It's My Mind

More about this "pledge line"

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 15:04:21 -0500

Regarding the video that I had posted on Saturday with some young men or I suppose boys in a black fraternity like pledge-line that was seen on YouTube over the weekend. Here's some more info that was brought to my attention:

A middle school teacher in Missouri was suspended Monday for putting a video on YouTube of his students chanting lines from Barack Obama speeches and wearing military fatigues. The video, called "Obama Youth -- Junior Fraternity Regiment," was posted by a YouTube user named "keepitwildtv" on Oct. 2. The school learned the video was on the Internet and took action against the teacher Monday morning.

This teachers probably should have kept it on his own time yeah. Perhaps even avoided using students at his own school as well.

What Hamilton has wrought

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 11:40:00 -0500

I mentioned my friend from Missouri. He has a knowledge of American history not many people will have. He doesn't have a degree in History unfortunately, but if you've got a passion for history perhaps you don't need no stinkin' degree!

His research interest has been the Civil War and he can break down why the northern and southern regions of the nation came to blows by the 1860s. He sympathizes more with the South and it's not because of slavery. He knows the position the south was in during the years before the shots were fired on Fort Sumter.

In anycase he can also break down the early days of the American republic. He doesn't like Abraham Lincoln, but I wonder if he despises Alexander Hamilton more. When it was time to write a new US Constitution (this nation having been under the Articles of Confederation previously) he wanted a sort of lifetime king. Or a President elected for life let's just say one not much different than the British monarchy that America had just left. My old friend said that the other delegates at that 1787-89 Con-Con told him to STFU n00b and he never returned to deliberate.

That being said that didn't mark the end of his prominence as in a new administration under a new regime as underscored by the brand spanking new US Constitution he had his ideas as to how this nation should conduct itself as far as its financial system goes.

For this we look at an article from LewRockwell:

The great debate between Hamilton and Jefferson over the purpose of government, which animates American politics to this day, was very much about economic policy. Hamilton was a compulsive statist who wanted to bring the corrupt British mercantilist system – the very system the American Revolution was fought to escape from – to America. He fought fiercely for his program of corporate welfare, protectionist tariffs, public debt, pervasive taxation, and a central bank run by politicians and their appointees out of the nation’s capital.

Jefferson and his followers opposed him every step of the way because they understood that Hamilton’s agenda was totally destructive of liberty. And unlike Hamilton, they took Adam Smith’s warnings against economic interventionism seriously.

Hamilton complained to George Washington that "we need a government of more energy" and expressed disgust over "an excessive concern for liberty in public men" like Jefferson. Hamilton "had perhaps the highest respect for government of any important American political thinker who ever lived," wrote Hamilton biographer Clinton Rossiter.

Hamilton and his political compatriots, the Federalists, understood that a mercantilist empire is a very bad thing if you are on the paying end, as the colonists were. But if you are on the receiving end, that’s altogether different. It’s good to be the king, as Mel Brooks would say.

Hamilton was neither the inventor of capitalism in America nor "the prophet of the capitalist revolution in America," as biographer Ron Chernow ludicrously asserts. He was the instigator of "crony capitalism," or government primarily for the benefit of the well-connected business class. Far from advocating capitalism, Hamilton was "befogged in the mists of mercantilism" according to the great late nineteenth century sociologist William Graham Sumner.

Does this mean that the idea to bailout big business was largely Hamilton's idea. Like we're doing right now for Wall-Street after they made their bad loans and invested in these portfolios that turned out to be bad news. Another thing you might hear about especially if you listen to Congressman Ron Paul is debt. Hamilton believed in debt:

In a lengthy "report" to Congress on the topic of the public debt Hamilton said that "a national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a public blessing." He would spend the rest of his life politicking for excessive government spending – and debt. The reason Hamilton gave for favoring a large public debt was not to finance any particular project, or to stabilize financial markets, but to combine the interests of the affluent people of the country – particularly business people – to the government. As the owners of government bonds, he reasoned, they would forever support his agenda of higher taxes and bigger government. (He condemned Jefferson’s first inaugural address and its minimal government message as "the symptom of a pygmy mind.") No wonder one historian entitled his book on Hamilton "American Machiavelli."

Wall Street financiers naturally took an immediate liking to Hamilton’s idea, and became the financial cornerstone of the Federalist Party (and later, the Whigs and Republicans). When Hamilton engineered the nationalization of the states’ debt as treasury secretary – something that was totally unnecessary since many states like Virginia had nearly paid off their war debts – the plan was to cash out much of the old debt at face value. This immediately became public knowledge in New York City, but the news spread ever so slowly to the rest of the country. Consequently, Hamilton’s friends and supporters from New York City and New England went on a mad scramble down the eastern seaboard, purchasing bonds from hapless war veterans (who had been paid in bonds) for as little as two percent of par value. Huge fortunes were made by these slick New York speculators. Robert Morris pocketed a nifty $18 million. John Quincy Adams wrote to his father that the wealthiest Federalist lawyer in Massachusetts made a huge fortune with this caper. Hamilton participated in this parade of plunder himself, but claimed that the profits he made were for his brother-in-law.

