Poverty, Just More, Not Less

The Bloomberg....aka....Mayor Micheal Bloomberg....decided to devise a new method of identifying folks on welfare or those who are deserving to be called in the poverty class. So prior to his new method....nineteen percent of NY City was poverty-class folks. Now....thanks to the mayor.....we can readily say that around 23 percent should be identified as in the poverty level. Naturally....only the government....especially the Feds.....can help them. This only makes sense.....in New York City.

To some degree, the poverty scale has kinda stayed the same for maybe twenty years....and maybe Bloomberg was correct in adding other factors into this measure of his. But the truth is that living in NY City....is about as dumb as you can get. No, a guy making $24k a year or less.....can't make it.

My dad always had a reasoning or logic for cases such as this. When you live in a place where the cost of living is such that you can't live a decent life....then you pack and leave. You go somewhere where the work pays better or the lifestyle is cheaper. There is a balance to life. Picking a high-cost area works if you can pull in $50k a year or more. You can live a decent life in rural Alabama off $1200 a month (or least until fuel got costly in the past six months). I might be more inflated on my numbers and say $1400 is the necessary in Bama to get by these days. But the key point that my dad always made....if you can't live a life at one place.....you move.

If 23 percent of New York City residents are at a poverty-level.....one out of four....then I'd think its time to leave. Pack and go. Don't settle for this being your best deal for the rest of your life. There are thousands of jobs in America.....outside of New York City.....and life might be a heck of alot better.

There is a behavior here at work....an addiction to just staying there....and sipping the poverty drink everyday.....just accepting this and getting by. I don't buy it....but these guys do. They won't move to Kentucky. They won't look for work in Colorado. They won't seek out better job conditions in Huntsville. Bloomberg may be right that the formula is wrong....but just getting another $300 in government funding to cover better poverty....doesn't fix anything.....it just lessens the pain for another day.....another week....another month....another year. Thats all you get.

The IndyMac Failure

I will offer a short opinion of the IndyMac banking failure in California. Who is at fault?

Well....it starts with the congress and senate. Yep.....I think all the members of the senate and housing banking committee should offer up their resignations because they didn't do their job. Every....single.....one.....of....them. They sat there today.....whining about how things went wrong and we need to blame someone. Well....start with yourself. A real banking committee would have been watching this and found reason to fix things about five years ago......but then none of these idiots on the committees know a damn thing on banking....and they basically take their orders from the lobby groups who pay them cash under the table.

Then we come to the government bank inspectors and audit folks....who should have asked stupid questions and looked sternly upon giving out huge loans with folks who barely cleared $50k a year. But then these are the folks who work for the president, who took in vast sums of money from other lobby groups....to look the other way.

Then we have the bank officers themselves....who should have used common sense. They should have wondered five years ago....about the bank possibly collapsing because of down housing market. But then there were making huge bonuses and meeting congressmen and senators....and the president's supporters. Why worry?

So yes, I'd like to have some senators, congressmen, bank inspectors, and bank officers fired. But then, this is America...and we just can't bring ourselves to do the right thing....so its best to blame as much as you can on TV.....take government money to fix the problem.....and just look the other way.

And the next time that we have a guy at the bank office....making barely $60k a year.....wanting to borrow $400k to buy a $440k house.....who has a $30k loan on a car....and two kids almost at college age.....maybe we ought to do the right thing and just tell the idiot to buy a $200k house and be happy with that. Common sense would have sure been nice to have, but then we just ain't got much to share with everyone.

The Ramstein Pool

An excellent article today in the Stars and Stripes....covering the Ramstein base pool and its impending opening.

It is an amusing story. Since the 1970s....there has a indoor pool over at Landstuh (barely 10 minutes from the gate of Ramstein)....which barely costs $2 for entry. The pool is old but in working order and open around 330 days out of the year.

