Dear Michael Steele

We need leadership on the earmark issue. Obama talks the talk but won't walk the walk. The earmark issue is something all people can rally around, Dems and Repubs. Start making big noises about the earmarks in the $410B Omnibus spending bill. Go on CBS, NBC anywhere and name names Dems and Repubs who are putting earmarks in bills. Point out also that the "tiny percentage" of money is a source of a very large percentage of corruption.

Ed Bradford

2009-02-23
From:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/us/politics/23govs.html?nl=pol&emc=pola1

Dear Governor Schwarzenegger

About your comment:

  "Even though it is against your principles or philosophy," he
  said he believed that officeholders should be doing "what the
  people want you to do rather than getting stuck in your ideology."

Your job is not to do what the people want you to do. You job is not to
do what your ideology tells you to do. Your job is to solve
problems. The people's solution as reflected in polls is not useful.
Polls are political and are formulated to assert or deny
viewpoints -- solutions.

What is needed from our leaders is the management talent of identifying
a problem and solving it. Solutions require a precise
definition of exactly what the problem is and making it understandable
to whomever a solution might apply or affect. Only then can a
solution be crafted that can logically address all facets of a
problem. Solutions should not be developed in a closet. Today, they
are formulated in back rooms where no citizen can participate.
Lobbyists and partisans do participate, but your constituency do not.

Today, solutions to problems are phrased as "more regulation" or
"less regulation" or "single payer" or "higher taxes". These are
solutions. What are the problems?

  Should we do anything about 23 Million homeless people?
  Should we create safety net for retirees?
  Should we have a strong Military?
  Does everyone have a right to health care?

These are problems. Once you answer in the affirmative to one or more
of these problems, we refine it.

  Should we create a safety net for retirees? Yes.
    How should we create it?

These are question that should be addressed, not how to stitch and tape
together existing failing solutions.

Alas, no one in government wants to go down this path. All seem focused
on either fixing the current model by raising taxes, or inserting
unlimited risk in to a privatization model. If the problem statement
could be refined to accurately reflect what 90% of Americans expect out
of Social Security, then there is one path that could lead to a
successful solution and would minimize ideological cul-de-sacs.

The development of Internet Web Standards has proceeded over the
past 8 years on the Internet in public using forums, email and
occasional face to face mettings. The resulting standards are
working even today while you are reading this. Open problem
definition and solution efforts to Internet technological issues
have been enormously successful. It's the technique of addressing
problems that is interesting and useful.  That single model of
problem definition and solution could get all interested parties
involved and remove a lot of partisan religion from the discussion.

Until our political leaders can do the homework necessary to present
issues and problems to America in a clear understandable fashion,
our country will continue down the path of division. You are helping
that by simply voicing opinions on solutions to ... what problems?
I have provided one model for identifying and solving real problems in
a most efficient and non-partisan way.

Your job, should you choose to accept it is to create an environment
where anyone can contribute (this is the age of the Internet -- there
are no excuses for not seeking this goal) to solutions to well defined
problems. Can you or anyone do that?


Ed Bradford

2009-02-19

Inside the Meltdown (PBS)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meltdown/view/

A very understandable report on the facts of the meltdown
starting with Bear Stearns and ending up in October; a look
at one or two trees in a forest.

For what it showed it was excellent. However. it supplied
no context. Not discussed:

1. types of home owners whose mortgages were toxic,
2. How toxic "securities" were invented.
3. What laws allowed the toxic securities to be traded.
4. When and how ARM's were invented and introduced.
5. Motivation of banks or lenders to use ARM's.
6. When and how zero down mortgages were invented.
7. Why did Freddie and Fannie have so much of the toxic mortgages?
8. How mortgages work where no permanent employment is evidenced?
9. What other solutions were possible at the time?

and finally, the ultimate question is

  "What would God have done?"