The link between Wall Street and the federal government was cemented into place later on, when investment banks took on the responsibility of marketing the government’s bonds, which of course they still do to this day. Thus, Wall Street investment bankers became inveterate lobbyists for any and all tax increases (on the rest of the population, anyway) to assure that their own principal and interest would be paid, and that they could promise their clients – the purchasers of government bonds – that the bonds were a good investment. They were corrupt from the very beginning.

When Hamilton and George Washington led some 15,000 conscripts into Pennsylvania to enforce the hated whiskey tax, the purpose was not only to collect the tax and reassure bondholders, but also to send a message to any future tax resisters. The volunteer officers who led the conscripts were mostly "from the ranks of the creditor aristocracy in the seaboard cities," wrote Claude Bowers in Jefferson and Hamilton. (The rebellion succeeded, nevertheless. George Washington pardoned all of the tax protesters despite Hamilton’s hysterical opposition and his desire to hang all of them.)

And also he helped to start this idea of central banking in this country over a century before America had the Federal Reserve Bank:

Hamilton is also considered to be the founding father of central banking since America’s first central bank, the Bank of the United States (BUS), existed primarily due to his efforts as Treasury Secretary. As William Graham Sumner wrote in his biography of Hamilton, however, "[A] national bank . . . was not essential to the work of the Federal Government." The real purpose of Hamilton’s bank, Sumner believed, was "the interweaving of the interests of wealthy men with those of their government." And interweave it did, providing cheap credit to business supporters of the Federalist Party, attempting to engineer boom-and-bust cycles to influence elections (called "political business cycles" in today’s parlance) and even financing the political campaigns of BUS supporters.

The BUS was a disaster for the general public, however; excessive money creating by the BUS printing press caused 72 percent inflation in its first five years, from 1791 to 1796. It became so unpopular that its twenty-year charter was not renewed, but then the War of 1812 gave it a new life, and it was resurrected in 1817. It immediately caused the Panic of 1819, and did what all central banks have always done: generated boom-and-bust cycles for the next twenty years. The bursting of the housing bubble in our time is the latest example of this hoary tradition.

To be sure I'm not totally up on my economics, but is it not safe to say if debt isn't good for us everyday folks then why is it good for government. At the end of the day, Government debt isn't good for those of us who's taxes are going towards this debt. Ideally this should be common sense.

What do you think out there?

Check out this "pledge line"

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 14:45:40 -0500

Almost evokes images of some of the crossings I've seen since I've been to school in the AUC. I almost thought they were Omegas because of the gold boots they were wearing.

I wonder what's up with having a "pledge" line of boys between the ages of 12 to 17 to announce their praises of Obama. Would this be appropriate to indoctrinate these young people in such a way? Should they credit Obama for their big dreams?

Think about it, I thought about entrepreneurship way before Obama. Yeah I'm much older now, but surely these young men had someone to talk about these things with them. Entrepreneur, doctor, lawyer, engineer, automotive technician, doesn't matter.

I've seen this vid a lot this morning. Check out this video's YouTube page this vid caused some drama because this was at a school. It's not exactly clear to me if it's a public school or a charter school. All the same this is scene as a form of propaganda using impressionable young people.

Check out Instapundit, Newsalert, and Atlas Shrugs. They're looking at this as a form of propaganda. To be sure it is propaganda. Heh, Newsalert actually titled his post appropriately using the term fraterning in its title although it still emphasizes the paramilitary aspect of this display. One of the links on Instapundit to Confederate Yankee breaks it down further mentioning the performance known as "stepping".

Anyway does anyone have any thoughts? Do you think this is heaping praise or worship on a politician who many see as con-men?

Swept into next century

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 10:06:08 -0500

DAMN!!! I heard about this last night. Felt this disappointment even more as well. Well this has been brewing for the last two games. And there's always next year I suppose but it could have been this year!

Sun-Times:

It’s got to be the curses.

Not goats and black cats.

Just curses. Four-letter curses. Four-letter baseball.

That’s what this 100-year anniversary postseason looked like for the Cubs — from all those walks in Game 1, to all those errors in Game 2, to all those zeroes Saturday night in Game 3, until it was too late in a 3-1 elimination loss at Dodger Stadium.

They won’t admit that the drought or the so-called curse or anything else extraneous got in their heads or in their way of playing the game.

‘‘I don’t think it has anything to do with the 100-year thing,’’ manager Lou Piniella said after the game. ‘‘I think it has to do with the fact that this team in postseason doesn’t generate enough offense to win games.’’ But there’s no denying that these World Series-favored Cubs didn’t even get down to actually competing head-on in talent-vs.-talent baseball until sometime after the first inning Saturday night.

And by then it was too late.

The butterfly walks and anxious errors in the first two games put them in a hole they had little chance to escape. By the time it struck midnight back home, their magic season was a three-and-out pumpkin.

"We just didn't hit, you have to score runs," Piniella said. "We had opportunities and you have to take advantage of them. This is six games I've managed now in the postseason and we have scored just 12 runs. That doesn't get it done." Alfonso Soriano was one of the culprits in the offensive drought.

"We have the best team in the league, and we struggle in the playoffs," Soriano said. "We did not play good, like a team. That's the reason we didn't win."

I'm sure there are plenty of Cubs fans who are a little upset right now that the Cubs didn't play well and they take an early exit from the playoffs this year. Unfortunately we have next year to fall back on!

