Is Big Oil Evil?

The liberal mediaand crazed environmentalists would have you believe that big oil is the biggest threat to our climate, our earth, and our humanity.  They would have you believe that these are rogue companies that have no legitimacy in our democracy.   Yet it amuses me while they froth at the mouth and pretend to present unbias facts, that they are hypocrites and liars of the highest order.   The liberal media bends and presents information in which they show one side and distort the other side.  This is bad newsmaking and quite frankly this is propaganda.

I don't have any real love for big oil, but I also recognize their necessity and their usefulness.  Without big oil and what hydrocarbon products bring to a modern society, society as we know it, would simply cease to exist.  Our standard of living without readily available and price competitive oil would plummet to levels that we have not seen in over 100 years.  So I certainly would never throw out the child with the bathwater.  The United States needs big oil but just because we need big oil doesn't mean that big oil necessarily plays fair.

On the plus side, oil is the engine that runs America, and this is demonstrated by the fact that three out of the top five companies in gross sales are oil companies.  Additionally, it is the oil companies that are also the top three payers in tax revenues on a yearly basis to the government.   On the negative side, oil companies pollute, lie, corrupt internationally, lobby, consort, and push their weight and power around on a global basis. 

But herein lies the problem with the critics of big oil.  They would like to replace big oil with renewables such as wind, solar, and geothermal.  The fact of the matter is that these alternate or so-called renewable energy resources today make up less than 2% of our energy usage and they will never be anything other than a fringe energy source for communities within America.  Each of these renewables also has its own negative environmental impact, an inconvenient truth ignored by their supporters.  There is only one energy source that can put a sword to oil, and that is nuclear, there are no other sources besides this, yet most environmentalists put their heads in the sand about nuclear and deliberately choose to ignore its usefulness.

For those that are concerned about big oil and its carbon emmissions, its contribution to climate change, its pollution and corruption, those that see big oil as evil, they must have the courage to step out of their self-induced caves of ignorance into the bright rays of a proven energy source which can handle the demands of America and reduced considerably our dependence on big oil.  If the fear-mongers would wake up from the  haze and daze of their mass delirium, they would recognize that their pretend world of pastoral little wind farms, sweet solar panels, and delightful geothermal ponds, doesn't exist.     It didn't work for Thoreau, and it won't work now.

Internet Sales Tax

Nobody really enjoys paying taxes and it isn't too surprising that when it comes to paying sales tax on goods purchased that there is plenty of controversy because most states having a sales tax in which the state, the city, and the country get their portion of the taxes paid.  When it comes to the interstate commerce and the sales tax there is a misimpression that this hasn't been adjudicated previously at the highest court level, but it has.   In the National Bellas Hess, Inc. v. Department of Revenue of Illinois, case of 1967, the Supreme Court determined that National Bellasshould not collect sales tax from Illinois residents and stated:  ” "The Commerce Clause prohibits a State from imposing the duty of use tax collection and payment upon a seller whose only connection with customers in the State is by common carrier or by mail."  In 1992, the Supreme Court made essentially the same decision in Quill Corp. v. North Dakota.  On December 2, 2013, the Supreme Court refused to rule on or review the New York state law mandating the collection of sales tax for online purchases from residents of New York.  This non-ruling by the Supreme Court neither sets a precedent nor overturns previous relevant interstate sales tax decisions.

The general rule for sales tax collection is that if the seller has no physical presence within the state in which the product is being sold, and further to the point has no sales agent within that state, and that the only connection between the seller and the buyer is by common carrier or mail, that a sales tax should not be imposed, as it would be in violation of the 14th Amendment, in particular the due process clause.  Additionally, the Supreme Court pointed out that the: "simple but controlling question is whether the state has given anything for which it can ask return."

Fast forward to 2013 and with the massive amount of transactions performed via the internet, the sales tax authorities of most states are salivating to get their hands on this money, as according to Bloomberg.com States lose: "an estimated $23 billion a year in uncollected sales taxes from web retailers."  What hasn't changed though is that the transactions that are conducted through the internet are essentially the same sales process of buying from a mail order house of yesteryear, but updated and refined to take advantage of today's technology...  Also, while critics complain about the advantages of out-of-state retailers versus in-state retailers, one must also keep in mind that the products being ordered must travel from one state to another, that freight, postage, and packaging does cost money to the out-of-state retailer, and that those that are out-of-state are competing against the proximity, convenience, personal touch, and nearness of brick and mortar retailers. 

The fact of the matter is if sales taxes themselves were not so high and so prevalent, that there would hardly be the argument that we have today.  State and local governments are aware of this fact, that is why it is quite common for states in conjunction with local tax jurisdictions to have periodic "tax holidays" from time-to-time. 

A sales tax should be equally applied within a state, subject to local jurisdictions, and the consumer should not be penalized for shopping outside of his state.  Consumers vote with their dollars again and again and again.  The taxing authorities just hate losing that money and rather than looking at their taxing policies internally, they want to take more from a consumer who is savvy enough to make himself a better deal online or wherever.

DNA and the law

The first DNA exoneration was in 1989, through 2010 another 310 former convicts have been freed through DNA exoneration which demonstrates how infrequently DNA, in and of itself, is able to overturn a wrongful conviction.  DNA is an important ingredient in the arsenal of the defense for those that are accused of certain criminal offenses, but it is also something that you have no specific constitutional right to have obtained or to argue for in your defense.   When given the opportunity to provide DNA in order to prove your innocence in regards to a crime, you are well advised to do so, certainly in circumstances in which you are not complicit in the crime, doing so, is one of the few dramatic measures that you can take that could materially impact your criminal case in your favor.

In an ideal world, the prosecution and the police would not work in conjunction against you as a defendant, but instead would submit themselves to a higher purpose which is to discover truth, no matter to where it should lead, and to pursue impartial justice on behalf of the public which they are sworn to protect and to serve.  Unfortunately, prosecutors and police are under time-pressure and budget constraints to find justice and to get convictions in an expeditious and efficient manner, in which justice itself ends up often taking a backseat. Determining that a crime has been committed is usually quite straightforward, but finding the perpetrator is something of an art form, and takes concerted and concentrated effort and resources.  Consequently, the name of the game is just to get things done.

