The Scrutinator

Here's the story of Anita Moncrief. As with every former liberal's story, it's unique but with common themes.

How This Ex-Liberal Found Fortitude and Her Way Home

More stories here.

By The Scrutinator @ 12:13 PM  ::  0 comments   ::  back-links

Full disclosure: I'm pretty sure I'm part of that bottom 95%, though I didn't find the cut-off.

Kissing up to the rich is wrong (and against my faith).

But so is demonizing the rich. Particularly in light of this.

Corollary: Like it or not, you're beholden to the rich. They're your benefactors. (Don't like that? Then pay more taxes yourself.)

Think about the teenager who continuously bad-mouths his parents, except when he's holding out his hand for his allowance. Want to be like that?

Corollary: What happens to these richest 1% has a hugely disproportionate effect on the government's income revenue. There's no Magic Money Fountain, despite what you've been led to believe. (That's its own future post.)

"Markets" need to experience pain (as feedback), or they become dysfunctional, anemic. This tax arrangement is very anemic, and it will likely have consequences. People don't appreciate what they don't pay for. Even poker has an ante. Not good.

But doesn't James 2 claim that the rich are exploiting me? You could read it that way, but the balance of Scripture doesn't roundly condemn being rich. James lists specific immoral actions, like exploitation, unjust lawsuits and even slandering Christ's name. Like greed, none of these things are unique to the rich, or apply to everyone. (I'm also convinced real exploitation--historically and globally--bears little resemblance to what goes on in the United States.)

Via Instapundit

Update: Tom Maguire is irritated by how the original article presents things, with more discussion in the comments.

By The Scrutinator @ 10:41 AM  ::  3 comments   ::  back-links

You're a teacher. One of your students walks up to your desk, slaps down his last test, a D+ grade, and says, "you need to make this an A!"

You say, "Why?"

He says, "I got this D+ because you prayed to Satan against me. So change it."

You say, "No I didn't."

He says, "If you didn't do it consciously, you did it unconsciously. And this D+ is proof!"

Before you can answer, he pulls out a newspaper clipping and slaps it on your desk. It's a story about a teacher in your own state who claims to be a Satanist.

Then he pulls out a petition signed by many of the kids in his class, that states that they believe the same thing.

What do you say next, and why? How do you go about evaluating a claim like this?

By The Scrutinator @ 4:03 PM  ::  4 comments   ::  back-links

Compassion International just sponsored their one millionth child. They're a great organization, and I commend them for the progress they've made.

The global financial crisis has brought poverty to 100 million people around the world.

Think of the scale: 1 million in 57 years; 100 million in less than two years. That's 2850 times the effect. Three orders of magnitude.

If you could have started a non-profit that would have prevented this crisis, think of the good you would have done.

But even now are your beliefs about this crisis just a collection of convenient myths you've accumulated?

By The Scrutinator @ 1:52 PM  ::  0 comments   ::  back-links

Seen this? Comedy, yet profound.

"Everything's Amazing, Everyone's Unhappy" (Can't embed it here, it seems.)

It's more a comment on the human condition, I think, than anything.

On flying, I'd say you're doing something no one in history had ever done until 100 or so years ago, and going faster than any human had ever traveled until maybe 60 years ago.

We take so much for granted.

By The Scrutinator @ 3:09 PM  ::  1 comments   ::  back-links

Thomas Friedman:

I have no sympathy for Madoff. But the fact is, his alleged Ponzi scheme was only slightly more outrageous than the “legal” scheme that Wall Street was running, fueled by cheap credit, low standards and high greed. What do you call giving a worker who makes only $14,000 a year a nothing-down and nothing-to-pay-for-two-years mortgage to buy a $750,000 home, and then bundling that mortgage with 100 others into bonds — which Moody’s or Standard & Poors rate AAA — and then selling them to banks and pension funds the world over? That is what our financial industry was doing. If that isn’t a pyramid scheme, what is?

The SEC's description of Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBSs) (emphasis mine):

Mortgage loans are purchased from banks, mortgage companies, and other originators and then assembled into pools by a governmental, quasi-governmental, or private entity. ...

Most MBSs are issued by the Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae), a U.S. government agency, or the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac), U.S. government-sponsored enterprises. Ginnie Mae, backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, guarantees that investors receive timely payments. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac also provide certain guarantees and, while not backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, have special authority to borrow from the U.S. Treasury. Some private institutions, such as brokerage firms, banks, and homebuilders, also securitize mortgages, known as "private-label" mortgage securities.

So if most are from Ginnie, Fannie and Freddie, isn't it really those organizations' pyramid scheme? And if they come with "certain guarantees," why wouldn't they get high ratings?

It really does go back to the Community Reinvestment Act.

By The Scrutinator @ 9:41 AM  ::  12 comments   ::  back-links

Zimababwe blames the west for their cholera:

Zimbabwe on Saturday accused the West of waging biological warfare to deliberately start a cholera epidemic that has killed hundreds of people and sickened thousands.

... Zimbabwean officials often blame their country's troubles on the West.

By The Scrutinator @ 2:21 PM  ::  2 comments   ::  back-links

Via Breitbart: the "snub" that wasn't, even though Jon Stewart and your own eyes clearly tell you otherwise.

Maybe I sound like a broken record, but what would public opinion be if every falsehood and distortion like this could be completely undone in every person's mind?

By The Scrutinator @ 10:02 AM  ::  0 comments   ::  back-links