The Lotto Effect and the Selling of Terrorism

One of my favorite quotes (origin unknown) is: “Someone is going to win Lotto; it just ain’t going to be you”. Of course this is a paradoxical statement, but quite true in the real world. It is a reality that in the practical application of statistics, when the odds of something happening become increasingly infinitesimal, at some point they become the equivalent of zero without actually getting there.  

There is virtually no risk a sane person wouldn’t take if the chance of a negative outcome was only 1 out of 259 million, which just happens to be the odds of winning the Megamillions jackpot. The inverse should also be true, that there is no risk a sane person would take knowing success was also 1 in 259 million, even if that risk is just one dollar.

Yet that’s not what happens. There are millions of perfectly sane people who take that irrational risk every day. The proponents of public lotteries have successfully argued that it is really just a form of entertainment, an innocent application of fantasy, or even (gulp) a social form of charity - a 21^st Century offshoot of a raffle at the church bazaar. Not really.

Actually, it’s simply a form of regressive taxation, since the proceeds in every state go to their general budgets, through the front door or the back. But that’s a topic for another time. Here I want to look at why individuals, disproportionately poor and/or undereducated, find lotteries so attractive…what I call The Lotto Effect.

Regardless of the sensation it engenders, akin to entertainment or fantasy, most all people who purchase a ticket or tickets have an expectation of winning, however small it might be. No one buys a ticket knowing they are going to lose. Even though that expectation might be tucked away in a corner of the brain separated from reality, it is most definitely there.  It is that expectation which is the real product being sold by the public lottery industry and it is accomplished by making the winning a public event.

Suppose in the process of running a lottery no player ever saw or even heard of anyone winning, including actors in commercials pretending they were winners. The only indication of winning would be the sudden drop in the jackpot. Add to that a demonstrably clear explanation of the odds. How long would the lottery be profitable?  You see, the key to selling the lottery is to make obvious the first part of the paradox - someone is going to win - and make invisible the second part - it just ain’t going to be you.

The rocket fast and entirely invasive nature of communication in today’s world makes this sales job easier than it’s ever been.

The Lotto Effect doesn’t just deal with lotteries. We can find it all over the space in which the expectations being “sold” bear little resemblance to reality.  However unlike the lottery, such sales primarily trade on people’s fears: germs, disease, crime, safety e.g.. The ratings and profits that feed news service’s coverage of a tragedy demonstrate that someone will or indeed did experience it, with endless displays of victims’ miseries.  However, there won’t be much coverage (or none) on the fact that there is almost no chance it could happen to you.

One of the more insidious applications of The Lotto Effect is the use of Terrorism as a means of promoting news ratings and political futures.

The true definition of Terrorism is an act of violence or threatened violence which creates a reaction disproportionate to its threat and for no other purpose than the reaction itself.  To the extent the reaction is not disproportionate it is simply a crime.  In other words, if people unaffected by the crime do not react in terror, it is not Terrorism.  

Terrorism certainly existed before the destruction of the World Trade Center, but it was that event that turned it into an industry in the US.  The Beltway Snipers who killed 10 people in 2002 nearly shut down the Mid-Atlantic, an area with about 25 million people. It was indeed domestic Terrorism.  For weeks people hundreds of miles from the crimes questioned whether they should buy gas or let their children go to school. But once the snipers were caught the fear ended.

Not so with the World Trade Center. The Terrorism that began then has not abated to this day. It has, in fact, gotten worse. Why? It is primarily because it is good business, for the media and politicians.

Even the World Trade Center tragedy, which was accomplished with only a little training in aeronautics and some box cutters, had practically no direct affect on the workings of American business, government, or society and yet it profoundly changed all three.  Our entire nation became color-coded, as if we were preparing for the Huns to land on Myrtle Beach.

The handful of domestic crimes in the US since 9/11 that sought to promote Terrorism have been wildly successful, not because of the damage and misfortune they caused, but rather because of the extraordinary publicity they received, and the use of those tragedies by politicians.

The media and politicians have fed the fear of terrorists for their own ends. The goal is to make every American fear that they and their loved ones are at risk.  The Lotto Effect, that this could happen to you, was front and center, never mind that out of 330 million people you maybe have a better chance of being licked to death by puppies.

Donald Trump has fashioned nearly his entire campaign around promoting such fears to gain support and, regrettably, it has worked. Even as the few terrorist attacks this Nation has experienced since 9/11 have been domestic, he has focused his campaign on foreign and non-Christian nationals as the source for an anxiety he is working to create. The media, primarily interested in profitable ratings, unwittingly helps him and other Terrorism profiteers at every turn.

The Lotto Effect manipulates too many Americans, the proof of which is the very existence Trump himself.

As a Nation we can’t seem to focus on the real risks. The American public is more concerned about a deranged individual spreading a few pressure cookers about than they are with the deranged leader of North Korea having access to nuclear weapons. Everyday gun violence gets only spotty coverage. Neither North Korea nor gun proliferation demonstrates the The Lotto Effect because people’s expectations are so low, even as the reality of being affected (by guns) or the massive affect of a threat (nuclear weapons) is strikingly real.

