7.1 Million Sign-ups Don’t Say Nothing

Unlike most folk of my ilk (poverty stricken African Americans), I find it troubling that we have given our Federal government the ability to make us buy a flawed product, or any product regardless if we want to or not. But putting that aside, I want to briefly discuss How I view the metrics of the Affordable Care Act or what is frequently called Obamacare (actual law in picture).

It seems as if many of its supporters are hooping and a hollering that the program has proven to be a success just because it had 7 million plus sign up. I on the other hand, can’t even understand how anyone can use this as an indication of success. Personally, to use this number I would have to know how many who signed up actually had insurance before but lost it due to the law itself. Next, I would have to know how many of those that signed up actually will be receiving Medicare. For example, currently, more than half the states and the District of Columbia are proceeding with a Medicaid expansion which allows them to extend medical coverage to single and childless adults, of which has encouraged jail operators in many of those states to use this criteria to enroll and provide coverage to inmates under ACA.

Last, I won’t be able to see the law in action until all the exemptions and waivers the President unilaterally awarded to businesses and other entities go into effect. Just looking at Maryland for example, we know that only 60,000 people have signed up for Obamacare through the state’s exchange although more than 70,000 in the state lost their health insurance. Is this a marker of success (I know more than 250,000 in total but I am not including Medicare).  But I digress.

Yet still, even without such, that I can see where the Affordable Care Act is going and all I have to do is look at the only other major health delivery operation the government runs is functioning, and that is the Veterans Administration Hospitals.

Everywhere you look the VA is having problems, both with patient enrollment and service delivery. In South Carolina recently, it was noted that problems at the Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in Columbia covered everything but the kitchen sink including but not limited to problems with surgical procedures, operating rooms not always being stocked with backup surgical instruments and equipment and not monitoring patient care close enough. More importantly, problems associated with infection control and rarely following up to ensure problems are solved adequately. And this is after reports of six deaths due to delayed screenings for colorectal cancer at the Hospital.

At the Buffalo Veterans Administration, New York, more than 700 patients at the Center may have been exposed to HIV, hepatitis B or hepatitis C because of accidental reuse of insulin pens, between Oct. 19, 2010 and November 2012.  Then there are the, three deaths that occurred at the Memphis VA, of which one of the deaths occurred because the patient was given a drug despite a documented allergy to that medication and another due to receiving a lethal dose of a painkiller. The last because VA staff did not give the patient the proper medication.

A drug abuse rehabilitation program at Miami’s Veterans Affairs hospital failed to monitor patients, provide sufficient staff, control access to the facility or even curb illicit drug use among patients because Staff members were frequently absent or in a back room instead of monitoring patients in the drug abuse rehabilitation unit. As expected numerous deaths have resulted as a consequence, specifically due to cocaine and heroin overdoses. The Miami VA is part of a network which also saw five cancer patients die because of long waits and delayed care. Not to mention that in 2009, the Miami VA revealed that nearly 2,500 veterans might have been exposed to HIV and other illnesses during colonoscopies performed with improperly cleaned equipment. In 2010, the St. Louis VA hospital may have exposed more than 1,800 patients to HIV and hepatitis in 2010 as a result of contaminated dental equipment. At the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center a 47-year-old Air Force veteran had the wrongtesticle removed during surgically which left him without any functioning testes.

I could go on and on but the fact remains that what we see with the government run VA is what we can expect from the government run Affordable Care Act. The delays that new veterans facebefore receiving disability compensation and other benefits often is way way longer than the private sector, with an average wait time of 273 days. Even worse are those veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan filing their first claim, wait nearly two months longer.  And don’t live in New York, Los Angeles or Chicago because that time is doubled.

Across the VA system we observe benefits claims taking longer than ever to process according to a recent report by the Center for Investigative Reporting. Before 2009, the number of veterans waiting more than a year for their benefits was 11,000. Since 2009 that figure grew to 245,000. And all the Federal Government does is asking for and gives more money as if that is the solution.  It is not. The problem with the VA, which is indicative of how the federal government manages health systems. It is one of management, administration, lack of understanding about health care delivery and oversight.  And this is the case for other VA hospitals around the nation in places like Dayton, Atlanta, Pittsburgh and Jackson,Mississippi.

