The Link That Explains It All April 29, 2005March 1, 2017 But first . . . two math errors of which I stand accused. I am guilty of one of them, so let’s start with the other. Thanks to the estimable Paul Lerman for pointing me to the May issue of Discover Magazine, which includes this item: Basic arithmetic mistakes abound in print, in textbooks and in the popular media alike. Edward J. Barbeau, professor emeritus of mathematics at the University of Toronto, exposed the following miscalculations in his book Mathematical Fallacies, Flaws and Flimflam (Mathematical Association of America, 2000). Can you spot where the numbers go astray? 1. Andrew Tobias, in the May 17, 1993, issue of Time magazine, offered this financial advice: Buy staples in bulk when they’re on sale. . . . Consider a family that buys one bottle of wine each week. With the 10% discount many stores offer on wine by the case, they would be saving 10% every twelve weeks-more than 40% a year, tax free and largely risk free. [This is a miscalculation because] the 10 percent savings does not accumulate. If it did, then in three years the family would have saved more than 100 percent. The correct statement is that the family continues to save 10 percent of the total cost as they buy more wine. Proud as I am to be first on any list, I did want to offer here the letter to the editor I hope Discover may print: Dear Discover: In your May issue, you cite an example of sloppy thinking from Edward J. Barbeau’s book. He quotes a snippet from my May 17, 1993 TIME column . . . << Consider a family that buys one bottle of wine each week. With the 10% discount many stores offer on wine by the case, they would be saving 10% every twelve weeks-more than 40% a year, tax free and largely risk free. >> . . . and makes the point that, no, you are still only saving 10% on each bottle of wine. Quite true. But in fact you ARE earning more than 40%, compounded annually, on the cash required to change your buying habits this way. There wasn’t room in the TIME column to make this adequately clear — my fault — but for the record: At $10 a bottle, you would save $52 over the course of the year by buying this way. And the most extra cash you would have to tie up to achieve that return would be $98 — the initial $108 case less the $10 you would have spent that week anyway. To “earn” $52 on a $98 investment, I am certain Professor Barbeau would agree, is to earn well in excess of 40%. The actual rate of return works out to 177% (although it’s still just a lousy $1 a bottle) . . . as detailed in my own book, THE ONLY INVESTMENT GUIDE YOU’LL EVER NEED. Thanks for the opportunity to clarify this point! Andrew Tobias (I went ahead and ordered Professor Barbeau’s book and, well, I’m not just in it, this example leads the book, taking up most of Page 1. I don’t fault the good Professor for this – we have e-mailed, and he says he’ll consider my response for subsequent printings, should there be any. But this is not exactly how I hope to be remembered. [I hope to be remembered for my recipes.]) MATH ERROR – RE KANSAS Daniel: ‘One correction that I’d note is that the article seems to state that the boys were somewhat more than 36 months apart in age. [When I saw that one was almost 15 and the other had until the week before been 17, my creaking brain saw that as almost 15 and 17 – two years apart – plus a little. Of course, it would be three years plus a little. Sorry!] But not withstanding that fact, what’s wrong with these people? Ignoring the absurd injustice, are they so blinded by hatred that they are willing to shunt so much of their resources into this punishment? Last I read, confining somebody in a place like Ellsworth costs somewhere around $25K per year (ignoring the capital costs of building the place) – and 17 x $25K = $425,000. Nearly half a million dollars to wreck the life of a boy who started to engage in sex with another boy and stopped when asked to stop. I just don’t get it.’ ☞ Another of you not only got it, but wondered how I could ‘condone pedophilia’ by suggesting 17 years in prison was too harsh. People have very different and strongly held views, that’s for sure. But enough of that. Let’s move on to the war of civilizations. IT’S ALL EXPLAINED . . . HERE Seriously. You want to know what Bin Laden is thinking, and the dynamic that’s been driving the world and our lives for the last few years? And what will happen next? No one knows for sure, of course. But you could do worse than to read this analysis from the Daily KOS. Have a great weekend.
