Toad at 4 days, belly full, taking it all in.
20040208
20040206
He had me until I read this line (some edits)
If one party collapses altogether, as is possible for the Democrats, will the other fission into two in order to fit our two-party paradigm?
Emphasis mine. Frederick Turner's Tech Central Station column neatly summarizes the intersections of several axes of political thought but this line, the next to last sentence, does not ring true to the editorial star chamber at WUTT!
Pardon us, especially you happy few conservative readers of this here blog, but the Democrat party is in very little risk of collapse.
The kind of people who hold power in the Democrat party (not necessarily the rank-and-file, mind you) have learned one lesson very well in the last few decades: they can get what they want, or what their narrowly-defined constituencies demand, if they remain loyal to each other. Their party has no unifying principles, only people dedicated to reelecting themselves and each other while offering lip-service to the Hard-Working Middle-Class American TaxpayerTM (and increasingly, Our Brave Men And Women In UniformTM).
A political party with at first nine people seeking its nomination for the Presidency does not appear to be a party in decline. The qualities and origins of those people is another matter. They will openly bicker, but about the details of what it will cost in political capital for one candidate to drop out and lend his support to another. Like the aphorism about the propositioned woman who recoils in disgust, "not for a million dollars!" the propositioner is encouraged because now it is just a matter of negotiating a price. (Re)electable Democrats accept that everyone has his price, the difficulty is finding it without embarrassment and being able to pay the quid to get the quo.
The GOP, on the other hand, is in serious risk of splintering, on the matter of principle, rather, President Bush's apparent lack of loyalty to GOP principles. For example, some Republicans are choosing to support Kerry, motivated by anger at the guest-worker proposal, hoping that a Democrat President will gridlock against a GOP Congress and no serious public policy damage would result. He lost some faithful with the steel tariff, some because of his support for renewing the assault weapon ban, a lot to the Medicare prescription drug expasion.
"Principled" conservatives, as Turner observes, will put public policy issues above price, or as he put it, "separate and insulate higher values from the marketplace." Instead of replying "not for a million dollars," they'd say "never," and mean it.
George W Bush, the natural delegator, is clearly less loyal to principles, and more loyal to people---the people he installed on his Cabinet, the dream team probably handpicked for him. For delegation to work, he has to be loyal to them, and demand the same loyalty from them, regardless of whether they adhere to traditional GOP positions.
In case you haven't noticed in other endeavors, a team assembled from "best-of-breed" members who otherwise have little to do with each other, doesn't work together very well or for very long.
Holding such teams together requires extra effort in the loyalty-to-people department, with heavy helpings of PR, market research, running interference, talking points, ass-chewings and -coverings, and at worst "choosing to spend more time with his family." Among the GOP, maintaining a cohesive team in a real breathing government looks like managing a team of high-performance salesmen---competitive, self-made, ambitious, internally disciplined, externally polished, publicly cordial to each other and happy to golf together, but each one barely concealing a weird streak, and bound to privately get on at least two other salesmen's nerves.
In contrast, the Democrats' bickering is out in the open, blatant, pandering, counting feathers and coups. The behavior on display in the primaries is not enough to disgust and alienate their base, because that base is deeply in hock to the Democrat party for their livelihoods. They'll find a way to prevaricate, circumlocute, metadiscuss, change the subject, and so on because they are, well, loyal to their next meal.
The GOP leans on a pretense of holding together by common principles. Those principles are not internally consistent enough, and the rift is growing, as Virginia Postrel observes and Frederick Turner agrees. Without this hobgoblin of little minds, the GOP instead relies on personal loyalty just to keep itself together and retain power. Absent Lee Atwater's Big Tent, valuing loyalty over principle does not work for the GOP except in tight circles formed in:
- industry (outsiders hold these with suspicion---Cheney blah blah blah Halliburton!),
- a prior administration,
- professional or academic associations, either innocuous or underground (Kurt Vonnegut was a Rotarian!) or
- multiple terms of horsetrading in Congress (conditions not favorable for developing or selecting men of principle).
The only other substitute for well-policed common principles is patience---take half a loaf now, let the other half rise while the ideological direction of the Supreme Court is altered by a few key appointments, for example, and tolerate some of the morally objectionable consequences of the last few decades until public opinion comes around (note Turner's observation of libertarianism, "in the end fairness will emerge"). Moralists, versus pragmatists (another libertarian writer uses the term "consequentialists"), are not, in our experience, patient.
