Forced Unionization of Health Care Workers?

Mark Mix, the president of the National Right to Work Committee has an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal today about the government's health care plan, "Read the Union Health-Care Label".  Specifically he discusses the legislation that authorizes the Secreatary of Health and Human Services to regulate health-care workers. 


Speaking of Secretary Kathleen Sebelius:

Ms. Sebelius will be taking her marching orders from the numerous union
officials who are guaranteed seats on the various federal panels (such
as the personal care panel mentioned above) charged with recommending
health-care policies. Big Labor will play a central role in directing
federal health-care policy affecting hundreds of thousands of doctors,
surgeons and nurses.

Big Government, Big Labor, Big Problems.

Government begins house to house search for guns

In a view of more intrusion to come by the federal government, the ATFE is going house to house searching and questioning law abiding Texans about their firearm purchases. 

This will increase as the government begins to strip away our liberties, one by one, starting with the 1st and 2nd amendments.

It all began with the Drudge Report headline linking to the Houston Chronicle article: Federal agents hunt for guns, one house at a time

 

Fantastic Creative Blog

I came across a fantastic website and blog today via Mindjet's blog.

The site, www.austinkleon.com, is chock full of informative and creative content.  He has mind maps of events (like SXSW), maps of books, one he's read about Charles Schulz), and poems. 

One of the many creative aspects of Austin's site is his "blackout poems".  He creates poems using newspaper articles as his source of words.   The process begins by outlining the words he wants to use for the poem, then blacking out the surrounding content. 

He's been commissioned to publish a book of poetry in this manner, due out in 2010.

Another great aspect of his site are his analysis of events, books, festivals and other happenings which he mindmaps.  He keeps a gallery of these on his Flickr account and they're also linked from his site.

Cell Phone Taxes & Monkey Fees

The NY Post published an article concerning the high rate of taxes and fees place on consumers for cell phones.  

The article struck a nerve with me because on Thursday I had updated my cell phone plan in Texas.  When I was finished I realized I was paying almost $15 dollars in additional taxes and fees.  Fortunately the amount was considerably less than if I lived in New York.

A gentleman interviewed for the article put the subject into context:

"If there was a $5 monkey fee, even if they couldn't explain it, you would still have to pay," sniped Danny Schluck, 28, of Bushwick.

Here's the original article: http://www.nypost.com/seven/04132009/news/regionalnews/phone_taxes_are_cell_hell_164180.htm

The Air Force Blog Assessment Flow Chart

Apparently the Air Force Public Affairs Agency (Emerging Technology Division) has come up with a flow chart to deal with bloggers: how to evaluate posts and decide whether or not to respond to them. 

 

Harris must pay $525,000 for sign blocked by I-10 bridge | Front page | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

I'm outraged this morning over an article  I read in the Houston Chronicle regarding a Clear Channel billboard near I-10 (West-bound & Highway 6).  Judge Jacqueline Lucci Smith ordered the county to pay Clear Channel the $525,000.  Apparently Judge Smith doesn't believe motorists can still see the sign.

Harris must pay $525,000 for sign blocked by I-10 bridge | Front page | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

BILLY SMITH II CHRONICLE

At issue is a 25-foot limit on surrounding structures that Clear Channel has rights to from when it purchased the visibility easement in 2001.  The HOV off-ramp apparently violates the visibility easement agreement. 

What really upsets me is that half a million dollars is being paid to Clear Channel AND they get to raise the billboard by the city.  I passed the billboard this morning and it is CLEARLY visible (see photo below). 

Then Harris County Toll Road Authority Director Gary Stobb is quoted blowing off the size of the settlement as just an additional cost to the Katy Freeway expansion project.  And that is the problem with public officials spending tax dollars.  It isn't their money so they JUST DON'T CARE.  

Stobb downplayed the significance of the settlement, saying the amount is a fraction of the $250 million HCTRA invested in the Katy Freeway expansion. The highway project cost $2.8 billion overall. "It's not like we built the wrong ramp ... ," he said. "It just is an additional cost to that design solution that wasn't apparent until after it was under construction.

I'm outraged over this settlement.  I will be writing officials about this misuse of our tax dollars. 

Here's a photo I took from my office of the billboard in question.  As you can see from the Chronicle's photo above that the billboard has been stripped to its frame I have outlined the billboard in my photo in yellow.  Click on the photo below to open the full size.

The Castle Doctrine

There's an article from the AP discussing the rise of self-defense related shootings across the country:  

Self-defense slayings against intruders on the rise | Front page | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

The first point the article is the use of the term "slaying" rather than shooting makes indicates the journalist thinks that self-defense is wrong.  The NRA is also blamed in this article for the rise in slayings do to the aggressive nature of the rollout in 33 states of the doctrine.

