On Lipstick and Pigs

In a decidedly puffy piece in today's NYT, we are told the Koch brothers are trying to soften their image.  Instead of the new gilded age industrialists who have tried (and continue to) buy the political system with a blizzard of cash, they want to be seen as classic libertarian liberals who "feel our pain" and want to encourage everyone to strive for success the way they did.  As in Donald Trump's case, it certainly helps if your old man leaves you an empire worth billions and you manage to continue its upward trajectory.   Unfortunately, most of the rest of us don't have the leg up these paragons of virtue obtained in life's lottery.  We need the social programs they would love to gut and the safety net they have every intention of shredding.  The fact they can even make the case for a kinder gentler Koch brothers is a scary reminder of the world we live in.   Most of the Koch enterprises are connected with fossil fuels.  As a society, we need to stop the burning and use of this form of energy.  The Kochs and their fortune are inextricably bound up with oil.  Does anyone really think they will wind down their business for the good of the environment and future generations?  All the smiley faces and social media wizardry they bring to bear can't disguise the fact the Kochs are fundamentally opposed to all the policies needed to combat climate change and bring social justice to the majority of the population.  

Bernie!

The Divine Mrs. M and I attended one of the meetings for Bernie Sanders last night and it was pretty awesome.   A good number of people were our age and older, but there were couples with young children and young adults also.  After a musical interlude by  a local band, the senator addressed us via conference call with a plea to organize.  Stating we don't have billions of dollars, but we do have millions of hands with which to make calls, knock on doors and spread the word.   No one will ever mistake Bernie Sanders for Abe Lincoln as far is oratory is concerned, but his message seems to resonate with people across the political spectrum.  Despite Hillary's huge lead in the polls, Sanders is drawing closer and more importantly making Hillary move to the left on many important issues.  The only jarring note was an overheard conversation between two guys helping direct traffic.   One of them said if Bernie didn't get the nomination, he wouldn't vote for Hillary.  That is so wrong on so many levels.  I hope the race doesn't hurt the eventual nominee, as either would be a good president.  The appointments to the Supreme court alone should be more than enough to bring out every democrat for the general election. 

Another Fair day ends in wrath

As surely as we couldn't buy a drop of rain in May, we can't turn the tap off in July.  The garden was promising to round into shape for a late surge, but if the rains keep coming, I'm seriously thinking of waving the white flag and surrendering.  Fortunately, I don't depend on the garden for a living, but there are many growers in this area who are looking down the barrel of a large caliber loss of income due to this crazy weather.  Corn is stunted, hay is not being made and soybean yields will be impacted even if we get a great August and September.  Being dependent on the weather has always been a factor in farm life.  It is now becoming the preeminent force in most farmer's planning.  That is not a good situation.

Picking up the pieces

The manhunt has been over for a month.  Richard Matt was killed by police and David Sweat was shot and captured.  The hundreds of law enforcement professionals and media representatives who participated in the carnival that followed the escape of the convicted murderers have long since moved on.  The sordid little back stories continue to play out in relative privacy.  The woman who aided the two escapees signed a guilty plea yesterday in exchange for no more charges than have already been levied against her.  In a tale of furtive encounters and gradually escalated involvement, she admitted the two men made her feel special, even as they plotted to drug and kill her husband, who also worked in the prison tailor shop with them.  Like a pebble dropped into a pond, the ripples of this infidelity and its effects on those near Ms. Mitchell will continue to be seen in the months and years to come.  It will almost certainly be fodder for studies of what happens when hardened killers with nothing to lose come in contact with local men and women who depend on the correctional system for employment.   The north country of New York is particularly dependent on this type of arrangement.  The sooner this area moves away from dependency on incarceration for economic growth, the better for all the Kathy Mitchells in the system and the families potentially in harm's way because of it.