Those that become convicted through our criminal justice system either via the courts or through a plea bargain are in a nearly hopeless position, becauseonce convicted, your changes of overturning the conviction on procedural rules, DNA inconsistencies, new evidence, or whatnot is a long-shot.  The question then becomes: should DNA evidence be a mandatory procedure in all criminal trials in which DNA is available.  The answer is yes.  It should be noted, however, that the fifth amendment is not applicable to DNA samples from the accused, subject to the bounds of procedural grounds in which a “witch hunt” cannot be instituted to collect DNA samples from the so-called usual suspects.

In fact, it is in the best interests of justice to see good police work, good prosecutorial work, and good defense work in our criminal justice system.  When there is good DNA evidence available from the crime scene, it should probably be mandated that DNA testing be provided showing the connection or non-connection between the accused and the actual crime.  While suspects may still be sold down the river through our compromised and distorted criminal justice system, despite evidence that exculpates them, you are in a far more favorable position to fight an effective defense or appeal with bona-fide factual information that has previously been submitted to the court and some of the best possible objective evidence that can be provided for all sides in our justice system is DNA

College Campuses and Free Speech

Students that attend college campuses across the United States are almost without exception, adults.  While juveniles may have some of their rights truncated in order to protect them or for other valid or well-meaning reasons, adults are adults and therefore are entitled to all of their constitutional rights.  While on a college campus, one would think, that students would always be given the option to freely discuss, debate, and criticize important issues of the day.  That means, of course, that you are allowed opinions that are not only wrong on the surface, but wrong through and through.  While there are some logical and legal limits on free speech, one of them typically is not whether what you are espousing is true or not.  If we were limited to simply stating true facts, or prevailing opinions, than it would be the government or the college campus that would determine what we were or were not allowed to actually think or speak and that isn't freedom of speech.  Freedom of speech includes the freedom to speak untruths, make defamatory remarks, and to torch conventional wisdom.

The fact that it is estimated that over sixty percent of college campuses have restrictions on free speech, and have instituted the ironically named "free speech zones" to restrict free speech to certain physical areas, for certain specific times, and only with previous permission granted by college administrators should send shivers down our collective spines.  If college campuses are no longer bastions of free thought, free thinking, radicalism, and such, than what has our country degenerated itself into.  It appears that colleges want their students to conform to groupthink.  They, the college, will tell what is and what isn't appropriate to think, to believe, to say, to write, and how to behave.  The colleges believe that by doing so, they will make a better America, in which we will all willingly get along, out of mutual respect and love.  What crock!!

The true goal of these college campuses is nothing less than intellectual eugenics in which a brave new world of properly indoctrinated students will be our leaders of tomorrow.  Those that don't have the desire or willingness to conform to these predetermined beliefs will be marginalized, and shutdown.  That is why campus liberals make such a concerted effort to preclude or prevent speeches from lay and prominent people who espouse viewpoints that they are not in agreement with.  The type of thinking that believes that only their thoughts,  and only their world view is valid is anti-American, it's unconstitutional, and its demagoguery and totalitarian at its core.

When you take away one's freedom of speech, you have taken away one's freedom of choice.  The elimination or reduction of free speech, in which that speech can be inconvenient, intolerant, misguided, hateful, or derogatory, also means that you have precluded speech which can be beautiful, inspirational, meaningful, important, and inspiring.  The free flow of ideas, thoughts, and beliefs are part of the cacophony and freedom of democracy.  Anything that stands in the way of free speech for whatever ignoble or noble purpose it proposes is wrong, and that simply is the inconvenient truth.

Who should run State lotteries?

Most States have lotteries, which ostensibly are setup to get additional funds for education, teachers, firemen, roads, parks and other assorted State necessitated expenditures.  Whether you are a supporter of lotteries or not, the cat is already out of the bag, so the question then becomes how to maximize revenue and minimize expenses in running State lotteries. 

The first problem with lotteries is that they are State run which typically leads to unnecessary personnel, overpaid bureaucrats, inefficiencies, misplaced priorities, mismanagement and the like.  There isn't any good reason to assume that the State knows how to best run a lottery and there isn't any reason to expect them to be good at it.  There are however, very practical reasons to believe that if the lottery contract was put out to bid, that the response would be excellent, and that the results would overall be quite beneficial to the State.

Many cities and State agencies have already contracted out such items as parking meters, toll bridges, prisons, and roads to private corporations in which these tasks have been competitively bid, audited, and implemented.  In most cases, doing so has more efficiently used the taxpayers' dollars while making it easier for State or city budgets to be met; in addition, services are often improved so you then get the dual benefit of both lower costs and better results.

It doesn't take any real stretch of the imagination, to see that the same sort of thinking could be quite beneficial for State run lotteries.  Lotteries could be bid in several different ways; for instance, the lottery could be outright subcontracted out to a proven gaming company in return for certain fixed percentages being earmarked for various State programs to be delegated by the representatives of the State.  The lottery could also be leased or presold to a private company in which the State receives a large upfront payment and then a certain percentage of residuals over the length of the contract.  The bottom line is why should the State be actively involved in the gaming business, when that isn't there raison d'être for being.

States are already beholden to the lottery business to meet certain expenditures for various services so this isn't a game that the State can afford to lose or to misfire on, therefore it is in the States' best interests to explore all avenues that will enhance this money flow.  To a large extent, the first State to privatize the lottery will have a major advantage over all the other States, and that is because the shackles will be off, the flow of ideas will be turned on, the deadwood will have been eliminated, and the motivation will be very high.

Ultimately lotteries are a form of taxation and while it may not be the best form of taxation it is at least voluntary in the most meaningful and straightforward sense of the word.  In fact, you can make a pretty strong argument that lotteries are a wonderful form of taxation because at least when you willfully spend your money on a lottery ticket there is a chance that you as an individual might receive a large monetary reward, and if not, at least you can take some solace in knowing that the monies that you have contributed will at a minimum go to a good cause.

