Category Archives: Philosophy

What May Come

Law, Philosophy, Politics, , , ,

With all the ‘talk, talk, talk’ going on about the Impeachment investigation I thought it would be nice to lay out the possible paths we may be fallowing in the near future. I’ll start with where we are now, with the Secretary of State Pompeo not honoring the House subpoenas for depositions by State Department employees. We can now ignore, or prune, that branch of the tree that starts with full cooperation.

What are the possible actions now? In no particular order of preference there seems to be three possible branches. Branch one: Increased resistance by the Executive branch. The next Branch is that the resistance stays as low key as possible and the final branch is acquiescence to the subpoenas.

I do not find the third Branch likely but it is the cleanest/simplest. What can follow it is that the House Committees either find sufficient evidence to recommend to the House to vote Impeachment or It doesn’t. If the person(s) being investigated are truly innocent of any impeachable actions this would be the best course for everyone concerned. Given the current evidence available to the public this does not seem likely as it does seem to show that Donald Trump did, in fact, attempt to get a foreign government to provide a thing of value for his upcoming campaign. Of course it is possible for the President to argue that Op Research is not a thing of value. Also it can be argued that he really didn’t ask for this. The problem is both arguments are quite thin and really don’t play well with an impartial jury.

So let us take on the first Branch of the tree, complete non-compliance subpoenas has and total resistance to giving evidence to the House Committees. This branch leads very quickly to either the House caving in and waiting to see just what the election in 13 months brings. Or the house can attempt to use it’s more usual method of enforcing it’s subpoenas by asking the Justice Department to bring criminal contempt charges. This would lead to another set of branches, the JD could honor the request or just ignore the request or responded that they see no merit in the request.

Let’s look at this last one first. Finding that the request for criminal contempt was with out merit would force the House to either just cave in or move quickly to using inherent contempt. More on inherent contempt later. Just ignoring the request has the advantage of burning time while leading eventually to the same two branches of finding no merit. As far as honoring the request for Criminal Contempt this leads to the problems of having the Attorney General go against the wishes of the President, something the current President doesn’t take well. Look for this to happen if Pres. Trump has found a way to get someone else to take the fall. In any case this path leaders inevitably to either the House passing/not passing a bill of Impeachment.

So now let us look at the possibilities of those branch’s above that lead to the use of inherent contempt which will entail having the House Sargent at Arms arresting the person or persons. As inherent contempt has not been used since 1934 (85 years) it is almost anyone’s guess on just how it will be worked now. Something to what for is actions taking place in the House Sargent at Arms office and in/around the cells in the House basement. This action by the house could quite easily lead to one of two events/branches. First, and most likely is that the person or persons peacefully submit to arrest. They also could resist the arrest. The resisting could take many forms, all the way from just not letting the persons from the House Sargent at Arms into the building the person to be arrested is in all the way up to having the persons own security detachment forcefully protecting their charge from the people attempting to make the arrest. This last would be very bad for all concerned and while possible I really don’t see it happening.

Let us look at the breach that leads to the person or persons who are defying the Congressional Subpoena(s) being taken into custody. The House would have to hold a trial and this trial could be long or short depending on the House Membership and just how strong the person(s) being held is. It is customary to drop the Contempt Charge(s) if the person so charged takes action to make amends. If the House does find them in Contempt they have several options ranging from fines to imprisonment. This can last till the current congress expires in just over a year from now. It is also possible that if these persons are of sufficient rank, that is they hold a non-selective service job (and in some cases even if they do) they too can be impeached and removed from office. (Please note that being removed from office by conviction on impeachment is tantamount to being fired for cause and you loose all benefits etc.)

That is all I can foresee for now. More later as thing become either more murky, less murky, or stay the same.

“No Me, Gim Do It.”

Philosophy, Politics, , , ,

When I and my Cuz Shari were toddlers our mothers put us down for a nap in the same play pen. The then went into the kitchen for coffee and a chat. Sometime later there was a great crashing noise from the room we were in. When the mom’s got there they saw the pen had totally collapsed. Shari, standing in the middle of everything looked up and said “No Me! Gim Do It.” Even tho it was obvious to the moms that is had been Shari’s doing.