Bernie and the Trump

Nowhere is the difference between the Republican and Democratic parties more in evidence than in the success of their insurgent candidates.  Bernie Sanders represents the better angels of the Dems.  While he calls himself a socialist, he is really a throwback to the best of the New Deal liberals.  He empathizes with the struggles of the middle and working classes and is willing to sit down and have a discussion regarding the policy initiatives which will begin to make his vision a reality.  People all over the country are coming out in droves to hear him speak.   He is making his points without malice toward any other candidate.   What a contrast to The Donald.  A bombastic blowhard whose rise to the billionaire class was essentially bankrolled by his father and his connections to old time power brokers in NYC, Trump represents himself as a brilliant self made man who is donating his time to run for president as a favor to the rest of us.   He has no policy proposals except to build a wall on our southern border to keep out the drug dealing rapists the Mexican government is sending to America.  He is at his best when attacking his fellow republican candidates and appealing to the dark side of a minority of Americans.   Following a well worn script dating back to the 1830s and the rise of the Know Nothing Party, Trump seeks to demonize immigrants and win the support of people who feel threatened by people of color.   It is the politics of hate.   While neither of these two candidates is likely to capture their party's nomination, they do represent the zeitgeist of Dems and Repubs.  Who do you wish would represent us for the next four years?

vagaries of weather

It looks like we will move from one extreme to the other as far as rainfall is concerned.   After an early summer of deluge after deluge, it is looking like a hot dry week will stress any of the garden survivors.  Most crops developed a shallow root system in response to the relentless rain and will be hard pressed to adjust to a drier regime.  The fall crops will be better able to adjust since most of them have just been planted.  I noted in my Friday blog we were expecting a wet weekend, but aside from stray thunderstorms, most areas, including mine were warm and dry through most of the last 72 hours.  I was able to till several areas in the ultra secret garden for the first time since May.  There was quite a cover crop of weeds in some areas, but hopefully most of them went under before setting seeds.  The galinsoga continues to germinate all over the garden with sinful profligacy.  The hoe and cultivator are still the most useful tools in the shed as we approach August.

Another wet weekend

Looks like outdoor activities will be dampened this weekend here on the NCR.  I planted the first fall spinach last night as well as some cilantro and transplanted several different varieties of brassicas in some fairly dry soil.  A light shower overnight got everything off to a good start.  I've got a lot more to do this weekend, but the prospects are not good.  The heavier soils are still semi-saturated and I have planted all the lighter more well drained areas.  Meanwhile, the lawn areas are starting to look shaggy.  I can only hope the forecasters are getting it wrong and keep plugging away.  The longer this season goes, the more it is looking like a lost cause.

Turmped out

While I don't consider myself a hardcore political junkie, I am probably better informed about politics in the US than most Americans and I have gone into Trump overload.   Virtually every media outlet is all Donald, all the time.   Since no one knows what egregious blather will emanate from his piehole on any given hour, hordes of reporters follow his every move and are usually rewarded with a juicy soundbite calculated to piss off another candidate and provoke another reaction.  He really has sucked all the oxygen out of the Republican race and has even sabotaged the GOP reaction to the Iranian negotiations and other issues the House and Senate leaders hoped to use to stymie Obama's final years as President.  There is even a conspiracy theory that Trump is really a Hillary supporter who may even launch a third party candidacy to ensure her election in 2016!   Finally, a "vast left wing conspiracy".   Just the thing to think about as I try to kill weeds in the gardens between the near constant showers here on the NCR.   I can deal with more of the Donald as long as it discomfits his fellow inhabitants of the Clown Car.

The fight against "foodlike substances"

Marc Bittman was on the CBC radio show Q last night and had an interesting take on the fight against the large food conglomerates pushing high fat, salty, sugary foodlike substances which are a large part of the current obesity epidemic.  The publicity budget for Coca Cola, Frito Lay and some of the other junk food merchants is hundreds if not thousands times the amount spent to advertise whole foods, including vegetables.  He said if the government is to become serious about promoting healthy eating it must attack the problem from a regulatory standpoint as well as making healthy food available and affordable to the middle and lower classes.  There are many areas of the country where even middle income people don't have access to fruits and vegetables on a daily basis.  A carrot and stick approach; making the healthy choice available and taxing the junk foods is probably the only way to wean us off the unhealthy choices brought to us by the giants of agribusiness.   Whether any politicians have the stomach for the fight (pardon the pun) is another question.