All of the aforementioned is happening even after five years ago the president made a pledge to repair the VA bureaucracy. There should be no way in the world that a dysfunctional systemlike the VA top brass keep getting millions and gain capacity in only by underserving the millions veterans. Yet VA network directors get tens of thousands of bonuses every year on top of six figure salaries.
Rica Lewis-Payton, the network director of the South Central Health Care Network, which includes Jackson, got almost $36,000 in bonuses last year: Washington, D.C., Diana Rubens, the VA executive in charge of the nearly 60 offices that process disability benefits compensation claims, collected almost $60,000 in bonuses. Rima Ann Nelson, the former director of the St. Louis VA (where HIV and hepatitis exposure is believed to have occurred),  had received close to $25,000 in bonuses since 2009; At the  Atlanta VA Medical Center, three of which VA’s inspector general linked to widespread mismanagement, former director James Clark received $65,000 in bonuses over four years.

Again, the issue is management. If we do take the 7.1 or 10 million as a metric of success, we must acknowledge that less than a million of that number did not have insurance, meaning folks who had private insurance were forced to purchase government insurance, allowing the federal government to run and control 16 percent of the U.S. economy. If this isn’t a corporate takeover or monopoly, nothing is.  Second, the ACA to reduce the cost of CARE and or better management. Insurance is based on math and the actuarial sciences. 

Fact is that comparatively speaking, young men use very little health care when compared to young women use more than young men. No way in the world would folk stand for young men saying they should pay the same rates of women, when the fact is that young men driving habits dictate they should pay more than young women.

But like I said, numbers won’t tell the story, but if you look at how the government currently runs health care from filing claims to service delivery, we need only look at the VA and the disproportionately negative health outcomes occurring compared to the private sector. And if Obamacare is managed in the same inept manner, as long as hospitals and insurance companies raking in the loot, money will go to huge profits before health care is provided. And as a result, all the regular folk gonna see is higher co-pay, higher deductibles, higher premiums, folk losing their doctors, not having access to the hospitals in their community and the same old federal mismanagement practices. I mean, is it feasible to expect that people who never read the ACA prior to voting to pass it as law, actually know what it does to manage it even modestly? The real issue is not having coverage but lowering cost and improving service delivery. Unfortunately politicians have people equating health insurance to improved health care or even just health care when it is not. Having health insurance makes you no healthier than having auto insurance makes you a safer driver.

Controlled by Propaganda and The Money GPS

Cyprus, Not Cyprus Hill Negro

One of the biggest news stories thus far this year was the lead for the top German, Brazilian, Japanese and Canadian Television outlets yesterday. But it wasn’t even mentioned in the coverage offered by CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, or CBS via broadcast transcripts - Thank God for PBS and the News Hour. Not to mention it wasn’t even a consideration for coverage by African American political bloggers or news sites the likes of The Root, Politics 365, The Grio or any other supposedly political news site that is run by African Americans. And no it was not Obama in Israel, or even Keisha Cole and Beyoncé, rather the run on banks and the EU central bank actions toward Cyprus. Yes to get a bailout from the EU central banks, banks are now allowed to take money from all bank depositors – all account holders.

Now I know many will ask, “What does that have to do with me?” A lot and I will attempt to explain, albeit I know it may be difficult for many of us African Americans because we never heard of Cyprus, care or know anything of substance of the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis, but such should be no excuse. See what happened over the weekend was that a group of EZ leaders, the IMF and newly elected President of the small tiny island nation with a GDP the size of Vermont and a population the size of Philly agreed to force all with a bank account to pay for the government’s debt. Banking will never be the same if folk can’t truth the banks and since they saw the could not trust the EZ, IMF, government or the banks they started to pull all of their loot out.

The EU central bank has decided it is ok for big banks to take money out of the accounts of private citizens to pay for the debt of the nation they live in. Yes that right, all under the guise of it being a new tax. Strange since taxes are the result of political legislation and don’t go back in time. But that is what the large global banks are doing and if they can do it there, they can do it here, especially given Obama’s lack of gonads to even prosecute and arrest bankers. Even funnier is the fact that the banks are taking citizen’s money for loans they did not ask for and which the banks knew were bad when they first made them to the government of Cyprus.

Some will naively assert that this is America and it could or would never happen here. Surprise, it already did, last year from on one of Obama’s boys – John Corzine of MF Global. What Corzine did is what we see happening in Cyprus right now – bank account seizure (tax) without due process. Thus if it can be done in Cyprus, it can and will be done in Italy, Ireland, Spain and even the US, since bankers who caused all this nonsense with the assistance of inept politicians will seek to get all their money from the governments they loaned them too to cover for the losses of the zillions of different complex papers they created that were then and still today basically worthless. But yawl don’t hear me though.