While that might sound silly, there is a real world example in American
History. Twice in his lifetime, J. P. Morgan (saved the United States
from financial collapse (1895 and 1907). The NPR program shows Bernanke
Paulson, and Geithner as big thinkers and very smart, yet all they have
proposed has produced nothing. Paulson had to ask for Bailout money under
one pretext and then use the money for a different purpose. He's
guessing.  He has no skin in the game. That does not inspire confidence
that he knows what he is doing. Same for Geithner and Bernanke.

What would J. P. Morgan have done? What did he do to avert two crises?

Morgan would have gotten the heads of the banks together and told them they
must support Bear Stearns. Some would have objected, a few might have
refused, but in the end they would all support Bear Stearns because JP
would have the Treasury behind him and JP Morgan had the trust of his
government and his fellow bankers.

Forcing the Bankers to fix the problem would have produced results
within months and the entire situtation might have been avoidable.
What would convince JP to do this. Morgan was a Banker, an honest
banker, His interest was the depositors of his bank and almost
everything he did was based on making the best possible investments for
his depositors. He also hated chaos in the market [typified by "ruinous
competition" in the railroad business].

Paulson, Geithner and Bernake should have gone to NY and in the JP
Morgan style, simply made the bankers an offer they couldn't refuse.

      "Save Bear Stearns and fix this problem or else."
     
Things like suspension of anti-trust laws, deposit of treasury revenue in
the members banks, taking away an banking license; there are a number
of carrots and stick options for compelling the people who created
these problems to fix them.

I believe that Dems and Repubs might have been able to agree on this.
If you watched the faces of the members of our legislature and heard
their voices after learning of the seriousness of the financial
problems, you would immediately recognized the 'deer in headlights'
look. None of the legislators understood the issues and as far as
I can tell, even Paulson, Geithner and Bernanke only understand the
facts and not how to manipulate the market.

JP Morgan knew how to do that.

What would JP Morgan do? Not what Geithner, Bernanke and Pauslson are
doing, that is certain.

Interesting question. "What would JP Morgan do now?"

Ed Bradford

Feb 17, 2009

The stimulus bill (ARRA) passed and has been signed into law. We now
hear that another might be necessary. Now is the time for Americans to
put conditions on any further spending. Have we not been angered at
our government's inability to say where the first half of the Bailout
money went? Are we not worried that the stimulus bill has no measures
for success?

I suggest we set two metrics that are simple to understand and absolute.
The first is a requirement that the GDP must be rising. The second is
that the population of the unemployed must be shrinking. With these
requirements in hand, we must say no to any further stimulus spending
unless the first round of spending has shown some effectiveness -- the
unemployed population is shrinking AND the GDP is rising.

With that in mind, I suggest that the way to convince our government to
not throw money into a bottomless pit is to declare a Tax Payers Revolt
whereby, each tax paying citizen asks his employer to not pay him or her
on the Tax Payer Revolt Day and to not go to work that day. The effect
will be a 1/365 reduction in the income tax revenues of the US
Government and if the number of participants is large enough, the
message to our legislators will not be missed. Fear of a 2 day revolt
or 1 week revolt will put a stop to further spending.

I suggest early in the Jul-Aug-Sep quarter when the Apr-May-Jun economic
statistics come out we declare a day of decision.

Either the GDP is rising AND the unemployed population is shrinking or
no more spending is passed or considered or a Tax Payer Revolt proceeds.
Mere mention of a second bill should be sufficient reason for the Tax Payer Revolt
to proceed.


Ed Bradford

Rather than completely disappear, like the CEO's in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, I suggest we declare a tax payers revolt for a specific day in July. Each tax paying citizen would ask their employer to not pay them for, say, July 22, 2009 and the employee would not go to work. That would actually affect the bottom line of income to the government and the size of the participation population would send a message - assuming the size was large.

The tax payers revolt happens if the GDP numbers for Apr-May-Jun are not rising AND the unemployment population is not shrinking. We should put a specific performance goal in place which is something our current government will not do.

We would all be happy and not bother with the revolt if GDP is rising and unemployment population is shrinking.

Nothing political about this. We just expect performance.

Ed Bradford
Pflugerville,Tx

2009-02-14

Is the ARRA Stimulative?

