Dispatches from the Flying M

Tea Party Math

I was never that great at math, but apparently compared to your average Tea Party enthusiast, I'm a mathematical genius.

They held a "rally" (if you can call it that when only 100 people show up, and are outnumbered by the press covering the event) today in Washington to push House Republicans to refuse to compromise and to hold out for at least a $61 billion cut in the 2011 budget. The first clue that they don't get math is in that refusal to compromise, since Republicans control only one house of Congress and not the White House--when Democrats hold the Senate and the presidency, you don't get to not compromise and still get a bill. That's simple math.

The bigger problem is that while government spending might be a small problem, and the deficit is something to be concerned about, virtually every reputable economist agrees that compared to jobs, it's a minor problem. The real problem facing us right now is that the recovery is happening, but it's still shaky. Cutting government spending now is the worst thing that could be done (well, possibly second worst--a government shutdown could not only squash any public confidence, but when Social Security checks and tax refunds and paychecks and government projects stop flowing, it'll stop the recovery cold and potentially hurl us right back into recession).

Corporations are making record profits, and they're not hiring. Since they're not hiring, someone's got to spend money to keep small businesses flush so they can hire. That's got to be government. Jobs have been coming back, but they're still hard to get and they're not paying as well as the ones that went away. Without a healthy economy, the deficit will get worse. With a healthy economy, the deficit will get better.  Pretty simple math, there, folks. Full employment means plenty of people paying plenty of taxes, and the deficit shrinks.

Of course, the Tea Partiers are angry at government, but if they're angry because their paychecks don't go as far as they once did, that anger is misplaced. They should be looking at conservative policies that have been pursued for the last 30 years, designed to shift wealth away from the middle class and the poor, to the very rich. Those 400 families that control more wealth than 80% of Americans are doing fine. The rest of us, not so much. It's true, TP, you don't have as much money in your pockets. But it's not because you're overtaxed. It's because the wealthy and the corporations have made sure wages stay stagnant or shrink so they can pocket more. To make sure this doesn't turn around, they're now going after public employee unions. Does anyone believe private sector unions won't be next? And if you can't organize and you can't strike, what gives any worker any control over his or her own future?

There's plenty to be concerned, even angry about. But if the Tea Partiers want to have a serious conversation about the country's direction, they need to go back to school and learn their arithmetic.

The Pragmatic Warrior

President Obama gave a clearly articulated explanation/defense of his Libya policy tonight, and in the process might have articulated what will come to be known as the Obama Doctrine. Essentially, it comes down to this: we will intercede militarily wherever we have the capability to make a difference, a coalition of willing allies, and a pressing national security or humanitarian interest. We will not go it alone except when and if there is no other choice. It's quite a reversal from the Bush approach, a point he made clear:

"If we tried to overthrow Gaddafi by force, our coalition would splinter. We would likely have to put U.S. troops on the ground, or risk killing many civilians from the air. The dangers faced by our men and women in uniform would be far greater. So would the costs, and our share of the responsibility for what comes next.

"To be blunt, we went down that road in Iraq. Thanks to the extraordinary sacrifices of our troops and the determination of our diplomats, we are hopeful about Iraq's future. But regime change there took eight years, thousands of American and Iraqi lives, and nearly a trillion dollars. That is not something we can afford to repeat in Libya."

He reiterated the basic points on a few different occasions. We do have strategic interests in the region, and a more specific interest in helping Egypt and Tunisia through these first fragile days of their new nations. Left unstated, but clear, was that we have an interest in supporting any group of people who might be able to force Gaddafi from office. He pointed out that it took us more than a year to build a coalition with the ability and willingness to intercede in Bosnia, but it took him 21 days on Libya. He used a lot of diplomatic muscle (and, no doubt, Hilllary Clinton's exceptional Rolodex) to pull this coalition together. He pointed out that he took action only after consultation with the Congressional leadership of both parties (and a unanimous Senate resolution supporting a no-fly zone).

Toward the end, he said, "But let us also remember that for generations, we have done the hard work of protecting our own people, as well as millions around the globe. We have done so because we know that our own future is safer and brighter if more of mankind can live with the bright light of freedom and dignity."

That's hard to argue with. I had my doubts about this effort from the start, and I still have some. But we seem to have done what he said we would do--kept costs relatively low (in treasure and in blood), handed off leadership to NATO, and shared the effort with our allies. Something else he didn't point out, but that I think is significant, is that when you build a coalition, not only do you share the costs and the burdens, but you also give your coalition partners a stake in the outcome and the continuing effort. It won't just be us trying to rebuild Libya, if that's the end game. This is, as noted above, a significant departure from the past--and one I heartily support.

Mildred Pierce

HBO continues its domination of dramatic television--and with it, domination of filmed storytelling, since the big screen (with a few notable exceptions) is so full of nonsense like Sucker Punch and the 4th installments of various franchises--with tonight's Mildred Pierce. Here's Stephen King, no slouch of a storyteller himself, writing about the miniseries.