What I can say factually that the present Administration, as the last four are for the fat cat bankers and Corporations. Just from IRS statistics we know that Americans who made over $10 million in 2010 paid on average just under 24 percent of their incomes in federal income tax, less than a third what they paid in 1950. The end result of such practices is a nation in which corporate profits are setting records while typical workers continue to make less than they earned a dozen years ago.

You know there was a time in America when corporations paid taxes, no lie. Not anymore even when corporate profits have been growing per annum at a 20 percent rate. In fact, to find a year when corporations were grabbing as great a share of America’s income as they’re grabbing now, you have to go back to 1950. In the 1950s, the average corporation paid about 40 percent in annual taxes. Now, major U.S. corporations actually pay about 12 percent in taxes. Why is this a problem, well in 2011, the Institute for Policy Studies, reported that 25 major U.S. corporations paid their CEOs more than they paid in corporate income taxes.  Then we can take alook at NYC where the number of  residents receiving food stamps has  more than doubled over the past decade under Mayor Bloomberg, according to data released yesterday. Now, 1.8 million receive food stamps, a jump from 800,000 in 2002, and the Independent Budget Office data show. But 99 percent of African Americans believe their President even against fact that the economy is growing. But it is not and if I accept this premise, then for whom is it growing?

First, the cost of the federally funded food-stamp program in places like NYC had increased dramatically to $3.4 billion from $1.28 billion over the past decade. True, naysayers and other average minded individuals reinforced on reciting lessor proofs proffered my weaker minds will say look at the stock market. I in return will say, yes, look at it. But reality notes that the stock market is not a good indicator for overall wealth of Americans since the average American’s wealth, if the happen to own a home is in home equity - real estate values are still down about $5.5 trillion from their peak. So thinking about, one has to ask if the economy is doing so well and growing as Obama describes it, why then are there over 47 million people in the US living on food assistance to survive. It is clear they are not obtaining any of this wealth.

The Administration is a top down machine just like it was when Ronald Reagan started the practice. The US financial system is buttressed upon trillions of dollars of bailouts and loan that result in risky speculation that cause incessantly financial bubble after bubble. Right now, America has a record debt of $16.7 trillion. Maybe this is why as quiet as it is kept, the Obama administration has announced policy that would allow the federal government to control private citizens 401k’s.

Plainly stated, it is the cost of borrowing money itself that has bankrupted Cyprus, Ireland, Spain and Italy. As it stands, the same shackles of debt are on the hands and feet of the US government and if history is any indication from a policy purview, the people will be the ones to pay for it. But this won’t happen, Obama and Bernanke are so stuck on “quantitative easing” even when they know and data points out that it is just making money out of thin air via a few zeroes added via a computer monitor. The problem with today’s QE is that it has put money into the pockets of the big fat Wall Street bankers but not into the pockets of consumers. What we need is to obviate all public debt and let the corporations and banks keep theirs and let them deal with the problems they created as a fiat. I mean default on the public debt has worked in Iceland, Argentina, Ecuador, and Russia, among other countries.

 But this all makes too much sense and we African Americans don’t care if it hasn’t anything to do with a singer, rapper or anything on television. I know, I asked all of my classes if they were aware of what had occurred in Cyprus: one asked, “you mean Cyprus Hill?” I responded “naw Negro, Cyprus not Cyprus Hill.” Cyprus may be just the start. As of now banks are closed until Thursday. We will have to see if a run starts again and if it spreads to other European nations, if so, it could be the end of the Eurozone and the start of the demise of the US economy. Two years ago we exported 40 percent of our goods and services, this year its down to 21 percent.

Smart money knows the stock market is finished. Get prepared

Congress has No Job Plan and Obama’s Job Speech: No Substance- No Peace

When I started High School in the tenth grade in Memphis in 1977, my homeroom teacher Dr. Meyer’s was also my economics instructor. Although a public high school, at least a third of my teachers had PhD’s. In his class, according to him I did so well that he suggested I take another economics class as an elective albeit he knew I was concentrating in math and science classes. Thus via a flip of a coin I took microeconomics over macroeconomics. Herein this essay begins, upon a reading of the President’s job speech.

I have come to accept as abstruse as it may seem for some to grasp, that the plausible allure for present day politicians regardless of race, gender and political affiliation, must either be the ability to lie or the scarious inability to see a truth in order to tell it like it is. All because it is clear they do not want to tell us the truth about the nation’s current economic conundrum – that it has taken decades to create this problem, that there is no easy solution out of this mess, or worse that they intentionally vitiate solutions because they have no answers because they have no answers and lack the scrotum to say honestly it will require decades to get out of this mess, that it will be hard and that Americans will have to tolerate difficult times and live within our means to do so.