The Libertarian Party suffers more from an overrepresentation of moralists, and a resulting internal lack of patience, than from a lack of adherence to principle among its members. They insist perhaps too much on principle to succeed at electing anyone, indeed they can be each others' worst enemies (who was it that warned, "Libertarians: do not drink Libertarian blood!"?). Some loyalty to people would benefit them, which is not natural for the G-d-damned independent types whom the LP normally attracts.
Despite President Bush's very good performance in the armed conflict, the GOP will collapse first. Sorry. That doesn't mean that John F-ing Kerry will be the next President, rather, Bush's party will be bruised and shaken in reelecting him, and have a difficult time choosing his successor and electing him or her. The Democrat party is much better at absorbing the shock of such internal struggles, in fact they endure it every four years. Nader was chump change as a spoiler for the left, compared to Perot and Buchanan on the right.
20040204
Tadpole becomes Toad
At 10:27hrs Mountain today, Tadpole drew his first breath and became Toad. Three dot two kilos. Say hello.
Barbaloot spent about twelve hours with unproductive contractions, and as they became painful, she opted for the epidural. Toad squeezed out shortly thereafter.
Barbaloot spent about twelve hours with unproductive contractions, and as they became painful, she opted for the epidural. Toad squeezed out shortly thereafter.
20040202
Coming soon
Fûz's proposal for a Thumper.
Design goals, over and beyond the Thumper specification:
When we were writing tech manuals for a living, we learned that smart firms (not my own, of course) wrote the manual first, as a vehicle to define the product before serious pen-to-paper design ("pen"? "paper"? yes, a long time ago) could begin. In that spirit, the operator manual is about half-way done and will be published first right here.
Design goals, over and beyond the Thumper specification:
- Ambidextrous. Tough to do when it's a bullpup, but a bullpup it will be.
- "Glass rod" trigger. Even tougher to do in a bullpup.
- No alpha emitters. Tip of the hat to Feces Flinging Monkey.
When we were writing tech manuals for a living, we learned that smart firms (not my own, of course) wrote the manual first, as a vehicle to define the product before serious pen-to-paper design ("pen"? "paper"? yes, a long time ago) could begin. In that spirit, the operator manual is about half-way done and will be published first right here.
Countdown begins
We check into the hospital tomorrow evening to induce Tadpole into becoming Toad.
It. must. breathe. Air.
It. must. breathe. Air.
Quote of the day
The API list keeps offering up gems, and we can only find time to post them here as we find them, rather than compose our own thoughts. In this case Raven Charles Riggs, with his permission, regarding the confusion of pacifism with cowardice among the faithful:
How many times does the word sword appear in the Bible?
Churches must confront the reality of evil in the world, not be governed by the hope that they won't encounter it in their lives. And they must believe that they're teaching their members how to deal with evil when they encounter it, in whatever form and in whatever place.
How many times does the word sword appear in the Bible?
20040130
Quote for Today
comes from Raven Steve Cooper, who contributed this to the API list, in a discussion about many frontier lawmen who happened to come from the wrong side of the law, and their victims:
With permission.
I bet there's many a nameless cowboy buried as a bad guy who was really just fighting for his rights.
With permission.
It's "Feeeooooooz" dammit
James Lileks guest-hosted Hugh Hewitt's radio program last night, and was riffing on the topic of what TRB stands for, in the case of The New Republic's weblog.
I called in with Tap, Rack, Bang, a malfunction drill for a weapon that goes click instead of bang. The producer couldn't get his head around my pseudonym, and James pronounced it "Fuzz."
Some disappointment. And I didn't even get to plug WUTT! on the air.
But damn, Lileks has a voice for radio.
I called in with Tap, Rack, Bang, a malfunction drill for a weapon that goes click instead of bang. The producer couldn't get his head around my pseudonym, and James pronounced it "Fuzz."
Some disappointment. And I didn't even get to plug WUTT! on the air.
But damn, Lileks has a voice for radio.
Quote from two years ago
Found on the API list, back in October of 2001:
Cal Thomas
We are raising our own kids this way, and we're vigilant for any sign of indoctrination from the government-run schools that will run counter to it. That said, I oppose (mildly) Colorado's law that my children recite the Pledge of Allegiance at school. Rarely will anyone younger than 12 or so understand what he or she is pledging himself or herself to.
"We need to make Americans out of American children, not multiculturalists who accept the fiction that all systems and all beliefs are equally good."
