Didn't Get Their Money's Worth

What is so difficult to understand about the concept of a "loan"? Someone with money will offer you use of that money for a period of time after which you will repay the money along with some small percentage to compensate the loaner for the use of the resource. Borrow, use, pay back. Seems pretty simple, yet apparently the best and brightest of America is graduating from college without being clear on the concept.

Kelsey Griffith graduates on Sunday from Ohio Northern University. To start paying off her $120,000 in student debt, she is already working two restaurant jobs and will soon give up her apartment here to live with her parents. Her mother, who co-signed on the loans, is taking out a life insurance policy on her daughter.

“As an 18-year-old, it sounded like a good fit to me, and the school really sold it,” said Griffith, a marketing major. “I knew a private school would cost a lot of money. But when I graduate, I'm going to owe like $900 a month. No one told me that.”

It seems that Ohio Northern University slipped up if they've got a marketing major graduating that didn't know that  loan of $120k would have a payment of about $900 a month.

College Dreams Turn Into Nightmares

If a college degree has value, then it seems reasonable that the provider of that product is going to have to charge for it. Quality teachers, infrastructure, equipment and even life experience is not going to come inexpensively. If the faculty, materials, and resources are sub-standard then they really won't be worth the effort. The student seeks the best preparation for the future. That means investment and inevitably obligation.

Wanda McGill has stopped opening her student loan bills.

She isn't sure how much debt she has accumulated, though she thinks it's about $100,000. But McGill, a 38-year-old single mother, knows for sure she cannot pay it.

McGill said she dropped out of DeVry University, a for-profit college with a branch in Columbus, two years ago after she ran out of money — even with the loans. She now makes $8.50 an hour working for an employment training center in Florida.

“I was promised the world and was given a garbage dump to clean up,” she wrote in an online complaint at consumeraffairs.com. “Like my life was not already screwed up with welfare and all.”

She is 38 years old and somehow she feels no obligation to the agency which gave her 100 large. She doesn't open the bills because apparently she thinks that if she hasn't seen them she is off the hook. She spent the money and must not have picked up very much in return because she only qualifies for what is apparently a marginally better than minimum wage job. Ironic that it is at an "employment training center"! Who is she capable of training and for what job?

The final quote says it all. Welfare apparently has screwed up her life. I wonder if individual responsibility would have been more effective?

Saturday Morning Rocker

Wadded Panties

The morning fishwrapper had an item about the Joint Forces Staff College at Norfolk. I always pay attention to that sort of thing since I had the good fortune to attend the Air Force equivalent, Air Command & Staff College during my active duty days. These are roughly year long schools classed as professional military education which offer courses preparing rising officers for duty at higher levels of responsibility. The material covered is extensive and the schools take great pride in maintaining quality faculty both permanent and visiting adjuncts. In other words they are very good schools.

Take a look at this piece:

Wired Magazine Outraged at Politically Incorrect Thinking

I recall the first day at the school as well as my attendance at the earlier Squadron Officer School. One of the lectures covered the rules of engagement for your tenure within the Air University. The focus was on the concept of "Academic Freedom." Without such a policy the discussion would inevitably be stifled and thinking would be straight-lined into narrow policy boxes.

The principle was that within the confines of the school it was permissible to voice the otherwise unthinkable. You could postulate the outrageous and mount an argument to defend it. Speakers could be welcomed who spoke against the military or established policy. Debate would be fostered which thrived on questioning the status quo. You could say anything in class without fear of repercussions. Immunity was the order of the day.

Tied to that principle was the Las Vegas axiom. What happens in class stays in class. What is said here is for purpose of debate and learning and not for public consumption. Thinking outside of the box will not get you cashiered.

Given those principles, go back to the Wired article and read the overview and caveats which the instructor used to lead into the discussion.

Is there anything wrong with asking students in a military leadership program to ponder such questions?

Not only is there nothing wrong, it is absolutely necessary! Wired needs to butt out of what they don't understand, the Army needs to "Ranger up" with regard to support of educational freedom, and Lt. Col Dooley should be considered for accelerated promotion.

