Saw Slumdog Millionaire a couple of days ago.  Not impressed.  Decent performances, kinda dumb story.  What's the moral?  Keep chasing after the girl and she'll keep telling you to piss off until you're wealthy?  Nice ...

I went to the Houston NABC for the last weekend.  I didn't do much, had a couple of huge hands (a 5-3-3-2 28 count and a hand I bid 2C P 2D P 7S) and fizzled in the only national event I played, the Swiss (the only skin on our wall was newly inducted Hall of Famer Mark Lair's.)  It was nice to see George Jacobs win the Vanderbilt.

Jeff and Paul and Izzy and her new partner, Sondra Blank, triumphed on BBO against Cayne a couple of days ago.  I missed the dramatic comeback as it conflicted with '24', but a good showing nevertheless.

America is so messed up (thanks Dubya.)  The only Republicans left virtually all come from conservative districts and are consequently more worried about their primary opponents than their general election opponents.  So they swing rabidly to the right.  They're irrelevant.  We need at least 2 grown-up parties for this deal to work.  Maybe it's time for a 2nd party in America.

Here's more of the platform I'd like to see from the party I'd vote for:

We don't subscribe to various Bronze Age religions.  If you want to believe superstitious nonsense, please keep it to yourself.  America is not a Christian nation.  None of the founding fathers were Christian. (For instance, Thomas Jefferson wrote his own version of the New Testament omitting all references to the divinity of Jesus and Benjamin Franklin was an atheist.  I really like this link: http://www.wonderfulatheistsofcfl.org/Quotes.htm)

We believe in balanced budgets but also recognize the validity of Keynesian economics.  No budget should project deficits as far as the eye can see.  If we had negative economic growth last year, we can run a deficit up to 10% of (projected) tax revenues collected, but if we didn't, we can't run a deficit at all.

We believe in freedom and liberty.  Victimless crimes will not be prosecuted.  More power will be delegated to the states, as intended by our founding fathers.  If you don't like life in Alabama, move to California or New York or Oregon.  I wonder just how great the United States would be if we had just let those backwards Confederates secede and be done with them.

I thought this video was pretty funny.  I hope Mary hasn't been watching too much of Glenn Beck.

I've been following the discussion around Obama's budget, a document entitled A New Era of Responsibility ... Renewing America's Promise.  I'm appalled at the recklessness of the thing.  Obama seems to be banking on the Big Lie theory, that people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one.  His projections of massive and unprecedented deficits as far as the eye can see are utter madness.

We already know what works.  We have Clinton's presidency to show us the way.  The wealthy need to pay their fair share.  The government needs to look for ways to economize.  Obama had an unprecedented opportunity to show political courage, ask for shared sacrifice, and really revolutionize America.  Instead he's ensuring America's decline under an ocean of debt.

Unfortunately, there is no coherent and principled opposition to the thing.  Republicans' hypocrisy and decline into fascism over the last 8 years has left them, as I saw someone describe it on Meet the Press this morning, like a bunch of eunuchs at the Playboy mansion, analyzing and observing the events around them, while unable to participate.

If I were the declarer in chief, here's how I'd play Obama's hand:

Roll back the Bush tax cuts on the wealthy yesterday.  Especially the inheritance tax.

I hear the opposition: 'You don't raise taxes in a recession.'  Yeah, well you don't lower taxes when you're at war, either, but somehow that argument fell on deaf ears over the last 7 years.  Allowing billionaires who die in 2010 to pass on their entire vast fortunes tax-free is insane and irresponsible in a time of financial crisis.  Give them a generous 10 or even 20 million dollar exemption and then tax the rest at a healthy 40 or 50%.  Raise the top marginal rate back to 39.6%.  Even at that level it's somewhat on the low side, but at least it gets you back into the right ballpark.

Stop letting insolvent banks hold our economy hostage and bleed our economy dry.

I was watching Bill Moyers last night and finally heard from someone who made some sense on the banking crisis.  Regulators need to assess the solvency of each bank.  Obama should insist that the directors/management of all insolvent banks tender their resignations (not that he will necessarily accept them all.)  Stockholders in insolvent banks must not be bailed out.  Their shares are worthless because the underlying entity is insolvent.  The government should take over each bank as it defaults on its obligations, if it can't be arranged to do so sooner.  The government should recapitalize the banks and then resell them back to the market.

Freeze military spending.

There's probably more waste, fraud and abuse in the department of defense budget than in all other departments put together.  Smart people should be able to figure out how to keep America safe with a budget that's only 5 times as much as the world's next most expensive military budget.  I'm all for paying soldiers more.  But corrupt folks like Blackwater and Halliburton need to be investigated for fraud and the era of no-bid contracts needs to come to an end.  Obsolete military programs need to be shelved.  Obsolete military bases need to be closed.  Unnecessary wars and foreign occupations need to responsibly and swiftly end.