Cal Thomas
We are raising our own kids this way, and we're vigilant for any sign of indoctrination from the government-run schools that will run counter to it. That said, I oppose (mildly) Colorado's law that my children recite the Pledge of Allegiance at school. Rarely will anyone younger than 12 or so understand what he or she is pledging himself or herself to.
20040128
Where's the Any key?
Ex-president Bill Clinton writes in longhand rather than compose his thoughts in MSWürd. Senator Hillary had to learn how to use e-mail to communicate with their daughter in college.
Can I have my Universal Service charge back?
Can I have my Universal Service charge back?
20040125
I've found my coyote, alright
Swen offers the Cherry Creek Country Club as a good opportunity to take a coyote. A heartfelt thanks!
However, I've got one practically out the front door where I work. Four times in the last thirty days I've spotted a strapping lad who works his way from the prairie of Buckley AFB, over to the flightline to thin down the rabbits and prairie dogs among Colorado ANG's F-16 sheds.
He usually shows up at dusk, when the only lawful dynamic human-wildlife interface in that area, Fuji ASA 400 in a Canon T50 with an f/3.8 150mm lens, will barely reach him. He also understands very well that photography is prohibited on the flightline, so I have to catch him in the open before he crosses into it.
I've got about 8 exposures of him so far, and if exercises and Distinguished Visitors weren't getting in the way, I might have resorted to camping out in the upstairs latrine at Building 909 with a tripod and the doubler on the lens.
Update: I heard a pack of them yipping after midnight chow last night. Reminded me of the song "Me just a Worthless Coyote" from the Hank the Cowdog children's books. And e-Claire has had her own encounter with 'yotes.
Update 2: The photos are in. The dusk photos were badly underexposed. However, I caught one as he appeared at high noon near where they were singing a few nights before.
However, I've got one practically out the front door where I work. Four times in the last thirty days I've spotted a strapping lad who works his way from the prairie of Buckley AFB, over to the flightline to thin down the rabbits and prairie dogs among Colorado ANG's F-16 sheds.
He usually shows up at dusk, when the only lawful dynamic human-wildlife interface in that area, Fuji ASA 400 in a Canon T50 with an f/3.8 150mm lens, will barely reach him. He also understands very well that photography is prohibited on the flightline, so I have to catch him in the open before he crosses into it.
I've got about 8 exposures of him so far, and if exercises and Distinguished Visitors weren't getting in the way, I might have resorted to camping out in the upstairs latrine at Building 909 with a tripod and the doubler on the lens.
Update: I heard a pack of them yipping after midnight chow last night. Reminded me of the song "Me just a Worthless Coyote" from the Hank the Cowdog children's books. And e-Claire has had her own encounter with 'yotes.
Update 2: The photos are in. The dusk photos were badly underexposed. However, I caught one as he appeared at high noon near where they were singing a few nights before.
20040122
Another class of migrant worker
We've been searching for an analogy to the Bush guest-worker proposal, the better to test the proposal and find where people's objections to it truly originate. So how about this?
Imagine that a class of foreigners seeks to enter the United States because they see opportunities for themselves that do not exist in their home countries. Brokerages arise to match the foreigners to such positions. The positions are plentiful but the cost of the transaction, increased artificially by US immigration controls and delays, makes recruitment unaffordable for most US firms who would otherwise offer these positions: pent-up demand.
Comparably-qualified native US citizens are not filling all of these positions because the compensation and perks are widely variable. The lowest compensated positions are going vacant and even many middle-level ones if the perks aren't quite right. They are satisfied with the tight immigration controls that keep foreign candidates out and artificially increase the aggregate price of the positions they do take.
Like it or not, this is an Econ 101 question graphing supply against demand.
Are we discussing peach pickers on the Western Slope? Framers and landscapers on the Front Range? Meatpackers in Fort Morgan? Pakistani software engineers on H1Bs?
No. Mail-order brides.
Bonus points if you can draw a parallel with the Bush proposals to "promote healthy marriages."
Discuss until I get back. Will be below radar until after some exercises and the birthing of one Tadpole; posting will remain light.
Imagine that a class of foreigners seeks to enter the United States because they see opportunities for themselves that do not exist in their home countries. Brokerages arise to match the foreigners to such positions. The positions are plentiful but the cost of the transaction, increased artificially by US immigration controls and delays, makes recruitment unaffordable for most US firms who would otherwise offer these positions: pent-up demand.
