Rigidity and Gridlocked Government

The present Congressional theatre, like that of most of the last year, is based on gridlock created by an absolute refusal to compromise by a faction of tea party influenced Congressional members. The rigidity of thinking frankly reminds me of a jury case years ago in a simple DUI case. The jury, after deliberation, took vote after vote. One juror always voted guilty, while 11 found the defendant not guilty. This particular juror was a naturalized citizen from an Asian Communist country. He simply refused to believe that any of the testimony for the defense was evidence. In his view, only what was presented by the prosecution was evidence, and he would not be swayed by any of his fellow jurors…including a law student and a nuclear engineer, and several other professional people.

The case ended in a hung jury, and the prosecution chose not to refile. This same kind of rigid thinking by some members of Congress is damaging to our citizens and our economy in the case of the refusal to extend the payroll tax relief for a couple months. The demand to make it for a year is, of course, a red herring. The very reason the senate passed (with 89 affirmative votes!) the two month one was to allow more time to hammer out details of a year long bill.

Today, even the editorially conservative Wall Street Journal slammed the House GOP for refusing to compromise on this, with great concern that it would do a lot of damage to the GOP politically in the upcoming 2012 elections…both at the presidential and congressional level. Politics notwithstanding, it is very harmful to a group of people who don’t contribute much to politicians and therefore don’t get their ear, but who comprise a massive majority of actual voters.

Rigid stances and refusal to compromise have not served our country in good stead in the past, and certainly aren’t at this juncture. The House GOP should pass the Senate bill now.

Footprints of the Giant

A number of years ago, composer/arranger Don Sebesky wrote a piece of music called “Footprints of the Giant,” which paid homage to one of the old masters, Bela Bartok. As the year comes to a close, we often take stock of what has happened in our lives and that of those around us, and think about or plan for the upcoming year. Sebesky, like many creative people, wanted to pay tribute to someone whose shoulders he had stood upon as he worked towards, and achieved a successful musical career.

Here’s a thought for you…whose shoulders have YOU stood upon to get where you are in life? As you plan for the upcoming year, who are you going to elevate to your shoulders and help achieve success in their career going forward? Such is truly its own reward, both for you, and for humanity. That individual you help may never become a giant in your or their field, but someone they help along the way very well may.

70 Years After Pearl Harbor- Events Still Transfix Us

Pearl Harbor was bombed 70 years ago. Many of us are contemplating that, and some have pointed out that there are a lot of folks that may not pay much attention. It seems that every generation has at least one major, defining event. Since Pearl Harbor, baby boomers are transfixed by the JFK assassination. For perhaps the ‘Gen X’ folks, it’s 9-11. These events both horrify and unify us. It is pretty much a certainty that there will be others as the timeline proceeds onwards. It’s how we deal with these as a people that helps define us. Make it your business to be defined in a good and honorable way!

End of Email- Oh really?

After reading another article on the ‘death of email,’ it seemed like a good idea to write about one of the reasons many companies would be loathe to give it up. The gist of the article is that a large French company, Atos, has banned email and is switching all employees to Facebook and instant messaging. (Find the article here: http://www.businessinsider.com/company-bans-email-2011-12.)

Here are a couple of factors that will probably keep most businesses using email, which also may apply to personal email. First, neither Facebook messaging nor IMs live on company servers…they are out of the company’s control. Companies like to save an electronic ‘paper trail’ for correspondence between employees and between employees and the outside in many cases. A corollary to this is that if there is legal action, the company may receive a demand to produce all email on a matter involved in the action, and that will be more difficult when it involves servers that belong to Facebook and IM providers like AOL, Microsoft, and Yahoo.

Another factor is the intra-company announcement. You know the kind. While some employees may consider many of these spam, so far there has been nothing to replace them for quickly getting information to a large group or even company wide. That will be much more of a chore on IM or Facebook.

For these reasons, and not just as a Luddite, I don’t see email going away any time soon. It may be that the second factor will be tackled with some new code that produces easier wide dissemination in IMs or Facebook, but the company server vs. outside servers issue isn’t going to change.

The Big Market Move…Nice, but…

It was encouraging today to see the stock market surge on several positive items in the news. So it’s the Dow’s best day since March 2009. That’s a good thing. the central banks intervened to help banks hit by the Europe debt crisis, and the Chinese Bank reduced their reserve requirement. This is all well and good if you’re a big trader or a bank, and certainly does affect all of us indirectly.

The other item was that the ADP employment report found an increase of 206,000 jobs, the most since last December. That affects a hell of a lot more people directly. What I’m waiting to see is the headline that employment has dropped to the lowest level since 2007, or that middle class wages have increased by as much as the top 1%’s income has. THOSE headlines would truly affect everybody in America in a positive way. If you believe in Santa, ask him for these! Even if you don’t, an almost 500 point move by the Dow is a nice (hopeful) start to a Santa rally.

An Ancestor Reaching Out?