The Prince and the Pauper April 28, 2005March 1, 2017 I will get to my exclusive transcript of the President’s chat with Crown Prince Abdullah, and to an important cinnamon update. But first . . . WHAT’S THE MATTER WITH KANSAS? He was twenty-odd months older than the boy with whom – both agree – he engaged briefly in consensual oral sex, and as a result he is now five years into a 17-year prison term. How much fear and hatred is there in Kansas? Can this possibly be the doctrine of compassion and forgiveness that underlie Christianity? Or of the ‘don’t tread on me’ Common Sense that underlie America’s dedication to liberty and the pursuit of happiness? I guess the boy was lucky we have not yet begun beheading transgressors. Salon has the story. Which may soon be unavailable in libraries in Alabama. BANNED IN BIRMINGHAM, OFFED IN ORLANDO An African-American venture capitalist writes: ‘Yesterday in Alabama, State representative George Allen introduced a bill banning all books in public schools and public libraries that were written by gays or lesbians. He had a complete list with writers like Truman Capote, Gore Vidal, and YOU!!!!!! On the same day, Jeb Bush signed into law in the State of Florida a bill that allows people to shoot to death anyone they feel is threatening them with serious bodily harm. For example, people like me – black men represent over 60% of all people killed with guns during a homicide.’ ☞ Yes, but who could possibly feel threatened once they know the other guy is very likely packing a concealed weapon? The Alabama bill will presumably never pass. But the Florida bill not only passed – it was signed into law by the President’s brother. THE DEATH OF MERIT Sam Spade: ‘As per your April 22 column, note the death of the meritocracy, as laid out by The Economist here. [‘A growing body of evidence suggests that the meritocratic ideal is in trouble in America. Income inequality is growing to levels not seen since the 1880s. But social mobility is not increasing at anything like the same pace. The United States risks calcifying into a European-style class-based society.’] I fail to understand why any decent American would not want to curtail this trend.’ ☞ Well, George W. Bush would not have gotten into Yale or the Texas Air National Guard or Harvard Business School on merit, so the trend has worked out okay for him, and he is dead set on accelerating it – most dramatically by eliminating the inheritance tax. Welcome to the Republican plutocracy. The connection here, as any reader of Thomas Frank knows, is that the good people of Kansas, Alabama and Florida – though barely making ends meet – vote to enrich the wealthiest of the elite, while thinking what they are doing is protecting their children from liberal elitists who look French. [That Thomas Frank link is to his current piece in the New York Review of Books. Not a bad proxy for those who lack the time to read his entire book.] WEIGHING YOUR CINNAMON Tom: ‘With this type of thing, it is always best to read the original paper. The data suggest that the smallest dose (1 gram or less per day) is the most effective in lowering LDL, triglycerides and blood sugar. The large decrease in triglyceride levels is especially notable since recent work has shown that the ratio of triglyceride to HDL level is the most accurate indicator of future cardiovascular and silent inflammation problems. Ideally the TGL/HDL ratio should be around 1. If greater than 6, the chance of a heart attack/stroke goes up 16-fold. A high cholesterol level, in contrast, only doubles the chance of a heart attack (per Barry Sears’ new book, The Anti-Inflammation Zone). Because the effect of cinnamon seems to last for some time (an almost unbelievable 20 days in this study), you probably don’t have to eat it daily. Perhaps a weekly dose of ½ teaspoon would be sufficient? It apparently works by making the cells more receptive to insulin.” IF THE CINNAMON FAILS TO WORK Ed Lewis: This comes from one of my very most conservative friends down south: LIVING WILL I, _________________________ (fill in the blank), being of sound mind and body, do not wish to be kept alive indefinitely by artificial means. Under no circumstances should my fate be put in the hands of politicians who couldn’t pass ninth-grade biology if their lives depended on it. If a reasonable amount of time passes and I fail to sit up and ask for a cold beer, it should be presumed that I won’t do so ever again. When such a determination is reached, I hereby instruct my spouse, children and attending physicians to pull the plug, reel in the tubes and call it a day. Under no circumstances shall the members of the Legislature enact a special law to keep me on life-support machinery. It is my wish that these boneheads mind their own damn business, and pay attention instead to the health, education and future of the millions of Americans who aren’t in a permanent coma and who nonetheless may be in need of nourishment. Under no circumstances shall any politicians butt into this case. I don’t care how many fundamentalist votes they’re trying to scrounge for their run for the presidency in 2008, it is my wish that they play politics with someone else’s life and leave me alone to die in peace. I couldn’t care less if a hundred religious zealots send e-mails to legislators in which they pretend to care about me. I don’t know these people, and I certainly haven’t authorized them to preach and/or crusade on my behalf. They should mind their own damn business, too. If any of my family goes against my wishes and turns my case into a political cause, I hereby promise to come back from the grave and make his or her existence a living hell. And now, finally . . . THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER Herewith – a true scoop for this column – dialog I was able to pick up with my Woot! Magic Ears by aiming them toward Crawford, Texas Monday. GWB: These oil prices are a real problem. $$$: Yes, I know. My family is making an extra $300 million a day. We are very distressed. GWB: Yes, I know. All my friends come out of the oil business, and they’re rolling in it. Very, very bad. Heh-heh. $$$: Yes, very bad. GWB: Listen, do you think you could help meet all this new Chinese demand by pumping another couple of million barrels a day? $$$: That will never be enough to satisfy them – there are a billion of them, you know. GWB: A billion? Really? Well, no one’s asking you to be a saint. Saint AbDULLah. But couldn’t you juice up production another couple million bbl a day? I love that. “Bbl.” Like bubbles. Nicknamed a poodle “bubbles” once. Bubbles. Heh-heh. $$$: We could achieve another couple of million barrels – GWB: “Bubbas” $$$: – but at today’s prices that would be another $110 million a day for our family, and we are not sure where to put it all. We are pumping it almost as fast as you’re borrowing it. GWB: No way! We’re borrowing $700 billion this year. Bubillion! He-heh. AbDULLah. Bubba-dubba. DUBYA! Heh-heh. $$$: Oh — $700 billion? So $2 billion a day? Well, I stand corrected. You’re going broke way faster than we’re getting rich. And that’s saying something, Mr. President. GWB: Heh-heh $$$: Are you getting help? GWB: Dick made two million last year, saved $46,000 on the TAX CUTS. Economy’s humming. I saved $26,000. $$$: Well, but . . . GWB: We get a house a plane and a chopper. Love sayin’ that: a chopper. Let’s go out onto the lawn and look all serious and frowny and do our photo thing.
