Holte's corner

Somebody already Thunk it

One problem with thinking outside the box, is that when one follows well tread paths one has some idea where those paths lead. In both religious and political ideology those tracks often lead in circles, sometimes lead to prepared traps, or to walls. In trying to think outside the box, one can find oneself cutting through weeds and vines for hours, only to stumble back on to one of the main roads. Sooner or later one comes to a "good idea" only to find "somebody already thought of this." Most frustrating -- but a reality of life nevertheless.

That is why the Dharma is described as a wheel. Each partial enlightenment has a way of giving way to further seeking. To get some idea of this it pays to read Nichiren's Dialogue between a Sage and a Fool. Naturally he ends the dialogue with his own voice, but the reality is that any fool traveling along the well worn paths of 13th century Japanese religion could have kept going around in circles forever.

Is there any idea that is truly fresh and enlightening, and that will lead us out of this circle?

Well, that is asking the wrong question. I believe that indeed the Lotus Sutra allows us out of the Circle, in concert with the other Mahayana teachings it offers a way of looking at religion that is fresh, invigorating, and offers the chance to architect better things. Likewise concepts such as Democracy, Equal Rights, Human rights, and various others we see in modern political theory offer us ways to get to a better government. The theory is all there. The circles of marxism, libertarianism, etceteras, just represent people too impatient to follow them.

The real question then comes down to, not the theory, but the practice. And it is there that there are more traps, walls and circles.

For example there are concepts in the Constitution that if followed would make it possible to improve the function of our Government. The first one is the principle of limited Government and separation of powers. The trouble is that everyone interprets these ideas so conveniently that they are either applied so rigidly no one will ever follow them, or they are abandoned in spirit while applied in letter.

Example; the constitution warns about combining legislative function with executive function; yet we create regulatory agencies where the executive is given not only legislative authority but judicial authority as well. That could be remedied simply; just appoint different officers for each role and require the legislative role to be subject to the review of elected deputies; but do we ever see that actually done? Of course not.

In the realm of Buddhism teachers and students aren't separated by glass walls. Those who know "give dharma" those who don't give their time, and if they can't find the time try to help those who do acquire dharma. "Priests" are enabled by the rest of us, but are not superior or enlightened on account of it. All the enlightenment is supposed to be acquired by "faith/meditation, practice, and study." And we all are supposed to be equal on this. But in practice those who think they have it try to lord it over or bamboozle others, and people form different schools of religion and try to crucify their opponents as practicing incorrect. Does anybody really break with these habits of clinging, well not often.

I'm tired at the moment. I'm fighting a bit of flue. I'll be better tomorrow.

Chris

How to Fix Detroit -- Single payer

A lot of people want to punish the "Big Three" for trying to keep their promises to their workers. After all, the Air Traffic Controllers, the Airlines, and hosts of other industries have all stiffed their employees, and look how much more efficient and profitable they are! [That was Sarcasm]. Aside from down-sizing senior management, the best thing that GM, Chrysler and Ford could do right now would be to get on board for universal single payer health care. Combine Medicare, Medicaid, and the disparate state plans into one unified system and pay for it with payroll taxes. Do that and one of the big costs of the current system would vanish from the Big Boys shoulders.

Instead of punishing and blaming labor for the stupidities of management, we need to finally do what most western nations did a long time ago; socialize those things that are (or should be) outside the money-measured system.

Defining human rights like a "right to medical care" as rights is difficult. Of course it is "right" that all humans should have access to health care. But it is a "positive right" and that makes its enforcement different from negative rights like liberty.

Positive rights like health care are requirements, not negative rights that can be enforced with fines and punishments for their violation. For a positive right to be real it must be privileged, it must be funded, and someone must positively make the goal of universal health care a reality before calling it a "right" has any meaning. There has to be a business model, a system that has "health care" as its mission, and people and rules that can enforce and provide for that right. Positive rights don't just happen without funding and effort.

