Welcome!

Hey Everybody, thanks for visiting my site. I hope this becomes more than a place for me to post my views, I hope it can be a place where constructive discussion can occur. For this reason I am banning the words republican, democrat, conservative, and liberal. These words divide us and make it easy to put people into boxes and assume that we know what they think rather than actually listening to them.

The same could be said of capitalism……

“Many forms of Gov­ern­ment have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pre­tends that democ­racy is per­fect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democ­racy is the worst form of Gov­ern­ment except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…” – Winston Churchill

What should minimum wage be in a capitalist economy?

In last nights State of the Union address President Obama made a case for raising the minimum wage from $7.25 per hour to $9 per hour.  The wailing and gnashing of teeth on the internet this morning was pathetic.  “It’s an invisible tax”, “We’ll have to lay people off or go out of business!”, “It will make inflation skyrocket!”, “If those people want to be paid more they should get an education!”.  I am here to say an unapologetic BULLSHIT to all of these, but more importantly to address the issue of what wages should be in a capitalist economy and how they should be set.  But first I want to address each of these claims individually.

What would a capitalist health INSURANCE system look like?

A fundamental problem with using the word “capitalism” is that it has come to be associated with the idea of “favorable to big business”.  For this reason large corporations proclaim their love for “capitalism” while simultaneously, intentionally or not, doing everything in their power to subvert its basic principles.  Also for this reason, those who are not happy with what they, sometimes correctly, see as bad behavior on the part of large corporations, loudly rail against the evils of “capitalism”.  One is just as wrong as the other.  I argue that capitalism is not necessarily favorable to big business, in fact if fairly applied, capitalism would never result in the large mega-corporations we see today nor the influence that they have on our economy and government.

Is the constitution still relevant?

An interesting take on the constitution by somebody who spent 40 years studying it.

My take? Like any ancient text it is a great foundation but it has to be interpreted in the context of changing conditions that could never possibly have been envisioned by the writers. I don’t see any problem keeping it and following it. Like all such ancient texts, however, it is too often twisted in ridiculous ways in an attempt to justify peoples own personal form of hate, bigotry, and stupidity.

Top down or bottom up?

Some of you know that I am a GIS analyst by trade. Most of you know that I am personally concerned about the overuse of our natural resources.  A lot of you also know that I am currently without the benefit of full-time permanent employment.  A few also know that, although I am still searching for the right job, I am also working very hard to increase my knowledge of my trade and enjoying the freedom to explore new opportunities where I might use my skills to address my concerns about the future of our society and our planet.  Probably none of you know that there exists an organization specifically developed to facilitate communication amongst people with similar interest and naturally I am a member of that society.

Who is to blame?

I had this forwarded to me today and thought it worth sharing.  Apologies for already breaking the rule about using the words democrat and republican but they are at least used in completely neutral terms.  I don’t agree with everything he said (see my comments at the bottom) but it is definitely worth a read.

I’ve said a thousand times the most important thing we need in our political system is a “None of the above” option on every ballot.

What would a capitalist health CARE system look like?

Lets forget all the rhetoric about ObamaCare, socialism, and death panels  for a minute and think about designing a health care system from scratch.  What should the goal of the health care system be?  Ultimately that goal should be to produce the best health, for the most people, at the least cost.  Before dismantling our own health care system it would be wise to evaluate how it performs in relation to those goals.