So how about those White Sox? Well they'll play today at the Cell with a 2-0 deficit against Tampa Bay in their ALDS.

Got camcorders on my mind

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:46:00 -0500

I bought a new camcorder well actually that was last Christmas sometime. The other camcorder I had, well I don't know if it was defective or not. The last year or two that I had it I couldn't get it to operate. Not even to attempt to digitize some tapes. That just means for the foreseeable future I won't buy a JVC camcorder.

Anyway I bought a basic Sony Camcorder not much different that the one you see in the first picture for this post. It's a MiniDV camcorder and for now it's not likely that I'll get the new rage at the moment which is a hard-drive camcorder. For my part though, I'm considering it.

Especially if it's for the right price and it's in High Definition (HD). Most of the camcorders I have seen that are HD cost over $1000. My only problem is with a hard-drive camcorder.

Should I trust shooting my video and then saving it to some internal media, especially to a hard-drive, and then risking that it could become deleted or lost in some way. That's why I prefer tapes and I could of course save my footage to DVD tapes and perhaps when I have that ability I would. Of course I heard once that attempting to upload and edit video from DVDs is difficult.

Right now I don't trust hard-drives camcorders. I prefer to save video footage not on the camcorder itself like I would on a digital camcorder but save it on some outside media such as tapes. Although it's great to see that there are other options like memory cards, I'm still not sold on the idea of storing video on an internal camera hard-drive.

What do you guys think? Can you provide a critique of Mini-DV or hard-drive camcorders? Do any of you have anything to add on DVD camcorders? And are HD camcorders worth their suggested retail-prices?

Democracy or Republic?

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 12:43:00 -0500

For a good while my friend from the sovereign state of Missouri can have some philosophical discussions. We might talk about society, race relations, economics, foreign affairs, or even systems of government. We especially talked a lot about the differences of a Republic or a Democracy.

He told me a definition of a Republic and he told me that the idea was written up in the Virgina and Kentucky Declarations. In those documents Republics were said to be a form of government where majority rules, however, there are minority rights protection. This was the idea of our Constitution to provide for a Republican form of government and allow for the protect of minorities.

I don't necesarily mean racial, ethnic, women, homosexuals or anybody like that. Perhaps it could be as simple as those groups or individuals who are largely at odds with where the mainstream is, especially politically. Such individuals have to be represented as well.

In saying this I know that it's very idealized. American hasn't always lived up to it's great purported promise, but then with all things that Americans are endowed or entitled to especially our inalienable natural rights we have to fight for them. Especially if it seems that a government that is supposed to guarantee its people their natural rights seems to have this great ability to deny them.

All the same we have one idea of what a Republic should be. Then what about Democracy? Is Democracy truly ideal where majority wills a direction for a governor or a society?

In the south, once upon a time, it was willed to keep blacks segregated. It was also willed that blacks get punished for crimes against whites while similar crimes portrayed by whites against blacks were treated with slaps on the wrists. The point I want to make is that it can become a slippery slope.

I saw this page today courtesy of the website for Illinois Democrats for which I'm not sure it's the official site for the Illinois Democratic Party. There was this link to a page for Conservative Democrats. Then another page that sought to explain the differences between a Republic and a Democracy. I thought that they over simplified it. It almost sounded like they were throwing the whole classism card.

Does a Republic entail leading people? Does a Democracy entail serving the people? Could a Republic serve the people and could a Democracy lead the people? Would there be much of a difference?

When we elect people to represent us we do expect them to lead. At the same time as voters we do have expectations. What they are might vary from time to time but sometimes a leader shouldn't just go by public opinion alone.

A leader wouldn't serve the population if he/she just fell in with popular opinion. Especially if it could have disastrous results. At the same time a leader should follow public opinion especially if he/she isn't serving the public's best interest by pursuing a policy against the public's best interest.

It's certainly a fine line between leading vs. serving the people. Perhaps it's correct to say there is an art to this and that if you went to that Republic or Democracy page I would hope some of us recognize that it's not that simple.

Tribute to WGN-TV's Merri Dee

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:54:00 -0500

I remember the days when WGN had a community calendar announcing the various events around the city during commercial breaks. I heard the old lady was retiring and WGN gives her a send-off. There were quite a few things I didn't know.

Her life wasn't all glamorous. Experienced things that I hope I never do. Especially being shot by an assailant who later claimed that she's the reason he can't find a job. Of course, there is one thing to say for that. Don't commit the crime!

Anyway I think you'll enjoy this vid.

Tuskegee Airman eager to share story

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 09:59:45 -0500

A little history lesson for those of us reading this blog who wasn't able to live this history from today's Sun-Times:

The colonel asked Lt. Quentin Smith to agree he would not enter the officers' club or swimming pool after 5 p.m.

The recreational facilities at the Army Air Force's Freeman Field in Indiana were for white officers only. Smith is black.

And what if Smith refused?

"Are you familiar with the 64th Article of War?" he was asked.

The offense? Ddisobedience of an order. The penalty? Death.

It was World War II, and Smith was one of the "Tuskegee Airmen," the nation's first black military pilots. They came from all over the country to train in the "military experiment, which was headquartered in Tuskegee, Ala.

