IRS Scandal

The Obama administration needs to just own up to the fact that the IRS not only targeted tea-party and conservative non-profit applicants, but also covered it up once discovered, as FactCheck has reported.

One of the clearest cases of providing false information came from the IRS commissioner at the time, Douglas Shulman, an appointee of President George W. Bush.

At a March 22, 2012 hearing of the Ways and Means oversight subcommittee, Shulman was asked about reports of conservative groups being targeted and he assured the subcommittee that “there is absolutely no targeting.”

Boustany, March 22, 2012: Can you give us assurances that the IRS is not targeting particular groups based on political leanings?
Shulman: Thanks for bringing this up. I think there has been a lot of press about this and a lot of moving information. I appreciate the opportunity to clarify. First, let me start by saying yes, I can give you assurances….
What has been happening has been the normal back and forth that happens with the IRS. None of the alleged taxpayers, and obviously, I cannot talk about individual taxpayers, and I am not involved in these, are in an examination process. They are in an application process, which they moved into voluntarily.

There is absolutely no targeting. This is the kind of back and forth that happens when people apply for 501(c)(4) status.

That’s obviously false.
On May 21, Shulman testified before the Senate Finance Committee, along with Miller and Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George. Shulman said that he learned “sometime in the spring of 2012″ that “there was a list that was being used” to identify political groups for further review and that the term “tea party” was on the list. But, he added, that he did not know “the scope and severity of the list,” and he “did not have a full set of facts” until the IG report was issued earlier this month.
Sen. Orrin Hatch said that Shulman should have “corrected the record and you should have done it long before today.”

 Various IRS officials lied about the existence of “inappropriate criteria” for years and once the story broke, then they lied again saying they didn't know anything about it.  The administration claim to transparency is getting pretty dinged up by this.  They need to have some heads roll, and probably have a special investigator investigate possible crimes in the cover-up.

Oregon Petition to Repeal Citizens United

As I noted last December, the Oregon Legislature is considering a resolution to repeal the Citizens United decision.  Oregon residents can sign an online petition to voice support for that effort.

Punch Them in the Face

Fox news radio host Andrea Tantaros was on a rant against the Obama administration for intimidation of the press.   She got on a roll and ended up telling viewers to find Obama backers and "Punch them in the face".

That'll restore order to the country for sure.  I haven't heard what fox management has to say about that, as far as I know they haven't said anything.

GM Food Labeling by Bernie Sanders Shot Down

What do Sherrod Brown, Al Franken, Carl Levin, Amy Klobuchar, Kirsten GIllibrand and Elizabeth Warren all have in common?  They voted against an amendment sponsored by Bernie Sanders to allow states to require foods containing GMO ingredients to be labeled as such.  That is a stunning betrayal by these progressives and Bernie was pissed, decrying the corporate-controlled Senate.

I am frankly stunned at the votes, especially Warren.  In my view she has some explaining to do, as do all the Democrats who voted against it.  Jeff Merkley was a co-sponsor and both he and Ron Wyden voted for the amendment.

Monsanto Protection Act

A single GOP Senator apparently blocked consideration of an amendment to the Farm Act in the Senate.  Jeff Merkley wanted debate on repealing the "Monsanto Protection Act", but it was blocked.  Merkley said:

And what did this legislation do? This legislation, the Monsanto Protection Act, this legislation does something that I think most would find astounding. It allows the unrestricted sale and planning of new variants of genetically modified seeds that a court has ruled have not been properly examined for their effect on other farmers, the environment, and human health. Now obviously this raises a lot of concerns about the impact on farmers and the impact on human health.
But there’s even more. the fact that the act instructs seed producers to ignore a ruling of the court is equally troubling. It raises profound questions about the constitutional separation of powers and the ability of our courts to hold agencies accountable to the law and their responsibilities. I can tell you that this process and this policy has provoked outrage across the country.

 We should be outraged, hopefully the GOP is listening.

Wyden Tiptoes Past the Landmines Into Logging Issue

I'm not sure if this press release from Ron Wyden has any substance or is just fluff, he has announced his plan for a "framework" to design future legislation, but no legislation at this time.  It is full of good platitudes and congratulations from lots of people, but where's the beef?

The goal of this announcement is to get the greatest amount of local input while fleshing out the legislation.

Sounds great, but tickets on the Titanic were a hot item once upon a time too.  Lots of people from Kitzhaber to Merkley to Joe Gonyea III, Partner, Timber Products Company bubbled about how great this was, but the heavy lifting is still on the horizon.

The Oregon and California Railroad Reinvestment Lands, known as O&C Lands, are 2.4 million acres of federal land spread across 18 Oregon counties and largely managed by the Bureau of Land Management.
“Oregon’s O&C lands are truly unique among federal land holdings and deserve separate treatment within the confines of the O&C Act,” Wyden said. “At the same time, forest managers have learned a great deal about conservation, clean air and water and habitat preservation since the Act was adopted and it must be updated to reflect that progress.  This update must also give new life to the original guarantee of jobs and timber production in the Act.”
Wyden is asking for specific input on which O&C lands will be designated for sustainable harvest and which will be set aside for permanent conservation. He plans to refine that map over the summer with input from representatives of local communities, federal, state and local forestry experts, tribal and conservation leaders. Senator Wyden is also seeking input on the rules for carrying out both sustainable harvest and preservation over the long term.

