak. The political imperative to do so, driven by Republicans and clumsily adopted by Democrats, has had devastating results. Over the past three years, the depth and pace of federal spending cuts have reduced growth by about 0.7 percentage point, equivalent to over $300 billion in lost output and roughly 2 million fewer jobs than would otherwise have been the case. That so-called fiscal drag has been the single biggest weight on economic growth.”
In other words, the Republican screaming about deficits and how horrible they are has caused a loss of two million jobs by preventing the passage of stimulus bills like infrastructure spending. What is the most important thing that we need in the USA right now? Jobs. Once again, we see demonstrated the Republican anti-reality focus. They complain about the deficit when the real problem is a lack of jobs.
The deficit is manageable, if the economy grows. Cutting spending to avoid deficit spending right now costs jobs and is a drag on the economy. It is necessary to spend money to live, and in all historical cases, we have been able to “spend our way out of a recession.” The best example is the US economy after WW II. We had a deficit of over 120% of our GDP, and in twenty years, we reduced that to below 50%. The deficit as a percent of GDP continued to drop until 1981, when Ronald Reagan became President; it was well under 40% by then. Under Reagan and the first Bush, debt rose above 60%. under Clinton, the ratio dropped a bit, but under the second Bush it climbed rapidly, ballooning (as of 2009) to over 100%, before dropping again under Obama. These are facts, and we must not let Republican lies get in the way of reasonable living and reasonable responses to economic problems.
The reason our deficit was so high in 1945 was that we had to pay for a war. The reason the deficit is so high now is that we had to pay for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (on top of an excessive deficit inherited from Reagan), and the bank bailout (for all of which Bush, and not Obama, is solely responsible.) If we had followed good economic policy after the crash of 2008, our recession would not have been so bad, and economic growth would have rebounded to easily 4% by now. With reasonable economic growth, tax receipts would go up dramatically, and the deficit would rapidly recede. There would be no more talk of the deficit being a ball and chain for future generations by anyone but Rand Paul and a few nuts in Arkansas.
To solve the rest of the country’s problems in one paragraph: we can prevent Medicare from going broke by adopting European medicine (which cuts the bills in half) and encouraging the immigration of young, hardworking Mexicans and South Americans who will pay in to the insurance pool. We can prevent Social Security solvency problems by raising the cap on contributions and making the contributions progressive, like regular income tax; and by encouraging the immigration of young, etc. who will pay in to the Social Security pool. End of economic problems for the foreseeable future.
A Stone Church in Winslow, AZ
This church, made of local sandstone, shines red in the evening light.
At The Beach
This photo was taken on the beach near Venice or San Pedro. Despite the lack of surf, there are two surfers in the water. Houses can be seen further down the beach.
Snowy Road
Abandoned Stone Cabin near Meteor Crater
These ruins from a stone cabin are on the East side of Meteor Crater, near the circumference trail.
Prairie Dogs, Treasury “full faith and credit”, and Republican Attempts to Raise Interest Rates
The black-tailed prairie dog has been eliminated from 98 percent of its original range. This formerly ubiquitous rodent has been trapped, poisoned, shot, and cursed out since cattlemen moved in to the Great Plains.
New studies, however, show that prairie dogs are essential to the ecology of the plains. They prevent desertification and aerate the soil. The holes allow large amounts of water to penetrate deep into the soil during the infrequent, heavy rainstorms. Their burrows provide homes for many other animals, and they are easy prey for hawks and black footed ferrets. They do not compete with cattle for grass, although their holes do sometimes cause broken legs.
The elimination of prairie dogs, while probably impossible, would cause grave damage to the ecosystems of the Great Plains. Prairie dogs should be encouraged to colonize the large, empty lands within the National Forests and elsewhere, that are not being used. The presence of cattle should not be an excuse for trying to wipe out prairie dog colonies.
Prairie dogs are just another example of how people disturb ecosystems and cause serious alterations to the land without thinking beforehand. We must always consider the effects of our behavior on our natural (and artificial) environment and avoid disturbing systems that have flourished for many generations.
The presence of seven billion people, soon to be nine billion, is having a profound effect on the environment. With good management, we can probably feed everyone, and with rising living standards we can probably introduce a small family policy that will prevent further growth. However, the effects of global warming and other, unforeseen damages must be planned for.
The behavior of the Republicans (and some of the Democrats) in the United States Congress bodes ill for the possibility of solutions coming from this body. In fact, economists have said privately that if there is a third government shutdown in the next few months, credit agencies will seriously downgrade the US rating, causing skyrocketing interest rates. There is some method in this madness if what you desire is specifically to raise interest rates for the US government (and everyone else as well.) There are people who have money and prefer to keep it in safe vehicles such as Treasury Bonds, but don’t like the currently tiny interest rates that are on offer. These people could be motivated to take action, regardless of its side effects, that causes interest rates to go up significantly.
There is no way that interest rates are going to go up in the current economic climate. Investors love T-bills because they’re so safe, but their interest rates are pitiful because the economy is so weak. So if you want higher interest rates, in the current economy you have to invest in more speculative vehicles, such as new companies with new products or loan sharking. Only an extremely powerful individual or group with a desire to raise interest rates would consider using the debt ceiling bill to shut down the economy. The number of politicians who have to be lined up to get this on is not that great; as a matter of fact, estimates of Tea Party stalwarts in the House run from forty to eighty or so.
The critical Tea Party advantage is the rules changes that allow the Speaker of the House to prevent any bill from coming to a vote unless it satisfies the Tea Party faction. The rule (sometimes called the Hastert Rule) has been tightened so that only the Speaker of the House can propose any legislation at all. This rule is anti-democratic. It prevents a bipartisan majority from bringing up a bill that will be a result of compromise and have a good chance of also passing the Senate. As it is, the only legislation that comes out of the House now is so extreme that it has no chance of passing the Senate. So, for example, the House has voted over forty times to abolish “Obamacare” and none of these bills have even been brought up in the Senate.
Thus, the Tea Party, by using the Hastert Rule, has prevented the legislative branch of government from producing any legislation at all. This is a shocking dereliction of duty and shows an inability to compromise. There is some justice in claiming that Democrats would not use this rule to create legislative traffic jams the way the Republicans have been doing. Do you suppose that a radical Democratic faction would threaten to shut down the government if Congress refused to pass a 25% increase in taxes on incomes of over $250,000?
Compromise is essential to governing,; the Tea Party is unable to govern. It only does the bidding of those hidden rich people who created it. Some of these people could be trying to force interest rates up by crippling the Treasury.
These hidden rich people are like the cattlemen who decide to destroy the Plains ecosystem to enhance their profits from running cattle. They both have a profoundly destructive effect on their environment, which may not be immediately recognizable, by taking actions that improve their short term yield while insidiously affecting the long term environment.
Oranges
Snow on the Mountain Across the Street
Conrad Theodore Seitz 