politics

The other day I tweeted a paraphrase from one of my favorite bloggers Atrios regarding Mitt Romney's tax returns that went something like "the tax rate on any money the pile of cash earns is much lower than it is on the money earned by people who actually work." A couple people asked me to explain this a little more so I thought it would make a good bloggy topic.

I haven't written much at all about electoral politics because frankly they're not very interesting. The GOP nomination process has had its moments of entertainment, but that's largely a matter of theater, not substance. The Occupy movement got me excited for a hot minute, but outdoor protest tends to ebb in the winter. In today's edition of "doing the pages" I'll write a little ditty about a contemporary political debate within the left that's interesting in it's own right, and explains some of my lassitude.

It's been a while. I haven't just been neglecting this old blog, but really almost all my social interfaces. So a bit of a catch-up is probably in order. In this edition:

1. Personal life and romance report quarterly update.
2. How's business?
3. And what about all that ranting...

Following on my last post, I wanted to collect some thoughts on the ongoing Occupy Wall Street protest, which has rapidly grown more interesting. Today, for instance, instead of biking to Golden Gate Park and seeing some of the great free music, I watched mass arrests of hundreds of marchers who made their way onto the south (bklyn-bound) lane of the Brooklyn bridge where they were kettled by the NYPD. Live on the internet. Pretty high drama, but it's possibly quite a lot bigger than that.

I have a long bet on the internet, but let's be clear: it's not a world-saving wager. I have faith that we'll (eventually) muddle our way out of the Great Recession, but into what kind of future? Seriously, how does a world of seven billion work?

My macro-level spider-sense is tingling, and it's hard to see where global change can come from, what deus ex machina could conceivably save us. Time to do a little digging.

According to press accounts, President Obama is pondering a strategy to make substantial cuts in both Social Security and Medicare funding. A friend asked on The Twitter why I thought this was a huge fail, and I can't really explain in 140 characters. So, the first substantively political blog post in a while.

I won't spend much time explaining why I think Social Security and Medicare are worth funding or what is motivating there is a clamor to fundamentally dismantle them. I just want to present some important and often overlooked information about the economic underpinnings of these arguments.

I don't doubt that the Earth, the miracle of life, and probably even the human species have a long future, but our particular mode of living seems not long for the world. When you stop and think about the challenges that we're actually facing, and then you take a look at what we collectively invest our time and energy in, it's hard not to feel discouraged. This is what I'm referring to when I say there's an "undercurrent of doom" out there. I preach a dark future, etc.

Except really I don't. Apocalyptic thinking is contagious but ultimately not very insightful, and dispair has the downside of being both depressing and ineffective. Knowing is half the battle, so one place to start is thinking about the challenge.

I've been doing the politics thing in a mostly mainstream way since 2003, following the action, participating heavily at times, trying to steer the Big Spaceship a little more to my liking. Following the horserace (or sometimes bloodsport, or sometimes commedia) in DC can leave one detached from the original motivation. One of my cousins asked me recently what my "real political values" are, I'm guessing because I tweet about class war and sound generally agitated. It actually made me stop and think, and that was nice. Here's what I came up with...

Just to put some data in the chamber, I think Wikileaks is an important development. While the leaking of diplomatic cables is hardly cut and dry a blow for good, I strongly agree with the big-picture strategy. It's also clear that Julian Assange is being personally persecuted and the organization frozen out online. All of this has happened before. Keep that in mind when parsing the news.

Starting a new tag, "Things I Consumed," I'll tell you about the things that I read, ate, watched or otherwise consumed, but more what they made me think. First up is The Big Short, Michael Lewis' exploration of our latest financial bubble via the lenze of those who saw the end coming and had the balls to invest in collapse.