One for the Ages!

Well I am in a good mood! Trump is the president for the next 4 years (at least) and his rise was totally remarkable, unlike anything seen in politics in my lifetime. Oh sure, other remarkable unexpected elections probably came about across the country on some level, Schwarzenegger was a California governor after all . Never has the highest office in the country been awarded to someone with no government experience, no military experience and no applicable work experience. OK the last one may not be entirely convincing since many in the business community think their boardroom acumen is perfectly suited for dealing with Congress.

I was a late (very late) supporter of the Trump campaign. At some point you look around the tent and realize no one is left to vote for but the orange guy with the floppy red hat. I was reluctant and still am that he can put a coalition together that gets manufacturing back and stops immigration from the Southern border. I am hopeful though that with the GOP House and Senate he stands a better chance than with a divided Congress.

Here is a short list of things I’d like to see happen in the first 100 days.

1.      1 Nominate Ted Cruz for the Supreme Court. If he accepts, which he probably will, he represents a solid conservative voice that shapes the thinking on decisions for the next 30 years. Putting Cruz on the SCOTUS takes him away as a presidential challenger and resident pain in the ass Senator and gives him a larger stage. Plus, Ted wants to prove to everyone how smart he is (and he REALLY is). Give ‘em a chance, we won’t regret it!

2.      2  Repeal Obamacare (ACA) and replace with ANYTHING resembling a market driven plan. The House Republicans under Paul Ryan have (I guess) been working on it for a while, but you know…Obama. How much of mess this program really is? Ever tried to untangle a box full of old clothes hangers? Like that…but more like warehouse full of hangers in boxes. Oh, and the instructions on how to begin are 2000 pages long, and in Chinese. It should have been an albatross around the president’s neck the last few years but never seemed to be. The only real ACA stuff I read was in my Heritage Foundation blog updates. Anytime the press uttered the words “Affordable Care Act” the White House staffers should’ve run out shrieking like they had seen a ghost. It wasn’t just a disaster, it was a predictable disaster.    

3.      3 Reassure our allies in Europe (NATO) that the alliance is still strong. Trump will insist on letting them all know if they want the defensive umbrella of NATO they better pay up. Rarely do all the allied nations pay their percentage. This ‘freeloading’ is what Donald Trump has explained causes the US to keep funding defense for the continent. I don’t agree completely with his assessment, but allies are crucial to world stability and free trade. Make nice with Europe. We need them, they need us.

4.      4 The regulatory state is a nightmare and although I can’t begin to determine which industry needs the most help, an overhaul should be done. Start with ‘environmental’ regulations put into effect strictly because of climate change non-sense. I don’t mean start tearing up the Clean Water Act and allow industry to dump toxic sludge into lakes and rivers. Quotas and limits on industry should be scrapped. They are as arcane as war era food rationing plans. Trump should take restrictions off the coal industry that the current president helped establish. The price of electricity should determine how much coal or natural gas we use, not onerous and expensive federal measures.  

Those are four just as quick as I could come up with them. Certainly there are aspects of a Trump presidency that worry me but with a true belief in this country and the unlimited potential of the market, I am optimistic.

 The missing element in this country (and the world by extension) has been tough leadership and moral certainty. The US navy keeps the pirates around the horn of Africa in check because it has the moral clarity to protect the sea lanes. Ditto for the South China Sea and the Dardanelles. Moral certainty means other countries interested in trade and travel accept the arrangement of peace and stability the US ensures in much of the world. This tenuous position of give and take power politics is ALWAYS in play in theaters around the world. Why is Russia a constant thorn in Eastern Europe? They represent the ‘other’ side of influence, state run economies and zero citizen freedoms. Only when US hegemony is removed, or severely curtailed, will we realize how good we all had it. I hope Trump begins to get a sense of the responsibility this country has as a default guarantor of peace. Something tells me he’ll get help where he needs it.     

Oklahoma State Questions--Summarized

Thought I’d do a quick overview of the State Questions on the ballot this year. Something to keep in mind about SQs in any year is they are written to advantage a group or groups of people and not necessarily designed to fix a problem.

