Taxes too high? Mexicans got your job? Worried about the kid who's in Iraq with no body armor? Having to choose between that 2-inch steak and your next fill-up? Wish you'd bought a hybrid instead of that SUV? Can't afford a vacation, health insurance or a new car? Wise-ass liberals making fun of you?

At last, there is something you can do to make things better!

Ban gay marriage!!!!

That'll make everything right again.

More on numbers--sort of

The other day I watched a classic little 1977 video by Charles and Ray Eames. They focused an imaginary camera on a couple lying on the beach in Chicago and moved outward by a power of 10 every 10 seconds, so that the couple, the city, the Great Lakes, the earth, the solar system and the galaxy eventually grew smaller and disappeared. Then the camera reversed direction and went closer, until it reached into a proton inside the man's hand. (Then, of course, I had to watch the Simpsons parody of the same video.)

It seems that most of us, analysts or not, tend to focus on a problem at a particular power of 10 and never get closer or farther away. Lately I've been trying to expand my view by an order of magnitude or so to look at the meta-problem.

For instance, take the massacre in Haditha. Soldiers lost it and indiscriminately killed a bunch of Iraqi men, women, children, old folks in wheelchairs. Clearly a war crime, according to some analysts, and should be punished. Other analysts say, yeah, but it's sort of understandable. One of the soldiers had just been killed by a bomb, and undoubtedly one or another of those civilians had seen the bomb being planted. When you're fighting a guerrilla war, it's so hard to tell who's trying to kill you and who just wants to be left alone. The soldiers are under so much stress, and so forth. Maybe we need more soldiers, better armor, better generals, better Iraqis....

Let's look at the larger picture. Isn't there a problem with a situation in which soldiers are trained to treat a visible enemy one way and the rest of the people another way? War isn't like that anymore. Maybe we should analyze the limitations of war, the tradeoffs necessary when we choose a military solution to a conflict. Looking at the historical fallout from war, do we, on average, gain more than we lose? (And who do is included in that "we"--our country, our family, our ideology, the innocent victims of the war, our world?)

On the home front, what does it do to our society when we train a bunch of our young people to "kill, kill, kill!" as they learn in boot camp? What does it do to those young people? What about the ones who come home from war and can't get the horror of it out of their minds? It's a prescription for insanity when we spend years instilling values in our children--don't solve problems by hitting each other; it's wrong to kill--and then later on train them to do just the opposite of what they've learned from their mothers and teachers since early childhood.

Is there any way to conduct a war such that soldiers are trained killing machines in one set of circumstances and humanitarians in another, often indistinguishable, scenario? Personally, I find it hard to imagine. It's just asking too much of a human being.

(If you're just interested in the science and could care less about the politics, go here.)

Truthdig - The Many Faces of Abu Musab al Zarqawi

Truthdig - The Many Faces of Abu Musab al Zarqawi: "http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/20060609_abu_musab_al_zarqawi/"

Zarqawi’s death was the greatest advertisement for his cause. He had already succeeded in provoking the civil war, the final spark being the Feb. 22 bombing of the Shia Askari Shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad. Zarqawi sought martyrdom and direct entry to paradise by fighting the infidels in Iraq. And in the eyes of his supporters, he succeeded --proving to aspiring jihadis around the world that Iraq is the place to go to if you want to enter paradise as a martyr slain by the infidels.

......

More will come to replace Zarqawi and avenge his death. Iraq’s Shias will be blamed for Zarqawi’s death, and Shias in the region --perhaps even in Saudi Arabia, or in Lebanon, where sectarian tensions are rising—will find themselves targets of violence. Expect a new group, calling itself the Zarqawi Brigades (or battalions, or army), to claim responsibility for some major attacks on Shia targets.

Far from putting an end to the Iraqi insurgency, Zarqawi’s death will most likely prolong it.