Pensions v. 401(k)

Successful corporations aren't run by stupid people and when a significant percentage of corporations either don't provide a pension fund or have replaced their pension fund with a defined contribution plan, 401(k), you should definitely wonder why.  The defined contribution plan was never meant to replace pension plans but it has morphed into that very thing over a period of years.  In 1978, Congress passed an add-on to the 401 tax code.  The 401(k) allowed employees to set aside a certain amount of their income into a special account, in which they would not be taxed, until such time as they made a withdrawal which would typically be done at a lower tax rate, because they would then be retired, and the timing would be at their discretion.  The main positive of the 401(k) was that the money would be invested with pretax dollars but what really brought it over the top to the general public was the matching percentage provided by the corporation itself.  This would appear to be free dollars, and in a certain sense, it is because that contribution is coming from the company itself, but like some benefits in life, there is a darker side.

401(k) plans were originally known as "salary reduction plans" and their intended purpose was to help tax defer the highest paid executives and employees.  However, in order for these highly compensated employees to get their big salary deferrals, there had to be a significant portion of the lower-paid or regular compensated employees participating in the 401(k) plan or the plan itself would not be in compliance with IRS code.  Deferring income for a highly paid executive is a preference; deferring income for a lower paying employee who is simply trying to make ends meet is much more problematic. Eventually, though, high level brain-storming sessions came up with a total win for the corporation, when it was discovered that by providing a matching percentage to employees, this would be enough of an incentive to get those reluctant lower-paid employees to sign up for the program, especially with colorful graphs and displays showing how much money these fortunate employees would have over a period of time, after assuming continued employment, steady pay increases, steady matching, and robust returns on their tax-deferred monies investment.

The one thing that the corporation left out or downplayed, however, was that the pension, if one was previously in existence would be phased out and therefore everyone would now opt in to the new 401(k) plan.  For companies that were newly coming into existence, the pension plan would never even be on the table.  Pensions for executives and highly compensated employees are not usually in their best interests, mainly because pensions and their long-term liabilities make it more problematic to merge or to be sold to other corporations for a favorable price.

According to suite101.com the average 401(k) and 403(b) balance for someone aged 55-64 at the end of 2009 was $124,472.  An investment return of 6% would bring in an initial yearly return of $7,468 if the principal remained untouched.  USA TODAY and Asbury Park Press reviewed records covering 1.9 million federal civilian pensions and the average federal pension was found to be $32,824 annually. 

I wonder which one you would prefer.

Money for Nothing

As reported by the Weeklystandard.com the US federal government has spent $3.7 trillion of your money on welfare over the past five fiscal years (2009-2013).  That number itself should give you pause, because it's simply enormous and this welfare state in America has continued to grow year by year.  What irks me the most is that the government gets the bulk of its operating revenue from taxpayers and it is to those taxpayers that it should answer to but it seldom gives us the courtesy of doing so.  The first question that should be asked, is whether our government has been a good steward of our money?  That answer is clearly a negative. 

The welfare system is primarily setup to make recipients dependent upon government aid.  This dependency clearly creates an ongoing tendency to make those recipients not only loyal but extremely protective of "their" benefits.  That isn’t good stewardship of other people's money that is in the most basic sense, taking the taxpayer's money in order to control and manipulate a significant portion of our population.  The federal government by its actions clearly wants people to be dependent on them.  That isn't the history of the United States, it is very poor policy, and a slap in the face of what charity truly represents.

I don't believe that it is any stretch of the imagination to say that government welfare is a form of charity.  It is a very bad form of charity as currently presented, but it’s a form.  The most significant problem with government welfare is that its primary purpose appears to be to feed itself and thereby to ensure its growth.  It has little or no interest in seeing programs reduced in size, reduced in their influence, or reduced in employment, and neither does it appear to care as to whether the program(s) is effective in accomplishing its objectives.  A charity is on the other hand, created by people who donate voluntarily and if they are unsatisfied, the charity will be materially impacted.  Therefore, a charity has a vested interest in seeing that its monies are wisely spent on the programs that it is setup for, so as to demonstrate not only to its Board of Directors that they have used their monies and people's labor in a prudent manner, but that they have succeeded or are succeeding in their mission.  If a charity is unable to demonstrate this on a consistent basis, or unable to manage its money prudently, they will cease to stay in business or their model will effectively change.  This is simply known as accountability.  It is also a reckoning.

The federal government on the other hand consistently behaves in a manner in which their primary goal is to have you "game" their own system.  That's a real sickness of the government welfare program as currently structured.  It isn't really about helping people; it's about getting your "fair" share.  The one thing that we do know, for a certainty, is that when you offer people money or goods or services for little or nothing, the more the programs will find an avenue to accommodate this and to increase. Everyone loves a bargain, a free bargain is even better, and to top it all off, if you don't have to even work for it, you won't. 

ISP Data Limits

Internet Service Provider (ISP) data limits are becoming a fact of life.  Two out of the big three players now have data limits.  AT&T's monthly limit for their cheapest DSL plan is 150GB of data per month with an additional $10 charge per 50GB of overage after a couple of warnings for exceeding the limit.  Comcast's limit is 300GB of data with an additional $10 charge for overage but you will be allowed up to three courtesy notices within a twelve month period in which you won't be charged for that overage, if you do exceed the limit your penalty for doing so is an additional $10 charge per 50GB of overage per month.  Both plans are subject to change, but the die has already been cast, and data limitations by ISPs are something that is here to stay.

Ostensibly the reason for the data limitations is to crack down on the data hogs and as always, the ISPs try to make it crystal clear that it's only because of a few miscreants that they are forced to provide data limits of our usage but that statement is nothing but a convenient smokescreen.  The fact of the matter is that entities such as Netflix, Hulu, and people that download data from torrents are getting a free ride on the ISPs' back and they mean to put a stop to it. 

In only a few short years, Netflix' internet subscription customers has surpassed HBO, as shown by Netflix' most recent quarter of 2013 in which they now have 29.2 million U.S. streaming video subscribers, which noses ahead of HBOs' subscriber base of approximately 29 million as of year-end 2012.  To get a perspective of Netflix's growth, in the 3rd quarter of 2012 their internet subscription base was a mere 21.7 million, so it is quite clear that the lead of Netflix v. HBO will continue to widen.

