Why the Rich get much Richer

On My 28 I posted a commentary titled “Goodbye Middle Class.” On June 26 David Lazarus posted this column in the Los Angeles Times.

His column abridged, (underlined and bold not part of the Times editing) At CVS Caremark, it doesn’t pay to be really good at your job. The nation’s second-largest drugstore chain adjusts its annual raises to how much an employee makes. The higher your salary, the lower your raise. The top workers at CVS stores — those earning the highest hourly wage for their job classification — are “red lined” by the company and receive no raises at all. CVS, which gave its chief executive a 26% raise last year to almost $23 million in total compensation, isn’t alone in making sure its rank-and-file workers don’t make too much money.

And this is why, in any discussion of income inequality, we keep reaching the same point — the rich get richer, while everyone else gets table scraps. “It’s not personal. It’s business,” said Mike Lipis, a Los Angeles compensation consultant. “You’re trying to make the most of your limited compensation dollars.”

I wrote recently about a report showing that the head of CVS, Larry Merlo, enjoyed the widest gap in the country between a CEO’s salary and that of his less-worthy underlings. According to compensation researcher PayScale, Merlo’s $12.1-million salary last year was 422 times the size of the median CVS wage of $28,700.

A top-performing CVS pharmacy technician earning a base wage of $9.30 an hour will similarly merit a 4.75% raise. But a red-lined pharmacy technician earning $15.67 an hour will see no raise.

Politicians have an excellent issue for the coming elections. It’s a good bet that none of them will even address the pay discrepancy. The reason? The source of the contributions for their campaigns.

Don’t look for the media to emphasize the salary discrepancies. Those heading the media companies are some of the highest paid people.

Leslie Moonves, CEO of CBS Corp. $62,157,026 in 2012

Philippe P. Dauman, CEO of Vaicom Inc.$37,165,750 in 2013

Marissa A. Mayer, CEO of Yahoo Inc. $36,615,404 in 2012

Robert A. Iger, CEO of Disney Co. $34,321,055 in 2013

David M. Zaslav, CEO of Discover Communications $33,349,798 in 2013

It Wasn’t a Hard Choice for Hillary Clinton

Despite my contention that Hillary Clinton is the wrong person to become the next president I am still interested in the attention she receives. One hour with Diane Sawyer on ABC and two hours with Christiane Amanpour on CNN is a great way to sell books and an even greater way to prepare for a run for the presidency without announcing she is a candidate.

Naturally Los Angeles would be a great place to start a book signing tour for Mrs. Clinton. This is a Democratic stronghold. Even better was the Barnes and Noble bookstore in The Grove shopping center. This is the heart of West Los Angeles and home of liberal Congressman Henry Waxman.

Los Angeles is a very spread out city. It took 50 minutes for me to reach this high priced and very popular shopping center. 22 miles of stop and go traffic. Despite the crowd that awaited me the parking was easy.

The back end of the line. Two blocks from the Barnes & Noble store

I expected the crowd to be significant and it was. Security in and around the mall was very prominent. The line was about two city blocks in length. I overheard a security person say that people were lining up at 4:30 in the morning. The book signing started at 11:30. First you waited in line to buy the book and then returned to the line to obtain her (Clinton’s) autograph. The total time for the entire process was reported to be eight hours. The book flap cover says the price for this masterpiece is $35.00 but on a visit to Costco I found the un-autographed hard cover copy for $20.00.

Hillary Clinton entering Barnes & Noble Bookstore at The Grove in Los Angeles

I did obtain a circular stick on badge that reads “I’m Ready for Hillary.” There is no rain in Los Angeles in June. It was a medium warm sunny day. That waiting line held many future campaign workers. If nothing else the turn out brought more visitors and business to The Grove, the adjoining Farmers Market and Canter’s Deli just up the street.

Hillary Clinton is the wrong candidate for President

Think words like hubris (Overbearing pride or presumption; arrogance; exaggerated pride or self-confidence) and narcissist (Excessive preoccupation with or admiration of oneself) and you have my impression of Hillary Clinton.