Telling the truth, no matter how saddening or worrisome lost on politicians even Obama. Not to mention it is difficult for a class of millionaires like Washington, DC politicians the pains economically us regular folks feel. Factually since 1960, there has never been a time in which four straight months of stagnate job growth as we have just seen has never manifested without a recessionary period to follow. Yet politicians on both sides of the aisles quip they have answers and solutions to solve this problem in the immediate future – a bold face lie. They say the recession is over, that we will not experience a double dip recession and that the nation is not in a depression – a bold face lie.

Now as for the President’s speech, it was passionate, but passion and great subject verb agreement does not amount to substance. I disagree with GOP stalwarts who assert a joint session was not the place for such a speech under the auspices it was not an urgent situation. But as I stated prior, for people who are not wealth like most inside the beltway politicians are hurting and the state of the economy is a serious national security issue.

Still with this said, Obama’s speech was more of the same rah rah type. Not that it was bad, but still the same old same old. Only thing missing was a “cash for clunkers” program. Why because it was not specific and talks around what I see and experience as a person under employed who has grown through $300,000 of savings just to keep from losing his home. I guess he knows that in this weak economy his numbers are bad but that the approval for congress is worse. On the ground, those of us without sufficient employment know that things will most likely get worse before they get better and that none of what he proposed even attempts to thwart the impact of the troubles of Europe through its banking and market crisis on the average American citizen, for consumers remain deep in debt and the depression in the housing market has yet to hit bottom.

We in touch and on the ground see the economy is too weak to add enough jobs monthly to even keep up with US population growth. My understanding of microeconomics and math indicates anything less 140,000 jobs a month will only keep adding to the ranks of the unemployed.

The plan had nothing I would consider big or different. He should have [1] offered to implement some sort of profit tax on large corporations that earn more than 20 million annually in profits of around 4 to 6 percent. He should have [2] offered some type of net job creation tax for large and small businesses for about a five year period to serve as an incentive for job creation that would said companies a tax credit that would cover at least a third of their salaries for that time period. He should [3] look at international growth sectors and instituted a re-employment service as opposed to unemployment that focus on industry specific training programs that would prepare the young and poor for skilled jobs.

Nothing in his proposal is punitive. He should have [5] mentioned that the top 100 companies in the US have uprooted around 3 million jobs here in the states over the past decade yet created around 2.5 million jobs overseas. He should have [6] specifically addressed Sarbanes-Oxley regulations and only implement them for corporations making under $200 million annually (I could only imagine the strain and expense on businesses with respect to their legal cost alone to comply).

Lastly, he should [7] reinstate Glass-Stegall, [8] eliminate Dodd-Frank, [9] increase tax rates on short term capital gains for hedge funds for example who create most of the market volatility and lower long term capital gains taxes and lastly – [10] relegalize the sale of marijuana.

This is just what I think, based on what I learned from Dr. Meyer in high school and my subsequent readings since then. It aided me in being able to amass more than $300,000 in investments without the aid of a broker or financial planner; although I have been using it up to stay afloat after my business closed and lost full time employment before then.

Politicians are scared to tell us the truth, do not understand the problem and too busy with the interest of large corporations to really solve or care about us little folk. They are afraid to tell us and won’t tell us the truth, and Obama’s plan is nothing more than the same thing he did the first two years while in office – hum bug.

Neither the congress nor the President can honestly feel what we feel on the ground. They argue about finding funds to provide for simple people who have lost everything due to floods, fires and tornadoes. They do not see that the games they play are not funn for us and look away from the possibility of what has been seen in France, Greece, Italy, Syria, Israel, England and else where in the form of civil disobedience can manifest over here. Nice speech Mr. President. Way to sit on your hands Congress. Just be reminded though – No Substance, No peace. For republiacns and democrats seem to not understand I am human capital not political capital.

Threat of Hunger and Starvation Really Real in USA

Threat of Hunger, Starvation and Malnutrition is Real for African Americans
In the US, it is estimated that 40 percent of edible food is thrown away by households and retailers annually and that food waste equals about 12 percent of the total waste produced in the nation. In total, industrial nations waste about 222million tons of edible food each year, barley less than the 230 million tons of food produced in sub-sahara Africa yearly.

One of the difficult tasks that many African Americans confront in America’s new economic reality besides unemployment is survival at its least common denominator – putting food on the table. A person working full-time at the minimum wage earns $14,500 a year. The official poverty line for a family of three is $17,285. Nationally, more than 30 percent of children live in low-income working families. A large number of these families who earn less than twice the poverty line are African Americans. One in five children in the United States lives below the poverty line.
With the recent natural disasters occurring around the globe, it may be time to consider what impact this may have on the daily living of many across the nation. Tornados across the nations, droughts in China and Europe and Earthquakes as well as floods all have a major impact on what we do here in America, especially with respect to our food supply. There is already a global food shortage, and the economic crisis makes it worse for many African Americans on the lower end of the economic spectrum just to put food on the table.