 We got a long way to go before this one is in the bag, this issue has been gridlocked for years.

Patent Trolls on the Run

Lawsuits are being filed and legislation being passed in Vermont, and the patent trolls face an aggressive obstacle to pursuing their goals of easy extortion.  While Federal legislation is still being considered, Vermont has forged ahead with State Legislation that causes the trolls to face financial risk if they send out their usual threatening letters demanding hush money.  If they do not document the specific rights (patent number, patent owner and the specific violation they are asserting), they can instead be prosecuted for making a false claim and fined heavily.  Good news that these hemorrhoids are getting their just rewards.

Curry County Oregon will change

The Public Safety Property Tax levy was soundly defeated in Curry County, so what's next?

What Sheriff John Bishop believes he’s facing after Tuesday’s defeat of a public safety property tax is hardly the stuff of childhood Wild, Wild West games.

Throughout the past several months, Bishop has also related to the board his worst fears: criminals running rampant, no one available to respond to even the worst of crimes – and then, if an arrest is made, nowhere to put the perpetrator.

He’s spoken of the “Mexican Mafia,” insurance rates on homeowners and businesses increasing, the county’s liabilities and his obligations to maintain the safety and welfare of the citizens.

Tax measure 8-71 would have increased Curry County’s tax rate from 59.9 cents per $1,000 assessed valuation an additional $1.97 per $1,000 for those living in unincorporated Curry County and $1.84 per $1,000 for those living in the county’s three cities.

“It’s unfortunate that we were not able to inform the citizens well enough with regards to the importance of the levy,” said Commissioner David Brock Smith, by and large the measure’s biggest supporter. “And it would have been much easier to inform citizens if we’d had a unified board. The only organized opposition was the city of Brookings; I don’t know what their motives are for the opposition. Only time will tell.”

However one County Commissioner, Susan Brown was bubbly, she opposed the levy.

“Now we need to get to work.” said Commissioner Susan Brown, the holdout against the measure on the commission board. “I think it’s an opportunity – a huge opportunity. We’ll sit with the citizens and see see what we can do. It’s all good.” 

We'll see about that, doesn't sound so good to me.  The Cities of Brookings and Gold Beach have their own law enforcement, but residents in unincorporated areas are pretty much on their own. People are saying the State may have to intervene if law enforcement becomes non existent and they plan to close the jail and release all the criminals.  The State might enforce some local income tax levy to keep law enforcement going.

The Dog

OK, I hate schmaltzy stories, but for the elderly woman who found her dog in the wreckage of Moore, OK while being interviewed on camera,  I'll make an exception to the rule.

Apple Says "We Pay Our Taxes", Well, Some of Them

The CEO's of big multinational enterprises have to be masters of using words to justify avoiding unnecessary responsibilities, like US Income tax.  This CNN article has some of the back and forth between Tim Cook, Apple CEO and Carl Levin and John McCain.  They start off by calling him a liar, then they get into the meat of the issue.

Michigan Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, and ranking member John McCain of Arizona both started the hearing with withering criticism of Apple's practice of shifting income to Ireland to avoid paying U.S. taxes.
Levin, a Democrat, called the practice a "sham," while McCain, a Republican, said that Apple's claims that it use of the Irish subsidiary did not reduce its U.S. taxes is "demonstrably false."
"U.S. corporations cannot continue to avoid paying their appropriate share in taxes," said McCain. "Our military can't afford it. Our economy cannot endure it. And the American people will not tolerate it."

"Apple is a great company, but no company should be able to determine how much it's going to pay in taxes...using all kinds of gimmicks to avoid paying the taxes that should be paid to this country," Levin said. "The people know it's not right."
Even the critics of Apple at the hearing did not claim that it was doing anything illegal with its tax strategy, they were only saying that the way the current tax system is now set up was bad policy.

In a related article, CNN explains how some of their tax gimmicks worked.

The 10-page overview of tax principles and law in the middle -- a history of how a program to block the use of offshore tax havens begun by President Kennedy was riddled with loopholes introduced by Congress -- is almost impenetrable.
Yet you need to wrap your mind around how Subpart F of the U.S. Tax Code was undermined by the so-called check-the-box and look-through rules in order to understand how Apple, by the subcommittee's calculations, was able to legally avoid paying U.S. taxes on $44 billion of income over a four-year period.
In one two-year span, according to the report, Apple was able to make $35 billion in income disappear through the check-the-box loophole and avoid paying $12.5 billion in U.S. taxes, or $17 million a day. The trick, as illustrated by the chart above, was to have billions in profits and dividends from overseas operations made payable to Apple Operations International, Apple's Irish subsidiary that by the company's own description is, for tax purposes, resident neither in the U.S. nor in Ireland.

 The report prepared by the Senate committee noted that:

At the same time as the U.S. federal debt has continued to grow – now surpassing $16 trillion the U.S. corporate tax base has continued to decline, placing a greater burden on individual taxpayers and future generations. According to a report prepared for Congress:

“At its post WWII peak in 1952, the corporate tax generated 32.1% of all federal tax

revenue. In that same year the individual tax accounted for 42.2% of federal revenue,

and the payroll tax accounted for 9.7% of revenue. Today, the corporate tax accounts for

8.9% of federal tax revenue, whereas the individual and payroll taxes generate 41.5% and

40.0%, respectively, of federal revenue.”