Comparably-qualified native US citizens are not filling all of these positions because the compensation and perks are widely variable. The lowest compensated positions are going vacant and even many middle-level ones if the perks aren't quite right. They are satisfied with the tight immigration controls that keep foreign candidates out and artificially increase the aggregate price of the positions they do take.
Like it or not, this is an Econ 101 question graphing supply against demand.
Are we discussing peach pickers on the Western Slope? Framers and landscapers on the Front Range? Meatpackers in Fort Morgan? Pakistani software engineers on H1Bs?
No. Mail-order brides.
Bonus points if you can draw a parallel with the Bush proposals to "promote healthy marriages."
Discuss until I get back. Will be below radar until after some exercises and the birthing of one Tadpole; posting will remain light.
It's rather small, really
If my friend Joe convinces me to run for the US Senate, I'd rather be interviewed by Howard Stern than Connie Chung.
Found via Buzzmachine, via Instapundit.
Found via Buzzmachine, via Instapundit.
20040119
"It's too scary"
Firstborn is now watching the DVD of Frodo and the Fellowship slogging through the mines of Moria. She has to turn away and cover her ears from time to time, such as when the Nazgul stabbed Frodo at the watchtower of Amon Sul.
We warned her.
We just finished reading The Hobbit to her and Middlechild so she had an inkling of what she'd be getting into.
What's amazing is what she already knows about the story, from her buds at school, who have already watched the DVDs or seen the movies in theater. In a way, this father feels a little jealous, that she's learning these things from her friends instead of from me.
What scares me, then, is that there are a few topics that we'll have to accelerate a bit so she definitely does learn them from us instead of her friends.
We warned her.
We just finished reading The Hobbit to her and Middlechild so she had an inkling of what she'd be getting into.
What's amazing is what she already knows about the story, from her buds at school, who have already watched the DVDs or seen the movies in theater. In a way, this father feels a little jealous, that she's learning these things from her friends instead of from me.
What scares me, then, is that there are a few topics that we'll have to accelerate a bit so she definitely does learn them from us instead of her friends.
Political plug---Arapahoe County
Travis Nicks seeks to be elected to the office of Clerk and Recorder for Arapahoe County, Colorado. Please go read up.
20040116
It isn't the rifle, it's the cartridge
StrategyPage notes that Uncle Sugar is going to give the Heckler und Koch G36 a go (no permalink, look under 14 January 04), under the designation XM8.
Civilians in the less afflicted provinces can sample a functionally identical rifle in the XL8T.
It's all very interesting, Uncle, but the new platform sends the same booolet at the same velocity---or if even shorter barrels than that of the M4 carbine are considered, even less velocity.
Clearly the light and short weapon is needed, for mounted troops, rear-area troops who need to be armed but are not constantly engaged in fighting, and so forth. But there's no need to stay wedded to the weaker cartridge that comes along with today's carbines.
The proposed 6.8mm Remington SPC cartridge is headed in the right direction, using a case that is slightly larger in diameter than the 5.56mm, giving it slightly more propellant capacity, to push a .270" bullet.
This .270" bullet must be short and squat to fit the entire cartridge within the 5.56mm envelope around which modern carbines are built. This short, squat bullet has a poorer ballistic coefficient than it needs to have, so it will lose velocity faster and drop more as it travels.
So a counter-proposal: take the 5.45x39.5mm cartridge case of the AK-74. It has the same case head dimensions of the 7.62x39mm AK-47 round, in fact is is mostly the same case, but the Soviets "Ackleyed" it by forming the case walls straighter, eliminating the case's body taper to increase the propellant capacity.
Just don't neck it down to 5.45mm, stop at 6.5 or so.
The resulting cartridge case will be about 6mm shorter than the 5.56mm original, but have the same or better propellant capacity because it's fatter. Use the shorter case with a longer, higher-ballistic-coefficient bullet, seated out in the case. The resulting cartridge will fit within the 5.56's overall length. Drive a bullet of smaller caliber but higher BC and figure it will retain its velocity better than the 6.8mm.
Instead of 115 grains at 2800 fps, try 140 grains at 2300, assuming the case propellant capacities are identical, and a given mass of propellant delivers the same weight-velocity product whether it's in a longer, narrower space versus a shorter, wider space, which of course it doesn't.