That is why we've failed so far. People identified health care as a national goal, but they've been confused about what the market is, how to deliver health care, and who should own that market. As a result we've had a muddying of the requirements for a functional system. As a result of this we have a dysfunctional system.

Shooting Down the Auto Industry

Modern Advertising/Propaganda artists are masters at finding the illustrative image. Republicans in the House and Senate found their's last night. Noting that the Big Three Executives all came to Washington in Private Jets they let go with a circular firing squad, with America in the middle.

The fact is that the executives of the big three simply don't deserve much pity. They have been operating in comfortable isolation surrounded by sycophants and obsequious toadies for most of their tenure. Whether their companies go down in flames or they continue, most of them will remain relatively comfortable. Much of their paper wealth will burn off, but they will in all likelihood retain homes, food, clothing, all the basics. Not like their middle tier white collar, and blue collar employees. Those folks stand to lose their jobs, their health care, their survival. It's that stark.

Still the image is apt. The truth is appalling. The Republicans are right. The big three don't deserve a "bailout". Those companies probably deserve an execution and a quiet burial. Maybe a plaque to their accomplishments at their former headquarters buildings.

However, the Republicans are right, but they are right for the wrong reasons and their 'solution' is wrong. The fact is that the Big three got to where they are through a whole series of strategic and policy blunders; many of them aided and abetted by the political system. Policy encouraged and supported low gasoline prices based on borrowed money and inports. Policy encouraged cheap credit, and flooded money into the hands of a minority of Americans so they could afford status symbols; which they mostly bought from the Big Three. Policies encouraged gas guzzling cars, discouraged energy savings, and allowed the Big three to depend on SUV sales. Policy made it hard for them to compete against imported auto manufactures.

Honda and Toyota pay high wages, but don't have unions. Policy allowed but did not make GM, Ford and Chrysler top heavy companies with over-priced executives. That was their own policy. Policy allowed but did not make them so incredibly arrogant, isolated from their workers, or unwilling to invest in modernization. In short they shot themselves down. We need to save the Auto Industry, but we do not need to save Chrysler, Ford and GM to do that. The UAW is not the cause of this financial meltdown, and it should not be the target of the executives and their mouthpieces as targets of opportunity, but they will probably have to take hits in the reorganization that those companies desperately need. No, Congress was right to take potshots at those airplanes. They are images of 30 years of socialization of costs and privatization of profits.

Perhaps Chapter 11 is the next step. Congress will have to revisit the issue in January when the the Executives, presumably will have given up their personal jets.

Chris

The Real Constitutional issues

The Constitution sets out the requirements for the "Federal Government" starting with a mission statement:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

This is "mission statement." It states the goals of the United States Government. When Barrack Obama refered to this line in his acceptance speech on his election night he also referred to Lincolns invocation of the same line. the purpose of the Constitution of the United States is not to form a union of the rich and wealthy. Not to serve only laborers. Not to serve Wall Street, nor only main-street; but to serve the "People of the United States." It is designed as Government "of the people, for the people, by the people." We aren't owned by top executives, not chattels of our Senators, Executives and Governors. They work for us -- or at least are supposed to.

The principle problem with our constitution is not that we have a big government, that the founders envisioned limited Government. They did, but not the way most neo-conservatives present it. The problem is that over the years our Government has drifted away from fulfilling its requirements as a Government. Our Government officers have either taken on tasks they aren't qualified for, or shifted responsibilities to other officers who are already overburdened. As a result its not the fact that we have a Department of Education at the Federal level, or a Standing Army, or that the Federal Government is all pervasive that is causing us trouble; but that the wrong people are doing the wrong things ineffectively.

Thus we have the Federal Legislature trying to oversee a bureaucracy that outnumbers them more than 1000 to 1. We have the Executive playing Judge, Jury and Executioner on a whole panoply of issues from Immigration Law to overseeing the Financial System, where their incompetance has been repeatedly and sometimes appallingly demonstrated despite best efforts and genius level appointments. Why is this? Because we have gotten away from the requirements and principles envisioned in the Constitution. The size of our Government is not the issue. In a functional Government size is not an issue. The Federalization of formerly State issues should not be a problem. It is because we have concentrated power in the Executive and cut out the functional roles of the States. Limited Government is not the issue; A Functional Government is self limiting and accomplishes its missions.

