ELECTION 2016: CLOSER THAN THE POLLS ARE PREDICTING?

National Affairs

We Americans have the right to vote this year for messy, disorganized and possibly vulgar change – or an expansion of what I have dubbed the Reign of Error.

Not a pleasant choice, is it?

Donald Trump is a vain, touchy, coarse and vulgar man.  He wouldn’t be the first US president to have such characteristics.  He can’t hold a candle to Lyndon Johnson in the vulgarity department and it is too late in his life for him to catch up to John Kennedy and Bill Clinton in the taking-advantage-of-women department.

Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, has been caught in a web of lies since she was first seen on the national stage.  These have been well-documented and continue to this very day.  We know her public persona and, more and more, we also know her private persona – and promises, for instance, to Goldman Sachs that contradict her public statements.  Her life has been a series of mis-steps and cover-ups that others have gone and will go to jail for.

Messy Vulgar Change or a Reign of Error?

This makes this election one of the toughest ever to call.  Neither candidate is angelic, though both try to make us think they are.  We know better.  Both candidates this year are persons of dubious character, each in their own way.  That leaves us voters their platform and their prescriptions to improve what ails us as the two areas in which we might make a more informed decision. 

Some well-educated and financially successful voters are aghast at the possibility of another LBJ.  Yet it was LBJ who changed the face of the nation with his arm-twisting, deal-making and blackmailing of Congress to ram through effective civil rights legislation.  He was an agent of change when the country most needed changing.

Many middle class Americans, on the other hand, have seen their jobs lost to overseas slave or cheap labor so financially successful Americans could buy “things” more cheaply.  These befuddled voters can’t understand why anyone would vote to continue the current Reign of Error.  They have seen their jobs vanish, their homes taken from them because of Wall Street and bankers’ greed, and their children’s quality of education, and educational choice, diminish.  They wonder how anyone could vote for a candidate who promises to carry on the current travesties, while adding even more.

For what may well be a surprising number of American voters, this is a game of Truth or Consequences.  The truth, as they see it, is that our nation has been on the wrong track since before the most recent recession.  But worse, far worse, is that things didn’t improve as the recession ended.  Not for most.

But this truth is one which transcends mere personal financial gain.  It includes:

* a dangerously reduced capability to defend the nation against external threats,

* an America that is no longer respected or trusted by those who would be our allies,

* an America that is becoming a global laughingstock, pushed around by not only a resurgent Russia and imperialistic China but by third-world dictators,

* an administration that believes no nation should stand alone even if standing alone is the right thing to do; we should instead consult with “our friends” in Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Myanmar and elsewhere,

* and Americans like those tens of thousands of coal miners in Kentucky, Ohio and West Virginia, who are thrown out of work because of some grand Stalinist-type scheme to change the world, then are told “It’s OK.  We’re going to give you welfare and nutritional assistance.”

Welfare is not work.  Becoming wards of the State is not worth it so that the USA may set an example of less greenhouse gases to the rest of the world, which example the rest of the world will surely follow.  Or not.

This brings us to what many voters see as the consequences of these truths: they believe we have lived in a Reign of Error both domestically and globally for too long. They are ready for change.  I believe they may not be willing to tell a pollster they could actually bring themselves to vote for Donald Trump, but in the privacy of the voting booth?  We may yet be surprised that this will be a much closer election than currently forecast.

Hillary Clinton is likely seen by many of those who consume news, rather than the literati who aspire to write it, as part of the problem and in no way a solution.  They see a Clinton presidency as not just perpetuating the class divisions in America, but extending them further.  A couple samples from her platform:

Free College Education for All!   There is No Such Thing as a Free Lunch.  Who really pays for this “free” education?

A Single Payer System of Health Care by Any Other Name.  There is No Such Thing as a Free Lunch.  Who pays when providers are bankrupted and individuals see their rates rise astronomically? 

Continued Lowering of US Stature and Defenses / Negotiating with Tyrants.  Who pays, and in danger, not dollars, when secret codicils to the Iran nuclear talks are deemed too sensitive for mere voters – or even Congress, the peoples’ representatives, to be allowed to see them?

A Shift to the Far Left.  It didn’t work in Russia.  It didn’t work in China.  It didn’t work in Cuba.  It isn’t working in Venezuela or scores of other places so, what the heck, it attracts a certain bloc of voters, so let’s give it a try here. 

