Hub Blog

Pigs fly! Even the WSJ says Mitt’s tax returns show need for a tax overhaul

2012-01-25T11:32:00.004-05:00

Even the Wall Street Journal thinks Mitt’s tax returns point to the need for tax reforms. Its editorial obviously comes at the issue from a different angle than the Economist’s editorial call for tax-code changes. See below. But there seems to be a consensus on the need to clarify and simplify our absurd tax system.

The most interesting part of the WSJ editorial: It concedes it “might be reasonable” to eliminate the “carried interest” provision allowing venture capitalists and other financiers to claim “capital-gains” status on what everyone else would consider “income,” in exchange for lowering the corporate income tax rate and other changes.

I can go for that. It’s just a matter of fairness. Financiers and others of their ilk shouldn’t be paying at lower rates as a result of screwed up definitions of what constitutes income vs. capital gains.

Btw: I wouldn’t mind a small hike in the capital gains tax rate. Historically, as you can see here, the current 15 percent rate is lower than it has been in the past. But it’s not that much lower compared to other eras (excluding the deplorable Jimmy Carter 1970s). If they got rid of the loopholes, I could live with 15 percent.

The Economist: 'America's rich should pay more'

2012-01-25T08:55:00.006-05:00

The Economist magazine has a balanced editorial about how and why the rich like Mitt and Warren Buffett should pay more in taxes. Thankfully, it doesn't embrace either President Obama's or Republicans' approaches.

Basically, the magazine suggests holding current income tax rates at current levels, closing loopholes, eliminating complexity and getting rid of provisions that only people like Mitt and Warren can take advantage of when filing taxes. The editorial doesn't quite come out and say what loopholes need to be addressed, but they should include the one that lets venture capitalists, hedge fund managers and other financiers to define their "incomes" as a form of "capital gains," allowing them to pay far lower tax rates than the average American taxpayer. See the post below. Somehow, the financiers have convinced Congress and the IRS that their carried over "fees" are actually a form of "capital gains," even though the gains were made on the backs of other people's and institution's investment money. This is why the argument that they're only investing their "own money" -- and thus deserve to keep the benefits of that earned money via lower capital-gains taxes -- is so bogus. They don't and didn't make their fortunes off of their own money. They made it off of others' money -- and yet get to reap the capital-gains tax benefits. It's legal. But it's wrong and unfair.

Shakespeare once said a rose is still a rose by any other name. The same applies to income: Income is still income by any other name. The issue here isn't so much legitimate capital gains. It's about who gets to claim "capital gains."

FYI: A good case could be made that Mitt, as a technically retired individual, can and should claim capital gains on past earnings. But here's the problem: When at Bain, did he pay taxes at the lower capital-gains rate or at the higher income-tax rate? Is he still receiving money from Bain and paying taxes at the lower capital-gains level? Warren Buffett, who's still working full time, says he's paying the lower capital-gains rate.

Mitt's lower tax rate

2012-01-24T09:26:00.009-05:00

The rich. They really are different from you and me. ...

Please, spare me the baloney argument that Mitt's paid a 15 percent capital gains rate on money he "already paid the top 35 percent income tax rate on when you first earned it." Mitt and other financiers make their fortunes by investing other people's post-income tax money. Mitt and other financiers don't make their fortunes by investing their own post-income tax money. We all know this. It's basic knowledge. It's not a secret. It's how venture capital, private equity and hedge funds work. The financiers make their money by investing other people's money. And yet people like Mitt and other financiers regularly pay lower capital-gains tax rates based on investment returns from other people's money? ...

What a tax system!

Btw: By "other" people's money, let's face it: we're largely talking about funds from 401(k) accounts, public pension systems, IRAs, mutual funds, and other "institutional investors," as they're euphemistically called to downplay the fact that financiers are making fortunes off of average people's retirement money.

'Does God Love the Patriots?'

2012-01-24T08:41:00.003-05:00

Reader No. 1 sends in this Charles Pierce column with the comment, "Aside from his obligatory and Tourette's like Nixon reference, a great summary of Sunday." ... The esteemed Reader No. 1 also sends in this Bill Barnwell review of Sunday's two great championship games.

Update -- I still can't believe the Patriots are the favorites. The Giants beat them in Game 9. The Giants play tougher. Etc. But the Pats are simply a 'safe' bet in God fearing Vegas, I guess.

'Three cheers for Tom Brady's realism,' Part II

2012-01-23T13:14:00.003-05:00

Reader No. 1 has more on the Pats game yesterday, from the perspective of watching the showdown with his two daughters:

We had a hot debate at home in the final 2 minutes - after Boldin hauled in the big pass, I asked Daughter #2, "Looks like overtime, what do you think?" "Be quiet!" was her angry response.

Then - the "Oh My God" moment with Lee Evans and Sterling Moore in the end zone - for a flash of a second, you knew we'd lost horribly, except we hadn't. I like Sterling Moore's attitude.

And then Cundiff. And as he hurried on, I said - I swear to God - "He's going to miss." He just didn't look ready. And - I finally got a prediction right.

Daughter #2 found this game quite stressful, she is a big fan. For what it is worth, I predict a similar intense Super Bowl.... Boomer likes the Giants.

I share Boomer's sentiments. But what about Reader No. 1's daughters? What are their gut instincts about the Super Bowl? The local blogosphere needs to know!

'Three cheers for Tom Brady's realism'

2012-01-23T10:12:00.003-05:00

The Pats really didn't deserve to win yesterday. But they deserve to be in the Super Bowl this year because of their play all season. They overcame the odds and a lot of doubts. Dan's right: There is a hint of 2001-2002 nostalgia in the air. But I'm afraid the two seasons, separated by 10 years, could also be seen as bookends for an era, one at the start and one at the end of a glorious era. This may be the Pats' last chance at another Super Bowl in the Brady/Belichick era. I got to say: The Giants look tough. Very tough. This is going to be a hard game to win. I'm not too optimistic. But, then, I wasn't optimistic in 2002 either.

Anyway, here's Reader No. 1:

Apparently you can lose the turnover battle and win the game! Unless you are playing the Giants.

Dreadful body language on Billy Cundiff rushing out onto the field forecast the inevitable miss - tough way to be remembered in sports history. The finishes on both games put new meaning into the term "Special Teams."

Three cheers for Tom Brady's realism.

The 2-week hiatus can only mean one thing: watching lots of highlight films of Super Bowls past. Time to buy a new hat .

Update -- The Patriots are favorites? The Patriots? After yesterday?

The key to today's Pats-Ravens game: Turnovers

2012-01-22T12:15:00.001-05:00

From Reader No. 1: "A reasoned analysis of the only thing anyone in these parts will be watching this afternoon. Brady turnovers in last two Foxboro playoff horror shows were game changers (Raven strip sack two years back, red zone INT vs Bigmouth Jets). Win the turnovers today, and win the game."

The real winner in yesterday’s S.C. primary: Barack Obama

2012-01-22T09:53:00.006-05:00

After hearing about Newt Gingrich big South Carolina win yesterday, the Hub Blog mind hippity-hopped back to this pre-primary Michael Barone column headlined “As S.C. goes, so could U.S.” … Well, it’s not going to happen. Newt Gingrich will not be “standing on the West Front of the Capitol taking the oath of office” next January because of the S.C. vote. More than likely, that man will be Barack Obama, for yesterday’s primary outcome wasn’t so much a victory for Newt and a defeat for Mitt, but rather it was a huge win for Obama, who gets to sit on the sideline as the GOP applies a self-imposed divide-and-conquer strategy on itself.

Update -- Of course, Obama could still yet annoy the hell out of everyone before the election. Reader No. 1 on the linked Dowd column: "A small masterpiece. And yet, he will probably get another four years to be unappreciated and misunderstood."

Update II -- Here's perhaps the best and most succinct explanation yet on why Gingrich won: “Wow, I am so totally shocked that a social con sorta won Iowa, a northeasterner won New Hampshire and a southerner won South Carolina. Look out establishment, it’s anything goes!!!!”

Lt. Gov. Murray’s car(eer) crashes, thanks to his ‘old school’ pal

2012-01-22T08:08:00.001-05:00

It’s tempting to say Lt. Gov. Murray’s political career is now all but over, thanks to the Globe’s devastating piece that shows Murray probably cracked up his state car because he was worried sick that his hackerama relationship with Michael McLaughlin was about to be exposed. But this is Massachusetts. The ‘old school’ pols never die, they just fade away for a while and end up at obscure boards, eventually re-drawing the seating arrangements for a new generation of sons, nephews and friends to take over. …

Did I tell you that I’m reading Howie Carr’s new book Hard Knocks, a fictional account about a “web of politicians dirtier than mobsters and criminals nobler than senators”? It’s pretty damn good.

The New GOP Mantra: Criticizing Capitalism = Embracing Communism

2012-01-14T08:38:00.003-05:00

So it’s no longer OK to criticize even aspects of capitalism. Rudy Giuliani on Newt’s attacks on Mitt’s private-equity past: “The stuff you’re saying is one of the reasons we’re in the trouble we’re in right now — this total, ignorant, populist view of the economy that was proven to be incorrect with the Soviet Union, with Chinese communism.”

I know, I know. Huh? But it’s the same type of mindset that’s been on gory display since the Wall Street collapse in 2008. The second someone criticizes any aspect of capitalism, some conservatives and Republicans whip out their copies of Road to Serfdom and Atlas Shrugged. You see, it’s not a debate about what type of capitalism we want moving forward (such as Too Big Too Fail vs. Not Too Big Too Fail). To free-market ideologues, it’s an all-or-nothing debate of Capitalism vs. Communism. Nothing in between. It’s capitalist freedom versus socialist gulags. Anything that doesn’t embrace the former is an embrace of the latter. It’s sophomoric logic, but it’s what now dominates right-wing economic thinking these days. It’s why Republicans can’t bring themselves to reform Wall Street and eliminate the Too Big Too Fail system we have now. To reform Wall Street would be to acknowledge capitalism isn’t perfect. To acknowledge capitalism isn’t perfect is to head down a slippery slope toward socialism. Therefore … blame Barney Frank!

As for Mitt’s old Bain Capital job, it’s fair game to review and criticize his past. Granted, most of Newt’s criticisms are tired stretches. But Mitt’s the one who made his Bain experience a centerpiece of his campaign. He’s the one who says his Bain experience will guide him in his decision making once in the White House. But now we’re not supposed to even question his moves and decisions at Bain? His strategic uses of layoffs, bankruptcy filings, tax provisions, asset sales, dividend payouts, and other measures are all of a sudden off limits to discussion? He can't defend them? That’s what Rudy and the Limbaugh crowd are all but saying.

The Tebow showdown in Foxboro

2012-01-09T10:48:00.002-05:00

Reader No. 1's thoughts on yesterday's great Broncos-Steelers game and this Saturday's Pats game:

I was saying just as we sat down to dinner (last night) with the family that - this Steeler/Bronco game has been on forever. We were at the 3 hour mark with six and a half minutes to play. And then...

The Steelers tied the game quickly, perfect pass from Big Ben to former Patriot-killer Jericho Cotchery, but it apparently used a lot of clock.

The Broncos went nowhere, didnt' use much clock, always a bad sign.

The Steelers couldn't close the deal in the last two minutes, plenty of clock to do it - not a good sign.

And then - the kickoff, and the Broncos ended it using very little clock.

What an awesome game, not just the fantastic finish, but the close calls, the reviews, the great passes... just awesome More than made up for the dreadful Giants/Falcons and Saturday's inevitable outcomes.

So now - the Pats host the Broncos on Saturday night, on almost the 10th Anniversary of the Snow Bowl/Tuck Rule Game. TEN years... a lot of time has passed. Just to remind us of how much time, we watched the great ESPN Special "The Brady Six" earlier today.

Is it time to pass the baton? That's one angle for sportswriters this week, and with humility, better than the 'Josh McDaniels revenge' angle. Of course, we love historical and revenge angles in Boston, I'm sure some local sportswriting legend other than Bill Simmons can combine both.