To be clear the Castle Doctrine only establishes that an individual does not have a duty to retreat before using deadly force in their home or vehicle.  In other words, if criminal breaks into a home, the home owner doesn't have an obligation to attempt to flee the home before shooting the criminal intruder.  In Mississippi the law has been extended to include businesses.

The Cases sited in the article:

1. A convenience store clerk chased an unarmed man down after he alledgedly stole a case of beer.  The clerk shot the man as he was leaving in his truck.  The man has been indicted by a grand jury. (Jackson, Ms)
2. A convenience store clerk ran after an armed robber and shot him in the back outside the store.  The clerk was neither charged or indicted by the grand jury.  (Jackson, Ms)
3. A man who shot an intruder climbing through a window in his home.  He was neither charged nor indicted. (San Antonio, Tx)
4. A man who shot another man through his front door.  The man who was shot was beating on his door and the home owner feared for his life. (Lexington, Ky)
5. A woman shot an ex-boyfriend who climbed through the window of her home.  She was not arrested but was indicted by the coroner's jury.  It is reckoned that the jury did not understand the Castle Doctrine law that had recently been passed. (Adair County, Mo)
6. Joe Horn, a neighbor who shot and killed two unarmed robbers in the back in his neighbors front yard.  This story received nation-wide headlines and established legal basis for the self-defense from prosecution under the Castle Doctrine.  Mr. Horn was neither arrested or indicted. (Pasadena, Tx)

The article makes it seem as though home owners are callous murderers for defending their lives.  It is the criminal who sought to create the scenario in which their death occurs.  Home-owners and store clerks have a right to life. 

The journalist who wrote this article attempts to lump the store shooting of the unarmed beer thief into the same category as the other cases, but glances over the fact that the store clerk will now have to prove self-defense in a court of law.  He hasn't gotten away free.  He's been indicted on murder charges.  And that's where the gray-area is.  If the thief is in his vehicle and is unarmed, can you shoot him?  I certainly wouldn't have, but as Surinder Singh puts it "For them, it's a case of beer. For us, it's our property. That person didn't have respect for his life. He put his life against one case of beer."

I think the Castle Doctrine is an excellent self-defense clause for individuals who take responsibility for their own safety.  If you read the article you will see that the journalist doesn't think so.  I guess she'll wait for the police to rescue him from a home-intruder at 3 o'clock in the morning.

The Power of Stupid

I don't necessarily agree with everything that Scott Adams is saying in this post, but it is pretty funny.

The Power of Stupid

via The Dilbert Blog by Scott_Adams on Aug 24, 2007

A reader sent this story about his workplace.

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"A theme from many of your previous comics came true to life for us today. Quality in the workplace.

Yesterday, a pointy-haired boss decided our meeting room needed nice motivational pictures on the wall. Twelve by eight inch, wooden frame, 1940s-style motivational tools (think 'Rosie the Riveter' in artwork, color and font). So an assistant was ordered to procure such things.

The first mistake was where the artwork was obtained from. Rather than pay $15 per picture for the real thing, it was decided to take the small JPEG images of what we wanted from a website that sold these trinkets. Cheap picture frames were bought (from a dollar store, by the look of things).

When the images were enlarged to fit into the 12 by 8 frames, the pixelation was terrible. In itself, this was funny. A picture that celebrates the idea of quality in the workplace looked cheap, and knowing it was a stolen image lessens the impact of the message slightly."
-------------

This story made me think about one of the great wonders of capitalism: It is driven by morons who are circling the drain, and yet. . . it works!

Think about all the people working and earning paychecks from companies that will ultimately fail. It's a lot of people. But until those companies fail, the employees are getting paid, buying goods, and contributing to the economy. After the failure, those employees hop over to another sinking ship, and so on.

Within successful companies, a huge portion of resources are dedicated to projects and products that will ultimately fail. But in the meantime, everyone is getting paid and propping up the economy.

I once worked in a bank, making loans to small business start-ups. Our rule of thumb was that 90% of new businesses fail. The exceptions were franchisees and pizza places. But we saw no shortage of people willing to mortgage their homes to start their own sporting good stores and boutique dress shops, despite the 90% chance of failure. Without clueless optimists, the economy would grind to a halt. My own career has been a long string of failures and a few notable successes.

I understand the math of capitalism, and how the few successes are so large they pay for all the failures and then some. But at any given moment, the majority of resources in a capitalist system are being pushed over a cliff by morons. This fascinates me. And it's clearly the reason that humans rule the earth. We found a system to harness the power of stupid.

In the rest of the animal kingdom, being a moron is nothing but bad. A moron lion, for example, who can't catch anything to eat, is adding nothing to the lion economy. But a moron human who starts a business selling garlic flavored mittens is stimulating the economy right up until the point of going out of business.

My point is that I hope the monkeys that already know how to use sticks for tools don't start using leaves for money. If that happens, we're screwed.