Duplicity.  This has to be said.  Using dirty tricks against Bernie Sanders to discredit any real opposition?  Saying one thing about Benghazi then saying “I don’t remember?”  Destroying 32,000-plus e-mails and droning, “I can’t recall?”  Sending Secret (defined as “serious damage to national security” if divulged) and Top Secret (“grave damage”) messages on a private server easily hacked by foreign agents and saying, “I didn’t know they were classified?”

There are many in America who dislike Donald Trump’s style, or lack thereof, and believes he is simply too volatile to lead the nation. But that same base also distrusts Hillary Clinton and believes she might be able to lead the nation – but in a direction they definitely do not want to go.  I believe that group is larger than the pollsters are reporting, primarily because no one wants to admit they might prefer a loose cannon willing to take a different approach.  

What if more Americans are considering voting differently than they are telling the pollsters? 

What if more Americans decide they want a Supreme Court that interprets the tenets of the US Constitution as written, not as it is “interpreted in light of changed conditions.” The Court doesn’t get to rewrite the Constitution, the people do, and only via Constitutional amendments.

What if more Americans are tired of having tin-horn dictators, pompous little Napoleon wannabes and Islamist terrorists denigrate our nation and, effectively, control our foreign policy? 

What if more Americans realize that welfare is not a job and “You want fries with that?” is not a job one is fated to perform for an entire lifetime

There is fear and loathing afoot in the land.  This election will determine if it surfaces or seethes again for another four years.  Even many well-educated and financially successful voters resent the new aristocracy the Reign of Error has bred and the elitism and entitlement they see as Hillary Clinton smugly proclaims that she is the heir apparent.

Some 38% of Americans now identify as “independent” regardless of the party with which they are registered.  I believe they will decide this election. 

Let’s get on with it.  No matter how bad it is, the checks and balances on executive authority will work as intended, and the longest each party’s partisans’ worst nightmare will last is four years before a new election takes place.  We’re Americans.  We’ve seen worse.  We can handle it.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: THE QUID PRO QUO

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: THE QUID PRO QUO 

-- National and International Affairs

THE CONSTITUTION of the United Mexican States

[This will get me flogged in the public square of Political Correctness. It matters not that I am a staunch advocate of increasing LEGAL immigration, and not just for the wealthy or uniquely talented.  We are either a shining city upon the hill or we are not.  But I am advocating LEGAL immigration.  For a little perspective on how other nations deal with this problem, I thought I’d check the Constitution of Mexico. Here are some key provisions regarding foreigners...]

* Assembly & free speech: Non-citizens are proscribed from any demonstration or public expression of opinion about Mexico. To wit: "Foreigners may not in any way participate in the political affairs of the country." -- Article 33

* Employment: Forget about it. "Mexicans shall have priority over foreigners...for all employment, positions, or commissions of the Government in which the status of citizenship is not indispensable.” -- Article 32

* Religion: The Mexican constitution forbids immigrants & naturalized citizens from being a member of the clergy. "To practice the ministry of any denomination in [Mexico] it is necessary to be a Mexican by birth." -- Article 130

* Property rights: Again, forget about it. "Only Mexicans by birth or naturalization and Mexican companies have the right to acquire ownership of lands, waters, and their appurtenances, or to obtain concessions for the exploitation of mines or of waters. The State may grant the same right to foreigners, provided they agree...to consider themselves as nationals... Under no circumstances may foreigners acquire direct ownership of lands or waters within a zone of one hundred kilometers along the frontiers and of fifty kilometers along the shores of the country." -- Article 27

* Political representation: Foreign-born, even if naturalized, Mexican citizens may not become federal lawmakers (Article 55), cabinet secretaries (Article 91) or supreme court justices (Article 95). The president of Mexico (as in the US) must be a citizen by birth, but in Mexico his or her parents must also be Mexican-born, thus preventing a first-generation immigrant, many of whom have held elective office in the US, the right to serve.

* Gaining citizenship via military service: Standard in the US, it can’t happen in Mexico. "In order to belong to the National Navy or the Air Force...it is required to be a Mexican by birth. This same status is indispensable for captains, pilots, masters, engineers, mechanics, and in general, for all personnel of the crew of any vessel or airship protected by the Mexican merchant flag or insignia.” -- Article 32 [I couldn’t find the same language for the Army...]

* Citizens’ arrest of illegals: Given the hue and cry from Mexico's leadership about American citizens watching and reporting illegal entry into the US, I found this one particularly hypocritical: "In cases of flagrante delicto, any person may arrest the offender and his accomplices, turning them over without delay to the nearest authorities." -- Article 16

* Expulsion / due process: Foreigners may be expelled from Mexico at any time, for any reason, and without due process. "The Federal Executive shall have the exclusive power to compel any foreigner whose remaining he may deem inexpedient to abandon the national territory immediately and without the necessity of previous legal action." -- Article 33. Article 11 further guarantees federal protection against "undesirable aliens resident in the country."