But within Netflix there is a crucial business flaw, they are at the mercy of ISPs.  Should that spigot be slowed down in any way or the cost to the consumer rise appreciably, this will impact their business model and their bottom line.  With Netflix having a market cap of approximately $20 billion they are too large for any of the ISPs to gobble up, even if the FTC was to give the merger a green light.  Instead the ISPs will fight back by controlling the amount of data that a household can utilize within a given month.  The ISPs will start high, as they have done, but this will be lowered, manipulated and reformulated.  How difficult is it to imagine that like the proverbial highway that we utilize to go to and from work each day that ISPs will begin to charge higher or lower data rates depending upon what time of day it is and therefore data streamed at primetime hours will count more heavily against you. Additionally, buried within their terms and conditions will be a new clause stipulating that any content that is streamed and under the umbrella from the ISP itself (e.g. xfinity streampix from Comcast) will not be counted against the data limit or perhaps will be significantly discounted because the ISP will state that this data is far easier to stream and therefore you can never exceed the limit of it.

The ISP controls the gateway to your home viewing entertainment received via the internet.  In their world there is good data and there is bad data.  Good data is data that they can make money on and keeps you within the family, bad data is everything else.

Is Bitcoin the future?

You know that you have made the big-time when there is a congressional hearing about your product which recently happened to Bitcoin.  Of course, that type of exposure has its good sides and its bad ones. Bitcoin is the industry leader in the virtual currency world, but it also has numerous competitors that may or may yet supersede it.

Before there was Bitcoin, there was PayPal.  PayPal also had its competitors but PayPal became the industry standard for eBay transactions that were previously slowed down by vendors because they were limited to accepting paper checks, or money orders, and most small-time vendors were not thrilled about using credit cards and having to pay their associated transaction and monthly fees.  PayPal ended up being a win-win situation for both vendor and customer and became the de facto standard for e-bay transactions and other peer-to-peer transactions on the internet.  The simplicity of the vendor seeing the payment appear in his eBay account via PayPal, allowed the seller to expeditiously mail the product to the buyer, furthering PayPal's' growth.

As we fast forward to about a decade later, Bitcoin, pushes the envelope to a new level by offering to accomplish transactions anonymously through a virtual currency that is fast becoming widely accepted.  However, there are several problems with this method when it comes to the government.  They are: it's not government regulated, it is utilized as a digital currency, it's anonymous, and it competes against our own legal currency and specifically our banking system.

I don't believe the government has any interest in putting Bitcoin out of business.  In fact, you could make a strong argument that the US government would like to see Bitcoin or one of its competitors become the de facto digital currency standard.   What the government and private enterprise like about digital currency is that it is quite traceable, unlike cash transactions, and anything that pushes or nudges the public, the youth, and especially the intelligentsia to transactions in which the government and companies can log your every move, is exactly what they want.  Advertisers would be overjoyed to be able to hit your cell phone or tablet with targeted advertising as you walk or drive into any area in which they conduct business.    Big Brother will monitor you through your own portable devices and your digital wallet, and as long as you can get that Caramel Macchiato $1 cheaper, you won't seem to care.

Of course, a government's beneficence does not come without some conditions.  Specifically, whether Bitcoin likes it or not it will have to adapt or it will be legislated out of business.  I predict that one of the major banks will purchase Bitcoin, and buried deep within the terms and conditions you will find some fundamental changes at Bitcoin.  For instance, no more will transactions be guaranteed anonymity, this digital currency will also be regulated by the US Treasury, there will be certain transaction fees, and over time Bitcoins will be tied to something, perhaps not a physical product, but something that will stabilize its value such as the population of the USA.

Corporate Welfare for Wal-Mart

In fairness, corporate welfare for corporations, defense contractors, and utility companies are endemic in America and the overall cost of this welfare is billons of dollars of wasted and distorted incentives from tax write offs to tax write downs and everywhere in-between.  This welfare is so prevalent, the crony capitalism is so disturbing, and the lobbying is so intensive, that I could go on a rant for pages.  Instead, I figure it was probably best to just focus on one large conglomerate, specifically Wal-Mart.  What makes Wal-Mart unique is that it is the largest corporation in the world by revenue (the next seven are all oil conglomerates!) and it is the second largest private employment corporation in the world (China Railroad Engineering Corporation is #1).  Wal-Mart is ubiquitous in America and it is an unusual man or woman that doesn't frequent their stores at some point during the month.  I am a member of Sam's Club (a subsidiary of Wal-Mart) and I can verify that Wal-Mart and Sam's Club pricing is as competitive as it comes, so from a consumer perspective it's very difficult to have an argument.

However, from a level playing field perspective, Wal-Mart does not play fair.  It hasn't played fair in a long time and I don't see Wal-Mart playing fair in the foreseeable future.  As in anything in life, there are major consequences for this distortion of the free market capitalist system.  In fairness to Wal-Mart I will say this, they couldn't take advantage of the system, manipulate the system, lobby within the system, if the government favoritism didn't exist.  That is to say, if there wasn't a door of entry to curry favor within government movers and shakers, than Wal-Mart would not be able to receive the benefits that it gets.  If there was no pot of gold to be raided, than the raiders would have nothing to aim for.  But alas, that clearly isn't the case.

Whether various government agencies are gullible, stupid, corrupt, unable to adapt to game theory, or a combination of all of them, I do not know.  I do know that Wal-Mart does not need free land, tax subsidies, subsidized financing, property tax breaks, subsidized infrastructure improvements, eminent domain workarounds in order to conduct its business.  Wal-Mart will work every angle to get these things because the smartest guys in the room are in Wal-Mart's room but they don't need those breaks in order to conduct or to accomplish their business!  It is therefore the height of hypocrisy to hand these things over to Wal-Mart and then to honestly believe that you as a government representative have been diligent in your job, and by consequence been fair to other businesses when in fact, you have been discriminatory in favor of Wal-Mart to the detriment of other competitors or competing businesses or usage ideas.

The more transparency that government representatives provide to its population, the better the negotiations will be when conducting proposed business with Wal-Mart or other like entities.  Ultimately, accountability starts at home; a true democracy is a raucous place, filled with the hustle and bustle of a cacophony of voices, in which a consensus will be fleshed out over time.  Wal-Mart wants its deals done in private, undercover, and for their publicity releases to be accepted as gospel.  The defense to that tactic is an open government filled with doubting Thomases.