The fact is that in America, hunger and race are related. In 1991 46% of African-American children were chronically hungry compared to 16% of white children. Moreover, the infant mortality rate is closely linked to inadequate nutrition among pregnant women. The U.S. ranks 23rd among industrial nations in infant mortality with African-American infants die at nearly twice the rate of white infants.
No matter what anyone says, the fact is that the possible of hunger and starvation in America is increasing and African Americans, mainly living in urban areas with little or no knowledge of farming, will be at the greatest risk. Food prices are rising, supplies are very tight and already we have seen some very intense food protests flare up around the globe this year.

The threat of starvation and extreme hunger in America is real. Low-income households already spend a greater share of their income on food per data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Expenditure Survey, 2006. Around the globe, Every 3.6 seconds someone dies of hunger and it is estimated that some 800 million people in the world suffer from hunger and malnutrition. I just wonder what these figures among African Americans are in this current economic climate.


PS: Will add links 2morrow. I wrote this Longhand from Books and GOV. reports.

Blackmail Economics

I have never been partial to the phrase blackmail, when historically, it seems like white oligarchs are the ones mainly undertaking such actions and folk the color black aint have no part in defining. But that is another story, and for lack of something new to assist in the accretion of incident promoting a general comity of understanding, blackmail will have to suffice.

Now *I must admit, over the past four years I was troubled by the economic landscape prior to the abyss instituted via the Bush administration, and likewise, suspect of the assertions made by the Obama administration to solve these issues. Even worse is what I see on the side of the GOP that seems to purport that verbose vehemence objecting to any action by any party is what America needs to grow jobs.

My main consternation is that the GOP offers no solutions to solving the problems of the economy or creating jobs and that Obama obviously has no real comprehension of economics. Not that I do, but my layman understanding seems to be advanced placement compared to the house GOP and the present administration. Also is the observation that in order to prove a point, even if it is to get Obama out of the Whitehouse, it seems they will do anything – even black mail. I mean no matter how you look at it saying they will not raise the debt ceiling without spending cuts is extortion.

As the debt ceiling fight continues, Republicans are playing down the effect a default could have on our national economy. Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), when asked about what would happen if we pass the August 2nd deadline without raising the debt ceiling noted that it could be a “positive thing” because it would show we’re “serious.”

Yes it is serious out here Mr. Paul. This while recent housing and employment data notes we are struggling and may even is close to a double dip recession. Albeit under employed folk like me see the dips melted together for it still feels the same. Not to mention I suspect home prices have much further to fall. The President is not out of the clear either. Just this week he indicated that the US would provide US financial support to bail out Greece. This after he has tripled the US deficit and we have 9.1 percent unemployment.

After a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, The president said, “I’m confident that Germany’s leadership, along with other key actors in Europe, will help us arrive at a path for Greece to return to growth, for this debt to become more manageable,” Obama said.

“But it’s going to require some patience and some time. And we have pledged to cooperate fully in working through these issues, both on a bilateral basis but also through international and financial institutions like the IMF.”

I find it hard to believe that the Democrats or Republicans, regardless in the House or Pennsylvania Avenue do not see that they are holding the American citizenry hostage. Things are not getting any better for most of us and it will only get worse. Three years ago I wrote an essay describing these times called “Real n the Field.” It is that time.

Just this past Memorial Day weekend, across the nation looked like places in the Middle East. There were reports of serious violence in Miami, New York, Chicago, Charlotte, Myrtle Beach, Nashville and even Boston. In Washington recently a teenager shot her Dad with a hunting bow when he took her cell phone. Approximately, 45.1 percent 4 of all unemployed Americans have been out of work for at least six months. That is a higher percentage than at any point during the Great Depression.

Not to mention that the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States was is a little under $4.00 compared to $1.88 in 2009 and the cost of food and energy have risen at an annualized rate of 17 percent over the past six months. According to the World Bank, the global price of food has risen 36% over the past 12 months. And this doesn’t include the problems with floods, natural disasters, droughts, food shortages or our actions abroad. Yea, we are being black mailed by politicians on both side of the aisle and the only thing that makes them different from us is that they are inside the beltway with a direct flight to Wall Street.