 Incidentally, Ireland was pissed about being called a Tax Haven.

Tornadoes

I grew up in the Midwest, just outside of Kansas City, and we had lots of violent spring weather but I never saw a Tornado until my Senior year of high school.  I remember well the drills in school where we would line the school hallways sitting with our backs to the walls.  On stormy spring evenings in Kansas, my sisters and I would lay on a blanket and watch funnel clouds form briefly overhead, we'd Ohhh and gasp when a particularly good one appeared overhead.  It seemed more like fun than a big danger.  It always seemed to me that a tornado actually hitting where I was just wouldn't happen, but the years 1965 and 1966 were active ones, culminating with a F5 ripping through the middle of Topeka Kansas, following a F5 in Shawnee Kansas the year before.  Both produced fatalities.  I had to take cover a couple of times during close calls in those years.


The Oklahoma Tornadoes give us a picture of the destruction a tornado can do when it passes through a densely populated area, the pictures of Moore, OK were chilling, no structures left standing in the path of the funnel.  Take a minute and treasure your life and health, and pray for those who lost everything.

Ron Wyden - Follow the Money Act

Ron Wyden and Lisa Murkowski have introduced the Follow the Money Act to restore transparency to the murky Ads that saturate our media.

Like clockwork, there’s something voters have come to count on with each election: more and more anonymous advertisements sponsored by mysterious, innocuous-sounding groups, voicing support or opposition for a candidate. These groups are taking advantage of loopholes and lax enforcement and leaving voters to wonder who these people are, where the money came from and about their true agendas. Voters can’t be detectives — they want to know who is behind political ads and what their hidden agenda may be before they vote.
To ensure transparency and strengthen enforcement, we have introduced the Follow the Money Act — the first comprehensive and bipartisan campaign finance reform bill to be offered in the Senate in more than a decade. We believe this bill accomplishes two major goals: It requires full transparency on the part of independent political spenders who intend to influence our vote and imposes costly sanctions on those who believe that evading the law is simply a cost of doing business in the independent political realm. This legislation is necessary to restore the faith of Americans in our democratic process.

 Sen. Ron Wyden is a Democrat from Oregon; Sen. Lisa Murkowski is a Republican from Alaska.

To sign the Petition supporting the Follow the Money Act, click here.

Oregon History from WWII

The distance of the US mainland from the fighting in WWII protected us from most of the effects of warfare, but not completely.  There were several attempts to attack the US, most pretty unsuccessful.

The Fire Balloons released from the Japanese mainland resulted in the only deaths in the US attributed to the enemy.  A balloon had landed near Klamath Falls, OR, was found by a group of students and their teacher.  Five students and 1 adult were killed when the explosives detonated.

In all, the Japanese released an estimated 9,000 fire balloons. At least 342 reached the United States. Some drifted as far as Nebraska. Some were shot down.
Some caused minor damage when they landed, but no injuries. One hit a power line and temporarily blacked out the nuclear-weapons plant at Hanford, Washington.
But the only known casualties from the 9,000 balllons — and the only combat deaths from any cause on the U.S. mainland — were the five kids and their Sunday school teacher going to a picnic.

There were also two aircraft bombings in Oregon near Brookings, neither one having much effect.  A light bomber was carried by submarine to the Oregon Coast, dropped two incendiary bombs inland hoping to start a wildfire, but the forest was damp and the winds light, and fire crews suppressed the fires.

On the ground, forest service lookout Howard Gardner heard what sounded to be a Model A Ford backfiring when the bomb hit. He scanned the foggy skies and caught a glimpse of the retreating airplane. When he called the ranger station to report it, the operator who received the call assumed it was just a patrol plane that had spooked the lookout. But when the fog lifted Gardner saw smoke. He called for help then set off towards the fire, which he assumed was a remnant from a lightning strike fire that had sparked the previous day. What he and his men found was a smoldering fire covering a circular area 50 to 75 feet across. They quickly got the fire under control and found a crater about three feet in diameter and about one foot deep at the centre of the site. Inside was evidence of intense heat, hot enough to fuse earth and rocks.

 Further investigation determined that a bomb had struck a fir tree. The bomb’s fin had sheared an oak tree. Fragments were scattered over an are 100 feet in diameter. It was clearly a bomb, though the men at the scene assumed it had been dropped accidentally by an American crew. Not until the bomb’s nose cone as well as a casing fragment was found the next day with Japanese markings did it become clear that this had actually been an enemy strike.

Also, the same submarine that was involved in the shelling had earlier in the war managed to shell a US military facility at the mouth of the Columbia River.

The only attack on a mainland American military site during World War II occurred on June 21, 1942, on the Oregon coastline. After trailing American fishing vessels to bypass minefields, the Japanese submarine I-25 made its way to the mouth of the Columbia River. It surfaced near Fort Stevens, an antiquated Army base that dated back to the Civil War. Just before midnight, I-25 used its 140-millimeter deck gun to fire 17 shells at the fort. Believing that the muzzle flashes of the fort’s guns would only serve to more clearly reveal their position, the commander of Fort Stevens ordered his men not to return fire. The plan worked, and the bombardment was almost totally unsuccessful—a nearby baseball field bore the brunt of the damage.

