"Are Those Pecans?"

"Are those pecans?"

I'm standing in the checkout line at Sam's Club. I'm holding four, two-pound bags of pecans. You can tell they are pecans by one of two ways. First, they are in bags that are transparent on about 40% of their surface and you can plainly see the pecans. And then there is the large printed word, "pecans," that is printed on that part of the bag that is not transparent. Either way, it's not hard to tell.

They say there is no such thing as a stupid question, but if there isn't, then what is this? Ok, it's really a rhetorical question that is meant to start a conversation. But I don't know this guy, and I have no desire to start up a conversation or a relationship with somebody who I will likely never see again after our 3 minute encounter is over. So whenever somebody asks me a stupid question, I like to take about a five second pause before answering. I have an expression on my face that says, "I'm mulling over your question, not so that I can answer it accurately, but so that I can determine why you aksed something so inane." I'm hoping that during this pregnant pause, the guy will realize how stupid he sounds and then gush something like, "Of course they're pecans." But he doesn't, so I answer.

"Yeah. They're pecans."

I know he wants more, but I'm going to make him dig for it.

"That's a lot of pecans, what are you going to do with them?"

Now I admit that eight pounds is a lot of pecans, but I'm wondering if he realizes we are at Sam's Club, where any purchase involves a two year supply of whatever it is you are buying. This is where businesses go to buy in volume.

Pause.

"Gonna' make spiced pecans."

"And then what? Do you just eat them?"

I resist the urge to answer with something like, "No, I string them together and wear them like a necklace."

"Just eat 'em."

"Well you must really like pecans!"

"Yeah."

"Well, I do to, but they're expensive. How much were those?"

Pause. "Fifteen dollars a bag."

"Well, that's sixty dollars worth of pecans there!"

He can do math in his head.

"Yep, sure is."

Cain, Movin' On Up

The more I learn about and watch Herman Cain, the more I like him. Apparently I'm not alone as he is now tied with Romney in the polls, up from virtual obscurity a few months ago. Politics though is full of shooting stars that burn up in the national spotlight. Think Rudy Giuliani and Rick Perry. Perry shot past Romney as soon as he entered the race. He looked like Romney, only better looking, with better hair, (if you can believe that.) And since most conservatives don't trust Romney, he got all that support right up until he started talking to a national TV audience.

You would think that a political neophyte going from zero to 39% in a poll of Republican candidates would be the biggest story in decades. Obama had a pretty incredible rise, but he was a sitting US Senator with a significant national profile due to his appearance at the Democrat's national convention in 2004. But it seems a lot like the Wizard of Oz scene. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain. Look, Romney's leading in the polls! Look, over here, Chris Christie is NOT going to run. Wait! Look over here, Chris Christie is going to hold a press conference to say whether or not he's really going to run. Ok, he's really not running, but look, he's endorsed Mitt Romney!

They don't relish attacking Cain like they do Romney, Perry, Bachmann and Gingrich. And they certainly aren't going to promote him like they do John Huntsman. So they have decided to ignore him like they do Rick Santorum. Their problem is that Santorum is at about 2% and Cain is at 39%. Cain has been labeled the Pizza Man because that helps to belittle his impressive business career. (Com'on, a pizza salesman as president?) After getting his Masters in computer science from Purdue, Cain worked as a mathematician for the US Navy in their ballistic missile program. Get it? This man IS an actual rocket scientist! But apparently, that's an uninteresting detail, since I've yet to see it referenced by any national media outlet. A Bachelor's in Mathematics, a Masters in Computer Science, career as rocket scientist, two corporate turnarounds, a stint on the board of the Federal Reserve bank at Kansas City, and he's know as a pizza salesman. And that doesn't seem to bother him. And not only is he not afraid to skewer liberals and their ideology, he loves it. like I said, he looks better all the time.

Day-O

Had not heard from Harry Belafonte in a while, but I never doubted that he would once again make a complete fool of himself in a vain attempt to explain liberal ideology. It is difficult. Check that, impossible, particularly if you plan to follow the rules of logic and express a coherent thought. Liberalism demands no trail of logic. To them all tenets exist independently and any conflict or paradox is simply ignored.

But it was his bashing of Herman Cain that got my attention. First, he says that Cain was "denied intelligence." Now calling somebody stupid is not a new political tactic. But usually it's done by one with some degree of academic accomplishment to call their own. I mean, it looses some punch when a high school drop out is saying it about a rocket scientist. And with a straight face no less.

