My All-Time Favorite Species December 30, 2011March 26, 2017 Yesterday I signed off with: Tomorrow: I can see your house. Literally. Well, it’s true, but it will have to wait until next year – a few more days for you to tidy up the lawn or shovel the driveway (curtains would be nice: I can see them from your street) – because today’s column being the last of the year, I’ve decided to write about something bigger. NOT WHAT YOU EXPECT ME TO SAY ABOUT GOLDEN RETRIEVERS If you are of a certain age, you expect me to evoke the iconic National Lampoon cover – ‘buy this magazine or we’ll shoot this dog’ (or in this case, ‘contribute to the Democrats or I’ll shoot this dog’) – and you may even be sufficiently keen of memory to correct me with whatever breed of dog it actually was. But I hold no puppy hostage. Rather, I want to suggest that the entire golden retriever SPECIES is at stake in the election 312 days from now because — after 5 billion years of planetary evolution (for those of us who ‘believe’ in evolution) – I think it pretty much comes down to the next decade or two for us 7 billion humans to find a trajectory that allows us to live sustainably on our little spaceship. (When I was born, we were 2.5 billion.) Not that, if we fail, we’ll all die in a decade or two. But things could have passed the point of no return (if they haven’t already) – as they once did for the inhabitants of Easter Island, to draw a microcosmic analogy detailed in Jared Diamond’s Collapse. The planet will still be here, and the rats will probably be here (they survived A-bomb tests), and the cockroaches will be having a good laugh (‘Remember that arrogant species that lasted five minutes and, near the end, tried to kill us with motels?’) – but not, necessarily, the humans. Which makes me really crazy because HUMANS ARE MY ALL-TIME SECOND MOST FAVORITE SPECIES. Golden retrievers are my first most favorite, and if WE go, there will be no one to feed them. Or – perhaps worse – make them smile. (Goldens would likely die from lack of affection before they died from lack of kibbles or bits.) Some people are unconcerned. They don’t believe in evolution, they don’t believe our effluent could affect the climate or poison the environment – they may be cat people – or they may be looking forward to The Rapture. But for my part, I think it would be crushing beyond words if – after the 5 billion years it took us to get to our current state of unimaginable COMFORT (we have hot water! any time we want it!), SECURITY (we have antibiotics! we have On-Star™!), and to the cusp of virtually unlimited POSSIBILITY (the pace of technological progress that puts a symphony orchestra and the entire world in our pockets is rapidly SPEEDING UP) – it would be crushing beyond words if we, as a species, blew it. And, yes, I know that because there are an infinite number of planets there’s almost surely other intelligent life in the universe, blah, blah, blah, but (as you can tell) I’m not buying it. Not in any practical sense that makes me care any less about our own little Earth-bound civilization. I just think we have an ENORMOUS responsibility to the thousands of generations who came before us, shivering in caves and living in fear and fighting the wars and suffering the plagues and inquisitions to get us to this point – and an even more enormous responsibility to thousands of generations to come – NOT TO SCREW THIS UP. Obviously, one cannot live in a constant state of panic (or melodrama), so I spend most of my time relaxed and happy, sacrificing almost not at all, enjoying the miracles of Fresh Direct-delivered apples and Apple-delivered word games. Still, the first charge I put on my Amex in 2011 was my max-out contribution to Obama Victory Fund 2012, and the first charge I’ll post next week will be my 2012 max-out contribution, because: Nothing matters more in guiding the species to a sustainable future than who runs the show. Just imagine how different things would have been if Gore had been president for eight years instead of Bush. If McCain/Palin had set the agenda these last three years instead of Obama/Biden. Or how different they will be if Romney/Bachmann, working with Rove, Scalia, Limbaugh, Boehner, Bork, and McConnell, get to set the agenda going forward. Early money – money NOW – is three to eight times more powerful to the outcome of the election than the exact same money next fall, when most people give it. That’s because money NOW pays for organizers who have 10 months to recruit, train, and motivate volunteers. (Money next fall – or money now to specific candidates – is mainly dumped into the ocean of necessary but marginally effective TV ads that next fall will flood the airwaves.) From each low-paid organizer hired NOW snowball literally hundreds of volunteers. Every week we wait is one fewer week for that volunteer snowball to grow. And one fewer week for those volunteers to register new voters and help existing voters overcome Republican efforts to disenfranchise them. At the end of the day, whether my net