SQ 776- Vote Yes

Simply, it affirms the legislature’s authority to pick a method of execution if one method has been ruled invalid. Also, it prohibits the death penalty from being ruled unconstitutional. This probably came about because of the botched execution of Lockett a few years ago followed by another execution where the wrong drug was used. It’s a good idea to ‘affirm’ the right of capital punishment because lethal injection as a tool is increasingly complicated. Drug makers refuse to sell certain 'killer' drugs and independent groups move to block executions. Who needs it. I’ve never had a problem with capital punishment; the method of execution is beside the point.

SQ 777- Vote Yes.

Basically this is a way for farmers and ranchers to use modern technological methods, mostly large scale production.  I am always leery of laws and amendments that make other potential laws unenforceable. The agriculture trade groups backing this bill hope to avoid be court cases by opponents over whatever silly ‘violations’ outside groups manage to drag up. The courts have to apply a strict “compelling state interest” in order to stop legal firms from using the law as an anti-competitive measure. If you pair it down the law is really an attempt to make it tough to sue farms for everyday legal farming techniques.  

SQ 779- Vote No

Teachers deserve more money in terms of salary and benefits but this measure won’t help. Any sales tax increase drives business away from local stores (Yes, I do work in one) and toward online sites like Amazon. It is a bit frustrating to see that not all the money even goes to elementary and secondary teachers, whatever it amounts to. ‘Higher Education’ also gets a slice of the pie. I guess that means TCC (Tulsa Community College) and a few tech schools will get almost 20%! This is the most frustrating part. Colleges should NOT get sales tax money. Sales taxes always have the biggest impact on those who can least afford the increase in food, gas and clothing. Who in our society can least afford it? Teachers.

SQ 780, 781- Vote No

There is an encroaching laissez-faire attitude toward drugs and drug use in the country. Prison overcrowding is a problem (I guess) and when one compares the lock ‘em up rate to other countries it seems we use prisons like others use public transportation. Squeeze a bunch of people in and keep the funding low. Yes our drug laws are tough. Prison overcrowding doesn’t worry me like kids who may become addicted does. The problem isn’t the law it’s the culture. Normalizing drug use will increase the availability of drugs (legal and illegal) and strain services meant to help addicts recover. And guess what? Those new addicts will need new treatment centers and additional state paid counselors. I’m not unsympathetic to low level drug offenses being reduced by judges or by adhering to a program for recovery. This exists already in most states. Good behavior and showing up for treatment means reduced sentencing for most offenders. This bill is unnecessary.

SQ 790- Vote Yes

Voting No will send you straight to Hell…I am pretty sure (kidding). This is a restore-our-heritage type of debate that overturns previous legislation that prevented public money from being used to pay for ‘religious’ organizations, events, displays…The problem is the phrasing on ‘religious’ was never applied in a consistent way. Sometimes private (Christian) schools got federal money under certain conditions and sometimes they couldn’t. Like most legal questions regarding State/Religious fights, we wait to see how the court rules and either celebrate the victory or start drafting the legal challenge. If you think the Ten Commandments isn’t religious (like me) but culturally and ideologically significant, vote Yes. So 790 erases the restriction on public money for religious monuments like the Ten Commandments engraving. I’m not even sure how much difference it will make since unfortunately the courts always decide these things. This is a tentative Yes.

On a side note I don’t think the Ten Commandments monument is a Christian symbol or representative of any religion. It’s a statement of principles, a set of values underpinning the Constitutional order and it gets codified in every amendment and addition to the legal landscape. The truths espoused are fundamental to right thinking citizens whether Christian, Muslim, or Atheist. Any great institution has a core set of values that acts like a rudder on a ship. Drifting off course…check the rudder.

SQ 791- Vote Yes

There is no good reason in the world why grocery stores shouldn’t be able to sell wine and high point beer. Really all this law does is take down existing barriers that liquor stores have to work around in order to comply with the current law. It allows them to sell cold high point (above 3.2 alcohol percent) beer in addition to selling cork screws, coolers and other non-alcohol related stuff. Under the current set up, liquor stores separate the booze from the goods and run two independent companies, kinda silly. I expect this measure pass smoothly, like um…beer through a funnel.

