Thoughts While Driving and Hiking

I drove over to the state park today to take a hike while my wife is at work and before the expected snowstorm arrives. (Yes, I'm aware of the irony involved in driving somewhere to take a walk, so, gentle reader, you need not point it out.)

People have strange thoughts while driving and walking, and probably my thoughts are stranger than most. Here, in order thought, is what was on my mind.

I really struggled with high school physics. Part of the problem was my inability to get my mind around the terms used. "An object falls at 9.8 meters per second squared, " Mr. Martinez said. I wondered, how can a second be squared? "Weight is mass times the force of gravity." So, I thought, mass is the same anywhere in the universe but weight depends on where you are. I'd weigh less at the top of Pikes Peak than I do here in Colorado Springs, and less here than I'd weigh in Miami Beach.

Suppose I could dig a hole all the way to the center of the earth, and hollow out a little room there. While I was in that hollowed out space, would I be weightless? There would be about the same mass of material in all directions around me. I guess I'd drift to whichever side of my little cavern the moon was on, moving right along with the tides.

While walking, I thought how much I have always envied people who seem to be inn shape without having to do any exercising. I have to work like the devil to be in any kind of condition. I was huffing and puffing mightily through most of my walk. Of course, it didn't help that I'd eaten a pancake breakfast just before starting out.

A sign in the state park says bears are the "most well-known" animals that hibernate. A better way to say it would be "best known." The park needs an English major to review their grammar. (Or me.)

My brother is writing a novel. I asked him about it recently and he said it ends with an epilogue in heaven. "What's your vision of heaven?" I asked. "Oh," he said, "It's a wonderful place where you can do what you want and nobody bothers you."

My brother the Libertarian. By the way, much of his novel is set in Reno, Nevada, which he has never visited. Go figure.

Some Miscellaneous Thoughts

First of all, loyal readers, Kris' cat Phoenix is aptly named. He is alive and well (more or less), still hiding in the rafters, but has come out several times long enough to eat and eliminate. Once the trauma of surgery is forgotten he should be okay.

Some time ago I told of a dream in which Conan O'Brien appeared to me singing "When Irish Eyes are Smiling." I called him Colin instead of his proper name. I apologize to Mr. O'Brien, to all his heirs and assigns, and to anyone else who cares. I have a "hold harmless" document here for him to sign at his convenience.

The Republicans have dusted off the old Laffer curve of supply side economics and are arguing that a lower tax rate will actually increase federal tax revenues. Logically, if that's the case, the best tax rate should be zero percent. That way, everyone could do whatever business seems best to them without any tax worries and the government would just be rolling in revenues. It's just silly, of course. George HW Bush was right to call it "voodoo economics" but that doesn't stop these people from trotting it out again to bamboozle the gullible and win votes.

Speaking of politics, Congress recently considered legislation putting the US on record in opposition to coerced marriages of adolescent girls. House Republicans blocked it, claiming it would cost something like twenty million dollars a year for enforcement (without saying why it would cost anything) and might encourage abortions (again without saying how or why). By my calculations, twenty million dollars a year works out to about seven cents per man woman and child in this country. I'm willing to spend that much, or much more, to keep children away from forced marriages.

One of my little Christmas rituals is to read the nativity stories in Matthew and Luke. They are different from one another. Matthew traces Jesus' heritage through forty-two generations all the way back to Abraham and tells the story of the Magi. Luke is more comprehensive, I think, telling us of Zachary and Elizabeth and the birth of John, then relating the familiar story of Caesar's taxation plans, the birth of Jesus in a stable, and the angels and shepherds.

The Magi, by the way, always were referred to as kings or wise men when I was a child. More recent translations of the story in Matthew call them the three astrologers, which kind of diminishes them, at least to me.

I like the stories, but, sad to tell, to me they are just stories.

My sister Patti claims there is a Christmas song this year called, "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas." Can that possibly be right? Can the singer even imagine the care a hippo would need? Better dig a big pond in the backyard and have plenty of money for the truckloads of food it would eat and the waste to be removed. And the reindeer would all have hernias by Christmas morning after flying a hippo to someone's house. And don't even get me started about Santa trying to get the animal down a chimney to place under a tree. (The hippo would probably eat the tree by Christmas morning too.) I thought "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" was the lowest possible taste in Christmas novelty songs, but I suppose I was wrong.

Kris and I drove to Denver on Christmas day to celebrate with her mother. It was just the quiet sort of Christmas day we wanted after the emotional roller coaster of Christmas Eve. (I say quiet although my mother-in-law has a hearing loss and keeps her television and record player on very high sound levels.) But it was nice and we are now living on leftovers. So probably are all of you. A very merry Christmas to everyone, and keep Christmas with you, all through the year.

Hard Christmas

I'm sitting in the basement of my house on Christmas eve afternoon. My wife is asleep upstairs. She needs a nap because she was awake for much of last night trying to find one of her cats.

This cat had surgery earlier in the week for removal of kidney stones, an operation that cost about $1000. Not any king's ransom to be sure, but for us it was a pretty big bite into the credit card. Wednesday night after bringing the feline back home, Kris tried to shut it up in a guest bedroom so it could recuperate in peace. Unluckily (and my wife doesn't have much good luck) she didn't get the bedroom door completely shut, so during the night the cat absconded and is now hiding somewhere in the rafters between floors in our house.

We've tried to lure the cat with the smelliest food we can think of - tuna fish - but so far it has not emerged for anything in about forty-eight hours, not even to empty its bladder or colon. (I hope not. I don't want animal waste lingering up there.)

So we don't know if the cat is healing or is in trouble, or even has died. In the worst case, we would have to guess where the corpse is and cut through the drywall to remove it. I can tell you I would not enjoy doing that. Not to mention the thought of $1000 spent to prolong the cat's life for three days.

Then, thinking we'd make our Christmas calls to relatives before Christmas day, we telephoned my middle sister (I have three) this morning. She has been afflicted with a dementia for the last few years and it has become gradually more difficult to communicate with her. This morning was the worst yet, however. She couldn't complete a thought or even a sentence and seemed utterly unable to understand me. This is my younger sister, to whom I was a tyrannical big brother when we were kids, but whom I love dearly now. In addition to the hurt caused by hearing her stumble so badly through our brief talk, there of course is the little voice in the back of my head that says, "If it's happening to her, it could happen to you, and soon."

Meanwhile, Kris is not doing the baking she meant to do this afternoon. My wife cannot easily leave intended chores undone, so I'm guessing she'll be baking well into the evening, which effectively blasts my plans for a quiet night before the fireplace watching "It's a Wonderful Life" on DVD with her. And yes, I know how to bake and could do it myself, but she has her heart set on doing this herself and won't be dissuaded.

So, not having much to do a few minutes ago, I tried to load the DVD player with a disc we borrowed from the local public library. And the player jammed. Not only could I not get it to play, it would not eject. All I could think was how much I really did not want to spend the afternoon taking the machine apart to get the disc out. It was really just the bottom for me, the proverbial straw that broke the proverbial back. I turned the player off and sulked for a few minutes, then, almost whimsically turned it back on. Wonder of wonders, it worked! My belief in the holistic theory of appliance repair finally paid off!