Conservatives rightly point to some of these symptoms. Liberals rightly point to others. But both are talking past one another. It's not that the Constitution is at fault. It's not that we should do away with Agencies or fire massive numbers of people. Rather we need to uphold the principles in the Constitution and build those principles not just into the overall structures of our Government but into the Departments and Agencies.

The principle of the Executive

We need to look at each mission in the Government, define that mission; and assign ownership of that mission to the right people as stewards of the public trust. This is the principle of executive authority. The President has overall authority, overall trust, and overall responsibility. He is our Chief General and Admiral. He should have the responsibility for making overall decisions.

The principle of Local/Federal partnership.

However, he cannot see clearly all the missions of the Federal Government, nor carry them out himself. Each Mission; Health, Education, Welfare, etceteras... are missions of the people of the United States; not just the mission of States, Counties or the Federal Government. The Federal Government doesn't have the supreme wisdom to make all particular decisions, and the States don't have the power to solve many of them by themselves. The purpose of Federalism is to generate synergy. The principle of Local/Federal partnership is a requirement of the Constitution. The idea that any problem can be solely the responsibility of States or solely the responsibility of the Feds, is simply not part of that vision.

Missions like health care involve research and definition, oversight and regulation, budgeting and execution. Healthcare especially should involve all stakeholders in decision making about those things that affect those stakeholders; Doctors, administrators, and other Medical Care Givers, all should have a role in both policy making and decision making and that role needs to be organized in a way that empowers each to do what they do best.

Separation of Powers and Cooperation of powers

The Constitution grants oversight and control powers to Congress for good reason. The legislature is in contact with the people. And it is the job of the people to raise the alarm when officers of a mission area are doing something wrong. When medical executors break the law, or give bad medical care, or sell poisonous products, the people overseeing them need to have the power to stop them.

The executive is good at performing functions, achieving goals, meeting mission specifications. But these things all cost. If executives can dictate spending as well as performance, they will try to build little kingdoms and divert wealth to their own homes, bailiwicks, or interests; at the possible expense of the overall mission they are responsible to or part of. That is why democratic forms; Commissions, elected representatives, and advisory organizations are necessary to determine priorities.

The oldest principle of taxation is that the stakeholders of a tax should have a say in how that tax is allocated. People form governments to allocate the commons. A Government is no longer a democracy when the people no longer decide that allocation. That is why the Constitution put the budgeting, oversight and spending decisions on Congress. And this should be replicated at all levels of Government. In Alaska, the fisheries there are not overfished because the Fishermen, stakeholders, have a say in the quotas for their fishing. With advice from experts they understand fully the issues involved and so they set their own quotas.

Legislature, Executive and Judiciary

We English speakers tend to pay lip service to principles, and to ignore the distinction between function as abstract and titles. Another issue we currently have is that often commissions assigned to regulatory functions play judge, jury and executioner in their decisions. This may be administrative law, but the principles of the constitution are compromised when a single commission has so much local power. When commissions are run by "liberals" they sometimes unintentionally seem to oppress the people they regulate. When they are run by the people they regulate they often sabotage the purposes of the regulation they are supposed to conduct. A large part of the reason for this is that our regulatory schema doesn't embody this very basic principle of separating functions.

Replicating the Judicial Function

A Regulatory commission should have at least one Judge on it, whose sole concern is the constitutionality, legalness, and fairness of the decisions being made and who has the duty of presiding over decision making. Further it should have both state and protective council to represent the people being regulated. Any Agency with judges in it should have Judicial officers in it by law.