Hope that helps!

Victory at Last

What a game...What a team...What a season!!!

Fly the W

The Fed and Accountability

I heard an interview with Larry Kudlow recently on ‘professionals’ at the Fed. By professionals (my word not Larry’s) he means academics without experience running a bank or institution who use modeling to make decisions. Something gets lost when economists move from higher education to federal offices and eventually hold titles, director of this and coordinator of that. Stack enough decades together and patterns of behavior on finance repeat themselves over and over until the thinking defines the institution. The Fed is in such a state.  

During the seventies and eighties federal institutions drew its experts (primarily) from community bankers, farmers and small business owners. The idea being that real world experience in a field was critical to making tough decisions on a larger scale. The people responsible for the economic health of the nation have a clear understanding of market principles and the consequences of tweaking the currency. For sure, the Federal Reserve has always been responsible to clean up dumb political decisions made by administrations hoping to goose the economy. 

Private sector bankers typically have rational ideas on lending versus a government employee who hasn’t met a payroll or bothered with ledgers. Not that public sector workers can’t be trained or understand how global finance works, but according to Kudlow, they lack the economic philosophy. 

Economists from similar schools and similar philosophies will come to similar conclusions when making decisions. This shouldn’t surprise anyone. Talk to salesmen at a convention and their opinions and attitudes on money and work will be familiar to each other and the profession. Ask teachers who they like for president in any election year and the response will likely be the Democrat. Surgeons vote alike and join the same clubs; their thinking on issues is familiar across states as is their salaries. The free market allows for like-minded people and groups to employ and be employed by each other. In the public sector (especially federal) this creates problems because bureaucrats are un-elected but have an increasingly outsized role in how Americans buy and sell.  

 Kudlow wasn’t bemoaning the institution of the Fed as much as arguing for a more accountable Fed. Government offices that draw heavily from one school of thought eventually stop listening to other schools, and thoughts. When everyone thinks the same way the mechanism for pulling back on bad ideas isn’t there. A rethink is needed when accountability is lacking.

The Central Intelligence Agency drew almost exclusively from the WASPy Ivy league schools right after World War II. Part of it just seemed logical, pick college kids with parents who attended the same clubs, went to same churches. The agency got bigger and through political will was forced to change its loose way of operating and accounting. Some high profile failures like the Bay of Pigs forced Congress put a lid on some of their crazier schemes. The CIA recruits from all over the US now.

Larry Kudlow didn’t make any suggestions about how to turn the Federal Reserve around but interestingly he is on the Donald Trump team of advisers. If Trump does win I think the country will see some positive moves toward a more accountable system of lending. The president’s authority over the Fed chairman is limited and presidents don’t like to interfere too much lest they get blamed for a messy problem. Kudlow is a known supply-sider advising a borderline protectionist candidate (Trump) on economic indicators. It is an odd pairing but one that can work if Trump does get the nomination next week. 

First comes accountability then comes philosophy.

"Do You Believe in (baseball) Miracles?"

The Cubs are in the World Series!!!

I almost can’t believe I wrote that last sentence but there it is, how sweet! They need to finish the season with a win of course but just getting there is a feat that this team hasn’t seen in 71 years—of just appearing in a World Series! Since 2003 I’ve been an occasional watcher of the north side abysmals, but always a fan. Why that year?(head drops...lets out a long sigh) This was the infamous Bartman year where that poor S.O.B  reached for the foul ball and ‘interfered’ with Moises Alou’s ability to catch it. The entire city knows now that it was a foul ball, out of play, and Bartman was within his rights to reach for it. Alou overreacted (shouting at him) and so did the tipsy outraged fans at Wrigley. He was escorted out like a criminal by some security guards who protected him from beer-throwing, cursing, threatening fans—a sickening display really.

ESPN did a brilliant documentary on it called “Catching Hell” outlining everything from crowd behavior and crowd psychology to rules governing fan interference. They even selected a sermon from a minister on the connection between Steve Bartman and Hebrew scapegoat traditions.