And so, brothers and sisters, daughters and sons, and good friends all, there is hope in the world. I am revived, and ready to face the rest of the day with good grace and cheer. I'd be a lot cheerier, though, if that damn cat put in a appearance.

Merry Christmas to One and All

I heard the bells on Christmas day

Their old familiar carols play,

And wild and sweet the words repeat

Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And thought how, as the day had come,

The belfries of all Christendom

Had rolled along the unbroken song

Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way

The world revolved from night to day,

A voice, a chime, a chant sublime

Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head

“There is no peace on earth,” I said,

“For hate is strong and mocks the song

Of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:

“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;

The wrong shall fail, the right prevail

With peace on earth, good will to men.”

It's time for FEARLESS PREDICTIONS, the feature of this blog in which is revealed events of the coming year. After all, my predictions might be as valid as anyone else's. So let's begin by saying. . .

The stock market will surge, with the Dow hitting 14,000 by December 2011. Republicans will claim credit for this, of course. Meanwhile, unemployment will still be at about nine percent. Republicans will refuse to take any blame for this.

Thirty-five "experts" will predict the World Series winner, and thirty-four of them will be wrong. (It will be the Rockies. You heard it here first.)

The bewildering array of products available promising enhanced Internet speed will grow even more bewildering. The divide between people who understand some of the new apps and those who don't will get wider than ever.

Global warming will continue apace while Senator Imhof of Oklahoma still insists it's all just a hoax. Luckily, seawater won't reach Oklahoma in 2011. (But people in oceanside cities will get more nervous.)

From Atlantic to Pacific, gee the traffic is terrific. And getting worse. Thousands of fatalities and a million injuries in auto accidents will not make any impression on people serious enough to spur rapid transit development or passenger train travel.

Kris Kringle is bringing me. . . snowshoes!

No fewer than ten Republicans will announce their candidacies for president in 2012. Sarah Palin will be among them. She'll manage to put her foot in her mouth several times but that won't deter the zealots who support her. The rest of us will be amused and appalled by turns.

I will be able to prove to Jesus that winning the lottery hasn't spoiled me. (I wish!)

The Big Needle

Last week I read John Grisham's latest novel, "The Confession" in which a man was executed because he had been coerced into confessing to a murder he had not committed. Grisham sets up the story so there is never any question that the convicted man is innocent. The actual guilty person confesses, but the state machinery of death is in motion and cannot be stopped by the defense attorney because the prosecutor in the case and the governor of the state have vested political interests in upholding the conviction.

The theme of the book of course is that innocent people have been and will continue to be executed because prosecutors cover up the coercive methods of some police officers, juries remain intent on convicting on the basis of confessions, no matter how obtained, and elected officials do not want to be thought of as "soft on crime."

Grisham makes the argument that the death sentence is imposed capriciously, sometimes mistakenly and isn't even economical. It costs about three million dollars to execute a person in the United States, after all appeals have been filed, rejected, and clemency is denied. It would clearly be less expensive just to keep the convict in prison. Grisham, by the way, makes a compelling case that incarceration on death row is inhumane, gradually driving the inmates into insanity.

Readers might remember the governor of Illinois commuting the sentences of all death row inmates once he became convinced the sentence was being imposed on innocent men. If that's the case in Illinois, by strong inference it's true in other states as well.

I'm not absolutely against the death penalty. There are two arguments in favor of killing convicted murderers that have made some sense to me. First, there is the matter of finality. As Isaac (Hanging Judge) Parker once said, Nobody I hanged ever hurt anybody else again." That made more sense in the nineteenth century than now of course. The other argument for executions was made by a different novelist, Joseph Wambaugh, who said that society must have some threat of last resort to hold over the heads of people who are already in prison on murder convictions. What else can we do with inmates who kill prison guards, sentence them to two life sentences?

But the death penalty must be applied only as a last resort and only in extraordinary circumstances. I've wondered what those circumstances might be, if there are any other than the one described just now. Serial killers? Murders for hire or killings that involve torture? Heinous as such crimes are, I would oppose executing such murderers. Yes, the crimes are awful, but we fall right back to the opening question of the undoubted convictions of innocent people.

There are some other aspects to the whole question of the death penalty that might be questionable. For one thing, we have heard a lot in recent years about involving the family of the victim in the prosecution effort. I'm in favor of keeping the loved ones of a deceased victim up to date on the progress of a case, but in our jurisprudence it's the society at large that is offended by the crime. It's "The people versus the defendant" after all, not only the family of the deceased. The victim's rights adherents are sympathetic but the prosecutor must decide how to handle a case based on the evidence at hand, not on anything else.

I've been lucky and no one in my family has been victimized by a violent crime, so I'll concede I might feel differently if someone I love had been murdered, but I wonder if families of murder victims get any sense of closure when the convict is put to death. Probably some do and some don't. Giving the relatives of the victim some solace is important, but it shouldn't be the most important factor in debating this issue.

(By the way I've only mentioned murder as deserving execution. I'd absolutely be against executing anyone for any other crime such as kidnaping, rape or stock market manipulation.)

Some Thoughts, Profound and (Mostly) Otherwise

There is a very light coating of snow this morning in Colorado Springs, with a promise of more to come. According to news sources, this is the latest date for a first snow on record. We've been having a drought lately, and shouldn't equate local weather with climate change, but I can't help thinking our lack of snow is one more straw in the wind (note weather metaphor) of global warming.

Commercials for Cialis are all over the airwaves. They always conclude with a man and woman sitting side-by-side in bathtubs in some very scenic setting. All I can say is that if I had to carry those tubs down to the beach or to some woodland glen I'd be so tired I'd have to say, "Not tonight, honey," to my wife. There's also the matter of filling the tubs with water, and I don't see any spigots near the tubs in those ads. That guy must have hauled the water to the tubs by the bucketful. By the time they get into the water, it would be the same temperature as the air, and unless they're in Miami that means the water is most likely cold. Which would not help with the problem that prompted all that work in the first place!

Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina is quoted this morning as saying, "You can't be a fiscal conservative without being a social conservative." I wonder what the Libertarians will think of that! As almost always happens, political success leads to a fracturing of the winning coalition, and moderation in their goals. Republicans always seem more cohesive than Democrats, but they will have their own problems figuring out what they want to do.

If the girl in the song's bikini was so itsy-bitsy and teeny-weeny, how would anyone know it was yellow polka-dot? Perhaps close inspection?

Recently I had a dream in which my wife and I were living with Colin O'Brien. At least I think it was Colin. He had red hair and kept singing "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling."

With Christmas on the horizon, I have a suggestion for our material society. Rather than ship gifts long distances why not make a contribution to a charity in the name of our intended? We'd save postage, not have to worry that the gift is unwanted, and help people in need.