I recently toured the 9/11 Museum and Memorial in NYC.  It is an incredible exhibit and fitting testimony to the innocents that were killed and injured in that attack.  I couldn’t help wondering, though, in the light of all that has happened since; the lifestyle changes, government controls, massive surveillance, the Iraq War, the Afghanistan War, the concentrations of wealth and power, social divisiveness, public and personal anxieties, and trillions of dollars, if this Museum was as much a testimony to how we surrender to Terrorism than how we grow from it.

Politicians are eviscerated anytime they even hint that small scale attacks meant to terrorize cannot be stopped entirely. Ask John Kerry who suggested such in 2004.  The fact is that as long as we react irrationally (Lotto Effect) and the perpetrators get almost endless news coverage the incentive for such attacks is baked in. The only way to neutralize Terrorism is not to be terrorized. The real winners of Lotto are the ones who never play.

The Art of the Sour Deal

A lesser understood promise by Donald Trump and the Republican Party has to do with their pledge to repeal the so called “Johnson Amendment”.  Despite that it was included in the Republican Party platform, addressed by Trump in his acceptance speech, and introduced to the “thousands” of readers of this blog it still garners essentially no attention by anyone other than those who want to see it eliminated – evangelical Christian organizations.

It has become red meat on Fox News for those who believe that anyone who doesn’t actively support “patriotic” Conservatism has the singular desire to take away every gun in the Country and ban the words Merry Christmas from the American lexicon.

Part of the reason the subject is not embraced by those who are not evangelical Christians is that they, including the news media, don’t have a working understanding of what it is. If the topic arises in the news it is passed off as “the law that restricts Churches from engaging in politics” (that is verbatim).  No, no, no, no, NO!!!

This issue is an excellent example of what is wrong with the dissemination of information by news organizations.

Christian organizations, notably televangelist and religious colleges & universities, know exactly what it means.  However, when people like Jerry Falwell, Jr. (son of Jerry Falwell, leader of the Thomas Rhoads Baptist televangelist group, and president of Liberty University) speak on Fox News they fashion their rage as a government restriction of their freedom and an oppressive violation of their First Amendment rights.

Such fits neatly into the Fox News basket.

What they are not confessing is that their desire to eliminate the “Johnson Amendment” really has to do with the most sacred aspect of their ministries – money.

There are NO government or legal restrictions that keep any church or university from pursuing any political issue or candidate that they want to. Do I need to repeat that?  The First Amendment protects such organizations as much as it does for any individual…another reason to be proud of this Country.

What the “Johnson Amendment” does is keep YOU from taking a tax deduction if YOU give money to a charitable (501(c)3) organization that engages in such political activity. That’s it. It does this by requiring the IRS to revoke the organization’s 501(c)3 status if they so engage. It does NOT mean that such church, University, or other charitable organization would have to start paying taxes nor does it restrict them from engaging in any political activity, as long as it's not their primary activity.

Why is this law important and why are evangelical churches and universities so zealous in their desire to eliminate it?  The answers to both are interwoven.

Far from ethical questions regarding free speech, the motivation for Jerry Falwell Jr. and his ilk is free money and lots of it.  If they were allowed to actively engage in partisan politics and still retain their charitable tax status they would become magnets for political contributions.

If I am David Koch with a few million dollars to drop on a issue or candidate, which is my better choice: a  PAC or Liberty University that would accomplish the same as the PAC only I’m able to get a 40% tax deduction?

A million dollar contribution, in that case, would only cost David $600,000. The remaining $400,000 is nicely picked up by the American Taxpayer (in lost tax revenue). It’d be a sweet deal for the Kochster, an even sweeter deal for Liberty University, and Trump (about as religious as Genghis Khan) gets the votes of the Christian devout. It's a sour deal for everyone else.

The ramifications of this effort to change our tax law to benefit the wealthy and concentrate wealth with America’s extreme voices are appalling.  It would be the biggest undermining of American Democracy since the Citizen’s United judgment.  Not only would there be a free-for-all of Charities entering the political process and the creation of phony “churches” with doctrines that are solely political, but it would further blur the secular nature of American government, abandoning the foundation on which this Nation was created.

Imagine, if you will, every political candidate having his/her own “church” or “churches” campaigning on their behalf and, by necessity, integrating their religion with their politics.

This Johnson Amendment, so named after Lyndon Johnson who as a Senator from Texas in the 1950s fought for its passage, is very important to the American people.  The charitable deduction, created in 1917, is nearly as old as the modern income tax itself.  It has evolved and survived primarily as an incentive to donors to assist charitable organizations with their beneficial purposes.

To combine the consolidation of political power within those purposes serves neither the Nation’s wellbeing nor its charitable spirit. It is just another reason why today’s Republican Party needs to be rejected and reborn.

Feel the Love

I first noticed it with the Democrats.  Hillary Clinton used it on more than one interview and public address, including her DNC acceptance speech. It was always preceded by the slightest little accenting pause. Now I’ve heard it emanating from, of all places, the muck fashioned lips of Donald Trump. I’m referring to the use of the term love.  What’s going on here?

It’s worth a thought. I struggle to remember any past politicians using the term love as an image to support their candidacy. Yet here we are, entering the final leg of perhaps the most unsophisticated and insolent Presidential contests in modern times and we hear the call to love.

Granted, the candidates do introduce the love from different directions, essentially from opposite corners.

