I have three stuffed animals at home that I hide when I expect visitors. (Guys don’t do stuffed animals.) But my fuzzy critters serve a purpose. Four years ago, I destroyed my living room TV set by throwing a beer bottle at it in anger and frustration. I had been watching Lou Dobbs.

So, for years, I have been throwing stuffed animals at Lou instead of beer bottles. But now I need throw them no more. Lou no longer haunts my 7 p.m. viewing. He quit his CNN program in a multi-syllabic huff this week. CNN’s venerable, respected chief national political correspondent, John King, will take over in January. I’m sure I won’t have to throw stuffed animals at Mr. King.

But I once considered Lou venerable and respected. He’s a Harvard grad, y’know, a self-touted intellectual giant in matters of finance and economics. That’s why I began watching him years ago. I learned from him things I did not know. But for the past few years, Lou has only taught me the face of intellectual arrogance, bigotry, and unexceptional reporting masquerading as “advocacy.”
Full Story »

Yesterday over at Future Majority, Kevin Bondelli responded to Jack Hough’s New York Post column “Don’t Get That College Degree!” Bondelli’s take led with one of the more terrifying titles I’ve seen lately: “Has College Become a Bad Investment?” Yow. When you dig the hole so deep that you can even use that kind of question as a rhetorical device, you kthisnow you’re in some deep, deep kim-chee. Seriously. That one ranks right up there with “Is breathing really a good idea?” and “What are the lasting benefits of a howitzer shot to the balls?”

Snark aside, Bondelli does a nice job of addressing Hough, who “argues that the increase in lifetime wages for graduates no longer makes up for the financial burden of university education and the ensuing student loan burden.” He also takes on one of the GOP’s most successful and devastating canards, explaining that Full Story »

“A TOP TEN LIST? Really? Are you fucking kidding me, Cargo? You do not appear to have the qualifications to make such a list, what with your lack of tooth gaps and, well, jeez. I mean, you? A Top Ten list? Gawd. You must be out of mate–OW!”

No.

As the American Dream™ continues to gnaw on every last bit of exposed flesh it can pick from our flailing limbs, it will no doubt, for many of us, also eat those debt-strangled, rapidly depreciating havens of dirty secrets, personal failure and indoor allergens known as parcels of real estate.

It will eventually, after a judicial process, a waiting period and probably more judicial processes, send a henchman or three to, at long last, relieve you of the burdens of homeownership and shelter.

But, come on. People in any line of work are nonetheless good, hard-working people too! They know just as well as anybody that remembers what it’s like to be employed in recent memory that work sucks and is hard, and comic relief can get us through even the toughest of times.

Accordingly, when the Evicto Man comes to summon you to your shiny new life as a spent munition in America’s War on Prosperity, here are the:

TOP TEN ADVISORIES FOR YOUR FRIENDLY FORECLOSURE EVICTION REPRESENTATIVE!

Full Story »

Gerg wasn’t a monster, they insisted.

He was big. He was temperamental. He was covered in green fur and didn’t wear pants. He was ever demanding. His face changed color, shape and expression depending on who was looking at him. Everybody loved Gerg, and Gerg loved everybody, but not in that genuine, heartfelt way — more like a golddigger cherishes her trophy husband, or a cheerleader loves the ugly friend she keeps around to look better in front of guys. But the support was strong, the words as heartfelt as they could sound, and the dubious sincerity of it all was easily drowned out with more wide smiles and more pairs of outstretched arms.

Gerg was, indeed, the town’s beloved mascot. On top of it all, he was always hungry. Full Story »

A couple of weeks ago author and NYU media theory lecturer Douglas Rushkoff penned a provocative essay for Arthur Magazine. Entitled “Let It Die,” the essay explains why we should stop trying to save the economy.

In a perfect world, the stock market would decline another 70 or 80 percent along with the shuttering of about that fraction of our nation’s banks. Yes, unemployment would rise as hundreds of thousands of formerly well-paid brokers and bankers lost their jobs; but at least they would no longer be extracting wealth at our expense. They would need to be fed, but that would be a lot cheaper than keeping them in the luxurious conditions they’re enjoying now. Even Bernie Madoff costs us less in jail than he does on Park Avenue.

Alas, I’m not being sarcastic. Full Story »

You’ve likely, at some point in your life, been in the company of someone who says something akin to, “I don’t give money to panhandlers. They’re just going to spend it on drugs and/or booze.” “They do this for a living. That man probably just bungs it in a savings account at the end of the day.” “They’re bums. They failed at life. They don’t deserve my hard-earned money.”

Or, maybe, this person is you.

I grew up listening to countless versions of the ideology of “Son, we don’t reward failure.”

You have to hold your own. You have to work hard and carry your weight. You have to straighten up and fly right. You have to contribute something to get something back.