More on Zarqawi and why he was at large for so long:

Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind - Nightly News with Brian Williams - MSNBC.com

Bush turned down chances to kill Zarqawi: ex-CIA spy. 01/05/2006. ABC News Online

On pennies and pounds: fun with numbers

Numbers are so confusing. Who can imagine a number of actual things, say, pencils or dollars, beyond a few thousand? Take millions, for instance. Or billions. It's hard to get a grasp on these huge numbers, and to add to the confusion they both sound kinda the same.

But they aren't, of course. As we all learned in school,

1 million = 1,000 x 1,000.
1 billion = 1,000 x 1 million, or to put it another way,
1 billion = 1,000 x 1,000 x 1,000.

That is, if you take a case of 1,000 pencils, and you add 999 more cases, then you've got a million pencils, or approximately a 50' boxcar load.

Now take that boxcar of pencils and hitch it up to 999 more boxcars, and you've got a billion pencils on a v-e-r-y l-o-n-g train. I'm not even going to start in on the trillions. As the late Senator Everett Dirksen was famously reputed to have said, "A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money."

Now look at this quote from Paul Krugman, courtesy of Tennessee Guerilla Women:

Consider the priorities on display in Congress this week.

On one side, a measure that would have increased scrutiny of containers entering U.S. ports, at a cost of $648 million, has been dropped from a national security package being negotiated in Congress.

Now, President Bush says that we're fighting a global war on terrorism. Even if you think that's a bad metaphor, we do face a terrifying terrorist threat, and experts warn that ports make a particularly tempting target. So some people might wonder why, almost five years after 9/11, only about 5 percent of containers entering the U.S. are inspected. But our Congressional leaders, in their wisdom, decided that improving port security was too expensive.

On the other side, Bill Frist, the Senate majority leader, tried yesterday to push through elimination of the estate tax, which the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates would reduce federal revenue by $355 billion over the next 10 years. He fell three votes short of the 60 needed to end debate, but promised to keep pushing. "Getting rid of the death tax," he said, "is just too important an issue to give up so easily." (New York Times, 6/9/06)

Skimming over this passage, you see two numbers: 648 and 355. At a casual glance you might think that port security would cost 648 something-or-other, and the tax cut would only cost 355 something-or-other.

The actual numbers, of course, are respectively:

$648,000,000
$355,000,000,000

In other words, tax cuts for wealthy estate owners would cost nearly 548 TIMES what port security would cost, or 54.8 times the total port security bill for each and every year the tax cuts are in effect.

The port security bill would have funded about 10,000 new port container inspectors. The money spent on the tax cut could have funded 10,000 new port container inspectors PLUS

41,527 new elementary schools, or
7,950,000 public safety officers, or
46,724,000 kids in Head Start. (Extrapolated from the National Priorities Project Database.)

They say people are apathetic about the looming budget crisis. Have you skimmed over any budget numbers lately? Wanta go back and reread now? (Hang on to your socks!)

Update on the Primary

Remember I said I had been working for one of the two top candidates in my Assembly district?

Well, as of today, the race is too close to be decided, and we'll have to wait until the absentee ballots are counted. But the big surprise was, neither my candidate or the developer-funded candidate came out on top. At the last minute, people said they were turned off by the vast number of mailers sent out not only by the candidates, but by independent groups either for or against them.

The third candidate, who sent out relatively few mailers, took the race. (Though I suspect him of being involved in a last minute hit piece against my candidate.)

This is bad for my candidate, who was the better of two good candidates, in my opinion. But it's good news for those of us concerned about the increasing role of money in politics. The people said, "You can bombard me with only a certain number of ads before I get fed up and you lose me."

Both of the losing candidates claim they had no control over the independent expenditures, which are legal only if the candidates has nothing to do with them. People argue hotly over whether that's true or not, but the fact is that Clean Money campaign finance would put a stop to this nonsense.

That's because, the candidates who choose Clean Money public funds get their funding increased whenever the opponent (OR INDEPENDENT GROUPS SUPPORTING THE OPPONENT) outspends them.