Incidentally, the McDaniels story should raise some flags - you won't find a lot of organizations with clearer chains of command and accountability than NFL teams, and the Patriots in particular. How's this going to work exactly next week and, cross fingers, the week after that and in the Super Bowl? In Bill We Trust!

Penn State fans suffering from bad case of Green Bay Packers Syndrome

2012-01-06T12:39:00.004-05:00

So some Penn State fans don't want an outsider coming in to coach their much vaunted football program. You know, the program engulfed by allegations of locker room pedophilia, management cover ups, failure to follow the law, flunking the most basic moral test of protecting the most innocent in society. Yeah, that program. ...

It's going to be a long re-building process for Penn State if their most ardent fans have their way. Remember the Green Bay Packer Syndrome, i.e. the never-ending quest to build success by reliving the past. It rarely works. In the case of the Packers, they brought in coach after coach with alleged magical associations with the late Vince Lombardi. They allegedly "understood" the "Green Bay way." They all sucked. The Celtics suffered from a variation of the Green Bay Packers Syndrome in the 1990s and early 2000s, always insisting some new addition had to "bleed green" to succeed. The Norte Dame football program has had its own strain of the Green Bay Packers Syndrome, always bringing in some coach with a quasi-Cinderella tale that fits with alums' fairy-tale image of the program. (Never mind that the last two Notre Dame coaches to win national championships were hardened NCAA journeymen and scoundrels; the alum prefer to stick with their fairy-tale delusions.)

A Hub Blog Christmas present to readers

2011-12-25T07:23:00.003-05:00

A special Christmas present from me to you: ‘Shut Up, Fat Boy!’ … And such moving holiday sentiments: “We’re gonna celebrate this win, and I’m gonna let him have the worst Christmas he can have.” ... Don't you love it? ... Merry Christmas everyone!

2011-12-25T06:49:00.005-05:00

The resurgence of Ivy League sports -- and money

2011-12-23T07:59:00.005-05:00

Ivy League sports programs are enjoying a competitive renaissance because of the across-the-board financial aid packages offered by universities to all students, not just athletes, thus attracting higher caliber jocks to Ivy schools in the process, the NYT reports. ... It makes sense. To a degree. But what's ultimately the difference between a "financial aid package" and an old-fashioned "scholarship," which have long been banned in the Ivy League? Scholarships are used to recruit and entice athletes to universities. Now financial-aid packages are used to recruit and entice athletes to universities. They're used for the same purposes. Right? The Ivies are semantically changing their definition of scholarships. That's what's happening, whether the universities care to admit it to themselves or not.

Update -- From Reader AM:

The Ivies haven't really changed anything in regard to scholarships. The story has been, for more than 50 years, that student-athletes are generally given an advantage in the admissions process (i.e., their potential contributions to the school as athletes weigh heavily) but not in financial aid -- all aid is need-based and fully meets need. It can't be taken away because you get hurt, or the new coach doesn't want you, or whatever (which was BTW true of athletic scholarships until about 1967); nor, for that matter, if your grades are low. No over-signing or partial scholarships or any of that stuff. In a sense, it's simply a matter of need-based versus merit aid. (The military academies follow a third course -- they pay everyone.)

What has happened is that the NCAA cap on athletic scholarships has in effect dropped their value well below that of a full-boat "academic" scholarship. There's controversy with NCAA D1 now about raising the cap -- looks like that won't happen (after initial approval) because of opposition from less affluent programs. (Many observers believe that raising the dollar limit was a ploy be big-money schools/conferences to split the division once again.) But for the time being, anyway, a student-athlete who qualifies for need-based aid, which is most of them, gets a better deal financially (and probably academically) by going Ivy.

Charles Gasparino: Break up the big banks

2011-12-23T07:37:00.003-05:00

Chalres Gasparino calls for a break-up of the Too Big Too Fail banks. He’s right. But here are the obstacles preventing such action:

1.) The big banks own Washington. They don’t want to be broken up. Therefore Washington won’t act. Both Democrats and Republicans are at fault here.

2.) A break-up would require empowering government to take action. Can Republicans philosophically bring themselves to admit this? I doubt it. They’ve embraced a quasi-utopian economic notion that the private sector is always perfect and the public sector is always imperfect – and therefore an imperfect government can’t possibly intervene to fix something that’s already theoretically perfect. It would blow their minds – and blow up their perfect ideological world view – to admit this.

So, in the name of keeping government out of the financial markets, we're going to guarantee government intervention in the financial markets on a far vaster scale, i.e. future massive bailouts of Too Big Too Fail banks. ... As I've said before, you can have a little government intervention now, or a lot of government intervention later. It's a simple choice.

Rick Perry: Double dipper

2011-12-19T16:17:00.002-05:00

He's such a hack. Worse: He's a hack hypocrite, collecting a $92,000 state pension while criticizing Social Security as a giant Ponzi scheme. ... Btw: The maximum Social Security benefit a person can receive is about one-third what Perry is getting from the Texas pension system. Another example of our three-tiered class system in this country: Financiers, government workers, and the rest of us.

Vaclev Havel, RIP

2011-12-18T09:02:00.004-05:00

He was a true man of peace and freedom. One of the greats of the ‘80s and early ‘90s, along with Lech Walesa, Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, and Corazon Aquino. Unarmed, they stood up to tyranny – and tyranny flinched. ... The NYT's succinct, says-it-all lead:

Vaclav Havel, the dissident playwright who wove theater into politics to peacefully bring down communism in Czechoslovakia and become a hero of the epic struggle that ended the Cold War, has died. He was 75.

'Tom vs. Tim'

2011-12-18T08:45:00.001-05:00

Can't wait.

Yet another public-sector perk: Cashing in on 'unused' vacation and sick time

2011-12-18T08:06:00.004-05:00

So former Chelsea housing director Michael E. McLaughlin worked only 15-hour weeks -- and yet cashed in for $81,578 in alleged "unused" vacation time and a whopping $114,237 in alleged "unused" sick time. Crunching the numbers, the Globe says that means he took only four vacation days since 2003 and 3.5 hours of sick time over the past 12 years, assuming you believe McLaughlin's claims. Do you believe McLaughlin's claims? ...

Let's face it: This may be an egregious example, but this general type of vacation- and sick-time "sell back" happens all the time in government. Five-figure and six-figure vacation- and sick-time payouts are not at all unusual. Not only do government workers get better and more secure pensions and retirement benefits than private-sector workers, they also get big lump-sum wads of cash at the end of their careers. Private-sector employees largely work under a "use or lose it" system for vacation and sick days. There's no accumulated cash outs at the end of their careers, no extra five-figure or six-figure pot of gold awaiting them. So why do public-sector workers get this so-often-abused perk? Supporters say it's because public workers will start taking more vacation days and calling in sick more often without it. The appropriate answer: Well, yeah, what's wrong with that? But under the current warped system, we all know they do get vacations and sick days and lump-sum payments. The record keeping on this front is simply a joke -- and everyone knows it. ... The new three-tiered class system in this country: Financiers, government workers, and the rest of us.

Another reason to miss Kendrick: Jeff Green out for season

2011-12-17T13:08:00.003-05:00

Ahhh! ... It makes the Kendrick Perkins trade sting even more. ... Hope Jeff recovers and is back as strong as ever next year. ... It must be said: The memory of the Reggie Lewis tragedy must have weighed on the Celtics' minds, consciously or unconsciously, when they first learned of Green's heart woes. It's good Green and the Celts are acting decisively on the medical front.

Remembering George Kennan

2011-12-17T12:03:00.004-05:00

After reading reviews here and here and here of John Lewis Gaddis’s new biography on George Kennan, I finally got around to reading Kennan’s famous ‘X article’ outlining the Cold War strategy of containment and its likely outcome if the U.S. held firm. From beginning to end, the essay, written in 1947, is the work of brilliance – a brilliance that was ultimately confirmed by how history played out. Kennan didn’t just outline how and why the Soviet Union needed to be contained. He outlined how and why the Soviet Union would ultimately collapse. …

Much is being made about Kennan’s own “ultra conservative” and “almost monarchist” political views, suggesting he was no big fan of American democracy and destiny. He was definitely an elitist and highly skeptical about whether America had the will and wisdom to act as an effective world leader. But this is how he concluded his famous ‘X’ essay:

The issue of Soviet-American relations is in essence a test of the overall worth of the United States as a nation among nations. To avoid destruction the United States need only measure up to its own best traditions and prove itself worthy of preservation as a great nation.

Surely, there was never a fairer test of national quality than this. In the light of these circumstances, the thoughtful observer of Russian-American relations will find no cause for complaint in the Kremlin's challenge to American society. He will rather experience a certain gratitude to a Providence which, by providing the American people with this implacable challenge, has made their entire security as a nation dependent on their pulling themselves together and accepting the responsibilities of moral and political leadership that history plainly intended them to bear.

There's a hearty dose of idealism in those words, mixed with stern realism, suggesting reviewers may be focusing a little too much on Kennan's gloomy elitism.

FYI: I can't remember if I've ever read the 'X' essay in its entirety before. Probably not. I definitely knew about it and read about it -- and read portions of it over the years.

Casino interests maneuvering ... Part II

2011-12-17T07:57:00.002-05:00

Brighton Reader's spy report on casinos has been confirmed, with some added details. Suffolk Downs -- surprise, surprise -- was the one conducting the loaded-questions poll about casinos. We're shocked. Shocked!

America’s insane energy policy

2011-12-16T12:23:00.001-05:00

It’s kind of sick: On the same day America finally ends a war brought about partly by the country’s dependence on Middle East oil, Republicans successfully push to keep energy-hogging incandescent light bulbs while Democrats continue to resist building the new Keystone XL pipeline from Canada. … Incredible. … Is this a great country or what?

Iraq: Mission Over (Sort of)

2011-12-15T09:24:00.002-05:00

Of course, the historic semi-end to the American involvement in Iraq shouldn't be confused with the historic mission-accomplished pronouncement in 2003. ... Then again, maybe they're just one in the same. ... After reluctantly supporting the war in 2003, I've long since concluded it was a strategic and tragic distraction and mistake. There were some definite pluses to the invasion. Chief among them: The fall of Saddam. But it cost more than it was worth. All these years later, the failure to find WMD in Iraq still rankles. All these years later, the inept pre-invasion occupation plans, if you can call them that, still astound. All these years later, the initial denial that we were involved in a full-fledged guerilla war still frustrates. Add it all up, and today's events are bittersweet.

Casino interests are maneuvering for position on the PR front

2011-12-13T05:50:00.010-05:00

Hub Blog's spies are reporting in on casino-related activities. From Brighton Reader: "Yesterday I got a long polling call about casinos, specifically the proposal for Suffolk Downs. Clearly they were trying to find out which arguments in favor of a casino in East Boston will work. It was always referred to as 'a world-class complex.' It will be interesting to see how this plays out." ...

Hmmm. Word-class complex. Definitely sounds like something coming out of City Hall or meant to appeal to someone in City Hall. Now who could that be?

Update -- Steve Wynn has launched his own "soft-sell kickoff to the wooing of Foxborough." He's throwing in free day-care services for future employees. Can a world-class Suffolk Downs match that? Huh? ... Personally, I think every red-blooded American should have a soft serve ice cream machine in their own home. Do I hear a bid, Suffolk?

'Baby was Baby'

2011-12-12T05:58:00.001-05:00

Peter May says Big Baby will be missed. I agree. He wasn't a superstar. He didn't have the consistency of one. But when he played well, he played really well. ... Via Reader No. 1.

The Occupy protests: Correlation or cause of public outrage?

2011-12-11T11:14:00.008-05:00

There’s a funny Bloomberg/BusinessWeek post going around about how you can use statistics to prove anything. My favorite chart from the post: “Is Facebook Driving the Greek Debt Crisis?” Well, the statistics do show a strong correlation between the two.