worth is a few tens of thousands of dollars higher or lower – you have to think of this in terms of net worth and future earning power, not cash in the bank, none of us has cash in the bank – what difference will it make? I am SO fortunate to be able to max out without having to skip a meal. As sacrifices go, this sure is a lot less painful than spending the coldest winter on record – without shoes – in a hut in Valley Forge. Have you ever looked into a golden retriever’s eyes? So that’s my pitch. It may not move many people – even I recognize that hysteria, however justified, may not be the most effective tone to take – but the challenges are no less real for ignoring them. If you can help, please click here. I’ll see your support come through and smother you in thanks. This is for all the marbles, folks. Not just the President but, if we can register those millions of folks and get them to the polls, the House, the Senate, state legislatures (and, indirectly, the Supreme Court for what could be the next 25 years). SPREAD THE WORD. Support now doesn’t guarantee success, but it is by far the most leveraged way to tilt the odds toward equality. Three to eight times more powerful than waiting. Those of you who wish we could bring back the Bush years and cede the Koch brothers more power (and eliminate the estate tax on billionheirs) will of course want to support the Republican effort instead. I get that. I think you’re nuts, but I include you when I say: Warmest wishes for a Happy, Healthy, New Year. Drive safely! Good night, everybody.
The 1% The Pendulum Has Swung Too Far In Their (Our) Favor December 29, 2011March 26, 2017 KEEPING MILLIONS UNEMPLOYED TO PUT ONE MAN OUT OF WORK Here. THE 1% Did you see Joseph Stiglitz’s recent piece in Vanity Fair? In small part: It’s no use pretending that what has obviously happened has not in fact happened. The upper 1 percent of Americans are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation’s income every year. In terms of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent. Their lot in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding figures were 12 percent and 33 percent. One response might be to celebrate the ingenuity and drive that brought good fortune to these people, and to contend that a rising tide lifts all boats. That response would be misguided. While the top 1 percent have seen their incomes rise 18 percent over the past decade, those in the middle have actually seen their incomes fall. For men with only high-school degrees, the decline has been precipitous—12 percent in the last quarter-century alone. All the growth in recent decades—and more—has gone to those at the top. In terms of income equality, America lags behind any country in the old, ossified Europe that President George W. Bush used to deride. Among our closest counterparts are Russia with its oligarchs and Iran. While many of the old centers of inequality in Latin America, such as Brazil, have been striving in recent years, rather successfully, to improve the plight of the poor and reduce gaps in income, America has allowed inequality to grow. . . . . . . Those who have contributed great positive innovations to our society, from the pioneers of genetic understanding to the pioneers of the Information Age, have received a pittance compared with those responsible for the financial innovations that brought our global economy to the brink of ruin. . . . . . . [O]ne big part of the reason we have so much inequality is that the top 1 percent want it that way. . . . . . . [W]e started way behind the pack, but now we’re doing inequality on a world-class level. And it looks as if we’ll be building on this achievement for years to come, because what made it possible is self-reinforcing. Wealth begets power, which begets more wealth. . . . . . . Alexis de Tocqueville once described what he saw as a chief part of the peculiar genius of American society—something he called “self-interest properly understood.” The last two words were the key. Everyone possesses self-interest in a narrow sense: I want what’s good for me right now! Self-interest “properly understood” is different. It means appreciating that paying attention to everyone else’s self-interest—in other words, the common welfare—is in fact a precondition for one’s own ultimate well-being. Tocqueville was not suggesting that there was anything noble or idealistic about this outlook—in fact, he was suggesting the opposite. It was a mark of American pragmatism. Those canny Americans understood a basic fact: looking out for the other guy isn’t just good for the soul—it’s good for business. The top 1 percent have the best houses, the best educations, the best doctors, and the best lifestyles, but there is one thing that money doesn’t seem to have bought: an understanding that their fate is bound up with how the other 99 percent live. Throughout history, this is something that the top 1 percent eventually do learn. Too late. ☞ It’s worth reading the whole thing. Tomorrow: I can see your house. Literally.