A Press release from Heaven

God announced today a major change in the standards for salvation. Called "Sin-and-Trade," it should allow a much different method of achieving eternal happiness.

"Up to now, of course, each person was responsible for his or her own sins," God explained. Our new plan will provide a way for wealthy people to enter the kingdom. You probably remember my Son railing on and on about rich people: "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven," He claimed. "Well, what we're after here is just a way to level the playing field. We don't want any of this 'salvation redistribution' idea taking hold.

"Rich people are often called 'gifted.' This one can catch a flyball hit directly over his head, that one can hit high C, those other ones can figure out a complicated tax code to take advantage of loopholes, and all of them profit from their 'gifts' all out of proportion to any benefit they might provide to the population at large. People at the bottom of the income ladder are never called gifted. You never say, 'He has a gift for collecting garbage, she really has a knack for checking out groceries.' Unfortunately, folks who have done so well with what was given to them also have a way of committing large sins. Think about Tiger Woods and you'll know what I mean. Or Dick Cheney. Now why should they have to go to hell and leave all the poor people in heaven?

"Our new idea allows rich folks who have sinned to trade their wickedness to people who are virtuous but broke. That way, sinners can make their way into paradise and poorer people can have some earthly comforts, or at least necessities. Now, we've had to wrestle with the question of how much various sins are worth, but in the end we think we'll leave the matter to good old private enterprise. Sinners can even look for bargains - truly indigent people will sell their chance at eternal bliss much more quickly than those who are of just modest means. We recommend trying Haiti. It's really just compassionate conservatism."

Narcotics

Here in Colorado Springs we're fussing about medical marijuana. City council is contemplating and will almost certainly enact a ban on medical pot within 1000 feet of any school. I'm not against the ban, but lets not fool ourselves - the ban will not keep any kid away from marijuana.

I want to talk about harder drugs today, however. Ranging from hashish through cocaine and heroin and the synthetic substances, LSD and meth, and the new alcoholic caffeine drinks, they wreak havoc on our own population and do incalculable damage to the impoverished peoples of the earth.

Use of organic drugs undermines the health of users, drains their bank accounts, and causes their children to grow up in want. Whatever the motivation people have for narcotic abuse - poor self-esteem, desire for a thrill, rebellion against the hypocrisy in our society - the result is unhappiness and violence.

To prove the point, just look to our neighbor to the south. Gang violence, murder of innocents, enormous fortunes being accumulated by vicious persons while they terrorize honest farmers - all can be laid to the desire of Americans to use these awful substances.

As Americans, we demonstrate incredible arrogance going to poor people in other countries and asking them not to send us narcotics because our people can't control themselves. Not only are the deaths in Central America attributable to us, we also are buying opiates grown in Afghanistan where our soldiers are fighting and dying to defeat the Taliban, part of whose ability to keep battling us comes from sale of those same drugs.

To put it shortly, no one can be a patriotic American and use these drugs.

So, what we desperately need is a public education effort to call attention to the price we pay for experimentation or addiction. All that money spent on electing candidates could have been spent so much more beneficially trying to stop use of drugs.

Of Time and Money Flowing

So, the Republicans won the election last week. They will assume control of the House of Representatives and will be able to stop anything they don't like in the Senate. During the campaign they insisted they will cut government expenses and reduce the regulations imposed on small businesses.

They were careful to say SMALL businesses, because popular opinion still is hostile to large corporations. Halliburton, Enron, and so forth still leave a very sour taste in the mouth of most people. Corporate executives who fly private jets to Washington to beg for bailouts are still on my mind even if many other people have forgotten them.

The Republican candidates were very cagey about what they will cut from the budget, but they did make two proposals: allow insurance companies to sell policies across state lines, and reduce or eliminate capital gains taxes. Supposedly this will stimulate economic growth.

I'm not too much of a fan of states-rights. Too often the concept was used to prolong racial segregation or thwart federal legislation. In the case of insurance companies, however, I'm inclined to invoke states-rights. Allowing insurance companies to sell policies across state lines would allow them to locate in the state with the most permissive laws, effectively nullifying the insurance laws of 49 states.

The idea of reducing or eliminating capital gains taxes is touted as a means of stimulating savings and investments. It seems to me that a far better way of accomplishing the same goal would be to reduce the tax on dividends and interest. This would promote steady growth while the capital gains option would result in an overheated boom-and-bust economy. We have seen the results of just such an economy in the last few years. A capital gains tax reduction or elimination bill should be titled "The Day Traders' Relief Act."

I wouldn't be too worried about either of these proposals if the Democrats would have the courage of their convictions, but they very well might run away from their convictions again. God, but we could use Harry Truman right now!

Some Ethical Questions

I've been thinking about Dietrich Bonhoefer lately, the German theologian who was hanged by the Nazis as the Third Reich itself was dying in April 1945. Bonhoefer was involved, to what extent is unknown, in the plot to kill Hitler in July 1944.

Bonhoefer started out as a traditional religious thinker, but came to America in the early 1930's. He came to enjoy jazz. His American experience seems to have started him on his ethical odyssey. Bonhoefer returned to Germany prior to the beginning of the war to work as a pastor.

He became interested in the matter of honesty. While agreeing that honesty is the best policy, he wondered if it was always best. The scenario that changed his thinking was: a little boy is called to the front of his classroom by his busybody teacher and asked, "Was your father drunk again last night?" Now as it happens, the father was drunk last night, but the boy doesn't have the presence of mind to tell the teacher to mind his own business. Instead, he's faced with a conflict between honesty and loyalty. If he answers truthfully his father will be humiliated and might lose his job.

So, Bonhoefer claimed the boy not only has a moral right to lie, he has a duty to do so.

There are many other instances where a lie is the best policy. You're at the hospital to visit a very sick friend. Before you go into his room you hear a doctor say, "It's hopeless. He has 24 hours to live." You go into the room and your friend gasps, "I'm not going to die am I? I couldn't stand it if I thought I was about to die." What do you say?

Of course, lying isn't as great a matter as some other dilemmas. If lying can be justified, even required, what about theft, violence of different sorts, destruction, or murder?

Bonhoefer had to face the question whether he had a moral obligation to murder a few men to save millions of lives. Math would make the answer easy, but of course the puzzle has to do with what actions an individual would take, not just allow to happen.

The commandment says, "Thou shalt not kill." Some people claim it actually says, "Thou shalt commit no murder," allowing killing in the greater good for example. Most of us would agree. We support sending drone planes to kill suspected al-Qaida supporters in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and brush off civilian deaths as just unavoidable, or even blame them for being in the way. What should someone who is horrified by this carnage do?

A hundred thousand Iraqis have died as a consequence of "Operation Iraqi Freedom." Is that worse than the toll Saddam Hussein would have taken on his own people? What gave us either the right or the responsibility to overthrow him? President Bush claimed Saddam was behind the attacks on the United States though in retrospect the evidence for his involvement is lacking. Even in 2003 many Americans suspected the rationale for war was bogus.