This is exactly what I think is starting to happen with the Trump Administration and the Ukraine scandal and why I have used the illustration above. While it is Tammany Hall, and thus Democrat Party it is still very illustrative of what is happening now. (Note: I know enough political history to know that both corruption and shifting of blame is an All Parties phenomenon.). While we currently only have three people in the ring (Trump, Pence, and Giuliani) and this is more of a triangle I feel confident that more will be added soon. Some of them will be totally uninvolved, others on the side of ‘Truth, Justice, and the American Way’, and others guilt of some involvement. This is a classic Mob tactic, throw everyone you can under the Bus in hope you will get away scot free. That is why the Impeachment hearings in the house are so important.

Like in chess, Mobsters, try and complicate things when they are loosing. This is about the only way you can get your opponent to make a mistake and that is their only hope of winning. The American people need to see in the simplest, clearest terms just what Pres. Trump did, and what his henchmen did. All of the underbrush being tossed out by the suspects need to be clear away. The facts of the case need to be stated in the simplest, cleanest, clearest manner for all to see. This is why the hearing(s) need to be as tightly focused on the attempt to use the Ukraine to become involved in our 2020 election. While the Impeachment is just an indictment the American people need to be able to see that if the Senate does not Convict, that vote was totally motivated by partisan need and not by any reasonable doubt of culpability.

These hearing(s) need to be done quickly, too. Not only for the nation as a whole, but for the Republican Party. The worst possible outcome would be for Donald Trump to win the Republican Nomination and then be convicted in the Senate. So to the House Of Representatives I say move with ‘all deliberate speed’. To the Democrats I say, do everything you can to see that the truth is shown clearly, to Republicans I say remember you are Americans first and Republicans second and work toward the best interests of the nation, remember what America stands for. This is the only way you can save your party from going the way of the American Party.

The GOP & Russian Election Interference

General, Philosophy, Politics, , ,

It would seem my timing for this and my last post could not be better. As you may remember my last post dealt with several hypothesis on why the GOP did not support actions or laws to stop the interference by Russia, or any other foreign government, from influencing our elections. With the hissy fit that Moscow Mitch thru on the Senate floor yesterday I hope that the rank and file GOP will tell their representatives it is time to change.

Reason One: It is the traditional role

Sense the very early 20th century the Republican Party has taken the position that it was the best party to protect the nation from foreign influence. Sense the Russian Revolution they also took on the role of the party that is protecting us from Bolshevik/Communist infiltration. From 9/11 the GOP has told us that they were the party to protect us from terrorist. Yet when we are given hard evidence, by multiple intelligent agencies, they do nothing. This is an issue tailored made for the GOP. They have over a hundred years of experience campaigning with protecting the USA from the evil foreigners, starting with the Republican Parties antecedences the “Know Nothings” of the 1850’s. With how effective the current rhetoric of Pres. Trump about the ‘Hispanic’ menace or the hell holes the ‘the squad’ represent this should be a no brainer. The election is over a year away, it is not too late.

Reason Two: It is Insulting

That the GOP needed Russian help to elect Donald Trump in 2016 is insulting to the Republican Party. This is the party of Lincoln, Reagan, and two Bushes, and they were running against a Clinton and a woman, they didn’t need Russian interference. This would play very very well with the electoral base.

Reason Three: No need to work with the Democrats

The was no need nor reason to work with the enemy, AKA Democrats, to do this. The GOP controlled both houses of Congress in the 115th so no help was needed. As far as Robert Mueller, he work for GOP Presidents. At worst, if what the GOP has let us see, the Trump Campaign was nothing more than ‘Useful Idiots’. At best they saw the danger and walked away from any offers. (This last has very low probability given the Mueller Report.) An while the President doesn’t come out too well it doesn’t really hurt the party. Even now, Sen. McConnell could have a “Republican” law introduced to help keep any foreign influence from our elections. It could actually do something and be more than a legal placebo.

That’s all for now. It is up to you, dear reader, to decide just what the GOP is doing and why. Once you do, be sure and vote next year. Especially if you are upset with the GOP as they always do worse in high turn-out elections.

A Reason Why the GOP Senate is Acting the way it is.