Thanksgiving being a family time primarily, the mind runs to family things. Sometimes moments occur in life that are inexplicable, but you still can’t help but ponder them from time to time. In my case, there are both a king and a pirate way back in the dusty distant past of my family history. Perhaps this means I’m a small fraction of a percent royal scoundrel, and have been called worse in my time! Now, I’ve never had a moment in my life that made me think of anything some regal king or chieftain did way back in the day, but with regards to the pirate, I have.

Having been on several cruises, I realized after a few sailings that I always gravitated to the top deck at the stern of the ship every single time we sailed out of port, or into one. After while, it occurred to me that that’s exactly where the wheel would have been on a sailing ship…such as a pirate might have commanded. Could this be something burned into my DNA, or just a wild imagining? No one can say, of course…that’s what makes it inexplicable…but it’s still one of those things one rolls around in one’s head from time to time as you ponder, “I wonder if…”

Running up the Jolly Roger, a salty Thanksgiving to you!

Old Age & Treachery Over Youth & Skill?

Years ago, while working with my father (who, probably unlike yours was diagnosed with a serious mental illness…yet kept working and functioning up to a point), I began to notice that every time I outsold him, he would write across the top of the weekly planner on the desk in Sharpie. He would always pen the following: “Old age and treachery will overcome youth, skill, and enthusiasm.”  It became my mission to make sure that didn’t happen.

Although not in the ‘old age’ category, I am close enough to be able to see it now, and I still disagree with this. In fact, by merely dropping the ‘youth’ portion, I have found that the latter elements can serve anyone quite nicely in their quest for success…both personal success, and in contributing to the success of the common good and our country.

Keep sharpening your skills and acquiring new ones, and whatever others may do to try to knock you down, DON’T lose your enthusiasm!

Occupy Moves to a Bank

This afternoon in San Francisco, the Occupy SF folks moved into the lobby of Bank of America in the financial district. As this is written, there have been about a half dozen arrests. The occupiers are primarily peaceful, chanting and ‘om-ing.’ They did pitch a tent inside. This brings up a couple of thoughts. First, with the police raids and clearing of Occupy camps around the country, then the returning of the movement folks, one group that is profiting off the whole movement so far is merchants who sell tents!

Here’s another thought: A couple weeks ago, there was a internet-driven push (which actually started back in 2009, but took a while to really take hold) encouraging people to move from the big banks to smaller locally owned banks or credit unions. The protests of the Occupy people get publicity, and I get that, but instead of ‘taking over’ the lobby of a bank, wouldn’t it do more to alter the big banks’ behavior if all those occupy folks went out and each got several people they know to withdraw all their funds from those big banks and move them to smaller ones and credit unions? Just a thought.

A Right to Make a Profit?

From Newser.com: Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan defended his bank’s controversial new $5 debit card fee in a CNBC interview yesterday, saying that most customers would avoid it, and that the bank had given customers plenty of warning about it. Asked to respond to President Obama’s statement that banks don’t have “an inherent right to a certain amount of profit,” Moynihan replied that “I have an inherent duty as a CEO … to get a return for my shareholders.”

He said that once BofA talks to customers and shareholders “they’ll understand what we’re doing—understand we have a right to make a profit.”

No, Mr. Moynihan, you have NO RIGHT to make a profit! This is America…you have the opportunity to make a profit. As CEO, you have the obligation to your shareholders to get a return, as you noted, but no RIGHT to a profit! You and other big banks and investment banks got a giant bailout from taxpayers and the Fed…you have, in effect, privatized profits and socialized losses. That is NOT the American way, and it’s now generating quite a bit of anger right down at the street level on Wall Street and elsewhere. Having run small businesses, I can assure you that no one ever guaranteed my RIGHT to a profit…sometimes we made good ones, other times, we took a haircut. That’s business in the real world. I suggest you and other arrogant banksters step out into that real world and see how things REALLY are!

Coming Facebook “This Is Your Life” Changes

There has already been plenty written about the upcoming Facebook profile changes, and how it will be even more intrusive.  It can be checked out in beta, and some people love it, others despise it. It appears that if you are in the latter category, there are at least some controls in place to allow you to keep limited some of the information you share. That’s a good thing, no doubt about it.

The sad (in my opinion) fact is, however, the privacy horse was out of the barn before Facebook even existed. No matter how careful you are with what you put on the web, if you have had any dealings with businesses at all…and most have unless they live in a cave with no contact with the outside world…THEY will have put info related to you up on the web. In fact, your info is being sold and resold at warp speed. Some of it is ‘annanomized’ so that your identity is stripped out, but there is plenty that isn’t.

On the flip side of all this lack of privacy, if you are trying to dig up information about someone who passed away before the internet (besides death notices and family tree information), good luck getting much detail about them! This may make for some very interesting historical research issues many years from now, even with Google’s fabled digitizing of all books. It may make digging through Egyptian tombs look like a walk in the park!