CONSERVATIVES & LIBERALS

Conservatives don't like change, except possibly when it is to their advantage.  As change happens, conservatives regret it and want to "turn back the clock."  Liberals love change and are likely to plunge into changes where the unintended consequences are not thought through.  Liberals are not content with the status quo.

Certain ideals of conservatives are certainly admirable such as taking responsibility for your actions.  This is a basic tenant of the Twelve Step Programs, for example.  They also want strict sexual social strictures, especially for others.  In practice, obeying these turns out to be very hard to do for many conservatives.  Liberals do not have sexual strictures.  There is an old joke that conservatives pull their shades and draw the curtains at night but probably don't need to, whereas liberals don't pull their shades or draw their curtains at night  but probably ought to.  But liberals do have strictures and can have a hard time obeying them.  Liberals want low-cost health care for all, but they refuse to reform torts that drive up the cost of medicine.

Liberals want to allow a "reasonable" amount of  personable irresponsibility so that a person's life is not damaged permanently by some small indiscretion.  A problem is when does "reasonable" turn out to be "unreasonable?"  The boundary is ill defined.  Liberals tend to be social libertarians  whereas conservatives tend to be unfettered business libertarians.

A true conservative does not believe in debt, either in their personal lives or for government.  Many will not borrow money under any conditions: not to buy a car or even a home.  Though they might say otherwise, many liberals dote on debt, both in their personal lives and especially for government.  Thus conservatives are wary of big government and liberals feel that big government is needed to handle big problems and is a social good.

All this led me to develop a phrase many years ago that "Liberals may want to get into our wallets but conservatives want to get into our bedrooms."  Liberals gravitate to the Democratic Party, conservatives gravitate to the Republican Party.  One has only to look at the present election to see this phrase in action.

As an aside, what about libertarians?  They are torn between the Democratic Party where the social libertarian strictures are and the Republican Party where the unfettered business oriented libertarians are. There is a Libertarian Party, of course, that is not very influential.  It turns out, therefore, that libertarians congregate in the Republican Party where the anti-government, unfettered business faction is.

More recently, I have discovered another definition that has a lot of merit: liberals emphasize groups (Blacks, women, Hispanics, unions, lawyers) and community whereas conservatives emphasize individualism,  family, and community.  You can see this when Hillary Clinton wrote a book "It Takes A Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us."  On the other hand, Bob Dole in his acceptance speech for Republican candidate for President said "... it does not take a village to raise a child. It takes a family to raise a child."  There is much to be said about what I call the Kansas conservative, a rugged individualist, but when someone's barn burns down, the community rises to rebuild it.  As one farmer said, "We were doing all right before 'gimmie' politics."  If a community is destroyed by something like a natural disaster, liberals have government step in to help restore the community.  It is the difference between the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake where the Federal government did not get involved  and the 2005New Orleans Hurricane Katrina where the Federal government got heavily involved in the recovery.

You can see it again in President Obama's statement when he said "If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet." **  This created a firestorm among many "self-made" business people who worked very hard to create their business, and thus feel they did it all by themselves.  Creating a successful business IS HARD, and I doubt that President Obama would dispute that.  Only 51% of new businesses last more than five years***  So I wish President Obama hadn't used a phrase like "you didn't do that" and "somebody else made that happen." He could have made the point less insulting, I believe (e.g "We stand on the shoulders of giants," for example). But without the community, we wouldn't be nearly the advanced nation we are now.  The internet was developed by the USAID.****  Another modern marvel is GPS that was developed by the DoD.  But once again see the difference between a group/community centered approach (liberalism) and individualism/community (conservative).

What about wanting a strong military?  This issue is complex.  When the Solid South was in the Democratic party, they were the war party: WW-I, WW-II, Korea, and the big buildup in Viet Nam.  The Republican Party tended to be isolationist; however, when the Solid South became the Southern Strategy of the Republican Party, the Republican Party became the war party but the isolationist wing is still there too.  I think maybe that conservatives feel that you cannot be too safe and therefore approve of a strong military far beyond what is needed.

Note added August 31,2012:  The conservative (center right) columnist David Brooks has written an op=ed piece for the NY Times that seems to be in agreement with much of the above: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/31/opinion/party-of-strivers.html?ref=davidbrooks

For a further commentary on liberalism, see "In The End Liberalism Wins" (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2009/12/in-end-liberalism-wins.html)


* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Takes_a_Village
** http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2012/07/17/foxification_rescuing_romney.html
*** http://www.businessknowhow.com/startup/business-failure.htm
**** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Internet

A DANGEROUS TREND

I hadn't intended to write this item and thought we were beyond such things, but apparently the Roman Catholic Church wants to get involved in the American electoral process even to the point of publishing a dark, dreadful anti-Obama advertisement (although they do not mention him by name).  I am reluctant to cite the advertisement, but I guess I must for credibility  (http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=D9vQt6IXXaM&hd).  I address several concerns below.