Clinton and her surrogates have used it as a representation of what we need to add to our national consciousness in order to bring about the changes they advocate, especially regarding the treatment of illegal aliens.  Not really like singing the Beatles tune All You Need is Love, rather more like Mary Poppins suggesting we need to add Just a Spoon Full of Sugar.

Trump, on the other hand, is not advocating that love is missing from our collective body politic, quite the contrary.  He promotes the idea that the American people are just fine (at least the ones packing his rallies), but it’s those pesky fir-ah-ners wanting to get into this Country that need the love.  He actually implies the need for a love test (along with blood and religion, I assume) proving that they “love us”.

I suppose for Donald it would be perfectly fitting to have Cuba Gooding at the immigration line shouting “SHOW..ME..THE LOVE”, as he did with “money” in Jerry McGuire.  To the extent the applicants fist-bumped or high fived before they proceeded to their faith examination might be test enough.

Using love within in the context of rhetoric that more simply asks “vote for me” may be a metaphor for a darker side of these Presidential campaigns.

The Trump side is easy to see.  His authoritarian demand that immigrants to the US “love us” flies in the face of one of the dearest siren songs for Conservatives…Freedom.  It is precisely that we don’t demand to be loved that makes a free society so compelling, even if that freedom carries with it a potential for conflict. 

Colin Kaepernick of the San Francisco 49ers is ostracized by “freedom loving” Conservatives as a personal affront to their patriotism, yet they fail to reflect an iota on the free part of freedom, which they should take pride in.  I’m guessing he wouldn’t gain admission to a Trump Nation regardless how well he threw a football.

Note that the absence of love is not hate; however the paradox is that the more you demand love the more potential there is to generate hate.

Clinton’s misappropriation of love is more subtle. The underlying theme when she suggests that love is a missing ingredient to the well being of Americans is a call to be better citizens, as if a tasteless cake that has been served up by our Government bakery is missing a touch of salt. She’s selling her own Progressive siren song that self-interest needs to be supplanted by compassion.

Although feeling the love may be a Progressive motivator and land on a few signs at a Bernie rally, it can be counter-productive to objective governance. The fact is that love, a strong and important driver of human behavior, is essentially another form of self-interest and can be used to undermine the freedom not to love.

The very fact that these candidates have chosen to include love in their arsenal of attack tools is a testimony to the rancor that has been this political season to date.

The great American experiment to create a secular nation of agreed upon laws that everyone can love without it (the Nation) demanding to be loved is not furthered by politicians advocating their candidacy as a call to devotion…for Americans or those who want to be.

Trumpilosis

I’ve said it before, even on this blog (you may have said it as well): I am sick of Trump. Such a statement may appear straight forward on the surface, but in looking deeper I wonder if perhaps this illness is the waxing side of a healing process.

If you’re like me, you’re sick of Trump not because of the man he is. Sure, I have become more incredulous weekly, even while believing each week that I couldn’t become more so. I am amazed how a man so blatantly unbalanced, so clinically narcissistic, and so unashamedly crude, could rise to the threshold he is currently at. 

Therein lies concern, perhaps even fear, but both have less to do with the mental queasiness that sweeps over me nearly each time I pick up a newspaper, magazine, or turn on my computer or TV. The man evokes responses of laughter to anger and all in between, but it’s his incessant presence that now induces nausea.

Think about the process you or I go through when we catch a viral infection.  It starts with a questioning awareness. Hmm…what is that feeling in my throat? It’s then followed with a struggling denial; it’s probably something I swallowed that scratched…please, please.  We’re then faced with acceptance, but cling to the hope that what we’re about to experience will be fleeting and non-consequential.  If it ends up bad, as it usually does, the whole event will occupy the biggest portion of our conscious awareness for days.

Now take that nasty cold (which everyone can relate to) and stretch it out proportionally over 16 months (June 16, 2015 to November 8, 2016) and you have what this Nation is experiencing with Donald Trump.

The first months of his run for office were filled with disregard, the only annoying little questions that popped up related to the extent of his following; a minor protest vote…perhaps… or just disgruntled talk radio yahoos? As the weeks passed it appeared he wasn’t a joke, even as he acted like a clown. Still, pundits and experts alike, especially Republicans, denied his candidacy was real, even as they speculated on the absurd outcome of his success.  It was notable that speculation was entirely on his possible success for the nomination, not his Presidency.

 Now we’re in full blown, snot-filled, gut-wrenching immersion of Trump and it’s everywhere. The rest of the news or even provincial conversation has become a backdrop to the subject of Trump.  If I tune to a TV or radio news station, or other talk entertainment I’ve begun to count the seconds before I hear the word Trump. It’s like waiting for your next cough. Watching Peppa Pig with my 3 year old granddaughter is like getting a little shot of nasal spray.

Trump, like a visit from an unwelcome disease, came in through the backdoor, fattened himself up a bit in the kitchen, and now he’s sprawled all over the living room. Even if we’re confident he’s eventually leaving, we would feel so much better if he was gone today.

I and others who share thoughts have contemplated the hole that will be left in a world without Trump. What will it be like when at the end of the day my son-in-law no longer says “…so let’s see what that idiot Trump has done today”? Will there be a collective sense of emptiness?