"Sharing" with the 1%

There is a pretty big divide in the reaction of people to the "sharing" economy.  The principal proponent of the new economic model is Uber.  By hooking up drivers with time to spare and people needing rides it has revolutionized the stale taxi and livery service model.   Although the taxi industry could be expected to vigorously oppose the upstart, many other people are giving Uber and other "sharing" apps the hairy eyeball.   By defining their drivers as contractors, Uber doesn't have to pay benefits, make sure of safety and insurance or meet any of the regulations other drivers for hire must abide by.  The booster of this new economy, which owes much to the internet and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs resembles the dawn of industrialization in that workers have virtually no rights and benefits and much of their labor accrues to the owner of the app.  The labor movement evolved to help workers in the auto and steel industries get a fair return for their labor.  Now, you hear Uber drivers extol the virtues of working several jobs in order to meet their expenses.  It would seem they have gone down the proverbial rabbit hole and are rejoicing in what a previous generation would have considered indentured servitude.  They are not "sharing" in any meaningful sense.  They are selling their labor at a discount rate and making a small minority very rich.  It sounds like the gilded age with cell phones and computers. 

Beware the Ides of July

Another weekend of toil in the garden to little gain.  Harvested the garlic crop in the steambath Saturday weather after another half inch of rain.  I would guess the garlic yield was off at least 30-40%, between skips and smaller heads as a result of the early dry weather followed by relentlessly wet conditions.  I usually celebrate the half-way point in the gardening season, but this year it's just a slog toward the finish line.  Between the weather, the weeds and an assortment of critters who treat the garden as an all you can eat banquet table it is more than a little disheartening.  If I didn't get an adrenaline jolt from watching things grow and flower I probably would have given up by now.

Wages and the new liberalism

Paul Krugman in the NYT this morning sticks it to the conventional wisdom once again.  Most conservatives believe as Scott Walker does that raising the minimum wage is a "lame" idea.  His idea of economic growth is to produce millions of jobs so each of us can have 2 or 3 of them.   Instead, as Krugman points out quite cogently, there is plenty of evidence backed up by scientific studies showing that an increase in the minimum wage does not result in the loss of jobs.  Quite the opposite, as those toiling at the low end of the spectrum usually spend almost all of any increase in wages on more goods and services.  This activity produces greater economic good than cutting taxes on the "job creators", because most of these people put their extra money into long term investments which produce little short term stimulus.   Thus the Costco model of paying their employees substantially more than the minimum wage with benefits results in a work  force with higher morale, lower turnover and increased productivity.  Contrast that with the Walmart program of paying lower wages with zombie morale, high turnover and employee pilferage.  Hillary, Bernie and the other Dems competing for the Presidential nomination are all in favor of increasing the minimum wage.  This will in turn put pressure on employers to raise middle income wages also.  What's not to like about this program, unless you are a diehard member of the 1%.  But don't worry billionaires, Scott Walker and Jeb "Americans need to work more hours" Bush have your back.

Turning the screws

The Greek legislature voted yesterday to let the beatings continue.  The rock throwing crowd outside felt somewhat differently.  It remains to be seen if democracy will survive in its putative cradle.  What the rest of Europe has done is to keep Greece in a straitjacket of austerity while not allowing it to inflate its way out of debt.  The current policies have the effect of deflating the economy and making the debt overhang even more recalcitrant.  If Greece had its own currency it could simply devalue it and jumpstart the economy, much as Canada did in the early 2000.  Because it does not have that flexibility, the government will subject its citizens to decades of crushing deflation until they are competitive with more developed economies.  In other words, they will have to turn themselves into a third world nation to satisfy their creditors.  Good luck with that.