Ethical questions have a way of becoming complicated. People who claim there are simple answers . . . well, I'll leave it at that.

Well, I'm Back

Bowing to popular demand - actually just one request, and that from my sister - I am resuming my lonely fight to bring truth, justice, and the American way to one and all, even Lex Luthor.

We've just had an election, turning the country significantly to the right. This is not unusual in mid-term elections where the voters tend to be older and more conservative than in presidential years. For some reason, younger people tend to be uninvolved with politics at the halfway point between presidential elections. The turnout this year among eighteen to twenty-four year olds was estimated at eleven percent, which is about normal.

It's actually kind of interesting to say younger voters tend to be more to the left, considering that their parents thirty years ago were the new conservative wave. I remember a Time magazine article at that time saying that Ronald Reagan was "dynamite on campus." That itself contradicts the presumed pattern of the 1960's, the generation that begat the young Reagan fans. My contemporaries of the '60's who were allegedly all hippie draft-resisters.

Possibly each generation rejects the values of their parents. (Frankly I doubt it. I'm more inclined to think most of us gradually turn into our parents.) More likely, those who do contradict what their elders believe are the ones who get the most attention.

Be all this as it may, we can look forward to almost no federal legislation in the next two years. (And not much state legislation either.) The new House of Representatives will not agree to anything President Obama wants to do, and the president will not stand for any substantive changes in the laws passed in 2009 or 2010. Mr. Obama can (and should) concentrate on foreign relations for the next two years.

Monday Morning Thoughts

My father told me this story. One day when he was fifteen or sixteen years old, he was walking along a street in downtown Boston with some friends. Like many another teenager, he wasn't paying much attention to where he was or where he was going and then suddenly found himself flat on his back on the sidewalk and, as he told it, "A big Irish cop was standing over me saying, 'And if you do the same again you'll get worse next time.'"

He didn't have any idea what he'd done to annoy the officer, but the incident stayed with him. He lived another sixty years, and always kept a kind of disdain for the police.

He had reasons, of course. Police officers broke strikes and enforced segregation. In Boston, and in virtually every other place, police officers accepted free merchandise and meals. Some were truly corrupt, turning a blind eye to organized crime and rackets of one kind or another in exchange for bribes.

Years later, as it happened, I made a part of my work career in law enforcement, albeit working in national parks where bribes are offered infrequently and incorruptibility is an honored trait. I don't share my dad's feelings about the police. Frankly, I think police officers nowadays are better trained, better equipped and better paid than ever before. Their performance on the job reflects their improved status.

My larger point is that professional performance on a job is tied to those factors: training, equipment and pay. If an employer wants professional work, he must provide the employees with these things. Trying to get professional performance on the cheap just doesn't work.

A colleague found a story on the Internet about a town in Tennessee that tried that to an extreme degree. Trying to cut taxes (at popular demand no doubt) this town decided to make firefighting a subscription service rather than one supported by tax money. If you wanted fire protection, you would have to pay an annual fee to the town in the amount of $75.

One man decided not to pay the fee. When a fire broke out at his house, he called the fire department and then was horrified when the fire crew arrived, consulted the list of subscribers, and then just watched as his house burned down. My colleague said, "How stupid could this guy be, not to pay the fee?"

I think there's a larger point, which is, how stupid could the voters in this town be to make firefighting a fee instead of a tax supported activity? And, how far does the venality of the public go in trying to cut taxes?

In a democracy, people have a right to ask "What's in it for me?" We should be angry if our tax dollars are wasted, but cutting taxes left right and center isn't the best response to government waste. How much can taxes be cut and when do we begin cutting our own throats, as the residents of this town in Tennessee undoubtedly have?

The Deserving (and Undeserving) Poor

A childhood neighbor and friend posted a doctor's letter to President Obama on Facebook a couple of weeks ago. The doctor told the story of treating an emergency room patient who claimed Medicaid but who had a gold tooth, several tattoos, and was talking on a cell phone during treatment. The thrust of the letter was that this person needed a lesson in personal responsibility which the president might provide. The letter strongly implied that the patient had neglected to buy health insurance in favor of frivolous purchases and now was relying on the taxpayers for medical care.

Of course, we don't know the whole story. She (I'll call the patient female just to give her a personal pronoun.) cannot return the tattoos, and only the most heartless person would suggest she have the gold tooth yanked out to raise money for her doctor's bill. The cell phone might well have been on prepaid minutes and been non-refundable. Telling people in her life that she was in the emergency room doesn't sound frivolous to me.

Perhaps she had just been laid off a job and had lost her health coverage, or been turned down for coverage for some reason. (She was in the emergency room after all.) Perhaps health coverage was simply out of her price range.

I'm not saying this as an excuse if indeed the woman was continually making a choice of luxuries over necessities, and counting on the rest of us to pay for what she requires. What does strike me is the sense of outrage my childhood neighbor and other Facebook "friends" exhibited over the story. Even if the worst interpretation is placed on her actions, this woman took advantage of the system to the tune of a couple of hundred dollars. We're entitled to be angry over any such abuse of our better instincts, but a simple sense of proportion tends to elude us. We should be a million times more outraged over someone who bilks us out of several hundred million dollars as we are over a hospital patient who cheats us of a few hundred dollars. Think Haliburton, just for a start.

Taxes, Taxes, Taxes, Where's It All Gonna End?

This was the cry of a neighbor some fifty years ago, and it's as pertinent now as it was half a century ago. I mention it just to remind us all that complaints about taxes are nothing new. In fact, complaints about taxes and tax dodging are only slightly less old than taxes themselves.

A few months ago, Fareed Zacharia, a noted columnist, wrote a piece in Newsweek magazine suggesting that all federal income taxes in the United States have a zero percentage rate for persons making less than $100,000 per year. Incomes above that figure would still pay income tax on a graduated scale, actual percentages to be determined, but probably not above about ten percent. Almost all deductions would be eliminated. State income taxes would assumedly fall in line with national tax laws.

Before anyone begins applauding, Mr. Zacharia couples this plan with a national sales tax of about sixteen percent. (He calls it a value added tax.) He claims the revenues generated by this scheme would be sufficient to reduce the annual deficit substantially and would be fairer to all concerned. Money made by investment or savings would be taxed at the same rate as money made by work.

I thought the idea had some merit. Most people would no longer need to file federal tax returns, would not have any payroll deductions, money presently held by FICA would be put into circulation, and people could be sure the tax code was not being manipulated by the few to the detriment of the many.

Then it occurred to me that everything I buy would instantly become much more expensive. Consider: the farmer sells grain to a miller, who pays a tax; the miller sells flour to the baker, who pays a tax; the baker sells bread to the grocer, who pays a tax; and the grocer sells bread to me, and I pay a tax. Five transactions, all taxed at sixteen percent amount to a tax of eighty percent when all is said and done. (Actually even that figure is low, because value is added and prices go up with each sale.)