OK, I don't really know if Belafonte was a dropout. His Wiki article says that he "attended" George Washington High School before joining the Navy. The tip off being that it doesn't say "graduated." But I do know that Hermain Cain has an academic record that, in my opinion, puts him amongst the smartest people to have ever run for president. (And that small group would not include the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.) Herman Cain got his bachelors degreee in mathmatics and then his masters degree in computer science from Purdue (A pretty respectable school for engineers.) He then went to work for the Navy as a mathematician in their
balistics program. That's right, he actually was a rocket scientist!! But, hey how can that compare to singing The Banana Boat Song? (Which was actually written by actor Alan Arkin!) Cain had a famously successful business career with Pilsbury, turning around Burger King and later Godfather's Pizza, before serving as a member of the board of the federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

So, as you can see, he was a natural target for Mr. Belafonte. And Herman Cain's greatest sin is, of course, not being black. That is, not black enough or not a real black. Belafonte puts Cain in some pretty good company on this point. He mentions other people who are not authentically black, like Condoleeza Rice and house slave, Colin Powell. Let's see, Colin Powell got his bachelors in geology and then his MBA before attaning the rank of four star General and becoming the youngest Chairman of the Joint Cheifs of Staff. Rice: Phi Beta Kappa, cum laude, Masters from Notre Dame and PhD from University of Denver. Do I detect a pattern here? Here is how he characterized them:

“The Republican party, the tea party, all those forces to the extreme right have consistently tried to come up with representations for what they call black, what they call the real Negroes. They’re heroes for some people. But for a lot of us, they’re not."

Yes, nothing admirable about those records. Why would you want role models like that?

Things You Probably Don't Want To Hear

Here is something you probably don't want to hear from the radiologist: "I've been looking at these for 30 years, and I've never seen anything like this."

He said that after veiwing the result from my mamogram, and there's a claim I never thought I'd be making. A few weeks ago I rolled over in bed and scratched an itch on my chest. That's whenI felt a solid, pea-sized lump near my breastbone, but definitely in the breast tissue. The doctor said do a mamogram and ultrasound. The mamogram didn't really show anything, but the ultrasound did and that's what lead the radiologist to celebrate my uniqueness. So a needle biopsy was in order, with the good news coming a few days later. It turns out that they think it was simply scar tissue from a previous injury, although I don't ever recall being hit or otherwise injured there.

Pop Quiz

Here is a pop quiz designed to test your knowledge of notorious political attacks.

1.) Who was the first person to call Ronald Reagan's economic policies "voodoo economics?"

2.) Who was the first politician to smear Michael Dukakis over his release of Willie Horton from a Massachusetts prison?

3.) Whose campaign was the first to question the US citizenship of Barrack Obama based on where he might have been born?

That's the funny thing about primaries. The answers are: 1) George H.W. Bush 2) Al Gore 3.) Hillary Clinton

A Little Too Personal

It seems the left cannot be opposed to something unless they can find an individual that can personify the object of their rage. For eight years they didn't oppose the policies of George W. Bush, they opposed the man, George W. Bush. And no opportunity to define him as a complete fool or one with nefarious motives was ever passed up. Now the object of their affection is Scott Walker. And they have initially determined that he is mentally ill, at least. Oh, and he's going to sell all our assets to the Koch brothers for next to nothing so that they can be in control of all aspects of life in Wisconsin.

PAY ATTENTION PEOPLE!!!

Have you ever noticed how people who are writing about politics are always admonishing everybody else to pay attention? Usually they will put it entirely in caps with more than two exclamation points. Obviously they have no idea how how insulting that is. I sincerely doubt that any one person who writes that is more informed than me. I'm not bragging, I just don't know of anybody who consumes as much news and opinion as I do. But just like the ones who lament the "stupid voters" after the election, it's their curious assumption that it was because they just weren't diligent enough in gathering and digesting all the proper information. And that of course is what they are reading. Because we all know they couldn't possibly understand this and just think differently about it. No, that's not possible.