You don’t want to live in some welfare state where people get rewarded for being bums.

Well, guess what: We’ve got it.
Full Story »

I know a man, a man of a conservative bent, who gets downright irate anytime you use some variation or another of “tax cuts for the rich” in conversation. He can’t be taking it personally, I don’t suppose, since he isn’t rich and, as far as I can tell, he has no prospects for getting that way unless he happens to trip over a winning PowerBall ticket. So I guess you’d say he’s like Joe the Plumber and many millions more Americans who have very little, but want to make damned sure that they look after the interests of those who have everything.

People like this man are the reason I always giggle when I encounter political and economic theories that hinge on things like “rationality” and “informed self-interest.” Full Story »

After a short walk from the light rail I was greeted by an empty P.O. box. A couple blocks north, I was greeted by a copy of the Post/News Duopoly’s jobs page, dated October 2008. “‘The fuck is this?!” I asked myself audibly as I flung the page onto the ground and kept on. At the 7-11 on 3rd/Broadway I bought a Lotto quick pick and a Powerball reject that was laying on the machine. After an uneventful lunch a couple blocks from there, I made the decision to cross the following intersection, one of the most dangerous I’ve encountered in Denver:

Full Story »

Income distribution is a divisive subject. Fairness, more so. The standard way of evaluating income distribution is the GINI Coefficient, an extremely complex equation that produces a number between 0 and 1. With GINI = 1, one person in an economy gets all the money, and everyone else has nothing. At GINI = 0, everyone is absolutely identical.

There are no nations at either end.

The current approach to ensuring some degree of fairness is to use the tax system. And, here presented, are various systems of taxation as well as the impacts of targeted changes to tax systems. It does involve some maths, but it is presented as simple tables. Like this one…

Figure 1: Equal Taxation Full Story »

Mountaintop removal coal mining at Kayford Mountain, Boone County,
W. Va. Photo: Vivian Stockman, courtesy of SouthWings Air

Part II: Almost Heaven Level: The Mechanics of Moving Mountains

In the heart of Appalachia, knobs, gaps and hollers define the undulating green landscape. Life is old, travel is slow, and it’s a daunting job to get a bus full of journalists up the steep, rutted dirt road through Cabin Creek Hollow to Larry Gibson’s cabin on Kayford Mountain. But no photos or descriptions of the devastation we are about to witness can do justice to a close-up look at a mountaintop removal mining operation. That is why we are here. That is what Larry wants to provide for reporters on this Society of Environmental Journalists field trip to the coalfields of southern West Virginia in October 2008, in hopes that we will be a conduit for the story he spends his life telling. Full Story »

Vice-presidential candidate Senator Joe Biden (D-Delaware) ran into a buzzsaw of an interview from Barbara West of WFTV-TV, Channel 9, in Orlando, Fla on October 23.  West is the wife of Wade West, a GOP political and media consultant, and her bias was evident as she made more than one statement of opinion, as though it were fact, then proceeded to ask a question related to that opinion/faux fact.  The exchange making the rounds most often in the blogosphere is this one:

West:  “You may recognize this famous quote:  ‘From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.’  That’s from Karl Marx.  How is Senator Obama not being a Marxist if he intends to spread the wealth around.”

Biden:  “Are you joking?  Is … is this a joke?”

West:  “No.”

Biden:  “Is that a real question?”

West:  “That’s a real question.” Full Story »

Back from Bamyan; the sewing program; village dominance

by Connor O’Steen

I have now been on the road between Kabul and Bamyan for a total of 32 hours, and it’s safe to say that that’s 32 hours too many for my taste. The road is roughly the quality of a rural mountain road in the United States, but the fact that it feels endless makes it much worse. Going to Bamyan, you cross a number of mountain ranges with valleys nestled between, and beyond each steep ridge I hold out the hope that the next section will be smoother. This, of course, just makes it more frustrating when the sections get progressively rougher, and I have to tighten my white-knuckled grip on the car’s overhead handles. The up and down turbulence is unsurprising, it’s the occasional side to side rocking that’s hard to stomach. This last ride back to Kabul was made worse by the presence of a dog and her eight puppies in our trunk. Just like in Kabul, we take in dogs in our regional offices, and through gross oversight one of them was left unspayed. She also acquired the skill of escaping the compound. 2+2= eight puppies to take care of. Full Story »

Externalities is a term I first heard in my undergraduate economics classes nearly 20 years ago, and its used to describe the parts of a system that are ignored by the users of that system. In the context of electricity generation, the water required for the boilers and for cooling were once considered an externality until water shortages illustrated to utilities that water mattered. Similarly, we’re seeing that the externalities of air pollution in the form of acid rain and now carbon emissions are being pulled into the economic model. We’re increasingly finding that there are no longer any externalities left, that water and land and even air matter and must be included in any complete accounting of the impacts of the our decisions. In many ways, the elimination of all externalities was a key component to Monday night’s Green Constitutional Congress, and panelists Jonathan Greenblatt and Majora Carter all touched on externalities affected the world. Full Story »