We also have the matter of exemptions. The example I just used is for food. A compelling case can be made, and many state legislatures have made it, that food must not be taxed because it is a necessity of life. In the same way, medicines are not taxed, doctor's visits are not taxed, charities do not pay tax on donations, even though money is changing hands.

So, I'm skeptical about a national sales tax. It seems to me that it would fall most heavily on the bottom rungs of our economic ladder.

My own thought concerning federal taxes is really very simple. Taxes in the lowest bracket should be zero percent. How much income would be exempt is a matter for discussion, but there would be a definite minimum income below which there would be no tax. To make up for the revenues lost by this plan, we would eliminate deductions for many business expenses and make the capital gains tax rate the same as the one for ordinary earned income. It's absurd that the current tax code is so arcane and full of special provisions that only a dedicated few can make sense of it and gain from it.

And lest anyone shout, "Income redistribution!" as the John McCain presidential campaign did two years ago, I'd just answer that every change in the tax code is income redistribution. For once, those of us of modest means should change the tax scheme to our own advantage.

Burn the Quran?

The flap this week concerning the pastor of a tiny Florida church's intention to burn copies of the Quran is headline news right now. Muslims express outrage, the President has weighed in on the issue, and CNN is covering the event 24/7.

What we're missing is a teaching opportunity here. The glory of democracy is our defense of free speech rights. Even the President of the United States is not empowered to stop this yahoo from expressing himself in the way he - nobody else - thinks is appropriate. Lets explain that to people who are furious about the Quran burning.

Book burning generally should horrify and outrage us all. It's one of the things that puts us on a slippery slope. Once it gets started, who knows where it will end? But if we defend free speech, including free symbolic speech, then we are obligated to support the reverend's right to burn Qurans while at the same time deploring the act itself.

As usual, there is a lesson here for Americans as well as foreigners. I can't help but wonder if Americans who support the Quran burning are the same people who would muzzle free expression in our own country. Anyone who supports and defends the minister's right to burn Qurans would logically also have to support the freedom to, say, burn the American flag.

One last thought: what is the proper way to dispose of a Quran that is worn out? If, as with the American flag, burning is the appropriate method of disposal, there is at least an irony involved in all of this.

Wing Nuts

This morning while driving I tuned in to one of talk stations I refer to as "right wing radio." The host today was a man named Bob Beauprez who two years ago was the Republican candidate for governor here in Colorado. I was deeply disappointed when he agreed with a caller who claimed the Obama campaign deliberately brought about the economic downturn of 2008 in order to win the election!

Here was a supposedly responsible politician accusing a member of the other party of wrecking the nation's economy on purpose, putting millions of people out of work, causing massive defaults on home loans and subsequent foreclosures, probably shortening many lives, to win an election. And all this, according to the caller, with the connivance of the (Republican) Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulsen.

I bring it up as one more example of the insanity, the paranoid hatred that parts of our American population are exhibiting. The credulous are being driven by hate mongers who, for reasons known only to themselves, have adopted the old Bolshevik strategy for gaining political power: "The worse things are, the better they are for us." They are pursuing a deliberate course aimed not merely at defeating a president and his party but at dividing the nation into two warring camps. They will have a heavy reckoning before the bar of history.

Some More About Science and Faith

If you or I could take a trip on the Way-Back Machine 500 years to any part of western civilization and questioned any of the people we met, say Christopher Columbus for example, we would have been assured that the earth is the center of the universe. It's a calumny on their science, by the way, to think they did not recognize that earth is a sphere. They just believed that earth is the focal point of everything, and every heavenly body orbits our planet.

The Bible doesn't quite say that of course, but there is a clear implication in Genesis, considering that God created earth on the first day, without form and void, and didn't make the sun until the fourth day.

Then along came Copernicus and Galileo with the theory that the earth circles the sun. Earth is demoted to being one among six planets going around the center, our own personal star. Copernicus was wary enough to wait until he was safely dead to publish his theory, and Galileo paid a heavy price for speaking out while still distressingly alive.

Little by little, however, the heliocentric universe became the accepted wisdom. The discovery of Uranus and Neptune did nothing to upset the applecart of peoples' perceptions, but recognition that the sun is part of an enormous star system called the Milky Way certainly did. Now there were millions of stars orbiting a galactic center and the sun was merely one among them, no more significant than others, in fact a pretty ordinary specimen.

Then astronomers began to think that certain fuzzy images in their telescopes might not be nebulae within the Milky Way but entirely different galaxies at mind bogglingly huge distances from us, and each of these new galaxies also contained millions of stars. By the 1950's it was generally accepted that there might be billions of stars. Science-fiction enthusiasts imagined beings somewhere out there, little green men, malevolent monsters intent on conquering us, or wise ET's.

But it was only in the last fifteen years or so that inferential evidence began to accumulate that there really are planets outside our solar system. Recent discoveries indicate planets are common, in systems near and far, most wildly different from ours, some probably similar to our own.

Soon the new space telescope will be launched, with the expectation that it will discover smaller rocky planets, not just gas giants.

During this same time, biological research has pointed out that life on earth originated in tidal pools where long strands of amino acids united to form proteins which, with an electric charge from convenient lightning strikes, became organic. (I learned this in biology class at a Catholic high school in a course taught by a religious brother.)

All this goes to the point that we're not nearly so important in the great scheme of things as our ancestors supposed, those folks we met with our Way-Back machine.

There are religious ramifications in all this science. We have been convinced of human exceptionalism for thousands of years. "For God so loved the world that he sent his only beloved son. . . ." How do we continue to believe this if there are hundreds, thousands or millions of other worlds on which there might be sentient life? Does poor Jesus have to make the rounds of all these planets and save them from their sins?

I say this seriously, even reverently. In a way I wish it was different, that we were the only intelligent beings in the universe. (In fact, we're not the only intelligent beings even on this planet.) It would make things easier.

Lets Talk About Science

I'm no scientist, far from it, but I have maintained an interest in scientific topics through an increasingly long life and have a few things to say on the subject.

When I was in college many years ago, I made some spending money working as a film projectionist on campus for professors who wanted to use media in class. One day I was in a geology class showing a movie, and at the end one of the students asked a question concerning continental drift. The teacher answered, dismissing the idea as just something some people believe in. Of course, continental drift is consensus wisdom now.

I bring it up just as a reminder that what is accepted wisdom now might be overturned tomorrow. Three more examples: until fifty years ago dinosaurs were characterized as slow moving cold blooded animals and part of the reptile family. Now it is conventional wisdom that dinos were more like birds, quick and smart (more or less).

Speaking of dinosaurs, scientists used to blame their extinction on climate change. Check Walt Disney's Fantasia for an illustration. The thought that the beasts went extinct because of a catastrophic extra-terrestrial event was derided when it was first suggested. Now it's accepted by nearly everyone that an asteroid collision with earth 65 million years ago caused their demise.

Charles Darwin's theory suggested that evolution was a long incremental process of tiny mutations that accumulate over time to produce new species. Now the theory is modified to the extent that most biologists believe a species can go on for millions of years without any appreciable changes, but when populations are isolated and threatened, change can occur rapidly.