Smith, a resident of Gary, Ind., and fellow former Tuskegee pilots Robert Martin and Shelby Westbrook are planning to share their experiences breaking the color barrier -- and the discrimination they endured -- Thursday evening at Pritzker Military Library, 610 N. Fairbanks Court.

"The policy of the military when we came in was blacks can't lead, blacks can't fight, and they most certainly cannot fly combat planes," Smith said. "That meant that 99 percent of all blacks were either digging ditches, working in the kitchens, or in home and supply."

Smith, Martin and Westbrook will be interviewed by broadcast journalist John Callaway. Entry is free to the event, which will be broadcast live online.

The part I placed in bold. Are you kidding me? Most of the people I have met knew how to fight. We've been fighting in this nation's wars since the American Revolution and the US military of the 1940s say we couldn't fight?

Is it that black just didn't have the privilege to play soldiers? Especially given the minor fact that some early gun control legislation was designed to keep blacks from owning weapons. It's probably somewhat safe to say that they didn't want any Negroes to dare defend themselves from either a lynching or harrasment!

Sorry for the rant. I wasn't around back then, but I do know that the Tuskegee Airmen broke true barriers. Progress was slow and I would say still slow, but at least the military isn't segregated anymore. At least blacks will have the same opportunities as any body else who joins the military.

Now to figure out where to watch this event online since I'm so out of town I won't be able to make this one.

This I remember

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 18:37:05 -0500

Happened back in 1994. An 11-year-old child already involved with gangs was murdered very young by a couple of pitiful young men. Actually these young men were brothers aged 14 & 16 respectively.

I call them pitiful because I recall their pictures. They didn't look happy or at least had any great direction in their life. The pitiful part came from my mother, that's what she called them. It's unfortunate really.

Now back then I didn't know as much about this little boy as I do now. He was born to a crack addict mother and I have to ask once again where's daddy. Did his dad care whether he existed? Would his dad have know where he was? All the same he was abused sent to his grandmother, whose home got incredibly crowded with as many as 19 children living at home with her on some occassions.

He was 8 when he started stealing cars and breaking into houses. At 11 years old he was either too young for juvenile detention, but too dangerous to be left with kids his own age. He became a bully towards the residents and the children of the Roseland neighborhood extorting money from them. He had already racked up 23 felonies and 5 misdemeanors running errands for street gangs.

The day that made him a name know in Chicago was the day he shot a 15-year-old because he declared that he wasn't in a gang. This shooting was said to have left this young man paralyzed. Then he had the misfortune at shooting at some rival gang members. Unfortunate he hit an innocent 14-year-old girl who in a few weeks (this was August 1994) was about to start her first year of high school.

Police were looking for this boy. The Black Disciples were shuttling him around to keep him away from the police. There was still some fear that he would eventually talk to the police. He was executed under a viaduct.

From that Wiki article I found, I went on thru to this Time article. This kid didn't have a chance. His mother was messed up, and I read thru to see that his father had his issues and eventually found himself in jail. And dear old grandmother well Sandifer called her mama and his actual mother by her first name. Unfortunately social workers didn't have much faith in "Mama" either. Grandmother had her own issues.

One could conclude that this kid was doomed. Could he have gotten some help before he committed the crime of murder or attempted murder? Is it possible that he could have lead a normal life despite his background?

I don't know, but I would like to think that at 11 years old he had some time to turn some things around in his life.

If this brief blurb didn't tell you enough you can watch this vid as well

White Sox wins the AL Central

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:24:44 -0500

Both the Cubs and the White Sox are in the playoffs. This will make watching the baseball postseason even more interesting with two Chicago teams going for that World Series.

It should also be noted that LA has two hometown teams in the playoffs. Both the Anaheim Angels and the LA Dodgers. I wonder how out of sorts LA baseball fans are at the moment.

Tribune:

There's nothing like defending your home turf on a playoff-type stage.

Just ask John Danks, Jim Thome and A.J. Pierzynski, who each stood tall and strong in vaulting the White Sox to the American League Central title Tuesday night with a 1-0 victory in the division tiebreaker.

The Sox advanced to the postseason for the second time in four seasons and will play AL East champion Tampa Bay in an AL Division Series starting Thursday at Tropicana Field.

Danks redeemed himself for a 7.91 ERA against the Twins in four regular-season starts in heroic form. Danks pitched eight innings of two-hit ball on three days' rest.

Thome accounted for the Sox offense with a home run off Nick Blackburn to lead off the seventh.

Pierzynski, who began his career with Minnesota, prevented the Twins from scoring by blocking home plate to stop a run in the fifth inning.

Hmm I wish I had a similar image for the Cubs' Division win. Anyway let's see how Chicago's baseball teams will do in these playoffs.

I visited the online CTA Gift Store

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:11:00 -0500

I must say I like some of their items but what I really wanted to see was a holder for any CTA Chicago Card or pass and they don't seem to sell anymore. They might want to consider developing that product unless of course from the times they did sell them, when the primary fare media was the Transit Card, they didn't make a lot of money off of that. Still it's great to see their gift shop back.

I could honest go for either their CTA messenger bag. The one that has one of the old CTA logos and perhaps any product that contains an old CTA token. It's also awesome to have a t-shirt with signage from your neighborhood L stop. Even a farecard shaped mouse pad.

I just wish there was a way to suggest items for this store to sell, but it's a good start.