Pills for Your Porc and the Cinnamon Play (Really) April 27, 2005March 1, 2017 Clare: ‘I’ve been taking glucosamine with chondroitin for five or six years (on a maintenance dose after the first year). I started because my dog was so much better after starting it. I’m a zoo docent, and some of our animals are arthritic – and take glucosamine. One particular favorite of mine was a prehensile-tailed tree porcupine who was 17 years old, the oldest in captivity. (She died at 18, so I guess we now know how long they can live in captivity!) After starting her glucosamine with chondroitin, Julia was climbing back up her branches and being much more active. I’d tell this tale to grandparent-looking visitors and you’d be amazed how many responded that g-c had helped them, too. Although some people can’t take it, it’s been great for me and the animals.’ Frank Schrader: ‘If you take a blood thinner or a daily aspirin (of any strength), only take chondroitin under a doctor’s supervision. Its molecular structure is similar to that of the blood-thinner heparin, and the interaction could potentially cause excessive bleeding. Of course it’s possible to get glucosamine without chodroitin.’ Peter Kaczowka: ‘Mike Mattes wrote you that glucosamine with chondroitin worked for him but that (as a diabetic) he found that it sent his blood sugar levels out of control and he had to stop. Mike (and everyone else) should be aware that cinnamon (!) can significantly lower blood sugar levels, triglycerides and LDLs. I put a teaspoon in my coffee every morning, although the last gulp is pretty slimy. I read about this a few months ago in Science News (excellent weekly!). Google ‘cinnamon blood sugar’ and you’ll find many articles, including this one: Initially the scientists were testing the effects of a variety of commonly eaten foods on blood sugar. During these tests they found that apple pie flavoured with cinnamon defied expectations that blood sugar would increase and instead decreased. This finding led to more research into the cause of this unexpected result and into the properties of cinnamon. Interestingly, not only did blood sugar levels decrease in all the groups taking cinnamon while there were no significant changes in the groups on placebos, triglyceride and LDL (‘bad’) cholesterol also decreased in the groups on cinnamon. The reductions were: blood sugar – 23% to 30% triglyceride – 13% to 26% LDL (‘bad’) cholesterol – 10% to 24% ‘Your doctor and the drug companies, will never tell you about this because (says NewsTarget.com): Most U.S. researchers aren’t interested in looking at cinnamon simply because it doesn’t pay. Despite its innate healing characteristics, you can’t patent cinnamon. Therefore, no profits. ‘I searched in vain for a ‘pure play’ on cinnamon, although there appear to be cinnamon futures sold in India.’ THE NUCLEAR OPTION AGAIN (NO, THE REAL ONE THIS TIME) If you missed yesterday’s video, click here. Otherwise . . . Thanks to Peter Ludemann for forwarding this interesting piece by Stewart Brand. Brand, Sixties activists and environmentalists will remember, edited the Whole Earth Catalog. Is the population explosion is taking care of itself? He says it is. Is it time to look again to nuclear energy? He says it does.