Gardening delights

It happens so rarely I am shocked when it does.   I got home last night and plunged into an orgy of planting and transplanting.  Lettuce, cabbage, beets and cilantro went in as I fed the hordes of hungry mosquitoes as dusk descended.  The soil was the perfect chocolate cake texture except at the very end of the beds where it still felt more like pudding.  As I finished, I didn't want to water everything while slapping myself silly to deter the areal attack, so I put it off until this morning.  Imagine my surprise to discover it rained about 3/10s of an inch during the night.  Just the perfect amount to water the transplants and get the seeds going.  As I said, it only happens once in a blue moon, so I am still savoring the experience.

Through the looking glass

Hillary Clinton is about to be dissected again in the Sunday NYT Magazine.  The paper of record seems to have a particular hard on for the Clintons, dating back to the Whitewater "scandal" in the 90s.   As with most of the other problems associated with Bill and Hillary, there is far more smoke than fire.  The biggest complaint the press has this time around is their limited access to Hillary.  Given the poisonous relationship, if I was her, I would be using cattle prods to keep the press away.  Besides, given the tattered reputation of most in the media, it is probably a winning strategy.  Reporters want a story and if they can't get one, many of them will manufacture a hit piece based on smoke and mirrors.  I am agnostic regarding the Clintons, but I think most people perceive the persecution of the media as unfair and they are willing to give both of them the benefit of the doubt regarding the scandal du jour.

Of Pluto and Plutonium

It seems fitting the namesake of the dwarf planet we are about to see clearly for the first time is also in the news as the US negotiations with Iran are in their final stages.  Both items give us hope that human existence may extend beyond the immediate future.  The scientific prowess that allowed us to rendezvous with Pluto and beam pictures more than 3 billion miles shows mankind can solve virtually any technical problem if properly motivated and funded.  Maybe we can tackle our ecological and energy problems with the same mindset.  Meanwhile the more mundane and seemingly endless wrangling with Iran over its nuclear ambitions may be the more momentous of the two events.  The perpetual hawks on both sides are already trying to destroy the deal before its full text is revealed.  John McCain of "Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb bomb" Iran fame will no doubt put the balance of his vanishing credibility on the line as will his sidekick Lindsay Graham and newly minted nutjob Tom Cotton.   The Israelis can be counted on to oppose anything short of Iran's unconditional surrender.  Meanwhile, John Kerry has persevered and seems to have gotten a deal which includes the necessary inspections to ensure Iran is not cheating.   In a less than perfect world, this is probably the best outcome we could have expected.  Let's hope the President can sell it to a skeptical public.

An epidemic of elder laziness

The narrative most republican candidates subscribe to is a variation on the 47% theme.  Namely, many of us belong to the nation of "takers".  We are lazy moochers who look for government programs to live a life of leisure, while the "makers" and job creators labor tirelessly and are taxed inordinately to make everyone else's life easier.  That's Ayn Rand 101 and the policy prescriptions which drives Jeb Bush to say American workers must work longer hours to drive economic growth, and Scott Walker to justify the destruction of labor unions as a centerpiece of his program.  Never mind that Americans work up to 30% more hours than Germans and retire later than in almost every other industrialized economy.   It will be interesting to hear Hillary's economic prescriptions later today.  They will probably stand in stark contrast to Walker and Bush's  plans for the average Joe Paycheck.  Increased minimum wages, more worker re-training and a more progressive income tax would be a good start, but even Clinton won't have the moxie to challenge the orthodoxy of modern capitalism; namely that the winners of the economic lottery should get the lion's share of the spoils and the rest of us must be content with scraps, despite providing the labor which enables the gains.
 As for those lazy seniors, we need to raise the Social Security retirement age and keep them on the job and producing during those golden years, otherwise we will wind up like the Greeks!