Mexico, like every other nation -- including the US -- has the right to control its borders and regulate resident non-citizens from other nations. Personally, I’m for LOTS more immigration, the absolute strength that sets America apart from other nations, especially from our closest neighbors -- albeit legal and skill-based, rather than illegal and need-based. But how can Mexico’s political leadership lecture the US on its immigration policy when their policies read like this? It’s time for an honest dialogue on this issue.

[Sources: All OSINT (Open Source Intelligence), with special thanks to The Center for Security Policy's J. Michael Waller, Ph.D]]

Oil Companies Do NOT Want Permanently High Prices 

– National & Economic Affairs

Sounds like a non sequitur, doesn’t it? What business doesn’t like higher prices? Don’t get me wrong -- higher prices usually mean higher margins and that means bonuses and raises for executives and employees and it means happy shareholders. But oil companies don't want permanently high prices or prices that are too high. There are three reasons for this:

(1) Those who produce oil, those who refine it, and those who sell it realize that, above x price (with x fluctuating depending upon incomes and inflation expectations,) oil will be uncompetitive.

(2) Oil companies don’t own their raw material. Venezuela owns Venezuelan oil. Saudis own Saudi oil. Nigerians own Nigerian oil. Et cetera. Oil companies are no different than the proprietor of a country store. If Frito-Lay ups the price of a bag of potato chips by $1, does the country store proprietor benefit? Yes -- to the extent that he earns the same profit margin. Did the storekeeper make a windfall profit? No -- he made a little more but he’s operating on the same margins. It’s Frito-Lay that made the big bucks with the price rise. Think of OPEC as Frito-Lay, only bigger.

(3) The higher the price of oil, the greater the share of proven reserves the oil companies booked at way lower prices. They lose money because, once those old wells negotiated with an assumption of $20 a barrel, or $30 or $40 or $50, hit their payout targets, the nation in which they are drilling gets to raise their share of the revenue.

For all these reasons, big oil companies, oil refiners and oil and gas retailers don’t want to kill their primary, and in some cases their only, source of income. Oil prices that are too high = world recession = a collapse of oil prices. Thus has it always been, thus shall it always be. Whenever we get to this side of the gas price bell curve, we hear the choruses of the ignorant saying, “This time it’s different,” or “The world is ending.” They’re wrong.

At least higher prices at the pump don't give the Feds and states more money to fund their favorite pork projects. Thankfully, taxes on gas purchases are based upon the volume of sales, not a percent of the price.  If gasoline is $2.70 a gallon, the country owning the crude typically gets about $1.55 and those who paid for the drilling equipment, labor to find the stuff, suffer the dry holes, ship it across oceans and land masses, refine it, distribute it via pipelines and such, and sell it at retail get to split 70 cents or so among them. The remaining 45 cents goes to the state and federal governments.

At $100 a barrel, who wouldn’t want to produce all-out?  But as we’ve seen for the last two years, the antidote to expensive oil and gas is… expensive oil and gas. It’s called The Law of Supply and Demand and all the ink from all the Chicken Littles in the blogosphere won’t change that law one bit. If you want to do something to deal with higher gasoline prices, do this:

(1) Buy shares of oil companies and vote out the SOBs who pay $400 million pension packages to a single executive. Stop the madness. Cap the pay of these dweebs who are stealing from the shareholders. You own the damn company -- band together and fire ‘em all.

(2) Lobby your representatives to raise fuel economy standards and take other intelligent conservation actions. In other words, use less. Remember Supply and Demand.

(3) The first two are for serious activists. Just want to complain, but you’d like to do it while making money? Buy shares of energy companies. You’ll still pay a couple thousand extra bucks in gasoline costs every year -- but you’ll pay it out of the tens of thousands you’ll have made owning well-selected companies.

Clue Birds Diving In for the 2nd "Presidential" "Debate"

Calling the debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton at Hofstra a Presidential Debate is a non sequitur. It was certainly not Presidential. Two unpopular and divisive candidates slinging personal accusations across the divide for 90 minutes was merely an extension of their campaign ads, which could just as easily have been shown in lieu of their appearance.

And a “debate?” Hardly. Go to any college or high school debate and you will see proscriptions against argumentum ad hominem, attacks on your opponents’ personality or motives, rather than responding to the fallacies of their positions. This first debate was both fiasco and anachronism.