Anyway, I was thinking of the correlation-causation question after reading all the laudatory things being said about the Occupy Boston protests, which mercifully came to an end yesterday. The main compliment: The protesters “drew attention” to the issue of income inequality in the U.S. But it obviously wasn’t just a protest about income inequality. The movement specifically targeted Wall Street, Boston’s Financial District, and other obvious symbols of the nation’s financial system. The protesters were tapping into a deep public zeitgeist over the government’s bailout of an industry that played a key role in causing the Great Recession and today’s ongoing financial crisis.

The public was already pretty riled up about economic conditions and Wall Street by the time the Occupy protests started in September – which, it should be noted, was three long years after the financial crisis started. Movies and documentaries had already been made or produced about the financial crisis. (Personally, I can’t decide which I liked better: HBO’s “Too Big Too Fail” or “Margin Call.” They’re both great. I was impressed but not wowed by the Academy Award winning “Inside Job.”) Books about the financial crisis have been rolling out of publishing houses ever since Lehman’s collapse in 2008. Jon Stewart has been busy over the past three years creating a comedic cottage industry out of Wall Street’s never-ending string of antics. Hey, even Hub Blog has been ranting about Wall Street over the past three years. Etc., etc., etc.

So, please, spare me the accolades about how Occupy protesters “drew attention” to income inequality, Wall Street, economic injustice, and other related matters. If anything, a good question to ask, as alluded to above, is: What took them so long to protest Wall Street? Part of the answer is that they were too busy protesting for or against climate change, Obama-care, the Israeli-Palestinian faceoff, the wars, and just about everything else on the left-wing protest check-off list.

Now we’re getting to the crux of the matter: The Occupy movement was not a “broad based” protest movement. It was largely a left-wing protest movement, as much as the MSM tries to ignore or gloss over that obvious elephant-in-the-room fact. Most people realized the average Occupier was a dime-a-dozen hippie-wannabe protester, the type we’ve seen countless times before over the decades, attending protests like they were attending Catholic masses, performing all the familiar rituals and repeating the same chants, declaring their righteousness and devotion to the moral cause at hand.

Still, despite decades of enduring ham-handed left-wing street theater, people like yours truly and Michael Lewis and Mark Cuban and even libertarians initially, if grudgingly, welcomed the protests. It wasn’t so much about protesters “drawing attention” to important economic issues. It was more about them giving second-wind, and a new dimension, to protests about economic matters in this country. The Occupiers were ultimately followers, not leaders. They arrived late to the great economic debate -- and long after right-wing Tea Partiers showed up. But at least they arrived, complete with annoying bongo drums, tired “Hey ho” chants, and their Che Guevara T-shirts. They made a difference, even though it would have been nice if they had been around to counter Wall Street’s army of lobbyists while the Dodd-Frank bill was being written and watered down to mush in 2010.

Almost inevitably, though, the Occupy protests became about ‘60s nostalgia and a celebration of themselves. The Pete Seger and Susan Sarandon and Michael Moore types started showing up at the protests. The ‘die-ins’ commenced. The protests branched out to Israeli consulates. The phony bandana-wearing anarchists took center stage. (Ooooo. They were so mean looking!) The itch, even desire, to get arrested became a central component of getting their Protest Merit Badges. (I once met a person who bragged how she tried to save every plastic handcuff slapped on her wrists after being “arrested” at protests; I’m sure she’s since handed them down to her grandchildren, almost like family heirlooms and religious icons.)

The bottom line: The Occupy movement overstayed its welcome – and usefulness.

This is also true: We won’t recognize the movement’s protesters after their supporters and admirers finish touching up and re-writing their history. The Occupy protesters have now entered the left-wing pantheon of great protests. They’re going to be as big as the Port Huron signing! Though not as big as the ’68 Chicago or Woodstock events (the real ‘60s protesters will make sure of that; they’re very turf conscious when it comes to mythological pecking orders).

But I don’t want to leave on a cynical note. The Occupy protesters did some good. They helped galvanize the opposition to Wall Street’s now protected status as “too big too fail." The protesters weren't the cause or catalyst of public outrage. They merely reflected it. But at least they did something, even if it their means were tardy, annoying and misguided at times.

Next up on the protest agenda: A little more outrage over the MF Global scandal? I mean, how the hell do you misplace $1.2 billion in customers’ money? How? Only on Wall Street.

'Determined to risk a confrontation'

2011-12-09T08:12:00.003-05:00

A once somewhat admirable protest has long since dissolved into classic lefty street theater. Now the play is approaching its finale. The self-appointed heroes must have one last 'confrontation' with the police and powers that be. They want a confrontation. They need a confrontation. If anything, they need it for their Advanced Arrest Protest Merit Badges! ... If this had been a Tea Party protest ...

Ultimately, this is what OccupyBoston ultimately morphed into, and we all know it: "It’s an experience. It was really nice, like a really tiny city. I never really looked into what the 1960s was like, but if it was like this, it was awesome." ... It was an experience! ... It was awesome! ... Give that man his Occupy Boston Merit Badge! ...

Republicans can blame themselves for Elizabeth Warren

2011-12-08T05:52:00.004-05:00

Reacting to the latest poll showing Elizabeth Warren leading Scott Brown in the U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts, Brighton Reader writes in:

The Republicans should regret not letting Elizabeth Warren become head of the new Consumer Protection Bureau. If not for her, Scott Brown would have won. The other candidates would not have been able to raise enough money and volunteers to knock him off. Now the seat is in play, forcing the national party to divert a lot more money and effort to hold the seat. Brown is a hard-working and disciplined campaigner, has been shrewd in his votes, and has lots of appeal to the non-ideological part of the electorate. But people are mad, really mad, about the financial crisis and the bailouts, and are still looking a way to register their anger. Voting for Elizabeth Warren may be it.

In their heart of hearts, lots of Democrats wish Warren could somehow magically replace Kerry. She has passion, and somehow seems like she would really cares what happens in Massachusetts, as opposed to the current senior senator (D-Louisburg Square & Nantucket).

Why either party feels any obligation to defend the financial industry baffles me. But they both do it, to different degrees and in different ways.

Hub Blog warned a few months ago that Brown couldn't afford to come across as the candidate of Wall Street. He isn't. He's voted against Wall Street's interests in the past and probably will do so in the future. But he's also getting a lot of anti-Warren donations from the financier class, and the perception that he's being bankrolled by Wall Street looks awful. He needs to find a voice on this issue without coming across as pandering to anti-Wall Street sentiments. Suggestion: Pound into the notion that crony capitalism -- as practiced today by Wall Street and other protected industries (hint, hint: Solyndra et gang) -- needs to go.

Update -- Here's some ammunition for Brown: Wall Street and solar-energy subsidies. ... Crony capitalism rides again! ...

Remembering Pearl Harbor, one last time

2011-12-07T08:22:00.003-05:00

It's nice to see so many papers and sites giving space to the 70th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Here are the Globe and Herald stories, along with an excellent photo round-up at Business Insider. But the NYT cuts to the heart of the matter: This will probably be the last major anniversary with more than a handful of Pearl Harbor survivors still around. Maybe a few in their early or late 90s will be alive for the 75th and 80th anniversaries. But their numbers are dwindling fast. ... Anyway, all of this might sound a bit morbid, but it's the sad thought many of us hold when we mark WWII anniversaries these days: The Greatest Generation is passing into history. Growing up, I can remember bumping into WWII veterans everywhere I turned. One friend's father was a Pearl Harbor veteran. Another friend's father served on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific. Another friend's father fought on Iwo Jima. And another friend's father was a medic-doctor on Utah Beach in Normandy. The list goes on and on. And now they're either gone or so old. It's sad.

The second (and secret) Wall Street bailout

2011-11-28T10:11:00.002-05:00

Forget about the $700 billion TARP program. The Wall Street banks got an additional $7.7 trillion in heavily discounted loans from the Fed, allowing them to stabilize their finances, pay back their TARP loans and net $13 billion in profit in the process. It's beyond incredible. ... Yeah, right. This is capitalism. ... From Sen. Sherrod Brown: "When you see the dollars the banks got, it’s hard to make the case these were successful institutions. ... This is an issue that can unite the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street. There are lawmakers in both parties who would change their votes now.”

There seems to be a cross-ideology consensus emerging that we now have an utterly broken, intolerable financial system in this country. ... Bloomberg piece via BI. Here are some other recommended items:

The first one: “Margaret Thatcher knew that capitalism must deliver for the masses.” Reader No. 1 sent in this one, with the apt note, “Something we’ve lost?” That is, something we've lost lost in the blame-game debate over how we got ourselves into such an economic mess. The current crony capitalist system isn't working for the little guy anymore.

The second piece, by Henry Blodgett, suggests a solution: Let losers lose. It’s a good post. To avoid future Wall Street bailouts, I’d suggest creating a new FDIC-like system for investment firms, in which regulators can swoop in and close insolvent companies, quickly and ruthlessly, forcing managers, investors and most creditors to take a loss. It would probably require an industry funded insurance pool of money to financially stabilize the system after a shutdown, something akin to how retail banks now have to kick in money for the FDIC’s deposit-insurance fund. Conservatives don’t like this idea. They’ve called it a tax increase and unnecessary government intervention. But what would they rather have: An orderly bankruptcy system in which losers actually lose or a too-big-too-fail bailout system that allows losers to win?

The third piece, also from Reader No. 1, is about the City’s Journal’s Fred Siegel, one of the sharpest writers out there today. Don't agree with everything he says. But ...

The Pats: 'What was I worried about?'

2011-11-22T04:26:00.002-05:00

Reader No. 1 on last night's big win: "What was I worried about? Remorseless Patriot second-half crushing Chiefs, actually quite different from so many games the past 4-5 years, where we rolled it up in the first half-hour and cruised / sometimes slipped in second half. Not to get carried away against inferior competition, but encouraging... "

Quick HB note of pessimism: The defense still looks one flimsy straw away from total collapse.

A conservative's critique of a conservative's critique ... Part II

2011-11-21T09:32:00.004-05:00

Reader EM disagrees with the Hub Blog reader immediately below. Here's an excerpt from his email:

The fatal flaw in your respondent's critique comes early:

"the country can be liberated and experience growth in prosperity and freedom through the dimishment of federal largesse."

Austerity is always a last-on first-off proposition, hurting the poorest the most. Until I see convincing evidence otherwise, I believe it appeals to the most crabbed part of our country, which gets more out of hurting those a few rungs lower down the ladder than working to make everybody better off.

Newt himself repudiated this recently:

"..the United States is actually caught between three possible futures:
1. Fantasy and collapse (the Greek model)
2. Pain and Austerity (the Washington establishment model)
3. Innovation and Growth (the Hamilton-Lincoln-Reagan-Thatcher-Gingrich model).

...The Washington establishment’s reaction to the runaway spending is a policy of austerity and pain.
Democrats would cause austerity and pain on the individual by raising taxes, thereby shrinking family and business purchasing power.

Republicans would cause austerity and pain to government by cutting spending and thereby shrinking the services and income transfers government provides.

Clearly, shrinking government is preferable to overtaxing the American people but we must remember that there is a third alternative to pain. It is the path of innovation and growth. Historically, this has always been the American solution."

A conservative's critique of a conservative's critique of conservativism

2011-11-20T04:10:00.003-05:00

Hub Blog sent this column by Ramesh Ponnuru to a number of my conservative friends to see what they thought. One of them sent back the following response, which I pass along in full. He wasn't impressed with Ponnuru's critique of conservativism:

This is really a weird column, and if you didn't tell me it was written by Ponnuru I would have guessed it was written by, say David Brooks - someone plausibly sympathetic to Republicans, but at heart, really conflicted.