Symbols matter

As much as the non-stop coverage of the lowering of the Confederate battle flag from the grounds of the South Carolina statehouse has seemed over the top, it is a big deal.   Of course, the liberal wing of the media has spent far more time than Faux News and their ilk has on the story, but the symbolism of the flag in question means far more than many think.  It is an avatar of the old south which has refused to be integrated into the mainstream of American life and culture.  Even though the new South, represented by Atlanta, Miami, Dallas and the shiny cities dotting the old Confederacy tries to shed the bigotry and suppression of minorities, there is a feeling among many in the vast countryside that Appomattox never happened and "The South will rise again".  Some of these idiots would reinstitute slavery, or at least segregation if they could.  The many rural southerners serving in the armed forces have proudly waved the stars and bars over the years, sparking conflicts with blacks in the military.  Until the last vestiges of the South's treason are put to rest and the people buy into the notion we are one country with shared values including toleration and respect for all races and beliefs, there will be martyrs and funerals.   Unfortunately, as was made clear by the 21 year old who killed nine people for the sake of a discredited flag, the healing of America will not happen when the older generation dies.  The hate they continue to pass on to their descendants must be countered with truth and compassion.

Summertime market blues

It doesn't seem to matter what kind of markets we talk about, because they are all languishing in a midsummer swoon.   The Chinese market is giving headaches to millions of small investors who jumped in at the end of a bull market which is rapidly turning bearish.  European markets are skittish because of the Greek crisis and even the mighty NYSE suffered a "glitch" which halted trading for several hours.  In my own case, it is the veg markets causing heartburn.  Following a good runup to the Fourth of July, demand for lettuce, spinach and most other green crops has fallen faster than some of the aforementioned stock markets.  Rejections due to "market decay" are on the increase and farmers are getting restive as crops increase in size and their phones are not ringing.  As with all things, the markets will eventually stabilize and demand will increase.   Unfortunately, to paraphrase John Maynard Keynes, eventually, we will all be dead. 

Costs and benefits

A nagging feeling of futility hit me the other day when the final fines and fees were levied on BP for its part in the Gulf oil spill.  $18 billion sounds like a lot of money, but to hear advocates of the Gulf of Mexico tell it, the money is the proverbial drop in the bucket of what a real cleanup would cost.  A smaller spill off the coast of Santa Barbara in California will probably require more money than the total worth of the company which caused it.  Maybe it is time to reassess the costs and benefits of moving petroleum around the country.  If even minor spills rack up hundreds of millions in damages and major gushers like the BP fiasco are virtually incalculable shouldn't we be taking these costs into account?   Especially when clean energy sources are becoming steadily more competitive and reliable and don't increase the climate change effect the way fossil fuels do.  Do we want to keep knocking the tops off mountains in West Virginia and putting our water resources in danger to squeeze the last drops of oil and chunks of coal from a protesting earth? 

Summer doldrums

As I mowed one of the back lawns for the umpteenth time this season, it occurred to me that aside from increased daylight hours and warmer temperatures, summertime on the NCR is somewhat overrated.   The homeowners among us spend most days off maintaining the yard and repairing the ravages of winter.   It seems curmudgeonly, but after doing this routine for 40 years, it is getting old!  At some point, it will be nice to see someone else sweating in the sun as I relax and contemplate the "hazy, lazy days of summer"....  Meanwhile, the summertime media has finally noticed the surge of Bernmentum as the large crowds continue to show up and listen to Vermont's favorite socialist urge the middle and lower classes to make the 1% shoulder more of the financial burden of running the world's largest economy.  I think the coverage is more in the vein of  "Hillary is looking over her shoulder at Bernie", than thoughtful examination of the issues Sanders is bringing up.  The elite media perceives itself as part of the aforementioned 1% and refuses to take the movement seriously.  We'll see if Bernie actually generates the enthusiasm necessary to create the grassroots which will challenge the economic dominance of the Koch brothers and their ilk.  It will be fun to watch.