Publicist Coup

A book is coming out. That means buzz is going to be created. That means a publicist is going to get some great quotes that are going to make the book into mandatory reading.

The book is about the President. The book is not complimentary. The book is titled, "The Amateur." And here is where the title came from:

Clinton Touts Clinton Taunts Bamster

It surprises me to realize that what the guy suggests doesn't sound all that outrageous to me any more. I think I'd almost welcome it...almost.

What Is It and Why?

Put the emotions aside, close the religious textbook, raise no cliches regarding what some of your best friends are, and employ no scatological crudeness. Take a deep breath and now without raising the volume tell me what it means to get married.

When was the first time in your childhood that you became aware of marriage? What was the occasion for the subject arising? Did it have to do with mommy and daddy? Maybe you were going to attend some sort of party where you would see the rest of the family; aunts, uncles, grand-parents, cousins, et. al. What was going to happen? Why did this have any relevance? Was there a fundamental necessity?

I'm willing to bet it was some sort of quasi-religious ceremony. A minister or priest or rabbi was going to go through a ritual and two people were going to pronounce some solemn words and then you were going somewhere for a rubber chicken dinner and to watch Uncle Joe make an ass of himself again. A band played, people danced, there was a cool big cake and a woman in a wildly extravagant white dress.

Why?

It has to do with society and custom. There is a benefit to stable family relationships when children are born. A nurturer and a hunter/gatherer mate and the offspring turns out a lot better when the symbiosis has a chance to work. We ritualize and sanctify so that there are encouragements for the desired stability. We created marriage. It is a social custom.

Realistically marriage is not necessary. We don't need to have a religious ceremony. We don't need to have a cake and party or a white dress and tuxedos. We could simply move in together and if children appear as a natural result we would take care of them responsibly.

In fact, isn't that what occurs in the majority of lives now? There seem to be a lot more children and a lot fewer marriages proportionally.

Then government got involved. Relationships got tangled with employee benefits and HIPPA confidentiality and inheritance and parental rights. We got licenses and blood-tests and tax benefits. Was any of that related to the core definition or rationale for marriage? And don't forget divorce, child custody and community property.

Then we throw in homosexuality. Now the brew gets really toxic. We get confused regarding nature and nurture as causative. We stir in fundamentalist religious beliefs and societal aversions. We add some stereotypical behavior patterns and top it all off with a high mortality disease tightly linked to certain practices.

Are there homosexuals in our society? Absolutely. Do they have a choice in their behavior? Of course, everyone has a choice but celibacy isn't very easy even for heterosexual religious folks. Is there genetic predisposition?  Are homosexuals, by definition, promiscuous? Can committed partners establish long term relationships and avoid the pitfalls of government's overlay on "marriage"? Should two adults be able to share property in the same manner as married couples? Can two men or two women meet the needs of raising well-adjusted children. The questions get very tough very quickly.

So we see the Bamster facing a true conundrum. What is he to do? Is the constituency large enough to balance the other side when he makes a decision? Will position A do more or less election damage than position B? How can he nuance the statements to make everyone believe he agrees with them?

Biden Leads Bamster to Evolutionary Decision--Sort Of

Well, what really is his position? Will it be a policy decision or simply his own slowly determined conviction which he will do nothing about therefore "no harm, no foul"?

Read this quote:

“I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I talked to friends and family and neighbors, when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together; when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that ‘don't ask, don't tell’ is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I've just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.”

Memo to Messiah: Those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors are not out there fighting on your behalf. Get over it. They fight for their nation. They fight to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic (you may squirm while pondering that word). They fight for each other and for their own personal pride. They fight for their families. And inability to commit themselves in a marriage is seldom a leading issue on their minds during the battle.

At least now we know that his position is not derived from reason or law, but from talking to friends. At some point he concludes and his position is for him personally which is apparently not for the nation totally. And it is important for him to go ahead and affirm that he thinks something.

Of course 41 states are currently on record as thinking something entirely different.

