A note on party before country,“That was then, this is now” version: Then:Lindsey Graham, who is one of the president’s closest allies, warned that should the Turkish carry out an invasion of Syria,Congress would impose bipartisan sanctionsthat he expects to be “veto-proof,” and he said he has already spoken to Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen about the sanctions. Then: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell issued a statement that said that a “precipitous withdrawal” posed the danger of allowing ISIS to “regroup,” and he argued that a new conflict between Turkey and “our partners in Syria” would risk Turkey’s ties to the U.S. and cause it to be more isolated. Then: Florida Senator Marco Rubio tweeted, “If reports about US retreat in #Syria are accurate, the Trump administration has made a grave mistake that will have implications far beyond Syria.” He noted that it would “confirm #Iran’s view of this administration,” potentially causing an escalation in their attacks and possibly a broader regional war. Then: Maine Senator Susan Collins called it a “terribly unwise decision by the president.” Then: Utah Senator Mitt Romney tweeted that the pullback is a “betrayal” that “says America is an unreliable ally.” The move, he said, “facilitates ISIS resurgence” and “presages another humanitarian disaster.” Then: House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said on “Fox and Friends” that “if you make a commitment, and somebody is fighting with you, America should keep their word.” Then: Fox and Friends Host Brian Kilmeade urged McCarthy, “Call the president before it’s too late.” Then:Trump tweeted: “If Turkey does anything that I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off-limits, I will totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey (I’ve done before!).”
Now: A member of U.S. Special Forces serving alongside the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in Syria told Fox News on Wednesday they were witnessing Turkish atrocities on the frontlines.
“I am ashamed for the first time in my career,” said the distraught soldier, who has been involved in the training of indigenous forces on multiple continents. The hardened service member is among the 1,000 or so U.S. troops who remain in Syria.
“Turkey is not doing what it agreed to. It’s horrible,” the military source on the ground said. “We met every single security agreement. The Kurds met every single agreement [with the Turks]. There was no threat to the Turks — none — from this side of the border.”
Now: Not “totally destroying and obliterating the Economy of Turkey (you’ve done before!).” Now: “Kremlin-controlled state TV hosts throw buckets of mud on #Ukraine, insist it should investigate Biden and conclude that ‘Republican majority in the Senate won’t allow President Donald Trump—whom we elected— to be impeached. It’s impossible,’” Now: Surveys have shown that Trump retains very high levels of support with Republicans: Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, Susan Collins, Mitt Romney, Kevin McCarthy, and Brian Kilmeade.
So, now, about the title question: “Who is the dummy?”
Answer: We all are. He is the President, raking in illegal money and false honors. It is we who put him there. And half of America still believes what he says.
H.L.Mencken: “No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”
Given the challenges that state and local governments are having with unfunded pensions, it’s important that Congress look at similar, even if less severe, issues at the federal level.
Since 2007, the US military has lost over $69 billion. As a result, the military hasn’t contributed to its health fund since 2012, according to its latest financial statement.
In choosing a reform strategy for the pension and retiree health care benefit systems for the US military, Congress should follow best practices for pension solvency, such as prioritizing paying off debt, setting realistic assumed rates of return, and requiring the military to fully make its required contributions.
What??! The US military has lost over $69 billion, its pension plans are insolvent, and it needs to pay off debt??! Can this be true?
No federal agency can be insolvent — not the military, nor Social Security, nor Medicare, nor the postal service.
Nah. Actually, the article was not talking about the US military. It was talking about a different agency of the federal government,the US Postal Service.
Replace the word “military” with the words, “postal service” and you see the actual excerpts. I was making a point.
For reasons that make absolutely no sense today, the USPS is the one federal agency that is treated like a privately-held business: It is expected to pay its own way by extracting money from America’s private sector.
Consider this line from the article: “Given the challenges that state and local governments are having with unfunded pensions, it’s important that Congress look at similar, even if less severe, issues at the federal level.