First, I'll object to his last assertion - that conservatives object to Mitt because they "fear" he would lead the party to "ruin"
I'm a conservative and I know he would be a lousy Republican, and supply very few coat strings because he does not inspire passion, and because he himself is not animated nor passionate about the philosophical underpinnings of conservativism - You sense, in his heart, he really doesn't believe that the country can be liberated and experience growth in prosperity and freedom through the dimishment of federal largesse. He is passionate about himself and his own destiny and his need to vindicate his father's aspirations, and then to surpass him, finally. Ponneru uses the loaded language of liberals - strange! - when talking about Republicans misplaced fear. We don't fear he will ruin the party - we fear his lukewarm embrace of conservatism will be forever linked to the movement itself, and whatever his failures will be artfully twisted to represent the failures of this philosophy. We fear that what we see as his compulsive need to be liked by the MSM will spill over into GHWBush-like invitations across the aisle to extend his hand, forgetting how skillfully Mitchell outplayed the old man.

He won't ruin the party though - he is an honorable man and he would be a decent and serviceable one-term president who will do little to change the national political dialogue. His successor would be a liberal, but one cloaked in the robes of moderation a la Bill Clinton - claiming this time he is a Democrat who learned from the excesses of the Obama administration - he'll be different - trust me.

Ponnuru says -"'conservatives believed that ideological impurity, especially on spending, had caused those 2006- 2008 losses"
First off - "ideological impurity" is the kind of phrase liberals love to employ when criticizing the right - as in, our zeal to weed out "impurity" that makes it impossible for us to compromise in areas like, say, the super committee. Don't get me started there. Leaving aside the odd choice of words from a man like him, it is not true that conservatives thought "impurity" caused losses - they thought big spending caused a bloated and out of control federal government, and provided democrats with enormous cover to up the ante to ever higher, unheard of levels. it wasn't "impurity" which led to losses, but a lack of animating philosophical energy which gave people of positive reason to get behind the party's candidates - no one like Reagan or Kemp or even Christy was out there on a national scale, selling an idea of what drives the party.

Ponnuru confounds Republicanism with tea-partyism - another liberal habit of convenience.

"Republicans believe that their 2010 election victories were rewards for returning to the true path of conservatism that they had left in the Bush years."

What an ignorant simplification of the attitude of Republicans - yes, they were energized by the drive and passion of the tea-party, notwithstanding it painfully backfired in at least two Senate elections. They believe, I think, that there elections were largely a repudiation of the most grandiose corrupt and unwelcome government power grab in history, in the form of Obamacare. The tea-party, which grew independent of the Republican party, (though admittedly its aims are often congruent), gave a coherent voice to the conservative wing of the party, a language with which to shaper the argument against the incumbent liberals. Find me one idiot who claims we won because we returned to the "true path"?? The only people who use language like that are liberals, who have no other equipment with which to fight conservatism, and instead resort to the arch, unfunny mockery that worked so well among pundits for most of the second half of the 20th century. There seems to be a nostalgic comfort derived form creating then burning those old bogeymen.

He says "In Colorado and Nevada, ( hey - he forgot about Maryland! ) conservative primary voters rejected two electable, conventionally conservative candidates because they were considered part of a compromising establishment."

Ummm yeah, they did. These were tea-party activists, green, idealistic, foolish - admittedly. But how does this recitation of recent history support his earlier argument that "ideological impurity" caused the 2008 election losses in the minds of republicans, but 2010 success was a result of our return to purity - so simple minded.

Those tea-party candidates were as ideologically pure as they come, and they got beat - So does he think we're blind to events as well as just foolishly ideological. because we certainly "returned" to purity there and we got our ass handed to us. Most republicans I heard from on a national level, lamented the nomination of O'Donnell, to name the most prominent example, because it was obvious the other guy, a moderate, would have won. Where does Ponnuru get this stuff? - Newsweek? He makes no sense here, and he tries to squirm out of it in the end as would any NYT/Globe columnist attempting to appear post-ideological by claming that the "real mistakes of the Bush administration keep being made." Right - way to make the two administrations seems politically indivisible, and demonstrate that you alone can see this - nice touch.

Look, I usually like RP, but why not just write the column you meant to write. The candidates we have running aren't the best and it stinks that the Bush administration didn't leave us with a better bull-pen to draw upon - shame on them. If we let the tea-party dominate things, we might end up with a charming but empty suit like Cain - Or an unelectable neophyte like Bachman. Romney is our best chance - it's fine if he thinks that - and thinks our ideological right might give us a loser of a candidate where Obama is eminently beatable. So say that, instead of propping up all kinds of old fashioned calumnies against Republicans - That is unless you're looking for a job at the Daily Beast.

Fighting Ayn Rand with Ayn Rand

2011-11-19T18:09:00.004-05:00

Hey, if it works, it works. Not that I'm a big Ayn Rand fan. I'm not. She was a politicized artist, and the world saw enough of her types in the 20th Century. But if using Ayn Rand to fight Ayn Rand is the only way to get some conservatives to see that the current financial system is not a form of capitalism, then I'm all for it.

Parking lots = urban decay

2011-11-18T10:01:00.005-05:00

Here's an interesting report about parking lots and the demise of American cities. The study looked at the cities of Hartford, New Haven and Cambridge. The first two cities never clamped down on the creation of new surface parking lots. But Cambridge banned new parking lots in the mid '80s. Guess which city is thriving today?

OK, so it's not as simple a correlation as the study suggests. Other factors played a role in the demise of Hartford and New Haven. The Hub Blog family has strong ties to New Haven, and I can assure you New Haven once fully embraced "urban renewal" and every other crackpot government idea about how to improve cities. Yale University played its own sorry role in the demise of its home town. Officials in New Haven have only recently begun to treat the city's own self-inflicted public-policy wounds.

But I think it's pretty obvious surface parking lots, sitting on land where proud buildings once stood, are forms of urban blight. They're depressing. They kill street life. They're missing-teeth gaps within an urban environment.

The Existence of a Plutocracy: Verified?

2011-11-14T09:21:00.004-05:00

So Congressmen can legally trade on inside information? Apparently so. It seems so far-fetched, so unfair, so potentially corrupt, that it's tempting to dismiss the 60 Minutes piece as a pure connect-the-dots conspiracy theory. But if it's true, it's verification that we have a quasi-plutocracy in this country -- in which Wall Street and government people regularly play footsie under the table to the detriment of everyone else.

Update -- Here's more. It seems to be more about the appearance of trading on inside information, rather than actually establishing a connection. That nudges this a little toward the conspiracy-theory zone. But it's still fascinating stuff. Is Congress really exempt from insider trading laws? It's simply unfair.

Papelbon takes his dance jig to Philly

2011-11-12T09:37:00.003-05:00

Reader No. 1’s take on the departure of Jonathan Papelbon to Philly:

See how many Google hits you get on "shipping" and "papelbon" in the news section and marvel at the creativity of headline writers (not even counting all the Tv stations doing likewise). Anyways a good if negative roundup at Dirt Dogs, including the famous 2007 BudLite box. He was fun to watch, kept in top shape this year rebounding from mediocre 2010, loved the pressure. Philly is a great fit even if the team aging like the one he is leaving. National League is better for his fastball-fastball-fastball approach.

Re the Sox, remember the philosophy and experience on closers since new management got here. We spent big once - Keith Foulke, one world series and two washed out injury years for $21m. Don't expect "closer by committee" but look for Cherington to rebuild with perhaps a slightly higher quality of free agents than seen recently.

Reader No. 1 has since sent in a more positive Dirt Dogs send off. ... As for moi, I appreciate what Papelbon did for the Sox. He was a welcome character and a great reliever. He'll always be remembered fondly here for his WS contributions. But I'm not too upset by his departure. It was expected. I'm also a little tired of the Sox. They need to hit the old refresh button to get me more interested about the coming season. ... BTW: I went over to Soxaholix to see its take on Papelbon's departure. Instead, I discovered a link to this truly sorry episode in Sox history. That scandal never got the attention it deserved, coming so close after the 9/11 tragedy. But it's not ancient history, folks. You might say the Sox and Penn scandals overlapped.

Good-bye, Joe Part II

2011-11-10T10:20:00.005-05:00

Eric Wilbur points to this April 2011 column, by Mark Madden of the Beaver County Times, as one of the earliest previews of what ultimately unfolded at Penn State. The “worst-case scenario” came to pass. It’s a great piece that admirably asked the tough questions well before the national media realized that something was amiss in Happy Valley. …

One of the big remaining questions: Why did Jerry Sandusky suddenly leave the Penn State football program in 1999? If it turns out his departure was part of an effort to sweep controversy under the rug, it means Paterno et gang knew about the sexual-abuse allegations for 12 long years – and effectively allowed Sandusky to keep sexually preying on other children. And they knew he hadn’t stopped.

FYI -- Dennis & Callahan interviewed Mark Madden this morning. Madden says more allegations may surface.

Update -- While not mentioning the Penn State scandal, George Will zeroes on what makes big-time college sports programs tick: Money. ... The NCAA and higher-ed people don't realize it yet, but they're headed for a crack up. They aren't running "student-athlete sports" programs anymore. They haven't for a while. They're running multibillion-dollar businesses that exploit young people for the gain of others. They've lost control of the system. The TV networks are effectively running the show now.

Update II -- From Reader JW on the original Paterno post:

Well said. Paterno's larger-than-life stature also is nominally why Penn State students took to the streets in protest Wednesday night, flipping a news van, throwing rocks, destroying property and generally causing chaos. Were all of them genuinely upset about the way a coaching legend was shown the door? Of course not. Many were bundles of raging hormones who went out to raise hell because that's what everyone else was doing. The dudes mugging for the CNN cameras gave that away.

We'll pause here for a brief public service announcement: Kids, don't drink and approach people with microphones. YouTube is forever. Many of those students will have children of their own in a few years, and then they'll finally understand why so many felt so disgusted by the way those in power at Penn State handled this nightmare. They'll realize they embarrassed themselves, their families and their university. They'll feel awfully stupid about the way they acted Wednesday, so don't be too hard on them. The hangover will come. Someday, they'll realize Joe Paterno wasn't the victim in this case. A bunch of innocent kids were.

Good-bye, Joe

2011-11-09T09:02:00.002-05:00

Initially, I held off passing judgment on Joe Paterno, figuring the media might be whipping itself into a frenzy again over an alleged sex-abuse case involving a major college sports program. The ugly Duke lacrosse scandal was definitely in the back of my mind. So was Paterno’s image of running a clean-cut college football program over 46 years. But I’ve now read enough to conclude that a lot of people at Penn State knew, or should have known, that a former Penn assistant coach was sexually preying on young boys at the college – and over a number of years. It’s as if they flicked a mental switch and went into full denial mode. They knew it was wrong. But they deep down didn’t want to deal with it. They wanted it to go away. They pretended it wasn’t there. They valued the image of the program too much. … Maureen Dowd’s column this morning is devastating. … Here’s why sports legends cherish image so much: They’re glorified.

Haynesworth gone: ‘Not with a bang but a whimper’

2011-11-09T08:14:00.001-05:00

Reader No. 1, who made the above observation about Albert Haynesworth’s departure from the Pats, points to two excellent posts by Chris Forsberg and Mike Reiss detailing Al’s final playing seconds for the Pats.

Steve Jobs: Inventor or Tweaker? Part II

2011-11-08T06:46:00.004-05:00

A couple of readers don't like "tweaker" moniker. From Reader AM:

I think Steve Jobs was much less an inventor than a social visionary, around technology - but that's more than a "tweaker." His comps might be George Eastman and Henry Ford, who were certainly technologists but who built their companies on an understanding of how the technologies would be used.

And from Reader No. 1:

I love, love Malcolm Gladwell (and Walter Isaacson, can't wait to read this book) but... 'tweaker' misses the point. The key point is the difference between Invention and Innovation, nicely addressed here.

I think the article was conveying roughly the same point, i.e. Jobs wasn't necessarily an inventor. But I do like the word "innovator" more than "tweaker."

Steve Jobs: Inventor or Tweaker?