It has long been my observation that aggressive minorities rule a nation.  This is true of Iraq where the minority Sunni's control the Shiites. Yes, both are Muslims, but they hate each other.  It is true of Syria where the Alawite Muslim minority control a country where 79% of the people are Sunni Muslims.

In the United State, the Roman Catholic Church is increasingly getting involved in U.S. Politics and trying to impose their religious restrictions on all of the U.S. citizens.  It looks like the Roman Catholic Church is trying to do the same in the U.S. as we see in Muslim nations and with only 22% of the population.  Note that 6 members of the Supreme Court are Roman Catholics, two are Jews, and one is Protestant.  Fortunately these justices do not vote as a block.  The Republican Party had a candidate running for the Republican nomination that seemed to be taking orders directly from the Pope - Rick Santorum.  Fortunately, he did not get the nomination, however, he did surprisingly well in the process.  Though U.S. Protestant  Evangelicals were formerly against Roman Catholicism, the Catholics managed to get their cooperation for Santorum.

The Republican Vice-Presidential  candidate Paul Ryan is Roman Catholic, however,  and has proposed bills that would restrict the American public from certain freedoms such as abortion which Ryan would criminalize even in cases of rape and incest and cosponsored the Sanctity of Life Act where a fertilized egg should have all the rights of "personhood!"  This act also would criminalize the right to in vitro fertilization* and some forms of birth control like the intrauterine device.  It used to be that life started at birth when the baby took a breath.

Not surprisingly he also opposes "Don't Ask-Don't Tell", same sex marriage and the right of gays to adopt.  He voted against the Hate Crimes Prevention Act.  Perhaps some solace can be taken in that Ryan as vice-President may be able to do less social harm than he could in Congress.

Although church's are exempt from requiring birth control items in health insurance for their employees, the Roman Catholic Church strongly opposes giving them to employees at non-sectarian organizations like hospitals and schools that they may own.  You might even get the impression from them that Catholic employees are required to take birth control methods, though such is definitely not the case.  It is said, however, that 98% of Catholic women have taken birth control measures at some point in their lives.  The Catholic church would take this right away by law for all of us.  Some like the Catholic church surrogates manage to warp this around to saying they are giving us more freedom not less!

The Catholic Church likes to say that their first amendment rights are being taken away; although religious rights of churches are not guaranteed by the First Amendment.  I have covered this elsewhere in an item called Church and State (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/#uds-search-results), but to mention just a few, polygamy is against the law though the first amendment right was appealed to by the Mormon Church and the pacifist Quakers have to pay their full tax and not subtract something for funding our military.  They too claimed a First Amendment right.  Of course they are small denominations and perhaps with 22% of the population Roman Catholics can change the meaning of the law from its historical precedence.

If you aren't worried, you should be!

* According the Mother Jones, a least three of Ryan's sons have used IVF to have children.

Note added August 19, 2012: It seems that some of Ryan's stands are even too much for some Roman Catholic officials:  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/19/opinion/sunday/dowd-beware-a-beautiful-calm.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120819

Note added August 21, 2012:  Republican nominee Todd Aiken for the Senate in Missouri against Claire McCaskill came out with a gaff, "Legitimate rape rarely causes pregnancy" that have generated calls within the Republican Party to replace him.  He has also called for an end to the Ntional School Lunch Program, repeated his earlier claim that student loans are like stage 3 cancer, and that Civil rights should be re-litigated (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2012/08/21/could-todd-akins-gaffe-actually-help-the-gop-in-missouri/)

WHERE IS REGULATION NEEDED?

(This post is modified from one on the Motley Fool METAR  Board.)

There are many industries that can be deregulated. Interstate trucking was regulated by the "Commerce Clause" (Interstate  Commerce Act of 1887) but was finally deregulated by Jimmy Carter in the Motor Carrier Act off 1980.  The industry went through a difficult two years afterward of mergers and failures. A relative who worked in this industry said that ultimately he thought the consumer benefitted. The airline passenger industry may be another.  It was regulated by the Air Mail Act of 1925 and the Air Commerce Act of 1926.  Its deregulation was completed by President Carter in 1978.  I'm not sure in this case that the flux in the conversion is over yet, though I'm sure that over all there are benefits to the consumer.

Financial institutions cannot be degregulated. We are seeing the problems of doing so in our present economic situation (We are seeing that more regulation of derivatives is needed, not less.), but we are not alone. Financial institutions continue to be scandelous. The laundering scandal by Standard Chartered Bank involving $250 BILLION has followed hard on the scandal of involving lying about their LIBOR rates, principally by Barclay's. I take little comfort in these two scandals, brought to light just this year, are not primarily involving U.S. financial institutions.  Subpoenas for the scandal have now been received by Citigroup and J.P. Morgan Chase as well as by Deutsche Bank, HSBC, and Royal Bank of Scotland.