Philosophy, Politics, ,

Once more, today, a Senator who is a member of the GOP Caucus of the Senate has stoped the passing of a Law to have any campaign who is offered help by a foreign government report such offer to FBI. No reason for the objection was given and some people are starting to wonder just what the GOP is up to. In my searches of the internet to see if I could find any reasons why the GOP Caucus is acting this way I have been flooded with theories and conspiracies but no hard statements form reliable or notable sources. I would like to put forward some ideas of my own and would like to see how they play out.

Hypothesis One: Motions were Unanimous Consent

This latest stoppage was to what is known as “Unanimous Consent” motion and it means literally what it says: all of the Senate agrees, votes Yes, to enact the law. It is possible that the Senator who objected to the Unanimous Consent felt that such an important act needed proper debate. Maybe she just objects to the whole idea of Unanimous Consent. This later idea is easy to check, if a bit of work, just see if she has objected to all previous Unanimous Contents while she has been in the Senate. But basically we are saying the the Senator in Question objects to the bill in question being passed by Unanimous Consent for what ever reason.

Hypothesis Two: A poison pill

It could be that there is some clause buried that the GOP strongly objects to. This is known as a ‘poison pill’ and is a very common tactic used by the minority party of one house to get the majority of the other house to kill the bill. To date I’ve n to heard of ‘poison pill’ in the bill, but I will keep my eyes open for it.

Hypothesis Three: “Not in my Senate!”

This is a simple one. It could just be that the GOP caucus does not want to pass any bill from the house it just doesn’t have to. That is this bill was not in the “Must Pass” category. This to is easy to check to see if only “Must Pass” bills from the house have voted on by the Senate.

Hypothesis Four: Force of Habit

This final idea is that Senator McDonnell is just in the habit of not passing any bills put forward by a Democrat. It has been almost then years that he and the GOP Caucus has been objecting to any bill that the Democrats, House or Whitehouse, has put forward. The very idea of agreeing with the Democrats is an anathema to them. Not that they don’t welcome support form Democrats when it is clearly a GOP Bill but whenever it looks like the Democrats can claim to have a win it will be stoped dead. Currently i see no way to test this.

Of all four hypothesis’ I favor the fourth and I hope someone will suggest a way to test it’s validity. In any case we seem to be in for an election in 2020 where who ever win’s will have to defend their election against charges of being elected by the Russians.

A new Boss of Boss’s

Philosophy, Politics, , ,
Mr. Big

Hypothesis: Donald Trump has Turned the GOP in to a mafia organization.

As anyone who has followed the Trump Administration and read just a few of the ‘tell all’ books knows it has been said a time or two that it is run like a ‘Mob Family’. Not sure if they mean like a real mafia organization or just like our TV/Movies version. In any case the most recent action(s) of the GOP in the House I think it is safe to say that the House members of the GOP think it is. Further more they seem to be running their caucus like it too.

This is not something new. The GOP, all of it, has been on this road for sometime now. I submit it can be traced back to 1990’s and the “Contract on America” and the start of a much more vigorous control of the GOP Congressional Causes. It started to take it’s current form with the 2010 elections and the near absolute control of many of the state houses by GOP super majorities. With these super majorities in place the GOP was able to redraw congressional districts to favor the GOP. Good old guided age gerrymandering. With these new districts in place it became an assured thing that the only thing a GOP incumbent needed to fear was being primaried by someone to the ‘Right’ of them.

The primary challenger doesn’t have to be really more to the right of the incumbent, he just has to make the incumbent look like he is to the ‘left’ of him/her. With the way the congress worked in the teens this was quite easy to do. All the challenger has to do is show that the incumbent has ‘compromised’ with the ‘left’ (read that Democrats) or worse yet, voted with them when the caucus didn’t. This means that the House GOP Wip has a great deal of clout to swing. All he has to do is walk over to the congress person in question and say in a quite voice “Nice little district you have here. Same if you loose it.”

Other things have also come about. Like ‘out of town’ talent ($$$$$) can now be easily and quietly brought in. With the creation of ‘fake news’ and the creation of tailor made new reporting and the end of the fairness doctrine it is very easy to down any incumbent. Add into the the open acceptance of ‘transactional politics’ (I call it “Zero Sum” politics) where if your side doesn’t get everything it demands then it has lost and you have the makes of our current situation.

