frankilin roosevelt

It's not about being liberal or conservative anymore y'all. That is a hype offered by the fascist whores who want to confuse the people with lies while they turn this country into an aristocratic police state. Some people will say anything to attain power and money. There is no such thing as the Liberal Media, but the Corporate media is very real.


Check out my old  Voice of the People page.


Gino Napoli
San Francisco, California
High School Math Teacher

jonsdarc@mindspring.com




Loyalty without truth
is a trail to tyranny.

a middle-aged
George Washington



ARCHIVES
1662 POSTS
LATEST ITEM

March 2024
February 2024
January 2024
December 2023
November 2023
October 2023
August 2023
July 2023
June 2023
April 2023
March 2023
February 2023
January 2023
December 2022
November 2022
October 2022
September 2022
August 2022
July 2022
May 2022
April 2022
February 2022
January 2022
November 2021
October 2021
September 2021
August 2021
July 2021
June 2021
May 2021
April 2021
March 2021
February 2021
January 2021
November 2020
October 2020
September 2020
August 2020
July 2020
June 2020
May 2020
April 2020
March 2020
February 2020
January 2020
December 2019
November 2019
October 2019
September 2019
August 2019
July 2019
June 2019
May 2019
April 2019
March 2019
February 2019
January 2019
December 2018
November 2018
October 2018
August 2018
July 2018
June 2018
May 2018
April 2018
December 2017
November 2017
October 2017
September 2017
June 2017
May 2017
April 2017
March 2017
February 2017
January 2017
December 2016
November 2016
September 2016
August 2016
May 2015
March 2015
February 2015
January 2015
December 2014
September 2014
August 2014
May 2014
March 2014
December 2013
November 2013
October 2013
August 2013
July 2013
June 2013
May 2013
April 2013
March 2013
February 2013
January 2013
December 2012
November 2012
October 2012
August 2012
July 2012
April 2012
March 2012
January 2012
December 2011
November 2011
October 2011
August 2011
July 2011
June 2011
January 2011
December 2010
November 2010
October 2010
August 2010
July 2010
March 2010
January 2010
December 2009
November 2009
August 2009
July 2009
March 2009
February 2009
January 2009
December 2008
November 2008
October 2008
September 2008
August 2008
July 2008
June 2008
May 2008
April 2008
March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
February 2007
January 2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
June 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
June 2005
May 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004

Wednesday, 15 March 2017 at 1h 47m 42s

Econ 101

A comment from a comment section about Health Care economics

I don’t believe there are a significant number of policy makers who really believe that market forces can bring the kind of efficiency to health care, that they can to commodities.

When I took undergrad Econ in college, in the eighties(!), the classes in which the basic concepts of how “free markets” work are taught, always taught about the limited conditions required for the theories to hold. The exceptions to the theories were just as much a part of the curriculum. Namely, the undergrad in Econ 101 learns about “externalities, monopoly and monopsony power, problems of asymetric information, problems with “goods” like health care that have very inelastic demand curves, the problem of public goods.”

This is Econ 101. I suspect the only people who have a simplistic “market fundamentalist” view of healthcare, are unsophisticated persons, with a conservative/libertarian instinct.

Paul Ryan is not such a person, and I believe that when Republicans, like him, speak with apparent fealty to such simple minded notions, they are doing so as a cheap and easy form of Propoganda. To persuade uninformed voters that their proposals have merit. That they are really looking out for the good of the American people.

The reason I think this distinction matters, is that there are very real conflicts, of wealth, power, prestige, that permeate human culture. The complicated systems that determine “who serves, and who eats.”


They will cluelessly destroy something that was working because they are blind ideologues. But as long as their rich donors get tax cuts, then problem solved. You losers should stop buying thousand dollar i-phones and invest in those health care savings accounts instead -- for health insurance that offers meagre coverage and expects you to pay a decent amount out of pocket while not paying for pre-existing conditions.