2003 was my junior year of college. I had time to spare and the Cubs were good! That meant skipping the occasional class to catch an afternoon game and rushing home from late classes to catch the last few innings. Not a lot of work (school or other) got done that year and the biggest let down was that playoff season where we lost to the Marlins. They were just better. Bartman or not, our guys couldn’t strike out the Florida club and managed to create additional problems by overthrowing runners, missing ground balls and walking batters. They were abysmal. Our pitching led by Kerry Wood and Mark Pryor had been almost automatic until the 6^th game of the series (the Bartman game). Kerry Wood threw the last game poorly. Marlins advanced. Cubs stayed home. Wrigleyville faithful drowned their sorrow in Old Style and raised their fists toward heaven—Greek tragedy style. It was further proof their ivy walled stadium was cursed. 

Until last Saturday…they never got over it.

   

The most I could muster since that heartbreaking fall of ’03 was watching WGN (when they still played games) on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Cubs had stars in those years and reached the playoffs a few times; in 2008 they got swept and of course just last year the Mets knocked them out with AMAZING pitching. Last year made a believer out of me like it did for so many. This team was built to win. The front office made purposeful decisions to spend money on young talent and develop it. The General Manager Theo Epstein had similar results with the Red Sox in the early 2000s and he made good on his promise to Chicago to invest long term. Fans sense a dynasty is being put together in the best place in the world for baseball, Wrigley field. Nothing is guaranteed of course but the talent this team has trained, traded for and developed is unlike any team before.

I can’t imagine having the time or passion that I did in ’03 ever again. Baseball is just too slow a game for me to sit down for 3 to 4 hours a night and watch. I suspect this is true of most people, even Cubs fans. The pace and regularity of the sport makes it difficult to focus exclusively on the game. We just don’t watch TV like that anymore and even with the DVR recorders, who can catch 50 games a year let alone 162? 

 I’ll be watching every pitch of this historic World Series though. I might even record a few next season and follow the club better in 2017. So I am not the most dedicated fan anymore but like so many others who have hoped, and believed this day would come—GO CUBS!!

"Getting Ahead in the 1st World" or Despicable ME

I’m in new car season. Also known as pumpkin spice latte season. I hate car shopping. Concern over ‘lemon’ buying fills my head. It shouldn’t. The regrettable purchase from the shifty sales guy hasn’t ever happened to me. Always in the back of my mind though.

The shoulder slumping reality that another item needs purchasing (another blasted thing!) forces me to imagine life as a hamster. Not the bad smell or the short life span (although that too) but the endless wheel spinning. Oh the spinning!  Do people ever really get ahead? I don’t mean get rich by discovering an unknown talent like uh…spider whispering. You know, lure them to their doom (I’d pay huge!). I just mean paying debts, growing wealth, saving money and traveling. How common is it for families and individuals to graph their income as a steady increasing line while keeping their expenses line relatively stable?

I understand that making money and ‘getting ahead’ requires attending to small things and overseeing everyday purchases, no scratch off lottery tickets or Monster energy drinks.  Even after all the penny pinching, dollar skimming ways households manage to level the field, it still seems like certain people make deals and some just survive. We either get it or we don’t. Some women can craft and some can’t; some men can dress and some can’t.

Not that my spending isn’t occasionally frivolous and piggish. I can eat like a state fair rat once the noisome folks are gone; it costs a lot of money OK…so sue me!

Anyone can improve through discipline though. If ‘getting ahead’ means more income that outgo, I have to be content with small progress. Loosing ‘hands’ are inevitable in games of Texas ‘hold ‘em’, but anyone leaving the game with more money at the end of the night than at the beginning is successful.

I need to get a little more income if I am going to get a new car though. Poker isn’t an option. Even if I do get enough money for a new car with the extra income I haven’t improved my lot. Sure I have a new car and that’s awesome but it’s kinda worse. My paid off car was getting me from one spot to another under the same speed limit (usually) and costing zilch. Old cars break down and need constant maintenance putting the owner in the poor house to keep the clunker running. So get a new car and make payments, still in the poor house, but driving to it in a nice car. The hamster wheel keeps spinning.