I am pleased to hypothesize that the analogy will hold true.

There are few non-event experiences we have in life that are more agreeable, in fact pleasurable, than the realization that we are no longer sick, even if our noses are still running a bit. The weather becomes unimportant, we focus on what’s good in people, and we feel empowered. When all is said and done, we simply have less fear.

I’m encouraged to believe that Donald Trump may be a most fortunate circumstance for Hillary Clinton. Not just in making her electability uncomplicated, but primarily in making her Presidency begin on such a positive note, much better than the so-called honeymoon periods afforded other Presidents.

When the nation realizes that the disease we might know as Trumpilosis no longer runs through our collective veins, when we can see the petty nature and misinformation that forms the basis for Hillary Clinton's detractors, when the Republican Party has purged much of the extreme right-wing from its Conservative viscera, when Obama can no longer be used as an emblematic excuse to block the work of Government, it very well may become a new healing for the Nation.

Democrat equality in Congress wouldn’t hurt either.

I believe that even though Hillary Clinton is not a naturally dynamic and competitive campaigner, it's because she is smart, because she is impassioned, because she's experienced, because she is connected, and because she is a woman that she has the potential of ushering in an era of good health. The likes of Trump will be forgotten as quickly as the Nyquil squirreled away in the medicine chest.

Hillary Revealed

Bill Clinton, the youngest President to retire from office since Theodore Roosevelt 90 years earlier, was prepared to engage the flip side of his life once he left Office, but not in politics. 

It is reasonable, though, to assume that Hillary had planned, at some level, a career in politics, and no wonder. Starting life in equal footing with her spouse, by all accounts with more cerebral firepower, then spending the next 21 years as a virtual lady-in-waiting, she was likely primed to realize in her own life the gender equality she had advocated for decades.

For Bill in the late 90s, he wanted to construct a vehicle that delivered tangible value, where the application of his time produced visible results as opposed to the blurred outcomes of government administration. The past 16 years have demonstrated the fact of the choice he made. If it had been to paint really bad pictures, I’m sure we would have seen those instead.

He chose to create a charitable organization that would provide assistance and relieve suffering for people whose needs were dire and whose distress transcended nationality.  Why he or anyone in a similar position decides to build a mechanism to help human beings for whom they have no responsibility doesn’t merit analysis.

In the last days of his Presidency Bill Clinton was asked in a formal interview why he allowed himself to do something so foolish and reckless as his backroom sexual encounters with Monica Lewinski.  He insightfully replied “…for the worst reason in the world, because I could.”  Safe to say, he chose to build the Clinton Foundation for the best reason in the world, because he could.  So goes the paradox of opportunity.

Some might admire the all too common televangelist who extracts, through guilt and fear, small dollars from the faithful of limited means. They then compile the dollars to create great edifices for their “church” and for themselves personally. I’m not one of them. 

I prefer to see the wealthy touched for big dollars to provide direct aid, with no one else benefited disproportionately.  It’s limited welfare and may provide more inspiration than solution, but without someone to instill the transfer it doesn’t happen.  Unlike the great philanthropists of our time (Bill Gates e.g.), Clinton managed it with simple influence.  The modest quid pro quos donors received (there are always quid pro quos, even if it’s just recognition) should hardly be a controversy, let alone a scandal.

Hillary Clinton has had minimal involvement with the Clinton Foundations, given the attention she paid to her political career.  She was not as a Tammy Faye to a Jim Bakker.  Even if there was some interaction between her as Senator or Secretary and the Foundations run by Bill Clinton, it doesn’t merit the outrage that Republicans have leveled or which the media has given deference to.

Show me how Hillary benefited personally from the Foundations, other than pride. Don’t hand me the bullshit about speaking fees. They would have made those regardless.  In a nation where LeBron James receives $100 million for shooting basketballs for 3 years or Carly Fiorina receives $100 million for driving a company into the dirt over a 5 year period (at least LeBron sinks his baskets), I’ve become numbed by outrageous earnings, and the Clintons are hardly standouts.

The fact that Republicans have decided to use the Clinton Foundation to play into the narrative that Hillary Clinton is dishonest, is a testimony to their own failed narrative of which Trump is the personification.

I will concede that if the only thing the Clinton Foundations did was to airdrop billions of bibles (in the appropriate translations) over desperate populations then there would be no useful controversy for the Republicans, even if the Clintons owned the companies that printed the books. However, the real story has nothing to do with the Clinton Foundations, since the work done by those foundations carries no weight for those who are quick to condemn the Clintons.

The real story has to with the unrevealed secret why Hillary is so inherently dishonest, why Conservatives across the country know she is not to be trusted, why Trump can pose (thumbs up) with a fan whose t-shirt reads “Hillary for Prison in 2016”, why anything she is or was involved in stinks of corruption, why her words by definition are suspicious, and why the only appropriate path for her is to “lock her up”…probably Guantanamo.

There is a reason that Republicans and the media treat this conniving, manipulative, and lying personality as an natural state of being for Hillary Clinton which I am going to reveal to you here:

Hillary Clinton is…a woman.

If Hillary Clinton were a man there is nothing I can think of; Benghazi, email, computer servers, and certainly not a successful charitable foundation that could have been used as distrustful, let alone as prison quality activities.