Pills for Your Porc and the Cinnamon Play April 26, 2005January 18, 2017 But first, on a separate topic, watch this video with John McCain and Chuck Hagel on the ‘nuclear option.’ And second, before we get to cinnamon (you do not want to miss cinnamon), a bit more on Friday’s topic, which might loosely be called ‘social justice.’ Some of you weren’t buying it. For example, Michael, an assistant professor: Michael A.: ‘I went to the census web page to check income data. I assumed a 240 day working year, so that gives at $17,280 yearly wage. According to the table of active workers about 12% make that much or less. So I don’t know where this 25% of the work force making less than $9.00 per hour comes from. If you want I can try to recreate the calculation, but I have a feeling that facts don’t matter. Moreover we have had a tremendous influx of unskilled low paid foreign workers enter the US over the last 20 years and the influx continues. Here in northern Virginia it seems almost everybody you meet in a retail store is a newly arrived foreigner. So it’s not surprising that we might have a lot of low paid workers in the US today. Are we supposed to do income transfer from Americans to people who come here voluntarily and presumably would leave if they felt oppressed? Does the US owe the world a living? A middle class living?’ ☞ Facts matter greatly. (Indeed, few things are more offensive than to suggest to someone that you think facts don’t matter to him, as it means you think he is either dishonest or stupid.) You didn’t include the URL of the page you were looking at, but I can think of one reason only 12%, and not 25%, make $17,280 or less. Let me know if you think it is too ‘far out.’ Is it possible – and I’m just letting my imagination run wild here – but is it possible that some people earning less than $9 an hour work more than 240 days a year? Or more than one job, to make ends meet? If so, that could explain the discrepancy you have unearthed. (At the current minimum wage – which compassionate conservatives oppose raising – you would actually have to work more than 365 days a year, nine hours a day, with no holidays or sick days, to reach $17,280. And that doesn’t count the time spent getting to and from work, which can be considerable, as the folks you describe often can’t afford to live near the retail stores you patronize.) So we just disagree. To you, Michael, these folks – and their children, who had no choice in where they were born – should get no more of a leg up than they do now. Everything else can be indexed for inflation, but not the minimum wage. So as prices rise, minimum wage workers will, as a matter of compassionate conservative policy, get squeezed tighter and tighter. I would strike the balance differently. To me, my friend who made $156 million last year (I have a friend who made $156 million last year) did not need the tax breaks of the last five years, whereas the folks Beth Shulman is thinking of do need a better shake. They need it partly on moral grounds, but also because an economy and society are healthier when people who work hard and play by the rules are able to get by; able, also, to raise their children – our future – decently. In hope of such a society, which ultimately profits the rich as well as the poor, we have things like a progressive income tax, the estate tax, the earned-income tax credit, Social Security, college aid programs, AmeriCorps, and the minimum wage . . . all of which the Republican leadership, in one way or another, works to eliminate or roll back. Finally, you raise the immigration issue. Which is agonizing – like being on a life raft and having to push people away with your oars. No, I don’t think ‘we owe the whole world a middle-class living.’ But I do think we could do better in that regard. And I think that, in any event, we make a mistake when, within our borders, we shift the balance of good fortune ever further in favor of those already best off. My favorite philosopher, just like the President’s, is Jesus Christ. We just seem to interpret his teachings differently. OK, sorry to do this to you. Tomorrow: Pills for Your Porc and the Cinnamon Play
Barry Goldwater’s View April 25, 2005March 1, 2017 It’s not followers of Islam who scare me, it’s ‘Islamicists’ – followers of Islam who, with the holiest of intentions, and only to please God, crash planes and kill innocent people. It’s okay with me (barely) if they crash their own planes and kill themselves. Or if people willingly drink their own Kool-Aid. But no fair, it seems to me, threatening the lives of moderate Muslims or anyone else. And so I read with interest these excerpts from Paul Gaston’s piece in Saturday’s Washington Post: People calling themselves Christians are gathering once again for a crusade against what they consider to be the secular humanist subversion of Christian values. . . . What these self-avowed Christians do not acknowledge — and what the American public seems little aware of — is that the war they are waging is actually against other people calling themselves Christians. To simplify: Right-wing and fundamentalist Christians are really at war with left-wing and mainstream Christians. It is a battle over both the meaning and practice of Christianity as well as over the definition and destiny of the republic . . . The assault on the judiciary is especially revealing. The vicious attacks on Judge George Greer, the Florida jurist who presided over the Schiavo case, reveal the bizarre nature of right-wing Christian fantasies. A regular recipient of hate mail and threats against his life, Judge Greer is a lifelong Southern Baptist, a regular in church and a conservative Republican. None of those credentials protected him from the assaults of fellow Christians, including