Between her new book (Hard Choices) and her appearances on ABC, Hillary Clinton is setting the stage for her presidential campaign. Pertaining to Benghazi, What does “I take responsibility” mean? Mrs. Clinton is not the first person to use those words. Every time there is an error made by government a politician steps forward and tells us he or she is responsible. Eric Shinseki, former secretary of the VA, was responsible for VA hospital care and did resign. The lose his job was the price he paid for his incompetence. Mrs. Clinton? No price was paid. Hillary Clinton is a polarizing figure who will do more harm than good to the Democratic Party. If she is elected president, Bill and Hillary would be a distracting element to managing America’s government. I am certain that there are many other Democrats who could successfully run for president in 2016 but have been warned away by the Clinton machine.

What do you think?

Freedom of Speech is Under Attack

This is about fear. We must never say anything that will alienate any group. It’s about political correctness. Where are the moderate Muslims?

I did not attend Brandeis University. I am a graduate from Penn State. I always thought Brandeis University is the school where all ideas can be expressed.

About Brandeis on its web site: The name Brandeis was not chosen by accident. Our founders sought to name the university after an individual of impeccable moral fiber, leadership, intellectual ability, integrity and social conscience. The name that stood out was that of the late U.S. Supreme Court associate justice Louis D. Brandeis.

A few weeks ago Brandeis University took the step of dis-inviting Ayaan Hirsi Ali from giving a talk at the forthcoming commencement ceremony on the grounds that the faculty who had protested her appearance had pointed out that she was not simply critical of Islamic practices, but blamed the religion of Islam itself for the kind of backward positions many Islamists took. Explaining her shock at the Brandeis position, Hirsi Ali gave the following statement to Time magazine:

“I assumed that Brandeis intended to honor me for my work as a defender of the rights of women against abuses that are often religious in origin. For over a decade, I have spoken out against such practices as female genital mutilation, so-called “honor killings,” and applications of Sharia Law that justify such forms of domestic abuse as wife beating or child beating. Part of my work has been to question the role of Islam in legitimizing such abhorrent practices.”

Source: http://pjmedia.com/ronradosh/2014/04/26/aayan-ali-hirsi-the-islamists-and-the-question-of-free-speech-in-the-academy/

The Economist calls this “Enlightened intolerance.”

Salon.com says “Ayaan Hirsi Ali and the dangerous anti-Islamic logic of the war on terror.”

“It is difficult to conceive of a braver woman alive today than Ayaan Hirsi Ali,” said James Kirchick in The Daily Beast.com. Born into a Muslim family in Somalia, she was subjected to genital mutilation as a child, fled to the Netherlands to avoid a forced marriage, and became an outspoken critic of Islam, and Its treatment of women. Death threats followed, and she had to go into hiding after a Muslim fanatic murdered a filmmaker with whom she had worked and warned her that she was next. Now living in the U.S.under 24-hour police protection, Hirsi Ali remains “a heroic example to women around the world”-but not to Brandeis University. Last week, under pressure from Muslim groups, Brandeis canceled plans to award Hirsi Ali an honorary doctorate, claiming that her attacks on Islam went against the university’s “core values.” It was another depressing example of the “thought police” on college campuses squelching free speech.

“Brandeis got it right,” said Rabbi Eric Yoffie in HuffingtonPost.com. An honorary doctorate would have been an endorsement of Hirsi Ali’s deplorable views. She has said that “violence is inherent in Islam,” and called the entire religion a “destructive, nihilistic cult of death.” She doesn’t even distinguish between moderate and radical Muslims. “As we Jews know, there are real consequences when entire populations are represented in the public imagination by their worst elements.” But Brandeis has honored controversial figures before, said William Kristol in The Weekly Standard. Previous recipients include playwright Tony Kushner, who once labeled the creation of Israel “a mistake,” and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who has compared Israel to Hitler. Is there one rule for critics of Judaism, and another for critics of Islam?

One group has remained shamefully quiet over the muzzling of Hirsi Ali, said Jeff Jacoby in The Boston Globe: liberal feminists. They call opposition to employer-provided contraceptives “a war on women.” But “the savagery of honor killings or child marriages”? It does not stir their outrage. Brandeis should have followed ColumbiaUniversity’s example, said Robin Abcarian in the Los Angeles Times. When Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was invited to speak there in 2007, Columbia’s president let him-but only after denouncing his most offensive views in interviews, statements, and the introduction to his talk. The best response to offensive speech isn’t censorship-it’s “more speech.”