What I'm getting at is the requirement for science, and indeed all aspects of life, to be open minded. Skepticism is necessary in life, but acceptance of new ideas is mandatory when sufficient evidence for them is presented.

One last thought today. Some people deny science because they feel it contradicts their idea of religion. Now, I really don't have any problem with a person who says, "I don't care what science says, I believe God created the world as it is and that's it." What really makes me shake my head in derision is the charlatans who try to convince the gullible that all reputable science is wrong and they can prove scientifically that a literal interpretation of the Bible is good science. If they could, they'd be able to refute continental drift, evolution, and relativity. Really now.

Some Tidbits

And now for something completely different. After thinking about it for some time, I am now ready to reveal my alter ego: I am Captain Obvious. My special power is the ability to point out what everyone else already knows.

"Don't touch that stove, it's hot!" I exclaim. The burner is red and heat waves are wafting from it.

"You'll catch cold going out like that!" I told my children. It was sleeting and they were lightly dressed.

"If you don't return rental movies you can turn a small fee into a huge bill."

You may say this isn't much of a power, nothing like x-ray vision, but in fact being able to point out the obvious isn't all that common a trait. Else, why would people continue to make such obvious mistakes?

My younger sister Marilyn and I went to a parochial elementary school in Tallahassee Florida for two years when we were much much younger. All the girls wore beanies with the school's initials on them. After our first year there I think someone must have clued the nuns because the initials were removed from the beanies. The school was called Blessed Sacrament.

One of the first car stops I ever made as a newly minted park ranger was of a motorist who was speeding along the Colonial Parkway near Yorktown Virginia. When you make a car stop, you must do a lot of things quickly and do them right. You have to call in the license number, keep an eye on the motorist so as not to be surprised sitting in your car, get your seatbelt off (not easy if you're right handed and wearing a gun), check your rear view mirror so you don't open your door into oncoming traffic, and check the rest of the area in case of ambush.

But I managed to do all that, verified that the car was not stolen, and made my approach. The approach must be done carefully too. Tap the trunk to make sure it's latched and any possible assailant concealed there cannot get out; look in the back seat; stand just so behind the driver so he'd have a difficult time shooting you.

I asked for the driver's license and registration and explained that my radar had clocked him above the speed limit. I asked if he had any reason for speeding. Then I told him I would be back shortly and ever so carefully turned towards my car.

Only it wasn't where I had left it. In the midst of doing everything else I had neglected to take the car out of gear. Luckily we were on a slight upward slope so my patrol car was coming along very slowly.

It hit the motorist's car of course. He got out of his car and said, "Do you mind backing up so I can see if there's any damage to my car?" It wasn't really a question at all, and there was only one thing I could do. I backed up and he took at look at his bumper. After a minute he generously said there was not.

And then I realized I was still holding his license and registration. Well, what would you do?

He didn't get a ticket.

Another early car stop was of an elderly woman who gave her license to me and when I looked at it I noticed she was born in 1899. She wasn't terribly old, it was 1978 after all, but something inside me said, "If you give this woman a ticket she'll die right in front of you." It was, I think, the last time I ever interacted with someone who was born in the 19th century.

It's a fact of life that many people think their parents were humorless stern individuals who really made them toe the line. Often they call attention to this presumed severity when they witness other parents who fall short as disciplinarians, in their view.

My mother was an easygoing loving woman who bore her children's frequent poor behavior with restraint. Rarely she would burst out at one of us. "Peter, because of you my supper is going down in lumps!" I heard her say on occasion. (She kept her Boston accent almost all her life, so my name always sounded like "Petah.")

My father also had a good sense of humor, but possessed the gravitas Mom lacked. You didn't disappoint him lightly. I can remember being over his knee and getting paddled hard but I can never recall what trivial little thing I might have done to disturb him.

My brother Larry and I were fans of a 1950's television show called Andy's Gang, hosted by Andy Devine. Andy would do little comedy bits and introduce old movies, often featuring Gunga Din the Elephant Boy. Dad, annoyed, would trumpet "Elephants trumpeting through the living room on Saturday mornings!" What I wouldn't have given for a real elephant in our living room.

Actually, I was a considerate kid, in my own way. I'd get up early on Saturday mornings as a small boy and turn on the tv to the inevitable Saturday morning western. I'd turn the sound down very low so the talking scenes would not wake my parents, but when the shooting started I just had to hear it and cranked up the volume.

They never seemed to appreciate my thoughtfulness.

WWJD

I'm often astounded that the question "What would Jesus do?" is derided by many of my friends on the political left. It could be that they feel Jesus has been co-opted by the fundamentalists, or that Jesus didn't have anything to say that is relevant to our modern world, but I think both of these are bogus objections.

Jesus was the great ethicist of our western world, and what he said remains (to me) as important as it was when he said it. Perhaps what is needed is a renewed appreciation of what that was.

Who does Jesus really condemn in the gospels? He has a couple of things to say about sex, it's true. The stories of the woman at the well and the woman taken in adultery come to mind, but Jesus seems to be lenient with them. "Don't do it anymore," is about as critical as he gets. By the way, where was the man taken in adultery? Did he slip out a back door when the mob showed up? Why doesn't he have the guts to defend her?

That, I must admit is what troubles me about my fundamentalist friends. They seem to equate all morality with sexual morality. If you're not diddling somebody you're not married to then you must be a moral person.

No, it seems to me that Jesus reserves his great critique for the scribes and Pharisees. "Woe unto you, hypocrites, it would be better for you if you had never been born." And why is he so hostile to these people? The answer lies in their efforts to appear righteous while at the same time carrying on sinful lives.

And what sins were they committing? Greed, pride, envy, a basic failure to consider the other, to treat others decently. Three gospel passages come to mind: the nice young man who will not renounce his wealth, the Pharisee who prays in the temple thanking God he is not like common folk including a publican, and the prodigal son whose brother is jealous of the kind way their father has greeted the profligate young man.

"It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." When I was in high school religion class many years ago, Brother Robert explained that the eye of the needle referred to the gate of a city and the camel just had to get on its knees to enter. This of course showed humility, and meant that it was not an insurmountable obstacle for the wealthy camel driver.

I didn't quite buy it. Neither, I think, could any fundamentalist.

So where does that leave us? In another gospel episode a Pharisee approaches Jesus and asks him to summarize the Judaic law. Jesus answers, "Love God with your whole heart and your whole mind, and your whole strength, and your neighbor as yourself." The impressed Pharisee says, "That's the best summary I ever heard."

It seems to me that we are obligated ethically to provide for anyone less well off than ourselves, regardless of whether the person is deserving of help, and to provide hospitality - shelter - to strangers. To me, that's what Jesus was getting at.