Replicating the Legislative function

Regulatory Commissions should also have to run their decisions through formal deliberative bodies and eventually past Congress. Rule making, policy making, and budget decisions should always be made with input from stakeholders. Most regulatory commissions put their decisions out to the public, but few have formal deliberative bodies composed of stakeholders. Even more important, regulatory commissions should be organized on Federalist principles, with their functions replicated at regional and State levels -- or at least the advisory functions organized with State, County and local level branches and subbranches. If this were done Congress would only have to intervene rarely and most of the time could rubberstamp their decisions. Any agency with rule making functions should have to work with representative bodies by law.

The executive function

One thing our country has plenty of, are "executives." The executive function is a top down action centered function that attracts can-do folks with a sense of responsibility. The roots of the executive function are in the military and ancient nobilities. Executives are often alpha males, and like wolves and dogs, if they aren't well trained, disciplined and held responsible, they tend to revert to ambitious, predatory, selfishly competitive form. Executive officers should be appointed, or at least responsible to oversight officers, and tied by oath to their mission. They should have power over their "realm" and have to share power in a hierarchy with others having supervisory power over their budget, policy approval, and decision oversight. Because hierarchies are dangerous things, each mission of the Government demands a separate one. Judicial Officers responsible to Judicial Supervisors. Budget Officers to a Chief budget officer and Congress. The model for this is in the Constitution.

Building in Regulation

The constitution spells out that Congress shall be responsible for a whole series of functions, and then spells out that the executive shall carry them out. It then gives Congress the authority to establish offices and officers for those officers and vests the appointment of those officers in the President with Congresses advise, consent, and approval:

and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

Those responsibilities that are supposed to be Congress; Budget, oversight and policy making, fairly demand the creation of new officers and commissions to enforce Congressional involvement. Probably what we need are Policy, Oversight and Budget Commissions for each Department with a Budget Officer and an Oversight officer appointed by Congress, along with other officers responsible for helping the agencies control and determine their budgets.

At the same time, executive only officers would be responsible for each agency and mission of that department.

Those responsibilities that are supposed to be coordinated with the States would be coordinated directly with the States, both through congress, and directly with the State and County legislatures; but also with other stakeholders. For example with Education; Teachers, Principles and administrators would have a direct say in local policy. The way to accomplish this is by creating executive and advisory organizations organized on a membership basis, and able to provide their own funds parrallel to those of the Federal Government. The idea would be similar to the function of the Federal Reserve or the National Science Academy. These organizations would have a say in their own regulation, funding, and policies. Local members would each send deputies to County and State organizations, and those in turn would be represented Nationally. Thus everyone has a say in decisions affecting them. This only works if they also have a limited budget that they have to make decisions over.

The point here is that all these ideas follow from designs suggested by the Constitution and best practices nationwide and worldwide. There is no need to have a revolution so much as to return to the principles embodied in our original revolution

Partying on the "bailout dime"

It is amazing the arguments that come out of otherwise respectable people. For example; the arguments for cutting taxes on the rich say that the rich deserve more money because they have earned it. That if they don't get tax cuts they will somehow invest and work less, and that that will cause people to lose jobs and be unemployed. Yet their arguments for cutting wages to the poor are the opposite; that if workers are paid more they'll work less, that they need the incentive of poverty to keep them working hard. Usually these arguments come from the same people at different times. Sometimes in the same conversation.

Tom Hartman Hour 2 debate

Similarly the same bums who are laying off their line workers and blowing investor money in artfully fraudulent derivative instruments and AAA rated junk Securities, are paying themselves bonuses and insisting that they need these bonuses to "keep good people." It seems to me that bonuses are paid to honest people for doing the right thing and producing. The people they are paying bonuses to deserve the boot. College graduates or unemployed blue collar workers could do a better job than this lot.