These people are so stupid. Sean Spicer actually had a press conference where he put the Obamacare bill and this current bill on the table and bragged about how much smaller in size the current bill is. He claimed the larger stack of paper was evidence of government bureaucracy, without mentioning that 6 pages of the smaller stack of paper were devoted to limiting poor people who win the lottery getting health care tax credits. Really? That's what you are worried about? I didn't realize poor people winning the lottery was driving health care costs.

Because they are con artists, and don't really care about trying to actually address the issues and solve the health care problem. They are simply disguising a tax cut to the very wealthy as health care reform. They drape everything in this bullshit mantra of anti-government free-market fundamentalism, when it really is just a costume for the savage incompetent, short-sighted greed of their wealthy donors. They are clueless dopes selling nonsense with a bunk philosophy.


Sunday, 12 March 2017 at 20h 45m 10s

Modern music rocks



This band is one of the best post-2000 bands. Headed by the amazing guitarist Tosin Abasi, Animals As Leaders rocks. A former student named Alex actually introduced me to this band. Thank you Alex. :-)

He's doing this on an 8 string guitar. Wow.

Here is Tosin Abasi on his 8 string electric guitar.

Here is "Wave of Babies"




Sunday, 12 March 2017 at 18h 15m 16s

The Health Care Debate in a nutshell

Paul Krugman explains the difference between Obamacare and the Republican replacement bill. The bolded phrase is mine.


The structure of the Affordable Care Act comes out of a straightforward analysis of the logic of coverage. If you want to make health insurance available and affordable for almost everyone, regardless of income or health status, and you want to do this through private insurers rather than simply have single-payer, you have to do three things.

  1. Regulate insurers so they can’t refuse or charge high premiums to people with preexisting conditions
  2. Impose some penalty on people who don’t buy insurance, to induce healthy people to sign up and provide a workable risk pool
  3. Subsidize premiums so that lower-income households can afford insurance
So that’s Obamacare (and Romneycare before that): regulation, mandates, and subsidies. And the result has been a sharp decline in the number of uninsured, with costs coming in well below expectations. Roughly speaking, 20 million Americans gained coverage at a cost of around 0.6 percent of GDP.

Republicans have nonetheless denounced the law as a monstrosity, and promised to replace it with something totally different and far better. Which makes what they’ve actually come up … interesting.

For the GOP proposal basically accepts the logic of Obamacare. It retains insurer regulation to prevent exclusion of people with preexisting conditions. It imposes a penalty on those who don’t buy insurance while healthy. And it offers tax credits to help people buy insurance. Conservatives calling the plan Obamacare 2.0 definitely have a point.

But a better designation would be Obamacare 0.5, because it’s really about replacing relatively solid pillars with half-measures, severely and probably fatally weakening the whole structure.

First, the individual mandate – already too weak, so that too many healthy people opt out – is replaced by a penalty imposed if and only if the uninsured decide to enter the market later. This wouldn’t do much.

Second, the ACA subsidies, which are linked both to income and to the cost of insurance, are replaced by flat tax credits which would be worth much less to lower-income Americans, the very people most likely to need help buying insurance.

Taken together, these moves would almost surely lead to a death spiral. Healthy individuals, especially low-income households no longer receiving adequate aid, would opt out, worsening the risk pool. Premiums would soar – without the cushion created by the current, price-linked subsidy formula — leading more healthy people to exit. In much of the country, the individual markets would probably collapse.

The House leadership seems to realize all of this; that’s why it reportedly plans to rush the bill through committee before CBO even gets a chance to score it.


[SOURCE: Paul Krugman | New York Times | 7 March 2017]

If you want to make health insurance available and affordable for almost everyone...

Which is exactly the point. They don't want to make health insurance available and affordable for almost everyone. These Rethuglicans like to co-opt their ideology into a surrogate view for all business, economic markets, private enterprise, and entrepreneurial economics. Yet they actually are just zealots for the greedy interests of a few oligarchs, stupidly mangling every attempt at sensible legislation because they are just spokespersons for what their paymasters want.

They are cheerleaders and con artists. Most of them truly do not have a clue about how to govern or create any policy analysis beyond lame bullet-points which are crafted more to manipulate and disguise than to actually explain or delineate choices and ideas.