David Bancroft

Genocide in Non-White Countries is OK

The oft-chanted “Never Again” is in fact “Again and Again”

The diplomat who was president of the U.N. Security Council in April 1994 (Former New Zealand ambassador Colin Keating) apologized Wednesday for the council’s refusal to recognize that genocide was taking place in Rwanda and for doing nothing to halt the slaughter of more than one million people. The source for this report is the Associated Press.

Let’s review the history of world concern over genocide starting with Adolph Hitler and his plan to kill every Jew in the world. He successfully killed 6 million Jews and millions of others who did not accede to his views.

PBS posted this commentary on-line. “ Genocide has occurred so often and so uncontested in the last fifty years that an epithet more apt in describing recent events than the oft-chanted “Never Again” is in fact “Again and Again.” The gap between the promise and the practice of the last fifty years is dispiriting indeed. How can this be?”

“In 1948 the member states of the United Nations General Assembly — repulsed and emboldened by the sinister scale and intent of the crimes they had just witnessed — unanimously passed the Genocide Convention. Signatories agreed to suppress and punish perpetrators who slaughtered victims simply because they belonged to an “undesirable” national, ethnic, or religious group.”

What has really happened? With the exception of the United States bombing to stop the killing of Bosnian Muslims, no efforts have been made to stop genocide killing since that 1948 agreement.

Here is a list of the largest mass killing events since WWII. Notice that all of these events occurred in Asia and Africa. Killing in Europe is stopped. Is race an issue? How dare I suggest that it is!

Nigerian Civil War 1 million to 3 million deaths

Cambodian Genocide 1 million to 3 million deaths

Rwandan Genocide 500,000 to 1 million deaths

A message has been sent by the most powerful countries in the world!

Republican Party Stands Opposed to Social Welfare

Social Welfare is the various social services provided by a state for the benefit of its citizens.

In the United States the range of services includes Social Security (a program that guarantees a stipend to all senior citizens), Medicare (a program that provides health care to all senior citizens), minimal support for those unable to earn a living (usually referred to as welfare), and unemployment benefits (for those who lost their jobs through no fault of their own). Those are the primary programs that American residents are entitled to when there is a need.

In every instance those programs have been opposed by the G.O.P. In every instance those programs were instituted when a Democrat held the office of President of the United States.

The current chairman of the House Budget Committee, Republican Congressman Paul Ryan has sustained the Republican view on social welfare programs with the following words copied from his web site.

The current Medicare program attempts to do two things to make sure that all seniors have secure, affordable health insurance that works. First, recognizing that seniors need extra protection when it comes to health coverage, it pools risk among all seniors to ensure that they enjoy secure access to care.

Second, Medicare subsidizes coverage for seniors to ensure that coverage is affordable. Affordability is a critical goal, but the subsidy structure of Medicare is fundamentally broken and drives costs in the wrong direction. The open-ended, blank-check nature of the Medicare subsidy drives health-care inflation at an astonishing pace, threatens the solvency of this critical program, and creates inexcusable levels of waste in the system.

Ryan’s solution:
Beginning in 2024, for those workers born in 1959 or later, Medicare would offer them a choice of private plans competing alongside the traditional fee-for-service option on a new Medicare Exchange. Medicare would provide a premium-support payment either to pay for or to offset the premium of the plan chosen by the senior.

The Medicare Exchange would provide seniors a competitive marketplace in which they could choose a plan the same way members of Congress and federal employees do. Every plan, including the traditional fee-for-service option, would participate in an annual bidding process to determine the federal contribution seniors would receive to purchase coverage. Health-care plans would compete for the right to serve Medicare beneficiaries.

What Ryan calls “the president’s partisan health-care law” is an appointed government board like the FCC, the FDA, the FAA, and dozens of other appointed boards. He favors the unelected bureaucrats in privately owned insurance companies that answer to private enterprise. His view is those government bureaucrats aren’t as reliable to private company bureaucrats.