Cigarettes, the law, and NYC

Mayor Bloomberg signed into law on November 19, 2013, a measure that had previously passed through the NYC legislature, raising the legal age to purchase cigarettes from 18 to 21, effective 180 days from the date of the mayor's signature.  As bad as that law is, a companion bill, sets a price floor on the selling price of cigarettes at $10.50 a pack.  The people that are most rejoicing at this new law aren't whom you might expect, that is to say, the "nattering nabobs and nanny state nincompoops", but the wanna-be shadowy underworld elements that are part and parcel of NYC.  Here for them lies a golden opportunity to sell product that is desired, commonly used, with a ready market that is underserved, legal to purchase and store, and with a very healthy profit margin that cannot be undercut by NYC law.

The bottom line, unfortunately though, for small mom and pop stores that legally sell cigarettes in NYC is a heap of trouble, because their consumers are going to find other avenues to purchase their smokes.  Not only that but peripheral purchases of other products within these mom and pop stores will decline because if you aren’t purchasing your cigarettes there, you aren’t going to pick up any other impulse purchases as well.  That makes for a declining and hence a bad business model at these small stores and probably will force the closure of some of them, making it less likely for fellow New Yorkers to find a corner store that is in close proximity to them.

As for the cigarette smokers themselves, the law may be a blessing in disguise.  Freed of the necessity or desire of frequenting and thereby paying high prices for NYC cigarettes, they will band together, preplan, and find alternate and cheaper sources for their smoking pleasure.  Not only will these smokers ultimately end up paying less per pack for cigarettes, there will still be a massive profit margin built in for cigarette bootleggers, enough to make sure to take care of paying off those in the know.  Monies that would have flowed in steadily to NYC tax coffers will flow instead to the underworld, corrupt entities, and street hustlers.

Adults of ages 18-20, who are old enough to vote, use to be old enough to drink, are old enough to smoke, are old enough to die defending their country's liberty and are old enough to be involuntarily sent to adult jails, will be put into that gray area of "adults with lesser rights" and this new NYC law will simply breed more contempt of the law.  It will also bring into play a new type of man, one not selling illegal drugs and paraphernalia, instead he will be providing a legal product that is highly desired, inconsistently regulated, and well placed to exploit.

Mayor Bloomberg doesn’t wish to acknowledge that Americas' first successful cash crop was tobacco, and it was our most successful export from 1617 to 1793.  Without the success of tobacco, America as we know it may not have ever come to pass.  Vilifying tobacco serves no good purpose and never will.  If tobacco really was all the evil that opponents make it out to be, it would have already faded into the trash heap of history.  Smoking survives and will continue to survive because tobacco provides some notable benefits such as: appetite suppression, reduction of anxiety, relaxation, and yes, pleasure. 

Cell phones for free!

I was recently talking to my Aunt who told me that there was a program for people to get free cell phone service from the government.  That seemed a little hard to believe but to humor her I commiserated with my Aunt in my agreement that this was indeed "appalling" and to be honest, I didn't think much further on it, because I chalked the whole thing up to "urban legend."  I mean, people pay incredible amounts of money for iPhones month after month, for the iPhone itself, for the service, and a meaningful amount of iPhone users are struggling just to pay their bill monthly so I knew that there couldn't possibly be a program that provides free cell phone service in America.  I thought, perhaps, they might have a free cell phone program for senior citizens, especially the ones that fall down and can't get up, but that program is run by a private company called "lifecall" and it definitely isn't free, so I figured case closed.  But to my surprise, a recent Stossel  TV program covered the free cell phone scam and did a tremendous job in opening up my eyes, and while I don't have that much to really add to the story I thought I may as well put in my own few cents.

Apparently the lifeline program was created in 1984 to provide a discounted landline for low-income Americans to communicate and therein lays the first fundamental error.    Instead of subsidizing phone usage, the government should have subsidized or provided CB radios.  CB radios are both portable and reliable in true emergency situations and allow you to receive news and weather updates in crisis situations as well as the ability to communicate with others.    Fast forward to 2013, and the lifeline program has morphed into providing free cell phones for impoverished people, in which it appears just about anyone can skirt the rules and be issued a phone.

In fact, the free cell phone deal is so good; I was tempted to take advantage of it myself.  I mean you get a free phone, you also get 250 fee talk time minutes as well as the critical 1,000 text messages, so to be honest, the free cell phone would hardly crimp my style and certainly I could use it as an adjunct to my main communication device.  I decided to visit the safelinewireless.com website to see how easy the application process was and it's remarkably easy to navigate, in fact, you can finish your enrollment in less than 5 minutes.  They then give you three categories to qualify with:

            Income

            Program (like Medicaid, Section 8 housing)

            My child belongs in the program

I looked at all three categories and decided that income was the best fit, after selecting "income" the next webpage showed me the income level that you could not exceed, depending on the total persons in your household, I then selected a low-income level that was appropriate for my household size and the final webpage indicated that I was approved, but there was that "penalty of perjury" clause that precluded me from feeling comfortable with clicking all the way through on that final page.   Had, I instead, signed that form, I would have received my free cell phone, subject to any potential penalties for perhaps perjuring myself.

The reason the free cell phone plan is such a horrific scam is the following.  First off, the marketing guys that try to sign you up outside a welfare office, for instance, are paid per enrollment, which according to SafeLink wireless is "…up to $10 per enrollment!"  With that kind of incentive, you're motivated to sign up as many people as possible, whether they are eligible or not, after all that's not your problem.    The next issue is the phone companies themselves find the program to be quite lucrative, in which the parent company of SafeLink wireless (Tracfone) received $452 million in 2011 from lifeline's subsidies according to money.cnn.com. Finally, the program itself just isn't necessary, a cell phone isn't a right, it's a tool, and a convenience.  If the government really believes that cell phones are necessary for impoverished people, than perhaps they should make that a category that is covered under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.  Of course, I can hear the cries of disbelief now, "you mean to say that you believe people should be able to spend their food stamp monies on cell phone service."  Yes, I do, and if they are really hungry, they can always call a friend.

The Bilderberg Group

Who doesn't remember the notorious Mafia meeting held in Apalachin, NY in 1957 in which some of the biggest mobsters got together at Joseph Barbara's home in upstate New York to have a meeting to discuss outstanding issues about various criminal enterprises and to smooth over potential internecine warfare.  On surface, the meeting seemed brilliant; to get together with the significant players that could make a deal, shake hands on it, and to come to consolidated agreements about whom, what, and where.  The unforeseen problem, however, was the meeting was held in the middle of nowhere and the expensive cars that rolled into a small community was a massive red flag, encouraging the local police to investigate and thereby to raid the meeting, with the upshot that the biggest Mafiosi in the United States were identified and detained, exactly the type of outcome they most feared.  Instead of a quiet, secluded meeting, the Mafiosi got the type of publicity and notoriety that is very bad for business.