Update: Hornady's Fourth Edition of their Handbook of Cartridge Reloading consists of two volumes, one of load data for various cartridges, and the other of ballistics tables. Lessee: their 6.5mm 140-grain spire point bullet has a ballistic coefficient of .465. When thrown at 2300 fps, it will hold on to 1513 of them at 500 meters. With a rifle zeroed at 200 meters, it will fall almost 71 inches at 500. A 129-grainer (BC=.445) at 2500 fps retains 1633 fps at 500 yards and drops almost 60 inches from a 200-yard zero.
Hornady did not even catalog a 115 grain bullet for .270 in their Fourth Edition handbook. The lightest they go is 130, with a spire point whose BC is .408. Sierra lists a 110-gr spitzer with a BC of .375. With muzzle velocity at 2800 fps, it still has 1717 fps at 500 yards and will drop 76 inches.
I just have a thing for long, narrow bullets with high ballistic coefficients.
Civilians in the less afflicted provinces can sample a functionally identical rifle in the XL8T.
It's all very interesting, Uncle, but the new platform sends the same booolet at the same velocity---or if even shorter barrels than that of the M4 carbine are considered, even less velocity.
Clearly the light and short weapon is needed, for mounted troops, rear-area troops who need to be armed but are not constantly engaged in fighting, and so forth. But there's no need to stay wedded to the weaker cartridge that comes along with today's carbines.
The proposed 6.8mm Remington SPC cartridge is headed in the right direction, using a case that is slightly larger in diameter than the 5.56mm, giving it slightly more propellant capacity, to push a .270" bullet.
This .270" bullet must be short and squat to fit the entire cartridge within the 5.56mm envelope around which modern carbines are built. This short, squat bullet has a poorer ballistic coefficient than it needs to have, so it will lose velocity faster and drop more as it travels.
So a counter-proposal: take the 5.45x39.5mm cartridge case of the AK-74. It has the same case head dimensions of the 7.62x39mm AK-47 round, in fact is is mostly the same case, but the Soviets "Ackleyed" it by forming the case walls straighter, eliminating the case's body taper to increase the propellant capacity.
Just don't neck it down to 5.45mm, stop at 6.5 or so.
The resulting cartridge case will be about 6mm shorter than the 5.56mm original, but have the same or better propellant capacity because it's fatter. Use the shorter case with a longer, higher-ballistic-coefficient bullet, seated out in the case. The resulting cartridge will fit within the 5.56's overall length. Drive a bullet of smaller caliber but higher BC and figure it will retain its velocity better than the 6.8mm.
Instead of 115 grains at 2800 fps, try 140 grains at 2300, assuming the case propellant capacities are identical, and a given mass of propellant delivers the same weight-velocity product whether it's in a longer, narrower space versus a shorter, wider space, which of course it doesn't.
Update: Hornady's Fourth Edition of their Handbook of Cartridge Reloading consists of two volumes, one of load data for various cartridges, and the other of ballistics tables. Lessee: their 6.5mm 140-grain spire point bullet has a ballistic coefficient of .465. When thrown at 2300 fps, it will hold on to 1513 of them at 500 meters. With a rifle zeroed at 200 meters, it will fall almost 71 inches at 500. A 129-grainer (BC=.445) at 2500 fps retains 1633 fps at 500 yards and drops almost 60 inches from a 200-yard zero.
Hornady did not even catalog a 115 grain bullet for .270 in their Fourth Edition handbook. The lightest they go is 130, with a spire point whose BC is .408. Sierra lists a 110-gr spitzer with a BC of .375. With muzzle velocity at 2800 fps, it still has 1717 fps at 500 yards and will drop 76 inches.
I just have a thing for long, narrow bullets with high ballistic coefficients.
20040114
I am going to proselytize an E-9 tomorrow (shop talk)
I already proselytized an O-6 yesterday, so might as well go for the trifecta and get the base civil engineer too. I'll either get fired or get my tour extended to end of FY.
Get this through your heads: in the USAF C-CW CONOPS, the unit has a lot of work to do, to integrate itself into the chain of command. This is traditionally where NBC exercises have fallen down---the gulf of nescience that ebbs and flows between the endlessly drilled airman, and the thoroughly indoctrinated wing commander. The links in the chain of command connecting the two is only now getting hard, legible, usable guidance on how to operate an airbase under NBC conditions.
When you have an operational readiness inspection due at your doorstep in 30 days, your first reaction should not be to suddenly shift to 6 days at 12 hours each, to hone individual skills for said inspection. Individual war skills are about as good as you will ever get them in 30 days.