What is "stimulus"? From my Random House Webster's Dictionary comes:
    1.  something that incites to action or exertion or quickens action,
    feeling, thought, etc

The problem here is what "action" are we seeking. For me, I would seek
two actions: 1) increase the GDP; 2) decrease unemployment.

Does building a road do either of these? Yes and no.

For the GDP if people working simply move over and start road building,
the total output doesn't change. If unemployed people build a road total
output does change. So, in order for the stimulus bill to grow the GDP,
unemployed workers must be hired to do the infrastructure building. Most
unemployed workers are not road builders as far as I know. How then, does
road building grow the GDP? Where are the infrastructure builders
going to come from?

For unemployment the same argument holds. If unemployed workers build
roads then people are being taken out of the unemployed pool
and that is good. But as stated previously, most unemployed people are
auto workers, RV builders, Dell people, Microsoft people, but not
road builders.

Where are the road builders going to come from?

What if the infrastructure money for one single road, say, in Mississippi,
were spent to build an automobile factory and then sold to some auto
manufacture for a price that couldn't be refused. Here we would be
hiring people to build the factory and after the factory was built, we
would stop paying the factory builders, hire and start paying factory
workers. The net benefit of building a factory versus buiding a road is
that one offers long term employment opportunities where the other does
not. Building a road is sustaining, while building a factory is expansive.

In that sense the entire ARRA would have to be classified as sustaining,
not expansive.

Ed Bradford

Federal Health IT Strategic Plan:
2008-2012
Dated June 3, 2008
See:
    http://www.hhs.gov/healthit/resources/HITStrategicPlan.pdf
    Dated June, 2008

Strategic Plan Overview
Background, Mission and Vision

"On April 27, 2004, President Bush issued Executive Order (EO) 13335
IéIíto provide leadership for the development and nationwide
implementation of an interoperable health information technology
infrastructure to improve the quality and efficiency of health care,IéIí
establishing the position of a National Coordinator for Health
Information Technology (IT) within the Office of the Secretary of Health
and Human Services."
--------------------------------------
From
  7 . American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public  Print)[H.R.1.PP]
  at

  http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.+1:

  comes the Februrary 10, 2009 printing of the Stimulus bill.

COMMENT:
There is an existing plan called the Federal Health IT
Strategic Plan. The plan was the byproduct of Executive Order 13335
by President Bush issue in April, 2004. The plan defines the National
Coordinator reference in the Stimulus plan.  National Coordinator seems
a poorly chosen title because it sounds like a
national health coordinator when, in fact, it is a national
health IT (Information Technology) coordinator.  This is like a
Health CIO and perhaps, the name should be changed to reflect
that. Let's call him the HCIO instead of "NC" which could be
North Carolina, Numerical Control, Noam Chomsky, No Charge or
nitrocellulose. Everyone knows what a CIO is.

SUMMARY:

Obama, Pelosi and Reid are implementing President Bush's Health
Care Information Technology plan referenced on p908 of the

  American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Print)[H.R.1.PP]

Let's say I own a house.  I decide to sell it with owner financing. I write a mortgage to
a person who has a well paying job that looks permanent. Interest rate and principal are agreed
on and the mortgage is signed. 12 months later, along comes the recession and the buyer loses his job.
What happens to my mortgage in the courts.

From Timothy Geithner's plan write up at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/11/business/economy/11bailout.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp

comes the following quote:

"It will also renew a legislative proposal giving bankruptcy
judges greater authority to modify mortgages on more
favorable terms to borrowers and over the objections of banks."

Does this mean the contract between the buyer and seller is voided
and the judge can simply give part or all of my property to another?

In law, does bankruptcy trump contract?

Timothy Geithner wants full control of 2 Trillion dollars. That's

 15% (2/13) of the entire GDP of our country.