Sunday, 12 March 2017 at 18h 0m 10s

They are frauds

I love Paul Krugman. He has a way of making his point without offending people. Although all ideologues consider having a different opinion to be offensive, if you can give a reasonable explanation for your viewpoint, then you should be politely respected. Those who castigate with loose adjectives and political labels are children.


[H]as [Paul] Ryan ever put together major legislation with any real chance of passage? Yes, he made a name for himself with big budget proposals that received adoring press coverage. But these were never remotely operational — they were filled not just with magic asterisks — tax loophole closing to be determined later, cost savings to be achieved via means to be determined later — but with elements, like converting Medicare into a voucher system, that would have drawn immense flack if they got anywhere close to actually happening.

...[H]e has never offered real plans for overhauling social insurance, just things that sound like plans but are basically just advertisements for some imaginary plan that might eventually be produced. Actually pulling together a coalition to get stuff done? Has he ever managed that?

What I’d say is that Ryan is not, in fact, a policy entrepreneur. He’s just a self-promoter, someone who has successfully sold a credulous media on a character he plays: Paul Ryan, Serious, Honest Conservative Policy Wonk. This is really his first test at real policymaking, which is a very different process. There’s nothing strange about his inability to pull off the real thing, as opposed to the act...

In other words, maybe this looks like amateur hour because it is. Ryan isn’t a skilled politician inexplicably losing his touch, he’s a con artist who started to believe his own con; Republicans didn’t hammer out a workable plan because there is no such plan, and anyway they have no idea what that would involve.


[SOURCE: Paul Krugman | New York Times | 10 March 2017]


Thursday, 9 March 2017 at 3h 36m 48s

Look who google just suggested

This is Ghosts and Vodka.



Nice stuff.


Thursday, 9 March 2017 at 2h 32m 6s

New Album



The new album "Voids" from Minus the Bear. Just found out right now, and am currently listening to the first song on the album, "Last Kiss". A little too popified but still quality.


Thursday, 9 March 2017 at 2h 4m 56s

The coming Commercial Real Estate implosion

This is a 34 minute video discussion between two older financial gurus, one from Hawaii, the other from the Northeast. Gordon T. Long and Charles Hugh Smith.



The two grey-haired men give solid reasons why they state that only "400 out of 1300" malls in the United States will remain open in the next 5 years. When you go to your local mall, there are a large number of empty storefronts. Most small shopping centers also have empty store fronts. This stresses the underlying financing of these real estate investments, because of reduced revenue, which reduces the collateral value of the property. When the financing of the property occurs again ("rolls-over") every 5 to 10 years, if the necessary collateral of the property is depreciated, something has to give, but what happens depends on the financial players involved as well as the specific property. A bank could decide to take the property.

In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, an entire mall was sold for $100. In the 34 minute video above, Mr. Long speculates correctly that he thinks this is because Wells Fargo didn't want to write down the assets.

Here's a local CBS news story on the event. In this news piece, the stated reason by the Wells Fargo lawyer who went to the auction and bought the property was to make sure another competitor didn't purchase the property on the cheap. That makes sense to me. I report you decide.

However, I imagine if someone like me went to that auction and bid up the sale price to $100,000, Wells Fargo would have bid $200,000. So my question is why were there so few people at this auction? Wouldn't those "competitors" have bid at least another $500 at the auction? The stated reason by the Wells Fargo lawyer just doesn't hold up to common sense, unless there is collusion.


Wednesday, 8 March 2017 at 3h 4m 24s

Rethuglicans Laughing at the Lower classes


This is truly how they feel. Feeling impregnable and laughing literally all the way to the bank. Our hired putzes' pretend before a national audience.


Sunday, 5 March 2017 at 6h 38m 15s

Why I Love Rachel Maddow




Saturday, 4 March 2017 at 17h 59m 31s

Like a true narcissist

Donald Trump's awkward history of being attracted to Ivanka.

Here is Trevor Noah at Comedy Central bringing this up.






GOTO THE NEXT 10 COLUMNS