Don't increase education spending, spend education money more wisely.

Do you want the world's most brilliant citizenry?  Here's my plan:  Make broadband Internet available to every American.  You can profitably mass-produce a cheap net-ready workstation for under $200 each.  If you gave one to EVERY American, that'd be a paltry $60 billion.  Focus on young people of lower socioeconomic means and I'm sure you could provide near-universal access for one tenth that amount.  Make online videos/classes and testing on virtually every academic subject under the sun available for low cost to all and for free to those of limited means.  I don't understand why you can't have the best teachers in America make videos of their classes, make them available to America's families, and get Americans thinking again.  I'd love a Harvard education, whether I have some piece of paper on my wall that cost me $200,000 or not.  It really isn't that complicated.

Gut the budget for the Department of Homeland Security.

It's up to the CIA and the DoD to prevent a terrorist from smuggling a dirty bomb into this country or from using cyber-terrorism to cripple this country's technological infrastructure and bring it to its knees (a more likely and dangerous threat, imo.)  If you want to see colored lights and whatnot, go to your nearest intersection.  As for natural disasters, people need to relearn the lesson that decisions have consequences.  That if you build a city below sea level you're periodically going to get wet and that if you live in an area prone to hurricanes, it's up to you to either build structures capable of withstanding them or footing the cost of rebuilding.  They also need to learn the lesson that living in fear of terrorism or getting hit by lightning or by a plane that falls from the sky and hits your house just isn't rational and there needs to be a sane balance between expenses incurred and lives saved.

Raise the age at which you qualify for social security benefits.

Social security is a Ponzi scheme.  Always has been.  A racist and sexist one at that (discriminating against blacks and males, who tend to die significantly younger than their non-black/female counterparts.)  But at least when it was created, the life expectancy tables meant that it wouldn't be an excessively onerous financial burden (the average life expectancy in 1930 was 58 for men and 62 for women.) http://www.ssa.gov/history/lifeexpect.html  That's no longer true.  Fix it.

Health care.

Give the AMA and the insurance industry a chance to propose a plan that will insure all Americans without raising our current health care spending a dime.  If they fail/refuse, go to a single-payer model like the rest of the civilized world has done long ago.  We pay massively more per capita than any other country and yet tens of millions are uninsured.  The market model has failed in health care.  It's time to accept that and move to something that works.  More money (as Obama has proposed) is not the answer.  We spend too much already.

Tax carbon.

It was the right idea when I first heard of it in 1992.  It's the right idea today.  Nobody has the right to pollute my environment without paying me for the damage they have caused.  As the old native American saying goes, 'We don't inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.'  Americans need to be given a reality check when it comes to the true cost of energy.  That will spur conservation and increased investment in renewables.

End the 'War on Drugs'

The widespread incarceration of non-violent offenders is one of the great human rights travesties of all time.  I'd put it on par with slavery in terms of its destructiveness to our society and our moral fabric.  People have the inalienable right to dominion over their own physical person.  That includes ingesting substances that others deem harmful. 

Stop subsidizing breeding

As the world population approaches 7 billion people, I don't think the problem is that there's not enough folks. 

Not me ...

Mikey forwarded this email to me.  It kind of surprised me.  I was going to go on about how much I disagree with it (I'd be seriously offended by it if anything offended me anymore) on a paragraph by paragraph basis, but I decided against it.  I started a thread on BBO Forums here instead.

Edit:  I should have googled this first.  Only the first bit was actually written/recited by Ben Stein.  Guess Mikey's on his own for the rest of it.  

The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.

My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish.  And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees..  I don't feel threatened.  I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are:  Christmas trees.

It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me.  I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto.  In fact, I kind of like it  It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu .  If people want a crche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians.  I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period.  I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country.  I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship celebrities and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him?  I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too.   But there are a lot of us who are wondering where these celebrities came from and where the America we knew went to.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different:  This is not intended to be a joke;  it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her 'How could God let something like this happen?' (regarding Katrina) Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response.  She said, 'I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives.  And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out.  How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?'

In light of recent events... terrorists attack, school shootings, etc.  I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found a few years ago) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK.  Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school.  The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself.  And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr Spock's son committed suicide).  We said an expert should know what he's talking about.  And we said OK.

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out.  I think it has a great deal to do with 'WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.'

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell  Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says.  Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing.  Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing yet?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit.  If not then just discard it... no one will know you did.  But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.  

My Best Regards,  Honestly and respectfully,


Ben Stein