So how does this lead to Pres. Trump turning the GOP Mafia type organization? haven’t I just shown it was already been turned into one? Well, not really. I’ve shown all of the elements/components needed to make a mafia were present but it was missing one element. It needs a person ready willing and able to be the ‘Boss’. Sure the GOP had many many people wanting to be the Boss, but none of them had what it takes to do it. Donald Trump did and does. I submit that was missing was the way Donald Trump communicates to the ‘base’. Donald Trump has many faults but not being able to size up his mark. An make no mistake his was the GOP, not the American people. He doesn’t give a tinkers dam about the American people. He doesn’t care about the GOP except that it is a tool for gaining what he wants. Don’t ask me what he wants, I don’t know, but i am afraid we are soon to find out.

What the Trump Presidency can teach us all

Philosophy, Politics, ,

I take this time after Pres. Trumps speech yesterday (4 July 2019) to point out some things we all can learn from his presidency. I include not just Liberals and/or conservatives but all political persuasions. I also included those of us who study politics, either amateur or professional, practical or scholastic.

Just over 50 years ago, in my senior year in high school I started studying politics seriously. In four more years I got my B.A. in Political Science and had lived thru one of the greatest political events in history. It was at this time I first heard someone say that what we needed to do was elect a “Businessman” to be President. Someone who had demonstrated their abilities to get things done. Well we have elected a “Businessman”, so what can we say we’ve learned in the past two and a half years?

First off we can say for sure that most ‘Businessmen’ have no clue how to work in our political system. Be they Chairman of the Board of a mega corp or the president of a family owned mega business (as is Donald Trump) they only know how to give orders. They have no idea just how to make compromises. To not get everything they want from a deal. An when they try they usually do a very bad job of it.

Hypothesis One

One of the principal reason Mega Businessmen are so bad at working out political compromises is how responsibility and accountability work at the upper levels of management in Big Business. It is axiomatic in big business that “Credit flows up while shit flows down.” By this I mean that when something works well the credit for both the idea and it’s successful implementation will go to the highest manager who want’s it. While if something doesn’t work out the blame for the failure will go to the lowest working possible. I learned this early on in my career: “Mahogany Row is “NEVER” wrong.”

Is it any wonder that a person who has spent most of his/her working life in an environment of the person above you is always right and you never ask, but always command will not be skilled at bargaining? Also, given Hypothesis One, when ever an order is given it is given in such a way as to be always deniable if things go wrong but credit can always be claimed when they go right? If this is true we should be able to find evidence in how things are run in the current Administration. Look how many ‘acting’ key positions we have. Look at how they word orders. Indeed, just look how President Trump talks with his mediate staff. (That is when we can find out what was actually said.)

Hypothesis Two

Everything is a transactional deal. That is everything is Zero-Sum with a winner and a looser. Nothing is ever both sides win or both sides loose.

We are now going to get into something really heady here, Game Theory. It is one of the more advanced forms of mathematics loved by Political Science. If you want a fun way to understand just what Zero-Sum game theory is all about I recommend watching the old movie WarGames. I’m not sure when the great business schools of the west started teaching, or at least accepting, the idea that all business transactions are zero-sum transactions with only winners and looser. Any one who studies game theory knows that there are many games that are zero-sum that no-one can win. Just try Tic-Tac-Toe, if both sides make no mistakes no one can win. Their are also games where all players can win.

We now have businessmen leading us who have been brought up in the world of “If I don’t win, I’ve Lost” trying to make deals with others who know they think that way. So where is a question, why should they make a deal with us if they “know” they are going to loose?

Hypothesis Three

Everything can be ‘monetized’. Or what is the Danegeld? What is meant by this is everything has it’s price and if you are rich enough and/or famous enough you can do anything you want.

In the business world this is mostly true, because in the business world everything is mostly civil law. The problem is that you get into the habit of thinking everything has a price. That money will always solve the problem when things go south. In politics, not so much. In international politics even more so.

In business, if you are a corporation, if you do something that gets lots and lots of people ill or dead, you just dissolve the company, pay a relatively small penalty form company assets and go on your way. You are protected by the corporate vail if nothing else. If someone wants to hold an individual responsible for what happened you have to jump thru whoops to show the individual knew a lot of things before they can prosecuted. More often than not they can show they never ‘Meant’ it that way. They were ‘Misunderstood’ or the underling was ‘over zealous’ in there actions.