messages saying he would go straight to Hell . . . Nearly all of the demonized judges are, in fact, practicing Christians, not secular humanists. Perhaps half of them are Republican appointees, and at least that many regard themselves as conservatives. In addition to Greer, most of the judges of the 11th Circuit who upheld his rulings, as well as most of the Supreme Court justices who declined to intervene, consider themselves Christian . . . And, lest we forget, Charles Darwin himself was a serious Christian. The history of a Christian church divided against itself is a long and bloody one. People calling themselves Christians have stood for war and peace, subjugation and brotherhood, communism and capitalism, privilege and equality, enslavement and liberty, imperialism and isolation. That is one reason Thomas Jefferson insisted on religious liberty in the new republic. In his Virginia Act for Establishing Religious Freedom, he wrote that “millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity.” The present war within the Christian fold is perhaps more threatening to the republic than any of the previous intramural disputes. Right-wing religious zealots, working in partnership with the secularists who have advised President Bush, are a threat to the most fundamental of American principles. The founders of our nation welcomed and planned for spirited debate over public policies, including the role of the judiciary. But as sons of the Enlightenment, they looked to found a republic in which the outcome of those debates would turn on reason and evidence, not on disputed religious dogma. They planned wisely for principles that are now under wide assault. All Americans, of whatever religious or non-religious persuasion, need to be on the alert to preserve those principles. The burden falls especially heavily on the mainstream Christians who are slowly awakening to the gravity of the challenge facing them. Too long tolerant of their brethren, too much given to forgiveness rather than to confrontation, they need to mount a spirited, nationwide response to what constitutes a dangerous distortion of Christian truths and a frightening threat to the republic they love. The writer is professor emeritus of southern and civil rights history at the University of Virginia. This is not to say for a moment that any significant fraction of America’s fundamentalist Christians advocate violence. But there’s not a whole lot of ‘judge not lest ye be judged’ going on out there, either; and reading the above elicits the quote below (thanks to Del Rickel for bringing it to my attention): BARRY GOLDWATER’S VIEW Per the Congressional Record, September 16, 1981: There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God’s name on one’s behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I’m frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in ‘A,’ ‘B,’ ‘C,’ and ‘D.’ Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of ‘conservatism.’ – Conservative Arizona senator and 1964 Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater
The Meek? They’re Just Lazy April 22, 2005January 18, 2017 But first . . . SPAIN Juan Jover: ‘The lower house of Spanish parliament yesterday approved full gay marriage. It is sad that the country of my birth, which is officially Catholic, has advanced human rights more than the country I chose to live in with my partner.’ TEXAS Cheryl Crumley: ‘The Republican-controlled Texas House today passed a last minute amendment to ban gays from being foster parents. I personally know 8 same-sex couples in Dallas and between us we have 24 foster children. Most of these are children with special needs, or children of color that ‘no one else’ will take.’ ☞ Some might argue these decisions are best left to social service professionals, case-by-case, based on what is best for each child. Not the Republican leadership in Texas. And now . . . THE MEEK? THEY’RE JUST LAZY Last Friday I ran Beth Shulman’s piece on what she called ‘the Oprah society,’ in which some make it big (or win a car), but a great many struggle to make ends meet. It’s one thing to admire those who beat the odds [she writes]; quite another to create a society which makes the odds nearly impossible to overcome. Tom: ‘So some person named Beth Shulman believes cradle-to-grave guarantees of security – presumably government guarantees – are what we should expect. That’s called socialism. Count me out. ‘I’m the product of a divorced parent who raised us with nothing – nothing that is, except a strong sense that our family should survive and a strong family to support her. Thanks to this strong woman – who worked two and three jobs to raise her sons and was far too proud to ever consider welfare, food stamps or government lunches, I graduated third in my high school class, went to college, graduated (up to my neck in loans each of which is paid off), started at the bottom with a big corporation, eventually started my own business and finally sold it for a tidy profit. Today, at 44, I’m semi-retired. All this with no silver spoon and no trust fund. According to Ms. Shulman, I’m no longer possible, so she seeks to make sure that’s true. ‘Please spare me the lament that America is no longer the land of opportunity. Opportunities abound in this land – far more so than anywhere else on the planet. Many of us who have succeeded constantly look for young people with the dedication, discipline and work ethic it takes to succeed. When we see those young folks, we mentor them. Too often, though, we see young people with little more than a sense of entitlement – and we know those young people will not work hard enough to succeed. If Ms. Shulman prevails, entitlement will become the norm. ‘The philosophy that we no longer live in the land of opportunity and our only salvation is government guarantees is not only simply wrong – it’s wrong headed. When and if we become that land where everyone relies on the government to see to their needs, then we will truly no longer be the land of opportunity.’ ☞ This country was built by people like Tom and his mom and the strong family he says she had supporting her. A deep bow to all of them. Really. But a few quibbles: First, Beth Shulman did not call for cradle-to-grave security or socialism. She wrote: We could offer quality child care to give all our kids a fair start. We could insist our jobs provide at least a week of paid sick leave. We could raise the federal minimum wage-as a start to $7.25 an hour, an option our Congress just turned down last month. We could insist every American have affordable health care. We could ensure that every qualified young man and woman can afford to attend college and graduate without mortgaging their future. And at the end of one’s work life, we could make sure that all Americans have enough to support themselves. I think there is a difference between a week of paid sick leave and socialism. Nor is adjusting the minimum wage for inflation socialism. And unless by Tom’s lights every modern economy in the world is socialist except ours, then affordable health care – which all the other first-world economies offer – is not socialism either. Subsidizing higher education – as Tom’s was subsidized – is not socialism. (If he went to a state school, his tuition payments did not cover the full cost. And if he went to Princeton, even if he got no financial aid, the accumulated beneficence of Princeton’s alumni was subsidizing the experience.) And that leaves us with the last piece, that, ‘at the end of one’s work life, we have enough to support ourselves’ – the bare bones Social Security safety net. Unless the U.S. has been a socialist country for the last 60-odd years, preserving Social Security doesn’t make us socialist either. So to begin with, I don’t think Tom is stating Beth Shulman’s case fairly. But beyond that, there are questions that must be asked of Tom. Tom . . . were you and your Mom below average intelligence? And with crooked teeth you couldn’t afford to fix? I ask because, as you know, for every above-average child or mom, there’s another on the other side of the bell curve below. For every IQ of 130, there’s one of 70. And not everyone was born with your winning smile. YOU didn’t need public school, perhaps, and your Mom didn’t need the floor of a minimum wage or the aid of unemployment insurance. But not everyone has your and your mom’s genes. When YOU had your tonsils out for $2,500 in 1967, your mom just rolled up her sleeves and worked another thousand hours to pay for it. (Thankfully, she was making more than the $2.15 minimum wage). During that period, she bought no food, paid no rent; you and your mom just toughed it out living under a bridge. Today, you and she have provided for her future such that, even should she live to 107, she would need no help from anybody. If the money did run out, you wouldn’t have second thoughts as, looking down from heaven, you saw her in her eleventh decade living in a large cardboard box, back under that bridge. ‘Tough luck, Mama – you should have saved more or invested better.’ But can we expect every kid to have had a mom like yours? And every mom like yours to have had, in your words, a strong family to support her? Can every kid graduate third in his high school class if he just works hard enough? Forgive me (I graduated behind Kenny Frisof and Gary Benenson), but by my math, only three kids in the class can do that well, no matter how hard the rest work at it. And someone, not always out of sloth, will be last. I don’t think Beth Shulman is suggesting that that last-in-class person should live as well as you. But how should he live if he needs help? In deep poverty, shame, and suffering? Or with some minimal level of dignity and comfort? How should we treat the least among us? To me, it’s a balance. In my view, the poor didn’t have it too easy under Clinton/Gore, nor the rich, too tough. Tom and the Republican leadership differ. They have made things tougher for those worst off and significantly better for those with net worths of millions or hundreds of millions or billions of dollars. One last thought. Tom’s underlying assumption seems to be that socialism is a four-letter word. I would agree that socialism doesn’t work as well as enlightened capitalism. But neither does unenlightened capitalism. Arthur Arfa: ‘Your argument that we had the balance about right in the Clinton-Gore years is nonsense. All of the things outlined by Ms. Shulman in her article were just as prevalent in the Clinton-Gore years. The minimum wage was still low, there was no national child care of health care provided, no pensions set aside for the poor. You give bush too much blame for the problems that exist. Bush has done nothing to alleviate these problems, but Clinton also did little.’ ☞ I disagree. There are certainly limits to what one can do – not least when you have a Republican Congress for six of your eight years. But President Clinton pushed through a hike in the minimum wage over Republican opposition, pushed through the Family and Medical Leave Act over Republican opposition, pushed through the Children’s Health Insurance Program over Republican opposition, pushed through a dramatic hike in the earned income tax credit over Republican opposition, and another in college tuition aid. He tried very hard to push through affordable health insurance. And he made his parting mantra ‘save Social Security first’ rather than blow the surplus on tax cuts for the very best off. So I think their records are quite different.