We have seen that financial insitutions will take every opportunity to make a quick buck, will lie, and cheat. It is very difficult to make them stick to their honest business of taking in money at some interest rate and loaning it out at another in a responsible way.

I am hardly alone in thinking that some financial insitutions have gotten too big and too diversified. Even David Stockman (Ronald Reagan's first OMB chief) feels that Glass-Steigal needs to be reinstated.


http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/08/14/158790727/british-bank-agrees-to-340-million-settlement-over-laundering-charges
http://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/the-smarter-mutual-fund-investor/2012/08/10/the-libor-scandal-and-you
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19276506
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/opinion/paul-ryans-fairy-tale-budget-plan.html?src=me&ref=general

THE ISLAND OF GRANADA IN THE NEWS

The only athlete from the island country of Granada (The Spice Island) in the Lesser Antilles,  19-yrs-old Kirani James wins the gold medal at Olympics in the men's 400 meters sprint.  He is the only gold medal winner ever from Granada and is on an athletic scholarship at the Univ. Alabama: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirani_James  Granada has an estimated population of only 110,000 and occupies only 133 sq mi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grenada).

You remember Granada.  President Ronald Reagan was feared to start WW-III before he was elected, even by some in his own party.  But he fooled everyone and eventually even evolved to become an advocate for the reduction in nuclear weapons.  One thing you can say about him, when he chose to go to war, he at least picked someone we can beat.  He had the U.S. invade Granada in 1983 to presumably to save some medical students:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada_(1983)

SALT CONTENTS OF FOODS

Recently there has been an e-mail going around that mentions certain drinks and how much sugar they have, graphically representing it by sugar cubes.  It says someone should do this about salt (sodium).  I cannot supply the elegant pictures but I can tell you a lot about the sodium content of foods.

Incidentally, a low sodium diet is considered to be 1,100 mg/day sodium (but above 700 mg), about half the "normal day's allowance."

It is very difficult to get any prepared food that is both low sodium and low fat. The general rule is that any low or no fat food has higher sodium content than the full fat equivalent, perhaps to replace the loss of taste.

Sodium-rich Foods1. Bread is one of the worst things you can eat from a sodium standpoint - 1 normal slice = 300 mg. so two slices = 600 mg so two slices of regular sliced bread takes you more than half the way to a low sodium diet, and you haven't done anything to it yet. The best you can do (aside from making your own) is to buy thin-sliced bread like Arnold's Melba-Thin rye bread that cuts the sodium content in half.  English muffins (only one) is somewhat better also.  Italy used to be different.  They had a tax on salt so you used to be able (and maybe you still can) buy no-sodium added bread.
2. Five Mario Manzanilla pimento stuffed green olives contain 330 mg of sodium
3. Two tablespoons of Ken's light Caesar salad dressing is 320 mg of sodium.
4. Two tablespoons Kraft Thousand Island salad dressing is 270 mg of sodium.
5. Packaged cheese slices are very sodium rich.  For example, 1 sl of Borden's fat-free sharp cheddar cheese (21 gms or less than 1 oz) is 270 mg of sodium whereas 1 sl of their regular sharp cheddar cheese is 290 mg, but 1 oz of  Food Lion block sharp cheddar cheese (28 gm) is 180 mg of sodium.
6. Cold cuts are sodium rich, but if you search around, you may find some cold cuts are markedly less sodium rich than others.  Don't be surprised if the lower salt cold cuts turn out to be ham.

Reduced Sodium Foods
1.  You can find reduced sodium bacon.
2.  I kind of hate to say this but most desserts are low sodium.

Sodium-free foods:
(no food is completely sodium free and sodium free usually means no salt added)
A. Sweet-cream butter has no salt added so it is low in sodium.  Regular butter has 14 mg of sodium per tablespoon.
B. Frozen single vegetables  (e.g., just green beans or just peas) have no salt added, but frozen vegetable medleys (mixed carrots and green beans) or with sauce may have quite a bit of salt.  For example, 1 cup of fresh green beans or peas contains only 4 mg of sodium and will be listed on frozen packages as sodium free.
C. Prepared chicken or beef stock, no salt added, can be found, but chicken or beef broth will be loaded with sodium.
D. Rice is considered to be sodium free.
E. You can find no salt added dried potato flakes, but most powdered potato preparation are loaded with sodium.
F. Oil and vinegar salad dressings can be sodium free.  Balsamic vinegar, for example, is sodium free and I find no need to add the oil but oive oil is also sodium free.

There are sites on the internet that will give you the sodium content of natural foods.  One is by the Cleveland Clinic (that calls a low sodium diet to be less than 2000 mg rather than 1,100 mg as recommended in this post): http://my.clevelandclinic.org/healthy_living/nutrition/hic_low-sodium_diet_guidelines.aspx  Note that there value for American cheese is much larger than the value for block cheese given above.