This what one of my old professors like to call the “Henry the 2nd” defense. Those Knight of his misunderstood him when he cried “Will no one ride me of this mettlesome priest?” And went off and killed the Archbishop Becket. (I’ve often wondered if the Pope would have be so upset if Becket had just been a parish priest?). Unfortunately for Henry the Pope didn’t buy it. The question now is will the electorate.

So what can we learn? Maybe not to elect an amateur to high office and most assuredly don’t elect a Mega Businessman. Or maybe not.

On White Male Prililege

Philosophy, Politics,

The other day, my friend Lin (AKA my Ex), made a comment about how I really didn’t understand about all the talk about ‘Whte Male Privlage’.  How, being a white male, I really didn’t and couldn’t understand the feelings of those who resented it.  An I was both hurt and angered by the comment.

How could she say that to me, of all people, didn’t she know better?  It is enough to say we eased thru the tenseness of the moment and went on with out visit.  But I got me think about the whole issue of Privlage, of who has it, and who knows they have it.  If we could make a good study of it I think we would find that most (a very large percentage) of white males are totally unaware of having any Privlage at all.  An why is this?  Is it just white male obliviousness?  Do we just refuse to see it?  In most cases I think not.

I submit for your consideration the following hypothesis:

That ‘White Male’ Privilege is not privlaged, but rather the absence of discrimination.

Or perhaps it is best to say what we call out as “White Male” Privilege is the absence of discrimination. What I’m trying to say is that most of what is identified as being a ‘privilege’ acting in a way everyone should be treated but aren’t. To all the White Males out there I call on you to do everything in your power, in your everyday lives, to treat everyone the same way you expect to be treated. Everyone you see as not ‘white’ in you daily life take a little extra effort to see that you treat them just like you want to be treated. Apply this to every woman who crosses your path today, an everyday. An when you see another person you see as ‘one of us’ doing, saying, acting in a way you would object to if you were that person, then call it out. Ask them why they are acting that way? Tell them to please stop doing what ever they were doing in your presence.

An, please, don’t do it with anger. Ask it as a question, as a little child would. More in confusion than in anger. Don’t give them any chance to take what you say as a personal challenge or insult. For me it is all a mater of WDJD (What Did Jesus Do) for everyone else just replace the J with what ever divinity of love kindness and forgiveness you wish.

In other words…..Be A Good Man.

Terrible Liars

General, Philosophy, Politics, ,

One of the tings I learned as a young man was how to tell the difference between Good Liars, Bad Liars, and Terrible Liars. An to be grateful for the latter. We should be grateful that Pres. Trump and most of his administration are such terrible liars.

Maybe I should back up just a bit and explain what I mean by Good Liars, Bad Liars, and Terrible Liars. By Good Liars I mean people who lie so well no one ever discovers the lie that was told. By Bad Liars I mean people who tell lies that can and are eventually uncovered. An Terrible Liars are those people who you know are lying as they speak/write/etc. I have found that most of the terrible liars I have known share one trait in common, they really don’t care if you know that what they are saying is the truth or not. Unfortunately I have also know a time or two terrible liars who are totally unaware they are lying because, at the time they are lying the ‘know’ what they are telling you is the ‘truth’. I hold that Donald Trump is this later kind of Terrible Liar.

I also hold that way too many of the supporters of Pres. Trump are the first kind of Terrible Liars. I also have a theory on why they are like this. They only care about winning. They hold to be true that “wining isn’t everything, it is the only thing!” Also most of the time the penalty they have to pay is so minor compared to what they see as their gains it is well worth it. Often they are not even the people who have to pay the price of their lies. Someone else, who comes after pays the price, not them.

This is why I am saying we are lucky that Donald Trump and his Administration is such Terrible Liars. We know, in real-time, they are lying to us and we have the opportunity to hold them accountable for those lies. This is also the problem the GOP is facing now. If they don’t stop enabling these Terrible Liars they are, as a party, going to end up paying the price of all of the Trump Administration lies. In twenty years the GOP just maybe a memory of the body politic. It will go the way of the “American Party”. Gone extinct do to a total lose of credibility.

