Goodbye to 2008...8 years of W...Iraq...Global Economic Crisis...Madoff...Spitzer...Blago...When will they ever learn?
Starting with Reagan, Republican Administrations have quadrupled the Federal Budget Deficit, even accepting government (versus reasonable) accounting rules. From Washington to Carter, the US government had run up "only" about $900 billion in deficit. (Yes, less than a trillion $)
By 1992 (Can you say Bush Sr?. Where is Hunter Thompson when we need him?) it was $4 trillion. After a break during a Democratic Administration, the deficit began to explode again.
Now it is "officially" about $10 trillion.
People who actually understand economics and accounting are actually putting it in excess of $50 trillion if we count deficits in "entitlements" like Social Security, Medicare and Veterans Benefits.
The reasons for such treasonous Republican management of the American economy are painfully transparent. They never met a war they didn't like, or a tax they did. And they couldn't care less about waste in government spending.
The results are as disgusting as they are real. Our children and their children will be saddled with a financial burden at the same time they are coping with declining resources and increasing human dependency.
They will face a world of danger with military resources drained by senseless wars.
(Does it really matter if we turn Iraq over to Al Sadr, a Shiite, from Hussein, a Sunni?
Of course, Republicans aren't concerned about the future because they are about to float naked up to heaven in the presence of people like Tim LeHaye.
Luckily, there is hope. America has elected a true leader who has a vision and integrity. He can take our country back to the principles of the Founding Fathers.
Yes he can!
See my model at paradigmactuaries.com
Lee
Showing posts with label Huffington. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Huffington. Show all posts
Friday, December 26, 2008
Monday, December 22, 2008
Logic and the Caroline Kennedy Controversy
Do you know why talking heads never progress intellectually or pragmatically? Because they don't understand simple logic.
The current discussion about Caroline Kennedy's "qualifications" to be a New York Senator provides a paradigmatic example.
Caroline Kennedy is smart, decent, charismatic, compassionate, intellectually honest, and accomplished.
She is also part of an amazing family.
What experience is it that she lacks? Wheeling and dealing with slimy lobbyists? Wheeling and dealing with other hacks to pass legislation which weakens the American economy?
Hitler and Stalin had a lot of experience. So do Cheney, Mugabe and Rod Blagojevich.
Strom Thurmond and Wilbur Mills had a lot of experience.
On the other hand, it was claimed that Barack Obama, John Kennedy and George Washington lacked experience.
The tragedy is that when political hacks blather on about lack of experience, our great free press representatives just sit there like deer in the headlights.
Why couldn't we hear something like the following just once?
Representative Slimebag, you say Caroline Kennedy is not qualified to represent the State of New York. Which of the following is in your chain of logic:
1. All experienced people are intelligent and just.
2. Caroline is not experienced.
3. Therefore, Caroline is not intelligent and just.
Well, we can see several flaws here...
Many experienced people are neither intelligent or just.
Caroline Kennedy is experienced, just not in the way you care about.
Since 1. is false, 3. is meaningless.
Let's try again.
1. Only experienced people can be effective senators.
2. Larry Craig and Ted Stevens are experienced.
3. Therefore, only people like them should be senators.
Well, you get the idea.
What we need is a Federal Department of Logic to beat down all the sophomoric opinions which pollute the airwaves. Anytime there is a debate over something that matters, war, social security, education, health, agriculture, bailouts, welfare...we subject the various arguments to fairly rigorous testing, including:
1. Is your logic fuzzy, classical, boolean, quantum, or some other mode?
2. Do you follow Frege, Cantor, Russell, Turing or Hilbert?
3. Did you use truth tables or truth trees in developing your argument?
4. Did you check for tautologies, contradictions, inconsistencies...?
5. Did you use the six easy sentential logic statements or the ten hard ones?
More later.
Lee
The current discussion about Caroline Kennedy's "qualifications" to be a New York Senator provides a paradigmatic example.
Caroline Kennedy is smart, decent, charismatic, compassionate, intellectually honest, and accomplished.
She is also part of an amazing family.
What experience is it that she lacks? Wheeling and dealing with slimy lobbyists? Wheeling and dealing with other hacks to pass legislation which weakens the American economy?
Hitler and Stalin had a lot of experience. So do Cheney, Mugabe and Rod Blagojevich.
Strom Thurmond and Wilbur Mills had a lot of experience.
On the other hand, it was claimed that Barack Obama, John Kennedy and George Washington lacked experience.
