Friday, July 15, 2011

Friday Mashup (7/15/11)

  • Gee, David Brooks is a barrel of laughs today in the New York Times (here)…
    Years ago, people hoped that science could delay the onset of morbidity. We would live longer, healthier lives and then die quickly. This is not happening. Most of us will still suffer from chronic diseases for years near the end of life, and then die slowly.

    S. Jay Olshansky, one of the leading experts on aging, argues that life expectancy is now leveling off. “We have arrived at a moment,” Callahan and Nuland conclude, “where we are making little headway in defeating various kinds of diseases. Instead, our main achievements today consist of devising ways to marginally extend the lives of the very sick.”

    Others disagree with this pessimistic view of medical progress. But that phrase, “marginally extend the lives of the very sick,” should ring in the ears. Many of our budget problems spring from our quest to do that.
    But not to worry – BoBo is not about to call for anyone stuffing Granny in a meat locker when she expires or taking dear old Dad out with the trash at the onset of rigor mortis.

    However, I think our intrepid Times columnist also needs to point out the following (here, concerning the recent discussion of raising the mandatory retirement age for Social Security)…
    While it might be achievable for someone who works in an office to work all through their 60’s not every job or even trade is sitting at a computer. Many of the jobs that allow non-college graduates to earn a good living and raise a family are physically demanding. Working in a hot factory, climbing electrical poles, driving buses, cleaning hotel rooms are all jobs that someone in their 60’s are not going to be as able to do. Take a look around at the people you know in their mid or late 60’s. They may be in great health but that does not mean most of them can spend the day in physically demanding labor, day after day after day.
    It’s hard for me to “get my head around” the inherent cynicism of a mentality that actually discourages advancement in medical science to improve one’s quality of life while saying nothing (at least, nothing I’ve found from Brooks) decrying other economic “drags” on our economy that are at least comparable, including at least two wars and Bushco’s stinking, forever ruinous tax cuts.

    After doing a little bit of digging, though, I found that this is a familiar theme for BoBo, as noted here…
    In a recent column in the New York Times, Brooks talks about “geezers.” Wow. Isn’t that pretty “anti-pc?” Brooks quotes Freud and Shakespeare to somehow indicate that the elderly gradually withdraw from active life. While this is true in many cases, it is less and less true, and there are many contrary examples, like George Bernard Shaw, who could keep up with Brooks at way-plus-80, or Isaac Bashevis Singer who wrote for the New Yorker or Konrad Adenauer who ran Germany when both were well into their 80s.

    Mark Twain, Robert Frost and Pablo Picasso all did some of their best work in their later years. Cezanne worked his whole life only to find success in the paintings he did after sixty. So what’s the point, David?

    Brooks likes to take studies, especially those done by scholars at respected universities and explain and interpret them. But somehow the topic inevitably comes around to politics with a conservative bent. He says for example, after discussing how aging works and how the brain continues to be capable of all kinds of things in later years, that: “…the federal government now spends $7 on the elderly for each $1 it spends on children.”

    Hmmm…Well, OK. But of course it would be less than that if the Republicans had their way. The SCHIPS program of health care subsidies for the children of poor working families and its renewal were voted down by almost every single Republican when they came to the House of Representatives. So, if the idea is to pit elderly against children, which side are the Neoconservative Republicans on?
    I suppose that’s an eternal question that the Neocons, who are forever in pursuit of a “wedge issue” anywhere they can find one, will never answer.


  • Next, I give you the latest from Fix Noise (here)…
    Congressional Republicans are rallying behind a long-shot bid for a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced budget. But they're divided over conservatives' efforts to demand its passage as their price for backing any increase in the government's borrowing limit.
    In response, I give you the following (here)…
    The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) took a look at the ramifications of adopting a Balanced Budget Amendment like the one Republicans propose. Here are some of the CBPP’s key findings:

    - Veterans’ medical care, homeland security activities, border protection, the FBI, services for disadvantaged or abused children, services for frail elderly people, services for people with severe disabilities, would have to be cut by as much as 70% by 2021 relative to the already-reduced budget for 2011.

    - Medicare cuts would have to be significantly deeper than under the Paul Ryan plan.

    - Medicaid would have to be cut in half.

    - Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps) would have to be cut in half.

    - Supplemental Security Income would have to be cut in half.

    - Pell Grants to help low-income students to afford college would have to be cut by as much as $86 billion over ten years.

    - Farm programs would have to be cut by as much as $84 billion over 10 years.
    And for proof of just how “out to lunch” today’s zany teabagger-run Repug party is on this issue, I give you this (as opposed to an actual issue like this – people keep electing clowns like DeMint, I tell myself).


  • And I suppose that’s an appropriate transition to last week’s Area Votes in Congress (here)…
    House

    2012 military budget. Voting 336-87, the House passed a $649 billion military appropriations bill for fiscal 2012, up $17 billion or 2.7 percent from 2011. The bill (HR 2219) sets a 1.6 percent military pay raise, provides $119 billion for war in Iraq and Afghanistan, keeps the active-duty force around 1.4 million troops, and provides $32.3 billion for the military's TRICARE health program, up nearly 3 percent from 2011.

    A yes vote was to pass the bill.

