Day: March 18, 2009

In Defense Of The Bonuses

There are those who are defending the bonuses paid to the AIG thieves.  Among them is Andrew Sorkin.

Sorkin argues that the sanctity of contracts and the importance of retaining particular AIG employees weighs heavily in favor of paying the bonuses. We’ve heard both of Sorkin’s arguments before and we’re unimpressed. Let’s take them one at a time.

The sanctity of contracts. Sorkin argues that the economic mess could be made worse if the government introduced further uncertainty by “abrogating contracts left and right.”

AIG’s contracts are so complicated that we need these employees. Sorkin also argues that we need to pay the AIG bonuses because if the employees leave, they might simply turn around and trade against A.I.G.’s book. This could be a huge disaster, in his view.

I can see what Sorkin is pointing out, but……somewhere I recall he was for tearing up the UAW contracts when the auto industry came calling.

In November, Sorkin recommended shoving General Motors into bankruptcy largely so GM could rip up its union contracts, which he said pay workers an average of $70 an hour with benefits.

Apparently, Sorkin has drawn the lines for the battle of the collars.

Let us now talking about Liddy, the CEO of AIG.

Edward M. Liddy, chairman and CEO of American International Group Inc. since last fall, has become the reluctant defender of princely employee bonuses that members of Congress — and much of the American public — find indefensible.

The retention payments — ranging from $1,000 to nearly $6.5 million — were not his idea. Liddy himself is not getting a bonus. The deals were cut early last year, long before then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson asked Liddy to take over the company.  But wait!  Some recieving retention payments are no longer with AIG.  Why would we pay someone to stay who has already quit?

Wait!  He is basically working for the government, since it owns about 80% of AIG and yet he did not look after his employers best interests.  How did he get the job?  He is an alumnus of Goldman-Sachs, as was the guy that appointed him, Paulson.  Another failed company and we chose people who were at the helm there to over see the direction of another failed company.  Is there logic in there?

This is all so much BS…….everyone concerned should have been aware of the problems this is presenting….if not then it is time for them to bow out and let someone else handle the business of the country……the fake outrage of Congress is nothing more than political theater…to see it any other way is just moronic.

The battle of the collars has begun.

2009 Anal-Ocity

The right just cannot let the whole socialist/communist thing go and it shows that they are truly ignorant on what it is to be communist.

This anal statement is from Victoria Jackson on FOX News:

“My motivation is gone, because [Obama] will punish me if I’m successful. That’s how you start communism, is just take — Cuba. Obama wants to be Castro.”

Do you remember Victoria Jackson?  Saturday Nite Live in the early 90’s.  About the only memorable thing about her was her voice…it sounds like someone de-nutting a cat.  I do not think she has to worry about being successsful.  Yes, she is an idiot!

Up Uranus!

There are somethings that just MUST be reported……This is one of those stories.  And please, I cannot make this shit up!  (a play on words, tee hee)

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to take a peek inside the human colon?  Well, have you?  I know that is one of my to do things before I croak.

The Prevent Cancer Super Colon – an inflatable, interactive, 20-foot long, 8-foot high replica of the human colon – is the centerpiece of a display to raise awareness about the dangers of colon cancer.

Visitors walking through the colon will have the opportunity to learn about colorectal cancer prevention, risks, symptoms and treatment options.

The Super Colon also allows a close up view of what healthy tissue in a colon looks like and what tissue in various stages of cancer looks like. Free screening kits for colorectal cancer will also be distributed at the event.

March is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. Colorectal cancer is cancer of the colon and/or rectum. It is the second leading cause of cancer death in men and the third leading cause of death for women. In 2008 and estimated 148,810 cases were diagnosed, and it’s estimated that nearly 50,000 people will die of the illness.

Okay, may I see a show of hands of those who really deep down want to go inside a colon.  Why not watch a vid?  Anyway, on a side note, there probably will not be many Repubs in line to visit a colon, since they already know what it looks like in there….it comes from years of having their heads up the butts.

Creative Destruction

Oh God!  I have been racking my brain over the economic crisis for a theory that I vaguely recall. It is called “creative destruction”.

Schumpeter’s theory is that the success of capitalism will lead to a form of corporatism and a fostering of values hostile to capitalism, especially among intellectuals. The intellectual and social climate needed to allow entrepreneurship to thrive will not exist in advanced capitalism; it will be replaced by socialism in some form. There will not be a revolution, but merely a trend in parliaments to elect social democratic parties of one stripe or another. He argued that capitalism’s collapse from within will come about as democratic majorities vote for the creation of a welfare state and place restrictions upon entrepreneurship that will burden and destroy the capitalist structure. Schumpeter emphasizes throughout this book that he is analyzing trends, not engaging in political advocacy. In his vision, the intellectual class will play an important role in capitalism’s demise. The term “intellectuals” denotes a class of persons in a position to develop critiques of societal matters for which they are not directly responsible and able to stand up for the interests of strata to which they themselves do not belong. One of the great advantages of capitalism, he argues, is that as compared with pre-capitalist periods, when education was a privilege of the few, more and more people acquire (higher) education. The availability of fulfilling work is however limited and this, coupled with the experience of unemployment, produces discontent. The intellectual class is then able to organise protest and develop critical ideas.

