Amnesia is the order of the day in this election. In fact, Romney is the original candidate from amnesia. It's in his job description - he see his job as pleasing the audience he's speaking to at that moment and always retains the right to re-trade any position. Because of the votes he now needs, he's currently headed generally back to the 19th century by way of Herbert Hoover/Andrew Mellon, Harding and Coolidge. But essentially, he'a an investment banker/PE guy. They do business any way they can - that's what they do, that's what they've always done and that's what we should always expect them to do. That is why god (aided by FDR, who was aided by Pecora, Morganthau, Kennedy and others) invented regulation of financial markets. These guys will do business - it's our (the country at large's) job to see that they don't do harm. Romney gets away with continuous and continually changing misrepresentations, diversions, omissions, oversimplifications, blunders and lies, because he's not filing S-1s, he's running for president in a time of amnesia - it's always amnesia time in IB/PE land, except when it's usefully to choose something - always isolated and out of context - as binding precedent or must-avoid. After awhile (and it's already happened in the financial community big time) that very movement - or, as we say in finance, volatility - around various issues is actually seen to be a strength, e.g.. "this guy can bob and weave pretty darn well."  We (meaning they) don't want anyone with fixed principles - those can really get in the way when you are trying any and every way possible to make life easier for their private sectors business backers. It could be convenient to be a liberal sometimes - it was in MA. You never know when the wind will blow hard enough so that you actually have to raise taxes or close a loophole. Tacking to go up wind is expected, and only the rubes believe Romney actually believes what he's saying at any one moment. And only suckers and liberal Democrats believe that the election should be decided by the consistency, coherence or even morality of the candidates positions. We're talking about something much more important here - the power to affect how people make money and/or pay taxes.

Idea for Bloomberg

Bloomberg, as a parting gift to NYC, should buy the New York Mets and give them to the City in a way that ensures professional management and insulates them from future sale or  even pressure from City fiscal needs. The obvious model is the Green Bay Packers. The team could effectively be run by real baseball people under the loosest supervision of a board of directors appointed by mayors and approved by the City Council for long terms and who would have to be qualified/screened - not a difficult process.

Is there a rule in baseball against not-for-profit ownership? Would it be approved by the current ownership or would they be threatened? If so, why?  In a market like NYC, the team should thrive and not-for-profit, professional ownership could make long term plans that would easily rival those of the Red Sox, Yankees and other major market teams.

Dialogue prompted by Gram Parsons, the Louvin Brothers, Buck Owens/George Jones

Reverse chron. order  (because I'm lazy)

----- Original Message -----

From: Chris Bartle

To: Thomas Keefe

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2011 11:26 AM

Subject: Re: Possum & Buck

You are absolutely right – Gram didn't want to deal with the ugly and continuing reality of racism.  He was insulated from it to a great extent – music was a weird exceptional world. There was a real enough threat against    people like us, but optional – you could always go back to a safe zone somewhere or get your hair cut. He was hung up on the beauty of the expression – the raw cool of country music back then.

Your experiences are the real ones and they accurately predict what's happening now.  It's really ugly underneath and the Republicans get away with a lot of shit – especially with angry idiots like that Allan whatever guy in Florida and the weirdo former CEO of Pizza Hut and, of course, Clarence Thomas providing cover.

And you are right about the South today.  It takes more money from the Federal gov't than it gives back and takes for granted the depression and civil rights era policies that rescued the place from complete economic and    moral collapse.  It lives on a foolish dream of bullshit self-sufficiency and hypocritical morality that is reflected in its foolish music – despite the great talent there – and has completely lost its way.  Or, more conspiratorially, the South has been completely captured by the plutocrats who offer a pick up truck and a macho posture in return for taking over everything everywhere.  Not dissimilar from the Arab world, frankly (before the current revolutions).

--

Chris Bartle
917.414.9495
chbartle@ix.netcom.com

From: "Thomas F. Keefe" <tom@keefeandwesner.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Feb 2011 10:12:26 -0500
To: Chris Bartle <chbartle@ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Possum & Buck

This song came out about 2 years after I went to Georgia and Mississippi to work for Dr. King in the civil rights movement in the summer of '66, where we saw some violence, and lived in a heightened state of fear and alertness; the song always struck me as a more forgiving portrait of the good ol' boy southern red-neck Klan-member than the real deal...it was a kind of tongue-in-cheek poking fun at them that deflated the seriousness of their threats. It was the only time I think I've ever been specifically targeted by a hate group ( they came by the SCLC house I was staying at in Atlanta within an hour of my arrival asking "Where's they guy with the Beatle haircut?"; when I asked an older staff member about the wire mesh over the windows he said it was meant to cause a thrown stick of dynamite or a molitov cocktail to bounce off and fall outside on the porch rather than coming into the house...!), and the only time I've ever been put in jail- for walking down the street in Macon with a black friend.