The tragedy is that when political hacks blather on about lack of experience, our great free press representatives just sit there like deer in the headlights.
Why couldn't we hear something like the following just once?
Representative Slimebag, you say Caroline Kennedy is not qualified to represent the State of New York. Which of the following is in your chain of logic:
1. All experienced people are intelligent and just.
2. Caroline is not experienced.
3. Therefore, Caroline is not intelligent and just.
Well, we can see several flaws here...
Many experienced people are neither intelligent or just.
Caroline Kennedy is experienced, just not in the way you care about.
Since 1. is false, 3. is meaningless.
Let's try again.
1. Only experienced people can be effective senators.
2. Larry Craig and Ted Stevens are experienced.
3. Therefore, only people like them should be senators.
Well, you get the idea.
What we need is a Federal Department of Logic to beat down all the sophomoric opinions which pollute the airwaves. Anytime there is a debate over something that matters, war, social security, education, health, agriculture, bailouts, welfare...we subject the various arguments to fairly rigorous testing, including:
1. Is your logic fuzzy, classical, boolean, quantum, or some other mode?
2. Do you follow Frege, Cantor, Russell, Turing or Hilbert?
3. Did you use truth tables or truth trees in developing your argument?
4. Did you check for tautologies, contradictions, inconsistencies...?
5. Did you use the six easy sentential logic statements or the ten hard ones?
More later.
Lee
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Christmas 2008 Slate Stories
Like the Huffington Post, Slate covers the issues of the day.
Huckabee, Ashcroft, Madoff, Blago, Warren, Mueller, Craig...
That's quite a lineup...A phony Evangelical who pretends to be hip, an uptight hypocrite who wants to end freedom as we know it, a man so greedy he robbed a saint who survived the holocaust, a politician so self-absorbed he's willing to take the state of Illinois down with him, a minister who tries to straddle condemnation with forgiveness, an incompetent pedant, and a perverted Senator who claims to be (he may actually be right) a typical Republican guardian of traditional values...
Of course the good news is that soon we will have a President who cares about art, science, the environment and justice. Hopefully we will have a Senator from New York from a family that personifies hard earned hope.
Developments in the sciences have the potentionl of a transformation of the global economy which promises a new level of prosperity. The LHC may find the elusive "God Particle" for which Fermilab has been searching That may be the key to understanding deep secrets of reality which could illuminate a path to harmony.
Combined with advances in computer technology being made in places like the Santa Fe Institute and the impact of Obama's stimulus plan, we may be on the way to a growth economy the likes of which we have not seen for decades.
Yes we can.
Lee
Huckabee, Ashcroft, Madoff, Blago, Warren, Mueller, Craig...
That's quite a lineup...A phony Evangelical who pretends to be hip, an uptight hypocrite who wants to end freedom as we know it, a man so greedy he robbed a saint who survived the holocaust, a politician so self-absorbed he's willing to take the state of Illinois down with him, a minister who tries to straddle condemnation with forgiveness, an incompetent pedant, and a perverted Senator who claims to be (he may actually be right) a typical Republican guardian of traditional values...
Of course the good news is that soon we will have a President who cares about art, science, the environment and justice. Hopefully we will have a Senator from New York from a family that personifies hard earned hope.
Developments in the sciences have the potentionl of a transformation of the global economy which promises a new level of prosperity. The LHC may find the elusive "God Particle" for which Fermilab has been searching That may be the key to understanding deep secrets of reality which could illuminate a path to harmony.
Combined with advances in computer technology being made in places like the Santa Fe Institute and the impact of Obama's stimulus plan, we may be on the way to a growth economy the likes of which we have not seen for decades.
Yes we can.
Lee
Zen and the Art of Africa
Robert Pirsig sought an understanding of quality and value in ZAMM and Lila. What he had in mind was not a superficial definition and essence, but a deep and resonant revelation.
Quality as a source of Aristotelian happiness, Platonic ideal, Sartrean existence...which transcends our understanding in the way the essence of particle physics does.
In America, quality can be realized in the free pursuit of excellence. What can be said of Africa?
The Congo wallows in Civil War, the legacy of Mobutu's incompetence and corruption. We all know about events in Rwanda. South Africa's response to AIDS was nothng short of bizarre. Robert Mugabe has set a new standard for evil arrogance in Zimbawe. Kenya...
Can African's dream of quality or value in the midst of the horrors visited upon them?