E. Q.

I have always supported the idea that economics needs to be taught more often and at an earlier age. I think it is criminal that we treat "the dismal science" with such contempt (As if it is dismal!)When people graduate from high school, it is assumed they have a "basic" education. After all they will have had something close to 12 English classes, more than 10 years of math and an equal number of assorted science classes, almost none of which will be in economics. To me it makes no sense because economics plays such a large part in your everyday life. And most political contests are nothing less than a vote on competing economic plans. But for some reason we don't seem to think that's important enough to actually go out of our way to make sure the electorate has a basic grasp of economic principles. We have this delusional concept that people already understand, although I have no idea why anybody would think that. You can get a PhD and never set foot in an economics classroom. I have a friend who got her bachelors degree in Political Science without ever taking economics.

But recently I saw a post on the web where a friend of mine, who I consider to be well above average intelligence, wrote about the current flapdoodle concerning public unions in Wisconsin and included his thoughts on the, now notorious, Koch brothers, of Koch Industries. They are the current whipping boys for the liberals, having been sufficiently demonized to the point that they are now the focus of all that is evil. But that is just standard fare for the left. What struck me was how naive he was concerning the brother's wealth and what their motivations were in using that wealth to further their political beliefs. There were several mentions along the lines of "How much money is enough, for one (or two) person?" Then there was a bit of fantasizing about how a "good" person would use that money. I suppose that was to show by contrast that the Koch brothers must be evil and greedy since they were not putting it all in the bank and giving just the interest to pay teachers better. Of course their assumption was that this was an actual alternative for their combined fortune of $72 billion. And there is no doubt that even a very modest rate of return on $72 billion would be a huge number. But as silly as his ideas were, they revealed some even sillier notions about how an economy actually works. He is apparently under the impression paying interest is it's own reward. Seems that bankers are willing to take any amount of cash you have and pay you for the privilege of sitting on it. Of course bankers WILL pay you to hold your money, but only if they then do something even better with it, and that does not include just loaning it out at a higher interest rate to have somebody else sit on it. Eventually somebody has to do something productive with it to make any sense out of paying interest. It can't just be a giant chain letter. Somebody has to take that money and build a pipeline, drill an oil well, buy a truck, pay a driver and ultimately, MAKE A PROFIT!!!

You know profits don't you? They are the evil things that drive greedy men such as the Koch brothers. A common lament of these socialists is their bewilderment at the reasons why these men want to simply make the pile higher. That's their complete assessment of motives and alternatives. Now to be fair, he probably understands that the $72 billion is not in cash (even though that's the way he talks about it.) But it doesn't seem to occur to him that the vast majority of that $72 billion is in the form of hard assets that are keeping more than 80,000 people gainfully employed and paying taxes. This is not something that they will ever view as being for the common good. It's far more likely that they will view it as the Koch brothers exploiting the labor of others so that they can just add to their pile.

The Number That Really Matters

In the "debate" that is going on in Wisconsin, the unions have produced TV spots that make the argument that thay have conceded the benefit adjustments that Walker has proposed, so he should not try to take away their collective bargaining "rights" (they aren't rights.) But the amount of money state wokers will lose was never their comncern in the first place. If you want to understand what this fight is about, you only need know one number, and that number is $100 million. That is the ANNUAL amount that Wisconsin's public unions deduct from their member's paychecks in the form of dues. The workers have no choices in this, whether you are talking about joining the union in the first place, or paying the dues. Both are mandatory to get these state jobs. The union bosses are more than willing to allow their members to take pay cuts and/or get laid off. But they are not about to give up that gravy train.

A Random Point

For several days now Wisconsin has been in the national spotlight due to the protests here in Madison against Scott Walker's Budget Repair Bill. Facebook is full of Madisonians supporting the protestors and they have some legitimate gripes. But one thing that keeps getting put out there is that Walker is stripping workers of their "rights." The problemn I have with that, is they are referring to his desire to repeal Collective Bargining by public unions. That is not a right. A right is something that is inherent. You are born with it. You don't have to do anything to get them, and nothing in the way of action is required from anybody else in order for you to exercise your rights. The only duties imposed on others is to not interfere with the exercising of your rights. So, for instance, if you want to exercise your right to free speech, it is only incumbent upon me to not interfere with your speech. I do not have to give you a microphone or buy you TV time.

The ability of public unions to collectively bargin, was granted by the state legislature in 1959. They can bestowe it, and they can take it away. It is NOT a right, it's a privledge, just like driving a car. But be aware, that just pisses them off when you say that.