Now we come to the end. Does all this have any ramifications for our public lives? In the 1990's conservative politicians persuaded most Americans that public welfare promoted dependence and became a way of life for some people, and that public relief was ineffectual and a crippling expense for the rest of us. Lifetime limits were put on public assistance eligibility and many programs and agencies were ended. Private voluntary assistance to needy people would be substituted. People would be glad to volunteer their money and skills if they felt they were not being taxed into doing so. And people would have a moral obligation to help. Even as conservative a politician as Newt Gingrich said, "If you don't want the government doing this, be prepared to roll up your sleeves and pitch in yourselves." (Not an exact quote. I wonder what Newt's been doing lately in this regard.)

Now lets just ask ourselves: are there more homeless people now than there were twenty years ago? Are there more disturbed people without recourse, more alcoholics roaming the streets and alleyways, more tent communities near our metropolitan areas? Do more people die because they lack decent medical or psychiatric care?

I'm not doctrinaire about this. If private charity is really more effective than government aid to destitute or desperate people than government help, lets go that way. Government programs always have waste, there's no doubt about it, but did they do more to help people than is being done now? I think so.

WWJD?

A Thought or Two About Secondary Education

I taught high school history and government for four years. My students were often poorly motivated and many considered high school a sour joke. I've pondered why and I'd like to offer a couple of suggestions.

First of all, I'm not sure anyone has actually determined what high schools are trying to accomplish. Is secondary school a job training place, a location for teaching our kids to think, or a means of encouraging young people to enter technical professions such as medicine or engineering?

These are lofty goals and worthy of the teacher's and students' time, but are any of them being addressed in the "one size fits all" modern high school? One hears often of the lack of science and math in our high schools with the warning that we will fall behind other nations that do emphasize these subjects, but has anyone honestly ever heard an adult say, "I wanted to be a doctor or scientist but I just couldn't get enough science and math in high school?" A young person who wants to get this kind of course work will find a way to get it, and must be encouraged to do so. Why feed the disinterested or inept through levels of math and science they will never use again? It's good for them, I grant you, but so are art and music, subjects the modern school curriculum gives short shrift to and which would undoubtedly interest more of our young people.

This emphasis on "hard curriculum" is often accompanied with the statement that the schools need to "get back to basics." In truth, if we wanted to get back to basics we would use the Greek and Roman educational curriculum. Think if we taught young people how to speak and argue persuasively. For one thing the incidence of violent crime would be reduced if people were articulate enough to settle their differences with words, not bullets.

A question I liked to ask students at the beginning of the school term is, "Why are we here? Why does the state and why do your parents think it's important for you to know something about history?" Answers, when any kids were confident enough to say anything, usually claimed that history makes us better citizens, helps us detect glib promises politicians and salesmen make, keeps us from repeating old errors, and grounds us in the present. After a time I dismissed all these ideas and gave the students the only reason for studying history that ever made any sense to me: it's fun. Of course, if a student doesn't agree, why burden her or him with a year of drudgery?

When I taught in Virginia, even the contention that history's fun was undermined by the mandated Standards of Learning tests that bled whatever fun there might have been right out of the curriculum. The standards were so poorly drawn they completely ignored the western movement in the 19th century! When I pointed this out to the department chair and exclaimed, "No cowboys! No Sioux or Cheyenne people! No sourdough miners, no labor disputes, no Wyatt Earp for crying out loud!" she said,"It's not in the standards, so ignore it."

I've ranted long enough. We need to return to the Deweyan model of drawing out from the students what they want to study. The process of cramming knowledge into unwilling minds certainly hasn't worked, so why not make our schools places where students can learn what they want to learn?

BTW I haven't even talked about government class yet!

The Number One Foreign Policy Dilemma

What to do about Israel? What makes us think it's up to us to do anything about Israel? Perhaps a short historical review is in order.

The Zionist movement began many years ago, but was given new impetus in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Jews began buying land in Palestine on a willing seller, willing buyer basis. Nobody forced any Palestinian to sell land, but I doubt any Palestinian seriously thought his country slowly was being bought out from under him.

When the Jews of Europe became the arch whipping boys of the monstrous Nazi regime, all the world was horrified, and in the aftermath many of the survivors vowed such a thing would never happen again, and could never happen again if they had their own homeland. Palestine was the obvious location.

Now let us consider American involvement. President Roosevelt never contemplated the consequences of this very understandable desire of the Holocaust survivors. In 1945, fresh from the Yalta Conference, he met with the leaders of the countries in that area and told them the US would not recognize any Jewish homeland without their approval.

Two months later he was dead, and President Truman soon subtly changed the promise so that the US would not recognize a Jewish homeland without consulting the neighboring nations. Then in 1948 when the nation of Israel was proclaimed, the United States recognized it within a few hours. Domestic politics almost certainly played a role in the decision.

Not surprisingly, the rulers of Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and other affected states felt used and betrayed. We had effectively bought their enmity.

So in a sense, we entangled ourselves in the affairs of that part of the world and have never extricated ourselves from them. We have called Israel our ally for the last 62 years, often with rhetoric that makes the neighboring nations our adversaries.

There are many Palestinians who have spent their whole lives in refugee camps, dreaming of the day when the land of their grandparents will be theirs again. They will be satisfied with nothing less than the destruction of Israel and the expulsion of any surviving Jews from the area. There are Isrealies who will be satisfied with nothing less than the kingdom ruled by David three thousand years ago. Between these two positions, there is no chance of reconciliation. Only a peace between victor and vanquished could be made.

There are, however, people on both sides of this terrible divide who would reach a compromise in the name of peace. It is to them that efforts at a settlement must be directed.

And we've tried everything from the active diplomacy of President Carter to the brief dis-engagement of the George W. Bush administration. And still the instability and violence persist. We are embroiled in conflicts to which there is no end in sight for purposes that are, sad to say, probably unobtainable. It is ours and the world's most intractable problem.

(I hope no one was looking for a solution on this blog.)

Make Sure She Can Spell "Potato"

Will Sarah Palin run for president in 2012? Some say yes, as judged from bumper stickers seen around town, and many hope not. Some Democrats are undoubtedly licking their chops, thinking Ms. Palin would be a spectacularly weak candidate who would be defeated easily by President Obama.

I would caution my friends not to underestimate Sarah Palin. She evokes visceral feelings among the electorate in a way no other Republican does. She would certainly turn out her partisans on election day. The question is, could she expand her following from the right-wing into the mainstream.

History suggests she cannot. I can think of two obstacles she would have a very difficult time overcoming. First, she is from a small state, electorally speaking. Alaska has only three votes in the Electoral College, and I cannot think of a single president who ever was elected from a state with so few votes. Think back, and you'll find most presidents come from much more populous states. Bill Clinton was elected from Arkansas, it's true, but Arkansas has twice as many electoral votes as Alaska, and Mr. Clinton fell in with my second political maxim.

That is, presidents tend to come from the center of the country. Candidates from the periphery of the country historically do not do well. Again, think of a president who came from a seacoast state that was not among the largest in the country. President Carter might come to mind, though Georgia should be classified as a medium sized state electorally. Even at that, Carter can be thought of as the exception that proves the rule. He was, after all, defeated for re-election by a candidate from a much more populous state.

