This and That...

Twice in the last three days I have received a phone call from “Newt 2012”.  I answered both determined to give whoever was at the other end a hard time, but neither time was anyone or anything there.  Which is, actually, consistent with both Newt and his campaign.

Fast fact:  If we taxed the top 1% at a rate of 100% - that is, if we took every penny they earned year in and year out – the revenue provided would cover only ten percent of the deficit.  Not the debt, mind you, but just ten percent of the annual deficit.  It’s high time some folks began occupying reality.

I don’t care what anyone says, JoePa was thrown under the bus.  He received, according to his grand jury testimony, a report that did not graphically describe the incident involved, and yet reported it to his superior, who was ultimately responsible (Sandusky had not worked for Joe for a number of years).  After firing Joe, the Board of Trustees announced they would conduct an investigation.  Wouldn’t it have been better to conduct the investigation first, and then act on the findings?

Why is everyone surprised and upset by the failure of the “Super Committee”.  It was an extra-constitutional copout from the beginning, just as are the automatic cuts that its failure sets in motion.  As for the major drivers of our budget woes: Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and the Prescription Drug panderthon, all remain untouched and, in all likelihood, untouchable.

The Euro and its unfathomable derivative, the European Union, never had a snowball’s chance, and without radical change will not survive.  Imagine a union of the U.S., Mexico, and Honduras, with a common currency.  Greece, Portugal, and southern Italy are reasonable equivalents to Honduras and Mexico, and Germany is no U.S. economically.

Finally – I have been reading Arguably, a massive collection of Christopher Hitchens’ essays, and I feel miserably inferior.  I’ve read the Greek philosophers, Romantic poets, Enlightenment thinkers, Classical authors, and more.  But Hitchens has obviously not only read at least ten times more than I, he has clearly memorized every damned word of everything he ever read, then somehow developed the ability to express his knowledge and opinions in a way and with such force that no other mortal can. He is simply the greatest essayist writing today, and we cannot afford to lose him.