Ryan goes on to say The President’s partisan health-care law creates an unaccountable board of 15 unelected bureaucrats—the Independent Payment Advisory Board—empowered to cut Medicare in ways that will result in denied care and restricted access for seniors. The bureaucrat imposed cuts threaten critical care for current seniors and fail to strengthen Medicare for future generations.

So is it the blank-check nature of Medicare or 15 unelected bureaucrats that will be threatening current seniors? Ryan has covered both possibilities in his contradictory analysis.

The point is that Republicans are trying their very best to end Medicare, Social Security, and all other social welfare programs. They offer no substitutes. Their obsession with free market principles is the view of the rich who say they have no responsibility for the less well off.

There are many other reasons to oppose Republicans but that will be addressed on another day.

Why My son Isn’t Voting Anymore

He’s a smart man who moved to the San Francisco Bay area to complete his college education. After graduation he worked at a few Silicon Valley computer companies then decided there is more to life than making big bucks.

Along the way he was inculcated by the liberal/progressive viewpoints that are so prevalent in that region. He was ecstatic over Barack Obama’s win of the White House. The speech at Grant Park in Chicago enthralled him. He believed that the new president would change the world for the better. That the new president would turn around the country and provide the new start that so many had anticipated.

He came to visit for my birthday and wedding anniversary. Now that the party is over he tells me that he is beyond disappointment with our government. There is no point in voting in any election any more. The president, he says, had the opportunity to do the sorts of things that FDR did to employ the unemployed, build the kinds of infrastructure that so many previous presidents had inspired, and start the kinds of new education that would carry the United States as a leader throughout the 21^st century.

We talked about the president’s failure to quickly end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. We talked about the president’s failure to assertively stand up to Vladimir Putin.

He spoke about Ralph Nader as the man who spoke the truth but was denied participation in debates with Al Gore and George W. Bush.

How can I console my son? I pointed out that someone will be elected president. He will have to make a choice. That the system has been designed to deny third party candidates an honest opportunity and you just have to accept this reality. I pointed out that the public may be sufficiently disillusioned with the Democrats and that a Republican will most likely win the White House. He said it won’t make any difference.

What Country Are We In?

The Ukraine was part of the Russian Empire since 1783. It became an independent nation as a result of the breakup of the USSR in 1989.

Alsace-Lorraine is a frontier area between Germany and France of about 5,000 square miles. It was ceded by France to Germany in 1871 after the Franco-German War. Then was retroceded to France in 1919 after World War I, was ceded again to Germany in 1940 during World War II, and was again retroceded to France in 1945. The area has a large German-speaking population.

The Mexican-American War (Mexico-United States [1846-48]) resulted in Mexico ceding California, Arizona, and New Mexico to the United States. Texas had previously won its independence from Mexico with the help of the United States.

At least 50% of today’s California population are Spanish speaking. Most are probably from Mexico. Using Russian logic Mexico should consider re-annexing Alta-California.

Wreckage of USS Maine, 1898. The sinking of the Maine was not an action by the Spanish. Investigations revealed that more than 5 long tons (5.1 t) of powder charges for the vessel’s six and ten-inch guns had detonated, obliterating the forward third of the ship.

Should these regional boundary disputes be subject to approval of the entire world? Why is the United States the court of justice? Other than WWI and WWII America’s track record in policing the world has been dismal.

The USA Cannot Police the World

News report in the Los Angeles Times today.

President Obama said today that he was “deeply concerned” by reports of Russian military activity in Ukraine and warned Moscow to use restraint as the former Soviet state struggles to forge a new government.
“Any violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity would be deeply destabilizing,” Obama said in a statement from the White House. Such a move would be a “profound interference in matters that must be determined by the Ukrainian people.”
Obama’s remarks followed a day in which tensions mounted between the new Western-aligned government in the capital of Kiev and the Russian-speaking majority in the Ukrainian province of Crimea.