 I relish the fact that Alabama won the DIv. 1 Football championship last year with a largely black team and  black Heisman winner...but it's distressing that the Republicans endorse such thinly-disguised racism and rarely get called on it. 

  It is interesting that Merle has come over completely to the other side of where he was when Muscogee defined him, and stirred the polarization of the late '60s...do you remember getting hassled in a bar in Bristol, VT where we went to try to get a gig for our little band at Mudslide in 1971? That had the same kind of redneck vs. hippie dynamic, but up here in what was then a fast-changing VT. I agree that symbols like the stars and bars got co-opted, as of course the stars & stripes did, for theatrical purposes...there's some of that good ol' boy self-righteousness in the Tea Party and neo-con use of the flag and the military in cynical ways today. God help you if you criticize either....the south has changed a lot, but it's still the equivalent of a third-world country dragging the rest of the US backwards socially, politically and especially economically, by setting the agenda based on fundamental ( and, frankly, ignorant) religious and cultural grounds. They're also pumping out some of the most mediocre music - called 'country' but that's a mis-use of the term - that further confuses most innocent bystanders. We don't seem to have any Bob Dylans, or Gram Parsons, or McGuinn, Lennon, etc. to rally young listeners to something deeper than a facebook post or a twitter. Maybe I'm just getting old...

----- Original Message -----

From: Chris Bartle

To: Thomas F. Keefe

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2011 8:09 AM

Subject: Re: Possum & Buck

Remember "Truck Store Truck Drivin' Man" - "…he's the head of the Ku Klux Klan…and when summer rolls around, you'll be lucky if he's not in town"?

Also, maybe I didn't get it quite right below – symbols like the American flag and even the Confederate flag were appropriated by the hippies partly to show that, hey we can own them, too. Maybe the thought was something like – we don't accept your interpretation of their meaning, we get the power of the symbol and we like the colors/design.  

As with Merle Haggard and Lynard Skynard, the Confederacy that Gram was celebrating (if at all) was the confederacy of the poor white moonshiners, banjo pickers and hill country dissenters, not the country club descendants of Jeff Davis & Co.  I note that Merle has gone over to our side almost completely, at this point – he was always with the working man, primarily, anyway. Given that there is no "downtrodden" south today, I don't think Gram would side with the Haley Barbour types and, if written today, Lynard Skynard's "Sweet Home Alabama" lyrics would be a lot different.  At least I hope so.

--
Chris Bartle
917.414.9495
chbartle@ix.netcom.com

From: Chris Bartle <chbartle@ix.netcom.com>
Date: Fri, 18 Feb 2011 10:09:39 -0500
To: "Thomas F. Keefe" <tom@keefeandwesner.com>
Subject: Re: Possum & Buck

Yeah – I have been stuck on the Louvins for the past couple of weeks.  That Ira...the sensibility behind the lyrics is simultaneously antique and universal.  Only guys from that rural religious very poor background could walk so confidently across that paradox of deep belief and extreme honky tonk romanticism – and sound like they meant it.  Only guys from that background can sing like that unselfconsciously, too –- their singing takes on this nerdy/operatic tinge that more ironic artists can’'t access, except through people like the Louvins and BIll Monroe (whom the Louvins owe a lot to).  Boy oh boy, America had some amazing artistry lurking in the woods in those days.

As to Gram – I always think of him as the first great ironist of country music.  He spanned the paradox of the hippie truck  driver – hell, he damn near invented it.  But he came from the hippie side, definitively.  Racist was the last thing he was – I don’t think repugnance to black people would have even occurred to him – he was looking to tweak the northerners in a period when inclusion was more assumed and the threat to black people seemed less in the wake of MLK’s assassination/rise of the Black Panthers, etc.  Nowadays – he would stay away from it, I think, because the confederate flag has lost the innocence it regained for a brief moment in the post-Woodstock world. --
Chris Bartle
917.414.9495
chbartle@ix.netcom.com

---

From: "Thomas F. Keefe" <tom@keefeandwesner.com>
Date: Fri, 18 Feb 2011 09:37:22 -0500
To: Chris Bartle <chbartle@ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Possum & Buck
Amazing! I didn't think RLH was over the top...I like Rhonda's crucifix in the cleavage, great mixed message! It's incredible how the Louvins songs are endlessly open to great interpretations...
Was reading liner notes on Grevious Angel/GP double album CD last night and they said GP kept a confederate flag on stage with him in his late concerts--wonder what's up with that; even ( maybe especially) in the early '70s that was a racist symbol...

