Money, Money, Money

Link- Cash for "Kitchen Clunkers?"





"The rebate program, part of the government's $787 billion economic stimulus package, provides $300 million in federal funds to encourage consumers to buy energy-efficient appliances.

I understand some of the logic here. It's good for the environment. The government is trying to encourage Americans that our carbon footprint does matter and that Green is the way to go. My issue is in the economics of it.

It's following the footsteps of the "Cash for Clunkers" plan for automobiles and I think that is a terrible idea. We are going to process this in very simple economics. The issue at hand is the synthetic growth of the economy caused by everyone trying to save $3,500-$5,000 on a $50,000 car they can't afford. The program lasted around 2 months, if that, until the tax dollars ran out, with one extension in dollars and days. An enormous amount of cars were sold, which in turn provided a huge uptick in the economy. But those numbers give an artificially inflated outlook of the economy whereas now that the program is done the economy will likely round back down. Especially when everyone has a new car or is spoiled by the thought of handouts, so why not wait for the next round, which may not come, to get a new Corvette. Let alone, what will happen when people start defaulting on their loans because they can't afford that $50,000 car they wanted to save $3,500-$5,000 on? Sounds like what happened to the housing market, with a free money twist.

• Sidenote: I don’t think everyone who took part in the “cash for” program fits in what I described above, by any means. There are a good amount of Americans that live within their means and were able to buy an automobile under the right circumstances while being fiscally responsible

Again I agree, getting the over-emmissed (made up word) cars off the road and the electricity draining microwaves out of Martha's kitchen is good. I just don't think handouts are the correct way to do that and definitely is not a good precedent to set.

Paterson Stands Up

Link- NY TIMES: Paterson Says He Will Run, Rejecting Call From Obama

“President Obama had sent a request to Mr. Paterson that he withdraw from the New York governor’s race, fearing that Mr. Paterson cannot recover from his dismal political standing, according to two senior administration officials and a New York Democratic operative with direct knowledge of the situation.”

I have two main issues here:

1. The Story-

Gov. Paterson is the man who took over for the disgraced Eliot Spitzer following his prostitution scandal, and he was the unlucky man who is had to deal with the fallout from that disgrace. He is currently the sitting Governor of New York. (He is also legally blind... not that that should play an issue here.) He also is not enjoying very favorable polling numbers at the moment due to a wide range of issues, some his fault, some not.

What I don’t get is why in the world is Obama getting involved with political races at a state level. Before you say "all Presidents have done that, it's nothing new," I agree with you. But why Obama didn't just send some henchmen to pass his word along, instead of opening this up to the media, I don't know. Seems like everyone from the White House Spokesman to the White House Janitor has been briefed on this one. This should be the job of Tim Kaine, the chairman of the DNC.

Frankly, if his numbers are so bad, he probably won’t make it through the primaries. I think we should let the democratic process run it’s course here and let the people decide. If New York doesn’t want him, New York won’t have him. We don’t need a “holiest of holies” committee deciding who can and can’t run for office before the election takes place… like they do it Iran by the way. Obama should worry about running this country and getting America on track, not whether his party might lose strategic positioning in New York.

Although I don't think this is the main reason, all this seems to come down to is petty politics, which Obama has time and time again said his Administration would be above. This is one of many references in the article to how Gov. Paterson has miffed Obama and Democratic leaders in Washington.

• “Making matters worse, the governor also publicly snubbed Caroline Kennedy, a close personal friend and ally of Mr. Obama’s, who announced in December her wish to be chosen as Mrs. Clinton’s replacement, but then withdrew her name from consideration in January, citing personal reasons."

Gotta hate when a governor is making decisions for what he thinks is best for his state.

2. The Article-

So if you don't know, the NY Times is know to have a donkey (aka liberal) slant. This is no secret. But after reading the entire piece I can't help but wonder how they could not ask the same questions I am asking above. They call it an "extraordinary intervention" and a "delicate" move. Those are very carefully placed words as to not "bite the hand that feeds you" in my opinion. Nowhere does it point out that he needs to get his hands out the cookie jar. They don’t belong in this cookie jar.