The federal government financially is nothing at all like state and local governments, but it treats the USPS as though it were.
St. Louis Federal Reserve: “As the sole manufacturer of dollars, whose debt is denominated in dollars, the U.S. government can never become insolvent, i.e.,unable to pay its bills.”
Unlike state and local governments, the federal government is Monetarily Sovereign.
It never unintentionally can run short of its own sovereign currency, the US dollar.
It has the financial power to fund any size pension program, without collecting a penny in taxes.
The USPS is, in true effect, a giant tax-collection machine, whose net income dollars would have the same effect as do federal taxes: They would be recessionary in that they would remove dollars from the private sector.
We say “would” because fortunately, the post office loses money every year, so at least those dollars you spend on stamps and other services are returned to the private sector.
The mounting financial losses are starting to weigh on the Postal Service and draw warnings from government watchdogs.
The Government Accountability Office recently said in a report that the Postal Service will have to make some tough financial decisions in the near future because of the state of its finances.
And yet another GAO report said that health benefits of Postal retirees are currently on an “unsustainable path,” warning that the Retiree Health Benefits fund will be depleted by 2030 if no other payments are made into the fund.
What sort of “tough financial decisions”? Cut payroll? Cut services? Either one punishes the American people and the American economy.
One certainly could make the argument that the postal service is as important to the future of America as is the military.
But for good reason, you seldom hear about military budgets being “unsustainable,” or about the military needing to make a profit or break even.
The USPS is required to deliver mail — including advertising literature — to everyone and everywhere. Like virtually all federal agencies, it loses money, which is exactly what all federal agencies should do.
Why should all federal agencies lose money? Because when a federal agency spends more into the private sector than it receives from the private sector, that economic surplus stimulates economic growth.
No federal agency should make a profit or even try to make a profit. Instead, the sole focus of any federal agency should be on to provide the best possible service to the public, regardless of cost.
The US federal government should fund the best possible postal service, aiming for a system in which all letters are delivered instantly and all packages are delivered the same day, and everything is delivered free. That, not the illusion of monetary self-sufficiency, should be the goal.
The current system is illogical, unproductive and arguably unpatriotic.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of Monetary Sovereignty and The Ten Steps To Prosperity can grow the economy and narrow the Gaps:
Price transparency in health care is a great idea.
Let’s say your house needs a new roof. You solicit three bids, you obtain references, and you choose the cheapest, best-referenced roofer. That’s the way to make expensive purchases.
How do I do this?
Let’s say you need a knee operation. You can do the same: Solicit three bids from doctors, anesthesiologists, hospitals and the hospitals’ pharmacies, and then you obtain references for all of the above.
Finally, you’ll choose the cheapest, best referenced of each. Right?
Not a chance.
Maybe, just maybe, you’ll find reliable and informed (from Aunt Suzie?) references for doctors, and maybe the doctors all will give you estimates of cost, and maybe the doctors won’t tell you, “Cost depends on what we find.”
Even then, will you really manage to receive cost estimates for all the ambulances, nurses, anesthesiologists, hospitals, rehabs, and pharmaceuticals, many of which you can’t anticipate?
The whole process is way too complex, uncertain, and beyond your lay understanding. And anyway, your insurance may pick up 80%, or less, so why even bother?
Overall, it’s an impossible task, but it is exactly the “solution” the rich people think you should follow, and to assist you, they contribute to articles about medical care “price transparency,” when they should be talking about free medical care.
The idea is to make you believe you actually can do something about high medical prices, and if you don’t, it’s all your fault.
Many people are calling for greater price transparency in health care, where patients can clearly see the price of a treatment and determine how much they will pay out-of-pocket before receiving care.
Experts have long agreed that price transparency in the health care industry has a number of positive consequences.
It is an important information-gathering tool for consumers who want to compare prices so they can make more informed decisions about their health care.
Most people in American want greater price transparency and would compare health care prices if given the option, according to Public Agenda.
Oh, sure you would.