So Sarah Palin would, in my opinion, have a very difficult time winning a national election. Still, what alternative do the Republicans have? Mitt Romney? Tim Pawlenty? Yawn!

Unless someone else emerges very soon, I think President Obama will be returned to the White House very handily in 2012.

Miscellaneous Musings

It's a stormy afternoon in Colorado Springs, and my wife is away, volunteering at the Cheyenne Canyon City Park. Therefore, I have time for a few random thoughts on current and not so current events.

President Obama signed an act yesterday aimed at strengthening law enforcement on tribal lands around the country. Under the new law tribal police will have increased enforcement powers and presumably will be able better to protect people on tribal lands. The story claimed that one third of all Indian women are raped during their lives and until now the perpetrators were seldom caught or prosecuted successfully.

My congressman, Doug Lamborn, voted against the act. The newspaper story says he claimed it had not been considered under regular House procedures and he objected to the cost of enforcement, estimated at a billion dollars. I guess when it's not your own loved one who is being attacked or murdered the cost factor is of paramount importance.

Mr. Lamborn will easily be re-elected this fall by the good people of the seventh congressional district of Colorado.

British Petroleum certainly is spending a lot of advertising money these days. The ads feature Louisianans who say they love the Gulf coast and insist BP will pay all bills for cleanup of the oil spill disaster. Meanwhile, the company is dragging its feet about paying lost wages and income to thousands of local people who have been harmed by their negligence, which was a deliberate flaunting of safety and environmental laws. Moreover, they announced the other day that they will claim a $10 billion tax credit for cleanup costs. That means we taxpayers will get stuck with a significant part of the cleanup costs.

And maybe we should get the bill. We voted the oilmen into office who leased those oil deposits and deliberately allowed safety and environmental laws to be ignored. In a democracy we get the government we deserve. (Or so it's said.)

Maybe they could take a billion bucks from their advertising budget and pay for tribal law enforcement!

Speaking of advertising that tries to persuade people on an issue rather than to sell a product, the petroleum industry pulled their ads pretty quickly when the spill happened. I almost miss that 40ish slender woman in the pants suits who told us over and over again how wonderful off shore drilling is. Now the ads just feature people telling us how awful it would be if taxes were raised (or deductions eliminated) on the oil companies.

And it's a political year again, dammit, and we are deluged with attack ads. This year all the Republicans seem to want to publicize how unreasonable they can be. "I oppose everything the Obama administration wants to do, whether I know what is or not!" is their mantra. The candidate who is farthest to the right will win.

Here in Colorado one senatorial candidate tries to lump Jane Norton, a Reaganite Republican if ever there was one, with Obama and Nancy Pelosi. Whatever it takes to win a nomination I guess, but I wonder what that nomination will be worth come November if the aspirant had to pander to a lunatic fringe to win it. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi has become the favorite whipping girl of these radicals. Somehow they think all they have to do is say Pelosi and San Francisco and they'll win election. I have enough faith in the people to doubt it will work.

Finally, Ayn Rand books continue to fly off library shelves. It amuses me to see people flock to a government run facility to read books that decry government services.

On Immigration

I pity the poor immigrant, who wishes he'd stayed at home

--Bob Dylan

The immigration issue has been heating up in recent months, especially here in the west. Arizona has passed draconian measures to control illegal entry to their state and similar proposals are before other state legislatures. Hispanic residents of these states are indignant, feeling they are being subject to police harassment and are being used as a political football.

The number of people living in the US illegally is estimated as somewhere between four and twenty million. They came for numerous reasons, but economic opportunity certainly is the most often cited enticement for people to enter the US. In this, they are no different from generations of people who came to America in the last four hundred years.

Current immigration law favors people who have a skill or profession that will (allegedly) be of benefit to our country, or who have money to invest here. So, if you're a doctor, or can hit a breaking pitch, or have a large wad of cash in your pocket, you can go to the front of the immigration line. Such folks are not exactly your poor, your tired, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Other applicants are admitted by quotas among the nations on a lottery basis.

Naturally, the numbers of people in foreign lands who want to reside in America vary widely. People in nations where there is a huge demand for legal emigration might wait all their lives for a chance to come here legally. Is it any wonder that desperate people are not willing to wait patiently for legal status?

Since illegal immigrants risk deportation to the place they risked their lives to leave, we can hardly expect them to come forward and meekly accept expulsion. Even if all immigrants did volunteer for repatriation, however, the logistics of removing them are daunting. If we use the commonly cited total of twelve million illegals and an average capacity per airplane of two hundred (a generous average) then it would require sixty thousand flights to carry all of them out of the country. The country's bus lines could help take deportees to adjacent lands, but this would not diminish the number of flights very much. I'm not saying it couldn't be done or shouldn't be done, but lets not kid ourselves into thinking it would be quick, easy or inexpensive.

This also gives rise to another question. Can we ethically just dump deportees in the country they left at a border town or their capital? It might be argued that what happens to them once they're across the line is not our business, but the problems of one country often become the problem of other nations. Economic stress in other countries is the reason we have this situation in the first place.

The Obama administration has proposed that illegal immigrants will be obliged to pay a fine for entering the country and back taxes and then can be placed at the back of the line for those awaiting citizenship. Much as I like and respect President Obama, I think this is ludicrous. Illegal residents of the US are paid in the underground economy and records of their earnings will be spotty at best. Would you tell the truth about your earnings if doing so would cost you money you worked hard to get, and the government couldn't check your statement? I suspect this proposal is just a sop to conservative critics.

So here's my immodest proposal. The quota of legal immigrants from high demand countries like Mexico should be raised drastically. Three million legal permits per year is reasonable to me. Applications for legal entry could only be received and processed in the individual's home country. A criminal check would be made on prospective immigrants, confined to felony warrants or convictions or outstanding judgments against the person. No fees or taxes would be collected.

What would we get by doing this? Well, start with regaining control of the border. Once there is a real chance of coming to America legally, I suspect the incentive to enter by breaking our law will diminish. In addition, once immigrants have legal status they can take jobs in the above ground economy, pay taxes and contribute to social security. Five million additional contributors to social security would not solve all the problems of the fund, but would certainly help.

And why would anyone who is here already return to his native land to re-enter legally? They could demand at least minimum wage for their work. They would not have to fear the police, and if victimized by crime could seek justice in the legal system. They would have the same chance to advance and prosper as any American citizen.

There is one exception to this policy. The parents and siblings of so-called "anchor children" must be given legal status immediately. I realize this is not fair to other immigrants, but there is no other workable solution. Kicking the family of such a child out of the country effectively means deporting an American from our country, or leaving the child behind. Neither of these constitutes a family value in my opinion.

For those who want to expel illegal immigrants from the US, I ask that you examine your motives. If you're outraged because our laws have been broken, I'm with you, but if your objection to illegals is cultural, or you think they drain the economy, we part company.

I welcome comments on my plan.