This article does leave out some interesting facts as well. The article hints that this "delicate" move would allow Obama to support New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to run on the Democratic ticket for governor. (Interestingly, he holds the spot last held by Mr. Spitzer.) Who was Mr. Cuomo married to? None other than Mary Kerry Kennedy, the seventh child of Robert F. Kennedy and member of the Kennedy clan. They are now divorced but interesting none the less.

In Closing-

• “The message the White House wanted to send — that it wants Paterson to step aside — was delivered,” said the Democratic operative, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the discussions were intended to be confidential. “He is resistant.""

A democratic "operative" breaks his confidentiality and says Paterson is "resistant"... Seriously?

I hope Governor Paterson wins.

Carter Crys Racism

"When a radical fringe element of demonstrators and others begin to attack the president of the United States as an animal or as a reincarnation of Adolf Hitler or when they wave signs in the air that said we should have buried Obama with Kennedy, those kinds of things are beyond the bounds. I think people who are guilty of that kind of personal attack against Obama have been influenced to a major degree by a belief that he should not be president because he happens to be African American." - President Carter

What would President Carter call the "radical fringe element" surrounding the former President Bush while he was in office? That just was the decenting voice of America speaking out against an "unjust" war, "failed" policies, civil rights "intruded," etc., right? But couldn't this just be the decenting voice of America speaking out against an "unjust" plan for Health care, a "socialistic" economic model, etc., and not the color of President Obama's skin? They both have had effigies burned, curse words slung, and only God knows what else. No one said it was an easy job.

I am pretty sure President Bush has been compared to Adolf Hilter a thousand times more than President Obama has or ever will be. That is such a black and white picture for President Carter to paint. He of all people should realize that nothing in polictics is ever that black and white nor should it be portrayed that way by any leader or former leader.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs has now reiterated President Obama's stance twice now.

• ""The president does not believe that -- that the criticism comes based on the color of his skin. We understand that people have disagreements with some of the decisions that we've made and some of the extraordinary actions that had to be undertaken by this administration and previous administrations to stabilize our financial system, to ensure viability of our domestic auto industry." - Robert Gibbs

I leave you with words to live by.... "It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority."- Benjamin Franklin

Links:

• http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/15/carter.obama/index.html


• http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/09/16/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5315789.shtml

Disgraced Alumni

Link: Stanford Indicted

This is exactly why I think Hankamer School of Business should make ethics a mandatory class to getting a Business degree. Yes, Sir Allen Stanford (he is knighted in Antigua, which is also the location of several of his misdeeds) is a 1974 Baylor University graduate with a BA in Finance (makes my degree in finance seem less cool). James Davis, the CFO of Stanford Investments, who was also arrested, was his roommate at Baylor. Like Maldoff, Stanford is suspected of running a wide ranging Ponzi scheme of around 7 billion dollars. He also is under investigation for money laundering for the Mexican cartels, owing hundreds of millions in federal taxes over several decades and trademark infringement from Stanford University (seriously).

I sure hope, but wouldn't be surprised, that the media doesn't bring up any ties he might have to Baylor. However, we all know how the media loves its "bad news Bears" stories.

Oh, and his net worth is valued at 2.2 Billon. That is a whole lot of cheddar.

Waco in Iran?

Once again Waco is brought up in the media in relation to the Branch Davidian siege of the early 1990's. This time it was done by none other than the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The remarks came in his widely anticipated Friday prayer at Tehran University.

Iran's supreme leader defends election @ CNN.com

• "He even made an apparent reference to the deaths of people -- what he called the "burning alive" of 80 men, women and children -- during the federal siege of the Branch Davidian complex in Waco, Texas, in 1993."

I would like to point out, as I have so many times before, this happened outside Waco city limits and NOT in Waco. I think the Ayatollah should worry about the thousands of revolutionists marching against him and leave the 254 out of it.

Twitter's Edge in Iran

Check this link out.