I thought Paulson had big plans but this is big, really big.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/11/business/economy/11bailout.html?_r=1&hp]

Geithner proposes

1) public-private $1 trillion toxic assets fund for buying up toxic
   assets. He is so right on this. I know many of my friends and especially
   me are champing at the bit to buy the assets in question. I just know
   the public (local and state governments) will want to participate in the
   investment opportunity of a lifetime. And private individuals -- they
   can't wait. I think this program says: I am the US Government. I have
   lots of money and I can print more. I will spend it buying toxic assets,
   thereby giving good money for bad. I will save the banks who invented
   and sold all those bad assets. Then, after the banks find themselves
   solvent again, they will cautously lend money subject to the same
   government pressures that compelled them to offer zero down loans to low
   income and no income people that caused the problems in the first place.

2) Direct capital 'injections' into banks!? Does that mean the
   government (we the people) now own parts of banks? Does that mean we as
   shareholders have a say in how participating banks operate? I can see a
   large tank truck pulling up to Chase Manhattan in New York City and
   connecting what appears to be a firehose to a night deposit box and
   turning it on. Is that what a bank injection is?

3) A vast expansion of lending programs that the Treasury and Federal
   Reserve had already announced, which is aimed at financing consumer
   loans - another $1 trillion.

Finally, Geithner says:

"I want to be candid: this comprehensive strategy will cost money,
involve risk, and take time," he said."We will have to adapt it
as conditions change. We will have to try things we've never tried
before. We will make mistakes. We will go through periods in which
things get worse and progress is uneven or interrupted."

[There are no metrics or timelines mentioned.]

I don't get a strong sense of confidence here.

I am staggered at the self-assured attitude with which  the amounts of
money are tossed around. Does Timothy Geithner really know that much
about the economy? Does the Treasurer and his staff know how to
fix the economy?

Two trillion dollars in the hands of one unelected person.
Does that worry anyone? Dems? Republicans? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?

The Senate has passed the stimulus bill. [http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.+1:] All that remains now is the wrangling over the details. Conservatives don't like it and impute many evils in the words. Liberals like it and believe only good will come of it. In this case, the Liberals are optimists and the Conservatives are pessiments. The only question that remains is will it work? Not once in any of the Press conferences has that question been asked or answered. One person mentioned obliquely that Vice President Biden was talking about something or other and mentioned a 30% probability of failure. No one wanted to comment on what Biden was referring to.

Once again, America is putting Keynes to the test. We have done it before and according to some, we didn't spend enough. One test does not mean a remedy is not a cure. It does indicate that the rememdy is not a cure-all. Other spending programs have also failed to cure morose economies, but they might have not had the right parametizations either. This time we are aiming fully 6% of our entire GDP at this problem. If the stimulus fails and the economy is worse off a year from now, will this cure us once and for all of the bottom up spending cure?  I doubt it. All bad decisions pale in history.

Ask your the President and the House and Senate members:


Ask the question directly. Since they are taking money from people who work
for it and spending it in such vast amounts, each should go on record with an answer to this question.

Ed Bradford

This weekend will be historic. If Republican senators cave in and vote for a bill that the budget office says is not "stimulative", that costs $780B and that will seed more graft and corruption than anywhere in history, I think we the loyal opposition have no choice but to make sure those Republicans do not stay on office. We must unite agains any Replblican who votes for this bill; each should be voted out of office at the earliest opportunity. If the Republicans in their respective states cannot exorcise them during the primary, I will personally contribute my dollars to a Democratic opponent.  I think there could be no worse person holding an office in Washington DC than one who is so easily sold a bill of goods.

To Senator Specter and Senator Collins: I believe as many of my friends and many Americans do, that this bill is not stimulative, that it will deepen the recession into a depression and that it surrepticously brings government into private industry. Please vote NO on this bill.

Ed Bradford

This is my first post and it will be short.

I am looking for the full text of Senate bills S 1 and S 2. I find the "Short Title" and "Sense of Congress" sections on govtrack.us and govit.com, but the contents are missing. Why, if our new government is so transparent, is it so difficult to find the full text of a bill that is being considered in the Senate? Prehaps I don't understand what I am reading when I look on govtrack.us or govit.com.

Ed