Trump has lied at levels never imagined possible among public figures, political or otherwise.  Just ask the thousands of New Jerseyites who celebrated 9/11. Politifact has him lying over being honest by a margin of 2 to 1, look it up! Yet we never hear him described as inherently dishonest, rather he is described as a man who is acting that way. The difference is that a man can change, but the woman cannot.

Women are burdened with the reality that for the Conservative mind, as with racial bias, if a woman strays from traditional female paths they can easily succumb to the stereotypical attributes of being something less than honorable.  Perfectly nice Conservatives I know, including women, will say to me “I know Trump is crazy, but I could never vote for that woman”. There is a reason why they say “woman” instead of person or her name.

How Americans react to Hillary’s candidacy as she runs against a dangerous nutcase, when her truthfulness is woefully attacked, will reveal just how far we’ve come in dealing with gender equality…or not.

Ecolems

Occasionally I feel I retained only one thing from my undergraduate degree in Economics, although it would bear me a valuable understanding over the years. Simply put it is this: Economics is not an exact science, it is a social science.

Despite what you might hear or infer from intellectuals, politicians, teachers or economists who present numbers, formulas and endless analysis about cause and effect (with abundant certitudes), it’s really just about human behavior, with all the mystification you might assign to your crazy uncle at the Thanksgiving dinner table.

In that sense applied Economics as a discipline struggles with predictability... and predictability is the key to economic success or the lack of it its failure.  What could be less conducive to predictability than fear driven human behavior.

Two examples: I have a truly lovely friend who bristles at hearing the word welfare, let alone discussing it, because she is so certain of its negativity.  Or dropped onto any city street or town square and it would take me only seconds to find a person who knows that taxes are bad, by definition!

 These folks find themselves in a bubble of shared identity with others of like mind who vacillate wildly due to misunderstanding or lack of education. They are ripe pickings for pundits and/or preachers who, to promote their own self interest, insulate them from diverse views.

I’ll call these good folks Economic Lemmings or, say…Ecolems.

The bubbles that exist in the American culture today, which house our Ecolems, have never been so distinct.  One can speculate on historical comparisons, but due to technology, the nature of communication today has no precedent.  People have always lived in bubbles of a sort, but never have the bubbles been so big.

Economic certitudes are often combined with regional identity, religious affiliations, or provincial history.  All of a sudden, notably since the turn of this new century, Republicans and Democrats have become Red America and Blue America. This must feel similar to the not-so United States in the 1850s.

To use the immortal words of Donald Trump; what the hell is going on? Donald, you know exactly what’s going on, as your followers are comprised entirely of Ecolems.

Let’s look at the two economic issues mentioned above and see how the Ecolems respond; welfare and taxes, which are not mutually exclusive.

Welfare quite simply is the transfer of resources from one person to another without a transaction between the two taking place, although there is an implied benefit for both parties.  It makes no difference of the economic station of either party and a gift meets the definition.  It is everything from Social Security, to Church kitchens, to section 8 housing, to food stamps, to evangelical missions, or to boomerang children.

The controversy comes with the inclusion of choice.  My Ecolem friend thinks charity is great, even though that’s still welfare (shhh…don’t tell her). To think (as she does) that we can leave issues of poverty and homelessness up to churches shows that her understanding of the economics of welfare doesn’t extend beyond her middle class neighborhood.

The idea that strangers are at the receiving end of a transfer handled by a third party has become an anathema for her.  She cannot see the purposes of the transfer even though she is potentially a beneficiary…she gets to live in a society with less deprivation, more opportunity, and probably less crime.

Instead of questioning the quality or efficiency of the transfer she prefers to embrace the certitude that welfare is just plain bad, mostly because she perceives the unworthiness of the recipient. She’ll follow the advice of like minded preachers even though it leads her to an ocean bluff. 

When more people survive economically everyone benefits. The fewer…then everyone bears the cost. Think health care.

This flight from economic awareness is even more prevalent when it comes to taxes.

So complete has the concept of taxation been defined by those who are most affected (i.e. the rich) that it’s as if each American at birth were issued a gun with the sole purpose of shooting themselves in the foot when they reach the age of majority.

The reality is that the concentration of wealth is the single biggest drag on economic growth. Ironically, it negatively affects the future wealthy along with everybody else.

Wealth concentration, contrary to Republican BS, does not create jobs. Think social or human behavior.  People, including the wealthy, tend to flip from production to protection of wealth once it’s accumulated.  Money is effectively pulled out of the economy and primarily used as an investment tool for accumulating more wealth with the dangerous use of speculation.

In 1993 with a large Democratic majority Bill Clinton pushed through and signed into law one of the biggest tax increases on the wealthy in modern history (The Omnibus Reconciliation Act of 1993). His eight year term in office ended with spectacular economic success, including economic growth, budget surpluses, record employment, and low inflation to name a few.

In 2001 George W. Bush, with a slight Republican majority in Congress, passed his EGTERRA (aka Bush Tax Cuts), the largest tax cut for the wealthy in the history of the Country, then followed with immense government spending into limited markets (military e.g.) which further concentrated wealth.  The Conservative Heritage Foundation predicted these cuts would eliminate the National Debt in 9 years. Bush’s eight years ended with near total economic collapse of the Nation, record unemployment, and massive debt…oops.