Oh do what I did last night. Just copy and paste the CTA's website at transitchicago.com. Go to the "Wayback Machine" at archive.org. Then go back thru the years of old CTA website designs and look up Gift Express, and see what products they sold back in either the late 1990s or early 2000s.

Downtown rally to be held today for Cubs

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 10:23:54 -0500

Oh man I can't wait to see future coverage of this. May this year's playoffs be a good one. Tribune:

A noontime rally will be held today for the Cubs at Daley Plaza in advance of the team's first playoff game Wednesday against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Baseball Hall of Famer Billy Williams, WGN Radio's Ron Santo, Mayor Richard Daley, Gov. Rod Blagojevich and actor Jim Belushi are expected to be among the attending luminaries. Belushi will emcee.

The event is free and open to the public, and will run from noon to 12:45 p.m.

Of course it should be noted that the White Sox could find themselves in the playoffs as well. This is pending their one game playoff against the Minnesota Twins. The Sox struggled late in the season and couldn't hold their lead in the AL Central. And neither could the Twins apparently.

Another Political Science Department meeting

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:43:00 -0500

Well a student who was representing the Department gave us some updates, especially why the professors left the Department. Unlike the meeting I went to a couple or so weeks ago this one wasn't packed. And even the man who gave his presentation said well he probably could have planned this better and done this during another part of this week. There were only five or six of us in this classroom.

First off I learned a little more about why three political science department professors left the school. One was a huge surprise, he couldn't prove that he had the degrees he's said he has. So they released him from his position here. The other two well one I know left because they didn't get tenure, but it's still unclear to me what another professor left. Though reading the article in the Maroon Tiger he's had his issues with the school recently.

In any case one of the students wondered why Morehouse would just simply let go of three of their professors like that. And the discussion went into a general run down of what this student has seen in his time here at Morehouse. For instance he said once that a professor told a classmate of his that he wasn't going to pass the course. Then assignment that this student has turned in were magically missing.

He talked about his frustrations in getting his last class to graduate. Whether or not that means he registers for a course taught by a professor, then because of the current situation in the Poli. Sci. department he has to cancel that class because he has to teacher other necessary courses. Or he attempts to cross-register at other neighboring institutions only to get thwarted.

He also says that his records finds themselves magically missing. His academic records. As a result he says that he has to keep his own records. He admits that he shouldn't have to, but that's what he resorts to. As a result he's even started looking for ways that might force the school to get its act together. That is he's resorting to checking out those organizations responsible for accredidating colleges. Pretty drastic correct?

In any case, he's indicated because of his experiences in attempting to graduate from Morehouse, having been thwarted several times he's lost confidence in this school. Because the poli.sci. department is in upheaval at this moment he's probably not the only one. Either students have to figure out if they're going to graduate on time or who knows what.

The main point of meeting with this student was to collect an agenda to speak with the President of the college. Well it turns out the meeting for the moment will be with the college Provost. With the few of us in attendance that didn't sit very well. Even talked about what they hear about the Provost who is also known as the Dean of the Division of Business & Economics. The views of him aren't positive.

I suppose we'll have to see. I expect that this meeting will be interesting. Hopefully something good can come out of this. While everyone else has their frustrations I'm going to try to look at this with some optimism.

Something Needs to be Done about the Communiity Reinvestment Act

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 10:05:46 -0500

From IL GOP Network. No doubt discussion about this whole sub-prime lending business that has made the financial industry a mess right now:

To understand what's going on in this meltdown, you need to understand about the CRA. The melt-down has other roots, but the CRA is critical to what has happened over the years and, along with its related Federal acts, must be dealt with to prevent more problems

Two of my sons who work in the financial sector say that the start of the current problems was the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1976. It was the bad loans mandated by CRA that were bundled together and sold as investments, involving Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. As a consequence, there is no way to correctly value these bundles of loans. Closely related to the CRA are the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA), the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA), and the Fair Housing Act (FHA).

The CRA was proposed during the Carter years by Sen Proxmire to eliminate redlining. The major justification for CRA was the perceived unfairness of using bank deposits in poorer areas to provide loans to people who lived outside of the depository's geographic area. The remedy was CRA which requires "geographic credit allocation" that has no relation to the market and little relation to the credit-worthiness of borrowers or the true value of collateral.

This post is worth reading. Even if the formatting is a bit frustrating.

I wonder if black communities were better off with out the CRA? Especially since a neighborhood like Chatham had a locally owned bank to provide loans and such to area residents. Is it worth it to force a big downtown bank to provide lending services to a depressed community?

Don't get me wrong certainly we can do without this idea of redlining, especially if it's done in an indiscriminate way that treats black middle-class neighborhoods the same as poor black neighborhoods. Still would the CRA be much good if loans weren't at some point offered to people who couldn't afford them?

Big Government meets corporate welfare

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 12:06:02 -0500

Some people don't like President Bush because of Iraq but then there are certainly those who don't like his domestic policies since he's become President. Just ask those who have an idea about what conservatism is and they'll tell you that Bush isn't anywhere close to being a conservative. They might talk about his domestic policy or they might talk about his foreign policy as well.