And Kate Winslet, doing TV? See above.

I'm looking forward to it.

Shame on You, Mr. Johnson

Today, the one-year anniversary of the Affordable Care Act, the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by Senator Ron Johnson (R WI) in which Johnson uses the serious, potentially fatal condition of his daughter Carey as an excuse to flat-out lie about the provisions contained in that act. That's right--he twists the facts of his own daughter's health care to make an ideological point.

 

Johnson writes: "I don't even want to think what might have happened if she had been born at a time and place where government defined the limits for most insurance policies and set precedents on what would be covered. Would the life-saving procedures that saved her have been deemed cost-effective by policy makers deciding where to spend increasingly scarce tax dollars?"

Where to begin on this blatantly false tale?

 

How about the fact that the act doesn't call for government to define limits for insurance policies?  It does require that government do some research to find out what medical techniques are most effective, so that they can be employed more often than less effective ones, saving everyone money.

 

How about the fact that under the previous system, there were no checks at all on insurance companies denying treatment whenever they wanted, regardless of the inclination of doctors and patients? The Affordable Care Act takes power back from the insurance companies and gives it to the medical professionals and the people seeking treatment--it does not set up a board of government bureaucrats who examine every doctor's course of treatment.

 

How about the fact that for many people, an insurance company might not have covered his daughter at all? Under the Affordable Care Act, children can't be denied coverage because of preexisting conditions. Formerly, they could be. And though Johnson doesn't say how old Carey is now, under the act he can keep her on his insurance until she's 26.

 

Later in his incredibly dishonest piece of work, Johnson uses the "r" word: ration. That's exactly what insurance companies have done forever. Their business model is such that they make the most profits by taking in high premiums and denying coverage whenever possible. They've been rationing care all along. The most effective prescription for my high cholesterol, prescribed for me by more than one doctor, has been denied by insurance companies more often than not. Almost everyone who has any kind of ongoing or serious condition has similar stories.

 

The Affordable Care Act isn't perfect, but it's a step in the direction of putting health care decisions back in our hands, and taking that power away from the people who see us and our doctors only as dollars and cents on a ledger sheet.

 

For Mr. Johnson to misuse his daughter's condition in this way is utterly shameful. Sometimes one has to wonder how people like him can look in the mirror.

San Diego Noir

Our contributor copies of San Diego Noir showed up today. Order yours from Mysterious Galaxy and you can have yours signed by many contributors in mid-May!

 

CSI: The Burning Season

My next novel release for 2011 will be CSI: The Burning Season, which goes on sale in late June.

Here's the synopsis, and the really cool cover!

It’s a hot, early autumn evening in the small resort town of Mount Charleston, NV, where six firefighters are battling a massive blaze that threatens expensive homes . . . a blaze that will cost them their lives. Initially, the police determine that the fire was human-started, and the state wants to prosecute to the fullest extent of the law with six counts of homicide. Now the team of Sin City’s finest criminologists, led by Catherine Willows, are assigned to work a crime scene far from the glittering lights and 24/7 spectacle of the Las Vegas Strip, and soon find much more than they bargained for. . . . Meanwhile, Ray Langston and Nick Stokes are called to a crime scene where a dog has taken a key piece of evidence—a severed human hand—under a suburban home’s crawl space. What’s even more disturbing is that it’s not the first severed hand that’s turned up lately—there have been four other incidents around Las Vegas over the past twelve months. . . .

Dark Vengeance

In 2004, after writing many comic books, a few tie-in novels, and one original horror novel (The Slab), I wrote, and sold, a four-book teen horror/dark fantasy series called Witch Season. Simon & Schuster put it out in four individual mass market books. After sales slacked off, they sold the set to Barnes & Noble, which put them out in two oversized volumes as B&N exclusives. After a while, they pulled the books from B&N and sold them to Borders, which put them out in the same configuration, but never got around to releasing the second volume--so if you read the first one, you were stuck wondering what ever happened to Kerry and her friends. All the books were released as e-books last spring, so that was one solution for people trapped in the middle.

But Simon & Schuster believes in these books, obviously, since they've never been out of print and the first volume has sold a bunch of copies by this point.

So now they're doing something else very cool--they've repackaged the books, and allowed me to do some rewriting/updating (much has changed for teens between 2004 and 2011), and they're rereleasing them. The first volume comes out this October, the second shortly thereafter. New title, new cover, new promotional campaign, new life. If you've read 'em before... you haven't read 'em like this. If you haven't read 'em, or you know someone who hasn't... well, it's about time!

So farewell, Witch Season, hello Dark Vengeance!