2011-11-07T09:38:00.005-05:00

Here's an excellent article that asks whether Steve Jobs was a true inventor or an invention tweaker. The latter is not supposed to be an insult. Not many people know how to tweak inventions to make them work to their full potential. The summary of Steve Jobs' spectacular tweaks:

In the eulogies that followed Jobs’s death, last month, he was repeatedly referred to as a large-scale visionary and inventor. But Isaacson’s biography suggests that he was much more of a tweaker. He borrowed the characteristic features of the Macintosh—the mouse and the icons on the screen—from the engineers at Xerox PARC, after his famous visit there, in 1979. The first portable digital music players came out in 1996. Apple introduced the iPod, in 2001, because Jobs looked at the existing music players on the market and concluded that they “truly sucked.” Smart phones started coming out in the nineteen-nineties. Jobs introduced the iPhone in 2007, more than a decade later, because, Isaacson writes, “he had noticed something odd about the cell phones on the market: They all stank, just like portable music players used to.” The idea for the iPad came from an engineer at Microsoft, who was married to a friend of the Jobs family, and who invited Jobs to his fiftieth-birthday party.

Andy Rooney, RIP

2011-11-05T16:34:00.003-05:00

The amazing thing: I never got tired of him. I didn't eagerly anticipate his commentaries after every 60 Minutes show. But I was always glad to listen to them. They were just down-to-earth, common-sense observations. That's it. That's all he tried to do. And he did it well. He was genuine. And you don't see many genuine people around these days. ... My condolences to the entire Rooney family.

P.S. -- One of my favorite Andy Rooney commentaries came after the Giants beat the Pats in the Super Bowl a few years back. He was obviously happy as a clam. But he wasn't gloating. Then he ended the piece by suggesting the New England Patriots should change their names back to the Boston Patriots. It was an odd thing to throw in. He wasn't trying to mock Boston. Just the opposite. He meant it out of respect for Boston and the traditional rivalry between the two towns. He wanted to beat Boston, not New England. It was a clever way to convey a point.

There's hope yet for Illinois

2011-11-02T05:49:00.004-05:00

Not surprisingly, outsiders often have a hard time grasping the nuances of Boston politics, such as why Whitey Bulger was a bigger-than-life character here beyond his gangsterism. In Illinois, they have their own cast of local behind-the-scenes characters, one of whom was finally convicted yesterday of political corruption. This is a big deal in Illinois. I covered Bill Cellini for years as a reporter in Illinois. It's almost impossible to overstate how powerful he was as an insider's insider within the state's bi-partisan "Republicrat" system. For a decade now, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald (no relation) has been trying to systematically clean up Illinois' politics, first taking down Gov. George Ryan, a Republican, and later Gov. Rod "Blago" Blagojevich, a Democrat. He next went after Cellini, a quiet and long-time lynchpin of the system. No one thought they'd ever see the day -- Bill Cellini, found guilty as charged, in a public court. But there it is. The day arrived. ... Mark Brown of the Sun-Times and John Kass of the Tribune have good pieces trying to convey the importance of yesterday's verdict.

Update -- Well, maybe there isn't hope yet for Illinois. Its budget is a complete disaster. It's so bad, it's funny. It really is. They absolutely refuse to face reality. It's quite remarkable when you think about it.

The Inside Job: Cain gets Borked

2011-11-01T08:50:00.002-05:00

Some conservatives are howling at the MSM for covering the hit job on Herman Cain. But they surely deep-down know it was an internal Republican hit job. Right? … Oh, here’s Karl Rove, giving Herman some obviously dispassionate advice (snort):

“If these allegations are not true, say they aren’t true and put it behind you. … If not, better get everything out sooner rather than later because in a situation like this, if there is something there, that something going to come out.”

Hack-Progressive Alliance runs amok in … Oakland

2011-11-01T08:06:00.003-05:00

Pathetic Oakland. … Via Reader No. 1, who writes: “What happens when you let the hack-progressive alliance get out of balance. 1.5 cheers for Tom Menino.” ... One can only imagine how the establishment in Oakland would react if the same "demands" were issued by the Tea Party.

Mitt 'Pretzels' Romney

2011-10-30T09:39:00.002-05:00

Devastating. ...

But George might be applying a double-standard here. When Republicans seized all four branches of power last decade, they threw aside their principals too. Romney is being consistently inconsistent just like the 'conservative movement' and Republican party as a whole. The difference is that Romney is inconsistent on a daily basis. Republican conservatives are inconsistent depending upon who's in power.

'The Cult of Jurassic Park'

2011-10-30T06:06:00.004-05:00

For those looking for just a fun and engrossing read, it's hard to beat Bryan Curtis's 'The Cult of Jurassic Park.' ... About halfway through the article, I realized I might be a closet Jurassic Park fanboy, though Jaws, The Godfather and Goodfellas remain my true line-by-line fields of fanboy expertise. ... Surprisingly, I've become somewhat of a budding Avatar fanboy. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that, but there it is. ... Bryan's story via Reader No. 1.

The End of the War

2011-10-22T12:05:00.002-05:00

Have you noticed something? ... It has to do with the president's announcement that U.S. troops are pulling out of Iraq by the end of the year. ... Do you notice it now? Give up? ... It's silence. For a war that started with such loud and passionate arguments for and against, the silence now is almost defeaning. The war's not even ending with a whimper. Maybe people don't believe it's over. Maybe most people believe it ended a while ago. Perhaps people are too exhausted or cynical. Maybe it's just me. But it's still kind of strange to think that such a momentous decision could be met with such seeming indifference. ...

Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie show up; OWS officially co-opted

2011-10-22T06:41:00.003-05:00

The quasi-professional protesters are now showing up in droves at OWS. So the protests are now officially kaput. ... Here's the thing: The same quasi-professional crowd has protested for and against a lot of things over the years. Nuclear energy. Climate change. Wars. Racism. Civil rights. Economic justice. Unions. They bring along the same protest uniforms, signs, songs, chants, paper-mache puppets -- and they advocate the same solutions for every problem, roughly centered around strengthening the very same state they so often protest. Then they recently hit upon the idea of protesting against Wall Street. Finally, they hit a chord. Finally, there's a villain most everyone agrees deserves to be villainized. But then they bring along the same protest uniforms, signs, songs, chants, paper-mache puppets -- and they advocate the same solutions for every problem, roughly centered around strengthening the very same state they so often protest.

‘To watch a bureaucracy being born’

2011-10-19T16:04:00.001-05:00

Fred Siegel pens another fine piece, tracing the historical fault-lines within liberalism and concluding the OWS protesters are simply repeating the mistakes of the past. I particularly liked this observation:

Thanks to the Bush and Obama administrations, Wall Street hasn’t been forced to pay the price for its misdeeds. But when I asked some of the Zuccotti Parkers about the politics of government-sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddy Mae, two of the prime players in producing the economic bubble, the question drew either blank stares or “I’ve heard of them” and little more. Though well aware of the corrupting effect Wall Street has had on Washington, most of the protesters, it seems, don’t grasp the two-way nature of crony capitalism.

Via Reader No. 1

The Student Loan Industrial Complex

2011-10-19T08:36:00.004-05:00

Student loans taken out last year exceeded $100 billion, pushing the total outstanding student-loan debt to nearly $1 trillion. Question: How is it helping the economy to have so many young people so deep in debt so early in their lives? Their spending power is dramatically reduced as they pay off these loans. There's no equity involved, so they can't borrow against them. They can't easily wriggle out of the loans, so they are legally anchored down by these debts, sometimes for decades. ...

Like the government's past housing policies, the government's student-loan policies have to be re-evaluated -- and the sooner the better.

After the housing-market crash, many lawmakers on the left and right conceded that the dream of every American owning a home had to be re-evaluated. The policy goal wasn't practical, safe or affordable. The same applies to student loans. The dream of sending every willing student to college also has to be re-evaluated, if it entails putting them into heavy long-term debt. ... Reader No. 1 and I got in a good conversation about the student-loan issue over the weekend. I mentioned to him how some young OWS protesters and sympathizers blamed Wall Street/bank bill collectors for their woes. They make a direct connection between Wall Street and their debt woes. And there is a connection. A big connection. Financial institutions are making big bucks by acting on behalf of the government. But the other culprits in this sad saga -- the government and the higher-education establishment -- are not getting the criticism they deserve.

P.S. -- Comparisons of student loans to last decade's subprime-mortgage frenzy are apt. The similarities are eerie. But because of federal laws, it's harder for borrowers to default on student-loans, reducing the sudden risks of a wide-ranging financial-system disruptions. But student loans still have a long-term effect on the economy. It's a policy desperately in need of review and immediate reform.

'The Missed Red Flags on Groupon'

2011-10-18T10:40:00.003-05:00

Andrew Ross Sorkin looks at Groupon's numbers and isn't impressed. ... For the record, there were no missed red flags at Hub Blog!

Finally, protesters issue a proposed platform

2011-10-14T16:44:00.006-05:00

Most of the ideas are screwy. But some aren't. ... Interesting. ... No idea if this is legitimate or representative of the Occupy movement.

P.S. -- I like points 5., 7., 8., 9., and 16, partly or entirely. ... Five out of 20 ain't that bad.

Update - 10.15.11 -- Mark Cuban announces his own list of priorities for OWS. Many of them are pretty damn good, cutting right to the heart of the rigged financial system.

Update II - 10.15.11 -- Via Reader No. 1, here's a libertarian's take on the protesters:

Mocking them is easy; but here at home, the problem of crony capitalism is in fact eating away at our civic entrails. Leftists willing to grapple with this malignancy should be welcomed, if only for the potential seriousness of their efforts.

As the more thoughtful 68ers eventually discovered, the idea of reforming government by expanding it is a circular dead end.

I wonder what would happen if some serious-minded Tea Party and OWS types got together to hammer out an agreed-upon plan of action. I think they'd find a little bit more common ground than they might realize. There's going to be no consensus, ever, on a single-payer health care system or on eliminating private money from campaigns. But there are some points of convergence worth exploring.

Title Town, Part II

2011-10-14T13:53:00.007-05:00

And if the video in the post below doesn't work for you, then at least:

Title Town

2011-10-14T13:48:00.003-05:00

It's been a rough few weeks for Boston fans. Time to remind ourselves that we're ... you know what. Via Adam.

'They are in no danger of lapsing into the heresies of the past'

2011-10-14T12:23:00.005-05:00

Reader No. 1 sends in this Clark Booth piece from DotNews. Clark:

Teams that stupidly commission dumb and reactionary fools can suffer the consequences for a generation as the Red Sox did when the deeply misguided Yawkey placed his trust in the bizarre likes of Pinky Higgins.

Not that we are predicting anything comparable is about to happen to your contemporary Red Sox. No matter how the current nonsense is resolved they are in no danger of lapsing into the heresies of the past. We’ve moved well beyond all that. The more practical issue is: Can they remain apace of the Rays and Yankees who so gravely humiliated them in 2011 even if they, too, only survived another week?

Reader No. 1 adds:

Clark Booth has seen it all around here and contributes literary, filmic, and historical perspective on Our Principal Owner and the likelihood of what once seemed like the distant past repeating... I hope he is right that we are in 'no danger of lapsing into the heresies of the past.' It would be terrible if we Sox fans found ourselves 'boats against the current, borne back ceaslessly into the past'

For a couple of more sickening headlines, check out Peter Gammons on Twitter, including: "The Red Sox obit has turned into Michael Jackson."

I'm sure we will all now ask the question that Soxaholix hints at: is there a tough guy out there with a Red Sox/New England context who can help right the ship? Here's someone who wasn't here long but was a big part of 1986 success. No idea what he is like, didn't have a great managerial record but then neither did Tito in Philly.

Needless to say, Soxaholix has been on fire the past few days. The punch bowl jibe was classic.

'You've essentially got socialism for the capitalists'

2011-10-14T06:02:00.003-05:00

Michael Lewis says the Occupy movement still has legs. I disagree. But we agree the anger directed at the pseudo-capitalist Wall Street is legitimate and important.

Sox went after Yankees, ended up as Mets

2011-10-13T20:23:00.004-05:00

Reader No. 1 is on an absolute roll, sending in this ESPN piece (whose original headline I stole and shortened above). Reader No. 1’s terse reaction: “Hitting below the belt!” … But we agree it’s a gruesomely accurate low blow. … Man, the Sox have sunk so low so fast. … Also from Reader No. 1: “Theo Epstein’s dream job turned nightmare.” … Some media outlets are too busy trying to resurrect the cute “long-suffering Boston fans” spiel and “curse” narrative, and ESPN is just cleaning up on the obvious facts, to wit: This is a friggin dysfunctional franchise at this point.

Update -- Stealing a line from Patton and applying it to the current Sox chaos, all I can say: “I love it. God help me I do love it so. I love it more than my life.” ... Total breakdown. Total all-out back stabbing. God help me, as a Bostonian, but I do live it so.

‘Tito victim of latest Sox smear campaign’

2011-10-13T08:02:00.004-05:00

Gordon Edes has a completely different take on the Sox painkiller-booze scandal.

And watch the Nomar interview while you’re at it (within the same link). Nomar: “I think people just now are starting to recognize, ‘Ok, there’s a pattern here. All of a sudden it becomes personal.’” And then he lists all the past hit-job targets under current ownership – Francona, Ortiz, Damon, Pedro, Lowe, Manny, himself, etc. He even goes back to Mo and Clemens and Yaz and Williams. But, for our purposes, the current ownership is the issue. No one is quite saying it, but all fingers are pointing in the direction of Lucchino and Henry. They’re the only ones left, unless you count Werner, and I don't.

Update -- From Reader AM:

I think Edes is right, and so's Nomar -- maybe not all the way back to Yaz and Williams, but at least in noting the similarity of the current (remaining) front office's behavior to that of Dan Duquette. As Duquette learned, vilifying everyone on their way out can work for a while, but then it all catches up with you.

As for "John Henry taking a stronger hand" (widely reported) -- well, yeah, I'd think so. The decisions the Sox face over the next five months involve putting hundreds of millions of his dollars at very high risk, one way or another.

They've put together a team that is much less than the sum of its parts, not in terms of character but in terms of distribution of resources. In 2011 they did not have a starting pitcher who ranked in the top 50 in innings pitched, or a corner outfielder who played well enough to be a major league starter, which is not much to show for $100 million. And because their "young" players are 27-28-29, they have to win now (expensive even to try; no guarantees) or really rebuild (which will trash their attendance and business model). Too bad Theo couldn't take the team with him to the NL Central.

Update II -- David Ortiz says he wouldn’t mind playing for the Yankees: “I don't know if I want to be part of this drama for next year.” ... Now watch for a resumption of the smear campaign against him.

Occupy Wall Street, RIP

2011-10-13T07:19:00.001-05:00

Ron Radosh parks it with his deconstruction of the Occupy movement’s origins and almost inevitable descent into standard left-wing rhetoric and theatrics. It’s a shame. I know of a number of non-lefty people who really wanted the rallies to keep their initial focus on Wall Street’s shenanigans. But the subversives were subverted by the subversives. … Ron via Reader No. 1.

One major quibble: For the life of me, I don’t understand how someone as smart as Ron can make the bone-headed mistake of blaming the Obama administration for the bank bailouts. The initial bailouts occurred under the Bush administration and have kept right on going, via the Federal Reserve, which effectively allowed the banks to pay back their bailout debts with indirect bailouts via the fed’s discount window. I know those on the right feel compelled to bash Obama at every turn. But, really, the basic facts about the bailouts aren’t really in dispute. HBO couldn’t possibly be wrong!

Wall Street protests: The 'die-in' stage

2011-10-10T15:17:00.003-05:00

We're hitting the tipping point on the Occupy protests. They tried to hold a "die-in" in DC to protest drone attacks in Afghanistan -- and, curiously enough, they were led by a conservative blogger, who obviously knows how to lead a herd. We're now officially at standard lefty protest stage. Oh, well. The protests were beneficial for a while. ...

Anyone who has followed such protests, for any variety of causes over the decades, knows the "die in" is one of the oldies but goodies, right up there with "Hey, ho ..." chants, paper mache dolls, Hitler mustaches attached to photos of evil opponents, and, of course, my personal favorite, the fearsome anarchists with bandanas. They almost can't help themselves. Their politics are almost their religion, and protests are part of the service rituals. It's too bad. Their complaints about Wall Street are legitimate. They're hitting a chord among non-lefties. But, as I said, they can't resist pulling out the old props, cliches and demands. ...

Whitey Bulger: Hidden in plain view, Part III

2011-10-10T12:39:00.003-05:00

I think the debate is largely over about whether the Whitey tipster should have been outed. The Globe, via DK's two posts this morning, makes compelling arguments for running with the name, among them: 1.) The FBI and US Attorney never objected. 2.) Whitey almost certainly knew the Icelandic woman was the tipster. 3.) There are plenty of other far more damaging witnesses out there and they're not in witness protection. ... Running with the name was the right call in this case.

Whitey Bulger: Hidden in plain view, Part II

2011-10-10T06:52:00.004-05:00

The Herald raises a valid point: Was it right to oust the anonymous tipster in the Whitey case? The arguments against: it could put the tipster's life in danger and discourage anonymous sources in future cases. I get the main points. But here's why this case is different:

1. The entire Whitey case was a moral mess precisely because of the government's past use of secret informers. It's more than a little ironic that some are now whining about the integrity of the anonymous-informant system.

2. The FBI has lost so much credibility that some doubted whether anyone was really paid off for the Whitey tip. Count me among the skeptical. A little extra transparency in this case is justified.

3. The law enforcement community has leaked like a sieve throughout Whitey's gangster career. Does anyone seriously think the name wasn't already floating out there before the Globe identified her?

4. Two-million dollars is a lot of public money to let go without public accountability -- especially in a sordid case like this one.

5. The Whitey saga has been a media circus since the day he was tipped off by an FBI agent and went on the lam in '94. Books and movies are being planned about the Whitey saga as we speak. No one should be shocked by this latest twist.

6. The remnants of Whitey's gang a.) mostly hate Whitey for being an informant. b.) they like the fact he was caught. c.) they're not about to reach out for international retribution. d.) the gang is beyond over the hill. It's kaput.

Still, you've got to be a little nervous about the tipster's safety. How can you not be? But I don't believe terrible risks have been taken.

Whitey Bulger: Hidden in plain view

2011-10-09T09:52:00.005-05:00

The Globe has a huge package about Whitey Bulger's years on the run. It's good. Special bonus: They ID the Icelandic tipster who got the reward money. Believe it or not, I think I recognize her old Noxzema face. At the least, she has that late '60s look that you associate with old shaving commercials, Joe Namath and take it off, take it all off. ...

P.S. -- She also has a face that reminds me of the types of blondes you'd regularly see on Love Boat -- pretty, perky, wholesome.

Protesting Wall Street, Part II

2011-10-09T09:10:00.005-05:00

Reader No. 1 sends in a batch of right-wing/libertarian analysis pieces about the Occupy Wall Street protests. They run from the excellent (Nicole Gelinas) to so-so with a strong ending (Ron Radosh) to downright pathetic (Ben Stein, who plays the cranky old-man character again, complaining about the weather and a Hispanic parking garage attendant who speaks Spanish and ends up embracing Herman Cain's idea that the unemployed are unemployed because they won't get a job). ... Peggy Noonan also has a good piece about all the discontent out there, though it's not necessarily about Occupy Wall Street. ...

I haven't budged much from my own initial reaction to the protesters. I know that most of them are your standard lefties out to get their latest Protest Merit Badges. Personally, my favorite blast-from-the-past protesters are the "anarchists" running around with bandanas covering their faces. Oooooh. They're so fearsome! ... Anyway, where was I? Oh, yeah, the protesters. I still generally support them, until they get too rowdy and disruptive. They're reaching that tipping point. But until then, I'm glad they're drawing attention to Wall Street. The financial system in this country is broken. It's anti-free enterprise. It's not capitalism. Wall Street's "associates" have become a protected class. It's un-American. ... Hub Blog's Manhattan WMD Spy was supposed to be attending yesterday's NYC rally and was due back with a secret undercover report. Maybe the evil anarchists got him. I don't know. But I'll report back when he reports in.

Really good news for a change

2011-10-07T05:34:00.002-05:00

Yankees are out. Bounced by Detroit. ... I feel better. It isn't a case of mindless Yankees hating. It's about misery loving company. ... Now if only the Pats can shut up the Jets this weekend.

Steve Jobs and America's company, Part II

2011-10-06T11:18:00.008-05:00

I was going to mention in the post below how Steve Jobs, Bill Gates et gang came along at a time in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s when so many people were writing off America as a has-been industrial power. That bout of national handwringing came to an abrupt end once the ‘80s boom took hold, led by America’s emerging high-tech titans.

Virginia Postrel covers roughly the same ground, only much better and more deeply:

To understand the cultural significance of Steve Jobs, you have to go back in time: to before the iPad or iPhone or iTunes, before Apple Inc.’s comeback products made candy-colored plastics and iAnything cool, before Jobs got kicked out of Apple, even before the Macintosh hurled a sledgehammer at Big Brother.

It’s 1981. Most people have never heard of Silicon Valley. The country’s most famous businessman is Lee Iacocca, the head of Chrysler Corp. He’s famous because in 1979 he engineered a government bailout -- loan guarantees -- that saved the company.

Good stuff. Read on. It's a trip down the old corporate memory lane. ... Virginia via Instapundit.

Andrew Sullivan:

The reason he strikes such a huge chord with an entire generation lies, it seems to me, beyond his immense technical and business and design skills. It was because he became the bridge between the 1960s and the 1980s, the counter-culture and the counter-counter-culture. He was the hippie capitalist. He was the fusion of two great American forces - personal actualization and a free market.

Steve Jobs and America's company

2011-10-06T09:33:00.005-05:00

Quickly, name a US company that you, as an American, are particularly proud of when talking to overseas friends. General Motors? Please. General Electric? Sort of. Microsoft? Well, OK. Apple? Definitely. Apple has long been highly respected world-wide for its cutting-edge technologies, elegant product designs, and dependable quality. There's a mystery and aura to the company that only a few companies can come close to matching. Google jumps to mind. It's a US company I'm proud of as an American. But Apple is different. It's not just a software or Internet company. It's the whole thing --software, hardware, the whole tangible kit and kaboodle. It represents American industry at its finest. ... And now its visionary founder is gone. Steve Jobs has died. It's a sad day for all his relatives, friends, colleagues, clients and customers. But it's also a sad day for the country. A new Steve Jobs-like character will eventually and inevitably emerge down the road. But the passing away of Jobs is an end of an era in so many ways. It was a good and profound technological era, stretching from the introduction of home computers in the 1970s to the hand-held smart phones of today -- and Steve Jobs was at its forefront every step of the way. It was an amazing run. Steve Jobs was an amazing man.

Finally, students protest rising tuition costs

2011-10-05T14:27:00.005-05:00

Two hundred Northeastern University students held a rally to protest rising tuition rates. But by blaming only banks, they're missing the other culprits: the government and the universities themselves.

The government is too involved in the student-loan business, guaranteeing too many loans and encouraging students to go into debt. The banks are only too willing to oblige, ultimately handling and issuing the loans on the government's behalf. The universities haul in the dough, having no incentive to tighten their belts as long as the student-loan conveyer belt keeps delivering the financial goods. Sound familiar? The similarities to the housing-market bubble are eerie.

Wall Street targeting Elizabeth Warren?

2011-10-03T09:37:00.006-05:00

For the reasons stated in the post immediately below, I'm almost -- almost -- sympathetic toward Warren. ...

Update -- Looks like Brown is going to need all the help he can get, based on this latest poll. But he better be careful not to come across as Wall Street's darling. The betting here is he'll be taking populist shots at the financier class in coming months. He can't afford to let Warren outflank him too much on this issue.

Protesting Wall Street

2011-10-02T09:40:00.004-05:00

I'm with Margery: It's easy to make fun of the 'brats' protesting on Wall Street and in Boston these days. They're largely your usual-suspect lefties -- anti-capitalists at heart and ignorant about how economies work. But here's the thing: They're right to be protesting Wall Street's shenanigans, even if their world views and motives are wrong. Wall Street is not a true capitalist institution anymore. It's practically an extension of government, or government is an extension of Wall Street. Either way, it's not operating under normal free-market principles. Practically every single major firm on Wall Street should be out of business right now. They're not because we, the taxpayers, bailed them out. But there they are, all the Wall Streeters smugly drinking their champagne and mocking the protesters and believing they're the hotshots of capitalism worthy of huge bonuses, and ... Never mind. Don't get me going on these plutocratic clowns.

'The Sox need the formulas for Chemistry,' Part II

2011-10-02T09:32:00.003-05:00

From Reader No. 1 re the post immediately below;

This time YOU nailed it - "people who respected leadership." Incidentally, the Red Sox chief baseball intellectual spoke publicly on the importance of the character issue in 2008.

'The Sox need the formulas for Chemistry'

2011-09-30T17:33:00.006-05:00

Reader No. 1 touches on the Sox 'chemistry' issue that I've been mulling for a few days now. First, Reader No. 1:

The boil bursts, and everything comes out on the table. Jackie McMullan parks it, asking all the right questions.

As Jackie points out, a lot of people looked at decisions in 2003-2004 and said the answer was Moneyball/Sabermetric principles. Not wrong, but not complete: the Sox need the formulas for Chemistry. Hopefully Theo and company are not so smart that they can figure out this challenging new set of skills for competitive advantage.

Tito, thanks for 2 World Series, best for the future.

Here's my thoughts: I believe the Sox are boring. They're soulless. OK, maybe they don't need a Manny. But they also can't have too many Drews either. Every team, no matter what sport, needs spark-plug personalities -- leaders. They need leaders in the military, corporations, nonprofits, classrooms. The leaders can't all be coaches, generals, chairmen and teachers. They also need to come from the rank-and-file. The Sox didn't have 'em. Papi almost fits the bill, but he's a little over the hill and has always struck me as more of a sergeant. The need for leadership is something "Moneyball" management has never addressed and can never address.

P.S. -- Rereading Jackie's article, I should note that Justin Pedroia was a team leader by example, day in, day out. But they needed more. Not just "leaders" per se. But people who respected leadership.

The Long-Suffering Sox Fan Shtick is Back!

2011-09-23T08:39:00.005-05:00

From the NYT:

The ghosts were supposed to be exiled, the curses broken.

But if the Red Sox fail to make the playoffs, and in historic fashion, those good feelings could be washed away and a new curse may emerge for fans to suffer under.

Next up: How baseball is a metaphor for life, tired Shakespearean analogies, interviews with Doris Kearns Goodwin, a new curse name (nominee: Curse of Manny), etc.

Of course, the NYT was lecturing us after the 2004 World Series: ‘With Nothing Left to Win, Fans of the Red Sox Suddenly Feel a Loss.’ … We suffer when we win. We suffer when we lose. No matter what, we suffer. Ah, Red Sox fans! Ah, humanity! …

As for the Sox this year, they bore me. They’ve bored me all year. And last year. They’re a boring team with a completely overrated pitching staff. ... Previous anti-poignant-pain posts here and here.

P.S. -- At Soxaholix, Marty is throwing cheap shots again.

'Amy Bishop pleads insanity in University of Alabama shooting'

2011-09-22T10:17:00.004-05:00

I think it's safe to say she is not exaggerating.

Are 401(k)s Ponzi schemes?

2011-09-21T08:17:00.001-05:00

Everyone is talking about whether Social Security is nothing more than a big Ponzi scheme.

But has anyone made the same argument about the private 401(k) plans of average American investors? Just throwing out the idea. Think of all the recent rogue trader stories we’ve been reading of late. They and their non-convicted financier colleagues ultimately get first dibs on “institutional” money invested by mutual fund companies, etc. They extract fees. They take home huge portions of investment-return profits. They pay themselves first – and then retire first (often buying professional sports teams as a post-retirement hobby – but I digress). The average investors get what’s left over.

But even the left-over crowd depends on a healthy stream of new investors (i.e. the young) to keep pumping money into the system to prop up or drive up the prices of stocks, commodities and other investment products, until the left-over crowd can retire, leaving the newest investors (i.e. the young) holding the left-overs bag. The entire process repeats itself … until the system collapses, like, say, what happened in 1929 or 2008.

Of course, one could argue the 401(k) game is nothing more than a generational version of Musical Chairs – just like Social Security. Still …

As I said, just throwing out the Ponzi-scheme parallels, since so many seem determined to bash Social Security these days, including financiers, who’d just love to get their hands on all those privatized Social Security dollars via 401 (k) accounts.

Hey, look! It’s a ghost from rogue traders past!

It’s the banking system, stupid – Part XXXVIII

2011-09-20T07:13:00.003-05:00

Five months after Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, yours truly wrote a piece headlined “It’s the banking system, stupid.” Three years later, the same argument holds true.

One can throw Keynesian government spending at our current economic problems. One can advocate Supply-side tax cuts. Others can push for deficit reduction or higher taxes on the rich. But it all ain’t going to matter much as long as the big banks aren’t lending.

Another day, another financial rogue trader

2011-09-19T07:16:00.003-05:00

It's a wonder anyone defends our financial system anymore.

Remembering 9/11

2011-09-11T10:26:00.004-05:00

If you want to see an inspiring 9/11-associated documentary, check out Nova’s Engineering Ground Zero. It’s superb. While watching it, I was awed by the devotion and determination of workers to achieve their collective goal: To rebuild Ground Zero, with the highest priority being to finish the 9/11 Memorial by today’s 10th anniversary of the attack. They simply were not going to miss today’s deadline. They didn’t. …

I don’t have much else to add to all that’s been written about 9/11 over the past few days. I’ll just say that some relatives and I visited New York about two and half weeks after the attack, deliberately going there to “spend dollars” (remember that appeal?) and to pay homage. The saddest moment was venturing down to southern Manhattan and, to my surprise, still seeing that horrible gray dust covering empty store fronts, back-alley fire escapes and window sills. The gray dust got to me. I felt like I was violating hallowed ground.

National Guard troops were everywhere, manning barricades and blocking off streets. The NYPD were also there in force. The somber tourists -- and that’s what we were, tourists -- were politely kept back as unseen construction crews could be heard loudly hammering and digging away behind buildings that blocked views of Ground Zero. It was the same inspiring devotion and determination that I mentioned above, albeit it was tinged then with an almost overwhelming sense of sadness and disbelief.

The President and those evil Teamsters, Part II

2011-09-11T08:05:00.001-05:00

Someone emailed me to say he didn’t understand my post the other day on the Teamsters. Perhaps I was too rushed and cryptic when I wrote the post. So let me be more explicit: I was making fun of the conservative bee-hive indignation over President Obama’s association with the Teamsters, putting past presidential ties with Teamsters into larger historical perspective, starting with Ronald Reagan’s embrace of the ethically challenged union in 1980 and 1984. I could have gone back much further in presidential history.

The conservative movement’s latest gotcha point of the week (i.e. Obama and the Teamsters) has been utterly fascinating to watch unfold. I think it was either Tom Bethell or Joseph Sobran, both conservative writers, who used to describe liberal activists as worker-bees, buzzing around their hives (Mother Jones, Village Voice etc.) awaiting their orders and then launching coordinated bee-hive attacks on their ideological opponents, even if they didn’t have a clue what they were talking about. I always loved that bee-hive metaphor – and I’ve simply applied it to conservative activists. Most of them are nothing more than conservative worker bees at this point. …

Not that Obama’s association with the Teamsters isn’t troubling. But it’s no more troubling than Reagan’s or Nixon’s associations with the Teamsters, who have a long history of throwing their amoral support behind whatever party isn’t issuing indictments against them at the moment.

The Hack-Progressive Alliance: ‘A pernicious paradigm’

2011-09-10T07:23:00.004-05:00

At Sal DiMasi's sentencing hearing yesterday, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Wolf didn’t explicitly refer to the unholy alliance of liberals and hacks on Beacon Hill, i.e the Hack-Progressive Alliance. But he sure came close to it:

Wolf referenced letters sent to the court from some of DiMasi’s former colleagues as examples of the moral tone deafness on Beacon Hill. He cited rationales offered up by Rep. James Fagan and Rep. Frank Smizik in particular:

“Mr. Smizik said the day you were convicted in the Boston Herald, ‘I’ve never seen a better speaker. It’s a shame that somebody who did a good job gets caught up in something like this.’ You were essential to creating it. It seems to be an attitude that if somebody supports causes that you care about, some corruption is to be expected, and I think that’s a pernicious paradigm.”

More on the Hack-Progressive Alliance here.

The Patriots: No Super Bowl this year?

2011-09-09T08:55:00.001-05:00

Bill Barnwell doesn’t think the Patriots will make it to the Super Bowl, largely because there’s no way Brady can repeat his MVP performance from last year and because the Pats can’t possibly match their low turnover rate from last year. … Sounds statistically smart to me. But I’ll just go with my non-statistical gut: Teams aren’t as intimidated by the Pats as they used to be; BB hasn’t paced the team well heading into the playoffs over the past few years; the secondary is still a big question mark; the Packers, Jets and others just seem sharper and hungrier… Btw: Great Packers-Saints game last night. … Barnwell via Reader No. 1.

The President and those evil Teamsters

2011-09-09T08:04:00.003-05:00

I, too, am outraged by the president's embrace of the Teamsters and his later inaction in the face of overwhelming evidence of their unacceptable behavior and associations:

In 1980, Ronald Reagan forged a close political relationship with (Teamsters president) Jackie Presser. During Reagan's 1980 campaign for president, Jackie Presser served as one of Reagan's hosts at a private luncheon for Teamster and other union leaders and escorted Reagan to private meetings with Teamster officials.[20] After the November 1980 presidential election, Reagan named Presser as a labor advisor to his transition team. The media soon reported that Presser was reputed to have links to organized crime and that he was the object of a DOL civil suit for financial malfeasance. Reagan and his advisors claimed to have been unaware of the accusations, and Presser denied having any ties to organized crime.[15][21] Just days after the story broke in the national press, however, New Jersey State Police witnesses testified that Presser was the primary contact for the DeCavalcante crime family of New Jersey and the Patriarca crime family of Boston whenever crime figures needed loans from Teamster pension funds.[22] The courtroom testimony intensified the pressure on the Reagan transition team.
Democrats and leaders of the Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU), a Teamster reform group, demanded that Reagan remove Presser from the transition team. But Reagan aides said that the transition team had completed its task and the issue was now moot.

Oh, I forgot. It wasn't that president's ties to the Teamsters. Or another president's ties to the Teamsters. It was the current president's ties to the Teamsters. Sorry. My indignant mistake.

The Debate and Perry's lack of experience

2011-09-08T07:32:00.001-05:00

Hub Blog didn't watch the GOP debate last night, but Reader No. 1 did:

My own take: the debate, the party and the voters were well-served by having eight distinctive personalities onstage at the same time.

Brian Williams questions clearly showed the MSM bias, but he did a fine job of managing time and interactions after the intro (overly focused on the 2 frontrunners) and other than the abrupt end (though I did not miss eight concluding statements).

Perry's lack of prior experience in these forums showed. He was less smooth than Romney or Huntsman, less in command that Gingrich. I suspect he will improve, he needs to improve or he won't be President.

Huntsman alternated between great (talking about his record in Utah, critique of Obama) and useless (giving aid to the "anti-science" arguments).

I agree that the polls will tighten up at this point.

The Unimaginative Class

2011-09-06T07:40:00.002-05:00

The Imaginative Class once again shows how unimaginative it really is, to wit: They want to change the name of Bulfinch Triangle/West End to "SoCa." Get it? SoHo. SoCa. Just like how they tried to change the name of the Sound End to SoWa. ... Readers are dumping all over the idea. Rightly so.