Think about it.

The Wealth of Nations and 1776

Philosophy, Socioeconomic,

In the late 20th century people who say that Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, (generally referred to by its shortened title The Wealth of Nations) shows why ‘Capitalism’ works are forgetting the world and culture he was writing was. This is a world where rapid transit was by sea.  Most people walked and few ever went more than 7 miles from where they were born.  This is a world where most people were farmers and in some nations the middle class was smaller than the nobility.

Most business were ‘small’ like two or three people small. An big business was never over a 100 people.  Where money was cold hard cash (coin mind you) that you still had to check out to be sure of it’s purity (monarchs still liked to debase coinage to stretch the budget) and true weight (people like to shave or Knick coins).  An people lived in neighborhoods so small everyone knew everyone else and was suspicious of everyone else.

In Great Britain (England, Scotland,and Wales) most towns had just had Church & Chapel if not just Church. If you acted badly in your business everyone would know and best you would have a very hard time of it.  If you were very unlucky or very bad, you could even have your “Name read out” on Sunday.  Your wife, if wife you had, would could be ostracized from all town social life and finding suitable marriages for you children would be next to impossible.  Now I can hear some of you saying, “But what about all those stories I read like “Pride and  Prejudice”.  First the people in the story are not middle class they are ‘Gentry’ AKA lower upper class.  An if you look closely few, if any, of the characters are in “Trade” which is what business was called back then.

So what does this all have to do with Capitalism?  Simply that the Capitalism being discussed is small/local Capitalism.  Capitalism with few and easily identified entries into starting a business.  Just consider this:  Why was the silver smith shop of Paul Revere in Boston, a city, and not in a village like Braintree.  Several reasons but two of the most important was access to raw materials (shipped in over water to Boston Harbor) and customers.  That is the people with both the need to buy silver and the cash gold to buy it.  It would do us well to remember that most artisans did their work on consignment.  This went for cobblers, cartwrights, blacksmiths as well as silver or gold smiths.  Very little would you see a shop filled with goods you could come in and buy.

Also the law was very different back then.  Like modern day full partnerships, someone like Paul Revere, or even John Hancock, was personally responsible for all debts and liabilities of the business.  It is just about this time you see the first limited/shared liability companies showing up in London (to wit “ lloyds of London”) where an investor was liable only for the amount of money he invested and nothing more.  Even then some very interesting cases in commercial law come out of the period that forced Parliament to make new law.  Next comes the steam revolution that suddenly made traveling over hundreds of miles in a day something that could be done by most anyone.  I shan’t go into more detail on the industrial revolution as there are many many good books and online classes on the subject.

What is important here is that the type and form of capitalism we have now would be totally unrecognizable to Adam Smith.  Trying to justify economic activity using his writing makes as much since as starting a business based solely on cold hard cash and selecting your business location on foot traffic of the wealthy.

How SCOTUS can dodge Alabama’s Trap.

Law, Politics, , ,

A great deal has been written the past few days over just what and why Alabama passed such a draconian anti-abortion law. Mostly they all agree that it is to make a test case for the Supreme Court to over turn Roe vs Wade. An this may well be the case, but I think the Alabama Legislative may just have gone a bit to overboard in their enthusiasm. I see a way for the court to dodge the issue of abortion entirely and still overturn the law.

The Alabama law makes it illegal for a person (aka woman) to travel out side of the state to get an abortion. This one little clause. The first that came to mind was the ‘full faith and credits’ clause of the Constitution. Later, as I started writing this post in occurred to me that it also violates the right of any Citizen of the United States to freely travel between states with-out hindrance (with a few notable exceptions for convicted felons). Here are your citations: Full faith and Credit see Article IV Section 1. Right of movement see link.

SCOTUS could, or even a lower court could, declare the law unconstitutional on either one or both grounds and never even look at the issues of Roe v Wade. It is quite possible SCOTUS will not even hear the case if the appeals court rules the law unconstitutional on theses grounds. They could just let the lower court ruling stand.

To my way of thinking this is the end this law deserves. It is a bad law, badly written, badly intended, and was never intend to work except as a ‘cause celeb’ of the anti-abortion movement.