Extension of unemployment benefits stirs debates on several fronts

Perry Bacon has an important column on p A15 of the Tuesday Feb. 9 Washington Post (yes, paper deliveries went on today despite two feet of snow), “In Congress, it’s decision time on the long term jobless”, link here.

In states with highest unemployment, some workers can receive up to 99 weeks, and after the first 26 weeks, the federal government picks up the tab. Some Republicans and more conservative Democrats want to limit the benefits or keep them temporary. Some claim that it makes the jobless less enthusiastic about looking for work.

It’s complicated how you work with unemployment if you got severance first, and had the severance paid out over time as a continuation of salary. In some cases, it pays to wait until filing. In 2002, in Minnesota, I was eligible for 26 weeks, and wound up collecting about 16.

In practically every state, you have to remain actively working for work, and even attend jobs center counseling sessions. I wonder if “online reputation” could eventually work its way into the unemployment world. Could unemployment offices deny benefits to people that it thought had undermined their “online reputations”?

Demographics could affect sovereign debt, equity markets in the long run

Ian Bremmer and Nouriel Roubini have an important subscription piece on p A15 of the Wall Street Journal, “Sovereign Risk Meets Sovereign Reality: U.S. bonds won’t be rejected anytime soon, but higher borrowing costs will constrain policy.” He discusses the bailout of Dubai and the problems of Greece, Spain and Portugal, and the possibility of sovereign defaults is a real threat to equity markets. The link is here.

But he also says that the high debt in the U.S. and Japan will become a problem, without tax increases and entitlement reductions (means testing?) in the U.S. itself. Only the longstanding use of the dollar, almost as per Ayn Rand, seems to save us for the moment. Japan’s previous status as a trade creditor nation is weakened even more than the US by its aging population.

The undertone of the article is that “demographic winter” could become a serious strategic economic threat (indirectly showing up as higher interest rates), as much as climate change or financial debt structures themselves.

Maryland private parties closed for "zoning" violations

Zoning regulations can sometimes squash private “recreational” gatherings, at least in Montgomery County. MD, with a man who was running (straight) BDSM parties in an upscale rented house in Bethesda. They were said to be parties “among friends” but did request donations. Authorities viewed this as a commercial enterprise. The nickname of the party sponsor was reported to be “British Lucky Paul.”

The story was reported today (Feb. 4) in the Washington Examiner, p. 4, by Freeman Klopott and Alan Suderman, link here.

On Nov. 20, 2009, on my main blog, I reported a story of video equipment being seized from parties in San Francisco that did not have proper permits. In some cities, gay “private parties” have been found in violation of zoning laws, as in Washington DC, as reported on my GLBT blog Oct. 25, 2009.

Update: Feb.5

Paul Duggan fills in the details in The Washington Post with "Montgomery County sex-party host must role-play by the zoning rules", link here.

Abstinence-only education works if it emphasizes personal maturity, not just marriage

A study of abstinence-only education compared to instruction in both abstinence and condom use, showed that with middle school students, abstinence-only education tended to be more effective in getting teens to avoid sex, pregnancy, and STD’s later in their teen years.

However, the education was most effective when “practical” rather than based on the idea of waiting for marriage or based on religious precepts. That is, students believed the message when they were told that they were not old enough to deal with the consequences of premature explorations. The best idea seemed to be, to wait until you were able to be on your own and make a living on your own.

That all sounds like common sense, doesn’t it.

Tamar Lewis has the New York Times story, “Quick response to study of abstinence education”, at this link.

XOM, despite recession and earnings drop, beats analysts' expectations; what happens to oil company business models with green energy?

ExxonMobil, apparently the world’s largest company, reported a Q4 decrease by 23% in earnings in 2009 compared to 2008. The XOM News Release (PDF) link is here.

Because this beat analysts’ expectations, XOM stock was rising today, up 2.87% at 1 PM EST to 66.29.

ExxonMobil says that its purchase of XTO will enable it to profit from the growth of the “unconventional sources” market, that is green sources.

Oil companies will need to become “energy companies” ready to build the new green infrastructures and green Internet (as Thomas Friedman describes them) for their business models to be sustainable.

Gumshoeing backgrounds of foster teens finds eligible relatives to become adoptive parents

The New York Times ran a particularly compelling story about adoption on p. 14, National News, of the Sunday Jan. 31 New York Times, ”A determined quest to bring adoptive ties to foster teenagers”, by Erik Eckholm, link here.

The story relates a new effort on St. Louis to find relatives for older kids and teens in foster care. The article maintains that diligent gumshoeing nearly always turns up relatives.

The story relates some specific incidents where people did not know that their “missing” siblings had fathered or mothered children, giving them nephews and nieces that did not know existed. In one specific example the new relative parent was already married with a family. But if the relative were childless and especially single, attempting to interest him or her in adoption would raise interesting ethical questions. Should relatives be responsible for the other people’s children (I could put it more bluntly) just because they are “family”? On the other hand, the teens have to go along with the adoptions, too.