The USA has no economic interest in Ukraine. Of course we all feel sad for the Syrians, Iranians, North Koreans, and Ukranians. We simply are exhausted. Afghans may be to blame. We are there to help them develop a free an independent society. The problem is they don’t want our way of life. Our ‘manifest destiny’ idea that our way is the right way for societies to function and it has been handed down by God is our delusion.

The United States cannot police the world. We lack the army, the money, and Americans have no appetite for new interventions this year. That may become a long term attitude. It is a consequence of our two most recent foreign involvements. You know, Iraq and Afghanistan. Neither of those efforts went as projected. We spent millions, we lost lives, we saw thousands return home with permanent injuries with no success. In fact the opposite has occurred. More people and countries around the world either hate or intensely dislike the USA.

Much of the rest of the world does not accept our ideas. President Obama’s comments about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is more for domestic consumption than about stopping their action.

The exception is our war hawks. They would have us involved in Syria, confronting Iran, and now confronting Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

It Looks like another “cold war.”

Income inequality: Nothing New!

The following article was in The Week magazine dated February 7, 2014. Their title was Income inequality: Why does the gap keep widening? Then the article proceeds to tell readers that it hasn’t widened. It’s just great political rhetoric that might help win elections.

Perhaps it’s the strong rhetoric of Pope Francis and President Obama, or the growing sense that the economic recovery is leaving the poor and the middle class behind. But income inequality-an issue that once preoccupied liberal policy wonks and scruffy Occupy Wall Street activists-has suddenly become “part of the mainstream kitchentable debate” in America, said Michael Hiltzik in LATimes.com.

A startling new Gallup poll finds fully two thirds of adults either somewhat or very dissatisfied with the distribution of wealth in this country-and that includes 54 percent of Republicans. The rich just keep getting richer, said Harry Bruinius in CSMonitor.com, and “the public has been taking notice.” Since 2009, 95 percent of U.S. economic gains have gone to the wealthiest 1 percent of the population. Wall Street stocks and corporate profits are soaring to all-time highs, yet on Main Street, salaries have been stagnant, and millions can’t find jobs that pay middle-class salaries. Americans who once believed that anyone could climb the ladder with hard work and talent now suspect that the system is “stacked against them.”

The rich may be getting richer, said Nick Gillespie in TheDailyBeast.com, but that doesn’t mean it’s getting harder to join their ranks. A study released last week by Harvard economists shows that a child born into the poorest fifth of U.S. households has the same 7.8 percent chance of climbing the ladder into the richest fifth as he or she did 50 years ago. That figure is “unacceptably low,” but “upward mobility” is still happening. To address income inequality with effective policies, said David Brooks in The New York Times, we have to understand its real roots. The “growing affluence of the rich” isn’t causing the problems of the poor. Those problems are the result of globalization’s impact on “low-skill jobs,” and even more importantly, of social and cultural factors. America’s underclass lives in a world of broken homes, crime-filled communities, dysfunctional schools, and personal chaos. That’s what is keeping people stuck at the bottom, not the growing wealth of the top 1 percent.

Now there’s a convenient rationalization, said Matthew O’Brien in TheAtlantic.com. The reality is that as the rich award themselves with all the gains created by technology and cheap labor, they’ve come to inhabit “a different world.” Their kids grow up with $40,000-a-year preschools, tutors, private lessons, special college prep, and on and on. On this unlevel playing field, how do kids from the bottom 90 percent compete? Those at the top of the social ladder have one overriding goal, said David Horsey in the Los Angeles Times: “to protect what they have and get even more.” That’s why wealthy individuals and corporations flood Washington and state capitols with political contributions. It’s no accident that people who make $20 million on investments pay lower tax rates than struggling plumbers and teachers. Unless the rich suddenly get a conscience, the U.S. will soon be “the world’s biggest banana republic,” with the ruling plutocrats living behind gilded gates.

So what’s the answer? said Mickey Kaus in The Wall Street Journal. Democrats may moan about inequality, but when it comes to policies that might reverse the trends, “they got nothin’, as comedians say.” Raising the minimum wage? Hiking the top tax rates? Please. Small tweaks to the status quo will not “stop the top 10 percent from taking home 50 percent of the nation’s income.” Let’s face it: Everyone may be talking about income inequality, but thus far, it’s a problem without a solution.