Having visions with Mohammed

by Connor O’Steen

We met with the village elder of Yatimak, the nominal leader of a small cluster of houses on the far side of Jawzareen valley. We stood on a dusty path and were greeted by an old man who, for reasons I didn’t entirely grasp, we weren’t allowed to shake hands with. After describing our proposal of helping to create and fund a school for children in their village, we were led to the elder’s son. Idris is a middle aged man, immaculately friendly and with a heavily tanned and lined face. He speaks reasonably good English because, 20 years earlier, he had been a guard at Bamyan University and he took a free night class offered by an American teacher. Come to think of it, considering that he had probably not spoken English since that time, his language skills are tremendous. We sat on his roof in the morning sun, drinking green tea and going over life in the village. “My villagers are a very poor people,” he told us, “but with a little help we could be very prosperous.” Full Story »

Dear John,

I suppose I should really address this to your campaign managers, since you don’t know how to use a computer to read this.  But maybe they’ll print it up and hand it to you.

Anyway, John, your campaign is starting to smell like a beached sturgeon.  The whole thing with Paris Hilton and the other bimbo?  Lame, lame, lame.  I want you to win, man, but you seem to be trying your best to blow it.  Trying to link Obama to some dumb blonde chicks is not gonna get you to the White House, OK?  If you want to get there, you’re going to have to explain yourself and your positions to the  American public.

Take affirmative action, for example.  Full Story »

Replying to questions, why the Marshall Plan doesn’t work, and local democracy in Jawzareen

by Connor O’Steen

First off I’d like to thank you all for your thoughtful and encouraging comments on my previous installments. The first four were published while I was in Bamyan, so I haven’t had a chance to see them or the feedback until now. I admit that I had some initial worries about publishing on a blog: it’s an intimidating idea to publish copy that will subsequently be dragged across the Internet, perhaps to be eviscerated by packs of battle-hardened commentators. I think it reflects well on Scholars and Rogues that trolling is notably muted, here, and it’s convinced me that writing these letters is absolutely worthwhile. Full Story »

Afghanistan, Ghowr Province: an opium village

[Ed. note: Connor O'Steen writes of going to an opium village in Afghanistan's Ghowr province to do the necessary research to admit Nasim to the orphanage in Chaghcharan.]

First the roads. They were dirt the entire way and I was expecting this, but I had also figured that they would have been purposefully made, smoothed over even to facilitate the transfer of people from point A to point B. Silly me. The roads were the natural result of cars following the same path over and over. We drove in the ruts that had been imprinted by heavier trucks and, from time to time, our car’s tires scraped against the sides of the ruts, bouncing us from side to side. At first I imagined it was like being on a particularly cloying rollercoaster. Then I imagined it was like being inside a pinata. Then I stopped imagining things. Full Story »

Nasim’s story:  making and unmaking terrorists

by Connor O’Steen

It turns out the road between [location excised] and [location excised] is currently held by the Taliban, so until NATO clears things up I’ll be here. Seeing how that’s the case, and I now have some extra time on my hands, I might as well tell you some more about what I’ve seen.

Nasim showed up on our doorstep early in the morning, and when asked what he needed, said that he had been told by some of the other children of Chaghcharan that we ran an orphanage. His face was bruised and slightly purplish, both of his eyes were swollen and there were dark rings underneath.

Full Story »

Editor’s note:  Our guest, Connor O’Steen, is a special correspondent to Scholars & Rogues.  He’s currently in Afghanistan working for PARSA, a non-governmental organization (NGO) specializing in microeconomic development with an emphasis on women and children. He is often in rural areas far from Kabul where most other journalists cannot, or will not, go.  You are unlikely to find his insights in the mainstream media. Often, he has no access to the Internet, so excerpts will be sporadic, at best.  His correspondence to us is edited for context and to remove information that might put him or his coworkers in danger.

Dogs, generals, and orphans

by Connor O’Steen

One of the things we have no shortage of in Kabul is dogs. Marnie Gustavson, the executive director of PARSA and the person who’s been nice enough to put me up in Afghanistan, currently has seven dogs living under her roof.  It wasn’t exactly that she wanted this many; it was just how it turned out, really. Full Story »

Our economy has demonstrated remarkable resilience.

— President Bush at a press conference; July 16.

We’re spending like a drunken sailor.

— Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., predicting the federal budget deficit would double this year; according to Manu Raju of The Hill newspaper, the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that, for the first nine months of fiscal 2008, the government ran up a $268 billion deficit, $148 billion more the same period last year; July 17.
Full Story »