Read this:

The Bush administration is pushing for a $1 trillion-plus blank check – $700 billion just to buy bad mortgages – to bail out financial and other segments of the economy, complete with czarlike powers for the treasury secretary. This president has expanded the government by a greater percentage than LBJ, has created massive new entitlement programs, has further centralized education in Washington, D.C., and has advanced novel theories of executive privilege that obliterate some of the key checks on the centralization of government power crafted by the nation's founders.

Can we at least dispense with the silly rhetoric and admit the obvious? This administration does not stand for limited government, the Constitution, fiscal responsibility or free markets. The last point is crucial. Supporters of free markets believe that government should enforce some ground rules, but that companies should compete with minimal intervention. Businesses are free to make an enormous amount of money, of course, but they also must be free to fail. Yet the administration has pushed one set of market interventions after another, and when big companies fail, it is quick to turn to you, the taxpayer, to cushion the blow. That's not capitalism, unless one sticks the word "crony" in front of it.

With the meltdown in the financial markets, these Republicans are advancing a plan to throw an enormous amount of taxpayer dollars at the problem, and Democrats are busy gloating. "You see, unfettered capitalism is a failure! We need more regulations, more government, more control." It's absurd to argue that any market in the United States is unfettered or free of regulation. And it takes a little bit of time to explain how past government interventions have led directly to the current meltdown that Americans are experiencing. The only complaint by Democrats, by the way, is with some of the details, and, of course, Democrats were most eager to push the "everyone deserves a mortgage" mandates that led to this mess in the first place. Not that "compassionate conservatives" complained about this at the time.

Fortunately, there are still a few sane voices out there. Somehow, congressional Republicans have regained some of their backbone. Some are opposed to the bailout plan. Here is Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., speaking about the fundamental problem with the Bush bailout: "There are much better ways of dealing with this problem than forcing American taxpayers to pay for every asset some investor doesn't want anymore. We should start by reforming government policies and programs that created this mess, including the Federal Reserve's easy-money policy, the congressional charters of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the Community Reinvestment Act. Then Congress should pass a number of permanent and proven pro-growth reforms to encourage capital formation and boost asset values."

Via RealClearPolitcs!

My belief is that business that either engage in bad investments or bad business should fail. I trust a businessman (or businesswoman) to know whether they should tread into dangerous territory or not. Subprime loans from the little I know seems risky especially if you help people get mortgages they either don't qualify for or can't afford them. Why should a government help pull a business from failure especially if it was their fault?

The best case scenario for this is that well there should be some reforms. Perhaps the US Government shouldn't be so interventionist, but at the same time we now know that we should give people loans they can't afford to pay back. Perhaps government policy shouldn't entail helping people buy a home. It looks like for some it wasn't YET in their interest to buy a home. It's a mess folks!

Pastor Manning is back!

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 20:03:23 -0500

You might have heard from him, he's done videos going after Sen. Obama and his family. This rant here is over the top and bizarre I don't know what to say about it. For one thing I'm not sure who my vote is going to but this guy is going to drive a lot of people to Obama. The main idea here is that he wants white folks to take back control and pull the purse strings for their children who are donating dollars to those "terrorists from Chicago".

Huh?

Previous posts
Trinity of Hell!
Pajama's Media: Obama's Race Against Race

Ring of Honor had a PPV???

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 18:58:00 -0500

I was reading one of my new favorite pro-wrestling new website. In fact a "twittered" it a few days ago. Anyway I'm amazed to find out that this independent wresting promotion that calls itself Ring of Honor (RoH) has produced a PPV (check out the recap here). Oh yeah and as I start to write this I'm watching an introductory video for the promotion.

Anyway for some reason in the last few weeks, I've been having some nostalgia for the programming I saw from Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) that I started to watch in the summer of 1998. Never before have I seen wrestling as I have in ECW. It was violent, bold, and entertaining. I became a huge fan although I still call myself an WWF(or WWE) fan.

These days not as much a WWE. WWE now include the promotion that was ECW and now it just seems like another WWE wrestling program. If I wanted to watch more WWE, I'd rather watch Raw or Smackdown. Although I understand that now that ECW I watched so many years ago isn't the same ECW that was ressurected and under a big time corporate entity now!

That being said I'm glad to see Ring of Honor enter the PPV game. To be sure I've only read about them. I have never seen any RoH matches on TV or even online. I do know that the company emerged after the bankruptcy of ECW back in 2001. It may not be like ECW in every detail, but I'm glad that one more company is taking another step to expand.

When I first saw ECW probably August 1998, they probably already had a pair of PPV events under their belts. I had no idea about them, in fact, it was possible that I saw them on Monday Night Raw but I didn't totally comprehend what their role was or indeed the following ECW had. In any event what ECW did eventually I was able to see up close and personal on TV in less than a year's time.

Ironically enough I recently found out that ECW has been on Chicago TV long before I finally caught them one day on probably channel 62 WJYS-TV. Since ECW didn't have great distribution or indeed their programs were geared towards an adult or more mature audience I'm not sure I would have caught up to them before 1998. The program jumped from either Channel 26 or surprisingly enough Channel 50 WPWR-TV which is odd since between UPN, Star Trek, or Babylon 5 my eyes would be on Channel 50.

From the time I started watching the program to whenever ECW stopped producing it, I would watch them on either channel 62 or more frequently Channel 26 (the "U") WCIU-TV. I had to love their promotion of live events, PPVs, even videos of their best matches. And the music whether heavy metal, funk, or gangsta rap was another thing that I remember about ECW.