To lessen the fiasco factor going forward, and to make the next debate actually highlight the candidates’ positions, prescriptions and character, here are a couple suggestions for the candidates and organizers/moderators.

Clue Bird #1 for Mr. Trump: You made some important points and even a couple of good zingers like "I will release my tax returns… when she releases her 33,000 emails that have been deleted." Now. Shut. Up. You don’t need to fill the entire 2 minutes with unrelated “and one other thing” blah-blah-blah that obscures the importance of what you said. Your tax returns are back-fence gossip but the lives of Americans, and those of our allies, are endangered when classified documents are mishandled. Brevity is the soul of wit.

Clue Bird #2 for Mr. Trump: Thicken your skin. You don’t have to defend every lawsuit you faced in business, every debt you took on, every mistake you ever made. There’s a target at the other podium who has done the same or worse. Stop wasting our time telling us what an angel you are. We know you aren’t. Neither is your opponent. Pretend you’re in 5th grade. “Me-eee??? What about her?!” The best defense is a good offense.

Clue Bird #1 for Secretary Clinton: Enough with the imperiousness. Yes, the Republicans threw you a softball. Yes, you have the slickest campaign team in the business. Yes, you are the front-runner. But in case you haven’t noticed he’s gaining. If looking-down-your-nose elitism is your idea of seeming Presidential, it isn’t working. It looks smug, dull and patronizing.

Clue Bird #2 for Secretary Clinton: People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Clinton Foundation shenanigans, acceptance of massive sums from Wall Street, shady business dealings in the past, and your failure to observe basic security protocols are all yuge vulnerabilities. All Mr. Trump has to do is note that sacrosanct posturing is out of sync with the past record and current opacity. So much for the fiasco that was the first debate.

What anachronism makes it likely future debates will be no better? The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) is the organization that sets the rules of engagement for these debates. If you are like most Americans, you probably believe this to be some grand assembly of responsible journalists, academics and other luminaries above the fray of partisan politics.

You’d be wrong. The CPD is comprised of Republican and Democratic party faithful. It is co-chaired by a former head of the Republican National Committee and a former press secretary for Bill Clinton. The members are the ultimate party insiders at a time when Americans are more and more fed up with insiders.

They seem to have but one common interest: prevent anyone outside their two parties from gaining national exposure. At a time when the greatest number of Americans say they are torn by the prospect of voting for a presidential candidate they consider only the lesser of two evils, the CPD has again decreed that Americans will not have the privilege of seeing any candidate with a platform that may reflect other views.

It’s time to replace the CPD. Allowing other viewpoints may be terrifying to them, but more enlightening to voters. As an example, 62% of Americans in a recent poll say they would like to hear from Libertarian party candidate Gary Johnson.

 That’s significant, given that some 38% of us, no matter how we registered, identify ourselves as political independents. Governor Johnson and his Vice-Presidential pick, William Weld, are former Republicans who won their gubernatorial races in heavily-Democratic states where the voters were fed up with rising taxes, regulations and bloated bureaucracies. Both were term-limited after being overwhelmingly re-elected for a second term. Might we not benefit from learning what Democratic voters found so effective that they chose to re-elect these men?

I seek to learn three things about a possible POTUS: the candidate’s platform, their prescriptions to fix the problems we face, and whether they are a person of good character. I’m guessing any third podium attendee would win at least one of those -- including a randomly-selected 5th-grader.

Finally, Clue Bird for the moderators. The moderator should be "one who moderates." So get control of the microphones. In the first fiasco, two minutes became 2:30 and respect for your opponent was tossed in favor of using the podium as a bully pulpit by interrupting each other every few seconds. ("Did not." "Did TOO." Did NOT.")

How about: at the 1:45 mark, the candidates see a red light. At 2:00, their mic goes dead. They can take their silent time to listen to their opponent and take notes for their rebuttal. Of course, they also can grimace, posture and pout like a 2nd-grader, but remember, we are trying to elevate these debates an order of magnitude to at least the 5th-grade level.

Americans are not nearly as stupid or manipulable as the sound-bites, pollsters, and media strategists for the two parties seem to think we are. Most of us have but one request this year: let us make an informed decision by hearing positions and prescriptions.  It may just be too late for character this go-'round.

  

Clue Birds Diving In for the 2nd "Presidential" "Debate"

Calling the debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton at Hofstra a Presidential Debate is a non sequitur. It was certainly not Presidential. Two unpopular and divisive candidates slinging personal accusations across the divide for 90 minutes was merely an extension of their campaign ads, which could just as easily have been shown in lieu of their appearance.