If, by some miraculous intervention, you managed to learn what your doctor, hospital, nurses, medicines, etc. will cost, then what?
Are you going to shop around for the cheapest nurses and ambulance service? Will you search out the cheapest anesthesiologist and the bargain-priced hypodermic needle?
When was the last time you did that?
The Healthcare Financial Management Association highlights a number of tools that can be used to increase price transparency, like Member Payment Estimator by Aetna®, as well as crowdsourced platforms like ClearHealthCosts.
Check out the Member Payment Estimator and you’ll be told:
“The Member Payment Estimator lets employees — our members — estimate how much they’ll pay out of pocket for medical tests, office visits and procedures ahead of time. No more surprise bills. Or bills that are higher than expected.
“About 43 percent of households put off care because of costs. Our online tool lets employees compare costs for up to 10 doctors or facilities at once.
“This helps them avoid paying more than they have to.”
Isn’t that exactly what you want? To slog through price comparisons of medical factors you don’t understand and can’t evaluate for quality, so you can judge whether to go to Hospital A which has the cheapest aspirin prices or Hospital B, which offers a half dozen room-rate alternatives?
Even if that labor appeals to you, the deck still is stacked against you:
Many providers and insurance companies have succeeded in keeping health care prices opaque using non-disclosure agreements and restrictive gag clauses in contracts.
Because of this, a majority of states have been unsuccessful in achieving greater price transparency to help consumers make educated choices about their health care.
And, surprisingly, even the insurance companies don’t want medical price transparency.
Insurers and hospitals love secret prices
Steven Pearlstein
The Washington Post
As costs skyrocket, the Department of Health and Human Services is proposing new rules that would require hospitals to publish “their minimum and maximum rates for 300 common services.”
And, given this list, you, being an “expert” in medical procedures, will easily calculate which “common services” will apply to your next procedure, and then you will add up all those costs to make your medical decision. Sure you will.
And you’ll especially be delighted when you learn that the big bucks went to the thousands of “uncommon” services, which just happened to be the ones your procedure involved.
It would also make insurers reveal the prices they’ve negotiated for services and publish them on an interactive website that lets customers compare providers.
Thus, knowing your hospital’s gross profit on 300 common services, you’ll be able to . . . uh, what? . . . . go to the least profitable hospital??
Hospitals and insurers have teamed up to fight this. Hospitals claim that the rule would compel them to stop offering discounts and raise prices. That’s nonsense.
Look at New Hampshire. The state began “listing how much customers of different insurance plans would be charged at different hospitals and labs for medical imaging such as X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs.”
After five years, out-of-pocket costs fell 11 percent while the cost of imaging for insurers went down as well.
That’s nice. The costs your insurer pays would decline. But . . .
And the insurance companies? You might think lower costs would make them happy.
But they don’t actually want to drive down prices; in fact, “both hospitals and insurers profit more when prices and premiums are high.”
The thing the insurers “really care about is whether they are getting a better price than their competitors.” Transparency would expose this con game.
In summary:
The medical community doesn’t want price transparency
The insurance companies don’t want price transparency
And you shouldn’t want price transparency if it is a substitute for free Medicare for all — which is exactly what it would be.
And that is the whole con. You are supposed to believe that price transparency is a good alternative to free health care, which our Monetarily Sovereign government easily could fund.
The insurance companies surely don’t want Medicare for All, because it would put them out of business.
And the rich, who control America, don’t want Medicare for All, because that would narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.
And strangely, even you don’t want Medicare for All because you cruelly have been lied to and told it is “socialism” (It isn’t).
As a result, you prefer to keep your incomplete, expensive health insurance policy and all its deductibles, or do without health care insurance at all.
After all, if it doesn’t cost you anything it’s too good to be true.
You want to pay, pay, pay — unlike the rich and the politicians who get their comprehensive health care free.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of Monetary Sovereignty and The Ten Steps To Prosperity can grow the economy and narrow the Gaps:
A short article in the December 20th edition of THEWEEK magazine shows how Paul Volker accidentally succeeded in curing “nearly a decade of runaway inflation and weak growth.”