So if you run "clean" and some industry group publishes an ad for your opponent or against you, you get the equivalent cost of their mailer immediately deposited into your funding account. You can use it to further your campaign any way you want, unlike the IE group, which is under some constraints. The more IEs supporting your opponent, the better things are for you. This would put a stop to IEs in a hurry.

Watching C-Span

For no particular reason except that there's nothing else on, I'm watching the House of Representatives on C-SPAN. It's after hours in Washington, so the few House members left in the chamber are mainly there to bloviate along party lines to an audience of microphones. It's also a time to earn some brownie points with the bereaved back in the district by assuring them that every one is very proud that their sons have gotten killed in Iraq.

The gist is that our troops, magnificent people to begin with, are doubly so when they get killed. because they are protecting our freedoms.

This sort of speech is, of course, ancient. It's necessary to keep the supply of fools on the front line replenished in spite of the horror and meaninglessness of war. Like good illusionists, war profiteers and their lackeys in Congress offer up the glory of "serving one's country" to ensure that there is a steady supply of fools to replace the ones that get killed. The hope is that you won't notice the terrifying reality of war, the meaningless death and maiming, whether by hand-axe, cannon or IED. This is the age-old delusion that governments foist on the unsuspecting young--the glory of "serving their country," the beauty of sacrifice. The parades, the patriotic marches, bunting, the wounded limping or wheeling down the street to be cheered and then expected to disappear so that people won't suffer embarrassment.

Some things will never change? Not if I have anything to say about it.

Take a deep breath

The primary election is over, though it's too soon to find out if our phone banking and GOTV efforts paid off. I can take a deep breath and return to a semblance of normal insanity. Tonight I'll go to a victory (?) party for my candidate, who was running neck and neck with the big-business-funded candidate, despite being outspent. It still helps a little to have strong grass-roots support.

With the takeover of our political campaigns by big-money interests--a 20-fold increase in spending since 1979 here in California--it's heartbreakingly difficult for the little guy to prevail. It takes so damn much time and commitment. That's why I work to achieve Clean Money campaign finance reform.

Today, in GOTV, I worked with a woman from Scotland. I asked how they did it in Britain. She said spending, and donating, were severely limited, so you didn't have the deluge of campaign mailings--five or six a day lately--there, and campaigns were much shorter and depended on people going to the trouble to understand the issues and where the candidates stood on them. It all seems so civilized. Why are we such a backward country? We're like Mexico or something, where every politician is for sale.

Wherein the obligations of citizenship generate unexpected rewards

I went to Fort Bragg yesterday to give a talk about Clean Money, and Steve kindly offered to come along and be my chauffeur. I think it was a good thing for both of us to get out of town. We took Highway 128 from Cloverdale to the coast through Boonville.

I'd forgotten what the real California looked like. Not the endless traffic, strip malls, cheap cookie-cutter commercial buildings, gas stations and junk food stops. Not the bland suburbs and prettified downtown revivals. Not the big box "plazas" and miniature golf fantasylands.

Instead, miles without a house in sight, wooded ridges and tawny valleys below a crystalline sky, all so pure and clean. We rose through evergreens and oaks and coasted into the Andersen Valley, golden in the early summer, and best of all, uncluttered with our faux civilization.

The old world has its medieval abbeys and castles. We have our ancient oaks and redwoods.

Then through more redwoods to the coast--with its cooling fog and coastal drizzle--in the late afternoon and north to Fort Bragg. Stopped for a bite to eat at the Seal Internet Cafe on Main Street, where several wireless networks were available for our use. The mist was heavy enough to be called light rain, but it was humid and warm and invigorating.

The dear people of Fort Bragg (population 6,000 plus) have a Town Hall meeting on Friday nights, of all nights, at the Town Hall. (This is different from City Hall, a bigger and more imposing building, but nevertheless it appears that City Council meetings are actually at the Town Hall.)

But first, dinner with seven members of the local Alliance for Democracy--sponsors of the Town Hall meeting--who invited us into their circle of friendship.