Essentials of Ideology

We study the basic ideologies of American politics in my entry-level classes. Students arrive at a college government class ready to do battle as conservatives or liberals, yet they don't really understand the difference. Typically they conflate issues with ideology. Ask them what a conservative is and they will begin listing an agenda of social conservative positions or possibly a generalized tax/budget situation. Probe a liberal and they will pontificate on equality and opportunity and working class oppression and fairness.

Those may be symptomatic but they aren't the essential disease.

I use a list of five or six core principles to describe the ideology. With those principles, you can then usually find a reason for taking the issue positions . But when pressed, it becomes very easy to distill liberal and conservative in American ideology to a single distinction.

How do you solve societal problems? 

If you believe that the core issues facing us today can be best solved by a governmental program, then you are liberal.

If you believe that the way to handle our societal difficulties is individual responsibility for yourself and your actions, then you are a conservative.

Here is a gentleman who finds a slightly different way of saying the same thing:

Earned Success vs Learned Helplessness

Are you willing to work hard, risk failure, dedicate your efforts and then enjoy the results? Then it becomes clear what your ideology is.

Do you believe that all citizens have a right to healthcare, a college education, affordable housing, a comfortable minimum wage? Then guess what? You are on the road to embracing learned helplessness.

Embarrassment

OK, let's admit it was a sick sort of prank. At least that would be the charitable perspective. Certainly nobody ever could take it seriously as a bid to  unseat an incumbent president. Well, let's hope not.

But given that it occurred and in view of the outcome, one must ask serious questions regarding both the election and the state of the American electorate.

Texas Inmate Challenges Bamster and Draws Big Vote

To weigh that event you must first understand what type of primary election is held in West Virginia. The state uses a combination of state convention and semi-open primary election to choose delegates for the national party convention. That means that a portion of the delegates to the national convention are chosen in a state gathering of party activists and supporters and a portion are chosen in a primary election in which a voter declares on election day their preference for party to select nominees for the offices in contention. You don't need to be a registered Democrat or Republican prior to voting. Walk in, ask for the Democratic Party ballot and do your thing.

Open format primaries offer the opportunity for cross-over voting and are subject to some level of mischief, but that potential shouldn't be over-estimated. The core voting constituency in any primary will be reasonably active and reasonably aware voters. The people who take the time to play in the game are going to have some knowledge of the issues and the candidates.

That makes this event ominous for the Messiah.

A candidate for any office from either party operates with a clear understanding that the American electorate is tripartite. There are Dems, Reps and unaffiliated, aka "independent" voters. Depending upon your state those proportions may vary but they can be generalized as thirds of the voting population. To win an election you must carry your party base and attract a significant proportion of the unaffiliated. If you can snag some of the other guy's fans from his party you've got a landslide.

When 40% of the voters in the Democratic presidential primary vote for Inmate 11593-051 against an incumbent you've got a problem. 

I know how unhappy Republicans are with the President's policies. I'm fairly confident that the unaffiliated voters who thronged the historic election of the first half-African-American president are now disenchanted or unengaged. But, how alienated are the Democratic voters?

The Greatest Show On Earth

This would have worked out very well in a federal courtroom in New York City, Mr. Holder. That would have been just the place to deal with such a dignified trial.

Our Ball, Our Court, Our Rules--Get Over It!

I still remember the trial of Adolph Eichman. He sat in a plastic cube for his own protection and he was compelled to listen. He didn't get the choices which this tribe of clowns have been rehearsing for five years to flaunt.

Sit them down. Restrain them. Put earphones on them and give them simultaneous translation. Appoint their attorneys after advising them they have the right to defense and then get on with the business.

Several family members could be heard muttering when the lawyer for Mr. bin Attash, Cheryl Borman — who wore traditional black Muslim garb, covering everything but her face — asked women on the prosecution team to consider dressing more modestly so that the defendants would not have to avoid looking at them “for fear of committing a sin under their faith.” 

So, let me understand this. She doesn't want these sensitive individuals to be apprehensive about committing a sin, but apparently killing three thousand people is fine and dandy if it suits their needs? The sight of a woman in uniform or professional courtroom garb would jeopardize their sensitive souls?