The continuation of these cuts under the Obama Administration is a primary reason why the economic recovery since 2008 has been so slow, since it has had to rely chiefly on debt.

There are many supporting factors that relate to these Administration’s successes and failures. Nevertheless, taxes properly leveled and revenue properly applied are the single biggest engines for economic growth because they reduce inequality of wealth, generate spending, and (hopefully) reduce debt.

You could read the conclusions of Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz (and others) to Ecolems all day.  No matter.  Ecolems know all taxes are bad and will vote for anyone who wants to cut them or oppose anyone who suggests taxing the wealthy. The Ecolems oddly have no problem submitting to consumption taxes (sales tax e.g.) which puts the revenue burden squarely on the non-wealthy.  They march dutifully to the cliff’s edge, even with all those holes in their feet.

As Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have proposed, an immense public works effort to update US infrastructure would be an economic boom for the Country. However, the revenue source cannot be debt nor taxation of the lower and middle classes.  This needs to be borne by the top 20% and mostly from the top 2% based on income and net worth.  Everyone would benefit, but interesting the top 20% would still benefit the most.

Vote Republican and you’ll never see it happen.

There is nothing inherently wrong with inequality; in fact we’re better off because of it since it promotes the predictability of hard work and ingenuity. However, when it gets extreme as it has today, human nature takes over. The economy begins to feed on itself by economic growth yielding to the incessant concentration of wealth by the rich. The Ecolems continue their march to the sea

My Fat Lady is Singing...I Hope

The T-Man has dominated political news so completely over so many months that I feel like a person who’s been force fed doughnuts.  Initially he was comic and oddly fascinating.  Now I’m just sick of it, and with each repulsive Trump “gaffe” (are they actually gaffes?) I want to hug the toilet.

One such recent Trumpism struck me hard.  More than repulsed, as I was with his compulsion to describe his genitalia during a national debate, I was aghast at his ignorance and virtual lack of empathy, just as Khizr Kahn so articulated.

On August 3^rd in Ashburn, VA Trump announced at a rally that a veteran had given him his Purple Heart medal.  He said “man, that’s like big stuff.  I always wanted to get the Purple Heart…this was much easier”.  When I saw the clip my jaw dropped.

There is no point in speculating or analyzing why this Purple Heart recipient (whose combat injury had caused him to lose a leg) decided to offer Trump his medal. He had his reasons and they remain his. Trump on the other hand was fully accountable for his actions in responding to the veteran.

The obvious and appropriate response would have been to refuse to take it on simple grounds that possession of the award can only belong to those who have earned it.  Trump is so diluted as to think that possessing the little piece of metal and ribbon is all one needs to be part a very exclusive union. “I always wanted to get the Purple Heart” he said, and there he was, proudly displaying it.

I am so, so extraordinarily amazed that a public figure can reach the age of 70 and not be aware that not only wounded veterans, but for many soldiers who died during conflict the Purple Heart is the sole award for giving their lives to the Nation.  For others it can be their entire quality of life.

The sacred nature of the Purple Heart recognition transcends all other awards of merit or heroism since it embodies what military sacrifice is all about.  It should be the final thought of any leader in committing to a foreign policy.

Mr. Trump, in case you’re not aware, soldiers get hurt and killed…and you have the unmitigated gall to think you deserve to be their Commander-In-Chief.  Where’s that toilet?

Khizr Kahn forcefully stated during his speech at the DNC that you have sacrificed nothing.  You responded by saying you have sacrificed a lot, telling George Stephanopoulos you have built a lot of “things”, created jobs…in other words made a lot of money and expanded your infamous “brand”. 

It is no accident, nor should it be a surprise that a person who views the accumulation of material wealth as a sacrifice thinks he can earn a Purple Heart the “easier” way.  I’m sure your handlers will have you send the medal back to the veteran who gave it to you and publish that action, but no matter. You won’t understand.

It’s time for you to go back to your reality TV so I can start writing about things that matter.  Is that the fat lady is singing? Please…let it be.

Reality Politics

I actually cringe to use the T-word in opening an essay on American politics.  Not out of animus, rather just from weariness.  The reality that for nearly a year the Donald has been one of the first words heard upon tuning into news radio or TV has lost its fascination. 

It’s time to review what this one man phenomenon is and why he exists.

Dispense with the political system.  I’m already long on record that Trump can’t win the general election and that he will quit the race before experiencing a resounding defeat.  I’m still comfortable with both those predictions.  Therefore, for me there is no point in reviewing his inadequacies, lack of character, or psychosis. 

The real value of this political season is observing the petri dish that the virus known as Donald Trump has thrived in. After all, even if this DJT virus consumes its own carcass, the petri dish remains.

Marshall McLuhan, 20^th century philosopher/intellectual, is best known for his five word brain-teasing quote: The medium is the message.  Although McLuhan and many others have written to near ad nauseum to define the phrase, I believe most would feel the Donald personifies its meaning.

Trump has existed and prospered to date in an environment that fully accepts his presentation where others performing in the same manner would not be so accepted.  He virtually feels no obligation to tell the truth or even reflect on the inaccuracies of what he says. 

