Polarman

Stimulate the economy, Save Social Security AND cut taxes!!!

Every year, the government collects about 650 Billion dollars through social security taxes.  Let’s stimulate the economy in 2009 by not collecting that 650 Billion dollars.  Neither employee or employer should pay in 2009.  In return, the retirement age permanently goes up by one year. 

Of course, the government has to borrow the 650 Billion, but the proposed stimulus package contains plans to borrow more than that.

I recognize that the one year delay in retirement needs to be graduated in some fashion, so that people close to retirement age are less effected.  Let the wise men and women in Washington work out one of those compromises that if you’re born before 1950, it’s a 1 month delay, and so on and so on.

The social security tax is highly regressive, so this plan will help those that need help the most.  Rich people will probably complain this plan doesn’t help them.  Awww, everyone has to sacrifice somewhere.  Someone just pointed out, social security is not a tax, it’s a contribution.  Point noted, but not accepted.

It’s been argued that tax cuts don’t stimulate the economy.  That people make the mistake of saving the cut or they foolishly pay down debt.  That might be true in some Keynesian theoretical model, but for me, if we collectively agree to this proposal, then I promise to spend every dime of this temporary tax cut.

Unlike the proposed stimulus plan being kicked around in Washington, this plan immediately kicks in right now.  No waiting years for plans to be drawn up and shovel ready contracts to be bid out.

Frequently Asked Questions about the Wall Street Bailout

What is the Wall Street Bailout?

The Bush Administration has proposed that $700 Billion be used to buy Mortgage Backed Securities (mBSs)

Why did they propose the Bailout?

Wall Street institutions need the bailout because no one wants to buy the mBSs.

Why does no one want to buy the mBSs?

Because they are complex financial instruments that are very difficult to understand.

How difficult?

Very Difficult.  In fact, they are so difficult to understand, that only the creator of the individual MBSs can understand it.

I still don't understand.  Why did they propose the bailout, again?

Because the the institutions are highly leveraged, and if a mBS goes down in value, the institutions could be forced to writeoff the loss.

So what?

Because they borrowed roughly 40 dollars for every dollar of capital they had, and because they used the $40 to create these mBSs, if a mBS goes down in value by just a few percent, then the firm could become technically or actually insolvent.

Again, So what?

If the firms become insolvent, then dozens, or perhaps even a hundred CEO's could lose their jobs.

Why did the Bush Administration say that the Bailout is needed?

Because some of these firms provide credit to companies making real products.  This credit is the axle grease that keeps the economy going.

How did they arrive at $700 Billion?

They just picked a large number to convince the market that they are serious about this alleged problem.

Has the Administration explained what might happen if the bailout doesn't occur?

They have explained that they can't explain. If they told us for example, that a specific bank was in trouble, there might be a run on that bank.

Do you mean my bank might be in trouble?

Most likely no.  The FDIC insures individual accounts, so even if your bank was in trouble, the FDIC would take care of the problem.

Are they only helping the companies that need it?

No.  Paulson made it clear that needed all companies to participate so he will buy the mBSs from all companies in an attempt to unfreeze the market for the mBSs.

I'm still not sure what an mBS is.

mBSs are made up of toxic bonds, credit swaps, collateralized Mortgage Obligations, and Smelly River Ordinaries. 

Didn't these companies create the mess they are in?

Yes.

So the CEO's whose jobs we're trying to save were also at fault?

Yes.

How will the government price the mBSs if no one is buying or selling them?

They will trust the sophisticated computer models that the sellers created.

Trust the seller's computer model?!  Couldn't they use an auction or use eBay to figure out the right price?

No.  Because these financial instruments are so complex, they can only be valued by a computer Model.  Silly person, if you put these instruments on eBay, buyers would only pay a few cents for each one.  Less if shipping was involved.

But the government will check the computer model?

Yes.  They indicated they will verify that there is actually a computer sitting there.

What should Main Street think about this?

Main Street should be happy that they've allowed dozens, perhaps hundreds of CEO's to live the American Dream.

Why are the Democrats going along with the Wall Street Bailout?

They figure that the voters will blame the problem on the Bush administration and it will provide a sample for the Democrats when their administration takes over in January.  Lots of the $700 Billion will still be left, and then the Democrats can give it to the firms that give them the most money for campaigning.  Plus, they automatically roll over whenever Bush wants something.

What will the Bush Administration do next?

They will be proposing a $750 Billion bailout of Oil and Natural Gas companies.  After all, Big Oil provide the axle grease that keeps the economy going.

An open Letter to John McCain: Oppose the Wall Street Bailout

Dear Senator McCain,

I have often admired your leadership and service to this Country.  I am completely and utterly against this $700 Billion bailout of Wall Street.   I can assure you I will not vote for any candidate that supports this bailout.  I am appalled by the speed at which the Congress and ultimately voters are being asked to approve this bailout plan. 