Around that same time period, the first Bilderberg meeting was held in Hotel de Bilderberg in the Netherlands.  Just like the Mafia having their agenda, so do these gentlemen and ladies who represent the biggest and most powerful bankers, politicians, and businessmen in America and Europe, who together map out strategies and think sessions about how best to use their influence, their money, and their power to keep them at the controls of any significant actions or events that will influence their spheres of power and maintain their control of the keys to the gate.

People in power do not willingly give it up, and groups of powerful people working together will consolidate and crystallize that power so that in aggregate they are the only true force that matters in the western hemisphere.  When Jeff Bezos (CEO Amazon), Robert Rubin (Secretary of Treasury 1995-1999),  Eric Schmidt (Chairman, Google), Timothy Geithner (Secretary of Treasury 2009-2013),  amongst over 100 more international and national personages of the highest and most influential caliber get together at the Bilderberg conference of 2013 in which the media is not invited,  you should be concerned.  These aforementioned people do not have time to waste with trivial pursuits, their agenda for more power is clear, these are the true insiders and power brokers that make the deals that influence our lives for better or for worse.

The Bilderberg group does not consider themselves to be evil, they believe instead that their interests in working together with other powerful leaders of other nations makes for a safer and saner world in which they are all in agreement that we can no longer afford the human and damaging material costs of our previous European World Wars of the prior century. But there is a huge price for this largesse of protection; in return, the Bilderberg group most fervently desires a passive and docile population.  A population only too happy to sacrifice freedom of choice, true liberty, and free thought, for a life in which each person is assured food, shelter, mindless entertainment, and some sort of dead-end job. 

7 Year Pornography Expiration

The internet is ubiquitous with pornography, and the internet appears to be the preferred method for viewing and procuring porn because of the variety available, its anonymity, and the accessibility of all particular genres.  How much money is made off of porn, how big a business is porn, and how porn is doing in the internet age are questions that are difficult to answer since the vast majority of adult entertainment companies are privately held but estimates range for the entire pornography enterprise of pay-per-view, video sales and rentals, internet sales and rentals, print media, and audio media to be in the range of $2 to $6 billion per year.   (Estimates of porn revenues vary so widely and the methodology to come up with the estimates aren't consistent that any number generated is somewhat suspect.)

What isn't in doubt is that the real money to be made in porn is not on the acting end but on the production and distribution end.  Porn performers are non-unionized, typically receive no residual pay, no health insurance, and are often free lance with many having no agent representation and therefore are on their own when it comes to making a financial deal with the producer.

While I won't argue the point that an adult owns their own body and therefore should have the right to do with their body what they will, porn presents an unique problem that should be addressed, which is, for how long shall any performer continue to have their images sold and resold in which this particular performer is receiving no further monetary compensation.  The quick answer is that their contract stipulates the rules and therefore that is just the way that it is, but I find this to be quite unacceptable.  The question is one of how long any porn performer for a one-time payment should have to see their image reproduced time after time after time, in which that said performer would prefer to opt out.  I believe that time span should be seven years from the date the media was first available for sale.  Obviously, you cannot create an ex-post facto law, so all porn created before this law came into effect, would effectively become dated as of the date of the law itself.

The advantage of the law would be it would allow all porn performers to by default opt out of seeing their images portrayed again and again ad nauseam.  Seven years is a very long time for producers of porn to make their money and then some.  However, if all performers agree at the end of seven years that they wish to continue with that particular media distribution, a contract with the necessary signatures could be drawn up and the deal would then become valid for an additional seven years.  This does mean that if one or more performers do not agree or will not re-up,  that the media will then either have to be shelved, pending future negotiations, or edited to take these actor(s) out. 

The bottom line is pornography is not a wholesome business and people's lives change and those that were once a part of the business for a day or for many years should be allowed the dignity to walk away from it and thereby not be haunted or harmed by images from yesteryear.  Snapchat has the basic concept right, there should be a self-delete button automatically generated and this should be implemented within porn. 

TV Use to Be Free

If you live in a rural area or if you are over 40 years of age, you probably remember when TV was free or are still experiencing broadcast television for free.  In fact, according to Knowledge Networks’ 2011 Ownership Survey and Trend Report, "… 15% of all homes now just depend on free TV, up from 14%.", that number is no doubt a combination of people that predominately utilize free broadcast TV by choice and those that have cut their cable cords by their own volition (whether desired or not).

There was a time when free broadcast TV was the only game in town for television.  The consumer had the big three of ABC, CBS, and NBC, alongside PBS on his VHF channels.  On his UHF channels the viewer received a couple of local or independent channels which were much lower budget than the big three, and if you lived near a major metropolis you could also probably pick up an additional channel or two on your TV.  Although the choices were relatively few there was enough variety to suit nearly everyone and whether you were in school or at the office, there was always going to be at least one person who had watched the same show at the same time as you did.

The consumer today who pays for cable or satellite is given a multitude of channels, perhaps 200 or more, but he also pays for the privilege of doing so.  Besides his TV, today's viewer can still access media in a variety of formats and ways, some of which are free, some relatively low-cost, and some via the pay-per-view method.    I am often surprised though, how often the television consumer doesn't at least consider his free and low-cost possibilities first before purchasing his paid subscription, as the cost differential over a year's period of time can be quite meaningful. 

How valuable a cable subscription is situation specific and it is also virtually impossible to compare plans and services in an easily recognizable way.  Additionally, it just seems to be a truism that the channels that one person likes are wholly different from their significant other's choices and therefore you have to migrate up to a higher paid plan in order to accommodate both parties, as I am unaware of any cable provider that allows you a la carte choices. 

This brings me back to free TV and the big three which has since been joined by Fox, which is now available for free on broadcast TV, and for most people there is also the further choice of CW.  So free channels on broadcast TV have actually increased over the last generation and while these channels are overwhelmed by the variety and complexion of what cable and satellite providers have in their arsenal, they are free with no contracts and no commitments.