If 98 Out of 100 Doctors Were Alarmed By Your Condition But 2 Said Alarm Was Premature -- What Would You Do? December 28, 2011March 26, 2017 PEACE Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered this Christmas message. In the spirit of peace, it’s worth the minute to watch. AWE Thanks, Sid and Diane, for forwarding these four jaw-dropping minutes. It almost makes me wonder whether I am of the same species as these guys. Beautiful to watch. HOPE Each year, the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights holds its “Ripple of Hope” fundraiser in New York, named for Bobby Kennedy’s famous words in Cape Town at the height of Apartheid in 1966: Few will have the greatness to bend history; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation … It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is thus shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. One man working more than overtime to improve the lot of others was dinner honoree Al Gore. Watch his speech. The first five minutes are mainly thanks. But then, after giving low marks to the global talks on climate change just ended, he went on to address the big picture. The really big picture: The essential obstacle to action to solve the climate crisis is the promulgation and acceptance of a lie. The lie is that it is perfectly all right to put 90 million tons of heat-trapping, global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet every 24 hours and to dump it there on a continuous and ever growing basis as if that atmosphere is an open sewer. It is not an open sewer. These heat-trapping gases, it turns out, comply with the laws of physics: they trap heat. The temperature is rising, the oceans are evaporating more moisture into the air and the warmer air is holding more of it and thus the entire water cycle of the earth is being disrupted. And so we have once-in-a-thousand-year floods in city after city in countries all over this world. Twenty million people displaced from their homes in Pakistan, further destabilizing a nuclear-armed country. An area in Australia the size of France and Germany combined flooded out. My home city of Nashville, Tennessee a year ago May – thousands of my neighbors lost their homes and businesses and had no flood insurance be case it had never flooded in the areas flooded, a once-in-a-thousand-year rainfall there as well. In Vermont, when tropical storm Irene brushed by this city, briefly raising fears that the entire subway system would have to be shut down and the tunnels closed and luckily that did not happen, it did an estimated $12 billion of damage and the governor of Vermont said we didn’t used to have the climate of Central America, we used to have the climate of Vermont. . . . Out of the 254 counties in Texas, 252 of them have been on fire this year . . . We are told by every national academy of science of every nation in the world that has one that the consensus is correct and these academies have jointly called on the governmental leaders of the world to act urgently. . . . 98% of all the climate scientists who are most actively publishing agree with the consensus. If God forbid you had chest pains that got continually worse and you were able to consult with the 100 leading heart specialists in the entire world and 98 of them said, “Oh, my God! You’ve got to take this medicine and diet and exercise more, but you happened to find 2 of the 100 who said, “I’m not sure. We need to know a little but more.” – what would you do? That is the question that is facing us today. . . . In computer terms, our democracy has been hacked. It is no longer operating to protect and serve the public interest. . . . It’s fine to skip the first five minutes, but watch the remaining eleven? It just builds and builds. If you’re looking for New Year’s resolutions, this speech might suggest some. Walk more, turn things off when you leave the room, eat less meat (cows belch), vote for the party of people like Al Gore who – while they have not done enough either – at least lean the right way.
Infrastructure: It’s the Answer December 27, 2011March 26, 2017 LISTLESS LIBERALS Ralph: “Re yesterday’s column . . . you want liberals to appreciate what Obama has accomplished? If a Republican wins in 2012, everyone will suddenly have very clear hindsight.” MITT AND THE VIETNAM VET This clip – especially after Mitt leaves – is fair and frank. Two men, one a veteran, one who never served, with different views of what a veteran is entitled to. INFRASTRUCTURE Watch this clip to learn about TIGER and to see what a NON-political guy – a technocrat – is doing to keep Italy from going down. “When you are in trouble, you build your way out.” What . . . are . . . we . . . WAITING . . . for?!?!?!?