Comforting the Comfortable April 21, 2005January 18, 2017 MY DOG HAS TENNIS ELBOW Brooks Hilliard: ‘My 10 year old dog was having a terrible time until I began giving her a half-human-dose of glucosamine daily. Amazing. She’s puppy-like again. If she could write her own testimonial, I’m certain she would.’ ☞ Woof! Chris Petersen: ‘We adopted an 8-year-old Springer Spaniel who clearly had joint pain. We started adding glucosamine-and-chondroitin to his chow. He’s now 10 and has the body of a 5-year-old. Since Archie does not know how to lie (or at least to lie effectively), I took this as evidence G-C works and started taking it myself because of discomfort in joints in my hands. It has probably helped as I have ‘forgotten’ about the joint pain I once had. (But we may have to wait until November to know for sure.) ☞ Woof! Woof! CANCER IS NO EXCUSE Not to a compassionate conservative anyway. Give it up for Jonathan Alter, whose column begins: A Bankrupt Way To Do Business They put huge deficits on plastic for our grandkids to pay. They sell us out to predatory lenders. They’re the Credit Card Congress. By Jonathan Alter Senior Editor and Columnist Newsweek April 25 issue Let’s say Peter Jennings was named Jeter Pennings and instead of making more than $7 million a year, he earns $70,000, still comfortably middle class. Pennings has lung cancer, and he understandably wants the best treatment available. But his insurance company won’t cover experimental chemotherapy, so Pennings has an excruciating but familiar choice: he can charge the $25,000 chemo on his credit card or go without the cutting-edge treatment. If Pennings is like most people, he chooses to put his health first. With credit-card interest and late fees often totaling 100 percent a year, he’s now so deep in the hole he’ll never dig out. But under current law, he can file Chapter 7 and get on with what’s left of his life. Not for long. Last week Congress sent a new personal bankruptcy bill to President Bush’s desk, where he will eagerly sign it. The legislation, which is designed to make it much harder and more expensive to get out of debt, is not all bad. With 1.5 million personal bankruptcies a year, some change was necessary. But this bill, like so many others moving through Congress, comforts the comfortable and afflicts the afflicted. Worse, it provides for no distinction between those who get unlucky in Las Vegas and those who get cancer . . . THE 13TH Jeff Covey: ‘What happened on December 13, 2000 that would have marked it as ‘possibly the end of The American Century‘ instead of the 12th or 14th?’ ☞ Al Gore’s concession speech . . . the beginning of a new – and I hope short-lived -direction for America.
Is the News Bad in a Forest If No One Reports It? April 20, 2005January 18, 2017 MAC QUICKEN Michael Roth: ‘I have found MoneyDance is a pretty good alternative to Quicken on the MAC. They also let you download a free trial so you can give it a test drive.’ YOUR PARENTS’ ACHY JOINTS Mike Mattes: ‘Glucosamine with chondroitin has worked for me also. But (as a diabetic) I found that it raised my blood sugar levels to out of control. Had to stop.’ ☞ Oops. Bob Hunter: ‘Having heard similar stories about the success of glucosamine with chondroitin, I tried it a couple of years ago. After a year, I reluctantly stopped having seen no change. My orthopedist tells me it only helps about 10% of those who use it, which is great if you’re one of those 10%.’ ☞ Here‘s one somewhat more favorable assessment. Worth reading if you are considering this regimen. Dave Matson: ‘Some admittedly modest Internet research reveals that glucosamine and chondroitin may indeed have a positive effect, but as with most natural/herbal ‘dietary supplements,’ research into safety and efficacy is largely lacking. All such products on the market are courtesy of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA), one of the worst laws passed in the Nineties. This is the law that brought us ephedra and countless other dangerous products that are essentially completely unregulated. It’s long, but I highly recommend reading this synopsis of DSHEA.’ Emerson Schwartzkopf: ‘I started taking the stuff daily some 10 years ago when my joints sometimes got a bit sore on a daily basis (why not hedge against the arthritis that crippled my father?). I haven’t had joint pain since, and I don’t seem to suffer any side effects from long-term usage.’ David Ellis: ‘Glucosamine – I took it for two years, but never noticed a difference. Fish oil- with magic Omega3s did work. I started with 4 capsules and moved to 10. I don’t need my arthritis prescription any more. I used to crawl off the aikido dojo floor. Now I feel 20 years younger.’ Lynn: ‘Our dog, a Samoyed named Paddy, had a limp and had to take rather dangerous pain pills. We got him on G+C and, after a while, no more limp. They say he has arthritis and that stuff has done wonders. I always recommend it to people based on doggy evidence. He needs chewables which cost more, but he’s worth it.’ ☞ Our dog, a Golden named Tarzan, is fully limber but had a really persistent cough. They say laughter is the best medicine, so we sat him down in front of Seinfeld reruns for a week and it went away. OK, we have no dog, but I think it would work. TRANSPARENCY Dave Sirota pulls together an interesting list: President Bush has said that “in a society that is a free society, there will be transparency.” . . . But as the record shows, Bush is anything but pro-transparency. See the record for yourself: Knight-Ridder reports today that the Bush administration announced yesterday that it has “decided to stop publishing an annual report on international terrorism after the government’s top terrorism center concluded that there were more terrorist attacks in 2004 than in any year since 1985, the first year the publication covered.” When unemployment was peaking in Bush’s first term, the White House tried to stop publishing the Labor Department’s regular report on mass layoffs. In 2003, when the nation’s governors came to Washington to complain about inadequate federal funding for the states, the Bush administration decided to stop publishing the budget report that states use to see what money they are, or aren’t, getting. In 2003, the National Council for Research on Women found that information about discrimination against women has gone missing from government websites, including 25 reports from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Women’s Bureau. In 2002, Democrats uncovered evidence that the Bush administration was removing health information from government websites. Specifically, the administration deleted data showing that abortion does not increase the risk of breast cancer from government websites. ☞ Oh . . . and we are still waiting for the secret list of participants in Vice President Cheney’s energy policy – the one that even a subpoena from the Government Accounting Office could not pry loose. (And who blew Valerie Plame’s cover? And why won’t the White House be transparent about its pundit pay-offs, like the one to Armstrong Williams?)
It Gets Worse April 19, 2005March 1, 2017 OH, BOY And I don’t mean that as in, ‘Oh, boy!’ I mean . . . ‘OH, boy.’ I refer to the must-read excerpt of James Howard Kunstler’s The Long Emergency that’s been making the rounds. My own almost completely baseless view (but – Blink – we know more than we think) is that Kunstler’s scenario is way too dire. He underestimates our ingenuity! But there’s a long way from ‘way too dire’ to ‘no worries, mate.’ The concerns he raises strike me as very real. Indeed – while it is a thesis not specifically addressed in Kunstler’s excerpt – it seems possible to me that ‘the American Century’ ended almost exactly on schedule (who arranges these things?), December 13, 2000. (The last century, I need hardly remind purists, ended December 31, 2000, not December 31, 1999.) I hope I’m wrong and will be doing what little I can to make sure of it. But I’m holding my oil stocks, happy that I live a life that requires almost no driving. (It requires a fair amount of eating, however, and no small hum of air conditioning, hiss of heating – Kunstler is sanguine about none of this.) I think most of us will muddle through and adapt, and that there will be loads of ways to be happy with less oil. But the excerpt is worth reading. Click here. Tomorrow: Your Feedback on Glucosamine; White House Transparency
Dow Update April 18, 2005March 1, 2017 THE BEES KNEES Before I begin, I want to stress that I have the body of a 26-year-old (even if, in situations like this, the mind of a 12-year-old), and that I am not actually some old guy talking about joint pain. Not me! But let’s just say that a really, really close friend of mine was finding that his knees hurt when he’d crouch down to find something (manly and athletic) under the sink, or when he went out (on his manly one-speed Schwinn) for a ride, and so – filled with skepticism, but filled even more with dread of knee surgery – this friend of mine began taking three big ‘glucosamine with chondroitin’ tablets (as recommended on the bottle) each night before he went to sleep. That was (he tells me) several years ago now. And no (he readily admits) he is not a doctor, and bases his opinion on just a single case (his own). But, he says – even as you would expect that, with the years, his cartilage-worn joints would have worsened – instead, in fact, after a few months the pain just disappeared. The glucosamine-and-chrondroitin pills seem to have deposited new shock absorbers around his joints. I just hope that when I get to be an old guy, I remember this little hint. G+C is readily available in health food stores and even many supermarkets around the country. Or, cheap, by mail. The perfect gift for Mother’s Day, May 8? Father’s Day, June 19? (For Graduation Day, of course, you’ll want to get them this.) UPDATE The Dow is now about 5% lower than it was five-plus years ago when President Bush was selected and we went to more or less total right-wing Republican control. (This is not to tar all Congressional Republicans as rightwing; but you will not find moderate Republicans in the leadership.) In that same time, we have also lost the good will of much of the world and added 35% to our national debt. But at least we got Bin-Laden. WHERE TO PUT $5,000 Catherine Hogan: ‘I have a friend who is looking to invest $5,000 for the next few years and he was curious as to the best place to do that. I feel the stock market is pretty volatile right now and I wouldn’t recommend it. Any suggestions?’ ☞ Knowing only that much, I’d say: a savings account (assuming credit cards are paid in full each month, the attic is adequately insulated, etc.). This admirable but modest sum really is for a rainy day fund, not for investing – especially if his/her time horizon is just ‘the next few years,’ as you say, and not ‘the long term.’ The next few years could be wonderful. But based on current trends and leadership, I wouldn’t bet too heavily on it. SMALL CHANGE Bob Novick: ‘With EmigrantDirect.com you can get 3.25% on money market. It is a bit of a hassle to setup – but still that is 60% better return than your typical 2%.’ John Perko: ‘ING Direct now pays 3% on their accounts – no minimum, no fees, convenient links to your checking account.’ SMALLER CHANGE Dennis King: ‘Do you have any info or opinion about AmeriTrade IZone? I was all set to open a Scottrade account ($7 trades) when I came across their $5 trades. It apparently is a non-advertized division of Ameritrade.’ ☞ Amazing. I didn’t know about this (and I not only trade through Ameritrade, I own a few shares of the stock – shows you what thorough research I do). But gee, if you do so much trading that it makes a difference, you’re doing too much trading! To me, there’s no meaningful difference between the $5 commission you have uncovered, the $7 you were headed for, the $8 I pay at Fidelity, and the $11 that I pay at Ameritrade. All four are essentially equal when viewed beside the $300 or more I often pay for the exact same trade at Smith Barney (or would pay any other traditional broker).