RFK Jr. Drives Stake Through Heart of Kennedy Mystique

For the first time in something like 60 years, there will be no members of the famous Kennedy political dynasty serving in congress. The "Lion of The Senate," Ted Died in 2010 and his congressman son Patrick, chose not to run for reelection in Rhode Island. To be honest, the mystique that the family once had, certainly diminished over the past few decades. The very public tragedies that seemed to follow them around took on more of a scandalous flavor. Instead of political assassinations they were visited by more mundane scandals and tragedies brought on by reckless behaviour. Their political advantage evaporated. Caroline was laughed out of the room when she toyed with the idea of being crowned Senator. (Of course she had no interest at all in running for office. "Hey, if you're handing out Senate seats Mr. Governor, I could stick around for a while.")Ted's seat went Republican less than 3 months after he died.

But in the wake of the tragic shootings in Arizona, RFK Jr. has come forth to finally put an end to any association between the Kennedy family name and serious political discussions. He wrote this piece for the Huffington Post:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-f-kennedy-jr/post_1548_b_807713.html

The gist of the piece is the outright lie that his uncle, JFK, was killed by the forces of right-wing intolerance. Of course this myth has been around ever since Jaquelyn Kennedy openly suggested it in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

This is a despicable smear. The man has manufactured a history to fit this myth. He even included the long ago discredited story about school children in Dallas cheering at the news that JFK had been shot, and tells it as fact. The story was born when Dan Rather (little more than a cub reporter at the time) ran with the story even though he knew it to be false. What had happened was that one principal had decided to dismiss classes for the day because of the shooting, but didn't want to upset the children, so he didn't tell them about the assassination. They did what any other schoolkid under the circumstances would do. They cheered because they were going home early. Rather had been told it did not happen, but ran the story anyway. Surely Mr. Kennedy cannot be ignorant of this. Ironically, this whole column reminds me of the Dan Rather/Texas National Guard story that cost him his job at CBS. During that one, when it was becoming obvious that the documents he had were forgeries, he retreated and declared that even though the documents were phony, he thought the story was still true. Sometimes, a story is so good you just can't let the facts get in the way.

In the RFK column, he insists that the atmosphere of right-wing intolerance in Dallas was at the crux of his uncle's assassination. Just like Arizona, the problem was the "rage" and "craziness" unleashed by this toxic atmosphere. Dallas had become "the center of the extreme right wing." He even points out that the mayor of Dallas at the time, Earl Carroll, helped co-found the John Birch Society. Only the mayor of Dallas at the time was Earle Cabell and he was not a co founder of the John Birch Society. Documentation of just how radical Dallas was comes mostly from a historian by the name of Manchester. It's not surprising he would quote this man since the Kennedy family bought and paid for that history. Mr Manchester was commissioned by Jacquelyn Kennedy to write the book and apparently she even censored it, demanding that certain passages be deleted, and not because they weren't true. Publication was delayed until she got her way.

But the real problem is that Lee Harvey Oswald was a communist sympathizer and dedicated leftist. He was not just a member of Fair Play for Cuba, he defected to the Soviet Union at one point. (Warning: I will not dignify wacko conspiracy theories about the "true" killers. LHO did it, end of story.) Seven months before he shot JFK, Oswald had made an attempt on the life of Major General Edwin Walker, a right-wing zealot who had been relieved of his command for handing out right-wing literature. The bullet matched the gun he used to shoot Kennedy in November. JFK was a cold warrior who had just overseen the Bay of Pigs invasion.

RFK Jr.'s column is strange, though. It's like he's saying the right-wingers created the atmosphere of hate that then prompted left-winger LHO, to go out and kill? Have I got that? And you know, maybe he actually did refer to his mother as "mummy" but I don't think we need to hear that. Reading this crap was infuriating. But reading the comments that followed it was even more sickening. the guy is fabricating history in order to smear his political opponents. He refers to conservative commentators as hate mongers, and this is how the sycophants at the Huffintgton Post responded:

"I so admire who you are and what you do."

"Very moving, poignant article."

"Violence is keeping this brilliant guy on the sidelines, I postulate. Too bad, we could use him. But I understand."

And the one that me quit reading,

"Those who do not study history...."

Indeed. But if it's true that those who do not study history are condemned to repeat it, then what is the fate of those who make up their own history?