However, there is a disturbing problem, while we can still get free broadcast TV depending on our location, our sophistication, our TV, and our antenna, the major broadcasters are not in our corner.  People that receive free TV broadcasts don't pay a dime for them, whereas cable and satellite providers must pay retransmission fees to ABC, CBS, and the like for providing these stations to their subscribers.  The difference then breaks down as follows: for the cable/satellite viewer the major broadcasters get paid through those subscriptions.  For the free broadcast viewer, the major broadcasters just get paid through advertising revenue. 

As I said, TV use to be free, enjoy it while you can.

SWAT

SWAT stands for Special Weapons and Tactics and is a special police force organization which was initially setup to handle crowd control and civil unrest in light of the Watts riots in LA of 1965.  Although it took some time to develop, mature, and synthesize, a typical SWAT team of today according to Wikipedia would consist of some or all of the following: "Such units are often equipped with specialized firearms including submachine guns, assault rifles, breaching shotguns, sniper rifles, riot control agents, and stun grenades. They have specialized equipment including heavy body armor, ballistic shields, entry tools, armored vehicles, advanced night vision optics, and motion detectors for covertly determining the positions of hostages or hostage takers, inside enclosed structures."

SWAT teams are so common and ubiquitous nowadays, that it is estimated that over 90% of cities with a population of 50,000 people or more have a SWAT team as part of their police force.  Yet, the initial mission of SWAT teams was to be only used in extraordinary situations in which the community at large was either in danger, and/or there was an illegal or threatening organization that was heavily armed and unwilling to surrender without armed confrontation.  Examples of the latter would be the shootouts involving: MOVE, the Black Panthers, and the SLA. 

Yet today, SWAT is most commonly used for alleged drug or contraband crimes and the houses that are thereby raided are deliberately raided in order to arrest the suspects and confiscate their drugs.  But in so doing, the SWAT team puts into harm's way other family members, such as children or grandparents, who are wholly innocent or ignorant of these drug crimes.  Therefore, by these actions, it could be argued that these officers of the law are in direct violation of their primary mission which is to "protect and serve". That leads us to question as to why SWAT feels the need to  break into a house with overwhelming force in order to catch a drug criminal when houses are stationary and. have common egress and ingress points.  If there truly are drugs within the house those drugs are going to either have to come in to the house or go out of the house or both.  Why can't SWAT teams concentrate on catching the specific perpetrator at hand and not endanger themselves, the community, and those unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time by simply staking out or observing the suspect over a certain period of time.

Additionally, when it comes to SWAT raids, the data available indicates that it isn't even close to 100% of the time that the warrant is successful in producing criminal charges against any of the occupants of the house that necessitated SWAT in the first place.  Therefore there should be absolute transparency to every SWAT raid in regards to who, what, how, why, when, and where transpired.  How else, can a community properly oversight their police, their SWAT teams, and their community safety without this very pertinent information.

SWAT teams are yet another example of good intentions gone wholly out-of-control whether deliberately or inadvertently.  A man's home is his castle, this is a fundamental right, and what a man does in his home is really his own business unless there is valid proof that there is an activity within the home that endangers the public safety and/or the exigencies of the situation warrants an immediate entry.

Stock Market Cheerleaders

Monday through Friday the stock market is open and it's covered before the bell, during the trading hours, and after the bell by television organizations like Fox, CNBC, and Bloomberg, along with numerous online websites.  The overriding sentiment, no matter what is going on in the real world, is one of bullishness.  Of course, I want to be realistic here, the pundits are never 100% bullish, but that is the overall sentiment.  The message that these media outlets typically want to send out is that stocks and your investments in general, are only going to go up, up, up.  Further, that even if your stocks should go down, why that is just another buying point for your selections and they will still go up if you just have the courage to hang on, think of the long long term, or to purchase more at this new bargain basement price.  While this all looks and sounds great, especially when the stock market in general is going up, the fact of the matter is, sometimes the market goes down and it can go down by a lot.  In those types of situations, the pundits muddle through it, try to justify or unjustify it, try to explain it, pontificate, bluster, but it isn't quite business as usual.

Through it all, do these media outlets actually care or are they concerned about how you the individual investor performs?  Actually, I do believe that they do care and that any legitimate organization is trying to give you good and often sound advice.  The problems are that their track records may be rather poor, past history is not a guarantee of future success, and the hot hand of last quarter or last year by the time he or she becomes a name, is often having a poor year or a reduction to mean, when you unfortunately hear about them.  Their intentions may be good, the articles may be informative, but it doesn't necessarily add up to investment success.

The stock market cheerleaders also want to get you excited about the market, to trade with the market, to get in, to get out, or to just get involved somehow.  In order for the market to move, it needs action, for every buyer there has to be a seller.  The cheerleaders want to give you the illusion that you too can make that easy money, that it's only a click away, and that if you compound some daily gain over a weekly period and then compound it again and again, you'll be filthy rich.  They don't bother with telling you these important and fundamental facts, that you are an amateur up against professionals, quants, high-frequency traders, and insiders.  Do you really think or have the audacity to believe that you are the smartest guy in the room?

Before investing in the stock market, you should be aware of what you do and don't know.  You are not a congressman or legislator, or lobbyist, discussing pertinent legislative laws which will have a material impact on your business.  You are not a corporate insider well aware of whether your company is or isn't going to make its quarterly goals and well aware of the pipeline of future sales.  You are not part of the Federal Reserve and consequently do not know ahead of time, future Fed policies.  If this is who you are not, you are on the outside looking in.

Standing Armies

In our grievances as listed in our Declaration of Independence it was stated that King George had in the American colonies: "… kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures."  The colonies were right to be concerned and to feel imperiled by Great Britain's standing armies that answered not to our own domestic legislatures but to the King and its parliament instead; and when war came between us, those standing armies were loyal to the crown and not to the coloniesAfter our independence, the importance and the fear of standing armies lead to important debates between the federalists and anti-federalists during the constitutional convention, in which ultimately the funding of a standing army in America was vested to Congress and not to the President or to the Executive branch. 