They brought the war to us, we didn't bring it to them. If we were in their home court we would play by their rules which Daniel Pearl demonstrated can be brutal.

Ms. Borman later sought a court order preventing prison guards from forcibly extracting detainees from cells if they did not want to come to the next hearing, 

Ms. Borman probably knows that defendants in felony criminal prosecutions don't get a choice to RSVP for their hearings.

Bring on the clowns.

 

Lucky Julia

Julia would be helpless without government. She would go through life dependent upon her family, her friends, her neighbors and her own dedicated effort to success. But she doesn't need that. She has government and government enables her very life. Somehow the magical actions of a single individual over just three short years have converted the bleak existence of this woman in an oppressive country into a glorious life.

The Life of Julia

Where does this largess come from? How is it paid for? It doesn't matter, does it? It is good and wonderful.

And it will all disappear if we should revert to free enterprise and capitalism. Can we afford to let that happen? Well, maybe "afford" is a bad choice of words.

Frankly, Julia seems a bit pathetic to me. But I'm conservative.

Saturday Morning Rocker

Well, except for the part about it being labeled Allman Brothers Band--it's Derek Trucks:



Why does it sound so reminiscent of Wasted Words?

It's What We Do

Celebrity is what America embraces. The fame of being famous gets you on the cover of People magazine and a decade later in the check-out line display of the Sun and Globe and Inquirer.

If you aren't a Kardashian or Lohan or Hilton you're nobody.

Kathleen Parker Has Dinner With Nobody

I think I'd rather have a beer with Bill than peek down Kim's cleavage. I'm sure I would feel better about my country afterward.

CBS Not Quite Sure

CBS News encounters emotion and isn't quite sure how to deal with it. Sincerity is something that they are apparently unfamiliar with. But, I'll by him a Shiner any time the opportunity might be presented to me.

Team Portrait

"You Hear What I'm Sayin'"

Ohhh yeah. This is real. You couldn't make this stuff up.

Simply Pathetic

Remember Ward Churchill? He was the slimy slug who emerged from the primordial ooze to assert that those who died in the World Trade Center somehow deserved their fate. His credentials? He was a full professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His specialty? Native-American studies. His claim to fame? Self-asserted membership in a pay-to-play tribe thereby qualifying him somehow to be authoritative in native-American issues.

He was hired based on the claim, promoted, tenured and vested all on the basis of what proved to be a very tenuous assertion of ethnicity. As the case unraveled, allegations of poor scholarship and plagiarism further discredited him.

Isolated incident? Apparently not.

How about a professor at Harvard running for the United States Senate? Take a look at this pathetic case:

1/32nd Indian Wanted Friends

Are we really expected to believe that? She is seeking a teaching job at Harvard and she claims Native-American status to link up with people? Hasn't she heard about Facebook? It was invented at Harvard!

So naturally Harvard hires her and with that credential it is just a hop, skip and political jump to run for the Senate. If Ted Kennedy can do it, why not Chief Lizzie Warren?

I honestly never really thought that claiming myself as an ethnic minority on an employment application or faculty registry would get me a lot of friends. I've never scanned those things looking for someone to have a beer with. Maybe it's a new place to search.

What should I be?

Similarities

It suddenly dawned on me how much I am like President Obama. We both went to college. We both lived in Chicago. We both have two published autobiographies.

Apparently mine, however, are actually non-fiction accounts of events which occurred in my life. The Bamster is not encumbered by such requirements and can weave together fantasy creations of events to illustrate critical points he wishes to make in the shaping of his racially charged life.

New York Girl More Than She Seems

Embarrassing when the girl you write about in your best-selling book comes forward to say she wasn't the one. More embarrassing when the girl from New York is actually a girl from Chicago, but the justification is that some girl in some town was white and Obama was black, or at least half-black raised by a white grandmother, and the important thing is to illustrate the residual racism percolating under the surface at all times.

