TORTURE

In my classification, there are two types of torture: physical pain and mental pain.  The worst type is physical pain.  It seems hypocritical of us to try enemies for physical pain like waterboarding and then do it ourselves and say it legally is not torture.  Physical pain is torture.

Mental torture includes things like sleep deprivation which has been said to get the best results.  Our enemies have used it and we adopted it.  I'm not sure it is a crime.  I would tend to say it isn't.  I don't know what long term damage it does to the recipients.

People speculate on how more modern parts of warlike drones - will be viewed in 10 years, largely because of collateral damage.  It is naive to think that using group troops instead of drones would result in no collateral damage or even less collateral damage.  Plus how many of our troops are you willing to sacrifice to get the target?  I  support drones, but not indiscriminately.  If in 10 years it is decided that they should be illegal, then so be it.

It is incredible to think that war should be done in a surgical manner involving only military personnel.  War is messy and violent.  In WW-II, how would you classify the Dresden and Tokyo firebombings and the Hiroshima and especially Nagasaki* atomic bombs?  Such events were not made against military targets but in an attempt to break the will of civilians and their leaders.

* It seems like we dropped it because we had it.

YET MORE GOOD NEWS ON THE ECONOMY

Seems like every day we get more good news on the economy.  The latest is that the Thompson Reuters/University of  Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index is at an 8 yr high at 93.8, (the highest since January of 2007).  The final November reading is 88.8, also good.  Consumer expectations came in at 86.1 (the highest since January 2007) from 79.9, and the gauge on economic conditions rose to 105.7 from 102.7 (the highest since February 2007). "Expected wage gains rose to their highest level since 2008, and consumers voiced the most favorable buying attitudes in several decades," survey director Richard Curtin said in a statement." (http://www.cnbc.co/id/102263893?trknav=homestack:topnews:8)

CONTINUED GOOD NEWS ON ECONOMY

...November’s wage growth marked the fourth time this year that wages have grown at least 0.3% in a month, and there hasn’t been a single month that recorded falling wages. That phenomenon hasn’t happened since at least 2008. Wages have remained stagnant for years for a variety of reasons. The financial crisis, and the ensuing spike in unemployment, forced many Americans to take a job–any job–to get back on their feet. Many took jobs they were overqualified for and agreed to take a pay cut just to get back into the workforce. The unemployment rate fell but wages hardly budged. But something might be changing, albeit slowly, that is causing the wage shift.*

The economy has seen a net gain of more than 6 million full-time jobs since the official end date of the 2007-09 recession, which was in June 2009. The economy has witnessed a net increase of just 311,000 part-time jobs over the same period, according to Labor Department figures**.

The increase in full-time jobs seems to be contrary to politicians saying that most new jobs are part-time.

The best places to live are in the Northeast and Midwest. The only "Southern" state to be in the top tire of the good list is Virginia if you still classify it as a Southern State.

Seven years after the credit bubble burst, just two of the 12 countries that went through systemic financial meltdowns in 2007 and 2008 have reclaimed enough ground to reach their previous peaks in per-capita GDP: the United States and Germany. And Germany isn’t looking so hot these days, given that it’s teetering on the edge of deflation.***

* http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2014/12/05/are-wages-finally-snapping-back/
** http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2014/12/05/november-jobs-report-how-many-new-jobs-are-actually-full-time/?mod=djemRTE_h
*** http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/catherine-rampell-how-the-us-economy-got-its-mojo-back/2014/12/01/6831e8e0-79a1-11e4-9a27-6fdbc612bff8_story.html?wpisrc=nl-opt

FERGUSON, MO, POLITICS

It seems weird to me that more blacks in Ferguson, MO, aren't in the local politics.  I'm sorry to say that it looks like Ferguson residents don't care until some tragedy happens.  See the following quotes:

Ferguson’s population is two-thirds African-American, yet the mayor, five of the six City Council members and nearly the entire police force are white.*
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It’s true that Ferguson’s municipal elections schedule doesn’t encourage turnout. These elections take place in April, far from the traditional voting day in November. They also occur in nonpresidential years, when turnout by minorities and young people traditionally drops. In the most recent municipal election, only 12 percent of registered voters — white, black or otherwise — cast ballots. Voters can change those dates.*
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At Brown’s funeral, a family member called on mourners to make themselves heard at the polls. But only 204 residents of Ferguson registered to vote from the time of the fatal shooting to the Oct. 8 registration deadline for voting this year — only 204 in a city of 21,000 people.*

*http://www.shreveporttimes.com/story/opinion/columnists/2014/11/26/ferguson-voting-matters/19536643/

MAJORITY NOW SAY THINGS GOING WELL

According to a CNN/ ORC International poll conducted Nov. 21-23 [2014] of 1,045 adults, 52 percent of people said things are going well, including 8 percent who said they were going very well. This compares to 48 percent who said things are going badly, including 33 percent who said things are going pretty badly, and 15 percent who said things are going very badly.*

This is in contrast to August and November polls of 2011 when only 24-28% said things were going either fairly well or vary well and September, October, and December polls of 2010 when 25-29% said things were going fairly well or very well (less than 1% doing very well).  The worst month since 2005 was the November 2008 poll where only 16% said that thing were fairly well (less than 1% very well).

We've come a long way, Baby.

The best poll year was 2000 when January polls were 80 and 81% doing fairly well or very well (all time best starting in 1974) to  a LOW of 72% in June!  Let the good times roll.  Oh, for those bubble years!

* http://webmailb.juno.com/webmail/new/5?session_redirect=true&userinfo=8b254f2f4f26b1dc56d8fe41da329a7b&count=1417202894&cf=SP2&randid=771484870

GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE IN 5 MIN.

A source has come to my attention that exlpains global climate change in various time limits.  I present under 5 min. here: http://www.howglobalwarmingworks.org/in-under-5-minutes-ba.html

IMMIGRATION REFORM II

I can't believe that President Obama's Executive Order on immigration will be ovterurned in the courts.* There are an estimated 11.5 million illegal immmigrants in this country.  If he exempts from deportation 5 million, that still leaves an estimated 6.5 million to choose from.  He may deport as many as 400,000 illegals/year over the next two years (800,000 total).  There are plenty more than enough illegals to choose from for deportation.

Obama plans to deport illegals with criminal records and those who arrived here illegally during his term in office (whether they have had children during this period or not).  I have no idea except that this grouping may fulfill the total deportations during the next two years. If not, there are plenty of others around to fill the gap.

I think that the last in should be the first out is a sound policy because it helps discourage illegal migration.

The whole foofarah is over nothing really.

* Also see: http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2014/11/immigration-reform.html