Twitter 1, Censors 0

This is a great article to follow up "Net Warfare." Provides wonderful insight into why Twitter is being used so successfully in Iran to report the news while everything else is being censored out. Mainly it describes why Iran’s government can’t beat it.

"Net Warfare": The New Age of Revolution

The first point I want to make is I will be using the word “revolution” a lot to coincide with the Pro-Moussavi protesters and what they are trying to accomplish. I know it is yet to be seen if this is indeed a true “revolution” in the dictionary sense of “a radical and pervasive change in society and the social structure, esp. one made suddenly and often accompanied by violence.” That is the sociology definition and I would love to make a case that things in Iran will never be the same, but that’s not what we are discussing here. Maybe another day…

What I want to talk about is “Net Warfare.” I think the most intriguing fact of what is happening in Iran right now is how technology is completely shaping this entire affair. I am going to bullet my points to make this easier.

• Almost immediately after the results were released, that Ahmadinejad had won by a landslide, young adults, who make up around 70% of Iran’s population, hit the streets in protest.
• The “Green Revolutionists”, in relation to the color of the reformist movement, needed a way to create a unified front so they Twitted, Facebooked and blogged meeting times and locations for protests and gatherings.
• The government, in seeing what was happening, attempted to shut down the internet inside Iran, but they forgot (most likely because they can’t shut down service) about cell phones…
• Stories and pictures started pouring out of Iran about the revolution and the way the police and baseej militia, a group of plain clothed civilians with sticks backed by the pro-government Revolutionary Guard, were handling it.
• Pictures of hundreds of thousands of Iranians marching at Freedom Square in Tehran, young adults being beating by sticks of the baseej militia, blood stained hands of men carrying the wounded after shots rang out from militia strongholds.
• Side note: I think the fact that Iran actually has a militia, backed by the Revolutionary Guard, which is the main policing force in Iran, is absurd. If I was a dictator I would not have a militia, I would stick to the Guard.
• The government banned all foreign and homegrown journalists from writing or capturing any of the protests on film. They shut down several of the foreign media offices in Tehran and even started arresting journalists and cameramen.
• State run news casting would show short clips of the “marches” and downplay their importance or relevance.
• But they couldn’t stop Twitter. Yes, Twitter. Scores and scores of Iranians would use their cell phones to post their stories, their pictures and their revolutionary ideals on the website that was made famous by Aston Kutcher’s ring and ditch deal with CNN.
• Soon you hear about so called pro-government agents searching though Twitter, posting false propaganda, trying to battle the hundreds of thousand Iranians who are using the internet as a tool of their revolution.
• The revolutionaries start posting to not name names or post faces due to stories circulating of mass arrests and disappearing students in the middle of the night. Sounds like “Remember the 5th of November” doesn’t it.
• In a flanking move, the revolutionaries launch attacks on pro-government sites using DDOS, or distributed denial of service; tactics bringing down several state run news websites.
• Side note: In a devil’s advocate role, what the revolutionaries seem to be doing is blocking the state’s freedom of speech, a goal of they seem to be fighting for.
• Side side note: You could argue the state is using fake propaganda and all is fair in love, war and revolutions.

Where will this all lead? Only time will tell. This is where we stand as I write this. And this is only a small fraction of examples of “Net Warfare” being used within the conflict of Iran.

I do not want to overshadow the battles that seem to be ranging on the streets of Tehran and other cities around Iran. However, how interesting is it to watch the world’s first true use of citizen run “Net Warfare.”

If Ahmadinejad’s government can’t stop the revolutionaries’ use of technology I would argue that he and the Ayatollah Khamenei will have a hard time putting this revolt down without “having a radical and pervasive change in society and the social structure.” And yes, I did just tie that back to revolution.

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** I had written this article two days ago when news first starting breaking of this new citizen based warfare and had planned on updating and posting sooner. But every news outlet in the world beat me to it. Here are some better written and more informative articles that deal with issues on this topic.**

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1905125,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8104318.stm
http://www.circleid.com/posts/20060516_iranian_opposition_ddos_pro_ahmadinejad_sites/