So anyway I look forward to the expansion of RoH, and I hope that it'll be the number three wrestling company in this country behind WWE, and Total Nonstop Action (TNA). I just think it's more than time for another company to produce something that will be the next wave in professional wrestling. Right now having one company recycling the same angles that we've seen over the past decade and seeing a sanitized product of sorts.

Just for the hell of it, how about one segment of the program one known as ECW Hardcore TV embedded for your enjoyment. Especially important if you're a wrestling or ECW fan.

Oh and I should add ECW did have a national TV network program on the network formerly known as TNN (now SpikeTV). I had no idea that it has been just over nine years since August 1999 since the show premiered on TNN. SpikeTV would have WWE programming and much later they became the home of TNA not too long after WWE returned to USA.

White Sox knocked out of first place

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 09:47:00 -0500

This'll be 2003 all over again. Both teams had the chance to make it to the playoffs, but stumble. Well hopefully it's just that aspect. Take it away Tailgate:

But under the pressure of maintaining a hold on first place in the AL Central with the eyes of the nation watching, the White Sox collapsed harder than WaMu, with Thursday's 10-inning 7-6 loss the bitterest pill to swallow. It left them in second place, a half-game behind, and may force them to spend an entire winter wondering how they blew a 6-1 lead.

Unfortunate. I really would like to see a cross-town world series if it was meant to be. At least I can say the Cubs still have their Division title this year. And I look forward to their playoffs run.

White Sox welcome Divine Nine to African American Greek Night

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:12:00 -0500

If you're a member of either Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, and Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, then this event at "The Cell" is for you. Courtesy of Teesee`s Town:

It promises to be a night of fun – networking, socializing and the thrill and excitement of major league baseball under the stars – when the White Sox welcome “The Divine Nine,” the Black Greek-letter organizations (fraternities and sororities), to U.S. Cellular Field for the first-ever African American Greek Night on Friday.

Opening pitch: 7:11 p.m. The Divine Nine is made up of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, founded in 1906 at Cornell U.; Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, founded in 1908 at Howard U.; Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, founded in 1911 at Indiana U.; Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, founded in 1911 at Howard U.; Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, founded in 1913 at Howard U.; Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, founded in 1914 at Howard U.; Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, founded in 1920 at Howard U.; Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, founded in 1922 at Butler U.; and Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, founded in 1963 at Morgan State U.

Specially priced tickets ($45, bleachers; $35.50, upper reserved) are offered to The Divine Nine members to see the Sox take on the Cleveland Indians. Prior to the game, there’ll be a pre-game party at Gate 1 from 5:30 p.m.–7 p.m. Each ticket includes unlimited drinks (beer, soda, water), a hot dog and a bag of chips–during the pre-game only! Advance sales only! Email Rozzie McHenry at rmchenry@chisox.com for more details and to place your order. Play ball!

This is interesting to note. I've discussed a little about these organizations overtime. Even noted anniversaries that they've had, especially the Alphas, AKAs, or the Deltas.

Burke's debt plan

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 10:44:24 -0500

I found this Sneed column among the goodies in the Capitol Fax morning shorts. I think I'll offer my two cents after I provide an excerpt:

Scoopsville: Watch for Ald. Ed Burke (14th) and Ald. Leslie Hairston (5th) to introduce an amendment to the city's municipal code that may send shock waves through Wall Street.

•  •  The buckshot: Sneed hears the aldermen want to make greedy investment bankers -- involved in the nation's economic collapse -- ineligible to underwrite city debt unless they agree to cap executive compensation.

•  •  Translation: No firm can award more than $400,000 in compensation for all executives.

•  •  The upshot: "This would be a cold slap in the face of greedy executives paying themselves millions of dollars in compensation packages," Burke said. "The legislation is intended to shoot bullets at a Gucci gulch gang of lobbyists trying to protect the bad guys."

•  •  Translation: The aldermen claim it's a backdoor way of making investment bankers more accountable to taxpayers.

You know this is just another way of making business the boogie men. To be sure these business executives making millions or however much they make while running failing companies or indeed they're running companies that engage in bad business practices, they make an easy boogie man. Still I question the logic of attempting to control how much a company can pay their talent.

I can appreciate what Burke is doing. Obviously he's somewhat bothered by the fact that some of these Wall Street firms are collapsing and that government is about to bail them out. The best deterrent to me as far as putting a dent into such events as this whole sub-prime crises is to let these businesses fail. If you want your business to succeed you won't engage in short-term investments and if you do hopefully you won't be stuck with them.

I agree something should be done. I would imagine that the financial industry won't engage in activities such as this anymore. Government will apply some more regulations though it could be debatable as to whether that's the answer or not. Still this is a problem and there needs to be a change somewhere.

For further reading might I suggest you go to this post over at Newsalert that brings to our attention an article from New Geography entitled, "Back to Basics: The Financial Crisis Requires a Paradigm Shift".

I wish I could have these tickets

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 18:23:33 -0500

I'm looking at the price of these NLDS series for the Cubs, $35. If I was at home I'd try to buy this tickets. The only problem I can imagine is that these tickets will be sold out. The only downside.