Homeless Middle Class

What U wont see on TV #2

1] Whites leaving the Democratic Party in droves

2] Detroit Officials To Shut Half The City's Schools

3] Mom Arrested For Duct-Taping Baby Daughter

4] Blood Tests Show Chemicals In Gulf Citizens Blood From SeaFood

5] If Libyan unrest spreads, gas could reach $5

6] BABY DOLPHINS ARE WASHING UP DEAD ALONG THE GULF

7] Security Industry Association recommends biometric authentication for federal E-Verify program

8] Italian Stock Exchange suspended due to 'technical issues'

9] 5.7 Volcano Island Japan and 5.8 Santiago Argentina.

California heading for bankruptcy?

What China-US Talks Mean for African Americans

If you ask the average African American about China, they will probably say very little with the exception of the query, why do they own the neighborhood soul food restaurant. If you asked what impact does US-China relations have on them, you may draw a quixotic stare, as I did recently.

This week, China’s President Hu JinTao was in the United States for the first time since 2006 to meet with President Barack Obama. The goal I suspect based on the needs of the United states, the Economic tension with China and other concerns is to both reframe and redefine the relationship between the US and China. So far so good, Already Obama has encouraged the President to acknowledge that China has a long way to go with respect to human rights as well as secured $45 billion in investments from the nation. Add to that, the announcement affirming energy deals that will engender partnerships with US and Chinese energy companies to develop clean energy.

But what of importance for me is to discern how these efforts will impact the African American community and what does it mean for us? What I can surmise thus far is that if we are to benefit equally from interaction between these two nations, we must get our stuff in order. First, it means that we will have to become financially literate. Most of us do not know anything about the Yuan, let alone exchange rates and currency markets periods as it relates to the dollars in our pocket or our economic bottom line personally.

It also asserts that we need to become innovative as a community to take advantage of any opportunities that may engender due to stronger US-China economic interaction. This mean making our children learn Mandarin, study harder, and focus on the sciences and math as opposed to sports or music. Otherwise we will not be in a position to take advantage of the skills required to go after the marginal dollars in available in these areas around the world.

Looking at it logistically, the only other option for us will be to join the military if we don’t, for unlike China, that’s where a large corpus of US spending is directed. The Chinese spend billions around the world on natural Resources to expand and sustain their manufacturing base while we spend the same amount on funding two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Education and immigration issues will be of major importance for the Obama administration and African Americans need to push for changes that will enhance both. Mathematically, we need to be able to sell things and services and skills if we are to move forward on an equal economic footing. We are a nation of 300 million compared to 1.3 billion in china – we need to be involved in this market. Thus, the importance of education specifically for African Americans and all Americans for that matter cannot be overlooked. The deal with energy companies mentioned earlier mainly deals with developing carbon capturing technologies and clean coal technology. And frankly, we will miss the boat if we do not engage in these areas and understand what is at stake for us.

Plain and simple, many of us write off the importance of understanding the china-US relationship yet wonder why we maintain the same economic status as a community decade after decade. If we truly desire to reap the benefits of an African American President, then we need to study policy and make it work for us and stop kvetching about things that are not really that important.

New Concerns Of Global Food Price Shock

Homelessness Getting Worse in America

1] Code Blue declared; local church helping to homeless (PA)

2] As homeless seek safe haven, counties seek out solutions (FL)

3] Thurston County seeks permanent homeless site (WA)

4] As winter descends, some of Madison's homeless live in tents (WI)

5] Homeless in the desert (AZ)

6] Church-run shelter opens when it drops to 20 degrees (OR)

7] Homeless Campground Cleared By City Police (TN)

The Face of Unemployment in America

Constipated Now Nows

While many of us continue our habitual over zealous consumption of stuff and things of no real economic value, two events have occurred since the November mid-term election that may be of critical economic importance regarding the future of America, three if one includes the proposal presented this week by President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform.

The first was the announcement by the U.S. Federal Reserve this week of $600 billion of extra money being put in the economy. Specifically they will use the loot created out of thin air and computer virtual reality to buy $600 billion of long-term Treasury bonds (about $75 billion a month) through March 2011. They call this “quantitative easing.” In theory, this can be defined as a willy nilly, hocus pocus way to promote a stronger pace of economic growth and recovery. By my math, in addition to the pronouncement made by the New York Federal Reserve Bank to reinvest maturing mortgage securities owned by the Fed in Treasury bonds, that projects to approximately $900 billion of Federal bond purchases in the next six months or almost half the loot issued to finance this year's federal deficit.