----- Original Message -----

From:  Chris  Bartle <mailto:chbartle@ix.netcom.com>

To: Thomas F. Keefe <mailto:tom@keefeandwesner.com>

Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2011 7:21  PM

Subject: Re: Possum & Buck


Outstanding!!!  For a new-veau take on the Louvin  Brothers, check out these Nashvillians http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnZ376vcUSs  ˆ pretty darn good - and the completely over-the-top Rebecca Lynn Howard  contribution on this one - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1AU1KMi44Y&feature=related.   Great voice but, whoa ˆ - runaway train!  Great music sung by great artists who usually sing disposable crapola.--
Chris Bartle
917.414.9495
chbartle@ix.netcom.com

---

From: "Thomas F. Keefe" <tom@keefeandwesner.com>
Date:  Thu, 17 Feb 2011 14:11:02 -0500
To: Chris Bartle <chbartle@ix.netcom.com>
Subject:  Possum & Buck
Was listening to this, and thought you oughta hear it...ain't much  that's better than this!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nry2u-NQSQ&NR=1&feature=fvwp
 Thomas F. Keefe, Architect
Keefe & Wesner Architects,  P.C.
PO Box 142          135  S. Pleasant St.
Middlebury, Vt. 05753
(802)  388-6210
tom@keefeandwesner.com

Thoughts on an article about the movement to get rid of EPA

With the success of the 30+ year concerted and lavishly funded effort promoting the twin notions that government’s motivation is always and solely self regarding, and that, without regard to motivation, government can’t or won’t do anything efficiently or competently (it’s either evil or stupid or both), given the current "opportunity" created by the deficit/debt, there's no reason not to follow on this success with the next logical step: that is, aggressively question the necessity for the entire edifice of the modern state and require a zero-based argument for the existence of every form of governmental enterprise. Because it's essentially an ideological argument - anecdotally supported and ahistorical - the terms on which we receive this challenge are particularly difficult.  

Aside from the question of the deficit, there is no valid data or historical record to support the efficacy of an across the board shrinking of the government, especially, it might be noted, in the areas most vociferously attacked, such as medical care and retirement savings. But ideology, unfortunately, is not public policy, and, notwithstanding the superficial emotional appeal of this connection, the origins of the deficit/debt have more to do with spending accomplished through tax cuts and military conflicts than with the resolution of a coherent debate on the efficacy of this or that program/area of government intervention. In other words, the Bush tax cuts and the Iraq/Afghanistan wars created the deficit and ballooned the debt, and now the Republicans would like to argue that the programs they would like to cut must be cut because there isn't enough money. Logically, it's a post hoc fallacy. Politically, it's a well-laid trap. 

But it's a trap with an escape - tax reform. If Hacker and Pierson are right - and I would bet they were - the wealth and income gap that has opened up in the past 30 years (simultaneously with the broad-based attack on government) is not politically sustainable, once understood. People will not accept another Gilded Age, so another Teddy Roosevelt will arise, if he hasn't already.  Corporate tax reform - lowering overall rates and ending subsidies - and higher personal taxation of the top 1% will find a broad constituency, when the dust has cleared.

Meantime, thoughtful people who care about a country that fulfill its ideals - never mind thrives economically - will find themselves arguing the most basic points, summoning the most basic images and marshaling the most basic evidence – like why should we have child labor laws, why pollution is bad, why public education is good, why we should support the practical application of the bill of rights to all citizens, why we should have an independent judiciary, the nature of scientific evidence and how science achieves consensus and belief, etc., etc. to an intellectually ill-prepared public that has taken the benefits of a relatively clean environment, healthy food, incorruptible judges, fair judicial system, reasonably-priced medical care and free public education, not to mention 30-year fixed rate mortgages, social security, etc., etc. for granted.

In other words, some of the demons loosed in the 1960's - that government can go off the reservation, that government lies to protect itself, that government can ignore the will of the people, some of the legacies of the Cold War, Viet Nam and Watergate - the foes of government (apparently mostly big companies concentrated in certain industries) have turned on their heads, turning many, many people into resentful, history and science-free loose cannons who believe that the government, acting aggressively to solve domestic/economic problems, is always wrong, while paradoxically giving a pass to an aggressive military posture.

It’s never a good idea to lose control of the narrative, but that’s what’s happened.  Now the really tough stuff starts.