Second picture, a Minneapolis bus stop ad in 2003.

Handheld cell phone bans while driving don't work (HLDI)

The Highway Loss Data Institute Bulletin reports on the effect on laws that ban hand held cell phone use in the District of Columbia and several other states, with the PDF report here.

The Institute reports that there is no significant decrease in crashes in these jurisdictions. No state bans hands-free cell phone use for all drivers, but the media is claiming that the study may show that hands-free use is just as dangerous because it is the conversation that distracts the brain, not just the physical distraction of handling the device. This sounds improbable and surprising. The additional distraction from texting, for example, must be considerable.

What about other distractions -- drinking coffee, listening to 80s music on Sirius radio?

And what's the future for the Jupiter Jack?

DC Metro raises fares March 1 in lieu of more service cuts

The Washington DC Metro system is facing runaway problems with safety, service cuts and fare hikes. Today, Thursday, Jan. 28, the Metro Board approved an emergency across the board 10 cent fare hike, effective March 1, 2010 (apparently just through June 30).

The system has been plagued by slowdowns, delays, and single tracking and station closures for track maintenance, which was not common in the 1990s, as well as a number of serious accidents resulting in fatalities, the largest occurring last June.

The WJLA story is here.

Some cuts have involved weekend late night service, which is essential for nightlife and bar life in the Cy, which does not have enough parking and which has recently stiffly increased parking in evenings and Saturdays. Also, service cuts could lead to more DUI problems.

Obama proposes increase per-child tax credit: would this please the "empty cradle" crowd?

President Obama is making some proposals popular with social and fiscal conservatives, including nearly doubling the per-child tax credit, and requiring employers to offer direct-deposit IRA’s, even those now without savings plans.

A typical news story appears on CNN, here.

The Child and Dependent Tax Care Credit would raise from 20% to 35% for families making less than $85000 a year, and up to $115000 there would be some credit.

Social conservatives have supported such measures in order to encourage middle class to upper middle class families to have more children, and for adults to be able to have children earlier in their working careers, at least while they are in the late 20s, before the biological clock starts to work against them. Phil Gramm, back in 1992, had proposed multiplying the credit by 10! This comports with the “empty cradle” or “demographic winter” argument of Phillip Longman and others. The appearance of the story on the same day that Lifetime aired its movie “Pregnancy Pact” is a bit ironic.

The Christian Science Monitor offers this story, by David Grant, title "What's cooler than a child-care tax credit? Obama's opt-out IRA: The child-care tax credit would increase, but an opt-out IRA is both one of the most interesting and least controversial of Obama's middle-class aid proposals”. The article notes that Incentives for employers “to create opt-out enrollment in retirement plans” were provided by the Pension Protection Act of 2006, but there has been no program for associates in workplaces without employer-sponsored savings plans, and it’s not clear that much is done about contractors, except through their staff-placement firms in corp-to-corp.

Perhaps these proposals come about as Obama’s health care plans get eroded.

DC School Chancellor makes shocking statements about laid-off teachers

Here’s the latest Fast Company story (link) about Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of the District of Columbia school system, called “Update: Michelle Rhee vs. D.C. Teachers’ Union”, Feb. 1, 2010, link here. The story is brief and her comment as to supposed teacher conduct very explicit, accusing them of acts that would have been prosecuted as crimes (of the Dateline kind) and, upon conviction, put the former teachers on s.o. registries. So a public statement like this from the Chancellor is indeed shocking.

The Washington DC area media have really jumped on this story. Former laid off teachers are saying that they have been made into laughing stocks around the country, and that the DC school system will now really have a problem with its “reputation defense.”

One fired teacher said that every year almost every teacher is accused of something and has to prove himself or herself innocent, usually because the parent is mad at the student about a bad grade.

NBC Washington's video of the story (by Tom Sherwood)


Update: Jan 26

The Washington Post has an editorial here, "Michelle Rhee must open up about references to unfit teachers".

Health insurance reform may be much weaker on pre-existing conditions

The Health Reform Bill may be whittled down a lot. It may not provide the restriction on discriminating on pre-existing conditions for all adults, it may not make insurance mandatory, and it will not have the excise tax or public option. It will provide for the insurance exchanges.

The reach of the reform will be disappointing, leaving many more Americans uninsured than hoped.

The latest story is in the New York Times, today, Jan. 22, by Robert Pear and David S. Herszenhorn, “A New Search for Consensus on Health Bill”, link here.

Supreme Court reverses on campaign contributions; some are protected by First Amendment

The Supreme Court has reversed itself with respect to a 20 year old ruling, now saying that corporations (and probably labor unions) may use money from their own treasuries to pay for campaign ads. The AP story by Mark Sherman just appeared on AOL and Sphere, link here. To a large extent, campaign contributions are protected by the First Amendment. The ruling was 5-4; dissenters were Stevens, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Ginsburg. However, in this case, the "conservative" side may have been more favorable to bloggers and citizen journalism, even if in another sense it could beef up almagamated corporate or union interests. That's a good essay question (below).