Fact is, this is the only time I'll ever be able to see Chicago Cubs playoff tickets. I hope that changes soon though and I can catch the Cubs in playoffs action, in the near future.

Oh and how about the Chicago White Sox. They lost last night but there's another game tonight!

Barack Obama, John McCain and the Language of Race

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:05:01 -0500

Some of the themes here seemed to have been similar to what has been discussed in the Illinois Channel Links I showed you last week with regards to the 1908 Springfield race riots. Of course let's stay in the modern day here. We are talking about a NY Times editorial about the current presidential race.

It was not that long ago that black people in the Deep South could be beaten or killed for seeking the right to vote, talking back to the wrong white man or failing to give way on the sidewalk. People of color who violated these and other proscriptions could be designated “uppity niggers” and subjected to acts of violence and intimidation that were meant to dissuade others from following their examples.

The term “uppity” was applied to affluent black people, who sometimes paid a horrific price for owning nicer homes, cars or more successful businesses than whites. Race-based wealth envy was a common trigger for burnings, lynchings and cataclysmic episodes of violence like the Tulsa race riot of 1921, in which a white mob nearly eradicated the prosperous black community of Greenwood.

Forms of eloquence and assertiveness that were viewed as laudable among whites were seen as positively mutinous when practiced by people of color. As such, black men and women who looked white people squarely in the eye — and argued with them about things that mattered — were declared a threat to the racial order and persecuted whenever possible.

This obsession with black subservience was based in nostalgia for slavery. No sane person would openly express such a sentiment today. But the discomfort with certain forms of black assertiveness is too deeply rooted in the national psyche — and the national language — to just disappear. It has been a persistent theme in the public discourse since Barack Obama became a plausible candidate for the presidency.

Consider me strange but sometimes I wonder if we see race in everything now that the Senator is the first black man to represent a major party running for President. Reminds me of this video I found a week or so ago. IF you choose not to vote for Barack Obama for President or you choose not to vote for Sarah Palin for Vice President, you're either a sexist or a racist.

Anyway perhaps as we go forward in this election we might want to consider leaving the racial angle behind. Perhaps every white politician isn't denegrating Obama for his race. And Obama's race shouldn't be a reason we vote for him. I just thought this was an interesting editorial.

Via MyUrbanReport!

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A video of a frustrated man

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:04:31 -0500

I liked to watch the vids Ira Gallen posts on YouTube. Either classic film footage or perhaps footage of what you might have seen on TV back in the 1950s and 60s. His job was to basically preserve old films and old TV programs. You can also visit his website TVDays.com.

Every now and then I'd find that his videos were taken offline. Someone out there will claim copyright infringment and then YouTube will remove not only the offending material, but the account itself. In fact once I wrote a blog about what happened to PubDef sometime in 2007 regarding their fair use of a news report in St. Louis.

Anyway I just thought you'd enjoy this and I hope this would be a complimentary post since I hadn't posted all day. Oh and also check out this playlist of NYC videos in the 1980s and this was also shot by Ira Gallen who seems to be pretty handy with a camera. It made me look up old camcorders as well as. It even made me look up current camcorders on the market but that's another post.

The end of the investment bank

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 14:18:00 -0500

I wonder whatever that means. Is it the rash of bailouts and mergers that are going on amongst several investment banks? Check out this post from EdCon.com. Via Instapundit!

Don't confuse voting blocs and bigotry

noreply@blogger.com (Levois) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 11:01:53 -0500

I spring boarded off of this column from Russ Stewart when I wrote it last night. You'll see the finished product over at the Sixth Ward today. Just my thoughts on the main thesis of his column that black politicos in Illinois think that they have a claim to the office of state Senate President.

I have another good item for you to read.

Dawn Turner Trice from the Chicago Tribune talks about voting blocs. Especially as to how blacks might consider voting for Barack Obama as President. I found this interesting:

I've written a few times that the black vote is the least nuanced ofthe voting blocs. Each time I've written that blacks won't vote forObama solely because he's black, Lordy, I've received a firestorm ofe-mail asking how I explain the huge percentages of black support Obamareceived in the primaries.

I explain it this way: MaybeAfrican-American voters thought he was the best candidate. I've neversuggested that his race wasn't a factor for blacks (as it is for somewhites). But it's one of many factors. Maybe blacks feel strongly abouthis policies. I don't understand why people think that blacks don'tvote their interests.

An excellent example of this comes from Chicago's 2007 mayoral election. Mayor Richard Daley(who is white) received a huge heap of the black vote against CookCounty Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown (who is black) and William"Dock" Walls (also black).

"Identity appeal" always is crucial in politics. With race, it's hard to tease out how much race factors into the equation.

It was also mentioned that there was an AP-Yahoo poll that said that one-third of whites have negative views of blacks. It may not bode well for Obama's candidacy for President, that being said Trice still says that people will in the long run vote their interests. Whatever those interests may be.

Races won't vote, individuals vote. Perhaps there won't be a big Bradley effect. The voters might decide the day they finally go to the voting booth. That's how it's going to be for me because I haven't decided who I'll vote for.

Anyway the only point here is that everyone has their own story. You go near the end of this column Trice mentions the stockbroker who lost their job, a blue-collar worker who's home is in foreclosure, or a mother who wants equal pay for equal work. Race or ethnicity in this election matters little looking at those crucial issues.

What do you think?