This actually bizarre performance is not only accepted by the followers who have been duped by his snake-oil sales, but also by the news media which has been at a loss to figure out how to respond.  The news media may seem to be hobbled by the respect they traditionally afford a candidate vying for the Presidency from one of the two political parties, but I, for one, don’t cut them much slack.

These attitudes began and continue long after the reality which is Donald Trump has been completely exposed.  Why?

Talking to a Trump supporter (if you can find one that will discuss Trump without using the name Hillary) or hearing them interviewed, it is clear that what Trump says or the positions he takes are without consequence.  I believe at this point Trump would start to lose support from the faithful if all of a sudden he began to base his comments on facts.

Trump’s claim that if he committed murder in Times Square it wouldn’t deter his following isn’t off track (as weird as that sounds).  The concept itself is appealing to his supporters because it fits a reality in which they can vicariously exist; where a super-leader can do anything, even if only for their viewing pleasure.  Call it Reality Politics.

Donald has had a successful business career (I find it difficult to deal with people who like to argue that he has not).  It doesn’t mean he has been successful at life; people who spend all their working years making sandwiches can accomplish that.  However, even with his questionable ethics and bankruptcies he has built a lot of stuff.

What brought him mega fame though was not his business success, which was nearly unknown to most Americans. It was his television show. Donald Trump was a Reality TV star.

To the chagrin of my wife I like to call it Unreality TV. Think what you want, but Reality TV has come to bridge the space between story telling fiction and news-style realism.  It’s like reading the enthralling autobiography of a person who didn’t exist. 

Even though the fantasy factor that is part of nearly every scene in every reality TV show is known to the viewer, it makes little difference.  People perceive it like they are watching Scott Pelley on CBS Evening News.

It doesn’t matter what it is or what it purports. Whether it’s flipping a house, making a soufflé, finding a mate, building a coffee table out of popsicle sticks, finding an apartment in Tanzania (or as Trump says: Tan-Zania), or competing as a small business the only reality is the broadcast itself.

This is a new world we live in, driven by exponentially growing populations, and the delivery of rocket-fast communication and information.  It is the medium that Reality Politics can also find a friendly environment in which to grow…ergo Donald Trump.  It is also somewhat scary because it can be so confusing and, therefore, divisive.  What I see on my iphone might be different than what you see on yours, but who has the time or wherefore to figure out which (or either) is truth.

It is no wonder why the elements that comprise the contents of a petri dish are called a medium. It really is the message to pay attention to…not Donald Trump.

Who is the Real Criminal?

It’s prime time opening night at the Republican National Convention and a quaint, well dressed, possibly fragile, seventy-something woman is helped to the podium.  There she begins to deliver a heart-exposed recounting of the death of her son, which soon evolved into a spewing of vitriol…like a homeless person who starts with a soft plea for a touch of generosity and ends with unloading her AK-47 across a line of bank tellers.

Patricia Smith appeared by all accounts to be displaying her true feelings.  It was this quality of genuineness that makes the accounting of her words all the more serious and revealing.  Commentators who likely disagreed with her entire story only reacted with compassion and sympathy rather than criticism.

Unfortunately they were at a loss for words, which a sad commentary in itself.

At the end of her heated moment on a National stage, Mrs. Smith began a theme that remained as one of the few constants across the remainder of the Convention: that Hillary Clinton was personally and totally responsible for her son Sean’s death, and, as such, is a criminal and should be in prison.

Picked up by Chris Christy the next night, the crowd, adorned in their stars and bars, began to chant “lock her up”, several times interrupting Christy, leaving him only to smile and nod his head encouragingly.

There was a mob feeling about it, like the old fashioned, pre-lynching enthusiasm we’ve all seen in movies that recount a darker past.  Instead of repulsed or angered, I primarily felt embarrassed for our Country, not unlike how I felt when Trump decided to discuss his genitals during a Presidential Debate.

I will not give an account here of the absurdity of Patricia Smith’s claim that anti-Western Islamic extremists were bit players in Hillary Clinton’s conspiracy to have her son murdered.  The wasted resources of the Federal Government over four years of investigations have already done that. What I want to discuss is the real crime itself, as displayed Monday night.

 A mother likely shattered by the sudden and violent death of her son has the potential of being as unmolded clay.  Any of us would be desperate to seek answers to explain what is impossible to understand in a state of intense grief.  Although true of any parent losing a child, the national attention, the reporters, the cameras, and more must have made the intense need for reason and rationality more acute.

Every set of parents of the 20 first-graders murdered at Sandy Hook must have gone through it. Despite a simple explanation of insanity, most have sought accountability to explain how such psychosis can manifest itself into such tragedy.

Patricia Smith showed clearly Monday night that not only had she sought accountability for her son’s death but that she is wholly tormented by what she has concluded.  That was also undoubtedly the reason she was recruited to the podium. 

Who gave her the tools of her torment?  She did not independently arrive at a set of conclusions that the longest, most expensive, most driven Republican Congressional investigation in the history of this Country couldn’t obtain.  She was fed a scenario for purposes unrelated to the death of her son.

