The Long Road Out

It's hard to see how not taxing all the real estate assets currently owned by religious organizations helps maintain any sort of reasonable separation of church and state.   In fact, it means the government is the most direct funder of church activities.   No wonder you get "one nation under god" whenever political figures gather together--you're looking at a group of investors! So, let's start taxing at least the real estate assets now.   This can be done over a 20 or 30 year period, incrementally.   That will prevent the leaders of these protected organizations from complaining that they'll be "put out of business" by unfair treatment.   In fact, I'll take that argument straight on:   to all you priests and deacons and other puffed-up guys:   if you cant evolve your business model enough to pay for a small portion of the free services you soak up in 30 years, you should be fired. Taxing real estate has the benefit of being local--those fund...

Central Park Conservancy has made subtle indications suggesting their new policy to endorse the use of Central Park by minority children, particularly those with lighter skin.    The policy shift is evident in public communications from CPC, such as the one below near the West 67th St. entrance. CPC Sign Suggesting that Minority Children, as Long as their Skin is Not Too Dark, are Now Welcome in Central Park "Putting up signage indicating that it's acceptable to bring children of color, as we call them, into our Park is now our third highest strategic priority," Claire Schmolly, spokesperson for CPC, told this blog. "Of course, our highest priority will be to buy too many vehicles for Park maintenance," she assured us.  "What a fleet we have now, huh?   And it'll only get bigger, the more unnecessary vehicles we buy. " Scholly confirmed that the ultimate goal of CPC's leading priority is to own so many vehicles that it's impossi...

Not if you're Citibank, Bank of America, RBS, Barclay's, Morgan Stanley, UBS, JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank, Wells Fargo, or Dexia (?).   Or most other banks. These banks need an extra $1,139 billion in free government loans over the last three years to make up for what they lost on their debt obligations. Which leads to the point of this commentary:   I'm not an economist, but how can you theorize that you're stimulating an economy when certificates of deposit are returning zero per cent?  In fact, I received a marketing piece in the mail for a savings account at Citi that is paying 20 basis points and has fees of 25 basis points!   That's a negative return.   Guys.   I'm not being crazy when I say that you'd do better sticking your cash under the mattress. Yet, the zombies who set fiscal policy have determined that the only way to keep our economy moving is a world where savings pay nothing, and commercial debt collects 4% or so--400 basis points o...

So, yesterday the non-partisan committee released their report on executive branch involvement in terror.   It's unequivocal--as one national news source concluded: "It is indisputable that the United States engaged in the practice of torture," the 11-member task force, assembled by the nonpartisan Constitution Project think tank, said in their 577-page report. The scathing critique of methods used under the Republican administration of former President  George W. Bush  also sharpened the focus on the plight of inmates at Guantanamo, which Bush opened and his Democratic successor has failed to close." This report is currently number 7 on Yahoo! news feeds--it hasn't gone much higher--the top four slots now being held by various reported rumors about the Boston Marathon bombings. I'm not saying, but isn't there a pretty long history of violent news-hogging acts occurring within hours of reports that damn the government?   Certainly that's bee...

My high school girlfriend is texting and phoning me pretty much non-stop.  She says she's getting messages from my mom from the beyond...Mom's been dead since 2004 so it seems she's on the AT&T network or something...I'm guessing there are delays. The ex believes that my mom is sending her telegraph messages outlining the concept that my current partner is trying to steal everything I have.   She wants me to hire a private investigator to out my partner before it's too late.   "Take the offensive.   It's your only chance." Tonight I went to a performance of the Gotham Chamber Opera.   Things started poorly--our subway stop was surrounded by 20+ emergency vehicles and trains were stopped because some one was dead on the tracks.   Pushed?   Jumped?   Failed to pay appropriate attention to local conditions? Gotham Chamber Opera has generally been one of the true North Stars in the NY cultural sky (there's a full moon tonight; hence the astr...

So the Academy Awards are done, and the results can be summarized in one word:   Boosterism. Winners included the following pep-talks for America: Best picture for a movie that shows how Alan Arkin outsmarted those violent Iranians! Lots of discussion about a movie that takes as a given America's right to summarily assassinate any one else's political leaders (the discussion about the NYTimes facts on hostage abuse plagarized in 5 0 Shades of Zero Dark 30  are another example of using bright shiny objects to deflect our ADD-burdened intellects from the essential truth: that the goal of all this covert bullshit is murder .  Without rule of law, trial, or anything.   Murder.  Guys!   Pay attention!) The most egregious example of "the Academy loves America" is, of course, Lincoln .   Daniel Day-Lewis is always fun to watch, even when he's sleepwalking, but how could you stay in your Coke-and-butter-stained chair when the movie proposes the c...

It's a powerful draw, those Disney vacations...seems like there's a developmental gene, possessed by every child in the land,  that responds to anything with a mouse with large ears.  Because of this genetic connection, m y experience is the Disney trips are actually fun when you go with kids...the excitement is palpable and even contagious.    Sadly, though, I've ended up at DisneyWorld twice with adult groups and OMG (one trip was with younger friends who like the place, and the other was a private tour with a professional group). As I said, OMG!  The veneer is SOOO thin, and without the childish energy, you see through it everywhere.  The adult-only view, in my experience, is dominated by:   atrocious parenting--starting with corporal punishment and going downhill from there sugar-only calories (who knew that the Israelis and the Turks share a taste for white flour waffles with synthetic whipped cream!  The U.N. should capita...