Your reaction should be to get your flight chiefs and the unit control center staff together to mesh the UCC checklists against the SRC's expectations. Then trickle the findings down to your workcenter supervisors and make sure their actions and timelines are congruent with the UCC's checklists. Have a long look at your functional area's TTP section in Appendix 4 of AFMAN 10-2602. The essentials are all there.
Then you practice several Alarm Reds, a few post-attack reconnaissance runs, and several gear-shifts from Green to Yellow to Red to Green.
Simulate shifting from MOPP Four to MOPP Four Mask Only, or to MOPP Two. Find out where your comms break down.
Rehearse managing an asset under the Ten Foot Rule.
This is a martial art, folks. Anyone who has studied a martial art understands that mastery comes only after assiduous, repetitive drilling, punctuated by examination of purpose and intent of each step of the drill, sample applications of the drill under time pressure, role reversals to teach the anticipation of counters, free sparring to see if the student can apply the drill against an opponent, then more repetitive drilling. Your CE Readiness Flight handles the repetitive drilling part, like upper-belt students at a dojo. Squadron leaders---the masters of the school---teach the rest.
A knife-hand is a knife-hand is a knife-hand. It's a fundamental. Now look at which targets are vulnerable a knife-hand, which stances can deliver it, when it will work and when it won't.
The ORI is coming and it's too late to drill your Expeditionary Airmen in how to make a knife-hand strike. You'll just burn them out.
Now they need to learn what to hit with it. You will see the lights turn on. Trust me.
Get this through your heads: in the USAF C-CW CONOPS, the unit has a lot of work to do, to integrate itself into the chain of command. This is traditionally where NBC exercises have fallen down---the gulf of nescience that ebbs and flows between the endlessly drilled airman, and the thoroughly indoctrinated wing commander. The links in the chain of command connecting the two is only now getting hard, legible, usable guidance on how to operate an airbase under NBC conditions.
When you have an operational readiness inspection due at your doorstep in 30 days, your first reaction should not be to suddenly shift to 6 days at 12 hours each, to hone individual skills for said inspection. Individual war skills are about as good as you will ever get them in 30 days.
Your reaction should be to get your flight chiefs and the unit control center staff together to mesh the UCC checklists against the SRC's expectations. Then trickle the findings down to your workcenter supervisors and make sure their actions and timelines are congruent with the UCC's checklists. Have a long look at your functional area's TTP section in Appendix 4 of AFMAN 10-2602. The essentials are all there.
Then you practice several Alarm Reds, a few post-attack reconnaissance runs, and several gear-shifts from Green to Yellow to Red to Green.
Simulate shifting from MOPP Four to MOPP Four Mask Only, or to MOPP Two. Find out where your comms break down.
Rehearse managing an asset under the Ten Foot Rule.
This is a martial art, folks. Anyone who has studied a martial art understands that mastery comes only after assiduous, repetitive drilling, punctuated by examination of purpose and intent of each step of the drill, sample applications of the drill under time pressure, role reversals to teach the anticipation of counters, free sparring to see if the student can apply the drill against an opponent, then more repetitive drilling. Your CE Readiness Flight handles the repetitive drilling part, like upper-belt students at a dojo. Squadron leaders---the masters of the school---teach the rest.
A knife-hand is a knife-hand is a knife-hand. It's a fundamental. Now look at which targets are vulnerable a knife-hand, which stances can deliver it, when it will work and when it won't.
The ORI is coming and it's too late to drill your Expeditionary Airmen in how to make a knife-hand strike. You'll just burn them out.
Now they need to learn what to hit with it. You will see the lights turn on. Trust me.
20040110
Should guest workers pay into Social Security?
"Paying into" it implies that in the future one will be "withdrawing from" it. And there's the rub. Michelle Malkin panics that guest workers will be drawing funds out of our treasured nest egg of Social Security, rapidly depleting it. Aside from the fraudulent conditions under which these workers have been paying already, which should be punished, we can only reply, Well dammit, if guest workers are being FICA-d at the same rate as I am, they ought to be able to get out of it what they put in.
. . . beginning the day they're legitimized, of course. Losing all of the contributions they've made prior to that day is ample penalty for working here illegally. Let our laws change to let them re-enter the United States to work as guests, and from that day onward, we can be explicit that they get ownership in the new contributions.