Nixonesque Presidency?

Are we tired of the burdens of Liberty and the Constitution?  Jonathan Turley thinks so, and he wrote a strong polemic on the subject that was picked up in the Washington's Blog today.  I'm not buying all the stuff about Obama being the worst of the lot, after all I think George W Bush was worse, but all in all that would be damning with faint praise for Obama.

Here is one highlight from the article that hits home to me.

Nixon was known for his attacks on whistle-blowers. He used the Espionage Act of 1917 to bring a rare criminal case against Ellsberg. Nixon was vilified for the abuse of the law. Obama has brought twice as many such prosecutions as all prior presidents combined [and see this]. While refusing to prosecute anyone for actual torture, the Obama administration has prosecuted former CIA employee John Kiriakou for disclosing the torture program.

 I disagree with the premise that "Nixon was vilified for the abuse of the law."  He was impeached for involvement in the Watergate break-in, and in my view much of the rest of the assertions in the article about Nixon are an attempt to rewrite history.  George W Bush and Reagan did a lot of the same stuff.

I do agree however that our government (Congress and the Administration alike) has largely abandoned the inconvenient restrictions contained in the Constitution when they would thwart the goals of extremists in both bodies of government.  Come to think of it, I think the Supreme Court did the same in the "Citizen's United" ruling.

All the actors are capitalizing on fear, and using that fear to trample on our civil rights, as well as engage in barbaric excesses of torture and incarceration at Guantanamo.

George Orwell had it right that the rulers need a state of constant war to get everyone to accept breaching our constitution.

New DeFazio title - Troll Hunter

Peter DeFazio is on the hunt, his targets are business shakedown artists known as Patent Trolls.

Representatives Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) introduced the SHIELD Act, which would create a "loser pays" system for some types of patent litigants. The bill is meant to stymie companies that do nothing more than file patent lawsuits.

You know, people are really smart. It's like regulating Wall Street. You regulate this one product, and they can figure out a new one. But we're trying to have a standard that a normal human—and a judge—could understand.
They could plead at the beginning of the case. Establish the status of the entity that is the plaintiff. And if they come up as a non-practicing entity, or a troll, under these definitions, then they know if they go forward, they're on the hook. We're making [the fee-shifting] mandatory, if the defendant prevails. Last time we left a lot more discretion for the judge. This time we're narrowing that, so it's a clearer message.
The second thing we're also putting in is some bonding. If it's established they are going to be on the hook in this case for the fees, if they don't prevail, then they're going to have to bond.

I previously blogged on a variation of this, copyright trolls who aim their suits at individual consumers who download movies using BitTorrent.  Those Trolls fall into the same category, opportunistic shakedown artists..

Blumenauer and Agriculture

Earl Blumenauer has throughout his career focused on farming and Agriculture, and this may be the year something gets done.  Many of his proposals are focused on eliminating big subsidies to Agribusiness and eliminating wasteful or ineffective programs, and if all survive will save $380 Billion over 5 years.  It has very bipartison support, with the super conservative Heartland Institute and the Leftist Public Citizen both on board.  How can it miss?  Well this is Congress, they'll probably find a way.

Among the subsidies that could be eliminated, many of which require taxpayers to pay the bill for pollution and assume the risk for failure: royalty-free oil and gas leases in federal waters ($53 billion), the corn ethanol tax credit ($6 billion), loan guarantees for nuclear power plant construction ($18.5 billion) and crop insurance ($30 billion).

For a summary of the benefits of the legislation, click here.   According to the Senate Agriculture Committee press release, the bill has overwhelming support.

Freedom Of The Press?

The Department of Justice secretly obtained the phone records of the Associated Press in what the AP calls a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into news-gathering operations.  The records were for a 2 month period and included the office, home and cell numbers of  individual reporters and editors as well as phones in various AP offices and the AP line at the House of Representatives.  The records would not have included the contents of the calls, but would have shown the phone numbers of people or agencies that reporters called, and could have included numbers of those who called reporters and the length of the conversations.  The records were from a year ago, and the world is only now learning that it happened.  The reason behind the tap is unclear, but prosecutors have been investigating how the AP learned of an al Qaeda plot in Yemen before it was public last year.
Reactions came from around the world, unanimously negative.

• The American Civil Liberties Union called the subpoenas "an unacceptable abuse of power."  “Freedom of the press is a pillar of our democracy, and that freedom often depends on confidential communications between reporters and their sources.”
• "There can be no possible justification for such an overbroad collection of the telephone communications of the Associated Press and its reporters," Gary B. Pruitt, president and chief executive of the Associated Press, said in a letter to Holder.
• The Guardian said  "Although Obama was elected on a liberal ticket in 2008 and again in 2012, his administration has mounted a sustained campaign through the courts and other means against whistleblowers, particularly in relation to what it claims are sensitive intelligence matters."
• House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) called the DOJ subpoena “very disturbing” in an article in The Hill.
• The National Press Club said "This appears to be a gross violation of press freedom," said National Press Club President Angela Greiling Keane, a Bloomberg News reporter. "If there's a good explanation for this, the public has a right to hear it promptly."
• 
  Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/05/13/5417366/national-press-club-requests-explanation.html#storylink=cpy
  Senator Patrick Leahy, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement emailed to AP: "I am very troubled by these allegations and want to hear the government's explanation.