The Worst Coaches in Boston Sports History, Part IV

2011-08-26T08:53:00.004-05:00

Reader AM adds another to his list:

Here's one I should have mentioned - a hitting coach, Rick Burleson. He's a big part of the reason why Butch Hobson really was an awful manager. The Sox had just brought up two extraordinarily gifted young hitters, both left-handers with great power and remarkable patience for their ages, both incidentally native New Englanders. So to coach them, in came The Rooster, a righty with no power and not much of an eye who got by on and believed in aggressiveness at the plate. Both Mo Vaughan and Phil Plantier wound up back in the minors, and neither I think was ever quite the hitter he should have been because their selectivity didn't develop as it might have.

The Worst Coaches in Boston Sports History, Part III

2011-08-25T11:24:00.009-05:00

Now Reader AM has answered the call, with some real ghosts-from-the-past names (Frank Leahy and Chuck Fairbanks etc.):

Clive Rush is a good call - he was crazy. The "Black Power" defense was my favorite example. Rod Rust didn't do very well, and Dick MacPherson, though the nicest man ever, was not a success.

In baseball, Mike Higgins was awful (no "Black Power" defense here - some power, but no blacks, no defense). (it's apparently not true, however, that Don Buddin was his illegitimate son, as widely rumored.) I'm no fan of Don Zimmer - the Sox should have won by 10 games in '78 even with the injuries (being able to deal with injuries is the test of a manager, and Zim failed spectacularly.) Then there are the non-managers - Emil Fuchs for the Braves, and the Sox/Americans situation in 1907 - think it's a bad sign when your manager commits suicide during spring training?

I'd be inclined to give M.L. a pass - everyone knew he was taking one for the team, and some suggested that he was supposed to lose. Pitino's another crazy man. I think he tried to get Scottie Pippen that first year because he'd chosen to win and all the other NBA coaches were (he thought) morons, but he was one veteran away.

Hockey - well, that guy before Julien didn't achieve much.

In the college ranks, how about Ronn Tomassoni (I may have misspelled this, but as far as I'm concerned he misspelled both of his names), who utterly destroyed the Harvard hockey program?

Two Boston-connected guys, Frank Leahy and Chuck Fairbanks, were in effect blackballed from college coaching because, despite .800+ records, they were considered too pathologically competitive to be football coaches. Or something.

BTW: The Pats' Dick MacPherson later admitted: 'I made a huge mistake going to New England.' ... I wouldn't put the Zip on my all-time worst list. Maybe the all-time frustrating list, along with Jimy Williams. Neither was good in a close shave. ... Ba dum chh! ... Julien was preceded by Dave Lewis, who looks like the worst of a sad string of mediocre Bruins coaches. ... Ronn Tomassoni's name is spelled correctly. Here's an article on his resignation.

The Worst Coaches in Boston Sports History, Part II

2011-08-25T11:00:00.003-05:00

Reader No. 1 answers the call:

Speaking as a practicing manager, there are always many factors to take into account, I prefer the designation 'unsuccessful' coaches Virtually all failed managers-coaches did something right at some point in their careers and some who failed do well in another context with what they learned (you could put all four of our major coaches in that category). Having said all of that:

Rick Pitino's Celtic tenure was extraordinarily unsuccessful relative to expectations. He did draft well (Billups, Pierce) but stability and improvement never materialized.

Joe Kerrigan's 2001 fill in stint with the Sox. The roster was a train wreck of overpriced has beens. Unfortunately this talented pitching coach never got another chance to date.

Rod Rust, coach of the 1990 1-15 Pats, also never got another head job shot in NFL and according to Wikipedia was winless in his CFL chance.

Forgot about Rod. ... Still awaiting word from Reader AM. Anyone else with nominees, just send them in. ... Someone suggested branching out to college coaches. Fine with me. In these parts, that largely means Boston College coaches. Maybe even some UMass and Harvard coaches, if anyone has nominees.

Steve Jobs: An end of an era

2011-08-25T09:03:00.004-05:00

The stepping down of Apple's Steve Jobs is sad on so many fronts. It's sad on a personal level to see anyone stricken with such a terrible illness. It's sad on a corporate level for Jobs' beloved Apple. It's sad for the high-tech industry. But it's also sad for America in general.

Unfortunately, we live in a time when so many of our greatest minds flock to Wall Street for the quick and easy riches, whether they're Harvard or MIT or other college grads, and shun professions where patience, hard work and risk are the name of the game. Please don't tell me that finance is a risky business. It isn't. It's a safe, almost guaranteed way to make big bucks, with the government acting as a virtual backstop for all types of blunders. It has become the anti-thesis of true capitalism. But An Wang, Ken Olsen, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs. Now those are free-enterprise titans worthy of a nation's deep respect. They were all young entrepreneurs at one point. Their successes were never guaranteed. They were industry pioneers. They ended up changing industry history and our lives.

Now one of those risk-taking giants is stepping down. Who is going to replace Jobs? Who is the next true American free-enterprise titan who can come even close to what he's accomplished? I'm sure there are some worthy candidates out there. Mark Zuckerberg comes to mind, though his genius is more of the type that rides the crest of technological innovation, rather than creating technological innovations. Zuckerberg is an adapter. Jobs is a creator. There's a big difference. Steve Jobs has been a huge innovative force within the high-tech world for 35 long years now, changing the computer, movie, music and phone industries along the way. It's an understatement to say he will be missed. His departure leaves a gaping hole within America's tech and innovation sectors.

The Worst Coaches in Boston Sports History

2011-08-25T08:46:00.003-05:00

Responding to the post immediately below, Suldog has some excellent nominees:

I'd have to say Pinky Higgins and Billy Herman should rank ahead of Butch Hobson as stinkers.

Higgins was responsible (along with Yawkey, of course) for the Sox being the last team to break the color barrier, and he was a renowned alcoholic as well. His .498 winning percentage over 8 seasons doesn't appear totally execrable until you see that he led them to a .545 in his first year (1955) and went down, down, down in each year following, bottoming out at .422 in 1960 (he "rebounded" with .469 and .475 in 1961 and 1962, then was canned.) Not coincidentally, other AL teams were signing and playing good darker-skinned talent as Higgins' tenure went along, while the Sox remained the whitest team in baseball.

Herman led the team to consecutive 9th place finishes in 1965 and 1966, amassing a stunning 128 - 192 record along the way. Dick Williams took over in '67 and the rest is history.

I still haven't heard back from Reader No. 1 and Reader AM about their nominees. If anyone else has suggestions, send 'em in. I'm particularly interested in hearing from Bruins fans, due to my own minimal knowledge of hockey. As I told Suldog, "Going through three-plus decades without a Stanley Cup suggests a rich mine of coaching incompetence, though J. Jacobs, like Yawkey, shoulders much of the blame."

'The Twelve Worst Coaches in Sports History'

2011-08-24T15:50:00.002-05:00

There are some surprises on the list. No Bostonians, though one of them is oddly wearing a Boston uniform. ... Has anyone ever put together the worst coaches in Boston sports history? Reader No. 1 and Reader AM, help me here. Clive Rush, M.L. Carr and Rick Pitino come quickly to mind. ... Butch Hobson's name pops up on my radar, but I really don't think he deserves to be on the all-time worst MLB managers list. ...

Something to truly worry about: Hurricane Irene

2011-08-24T07:41:00.002-05:00

Now this I worry about. ... Not that yesterday's earthquake wasn't significant. But Irene looks potentially far more serious at this point. ...

'I Shouldn’t Be Alive: Caught in the Massachusetts Quake of 2011'

2011-08-24T07:16:00.005-05:00

PBS’s Frontline has already produced a documentary on yesterday’s earthquake, focusing on the incredible tale of Armchair Gen. Savin Hill, who kindly sent in the following transcript of the documentary:

Narrator: It started out as a typical late summer day in New England for Armchair General Savin Hill. The sun was shining and he was in his home office. The General's a self-employed marketing specialist, and the day seemed to start out like many others.

The General: As usual, I knew I had a lot of work in front of me. I had conference calls to make, email marketing programs to manage. It seemed like a typical day.

Narrator: Then, without warning, the General's day took a deadly turn.

The General: I was making a PB&J sandwich when I noticed a slight swaying.

Narrator: The General had suddenly found himself in the great Massachusetts Earthquake of 2011 -- one of the worst extremely minor earthquakes in the past 100 years.

The General: I knew it was an earthquake. I'd felt the 1.3 back in '98 -- my couch moved one-sixteenth of an inch back then. This was much worse. I saw the blinds move almost imperceptibly.

Narrator: Moving with cat-like agility, the General dashed out to his porch.

The General: I knew inside was not safe - but then I found myself on the porch! Not only could I be crushed by the house -- but I was sure to get splinters too.

Narrator: The General then vaulted into his parking space immediately behind his porch and made his way to his back "yard" -- a terrifyingly tiny space measuring 15 feet by 25.

The General: I used the James T. Kirk "roll" maneuver I'd seen in Star Trek to get from the parking space to the back yard. It seemed to work perfectly as I ended up in the back yard in a crouching position -- having transitioned from the James T. Kirk pre-roll crouching position. My shoulder was slightly dirty from the roll, but other than that, I thought I was fine.

Narrator: The General then had a choice -- to remain in the relative safety of his tiny back yard, or risk going back into the house and scheduling some conference calls.

The General: I knew another extremely small after shock could happen at any minute -- what if I was inside? I decided to stay outside, crouching by the rose-of-sharon bush in the shade to keep out of the wilting New England sun.

Narrator: As the General waited under the rose-of-sharon bush, he was becoming slightly thirsty. If he remained there for another 12 days, he could die.

The General: I knew if I stayed under that bush continuously for 12 days, I was a goner. By this point it had been nearly 48 minutes since my last glass of orange juice. I was having waking dreams of fountains of orange juice -- but I knew I just couldn't get to it. Not without taking the 38 seconds to go back in the house and go to the refrigerator. …

You’re not going to find a more dramatic account of yesterday’s dramatic events. Look for the full Frontline "I Shouldn't Be Alive" documentary later next month on your favorite PBS station.

P.S. -- Armchair Gen. Savin Hill and I have agreed: The next Frontline documentary should be "Falling Productivity: The crisis of home-office procrastination"

Wall Street's dependency on government

2011-08-22T10:45:00.002-05:00

Next time someone says Wall Street is a bastion of true laissez-faire capitalism, show 'em these disgusting numbers. ... Hats off to Bloomberg for ferreting out the numbers.

The 1970s in reverse?

2011-08-21T15:34:00.002-05:00

Hub Blog knows that conventional wisdom, at least on the right, says we're reliving the 1970s all over again, i.e. sooner or later President Obama is going to have his killer rabbit moment. I know what they mean. Some of the similarities are eerie, including seemingly intractable economic problems combined with weak presidencies. But watching this Jon Stewart piece, it kind of hit me the opposite might be true, i.e. this might be the conservative movement's 1970s. A kind of reverse 1970s.

I remember the '70s as a time when liberalism hung too firmly to its dogmas, refusing to take pragmatic steps to solve problems and deviate from old Keynesian theories. Economically, they refused, until the last moment, to take on the '70s inflation dragon, saying it would worsen unemployment do so. OK, now replace 'liberalism' above with 'conservativism,' 'Keynesian' with 'Supply Side' and 'inflation dragon' with 'unemployment dragon,' etc. Of course, also change the decade references. But still ... All right, the theory needs work. A lot of work. Obama playing the role of Carter is simply too obvious to ignore. But I can't get the other parallels out of my mind.

Boston’s history of filling in the harbor

2011-08-21T06:25:00.002-05:00

Here’s a cool slide show presentation by Boston College’s Jeffery Howe on all the landfill projects over the centuries in Boston – from filling in Mill Pond to filling in of the Back Bay. There’s a striking resemblance to my waistline adjustments over the years, but we won’t get into that. … Slide show via Lexington Reader.