Of course, Africa is not alone. Many parts of the globe harbor hunger, torture, terror and fear.
Can anyone find quality when someone is being denied justice?
The essence of recent findings in particle physics is that everything is connected. At our core and at the core of everything in the cosmos is the nucleus of the atom which itself is composed of fuzzy, probabilistic, interconnected, multidimensional clouds of ethereal structures. Nonlocality and entanglement are inherent in the essence of being...a web of connections
How can we ignore the destruction of fellow beings or the environment in which we exist when we are all so profoudly connected?
The answer is we can't. For true liberation we must be each other's keeper. Only then will we know quality, value, harmony, agape and peace.
Lee
Quality as a source of Aristotelian happiness, Platonic ideal, Sartrean existence...which transcends our understanding in the way the essence of particle physics does.
In America, quality can be realized in the free pursuit of excellence. What can be said of Africa?
The Congo wallows in Civil War, the legacy of Mobutu's incompetence and corruption. We all know about events in Rwanda. South Africa's response to AIDS was nothng short of bizarre. Robert Mugabe has set a new standard for evil arrogance in Zimbawe. Kenya...
Can African's dream of quality or value in the midst of the horrors visited upon them?
Of course, Africa is not alone. Many parts of the globe harbor hunger, torture, terror and fear.
Can anyone find quality when someone is being denied justice?
The essence of recent findings in particle physics is that everything is connected. At our core and at the core of everything in the cosmos is the nucleus of the atom which itself is composed of fuzzy, probabilistic, interconnected, multidimensional clouds of ethereal structures. Nonlocality and entanglement are inherent in the essence of being...a web of connections
How can we ignore the destruction of fellow beings or the environment in which we exist when we are all so profoudly connected?
The answer is we can't. For true liberation we must be each other's keeper. Only then will we know quality, value, harmony, agape and peace.
Lee
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Christmas 2008 Huffington Post Stories
What a blog...
US joins other third world countries in global ban of homosexuality...
Goes along with recent Anti-Reproductive Freedom and Anit-Environment initiatives.
Rick Warren does the invocation and Paul Weyrich dies...
Obama and Biden stuck with a global economic collapse and last minute Bush anti-human, anti-envoronment rules...Oh, and a $60 trillion budget deficit if you do the math.
Of course we can talk about Blago and Spitzer, the latter having sent all types of "criminals" to the slammer for using complicated government approved accounting and tax rules...
And then there's The House of Saddam, New Orleans, SEC Porn, Limbaugh, Paulson, Franken, Haggard, Lieberman, Madoff, GM and global warming...
Ken Starr is back to fight another battle in his war against sex. Bristol Palin's Mother in Law continues the family tradition of promoting good values.
Neocon Frank Gaffny continues his battle against truth and fairness...
Africa seems to be continuing to do well. Mugabe hangs in there (shades of Blago)...Violence rocks Kenya...
On the optimistic side, Caroline may become a Senator, Obama is nominating some real scientists to help move the country into a future lit by wisdom, and our New Secretary of Labor is a Profile in Courage...
As George Bernard Shaw (and Bobby and John) said, "Some people see things as they are and say why. But I dream things that never were and say why not?"
Lee
US joins other third world countries in global ban of homosexuality...
Goes along with recent Anti-Reproductive Freedom and Anit-Environment initiatives.
Rick Warren does the invocation and Paul Weyrich dies...
Obama and Biden stuck with a global economic collapse and last minute Bush anti-human, anti-envoronment rules...Oh, and a $60 trillion budget deficit if you do the math.
Of course we can talk about Blago and Spitzer, the latter having sent all types of "criminals" to the slammer for using complicated government approved accounting and tax rules...
And then there's The House of Saddam, New Orleans, SEC Porn, Limbaugh, Paulson, Franken, Haggard, Lieberman, Madoff, GM and global warming...
Ken Starr is back to fight another battle in his war against sex. Bristol Palin's Mother in Law continues the family tradition of promoting good values.
Neocon Frank Gaffny continues his battle against truth and fairness...
Africa seems to be continuing to do well. Mugabe hangs in there (shades of Blago)...Violence rocks Kenya...
On the optimistic side, Caroline may become a Senator, Obama is nominating some real scientists to help move the country into a future lit by wisdom, and our New Secretary of Labor is a Profile in Courage...
As George Bernard Shaw (and Bobby and John) said, "Some people see things as they are and say why. But I dream things that never were and say why not?"
Lee
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