The second is the meeting of the G-20 in South Korea. We know that most of the attention during this meeting will be directed towards the global economy. Particularly, monetary and currency policy and international trade. This will be an up hill battle for the US, since most of what we see that is jacked-up economically is our fault. I mean since the time of Nixon, we as a nation encouraged all of this, when we decided to get cheap stuff abroad via Chinese, Vietnamese and Latin American labor and taking the dollar off the gold standard.

Yes, once upon a time there was a gold standard in which the monetary unit is a fixed weight of gold. This came about via the Bretton Woods agreement put in place after World War II, allowing several countries to base their exchange rates to the U.S. dollar. But like I said previously, this ended in 1971 when President Richard Nixon ended the dollar-gold peg, leading to what we have now - floating exchange rates. Even stranger is that at this time, Alan Greenspan, who arrived in Washington in 1967, as a campaign advisor to Richard Nixon, wanted to reshape the economic landscape of America via deregulate, But I digress.


The China/US relationship is a clear example of what I am trying to say. They have pegged their currency to the dollar, which keeps the value of the Yuan artificially low, thus giving them the ability to flood the US market with cheap products. The consequence was that it gave China the ability to use the dollars they earned to buy US debt, which let us live way above our incomes. Unfortunate for us, this created a trade imbalance between the two nations, growing dollar reserves in China and creating a trade surplus (just as what we see with Germany).

Chinese dollar reserves currently are estimated at about $2 trillion. If the Feds puts too much money into circulation, these reserves may be devalued. And if China isn’t happy, and their value is decreased because the dollar is reduced in strength by the Feds actions, a trade war and a worldwide recession would not be far fetched as a probably outcome. Funny thing is we complain about china keeping the value of the Yuan fixed, but the actions the US central bank is doing by flooding billions in the world market, is the same thing, only via monetary policy.

What the federal Reserve has done is to take more risk with respect to our economy, an untested risk, which could not have come at a more dangerous time globally for the US. Banks already have about $3 trillion in cash, they just are hoarding as opposed to lending or spending. Thus such actions seems to increase the risks of higher inflation sooner than latter, especially now since the places we used to get cheap labor from is outcompeting us and holding our economic growth stagnant.

Now, other wealthy nations are super critical of the US economic policy as were of theirs 30 years ago, with the clout being on their side now. Especially the German and Chinese with respect to the Feds actions and overall macroeconomic policies. I just don’t get it, what will buying bonds do to encourage job creation? We still spend too much. On December 31, 2010, the Obama stimulus package, will end and thing will really be up in the air.

I do not know what the end game will be but I can say from our actions at home and our buddies around the world. And on the real the U.S. needs to generate at least a million plus jobs annually to keep up with new workers entering the job market alone. From the actions of the G20 summit there are several things we see. First is obvious, that no one wants to be in any paper currency. This may be why a former banker at Goldman Sachs and deputy secretary of state under George H. W. Bush, suggested a return to a modified gold standard. Second, that we are not in a position to tell other nations how large of a surplus or deficit they can run. And last, Unfortunately neither individual folk or our government have learned anything from the last 6 to 10 years of economic disarray. It is very obvious that folks still think and behave the same and still have not taken responsibility and just spend as much loot as they brought in – Governments included. Foir even with this second round of “quantitative easing," Amercia sure feels constipated to me. And may require Funkadelic - Promentalshitbackwashpsychosis Enema Squad.

You Big Dummy

Imagine this; Fred Sanford is at home, sitting down listening to the election returns from around the nation on his radio from NPR. Well not really, imagine me at home in the bed listening to the national election results on the radio, after all that’s what amounted for my entertainment last night. All I could say to myself, upon return upon return were Mr. Sanford’s legendary description of his son Lamont “you big dummy.”

It seemed to fit the evening correctly, both in terms of describing the democrats and the Obama administration and the fools who voted the GOP in office around the country by a historic level. In fact not since 1948, when Truman was president have we seen such a large take over of the house by one party. We know what happened nationally, now in the US House of representatives the GOP controls 239 seats, a pick up of 60 and also added 10 gubernatorial seats that they swiped from democrats

But even more troubling is what occurred on the state levels. In Georgia for example, the second Republican governor was elected in a row since 2002. Prior to this Georgia had not had a Republican Governor since Reconstruction. And for your history Buffs that is since Benjamin Conley in 1872, who ironically was one of the persons who assisted in promoting harsh resolutions condemning the state's failure to comply with the Reconstruction Acts of Congress in the organization of the General Assembly in an effort to reseat the colored members, kicked out by democrats.” A former Whig, Conley had opposed secession and retired to his plantation near Montgomery, Alabama, for the duration of the war. On his return to Georgia after the surrender it was natural for him to join the Republicans and to support the congressional plan for Reconstruction.”