Listless Liberals December 26, 2011March 26, 2017 There are two kinds of liberals: Liberals like me who have a list of all the things the President has gotten done in three years. Liberals who have no such list. Or a list of all the things he hasn’t gotten done. Almost everything on it is there because the Republicans have ruled it out. You want a single-payer health care system or at least ‘the public option’? They say: No. You want to get America moving again with massive infrastructure modernization? They say: No. You want hedge fund managers to have to pay taxes at the same marginal tax rate as their secretaries? No. You want Elizabeth Warren running the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? No. And on and on. Here’s my list: He appointed a magnificent Secretary of State, killed Osama Bin Laden, decimated the top ranks of Al-Qaeda, ended the war in Iraq, brought all those troops home as he said he would, set a timetable to end the war in Afghanistan, helped to inspire the Arab Spring, led the world in toppling Qaddafi – rather more cost-effectively than his predecessor toppled Saddam – restored America’s standing among the community of nations, was pictured on the cover of New York Magazine as “The First Jewish President” yet improved our standing with Muslims. He sextupled the number of stem cell lines available to researchers whose work may one day save your child’s life; averted depression, saved the auto industry, cut taxes for small businesses, cut taxes for the middle class; signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, lifted the Global Gag Rule on family planning, removed the co-pay for contraception, appointed two progressive women to the Supreme Court, extended health insurance to tens of millions (an estimated 45,000 of whom were dying each year for lack of it) paid for with a surtax on high-income individuals. He doubled the CAFE standard, kick-started alternative energy technology, promulgated the first mercury/arsenic air pollution regulations; launched an educational ‘race to the top,’ ended the college-loan giveaway to banks; advanced LGBT equality (I have a sub-list of 71 items on that front), has us poised to cut the military budget, launched the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau . . . all this, and more, in the face of the most truculent opposition in living memory that kept us from accomplishing even more with less compromise. Is it enough? Nope. But that’s why we need keep the ball moving forward. If we fail to, it will roll back. And yet – just as we did with Nader in 2000 – a lot of us liberals are doubting our own guy and psyching ourselves out. Needless to say, this plays directly into the hands of people whose views we most dislike. As it turns out, this is not a new story. In this must read piece, Jonathan Chait puts liberal disappointment with Obama into important historical perspective. We were down on Clinton, down on Carter, down on Johnson, down on Kennedy, down on Truman . . . and you know what? That was not so bad when the alternatives were Eisenhower (now considered by the right to have been a socialist) and Nixon (now considered by the right to have been a liberal). But with things as polarized as they’ve become, the stakes have become huge. This is no time for self-flagellation; it’s a time for focus.
hay-ZEUS December 23, 2011March 26, 2017 I got two things in the mail recently: BEST XMAS CARD OF THE SEASON In the sprit of Modern Family comes a card from my pals Sean and Randy, whose first child, Jesus (‘hay-ZEUS’), I met 13 years ago on his 9th birthday – which would make him just about to turn 22 – and whose two daughters are still just kids. There’s much more to their story . . . it is a joyous story of rescue through love . . . but all I want to tell you about is their Christmas card. The front is a terrific color photo of Sean and Randy, the two girls and Pokie (who appears to be an Airedale with the hair color of a poodle but what do I know?), all smiling and handsome and truly warm (Pokie, too: I may not know breeds, but I know when a dog is smiling). You open the card and there is a photo of a young man in bed, peacefully asleep, Santa cap on his head, captioned: ‘Baby’ Jesus overslept & missed the X-mas photo shoot! I laughed out loud. And, sap that I am, choked up a little at the quote from the facing panel of the card: A THRILL OF HOPE; THE WEARY WORLD REJOICES FOR YONDER BREAKS A NEW AND GLORIOUS MORN . . . Love, Sean, Randy, Jesus, Daley, Essie (and Pokie) You don’t have to be Christian to love the spirit of