Now that you are totally confused I will give it to you as simply as I can.  Creative Destruction:  “process of industrial mutation that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one.”  This process of Creative Destruction is the essential fact about capitalism. It is what capitalism consists in, and what every capitalist concern has got to live in.

Sounds familiar?  Uh huh……..sounds like the pains that capitalism is putting itself through.

Entrepreneurs innovate new ways of manipulating nature, and new ways of assembling and coordinating people. It is important to stress that a Schumpeterian entrepreneur is not an inventor, but an innovator. The innovator shows that a product, a process, or a mode of organization can be efficient and profitable, and that elevates the entire economy. But it also destroys those organizations and people who suddenly find their technologies and routines outmoded and unprofitable. There is, Schumpeter was certain, no way of avoiding this: Capitalism cannot progress without creating short-term losers alongside its short- and long-term winners: “Without innovations, no entrepreneurs; without entrepreneurial achievement, no capitalist … propulsion. The atmosphere of industrial revolutions … is the only one in which capitalism can survive.”

Bingo!  And now you know what is going on with the economy.  It is being creatively destroyed…but what will take its place?

Meghan, My New Crush

Anyone who has been a regular reader of Info Ink knows that I gave Sen. John McCain a really hard time during his primary run and then his presidential run.  I was a very strick and outspoken opponent to his campaign.

With all that said I would like to go on record stating that he has fathered my newest political crush, Meghan McCain.  Not only is she absolutely gorgeous she has an style that I can respect.  Normally I avoid blonds, but in this case I will make an exception to my rule.  I may not agree with her political ideology, but I will definitely agree with the way she handles her political critics.

Meghan McCain sat down with the ladies of “The View” Monday, railing against Laura Ingraham’s insult about her being “plus size,” commenting on her parents’ visit to the show last year and speaking about her father’s feeling of vindication at Obama calling some fundamentals of the economy strong.

McCain, who said she’d never even heard of Ingraham before the “plus sized” comment, called it “terrible” and added, “When Tyra Banks went on her show in a bathing suit and said ‘kiss my fat ass,’ that’s what I feel like. Kiss my fat ass!” McCain has blogged and Tweeted about the subject over the last week.

I am waiting for some insult from “Manne Coulter”, who Meghan called out recently also.

Meghan McCain’s recent criticisms of Ann Coulter as “offensive” and “radical” haven’t made her any friends among other female conservative pundits who have by turns criticized her weight and her lack of “fixed ideological principles.”

You go girl!

There Is NO Nuke Waste

I try to give both sides of a story and here is the other side of the nuke story I did about the Obama decision on nuke waste.

This is from an article in the WSJ:

So is this material “waste”? Absolutely not. Ninety-five percent of a spent fuel rod is plain old U-238, the nonfissionable variety that exists in granite tabletops, stone buildings and the coal burned in coal plants to generate electricity. Uranium-238 is 1% of the earth’s crust. It could be put right back in the ground where it came from.

Of the remaining 5% of a rod, one-fifth is fissionable U-235 — which can be recycled as fuel. Another one-fifth is plutonium, also recyclable as fuel. Much of the remaining three-fifths has important uses as medical and industrial isotopes. Forty percent of all medical procedures in this country now involve some form of radioactive isotope, and nuclear medicine is a $4 billion business. Unfortunately, we must import all our tracer material from Canada, because all of our isotopes have been headed for Yucca Mountain.

The supposed problem of “nuclear waste” is entirely the result of a the decision in 1976 by President Gerald Ford to suspend reprocessing, which President Jimmy Carter made permanent in 1977. The fear was that agents of foreign powers or terrorists groups would steal plutonium from American plants to manufacture bombs.

That fear has proved to be misguided. If foreign powers want a bomb, they will build their own reactors or enrichment facilities, as North Korea and Iran have done. The task of extracting plutonium from highly radioactive material and fashioning it into a bomb is far beyond the capacities of any terrorist organization.

Mr. Tucker must have missed the report:

Some granite countertops contain levels of uranium high enough to be dangerous to humans, said Rice professor W.J. Llope.

Using a spectrometer, Llope tested 25 varieties of granite bought from Houston-area dealers. In some cases, he said, he found countertops that could expose homeowners to 100 millirems of radiation in just a few months — the annual exposure limit set by the Department of Energy for visitors to nuclear labs.

A pretty good article by William Tucker….but I ask….at what cost?  I think it would have been a better article if he would have given us the start up costs of recycling the spent rods and then the cost of storage of what is left.  Just my thought.