    Voting yes: Robert E. Andrews (D., N.J.), Robert A. Brady (D., Pa.), John Carney (D., Del.), Charles W. Dent (R., Pa.), Chaka Fattah (D., Pa.), Michael Fitzpatrick (R., Pa.), Jim Gerlach (R., Pa.), Tim Holden (D., Pa.), Frank A. LoBiondo (R., N.J.), Pat Meehan (R., Pa.), Joseph R. Pitts (R., Pa.), Jon Runyan (R., N.J.), Allyson Y. Schwartz (D., Pa.), and Christopher H. Smith (R., N.J.).

    Libya-mission funds cutoff. Voting 199-229, the House defeated an amendment to prohibit funding in HR 2219 (above) for U.S. participation in the NATO-led military action aimed at defeating the regime of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and protecting Libyan rebels against his government.

    A yes vote was to bar U.S. military spending in the Libyan theater.

    Voting yes: Fitzpatrick, LoBiondo, Pitts, and Smith.

    Voting no: Andrews, Brady, Carney, Dent, Fattah, Gerlach, Holden, Meehan, Runyan, and Schwartz.
    Gee, another vote where Mikey the Beloved can actually pretend to have a spine, knowing it would fail anyhow.
    Contractors' political donations. Voting 256-170, the House prohibited spending in HR 2219 (above) for any requirement that corporations seeking federal contracts disclose their contributions to political candidates. President Obama has drafted, but not yet issued, an executive order requiring such disclosures in bids for federal work.

    A yes vote was to block the planned executive order.

    Voting yes: Dent, Fitzpatrick, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Meehan, Pitts, Runyan, and Smith.

    Voting no: Andrews, Brady, Carney, Fattah, and Schwartz.
    In response to this vote from our PA-08 rep (and by extension, everyone in his party as well as “Democrat” Tim Holden), I thought this was a good letter that appeared in the Doylestown Intelligencer.
    Senate

    Taxes on millionaires. The Senate voted, 74-22, to begin debate on a nonbinding measure (S 1323) stating the sense of the Senate that any agreement to raise the national debt ceiling and curb deficit spending includes "a meaningful contribution" in revenue from those earning at least $1 million annually.

    A yes vote was to advance the advisory bill.

    Voting yes: Thomas Carper (D., Del.), Bob Casey (D., Pa.), Chris Coons (D., Del.), Frank Lautenberg (D., N.J.), and Robert Menendez (D., N.J.).

    Voting no: Pat Toomey (R., Pa.).
    Leave it to “No Corporate Tax” Pat Toomey to never forget who his true constituents really are.

    This week, the House debated energy and water appropriations and an extension of National Flood Insurance, while the Senate resumed work on a nonbinding measure calling for higher taxes on millionaires as part of any deficit-reduction agreement reached this summer.


  • Finally, it looks like The Bucks County Courier Times, for some inexplicable reason, is in search of another conservative columnist, apparently thinking they don’t have enough as it is (this appeared in the paper this morning)…
    In what amounted to a complete non-surprise, Pennsylvania was just ranked near the economic bottom of the nation. Forty-third, to be exact.

    Why the dismal showing for what was once the major industrial powerhouse, not just of the country, but the world?

    More than anything else, crushing taxes and a hostile business climate.
    I wonder if the author is aware that, among other things, of all of the states and commonwealths residing atop the Marcellus Shale, Pennsylvania is the only one that doesn’t charge a drillers’ tax? And that is in spite of the $1 billion in education funding cut from our budget by Gov. Tom “Space Cadet” Corbett. If that isn’t “business friendly,” I don’t know what is.

    Besides, as noted here, PA ranked number 25 in a 2011 survey from The Tax Foundation, which measures the “business tax climates” of all 50 states. Not too bad, I would say.

    And as noted here…
    The state Department of Labor and Industry reports that manufacturing added 4,200 jobs in 2011 alone. The innovative products being developed in Pennsylvania today will someday be manufactured for mass use and consumption in the future. This means continued economic growth and new jobs for Pennsylvanians.

    We are already seeing tremendous job growth from Marcellus Shale development. The state Department of Labor and Industry reports that approximately 72,000 jobs have been created due to the growth of the natural gas industry in the state.

    Pennsylvania is poised to be a national economic leader. But to be truly successful, we need to improve our tax climate. The Corbett administration is committed to improving Pennsylvania's business climate and has included a number of tax reductions and tax credits in the proposed state budget to reduce the tax burden on job creators.

    The phaseout of the Capital Stock and Franchise Tax, which stalled the past few years, will finally resume and be completely eliminated by 2014. The administration's business-friendly interpretation of tax law regarding 100 percent bonus depreciation benefits and goal to reduce the corporate net income tax from 9.99 to 6.99 percent will send a strong message to the business community that Pennsylvania is serious about supporting job growth.
    Please understand that I’m not necessarily saying I support these initiatives. I am merely pointing them out to refute the argument of Chris Friend, who, the Courier Times tells us, is an “independent” columnist, television commentator, and investigative reporter (I’ll let you, dear reader, search out his site and read some of his content to find out how “independent” he is…in the way that Fix Noise is “fair and balanced,” as they say).

    The theme of Friend’s piece is how bad PA is supposed to be as opposed to how great Texas is supposed to be, including the following…
    When in Texas, there is an unbridled sense of pride, a feeling that the American pioneering spirit is thriving, and that nothing is unattainable.
    Well then, if Friend thinks the land of the “yellow rose” is supposedly so wonderful and PA is so awful, then I have this bit of advice.

    Move there, and stay there (and don’t file a medical disability claim or expect your premiums to decrease - here).
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