Yeah, I want to hear it too.

•  
  •  

Lady Justice pays attention to gold in her scales

The Enron rot and the new twist of the Jeffrey Skilling case points to the moral rot in the DOJ. In a bizarre twist, the DOJ will reduce his sentence by 10 years because,

In a revised sentencing agreement announced late last week, federal prosecutors cited the “extraordinary resources” required to litigate Skilling’s appeals as justification for reducing his sentence by more than 10 years. NBC News reports that in exchange, “Skilling would give up all of his remaining rights to appeal” and “he also would give up any claims to the $40 million he was ordered to forfeit” to the Enron victims fund. Reuters notes that such a sum – which will be handed over to a “depleted” victims fund – “pales in comparison” to the “$70 million Skilling has spent on legal fees.”

The result is that Skilling is being effectively deemed Too Big to Keep in Jail – a classification in which the government cites economic cost rather than exonerating evidence as a basis for prosecutorial leniency.
If this seems eerily similar to what we saw a few months ago with the Obama administration’s refusal to prosecute HSBC, that’s because it is. Just as the Justice Department back then cited potential economic fallout as a rationale to avoid prosecuting Wall Street lawbreakers (Too Big to Jail), we see today prosecutors citing financial costs as a rationale to reduce Skilling’s prison time (Too Big to Keep In Jail).

So in short, he bought his way out of jail, and his legal team is rolling in dough to the tune of $70 million. 

As Matt Taibbi reported in Rolling Stone about the unequal standards of Justice in the US today, consider the case of Curtis Wilkerson in Whittier, CA, he impulsively tried to shoplift a $2.50 pair of socks in 1995 and would be sentenced to life in prison. He's still there 18 years later, along with other third-strike people who committed minor misdemeanors, but weren't rich enough to buy their way out of prison.

Joys of Home Ownership

In a one-month period, I got to be on first-name terms with a bunch of home-repair people, seemed like everything in my 100 year-old home went out at once.

• The Spring on my Garage Door broke, trapping my wifes car inside.  Metro Overhead Door did a good job responding and fixing it.
• The sewer started backing up into the basement.  Pro Drain did a stellar job responding the same day and rooting out a root clog.
• The Dishwasher wasn't cleaning much of anything.  Reliable Appliance Repair took care of that in a snap.
• The hot water heater stopped heating.  Stan the Hot Water Man took care of that very quickly.
• Ants started invading in the kitchen.  Petes Pest control to the rescue.  According to Pete, this is going to be a good year for him, with the warm winter we just had, the ants are in party mode.

Not So Free Trade

Who's side is government on, Main Street or Wall Street?  The multi-national corporate domination steamroller continues to lead the US in a race to the bottom in quality of life on earth.  Rep Alan Grayson (D-FL) is raising the alarm on a trade deal being negotiated that has some alarming provisions according to the article in Huffington Post.

Known as a "NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) with Europe," the "partnership" is actually a deal between multinational corporations and their minions in government. It features "investor-state" dispute resolution, which would permit foreign corporations to file lawsuits to prevent government actions that they don't like, such as health, environmental and safety regulations.

Interesting concept, but it has degenerated into handcuffs on government, slapped on at will by special interests. Let's say your country or state passes a consumer protection law -- such as one that says fishing companies must label tuna caught using methods that kill dolphins. A Mexican corporation that sells tuna in the United States might declare this is a "non-tariff barrier" to trade, undercutting Mexican sellers of tuna versus American ones (though it applies equally to both).
Under the guise of a "free trade" agreement, the government could be sued, and have the dolphin-safe tuna law overturned.
This actually happened, in 2012. The World Trade Organization ruled against the American dolphin-safe tuna labeling law. So this is not just a theoretical possibility. "These provisions elevate corporations to the level of nation states and allow them to sue governments over nearly any law or policy which reduces their future profits," the Sierra Club warns.
Canada has been sued under a similar clause in NAFTA for refusing to export its water. Canada has also  been sued for keeping a pollutant out of its gasoline supply, and for taxing windfall profits by oil companies. This next wave of trade agreements may prioritize corporate rights over the privacy of our personal data, restrict regulation on fracking and (as Senator Elizabeth Warren [D-Mass.] has warned) roll back much-needed rules on large banks.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has probably never met a regulation it didn't want to repeal or violate. The chamber is even arguing that the Volcker Rule, which restricts gambling with tax-payer protected deposits by large banks, violates U.S. trade policy.

 The US government has a terrible track record on international trade issues, and President Obama has continued in the footsteps of past administrations.  Public Citizen has noted that after one year of a trade agreement with South Korea, we're worse off in terms of our trade deficit with them.

Just-released government trade data, covering the first year of implementation of the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement (FTA), shows a remarkable decline in U.S. exports to Korea and a rise in imports from Korea, provoking a dramatic trade deficit increase that defies the Obama administration’s promises that the pact would expand U.S. exports and create U.S. jobs, Public Citizen said today.