"None of this happened with Genevieve. She remembered going to the theater only once with Barack, and it was not to see a work by a black playwright. When asked about this decades later, during a White House interview, Obama acknowledged that the scene did not happen with Genevieve. “It is an incident that happened,” he said. But not with her. He would not be more specific, but the likelihood is that it happened later, when he lived in Chicago. “That was not her,” he said. “That was an example of compression I was very sensitive in my book not to write about my girlfriends, partly out of respect for them. So that was a consideration. I thought that [the anecdote involving the reaction of a white girlfriend to the angry black play] was a useful theme to make about sort of the interactions that I had in the relationships with white girlfriends. And so, that occupies, what, two paragraphs in the book? My attitude was it would be dishonest for me not to touch on that at all … so that was an example of sort of editorially how do I figure that out?” 

Got that? The anecdote was "useful" and apparently he believes that it would be dishonest to actually tell the truth.

How do you figure it out editorially? Seriously? Name a girl that was there. Place the event in the town it occurred. Actually have gone to see a play by a black playwright. Possibly recount the true reaction of the woman rather than a fantasy to justify your angst.

Does this man have difficulty with ethical behavior? Does he not know the concept of truth?

Weak Message to Follow

I freely admit when I don't understand all that appears before me. I like to believe that helps set me apart from the Neanderthals that inhabit much of this land.

So, here is what I know about this:

Chen Guangcheng is a blind political dissident in China. He objects to thing like mandatory sterilization, forced abortion and the concept of China's child limitation policies. The Chinese government is not as tolerant as we used to be with regard to public expressions of dissent.

The government sentenced dissident Chen and his family to house arrest. Naturally, Chen was somewhat unhappy with the situation, particularly the periodic visitations by government authorities to question, intimidate and rough-up the family with special focus on the women. At some point, security of the house was lax and Mr. Chen was able to, with assistance, escape and in the process injured his leg.

He sought medical assistance and sanctuary at the US Embassy rather than a modern Chinese hospital. He was granted such sanctuary. Now, our Secretary of State has gone to China to discuss our financial arrangements with our new landlord and mortgage holder. As a gesture of understanding and good will, she has negotiated the turn-over of dissident Chen to the Chinese government in return for a sincere promise that they will fund his advanced education, let him live in relative bliss and leave his family unmolested.

Mr. Chen was last heard to inquire, "Where the hell are we going now?"

SecState Turns Asylum-Seeker Over to Shelter Island Staff

No, there is no way of guaranteeing Chen's safety nor his education. No, there is no reinforcement of America's strong support of human rights. No, there is no apparent conflict with throwing Chen under the rickshaw and the staunch support of women's healthcare issues. Maybe the spin will be that Mitt Romney and the Republicans are really agents of the Chinese in waging war on women.

China has demanded an apology! Apparently for our embassy being preferable to living under house arrest for expressing a policy disagreement. How long will it be before the Bamster sends flowers and a sincere groveling note?

Gushing...

The  tingle must still be running up Chris Matthew's damp pant leg.

What happened? Well, the President took the family jet around the world to drop in, coincidentally on the anniversary of the Bin Laden raid which he so courageously approved although we aren't sure Romney would have, and smooze for eleven minutes with the troops. He got a photo-op with our staunch and phenomenally corrupt and ungrateful ally, Hamid Karzai. And along the way he promised that he would leave a contingent of American warriors on the ground with bulls-eyes on their back for another TWELVE years!

The Commanderly Thing

Chris likens it to Henry V. You remember Henry's speech before Agincourt don't you?



Somehow I see a lot of conflict between Henry's speech and Obama's behavior.

"We few, we happy few..."

Getting In the Spirit

How stupid must you be in corporate America to succeed? Can no one make a reasonable decision given a set of emotional and incontrovertible facts? Is the economic stature of Spirit Airlines so tenuous that refunding a cheap seat ticket cost to a dying veteran will break them? How is that going to balance against the cost of responding to the back lash?

Veterans Seem Upset Apparently

I wonder what they were thinking. And, I wonder if the person who made that first fateful bad decision is going to be joining the ranks of unemployed folks soon. For that matter, I'd wonder how long it will take for Spirit employees to express dissatisfaction with their corporate position.

Nostalgia