Christmas. And you don’t have to be a traditional family to be a wonderful family, deserving of all the same rights and good wishes as any other. THE POWER OF COMPOUNDING Back in the old days, when I was actually earning money, I was able to endow a couple of Harvard scholarships in memory of two friends I had lost to AIDS. Neither of them had gone to Harvard, but I was not about to give all that money to Yale or Columbia (where they had gone), so there it was: $150,000 for the Scot Haller Scholarship Fund, established in 1990, and $300,000 for the Peter Burns Scholarship Fund, established in 1995. Neither was a full scholarship, because I hadn’t earned that much money, but it was still enough to get nice reports from the development office each year sharing the bios of the remarkable students these funds were assisting. Nice. But for the most part, I paid little attention. Until a few years ago. A few years ago, Harvard started sending annual reports that showed not just how its overall ($30 billion or so) endowment was doing, but also how my two little funds were doing. And so it came to pass that the same post that brought the card of an oversleeping Jesus brought my latest endowment fund report. It leaves me wide-eyed and (remembering Scot and Peter) just a tad moist-eyed. Scot’s $150,000 fund distributed $28,494 in aid last year, up from the $7,500 or so it must have distributed in its first year, and had grown to a market value of $708,740. Peter’s – a distribution of $44,993 and a market value of $1,119,094! The takeaways I draw from this? First: I am so fortunate to have been able to do it. The psychic dividends are large. Second: behold the power of compounding! Third (and corollary to the second): the earlier you start that compounding, the more satisfying it will ultimately be. Fourth: exceptionally smart, disciplined, diligent money managers really can manage money more successfully than monkeys throwing darts. Fifth: those were likely an easier 20 years to grow capital than the next 20 will be. But, sixth: don’t let that fifth consideration stop you. Whatever you’re investing for, the sooner you start, and the more you add each year, the better you’ll do. LONG WEEKEND READING/VIEWING . . . I’m going to post these again next week, so by all means skip them if you are festively engaged. But just in case you have downtime over the weekend, watch this Rachel Maddow clip to learn about TIGER and to see what a NON-political guy – a technocrat – is doing to keep Italy from going down (what are WE waiting for?!?!) . . . and read this Jonathan Chait piece from last month, if you haven’t already, that puts liberal disappointment with Obama into important historical perspective (bottom line: we are idiots if we psych ourselves out and thereby hand the entire government – and the Court of the next 25 years – to Karl Rove / Rush Limbaugh / Antonin Scalia / Sarah Palin / the Koch brothers, et al). HAVE A GREAT HOLIDAY!
Competition from Abroad A Jaw Dropping Clip; A Jaw Clenching Critique December 22, 2011March 26, 2017 HOW TO MAKE A CAR I know: they’re all socialists in Germany, with those awful six-week vacations, those dreadfully short work weeks, and that free medical care. Still, they seem to almost as far along economically as we are – well, for example, the jaw-dropping video of this German automobile factory. WOW. We may even have a little catching up to do. In that vein . . . THE VIEW FROM ABROAD We’ve recently had Der Spiegel and the Globe & Mail on the Republican candidates. Herewith China’s view of our macro-economic challenges, as reported in the Wall Street Journal. Sobering stuff. (Hint: maybe we should start taxing ourselves to modernize our infrastructure?) Tomorrow: the best Christmas Card of the Season and the Power of Compounding
Dazzling Possibility December 21, 2011March 26, 2017 INCH BY SOLAR INCH . . . A new dye may make solar cells 14% more efficient – here. The progress seems slow week to week, but in a few years we may look back and find that solar energy is highly competitive with its more problematic competitors. . . . AND MUCH GRANDER VISIONS OF THE FUTURE Hey, kids, stick around: you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Nearly free energy! Space elevators! Robot-human-hybrids! Books you can download to your cell phone the minute you want them! (Oh, wait: we already have that, which is how I’m reading this one, Michio Kaku’s, Physics of the Future.) Previewed and summarized here. It’s much in the vein of Ray Kurzweil’s contention that technological progress these next 50 years will be 32 times as dazzling as the last 50. All the more reason to stay focused, logical, and constructive – lest, as a species, we snatch extinction from the jaws of near boundless prosperity and self-actualization. Which is to say: vote for the party that sextuples the number of stem cell lines available to researchers rather than the one that cuts them back; the party that empowers the department of energy rather than the one that vows to abolish it; the party that seeks to modernize our infrastructure rather than the one that votes to let it decay. Oh – and (speaking of the survival of our species) the party that leans toward, not away from, environmental regulation. Tomorrow: Stiff Competition from Abroad
Thoroughly Modern December 20, 2011March 26, 2017 MODERN FAMILY: IOWA STYLE This three-minute clip of a 19-year-old testifying to the Iowa legislature has been widely viewed. It’s hard to watch and conclude his family don’t deserve the same rights as any other. MODERN FAMILY: ABC STYLE It’s won so many awards! Wednesdays at 9PM (8PM Central) on ABC. Hulu has some episodes here. Third most popular show among Republicans, no less (at least by some accounts). Peace on earth, good will to us all. MODERN GRANDPAS This one shows the joy of learning you’re gonna be a grandpa.
The Best Medicine December 19, 2011March 26, 2017 ANOTHER MUST SEE, MUST SHARE Paul Lerman: “Re Friday’s link to Forks Over Knives, here is another life-saver: nine minutes, called 23 and 1/2 hours: What is the single best thing we can do for our health? Great presentation and visual technique, kept me watching even after the point was made.” ☞ Totally. Watch! Share! GIULIANI ON ROMNEY Ouch! THE HOUSTON CHRONICLE ON OBAMA I missed this when it first appeared: Obama deserves credit for strong growth in energy industry By MICHAEL E. WEBBER Updated 07:30 p.m., Friday, October 28, 2011 As Republican presidential candidates like Gov. Rick Perry tout their energy plans, they would do well to study our best energy president in decades: President Obama. Advocates for the U.S. energy industry routinely say they wish President Obama would pursue pro-growth energy policies. Well, he has been, and not just for the likes of fallen green giants like Solyndra. Under Obama, the traditional U.S. energy sector is flourishing. The domestic energy sector is experiencing its largest growth since the halcyon days of the 1950s and 1960s. As importantly, we’re growing in the right directions. For the first time in decades, we are seeing sustained increases in U.S. oil production and decreases in oil consumption, which means imports are dropping. U.S. domestic oil production is up an incredible 14 percent since Obama took office. A few years ago we imported nearly two-thirds of our petroleum products. Today we import less than half. The reduction in imports means tens of billions of dollars now stay in our own economy. But it’s not just oil: dry natural gas production is up 16 percent, natural gas liquids are up 26 percent, solar generation is up 14 percent and wind generation is up 59 percent. Even production of coal – supposedly the main target of Obama’s policies – is flat over that same time period. There are even headlines blaring that U.S. refining capacity is at the highest point in decades, exceeding levels achieved under recent Republican administrations. All of this growth produces royalties and taxes to address our budget challenges. Despite the numbers, many in the energy industry describe Obama as if he’s intent on making us freeze in the dark. They’d have us believe Obama and his team are singlehandedly killing the American energy industry. The facts tell a different story: This is a pro-energy president. . . . Recent energy policy decisions are classic examples of Obama’s post-partisan approach to energy. This summer he issued the first permits for Arctic oil production, opening up a potential 27 billion barrels of reserves. One week before, he issued very aggressive fuel economy standards for cars, requiring 54.5 mpg by 2025. This means the oil from those Arctic permits will last a whole lot longer, and drivers can anticipate saving a lot of pain at the pump. Increasing production with one hand while reducing consumption with the other – this is the kind of leadership the U.S. has long needed in energy. In light of all the bad news about partisan debt fights, maybe we can all celebrate the good news that U.S. energy policy – against all odds – is finally reaping significant rewards for all of us. Our Energy President deserves a fair share of the credit.