But back to my point. In the state house the won 17 seats giving republicans 107 of the 180 seats and in the senate the control 37 of the 56 district senate seats.

Now what caused this? I don’t listen to pundits but I have my own developed postulate on the outcome. Now unlike many I don’t credit this too the Tea (Taxed enough Already) party, and don’t understand how folk, especially black folk can suggest such when they likely don’t even know what the acronym stand for or their beliefs, albeit most of which are rooted in agoraphobic based nativism. But I can say first and foremost is President Obama.


President Obama selfish tendencies and his ethnicity brought this on. Only a fool, taking office after George W. Bush, who inherited an economy in shambles and on the brink of collapse would put health care before Jobs and stabilization of the dollar. I just don’t get it, I mean it seems to be misdirected attention to spend 18 of your first 23 months on passing health care with the way the market and unemployment situation is currently. Moreover, Obama also appointed some foxes (Geitner and Sumners) to run the hen house and allowed the to suggest policy, without critical examination too solve the economic crisis that history tells us would not be able to improve the economy that has taken 20 years to get this bad in a two year period.

All of this has made me prophetic since two years ago I stated that people were blinded by the “Obamafication of America” and we were moving from “Tobe to Joe Six-Pack.” Now the lunatics run the asylum.

Now Obama has to depend on Black folks to keep him in office, since he may loose the Latino electorate since he promised to deal with comprehensive immigration reform in his first year – which he did not, just as he promised to address needle exchange – which he did not.

The tea party is another issue. It seems that they do not understand that one cannot fix an economy as bad as ours in one or two years (idiots). Plus they are dishonest, for if the pundits knew anything and were honest, they would call this election for what it was. No, this is not an anti-incumbent protest vote; it was an anti-democratic incumbent vote. No it was not anti-Obama vote; it was an anti Black man as president vote. Which in summary means that this vote was directed to punish democrats for promoting and getting a black man elected as President.

Black folk if they were smart could learn something from the tea party. Instead of voting democratic without question, and complain about the GOP, if they truly desired change they would join the GOP, and vote for their own kind and once elected form their own political coterie. But requires too much though and many, as I said drank the kool laid – since they were just happy to have a black man as president. See what a vote does, nothing, for America is not a democracy it is a republic – and only land owners make decisions in republics, You big dummy. Now we have a collection of Andrew Jackson’s all over the place and all that is missing now is David Duke. Arizon just passed by a large margin, Prop 107, legislation that bans preferential treatment and discrimination prohibition (Affrimative Action) so the way I see it its on and all down hill from here - thanks for nothing.

Job Loss, USA

Most Americans are keenly aware of the horrible economic state of affairs the country is facing. However, there is a small group of people — those with jobs and benefits — who don't think the economic outlook is as bad as some say. In addition, they don't understand that our problems are part of a larger and more systemic global economic problem that is just as impactful as what we experience directly at home. This essay is for such people to inform them of the dramatic changes that may suggest that the economy is not going to improve anytime soon.

On Thursday, Oct. 28, the pharmacy chain operator CVS Caremark announced it will eliminate 300 employees who work in customer support and other operations to reduce corporate costs. These job cuts will affect staffers across the country, but more than half are at the company's customer support center at its headquarters in Woonsocket, R.I.

Astoria, New York-based Home Services Systems Inc., a home care agency that provides 1,900 seniors across the city with personal care services such as feeding, cleaning and bathing, reported it may be forced to and lay off more than 2,000 home attendants by year's end after losing its long-standing contract with the city. The agency filed a notice with the state Labor Department on Oct. 14 that indicated 2,065 employees will be laid off as a result of the contract loss.

On Friday, Oct. 29, a report was leaked regarding plans for a large reduction in the workforce of the Savannah River Nuclear Solutions at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C., by 2012, due to the completion of work under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. An internal memo details a phased workforce restructuring plan that would reduce the workforce by 1,400 employees, through a two-phased involuntary separation plan.

West Penn Allegheny Health System of Pittsburgh, Pa., announced that it also will be laying off employees. Four hundred workers will lose their jobs as part of an ongoing restructuring plan.

And states have had their own share of woes as well. New York Gov. David Paterson said he plans to lay off an additional 898 public employees by the end of the year.

I am just presenting this information to show people that it is bad and may even be getting worse. The sad truth is that this is not reported on television and it is beyond me why it isn’t. We all need to prepare ourselves for the future, because the economy will not be improving anytime soon.