If you're on Facebook, please drop by the book's page on the S&S website and "Recommend" it. The more attention it gets, the better S&S will like it. As will my family, the dogs, and everyone else I know. In fact, it just might make the world a happier, more peaceful place. Give it a try.

PS--there'll be more great Dark Vengeance news soon! Stay tuned!

Ranching Hazards No One Warns You About

Birds like to peck through irrigation tubing, in search of water. This leaves holes that can often (until the tube is riddled with them) be fixed with aptly named "goof plugs." I went out a little while ago, in strong winds, to plug some recent holes. Because of the wind, I didn't wear a hat.

Trouble was, these holes were under some pine trees. When I got back inside, because I had been so windblown, I washed my hands and then tried to run a brush through my hair, to no avail. I had somehow got a clump of pine sap (or resin) in my hair, and it was quickly hardening there.

I turned to the interwebs, where I found various pieces of advice. One common one was to apply oily peanut butter, and soften it with a hair dryer. Not owning a hair dryer, that was out, and the whole peanut butter thing sounded a little gooey. A more appealing option was olive oil. I took off my shirt, put a little olive oil on my fingers, and rubbed it on the spot, then combed it out. The sap was entirely gone. A quick afternoon shower did the same for the olive oil (I hope--my hair is not yet dry as I type this). But if it smells like olive oil for a day or two... well, could be worse. Toss in some garlic and rosemary and I'll be ready for a meal!

Another bit of advice offered was to treat the sap quickly, before it hardens fully. So if you get sap in your hair, don't go looking up advice--just remember nature's miracle substance, olive oil, and you're all set.

Obama's War

It's often difficult to pinpoint exact moments in a person's life that send that person into a different direction--the turning points that, taken together, inscribe the arc of the lifetime. Yet that is what historians and biographers must try to do all the time.

When I was researching Barack Obama: The Comic Book Biography, I reached the conclusion that one of Obama's most significant moments came on Oct. 2, 2002, when as a young IL state senator, he gave a speech opposing the by-then inevitable war on Iraq. In that speech, he called the war what it was--"a cynical attempt" by neocons in the Bush administration to "shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in loves lost and in hardships borne." He went on to say, "I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars."

In fact, he supported the war in Afghanistan as it was waged immediately after 9/11, and like many others, believed that had America not deflected its attention to a war of choice in Iraq, that conflict might have reached a quicker and more satisfactory end.

Bush didn't bring either war to an end, so Obama inherited both. Now, though, Obama has a new war, and it's all his.

There are no good answers to the Libya problem. Gaddafi, under any spelling, is a disease who should have been treated with a metaphoric dose of penicillin a long time ago. He's fomented and supported terror, enriched himself, his family and friends at the cost of the Libyan people, and generally been an opponent of any real Middle Eastern progress.  Now, in the wake of successful popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, the people of Libya are trying to rise up against him. But in some parts of the country, Gaddafi is beloved, and the rebellion shows signs of turning into a difficult, protracted civil war. If Gaddafi successfully puts it down, his hold over Libya will be even firmer, and will probably pass into the hands of family members when and if he ever leaves office. Being forced out by his own people would probably be the best possible result.

But that "probably" is awkward, because we don't really know who is in the rebel faction and who still supports Gaddafi. Indications seem to be that regular Libyan people--not foreign agitators or al Qaeda members--are prominent on both sides.

One part of Obama's statement has already come true. The military assault on behalf of Libya's rebels is truly an international coalition that includes Arab states. This is crucial. But I'm not sure it's enough.

We have a shaky economic recovery under way here at home. Would that recovery be healthier if we weren't throwing billions at the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq? What will this Libyan assault cost us, purely in terms of dollars? Is it worth it? Is it worth the life of a single American (much less anyone else in the coalition)? No, we don't want to see Gaddafi slaughter his own people. But other countries (Bahrain, for instance) are engaged in that activity, albeit on a smaller scale. Do we intercede there, too? Is there some sort of specific body count we have to see before we step in?

I'm generally opposed to assasination as a political tool, but if some Libyan got a clear shot at Gaddafi, I wouldn't mourn his loss. We can't do it, though. I'm not sure stepping into someone else's civil war makes sense under any circumstance, and I'm not sure getting involved in conflict in yet another Arab country is really in our own long-term interests.

Then again, I'm not sure it's not. I'm raising questions, not offering answers. I don't have those. I'm glad I'm not the president, and I'm glad the president is a smart guy with smart advisors.

Because he's got his own war to contend with now, in addition to the two he inherited. I'm guessing he's not getting a lot of sleep these days.

Look! Up in the Sky! It's a Bird! It's a Plane! It's Supermoon!

That's right, tonight is Supermoon--the closest the full moon has been to Earth since 1993, and it won't be as close again until 2016. There are some articles about it here and here. And should you want to photograph it, some tips here.

Edited March 20 to include the one shot of Supermoon that I liked, seen through a soaptree yucca: