All Life Is Problem Solving

Joe Firestone’s Blog on Knowledge and Knowledge Management

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Which Would You Rather Cut: Social Security, or Interest for Foreign Governments and Rich Bondholders?

July 13th, 2010 · Comments Off on Which Would You Rather Cut: Social Security, or Interest for Foreign Governments and Rich Bondholders?

Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles, the Co-Chairs of “the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform,” would have us believe that a deficit and debt crisis threatening the fiscal future of the United States is upon us, that “This debt is like a cancer,” and that unless we begin to make across the board cuts […]

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Tags: Politics

The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Seven (Conclusion)

July 12th, 2010 · Comments Off on The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Seven (Conclusion)

In my last post, I continued my analysis of the June 26th AmericaSpeaks Community Conversation event I attended in Falls Church, VA, focusing on Step Five in the decision process used in the meeting. In that post I presented the specific option choice frameworks AmericaSpeaks presented to participants in the categories of Non-Defense and Defense […]

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Tags: Politics

The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Six

July 7th, 2010 · 1 Comment

In Part 5, I continued my analysis of the June 26th AmericaSpeaks Community Conversation event I attended in Falls Church, VA, focusing on Step Five in the decision process used in the meeting. In that post the specific option choice frameworks AmericaSpeaks presented to participants in the categories of Health Care and Social Security spending, […]

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Tags: Politics

The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Five

July 7th, 2010 · Comments Off on The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Five

In my last post I continued my analysis of the June 26th AmericaSpeaks Community Conversation event I attended in Falls Church, VA, focusing on Step Five in the decision process used in the meeting. In that post I was critical of the overall bias in the general orientation toward the options workbook and the choices […]

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Tags: Politics

The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Three

July 2nd, 2010 · Comments Off on The Procrustean Democracy of AmericaSpeaks: Part Three

In my first two posts analyzing the June 26th AmericaSpeaks Community Conversation event I attended in Falls Church, VA, I presented the steps in the decision process used for the event and discussed the pre=conference phase and the first two steps. As we saw, these steps reflected a strong bias toward socializing participants into the […]

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Tags: Politics

DZWONKOWSKI ‘s “Get in on discussion about $13-trillion U.S. Debt”: A Commentary

June 22nd, 2010 · Comments Off on DZWONKOWSKI ‘s “Get in on discussion about $13-trillion U.S. Debt”: A Commentary

This one is a deconstruction of a piece in the Detroit Free Press by a gentleman in the MSM who’s decided to join the Peter G. Peterson/Catfood Commission echo chamber. (My thanks to Sisterkenney for calling it to my attention.)

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Tags: Politics

Jamie Galbaith’s “Foreword” To Modern Money: A Commentary

June 14th, 2010 · Comments Off on Jamie Galbaith’s “Foreword” To Modern Money: A Commentary

Warren Mosler has an important forthcoming book called The Seven Deadly Innocent Frauds, which is, fortunately, available right now in a pre-publication version for reading and commenting from Warren’s site. Jamie Galbraith, Warren’s friend and occasional co-author has recently written a Foreword to the book, which also can serve as a Foreword to the Modern […]

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Tags: Politics

An Open Letter to President Obama

June 8th, 2010 · Comments Off on An Open Letter to President Obama

Dear President Obama: I’m not entirely sure how to put this, so I guess I’ll just come right out and say it. During the last presidential campaign and in the context of John McCain’s admission that he didn’t understand economics very well, you let us know that you thought you had a very good understanding […]

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Tags: Politics

Money and Coercion

June 2nd, 2010 · 2 Comments

At the very end of the Seminal/FireDogLake discussion of my last post, “How Are You Going To Pay For It”, two commenters, ironymeter and konst, offered some comments about the idea in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) that fiat currency is, to a great extent, accepted, because the Government mandates its status as sole legal tender […]

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Tags: Politics

Obama’s new pledge: ” … with liberty and cat food for all.”

May 25th, 2010 · Comments Off on Obama’s new pledge: ” … with liberty and cat food for all.”

Barack Obama hasn’t reached that point yet. But it wouldn’t take very much. All he has to do is to go along with his National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform and the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, and he’ll drive us into a full-fledged depression with an increasingly shredded social safety net and a deeper […]

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Tags: Politics