The circus was in town. Several music festivals. A monthly Friday night reception at local galleries. Yet 44 of the citizens turned out for a serious political discussion. (I think the count was actually closer to 50; the room looked full when I was at the podium.)

The talk was well received, and afterward, 7 representatives of local groups (Greens, Democrats, Sierra Club, nurses, Unitarians, League of Women Voters and AFD) each took a few minutes to tell why they supported Clean Money. The Clean Money video was projected on the high-ceilinged wall behind the council seats, the largest I'd ever seen it--it was like going to the movies.

I managed to complete the talk and field numerous questions without too many faux pas, though I was aware of saying "um" far too many times, and the microphone was such that I practically had to swallow it to be heard.

After the meeting I talked with a candidate for county supervisor. Despite spending almost no money on the campaign, she was in a dead heat with the incumbent. Because of the small size of the town, she was counting on visiting every house in town and explaining her position. Yet the Press Democrat--the major journalism player, even in Fort Bragg--proclaimed she was not a serious candidate because she refused to solicit money.

Not that there was anything wrong with the incumbent--he was a progressive, like most people involved in Fort Bragg politics today--but she felt he had been in office long enough. She thought it was time for a change, so she was running for his seat.

We spent the night at the intriguing home of Meg Courtney, member of the Fort Bragg planning commission and soon-to-announce city council candidate. (She also had her ceramics and paintings on display at the art gallery across the street from the Town Hall.) Her home's original 1913 fir-paneled walls and ceilings are intact, so you notice the comfortable smell of old wood when you enter the building.

In our guest bedroom I found works by two old friends: John McPhee and Eric Sloan, part of the collection of Meg's partner Kevin. The next morning Meg took us to Kevin's workshop. He is a talented woodworker who designs and hand-makes ergonomically friendly hand tools that are so in demand he spends long hours at the shop--causing Meg to worry about his health. Searching the world over for a machine shop to make the metal portions of his tool designs, Kevin found just the shop he was looking for in the nearby small town of Comptche.

Fort Bragg made both of us yearn for life in a smaller town. It struck me that, going back to the ancient Greeks, democracy was designed with a certain size political unit in mind, and the 6,000-plus citizens of Fort Bragg are probably the outer limit for a functioning true democracy. Small enough that you can reach the majority by means of your own efforts and those of your supporters. Such towns may not need publicly funded election campaigns because it's possible to reach all the citizens without them.

For the rest of us, the corrupting influence of outside money sets in when a candidate can't possibly reach all his/her constituents without spending lots of money on mailings and TV ads.

Yes, small towns are easier for a very few big interests to buy up and control, but strong grass-roots movements can and do take such towns back from those interests. Democracy is a great thing. It's just that we haven't figured out how to make it work on a large scale. That's why we need Clean Money publicly funded election campaigns for most California towns.

On Saturday we fooled around in Fort Bragg until noon, then ambled back along 128, stopping in Mendocino to visit Lark in the Morning and their incredible collection of folk instruments from around the world. Then back to Boonville for an iced latte (me) and a chocolate mint milkshake (Steve) as well as a roadside guitar and flute sale by a Boonville oldtimer who knew Lark in the Morning's Beth and Mickey Zekley. Steve had to try several of the guitars and show the proprietor his own funky depression-era guitar.

While we were there, an old man in a white Cadillac pulled up and announced that he was a Grand Ol' Opry musician who once turned down a quarter-million-dollar offer to leave Nashville and record with a major record company. This guy seemed just quirky enough to be telling the truth. We left the old man to spin his tales about Nashville's good old days.

We passed up Boonville's Wild Iris Music Festival with Utah Phillips because the $40 day-pass price was a little too steep for us. I took the wheel and Steve entertained me with music that was probably just as good as anything at the $40 festival.

Back to civilization: Descending into Cloverdale, my cell phone began announcing messages that had come in while we were out of range.