Around 1993, Ramstein village (2 minutes outside of the main gate).....there was another indoor pool built. This one had the huge outdoor Olympic pool (heated), and a huge indoor pool for laps, and then another pool for kids....with a huge slide attached. The pool had a big picnic grounds, a solarium, and a sauna (co-ed). The cost here was slightly more than the Landstuh pool but then everyone was much happier with this "big-city" type atmosphere.

So four years ago...the big-wigs at Ramstein sat down and wrote up their new requirements for the base.....a huge hotel, a new huge BX mall, and a indoor pool.....and then congress was actually stupid enough to give them money.

The mayor of Ramstein village came over and basically pleaded with the base officials. This was unnecessary.....a world-class indoor pool already existed, and the pool actually depended on the local Americans for its survival. The Americans were not persuaded. Then the mayor and the pool management team offered to build another pool onto this complex in the town....just for Americans.....but the answer was still no.

So today, we learned that the Ramstein village pool financial situation is rather dire. The little corporation owes around $1.2 million to the local bank....they are in serious financial trouble and things can only get worse. The reason? They didn't really want to discuss that. I would make a guess that all of this heat and natural gas.....especially since 2000.....has cost a bundle.....and they've avoided raising prices because the locals simply wouldn't pay a 25 percent increase.

What happens after 1 September when the base pool opens? I would guess and say that the Ramstein village pool pulls in $8k a month off Americans....so the yearly take is around $100k...just my humble guess. How many Americans would still go out there? Maybe one in five will continue going to the world-class pool....the rest will make their way to the base pool.....where the price will be half of they were paying before.

An associate in my office asked me sarcastically if there were any other reasons for an American to avoid the German pool. I sat and thought this topic.....and realized that hanging around almost nude Germans was an issue for pure Bible-thumping Americans. It was also a problem for pure Bible-thumpers to be in a place where alcohol was readily sold (yep, they sell beer even at the pool). Then you have that issue of the co-ed sauna where folks barely wear any clothing....and hanky panky probably goes on. And finally....at least one night a week....I'll bet those sexed out Germans have a clothing optional night. It just ain't right for Americans to hang around such folks and get the wrong ideas in life.

So maybe its a good thing that the pool was built, and we saved all the purity of them Americans....well....maybe.

Bad Day @ Zugspitze

This is what we know. Yesterday in Germany, near the farthest point in the southeast of the country....there at the foot of the Zugspitze (highest mountain in Germany).....a bunch of guys met early in the morning and were going to make the 9.1 mile run to the mountain top. This is a 9,000 ft mountain....and there is a walkable trail all the way to the top.

The temperature around the bottom of the bottom of the mountain was in the mid-60's. As the guys left....they were all in shorts and at least half of the group had a t-shirt on (only)....some were smart enough to wear a sweat shirt. Somewhere the mid-point....the temp dipped....and was very near 32 degrees. Snow began to fall. The trail was covered with ice and snow. At some point....they began to fall.

By the late afternoon...two were dead and at least seven others were in serious condition. Between the cold and the lack of appropriate clothing....they basically froze. Helicopters came and went.....picking up the folks affected. Some gave up on their own......and a couple did finish the race at the top.

The odds of this race being ever repeated? I would have serious doubts. The locals are in absolute shock and plenty of video shows the organizers simply allowing this to continue....never asking where the breaking point was. A number of doctors are questioning the logic of ever allowing such a race to occur. A hike....with appropriate clothing....might have been acceptable....but a complete run? None of this makes much sense.

The New Yorker Obama

For those who haven't read widely today.....there is a fiasco of sorts between the Obama camp and the New Yorker magazine. The newest issue came out this weekend. The cover portrayed Obama and his wife as Muslim extremists, with the flag burning in the fireplace.

The artist who drew it, said it was all in satire....to half-blast the right-wing over the impending image of Obama. The curious thing is that a huge segment of New York society....is pro-Hillary....and dislikes Obama greatly. There isn't a huge segment of New York state residents who are pro-Obama. I would suspect that the magazine and the artist both made their little slant on Obama and his message.

As for the McCain crowd....they can sit back and smile over the episode....and ask the New Yorker for poster-sized images.