And a “debate?” Hardly. Go to any college or high school debate and you will see proscriptions against argumentum ad hominem, attacks on your opponents’ personality or motives, rather than responding to the fallacies of their positions. This first debate was both fiasco and anachronism.

To lessen the fiasco factor going forward, and to make the next debate actually highlight the candidates’ positions, prescriptions and character, here are a couple suggestions for the candidates and organizers/moderators.

Clue Bird #1 for Mr. Trump: You made some important points and even a couple of good zingers like "I will release my tax returns… when she releases her 33,000 emails that have been deleted." Now. Shut. Up. You don’t need to fill the entire 2 minutes with unrelated “and one other thing” blah-blah-blah that obscures the importance of what you said. Your tax returns are back-fence gossip but the lives of Americans, and those of our allies, are endangered when classified documents are mishandled. Brevity is the soul of wit.

Clue Bird #2 for Mr. Trump: Thicken your skin. You don’t have to defend every lawsuit you faced in business, every debt you took on, every mistake you ever made. There’s a target at the other podium who has done the same or worse. Stop wasting our time telling us what an angel you are. We know you aren’t. Neither is your opponent. Pretend you’re in 5th grade. “Me-eee??? What about her?!” The best defense is a good offense.

Clue Bird #1 for Secretary Clinton: Enough with the imperiousness. Yes, the Republicans threw you a softball. Yes, you have the slickest campaign team in the business. Yes, you are the front-runner. But in case you haven’t noticed he’s gaining. If looking-down-your-nose elitism is your idea of seeming Presidential, it isn’t working. It looks smug, dull and patronizing.

Clue Bird #2 for Secretary Clinton: People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Clinton Foundation shenanigans, acceptance of massive sums from Wall Street, shady business dealings in the past, and your failure to observe basic security protocols are all yuge vulnerabilities. All Mr. Trump has to do is note that sacrosanct posturing is out of sync with the past record and current opacity. So much for the fiasco that was the first debate.

What anachronism makes it likely future debates will be no better? The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) is the organization that sets the rules of engagement for these debates. If you are like most Americans, you probably believe this to be some grand assembly of responsible journalists, academics and other luminaries above the fray of partisan politics.

You’d be wrong. The CPD is comprised of Republican and Democratic party faithful. It is co-chaired by a former head of the Republican National Committee and a former press secretary for Bill Clinton. The members are the ultimate party insiders at a time when Americans are more and more fed up with insiders.

They seem to have but one common interest: prevent anyone outside their two parties from gaining national exposure. At a time when the greatest number of Americans say they are torn by the prospect of voting for a presidential candidate they consider only the lesser of two evils, the CPD has again decreed that Americans will not have the privilege of seeing any candidate with a platform that may reflect other views.

It’s time to replace the CPD. Allowing other viewpoints may be terrifying to them, but more enlightening to voters. As an example, 62% of Americans in a recent poll say they would like to hear from Libertarian party candidate Gary Johnson.

 That’s significant, given that some 38% of us, no matter how we registered, identify ourselves as political independents. Governor Johnson and his Vice-Presidential pick, William Weld, are former Republicans who won their gubernatorial races in heavily-Democratic states where the voters were fed up with rising taxes, regulations and bloated bureaucracies. Both were term-limited after being overwhelmingly re-elected for a second term. Might we not benefit from learning what Democratic voters found so effective that they chose to re-elect these men?

I seek to learn three things about a possible POTUS: the candidate’s platform, their prescriptions to fix the problems we face, and whether they are a person of good character. I’m guessing any third podium attendee would win at least one of those -- including a randomly-selected 5th-grader.

Finally, Clue Bird for the moderators. The moderator should be "one who moderates." So get control of the microphones. In the first fiasco, two minutes became 2:30 and respect for your opponent was tossed in favor of using the podium as a bully pulpit by interrupting each other every few seconds. ("Did not." "Did TOO." Did NOT.")

How about: at the 1:45 mark, the candidates see a red light. At 2:00, their mic goes dead. They can take their silent time to listen to their opponent and take notes for their rebuttal. Of course, they also can grimace, posture and pout like a 2nd-grader, but remember, we are trying to elevate these debates an order of magnitude to at least the 5th-grade level.

Americans are not nearly as stupid or manipulable as the sound-bites, pollsters, and media strategists for the two parties seem to think we are. Most of us have but one request this year: let us make an informed decision by hearing positions and prescriptions.  It may just be too late for character this go-'round.