I understand that the situation is very difficult, but encouraging Wall Street firms to sell their toxic waste bonds, credit swaps, derivatives and other crap to the Fed or the US Treasury is Obscene.

Just about any other solution is better.  700 Billion is a enormous number.  Give that to the taxpayers, and let them catch up on their mortgages or debt or whatever.  Let’s try a gigantic stimulus package BEFORE the taxpayers buy a bunch of garbage.

Or really do a Resolution Trust solution.  Seize insolvent firms and then manage the orderly unwinding of these toxic derivatives.

Or better yet, let's limp along for a few months, doing an AIG rescue here / letting a Lehman fail there.  Then your administration can calmly and rationally come up with a good plan.

 

DO NOT GIVE A GIANT BAILOUT TO WALL STREET FIRMS THAT CREATED THIS GIGANTIC MESS!

Please stand firm against this un-Republican and GIANT GOVERNMENT solution.  This is a chance to forcefully and correctly distance yourself from the Bush administration.  Being a Senator, you have the unique capability to stop this colossal bailout plan, by filibuster if necessary.

You hold what I think of as the Barry Goldwater seat in the Senate.  He would have opposed this bailout, and I urge you to as well.

 

Sincerely,

 

Knox North

Expelled Exposed

This National Review Article,

A Blood Libel on Our Civilization, exactly captures my feelings on the intellectual dishonesty of the Intelligent Design movement and their stupid movie, Expelled.  Intelligent Design is nothing more than warmed-over Creationism, a bunch of religious claptrap pretending to be a science.  The fool that wrote the book on ID couldn't be even troubled to do more than going to the edit menu and choosing Replace All on creationism and changing it to Intelligent Design.  Too bad a conservative judge caught him and called him on it. 

I guess now that Intelligent Design has been shown to be the same thing as Creationism, the Creationist will have to rename their movement again...  In Florida, it's being called Academic Freedom, the right for teachers to "critically examine" Evolution.   I wonder why these anti-science clowns don't want to critically examine gravity.  I suppose it's because the intellectual step-children of the pope that Galileo challenged consider that battle to have already been lost. 

Astrological Magazine folds due to... (wait for it) Unforeseen Circumstances!

Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.

 

http://www.astrologicalmagazine.com/

 

I took a screenshot just in case it vanishes.

 

Follow up to the Erdős Number being sold on EBay

A few years ago, William Tozier attempted to auction his Erdős number on EBay.  An Erdős Number is like the six degrees of separation to Kevin Bacon number using published papers instead of movies and using Paul Erdős instead of Kevin Bacon.   The attempt to auction his Erdős Number off apparently created a lot of interest and controversy in academia.  Wikipedia currently reports that the winning bid was around $1000.  I distinctly recall some angry mathematician submitting an outlandishly high bid of around a million dollars or more, but saying that he had no intention of paying.  Hopefully the angry mathematician's EBay account was canceled since I consider the auction process to be just as worthy of seriousness as the academic distinction of an Erdős Number.

William Tozier is now giving a detailed explanation how William Tozier auctioned his Erdős Number and the consequences in a post entitled One measures a Circle.  I look forward to his follow up posts.

Downloaded Beta of Live Writer

I just downloaded Windows live Writer from http://get.live.com/betas/writer_betas.

The one killer feature is the spelling checking is live like in Microsoft Word, so that misspelled words are underlined.  This is a great feature.  I am not familiar enough with the previous features to know the other improvements.

Why can't a computer be more like a brain?

Jeff Hawkins, who founded Palm Computing, writes in IEEEE Spectrum, Why can't a computer be more like a brain?  In this article, he brings us up to date with his latest endeavor, Numenta.   He covers progress since his book On Intelligence and gives details on Hierarchical Temporal Memory (HTM) which is a platform for simulating neocortexial activity.  Numenta has created a framework which allows anyone to build HTMs.

Test positioning of pictures

I'm interested to understand better the relationship between typepad and how it deals with pictures and so forth.

 

Here's the first test picture (above) of Liz and Carolyn.

All these were taken in 2004.

I think perhaps it would be good to remind people that you can click on the picture and see the picture in higher resolution.

Postal Service Removes clocks

The Houston Chronicle is reporting that the Postal Service fixes long waits by removing clocks:

The Watson Post Office is one of the nation's 37,000 post offices in which clocks have been removed from retail areas as part of a "retail standardization program" launched last year. The effort is designed to give the public-service areas a more uniform appearance, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported in Thursday editions.

"We want people to focus on postal service and not the clock," said Stephen Seewoester, Dallas spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service.

People should consider this when thinking about how health care would work if run by the federal government.  For health care, they'd remove calendars.