Many of the sectors that the Obama administration promised would be the biggest beneficiaries of the Korea FTA have actually been some of the deal’s largest losers:

• U.S. pork exports to Korea have declined 24 percent under the first year of the FTA relative to the year before FTA implementation.
• U.S. beef exports have fallen 8 percent.
• U.S. poultry exports have plunged 41 percent.

The U.S. deficit with Korea in autos and auto parts increased 16 percent in the first year of the FTA. U.S. auto imports from Korea have surged by more than $2.5 billion under the FTA’s first year. FTA proponents have shamelessly touted “gains” in U.S. auto exports without revealing that this increase totaled just $130 million, with fewer than 1,000 additional U.S. automobiles sold in Korea relative to the 1.3 million Korean cars sold here in 2012.
Read additional analysis of the government data on U.S. trade with Korea under the U.S.-Korea FTA.

A Perfect Fiscal Storm in Southern Oregon

In Southeastern Oregon, a perfect fiscal storm has been brewing for years, and Josephine and Curry counties are facing the prospect of bankruptcy, with unknown consequences.  According to an audit prepared by the Secretary of State, the county has already reduced services to a dangerous level.

Curry has the second lowest property tax rate in Oregon and is heavily reliant on federal timber payments.  The county’s unemployment rate has remained high, and spending on public safety is in the bottom 10 among counties.

 According to an article in the Oregonian, time is about to run out, sooner for Curry county, but Josephine is not far behind.

The spreading sense of crisis is coming to a head this month, with officials at the local, state and federal level all feeling pressure to head off the threat of what some darkly describe as Oregon's "zombie counties."

In Salem, legislators are working on legislation that would allow the state to take over some county functions. More drastically, they are considering a bill that would allow the governor -- with the approval of legislative leaders and local officials -- to impose a temporary local income tax to preserve basic police, court and jail operations.
 In Washington, D.C., legislation aimed at increasing logging on federal timberlands in western Oregon is starting to move through Congress after being stalled for years, and pressure is building on Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., to take charge of the process.
Wyden, the new chairman of the committee with jurisdiction over federal forests, promises to come up with a strategy and timeline this month for putting together a bill he thinks can pass Congress and be signed into law.
He says local approval of levy requests would help him sell lawmakers on the plan, which Wyden has already said would include extending federal timber payments to the counties for another year or two.
If those measures pass, he said, "it takes off the table the issue that these communities aren't stepping up."

Josephine and Curry have the lowest tax rates in Oregon and voters have stubbornly kept it that way.  At some point their wounds may be deemed to be largely self inflicted, and they may get higher taxes forced on them by whoever has to bail them out.  If voters turn down the public safety levy on the ballot this month in both counties, their law enforcement will completely collapse, it's on life support already.  They will close their jails and who knows what's next?

"We can't ignore it," said Rep. Bruce Hanna, R-Roseburg, adding that a governor can't simply tell the public that it's not safe to travel through some counties.

Focus on Beauty

Bob Dylan called Liam Clancy the greatest ballad singer ever.  He brought Irish music to the world in a quiet way.  Here is his performance of And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda.  Joan Baez also sang the song, and her pure voice is beautiful.

Banks don't get it, may get sued once again

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said Monday he intends to sue Bank of America and Wells Fargo for failing to help struggling homeowners.  This is a poster child case in the Financial Services Industry, they reach a settlement after committing mass felonies, pay a fine and promise to be good, then go back to committing more crimes.

The New York AG was involved in negotiating the first $25 Billion settlement last year, and now he has notified the Settlement Monitors that he will sue the banks for failing to honor the agreement. 

“Wells Fargo and Bank of America have flagrantly violated those obligations, putting hundreds of homeowners across New York at greater risk of foreclosure,” Schneiderman said in a statement. “I intend to use every tool available to my office to hold these companies accountable.”

“Like General Schneiderman, I continue to believe there are areas in which the banks must improve their treatment of their customers,” Joe Smith, monitor of the National Mortgage Settlement, said Monday. As part of the settlement, Smith may conduct reviews of the banks’ compliance and report them to the public. “As Monitor, I intend to use the full breadth of my power under the Settlement to hold the banks accountable,” he said.
Advocacy groups have grown weary of the settlement. At the time the deal was reached, consumer advocates were pleased that it included extensive servicing standards to prevent a repeat of the types of abusive foreclosure practices that ran rampant during the housing crisis. But within months of the agreement, housing counselors started to receive complaints that servicers were back to their old behavior.

The settlement monitor, Joseph Smith, says his office received 5,818 consumer complaints about servicers through February and hundreds more that came from professionals such as lawyers.

When oh when does somebody go to jail?

Oregon Coast Fishing at Depoe Bay

Depoe Bay, Oregon is home to fishing and Whale Watching charters, and I went out on the Mr. Max for a day of bottom fishing, we had a good day and got the limit on Ling Cod, we were actually throwing them back while trying to get a full catch of Rockfish.

H-1Bs and the Dream Work Force

The H-1B is an immigration program that once had specific aims to bring highly skilled immigrants with unique abilities into the US to provide our companies with knowledge that would advance our innovation and benefit all citizens.  It is a temporary permit to work in the US, and the worker must be sponsored and hired by a US company, and if the company or the worker ends the employment, the worker has to go home.  But the clever folks in the Multi-National corporations saw a gold mine, reduced costs and a captive pliable immigrant work force, coupled with tax breaks.  A bonanza indeed.