So we have the Federal Government bailing out the banks.

http://banking.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?Fuseaction=Hearings.Detail&HearingID=3df09367-cf45-438a-9c0f-7ebfec169719

What are the banks doing with their largess? They are paying bonuses, holding meetings on Carribean islands, and from the looks of it doing everything but investing. "Why throw good money after bad?" Then they go back to the Secretary of Treasury for more. 70 billion in bonuses!!! What is this! They appear to be doing everything but what the Secretary of Treasury told us the money was for. We should be taking over these banks and firing the CEO's, not giving them golden parachutes with taxpayer money.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081110/ts_nm/us_aig

"So far, the money is going to pay either bank dividends, satisfy old debts, or to shore up their bottom lines -- and, see below, pay bonuses and take over smaller banks. While banks are a business and see their job as looking out for their shareholders, now that taxpayers are significant investors, they should be working in the nation's interests as well. "

http://www.progress.org/2008/bonuses.htm

Well this time they were playing, not with stockholder money, or our IRA's, or investor money, no they've already blown that. But with Taxpayer money. And so they are finally getting the notices they deserve.

http://wcbstv.com/business/andrew.cuomo.bailout.2.851658.html

Barney Frank: http://www.house.gov/frank/tarp103108.html

If Barney Frank is right, then they should also be going to jail. They probably won't. But they should.

Chris

Performance Objectives

A political theorist I heard a few weeks ago was saying that politics is about "policy", "patronage", and "pork." This sounded odd to me because he was an Israeli Jew. He had to stammer out the word pork. That talk has been kind of bouncing back and forth in the back of mind ever since.

I've also been studying about "project management" and similar subjects. Project management has three issues; resources/performance, schedule and risk. If one reduces resources that increases schedule. If one tries to achieve on the cheap that increases risk. Most Project managers seem to be Republicans, but as practical men I don't think they are wedded to theories so much as performance.

So to reform that Israeli's statement; politics is about policy, performance, and risk management. It's about managing people. Obama was elected because blind ideology obviously doesn't work. Market meltdowns are a predictable result of laissez faire policies. This has been demonstrated time and time again. You would think people would learn. Why be wedded to goofy politics?

Well the answer is that politics is also a pyramid. Performance is about enterprise, it takes individual enterprise, leadership, to accomplish things. For any system to work there has to be a top down directed effort. Executives have to imitate the best model available to them; and that is the military structure; the top down structure running from General to field worker. The best policies require institutional memory. But mostly they require dynamic leadership. Kings used to also be Generals. Aristocracy is the result of the degradation in performance of this concept.

That is why policies used to come from prelates and soothsayers, from charters, from traditional repositories (churches, temples, monasteries) where people could record what works, what should work, and what doesn't work. Like with performance the direction is top down for actions, but bottom up for information. The best policies filter up needs and information, and then someone draws general observations and has an overall concept or vision. Then others apply their own expertize and wisdom to fleshing out that knowledge. Generals work the same way. Strategy is the overall vision and the 'fitting together of things'. Tactics is the working out of specifics. Theocratic and oppressive societies are the result of the degradation of this concept.

And finally there is a question. How does one keep the process dynamic? Democracy is the answer. I suddenly realized "democracy is about the mitigation of risk." Even nobles, pundits, priests and experts are ultimately flawed human beings. Even the most conservative of people if they'd stop and think would realize that that is true. Democracy allows ideas to filter from below. It allows the herd to follow its best instincts. Even Animals practice that kind of Democracy. When a greater truth comes along the whole herd will ignore its most precious and strong alpha males and females. Once the herd goes off in a new direction those alphas will run like crazy to get back in front.

Laissez faire, the invisible hand, is just another way of talking about self-rule. The weakness of all self-rules, is that people can become self-blinded, and don't always go in the right direction. Those in positions of authority aren't always as expert as they think they are. Democracy allows people to overthrow failed concepts and stop failed people from failing worse. Even dictatorships suddenly have majority rule when they fail. Democracy mitigates that disaster by allowing people to change course before set-backs turn into disaster.

There is a triangle here. Democracy is about mitigating risk by dividing authority and also dividing blame. We needed more democracy not less. And now we have a chance to restore it. The people have spoken. The herd has moved in a new direction. The alpha males and females are sputtering and nipping at the heels, but they have to either run hard to catch up, or be left behind.

Chris