Without any mechanism to return these monies (but no more) to the people who earned them, Michelle is conceding that Social Security is and ought to be income redistribution, not a safety net or a pension.
Imagine the outrage if we concede that we need the forced contributions of foreign workers just to keep our own system afloat, or to forestall the day it ultimately sinks. We gringos will take their money and keep it. In any language other than Democrat, that is represented by the noun "theft". The "forced" aspect of Social Security will be harder for Americans to ignore, hastening the day we have serious discussions about making it fair or eliminating it.
Look at the political implications of not compelling guest workers to contribute. All other things being equal, guest workers' labor will be about 12 percent cheaper than that of native US citizens. If we agree to design a guest-worker system at all, and we want to structure it so that it does not displace native US labor, this 12-percent disparity must not stand. We would have to collect the same FICA tax from them that we require of native workers.
Then it will be easy to persuade native workers to demand rights to FICA distributions in relationship to their own FICA contributions----the "wetbacks" are putting in their 12 percent and they'll get that 12 percent back at the other end of their working lives (if they live that long, and the typical Mexican or Guatemalan probably does not, which is another matter).
I didn't even have to complete this thought to a friend of mine. He saw where I was headed with it and completed it for himself: "I'll be damned if I can't get my twelve percent back too!"
If Uncle Sugar remits these FICA funds to the guest worker's government, instead of directly to the guest worker himself, that foreign government is bound to piss that money away before a significant amount of it gets to the workers who earned it. In the short term this is a good thing, because it will either incite them to revolt against the corrupt government, or cool their interest in guest working. Still, WUTT! proposes that the remittances be made directly to the worker, deposited into an account of the worker's choosing in their home country and currency, or even made toward the purchase of an annuity that will be worth more if they leave it untouched---exactly the kind of annuity that our own workers ought to be paying forward. It will be their property, it will be part of the estate if the worker croaks early, and the worker can borrow against it, none of which Social Security allows today.
We'd have to structure a guest worker system to collect Social Security taxes from them just to get the legislation through Congress and past the labor unions. In karmic return, the guest workers will be able to claim a right to the monies collected from them. Once they claim such a right, native workers will too.
This could spell the doom of Social Security, at least as an income redistribution mechanism.
At that point, privatization will be an easy sell too. Joe Sixpack, over your life you put $125,775 into Social Security. Here it is back, to the penny, minus some adminstrative charge you didn't have a choice not to incur. Had this money been invested in mutual funds over the years you worked and contributed this $125,775, today it would have been worth four times that. It's your money, it should have been making more money, and more jobs (for gringos or immigrants, doesn't matter) while you were waiting to get it back.
In short, I'll entertain Bush's guest-worker program, even if it is a cynical attempt to buy the Latino vote as Laura Ingraham asserts, if it can be a lever with which to wreck out Social Security. I'd like the program even better if it followed Citizen Smash's blueprint.
. . . beginning the day they're legitimized, of course. Losing all of the contributions they've made prior to that day is ample penalty for working here illegally. Let our laws change to let them re-enter the United States to work as guests, and from that day onward, we can be explicit that they get ownership in the new contributions.
Without any mechanism to return these monies (but no more) to the people who earned them, Michelle is conceding that Social Security is and ought to be income redistribution, not a safety net or a pension.
Imagine the outrage if we concede that we need the forced contributions of foreign workers just to keep our own system afloat, or to forestall the day it ultimately sinks. We gringos will take their money and keep it. In any language other than Democrat, that is represented by the noun "theft". The "forced" aspect of Social Security will be harder for Americans to ignore, hastening the day we have serious discussions about making it fair or eliminating it.
Look at the political implications of not compelling guest workers to contribute. All other things being equal, guest workers' labor will be about 12 percent cheaper than that of native US citizens. If we agree to design a guest-worker system at all, and we want to structure it so that it does not displace native US labor, this 12-percent disparity must not stand. We would have to collect the same FICA tax from them that we require of native workers.
Then it will be easy to persuade native workers to demand rights to FICA distributions in relationship to their own FICA contributions----the "wetbacks" are putting in their 12 percent and they'll get that 12 percent back at the other end of their working lives (if they live that long, and the typical Mexican or Guatemalan probably does not, which is another matter).
I didn't even have to complete this thought to a friend of mine. He saw where I was headed with it and completed it for himself: "I'll be damned if I can't get my twelve percent back too!"