The program has been hijacked by the outsourcing industry, and along with offshoring is destroying opportunity in the US.  Imagine the joy it brings to US employers that they can get rid of their American IT  staff that on average makes $70,000 with good benefits and replace them with workers from Asia, primarily India, who will cost about $50,000 and no benefits.  And for icing on the cake, the H-1B staff can't leave their job for a better one in this country!

At the same time another breakthrough in technology was making its way into the picture.  The internet and communications technology advances meant that workers anywhere in the world could access computers anywhere else, thus bringing IT offshoring into the picture, and the H-1Bs and offshoring could be used in tandem.  The workers could come to the US as temporary workers, learn how to do the jobs of US workers, then go home and work from there, thus saving much, much more for the US companies.  And that's how it is being used today.  20% of H-1B petitions granted last year went to just four firms, all outsourcers.

In order to sell the H-1B as a good thing though, IT needed a cover story, so enter the phony worker shortage in the US.  We are told that:

America is being out-innovated by other countries, and Silicon Valley is in danger of withering as restrictive immigration policies lead to a drought of highly skilled workers.

A big part of the problem, say the tech billionaires and credulous pundits, is our higher education system, which somehow can't turn out nearly enough science-savvy grads. The buzzword of the year is "STEM," which stands for science, technology, engineering, and math. When it comes to STEM grads, we're falling behind the rest of the world, they say.

Don't believe it. There is no shortage of STEM graduates, and as I wrote ln February, Silicon Valley is pretending there is a labor shortage as it relentlessly lobbies to let in thousands of additional foreign IT workers under the H-1B visa program.

Although STEM sounds like a precise term, it turns out that different organizations tracking such info use different definitions for it. But the bottom line is clear: We're producing more and more scientists, mathematicians, and engineers every year. And we're innovating at a breakneck pace.

The United States leads the world in STEM grads, producing 348,484 in 2008, according to a report by Congress' Joint Economic Committee. The number of grads in engineering and science has grown enormously, increasing from just under 400,000 in 2000, to 494,000 in 2008, according to the National Science Foundation.

In this article the argument for reform is made.

Not every H-1B recipient gets abused, displaces an American or goes to work at an outsourcer. But the H-1B is ripe for reform.
No matter what you think of the H-1B program, we don't outsource to innovate. We outsource to cut costs. Cut enough, and eventually we can't innovate without outsourcing, as has happened in vast parts of what used to be our manufacturing economy. (See Producing Prosperity: Why America Needs A Manufacturing Renaissance, by Gary P. Pisano and Willy Shih.) It can happen to our IT economy, too. True, reformers rarely get what they hope for. When Upton Sinclair wrote The Jungle, he wanted labor reform, and instead got the Pure Food and Drug Administration. He rued, "I aimed for the public's heart and by accident hit them in the stomach."
The H-1B isn't supposed to aim at our wallets, except by boosting our collective brainpower. That's gone off track. Let's make sure we change the H-1B so it's no longer the outsourcing visa, but the innovation visa. 

Just business as usual. 

Should Oregon Sue Banks Over PERS Losses?

This seems to be a "Below the Radar" issue for most people, there has been virtually no media coverage, but once again the financial system has looted everybody with few consequences.  Lawsuits are proposed all across the country as a result of LIBOR rate manipulation by major banks.

It is estimated that municipalities in the U.S. have lost as much as $6 billion in interest income, as bond yields were artificially lowered because they were tied to LIBOR. In July 2012 the city of Baltimore became the first municipality to join a class action lawsuit demanding reparations for losses incurred due to LIBOR manipulation. Other city governments, groups of homeowners, small banks, and large investors have filed similar claims.

 Now the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is urging Oregon to join in the lawsuits, alleging that the State may be out $110 Million in PERS and other losses.

Service Employees International Union estimates LIBOR manipulation cost the Oregon Public Employees Retirement fund and other local groups more than $110 million.
State Treasurer spokesman, James Sinks, the state's securities litigation unit looks at any malfeasance that affects accounts.
"We have attorneys looking at that both in the public and private sector to see what the actual losses were and what the next step for Oregon should be."
Sinks says the state has $125 million in lawsuits pending against several banks including JP Morgan Chase and the Royal Bank of Scotland.

FactCheck Economy Report Card

FactCheck.org did a report card on the economy since President Obama took office and published some key statistics.  Make what you will of them, some good some not.

Summary Reviewing some key statistical measures of Barack Obama’s presidency so far, we find:

• The economy has added more jobs since Obama took office than it did in his predecessor’s entire eight years in office.
• Despite the improved economy, the number of people receiving food-stamp assistance has continued to grow, and now more people have been added to the food-stamp rolls under Obama than under any single previous president.
• Federal spending under Obama has grown faster than inflation, but far more slowly than it did under President Bush.
• Federal debt held by the public has grown by 90 percent since Obama took office.
• Obama has ordered seven times more drone strikes than Bush in the covert conflicts in Pakistan and Yemen, according to independent estimates.
• Domestic oil production has soared; oil imports have dropped by one-third; new cars are getting 17 percent better mileage; and wind and solar power have increased 157 percent.