The central banker who whipped inflation
Appointed chairman of the Federal Reserve by President Carter in 1979 after nearly a decade of runaway inflation and weak growth, Paul Volcker set out to cure the nation’s malaise through a program of economic “shock therapy.”
Volcker slashed the supply of money flowing into the economy, sending interest rates soaring to just over 20 percent at their peak.
The U.S. tumbled into a deep recession, with unemployment peaking at 10.8 percent. Homebuilders mailed Volcker unused two-by-fours and protesting farmers circled the Federal Reserve building with tractors.
But by 1983, inflation had fallen from 12 percent to below 4 percent, allowing Volcker to take his foot off the brakes.
“I’m not sorry about it,” he said last year. “I don’t know any other course of action that would’ve been politically feasible or economically feasible.”
What Volcker did not understand is that economic growth requires money supply growth so his cut of the money supply caused the recession and did nothing to cure the inflation.
Recessions (vertical bars) are introduced by decreases in federal deficit spending growth (black line) and are cured by increases in deficit spending growth.Raising interest rates (red line) makes money more valuable by increasing the demand for money (This is called “strengthening the dollar.”) By definition, more valuable money is anti-inflationary (blue line).Contrary to popular wisdom, lowered interest rates (orange line) do not increase economic growth (purple line). In fact, the opposite seems to be true. Higher interest rates are economically stimulative because they require the federal government to pump more interest (growth) money into the economy.
Volcker believed the economy was caught in a vicious cycle, with Americans borrowing, spending, and demanding ever higher wages to keep ahead of inflation, which in turn caused prices to rise.
The blue line shows the Consumer Price Index for all Items. The red line shows the Consumer Price Index just for food and energy. Shortages of food and/or energy, not excess money supply, are what cause inflations.
Contrary to popular wisdom, inflations are caused by shortages, usually shortages of food and/or energy, not by excess moneycreation or by the so-called “vicious cycle.”
Volcker worked under the false belief that inflation is the opposite of recession, so to stop inflation one must cause a recession. But the opposite of inflation is deflation.
Commodity prices rise not because of too much demand, but rather because of insufficient supply. Curing an inflation requires curing the shortages of food and/or energy, which generally requires more government spending, not less.
Rather than constricting the money supply, Volker and Congress financially should have helped farmers to grow more and helped oil drillers to drill more. Increasing the food and energy supply would have ended the inflation without causing a recession. Rathers, this approach would have stimulated economic growth.
His success tackling inflation “laid the foundations for governments around the world to give greater independence to their central banks.”
“For a man who understood the mysteries of money more deeply than almost anyone, Volcker had little use for the trappings of wealth,” said The Washington Post.
Unfortunately, the “foundations for governments around the world” are misleading examples, which like austerity, debt reduction, and the euro, demonstrate ignorance of Monetary Sovereignty.
Reappointed Fed chair by President Reagan, he declined a third term amid tensions with the administration over financial deregulation, which he adamantly opposed.
Serving on President Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board in the wake of the 2008 financial crash, “he was highly critical of banks’ risk-taking,” said The Times (U.K.).
The former Fed boss lent his name to the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill’s “Volcker Rule,” which banned taxpayer-protected banks from engaging in speculative trading with their customers’ deposits.
But in a 2018 interview, Volcker said he doubted whether a Washington that had lost public trust and was now stuffed with lobbyists and lawyers would be up to tackling the next crisis. “We’re in a hell of a mess in every direction.”
In this, Volcker was correct. Banks and lobbyists do not operate in the best interests of America. They operate with the profit motive in the best interests of themselves.
That is why all banks should be federally owned, to remove the profit motive and to regain federal control over the money supply. (See Ten Steps to Prosperity, Step #9, below.)
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of Monetary Sovereignty and The Ten Steps To Prosperity can grow the economy and narrow the Gaps:
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 