Just as the House Special Committee to investigate Benghazi was, as publicly admitted by Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, created to drive down “Hillary’s numbers”, just as the fictional movie 13 Hours is used as a quasi-historical explanation (most notably by Donald Trump, Jr.), just as Fox Television and talk radio have eliminated any facts regarding Benghazi other than Hillary Clinton being the Secretary of State, so did Patricia Smith become a pawn to use in the Republican’s desire give Clinton to the mob. Lock her up.

The real crime we saw Monday night was the public use of a tortured woman who has been manipulated in such a way as to leave her plagued with sadness and anger for the rest of her days…because she can no longer assimilate the truth. Think about what that must be like. The real criminals were standing behind the stage at the RNC.

The crime committed on this woman is as ethically wrong as any con job, only more so.  Like Christy’s Tuesday night kangaroo court, the crime against Patricia Smith and the rest of the conservative Republican base can only be tried in the public forum and ballot box. Fortunately (and hopefully) that will cause the Republican Party to move to a better place.  Sadly, I doubt there is much hope for Patricia Smith.    

Holy War?

Political contributions are not tax deductable, and they shouldn’t be.  Although in the past there have been short periods which allowed small amounts to be deducted from taxable income these tax rules were soon discarded. The reason is obvious, but frankly the understanding eludes most Americans.

When an item is deductable it effectively joins the general tax-paying public to participate in the contribution. For example, Mitt Romney, who touted his large charitable contributions, gave most of it as a tithe to the Mormon Church.  The hundreds of thousands of dollars he gave to his church reduced his taxes by hundreds of thousands (probably about 40% Federal & State). Therefore the US Taxpayers and the Taxpayers of California essentially contributed to the Mormon Church through a loss in revenue.  Every dollar he gave to the Mormon Church cost him about 60 cents and the Taxpayers 40.

This is one very public way the congressionally driven US Tax Code engages in social policy, no different than milk supports, oil depletions, carbon credits or five thousand other lesser known pork barrel rules. State tax codes are no different.

In 1954 then Texas Senator Lyndon B. Johnson led a change in the tax law to address political activism by charitable organizations (called 501(c)3 organizations), whose receipt of a contribution allowed the contributor to take an itemized charitable deduction.

Churches in particular had been acting as quasi-political arms of certain candidates and the taxpayer was picking up the tab generated by the contributions of wealthy donors.

The so-called Johnson Amendment became tax law.  It disallowed any 501(c)3 organization from participating in any partisan political activity at threat of losing their tax status.  It has remained, for the obvious reasons, an unquestioned part of our tax law for 62 years, until perhaps…now.

In Donald J(erkhead) Trump’s disjointed and rambling introduction yesterday of Mike Pence as his running mate, he unveiled for the first time (to my knowledge) his new policy to attack the Johnson Amendment if he became President.

I had to get past the humor of ineptness which he obviously had in misunderstanding what he was talking about.  He initially inferred the law was created by Lyndon Johnson as President, then said; “(because of the amendment) you are absolutely shunned, if you’re evangelical…if you want to talk religion, you lose your tax-exempt status.”  Gosh, all those shunned evangelicals.  I wonder what they’ve been talking about all these years.

What Trump probably thinks and what his uninformed listeners hear is that a violation of this tax law somehow leads to Churches paying taxes.  Churches currently can preach politics as much as they want; it’s just that if they do you can’t take an itemized deduction when you give money to them. They’ll still pay no taxes.

What Donald was actually trying to cram into his little pea-brain is an effort, currently championed by Jerry Falwell, Jr., which is making it onto the Republican Platform this go-around.  It is an effort to remove the Johnson Amendment from the US Tax Code.

Of course Trump has no more understanding of the rule than a Kansas chicken plucker, but those like Falwell know that elimination of that rule will not only free them up to start campaigning for Conservative candidates from the pulpit, but it would begin to bring in contribution revenue to these “churches” by the tractor trailer full. 

All of sudden the Koch brothers will become born again (and damn it I thought once was enough!). Why would anyone want to give money to some super PAC when he can give it to the Holy Trump Tower of Babble and get a tax deduction to boot!

Keep in mind that the Johnson Amendment to the US Tax Code affects all 501(c)3 organizations which includes, among other organizations, all schools.  As with Churches, Universities cannot engage in partisan politics (favoring a particular candidate or candidate’s campaign), but like Universities, Churches currently can openly discuss general public issues as they affect their faith.

Trump repeatedly and exclusively addressed this issue of the Johnson Amendment as something he wants to accomplish “for the evangelicals”, he did not mention Churches generally.  He’s right, although he may not know it. 

His motive is support and votes. There’s no question he’s non-religious and has been his whole life.  The Right-Wing Christian Conservative movement is all about money and power. They don’t simply collect funds from their local parish, but their hands are outstretched nationally and internationally. 

They essentially want a Holy War against the Muslim religion as much as the religious nut-jobs in the Middle East and they see Trump as the man to bring it home.

Therein lies why Donald J(erkhead) Trump is the perfect candidate for the Christian Right, even though his history on their favorite social issues (abortion e.g.) and his patent ignorance of Christianity (making Ronald Reagan look like an Apostle) is so contradictory.

We ask American Muslims to speak out against radical jihadists.  Well I’d like to hear moderate American Christian leaders speak out against the efforts of the Republicans and extreme Christian Conservatives to politicize their faith for the same reasons…or are their wallets a bit too close to their Gospels?