The Pro Sports Tax Scam

The NFL doesn't pay any taxes, due to the unusual tax exemption awarded it by the Federal Government, something which Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) would put an end to.  He is sponsoring an amendment to the Marketplace Fairness Act, the Properly Reducing Overexemptions for Sports Act (or “PRO Sports Act”), that would end the corporate welfare loophole gained by the NFL and other Professional Sports Associations.

The uniqueness of the NFL’s 501(c)(6) status is that it got its tax exemption in 1966 legislation that established “professional football leagues” as a category of the (c)(6) business or trade association, otherwise defined by the IRS as ”business leagues, chambers of commerce, real estate boards, [and] boards of trade.” You can thank former commissioner Pete Rozelle for that nifty provision, included in legislation that also exempted the NFL from anti-trust provisions.

If the NFL were simply a business or trade association, it would be a 501(c)(6) because its “purpose is to promote the common business interest and not to engage in a regular business of a kind ordinarily carried on for profit.” However, Coburn’s amendment suggests that the NFL isn’t simply promoting the common business interests and value of the sport of football, but specifically acting like a business itself in increasing its profitability and the specific profitability of its members.

Not only are the 7-figure paychecks of the commissioners and top executives paid with tax-exempt dollars, the NFL teams also write-off the dues they pay to the NFL.  The NFL has a very lucrative logo licensing business (caps, jerseys, T-shirts, etc.) that is also tax exempt.  Similar arrangements exist with the PGA and the NHL.  Time for these tax leeches start paying their way.

Picking our Pockets

Move over too big to fail banks, there's another monopoly in town that has jacked up the cost of living to new heights, I'm talking internet monopoly here.  The Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) has published an article on its blog that points out that the companies dominating the internet broadband market (AT&T, Concast, Time Warner Cable, Verizon, et al) are selling internet internet access for about $500 / Year while it costs them less than $100 / subscriber, making a tidy 80% gross margin on that service.

How do they manage to keep this racket going?  Why the American way, they hire hundreds of lobbyists and partner with ALEC to buy protection against competition.  They do this with the Municipal Telecommunications Private Industry Safeguards Act the model legislation that outlaws communities efforts to build their own broadband networks, because that would be infringing on "Free Enterprise".  Such measures have now passed in 19 states, including our neighbors in Washington State. This is the worst of crony capitalism at work.
 

Portland - Graveyard of Polluting Equipment

Recently an article noted that Portland has become a dumping ground of Diesel equipment that can't legally operate in Washington or California because their standards are higher then Oregon. That lead to a finding that:

The latest federal evaluation of cancer risks estimated Multnomah County has more than 100 cancer cases per million people due to air toxics, 10 times higher than the national average.

 How bad is Air Pollution in Portland?  We don't really know because we only have one air pollution monitoring station in the Portland area in North Portland, and according to DEQ air quality expert Sarah Armitage commenting on a 2012 Pollution report,

Almost all the information in the recently released air toxics report comes from models, as opposed to air monitoring equipment that actually tests the air, Armitage explained. The model takes information DEQ has accumulated about which kinds of industries and pollution sources are operating where, accounts for weather and topography and estimates the concentrations of air pollutants.
DEQ has one air monitoring station in Northeast Portland that costs $150,000 a year to operate. Armitage said it would be nice to have more stations actually testing air quality, but that would be too expensive.
So, DEQ took the models of toxic air pollutants and compared them with a health benchmark of 1 case of illness per 1 million people.
Eight of the 19 toxins modeled at more than 10 times over that benchmark. That means they could cause 10 cases of illness for every 1 million people breathing the polluted air (the Portland metro area is home around 2.2 million people, according to the 2010 U.S. Census).

So our air pollution risk is based on models with assumptions on the risk.  Nonetheless, the models paint a pessimistic picture on what you're breathing every day.

Among the DEQ findings Armitage noted:

• There’s a tie for worst toxic air pollution offender between wood smoke and exhaust from cars and trucks.

• Benzene “really is everywhere, but we also saw it in patterns near the major highways.”

• 15 PAH “is distributed region-wide. There’s a uniform layer of it across the region.”

• Heavy metals were more neighborhood-based in “a very tight configuration around industry.”

• Hispanic and Latino populations were found to be at the highest risk from toxic air pollution because of residential wood-burning.

• 2 percent of homes in the metropolitan area are heated with wood, and air quality impacts from wood stoves “can be very local” – varying from block to block.

• People within 500 yards of heavily traveled roadways are at a higher risk from many toxins. “What we're seeing is a pattern of high concentrations within 500 yards of heavily traveled roadways.” The levels fall off around roadways “like a bell curve."

Gun Control falls to Politics

The legislation tightening background checks on gun sales failed, according to Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa who sponsored the bill, because Republicans couldn't stomach handing Obama a victory, even if the bill had bipartisan support.

"In the end it didn’t pass because we’re so politicized," Toomey told editors from Digital First Media in an interview published Wednesday by the Norristown Times Herald.

"There were some on my side who did not want to be seen helping the president do something he wanted to get done, just because the president wanted to do it," Toomey added.
His comments suggest that his fellow Republicans' votes weren't governed so much by judgment of good policy so much as a desire to deprive Obama of a political and legislative victory.

 That bodes ill for the next few years.  Gridlock again.