By the way ‘poor house’—super old phrase. It just kind of works though.

I have an Altima from 2000 that runs quite well considering the high mileage and the condition of the front. See I get a little close to that cement barrier in the parking lot and frequently run the bumper over the edge. So it is hanging in there but showing signs of wanting to fall into traffic, death by speed bump.

I am doing a fair amount of whining here with no real argument for anything but contentment. Sometimes we need to just vent. After that though edit the bad language out and post it.

My arc of responsibility for savings over the last 10 years bends toward progress. I’d like to keep it that way but I have my ‘needs’ and preferences. Vacations are a preference and I take a large one every year. I don’t mean riding a limo through Europe large, but a decidedly spendy trip whereby I leave Oklahoma at least. I need something to push me through the busy summers at work, a carrot propelling me forward through the dog days of the busy football season. Vacation is that carrot.

Until I discover a hidden talent or learn to budget, the complaining about VERY 1^st world problems will continue unabated. 

God Bless.

On Fiction and Writing

"If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it."

Elmore Leonard

Being able to describe a thing is a wonderful gift that needs to be curated and perfected, fretted over and dreaded about. What is it that I like good writers to do with characters, scenes, dialog and tension? The short answer...it depends. Non-fiction and historical books draw me in a way that fiction never did. Fiction of the action hero kind is great too and burly enforcers like Jack Reacher are a joy to read. Non-fiction though is the learner type book. Life-long learners seek knowledge and love the presentation a writer delivers through their work.

In recent years I’ve developed a respect for fiction writers who do research on a topic and then write a gripping story bringing the reader along to discover something new. The something new that is discovered is a trick however. The author puts wonderfully human emotions and histories into a fictional world that explains a larger paradigm. Classic novels always do this. They are classic because the characters and worlds they inhibit are almost tangible things. Readers get lost in the plot-lines and threads connecting seemingly separate narratives. Then worlds collide. Stories are suddenly representative of larger events and shifts in culture.

 Boo Radley’s (To Kill A Mockingbird) anti-social behavior becomes a strength when he is revealed as a gentle figure to Scout and Jem. Harper Lee didn’t just understand the South and attitudes about race and society; she knew human nature better than most. During the Jim Crow era, cultural lines were drawn sharply between blacks and whites but human nature remained the same across all barriers. Lee hooks readers by distracting them with mysterious neighbors and myths about unknown people in town. Her trick was to sell the reader on a nasty version of Boo Radley, all the while pointing out how the same fear and wrong assumptions led to the imprisonment of an innocent black man.  

Writers develop by creating a recognizable style or philosophy and exploring it different ways to make for a complete picture. Ayn Rand started doing this by writing plays and essays with a common but basic core theme, self-interest drives decisions. Her book We the Living was her first organized attempt at putting her developing believe in self interest into story form. A clearly fumbling attempt at shining light on a philosophy, it wasn’t Aristotle but it was still good. Her characters were simple one dimensional archetypes, set pieces really, existing to demonstrate an extreme view, positive or negative.

She moved on to richer characters with better histories, and dialogue chocked full of philosophies on everything from sex to existence. By the nineteen fifties she was calling her philosophy 'Objectivism' and her ‘self-interested’ characters exemplified the ‘rational man’ and also the evils of collectivist thought. From We the Living to Atlas Shrugged she wrote essays and gave lectures on her Objective principles while building her own special style, she crafted her ‘voice’. She started with a simple framework and layered it for an easily recognized style.

Mark Twain does dialogue like no one else and his Huckleberry Finn is rich with language and regional accents. Kids in early grade school have trouble with Twain (I certainly did) because the spelling of the words and phrases are incorrect as they are taught. Words like “knowed” “haint” and phrasing like “…I’s wuth eight hund’d dollars” keep kids from ‘sounding’ them out. The mannerisms from the characters feel as genuine as the prejudices defining the small towns along the Mississippi. His short stories have the same language and ‘yarn spinning’ from the mostly Midwest and rural characters.

Not sure why writing development was on my mind, but it helps to be reminded of what I admire in other work, great work.