A standing army is a mighty instrument that inappropriately applied can be used for all sorts of nefarious purposes.  First, it is important to understand that the military indoctrinates its soldiers to believe that they are part of a greater whole, that while there is room for individual heroism it is also a given that the individual soldier is subservient to the unit, that the overriding objective of soldiers is to be obedient to their superior officers, to follow orders promptly, and to implement them without hesitation.  While it is written in military manuals that soldiers need: "obey only lawful orders", in times of crisis, of exigency circumstances, there will be few soldiers, if any, that will have the courage or effrontery to confront their superior with their viewpoint that a particular order is, in fact, "unlawful". 

The history of standing armies is hardly comforting to us.  James Madison in 1787 stated: “The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home." For every great leader and general such as George Washington or Cincinnatus, history demonstrates that they are hundreds more of tinhorn dictators, tyrants, despots, cabals, and the like that wreak havoc both domestic and foreign, and use their military power as a blunt instrument to effect their desires and beliefs, whatever the cost, and whatever the consequences. 

The mission creep of standing armies can easily morph from protecting the homeland, to generic peacekeeping overseas, to promoting foreign democracy, to attacking our enemies both foreign and domestic, to outright war, and finally to enslaving our people themselves in order to best protect and provide for them from enemies yet unknown. 

A standing army should best be looked upon as a permanent and dangerous threat to liberty.  Justice comes in many forms and many guises and one of those forms is when you are looking down the barrel of a gun.  When the guns or the army that you thought was there to serve and protect you is in fact turned against you, where then will you find your freedom, your liberty, your happiness, your livelihood, your country, except in the lost pages of history, or in a declaration of independence now forgotten, or a constitution effectively overridden and dismissed

Safe Drinking Water

There are a slew of things that we take for granted in our modern world each and every day because for the most part you can count on them working correctly day in and day out, and while there are plenty of resources that we would be loath to lose the use of for even a partial day, one of the foremost items that we would be most troubling to lose is water.    While we can quibble and argue that the most essential element for life itself is air, the fact of the matter is, with the exception of the most dire of emergencies you can find yourself good or at a minimum adequate air, but nearly one billion people upon this great planet lack reasonable access to safe drinking water and without safe water your health, and your life itself is seriously imperiled.

According to nicoletwater.com, "90 percent of Americans receive drinking water from a public water supply, such as a city, town or county water department."  On the surface that appears to be wonderful news, except for the fact that there are significant logistics involved in bringing that safe drinking water to our homes.  The first issue is that the water has to be safe--it cannot be compromised.  We typically get our water from sources such as lakes, reservoirs, streams, and rivers, but that water isn't simply just piped into our homes as is, it has to be diverted first into and then typically pumped into a holding pond which will then have the water treated with chemicals, then the usage of filters to screen out sediments, and finally a more thorough filtration will be utilized.  Next, further cleaning chemicals will be used to destroy bacteria and other harmful elements, than tests will be run to assure that the water has been properly purified before that water is stored pending its delivery to the population.

Now with the safe water being stored typically in a water tower it is available for distribution but that brings in a host of other items needed for that distribution.  Water must flow through pipes to arrive at your home, it must also have the energy needed to flow through those pipes, while part of that movement of water will come from gravity,  part also comes from the flow of water through the mechanism of high pressure to low pressure, but in order to accomplish that, that necessitates electrical energy.  A water supply without appropriate power and without necessary pressure is stagnant water in which the quality of that water will be become suspect in a very short period of time due to the possible contamination of the water by bacteria.  You may still have access to the water, but now it must be treated, typically by boiling the water for a period of time, before you can use it.  Should your access to water be completely cut off, you are at the mercy to any previous storage of water that you may or may not have.  Without safe and clean water, the quality of your life deteriorates rapidly, and chaos & panic will quickly ensue. 

For millions of people around the world, that do not have either safe or a clean water supply available to them, and therefore they must either use water that is convenient but contaminated, or travel long distances to procure hopefully safe water in which the transport of water is neither convenient, easy, or reliable, since the weight of only one gallon of water is about eight pounds.  Without an easy, affordable, and steady supply of safe drinking water, your life, your livelihood, your sanitation, and your health is on the wrong side of the line drawn in the sand. 

Revelation 21

All the wisdom that we need to know, to contemplate on, to pray upon, to meditate with, is contained within Holy Scripture.  God has given us no task in which we cannot but succeed or overcome, if we are willing to listen and to obey the still small voice within.  It is only man, in his ignorance, who sees the body, and believes that this physical body is the be-all, and the end-all of life; but indeed nothing physical can last, only our soul, only our spirit.  No matter what occurs to your body, your soul can never be vanquished; it can only be ultimately absorbed into omnipotent God.

Genesis 3: 17 states: "And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life."  What this means is as follows; that mankind deliberately listened to the voice of its own ego, beguiled into believing that they too could be gods of a sort if they followed the advice of the serpent and tasted the fruits of the path of temptation, as opposed toobeying God's perfect way.   By eating the forbidden fruit, the relationship between Adam & Eve in regards to their Creator had been turned asunder, no more were they immortal beings worthy to be co-heirs to our Lord; they had been reduced to human beings subject to the laws of physical life and death.  Their life could no longer be one of paradisiacal splendor, a garden of love, instead they would have to toil, to labor, and to live within the physical laws of earth which includes suffering, pain, injustice, fear, unfairness, darkness, and ultimately death.

However all was not lost, as Adam & Eve had not been abandoned by God, as His wisdom, His power, His omniscience were still present to be One with Adam & Eve through prayer and contemplation, what had happened to them was that the physical needs of the body had corrupted and now competed with Adam & Eve's ability to draw upon, to listen, and to love their Creator. 

This was not the end as Christ showed us the perfect way back to our Lord, through his willful obedience and surrender to God's Word.  Far from living a life of sensory enjoyment, and ego fulfillment, Christ followed the admonition that each of us has a stark choice to either follow God or to follow mammon.  These choices are fundamentally opposed to each other, and when tempted by Satan and offered dominion over all the kingdoms of the world, he rebuked Satan and broke forever the bonds of Adam & Eve, for now here was a man who would not only overcome physical death, but would resurrect himself and walk the earth again while commencing the Great Commission before ascending to heaven.

Which leads us to Revelation 21:4: "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."  "For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found" Luke 15:24.  Revelation 21:4 is the end of our story, it is man coming back to God, being one with God, it is man overcoming self, it is man regaining paradise, and finally it is man receiving God's total and complete compassion for us, forgiveness of us, and unending and unfailing love for us.