This and That

More rain again during the 4th of July celebrations.  The 1/4 inch we received seemed like 2 inches in effect, rendering the garden too wet for virtually any interactions.   I was able to plant some lettuce and cabbage in the front garden on Sunday, but the back 40 remained wet and with more rain predicted tomorrow and Wednesday it is liable to remain that way.  It looks like most corn in the North Country will be harvested as silage, since it is mostly stunted and yellow due to the unceasing wet weather.
    The USA women's team won the World Cup in decisive fashion over Japan, hopefully inspiring a new generation of girls and their mothers and fathers to make the sacrifices necessary to remain a factor on the world stage.  As much as I decry the jingoistic nature of the chant, "USA, USA....."  Go ladies.
    The Greeks thumbed their noses at the European community's prescription for fiscal stability, namely, "The beatings will continue until morale improves".   Maybe the Germans, the Dutch and other northern countries will realize the folly of forcing the Greek economy to contract while expecting it to miraculously make punishing debt payments on time.  Both sides have a chance to make important decisions over the next few weeks.  Let's hope cooler heads prevail on both sides.
     The Divine Mrs. M and the Northern Adirondack Vocal Ensemble gave their Summer Concert as part of an inspiring program with the Lake Placid Sinfonetta and it was another triumph.  As I always say, she's not getting older, only better!

Feeling the Bern

10,000 people in Madison, Wisconsin waited patiently the other night to hear a presidential candidate, and no it wasn't Donald Trump.  The national media had to cover this event, because no other candidate has attracted that much attention without a compulsory attendance mandate.  Bernie Sanders, the unlikely socialist from Vermont, by way of Brooklyn is the man of the hour.  In some smaller towns in Iowa and Minnesota, more people than populate the town are attending his rallies.  His brand of big government populism is striking a chord among the middle and lower middle class would-be workers who feel like the economic deck is stacked against them.  The beltway press didn't even bother to dismiss Sanders, instead treating his candidacy as a Walter Mitty style daydream.   We are still a year an a half away from the election and Bernmentum may fade over time, but the enthusiastic crowds are responding to his message of people power as a counterbalance to the oligarchy we are rapidly becoming.  If these people become foot soldiers in the campaign and continue to contribute, Hillary will have to come closer to the policies Bernie is trumpeting.  And who knows what may yet happen.  It would be fitting if the battle for America's soul was waged by the Brooklyn socialist and the Queens mega developer.  Trump vs. Sanders in 2016!   America, I love this place...

Proud to be an American

Despite or perhaps because of the ability of the country to count Donald Trump and Barack Obama as prominent members of our society, I am proud to be an American.  Not in the sense of the "love it or leave it" slogans which sprouted when people protested the Vietnam War, but more in the vein of "change it or lose it" which the protestors shouted back.  The US has always had the dichotomy of those who would enshrine a particular view of America and declare it as the "real" America and those who see the country as an evolving organism which reflects the best and sometimes the worst of our strivings.  No where was this schism on display than in the reactions of citizens and the media to the Supreme Court's decision on same sex marriage and the ACA.   For a small, but vocal minority, the twin decisions represented another twist in the downward spiral of American civilization.  County clerks presumed to tell us their consciences were more important than the law and politicians advocated disobedience and fulminated about the recklessness of the high court.   The majority, however received the news with a mixture of relief and gladness.  The arc of justice has surely bent in the direction of greater inclusion of people into society.  This is what makes me proud of a country which has struggled with these issues throughout its history and has usually albeit sometimes belatedly come to an accommodation with progress.  May the Flying Spaghetti Monster Bless America!

Scapegoats and political fallout

Governor Cuomo has decided to make a political show after the apprehension of escapees Richard Matt and David Sweat.  A dozen high officials in the prison are on administrative leave and most of them will either retire or take demotions and disciplinary actions.  I think Cuomo is using the breakout as a pretext for long overdue reforms throughout the system.   The necessary changes have been resisted by the unions representing guards and employees as well as the superintendents and other prison officials.  The bloating of our prisons and the subsequent bureaucratic waste is a problem in need of solutions.  It will be interesting to see if Cuomo can successfully attack the entrenched interests which continue to stymie common sense reforms.  The deeper question, whether all these incarcerations are necessary or desirable will probably have to wait for another day.  After all, Matt and Sweat are the poster children for a system of punishment for egregious crimes.  The horrifying odessey of a Bronx youth who was imprisoned on Riker's Island for 3 years without ever facing charges is the opposite face of that coin.  The Governor's political courage would be severely tested if he tackles this much more urgent problem.