If Uncle Sugar remits these FICA funds to the guest worker's government, instead of directly to the guest worker himself, that foreign government is bound to piss that money away before a significant amount of it gets to the workers who earned it. In the short term this is a good thing, because it will either incite them to revolt against the corrupt government, or cool their interest in guest working. Still, WUTT! proposes that the remittances be made directly to the worker, deposited into an account of the worker's choosing in their home country and currency, or even made toward the purchase of an annuity that will be worth more if they leave it untouched---exactly the kind of annuity that our own workers ought to be paying forward. It will be their property, it will be part of the estate if the worker croaks early, and the worker can borrow against it, none of which Social Security allows today.
We'd have to structure a guest worker system to collect Social Security taxes from them just to get the legislation through Congress and past the labor unions. In karmic return, the guest workers will be able to claim a right to the monies collected from them. Once they claim such a right, native workers will too.
This could spell the doom of Social Security, at least as an income redistribution mechanism.
At that point, privatization will be an easy sell too. Joe Sixpack, over your life you put $125,775 into Social Security. Here it is back, to the penny, minus some adminstrative charge you didn't have a choice not to incur. Had this money been invested in mutual funds over the years you worked and contributed this $125,775, today it would have been worth four times that. It's your money, it should have been making more money, and more jobs (for gringos or immigrants, doesn't matter) while you were waiting to get it back.
In short, I'll entertain Bush's guest-worker program, even if it is a cynical attempt to buy the Latino vote as Laura Ingraham asserts, if it can be a lever with which to wreck out Social Security. I'd like the program even better if it followed Citizen Smash's blueprint.
20040106
FLASH PRECEDENCE---DHMO USE CONFIRMED---PACIFIC NORTHWEST
Courtesy of Dogtolusba, an Observer's Initial Report of terrorist use of dihydrogen monoxide has been confirmed in the Seattle area. This ruthless attack represents First Use in Theater, and has been reported by Flash precedence to the National Command Authority.
NBCREP Two to follow . . .
NBCREP Two to follow . . .
20040104
Finally found the term I was looking for
In a Liberty magazine review of Christopher Hitchens's biography of George Orwell, a paragraph seemed dissonant to me. The term "working class" and the term "middle class" appeared in the same sentences, several sentences in sequence, as the reviewer compared them. (Sorry, Liberty has no web presence so I can't offer a link.)
Perhaps my lack of a formal university education has allowed some misuse of terminology to enter, perhaps not. But to me, the middle class is the working class: people who get out of bed each weekday, pull on clothes that serve to identify a worker's purpose as well as to facilitate that purpose, report for work that is only nominally physically exerting, and come home with only nominal concern that their expenses are being met or they'll be mugged as they enter their homes. They work, at jobs that allow them to live within their means.
So who was the reviewer, or Hitchens, talking about in the term "working class"? To me, most of these people don't work, or many of them don't, because they are recipients of various forms of government charity. Of course there is a class of people who work their tails off, and seem to be slipping backwards into deeper poverty---our Church has connected a few of us with such a family, whom we sponsor, and that's what I've gathered about them. They're "working poor" and they are one doctor bill or uninsured car accident away from not being able to work any more.
What shall we call these people?
The term is "client-class," discovered among the comments to Armed Liberal's post on the Democrat Party's war stance. I'm not using the term here as the commenter, Trent Telenko, did, but who's the master, me or the word?
Perhaps my lack of a formal university education has allowed some misuse of terminology to enter, perhaps not. But to me, the middle class is the working class: people who get out of bed each weekday, pull on clothes that serve to identify a worker's purpose as well as to facilitate that purpose, report for work that is only nominally physically exerting, and come home with only nominal concern that their expenses are being met or they'll be mugged as they enter their homes. They work, at jobs that allow them to live within their means.
So who was the reviewer, or Hitchens, talking about in the term "working class"? To me, most of these people don't work, or many of them don't, because they are recipients of various forms of government charity. Of course there is a class of people who work their tails off, and seem to be slipping backwards into deeper poverty---our Church has connected a few of us with such a family, whom we sponsor, and that's what I've gathered about them. They're "working poor" and they are one doctor bill or uninsured car accident away from not being able to work any more.
What shall we call these people?
The term is "client-class," discovered among the comments to Armed Liberal's post on the Democrat Party's war stance. I'm not using the term here as the commenter, Trent Telenko, did, but who's the master, me or the word?
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