Dialogue with Doug B post-election

In reverse chron order (because I'm lazy)


From Doug B.: I largely agree on your perspective on Obama but I think he focused on too many key issues at the outset, and gave the impression that the economy was not necessarily issues 1 through, say, 3. In addition, the stimulus bill was very sloppy, to say the least, and the benefits of the bill have not been convincingly communicated. Finally, I agree with the importance of the objectives of the health care bill, but the way it was put together it becomes yet another entitlement we can't pay for.

I am not sure how Obama could have done more to appear "non-partisan" in the environment but somehow he has appeared to be partisan. Agree that Fox, Limbaugh, Murdoch, etc., have done much to damage the process, but there have been significant errors on the Dem side.

From Chris: (1) Health care was/is the holy grail of Democratic politics and has been for 75 years. This blinded Obama and all Democrats to some extent. They did a half-assed job, but given the Senate “requirement” of 60 votes and the unbelievable distortions of the debate, it is amazing they did anything at all. Of course, the reasonable question is: why do anything so half-assed? The politics dictated that once they started, they could not stop without being deemed a “failed” congress. But, I am convinced it’s the half-assedness of the job that killed the Congressional Democrats – all the benefits are back ended, while the costs seem not to have been affected (Though the CBO says ultimately costs will be reduced, I believe that there is a supply and demand issue and the bill increased demand without increasing supply. That’s too simplistic, I’m sure.)

(2) Obama did not understand until very late that the other side benefitted by opposing and vilifying him: and a united front made mischaracterizations of the legislation and Obama himself “stick”. Mitch McConnell said very early on something to the effect: if there is bipartisan legislation on things like the stimulus, financial reform and health care, those bills will be immensely popular. Despite our duty as public servants, we cannot afford popular legislation if we want control of Congress/the White House.

(3) The mischaracterizations required to oppose those bills created some of the most widely misunderstood legislation I can remember – not since we were told that flouride was a communist plot do I remember gaps between truth and assertion being so wide. And Obama did not understand that framing the issues was important as formulating the legislation. Nor do Democrats generally understand message discipline. As one minor factoid: more than 50% of the electorate believes that the Obama administration is responsible for the Wall Street bailout. Don’t get me started on the electorate’s lack of basic scientific knowledge or acceptance of simple facts like Obama’s religious affiliation or place of birth. That’s a direct result of the partisan divide – the McConnell paradox. (Added to that, the Republicans have accomplished the near-impossible: they have convinced the electorate that they didn’t really support the bailout and that they in fact hate bailouts; simultaneously they garnered almost all of the money and support from the financial services industry by opposing financial regulation reforms (and of course thereby contributing to the distorted regulation that resulted), after the largest regulatory failure in American history.)

(4) Under these conditions – economic near collapse, corrosive public discourse, partisan “news” organizations – there is no possibility of Obama (or anyone else) uniting the country to address the incredible long-term fiscal and environmental issues we face. It has to happen over a long period of time, as truth eventually becomes clear and the wall of mischaracterizations falls of its own weight.

Obama’s other mistakes (other than your list and mine, and simply not connecting with people):

(1) the tax code needed certainty - why not raise the limit to $500k/year and not lose that debate? That should have been issue number 2 after the stimulus – extend the cuts except for those making over $500k and elevate the estate tax deduction to $5mm. Reduce corporate tax rates and close off-shoring loopholes/incentives. Even that very generous legislation would have been tough but do-able; however it would have been very popular immediately afterwards.

(2) health care should have followed financial reform (and tax cut extension) because there were some Republican votes for those 2. There were none for health care and they should have known that – they were completely taken in by McConnell, Nelson and Grassley on that one.

(3) cap and trade (or similar carbon limiting legislation) should have followed health care, because it would also have been very popular – but only after reduction of corporate taxes – especially after the oil spill and the mine disaster. How the Dems lost that opportunity, I will never know.

There is no Deficit

There are multiple deficits. Addressing the Federal deficit is not nearly enough. Overall federal debt, state deficits and debt and unfunded public pension liabilities must be addressed in any clarifying discussion of public fiscal problems. Pension liability accounting must also be addressed. How can a discount rate be justified in calculating total liabilities? If New Jersey uses 8% (or thereabouts) as a discount rate, on what basis does it do that - especially if people are living longer?

Me and My Uncle

It seems to me that lots of Western Republicans believe that, having had their states created by the federal government from land bargained at the point of a gun or outright stolen from Native Americans, they would like now to shoot their partner, the federals, take the rest of the land, and leave the government "dead by the side of the road."