The case is “Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission”, slip opinion here.

Much of the debate concerned whether the "conservative" documentary movie "Hillary: The Movie", when shown, amounted to a "campaign contribution" since it was about an active candidate.

The visitor may also want to read the Supreme Court’s explanation of what a “slip opinion” is here (government teachers – it’s a good test question!; stave off that senioritis!)

The older ruling created a flap a few years ago, as there was concern that it would cause the FEC to crack down on political blogging as a form of indirect campaign contributions. The FEC backed away from that position anyway, but the problem is covered on my main blog under the label “campaign finance reform and bloggers controversy” (see my Profile).

Jeffrey Toobin on CNN later said that the ruling effectively let corporations spend as much money as they want to influence elections or "buy them." Is this about publishing and distributing speech (my pet issue) or about purchasing it (which I see as intellectually tacky)?

GOP takes Mass. Senate seat, complicating health care reform

Scott Brown, a somewhat charismatic and young moderate Republican, has won the late Senator Ted Kennedy’s Massachusetts US Senate seat, breaking up the Democrat supermajority (59-41) and supposedly jeopardizing the heath care reform bill.

Of course Nancy Pelosi insists that health care reform bill will pass soon, but many observers, including David Gergen on CNN, say that the coverage from the bill may be much less than “universal”. Democrats have not been able to sell their arguments, and from an ideological perspective one can see why.

Still, much of the “pre-existing condition” problem will probably be solved in whatever bill passes. And many people should find insurance much more affordable. The young will probably have to pay somewhat more, still.



Update: Jan 20

Steven Pearlstein has an op-ed in the Washington Post this morning, "GOP win doesn't mean health reform is dead", link here. The 60 vote supermajority fixation refers to being able to stop a fillibuster. The constitution does not require a supermajority to pass health reform itself (there is a supermajority required in the House for appropriations). High schooll government teachers can jump on the results of this election as a teachable moment (and maybe a good test question).

"Safeway Amendment": wellness, v. pre-existing conditions in health care debate

The Washington Post Business Section on Sunday Jan. 17 weighed in on the wellness aspect of the health care debate with the article by David S. Hilzenrath, “A success story that isn’t shapes the health-care debate: Blood tests and weigh-ins; Misleading claims drive ‘Safeway Amendment’”, with link here. This article ties in with an AlterNet piece discussed here Jan. 12.

The “Safeway Amendment” would allow rewards and penalties for the results of “wellness tests”, supposedly rewarding or penalizing behavior (in employer health insurance groups and in other circumstances). On the other hand, the provision could cross the line in a principle that was supposed to do away with the pre-existing conditions problem, that health insurance premiums should not be influenced by health status. The wellness tests arguably invade privacy, and with some health conditions it is difficult to draw the line between behavior and factors beyond a person’s control. (The article gives a graphic dialogue involving cigarette smoking.) How would STD's and HIV be treated?

Safeway Stores, however, claims that its plan for non-union employees has been effective, a claim that the article disputes.

In my last year at ING (2001), we were paid a slight bonus for agreeing to an annual physical.

Noreaster storms jeapordize Cheaspeake Bay homes: any relation to climate change?

It may be an example of hyperbole to say that the powerful Noreaster that brought 18 inches of snow to the DC area Dec. 19 and eroded the Calvert Cliffs area on the Chesapeake Bay is a result of global warming. But the disruption to the area, to some homeowners along the Bay near Lusby, MD is very real. I made a “field trip” to the area today. This sort of problem may be more familiar to southern California residents who have to deal with mudslides when there are sudden heavy rains in the winter.

I took the Calvert Cliffs State Park trail, too. The mileage signs are misleading: the distance of 1.8 miles really refers to the distance from the parking lot on Highway 4, not the start of the “Red Trail.”


Update: Jan 25, 2009

Check out the Washington Post story by Christy Goodman: "Cliff residents losing out to beetles on he brink; Endangered species depends on erosion that threatens Calcert County homes," link here. This refers to the Puritan tiger beetle.

Does "bare below the elbows" make sense for health care workers? What does it really mean?

Will the AMA or other US medical associations recommend following the UK’s “bare below the elbows” policy for all doctors and health care workers, as adopted in 2007? There’s some debate on whether it works in various links such as this one.

The policy means wearing no neckties and no hand jewelry that could interfere with hand and wrist washing, at least as far as stated. But whether decorative items of clothing usually associated with professional dress codes really carry more pathogens seems controversial.

Islamic health care workers in Britain have objected, especially because in some cases religious rules require females to keep their arms covered when not around immediate family. There is some debate about it here.

Do these recommendations affect hygiene in the home, where perhaps a family member is immunosuppressed because of HIV or chemotherapy?

Teaching encompasses a huge range in temperaments; but even content-oriented AP teachers need help keeping up

Public school teaching as a career lives in a wide range. At one end, you have teachers who do mostly AP courses and may teach a local colleges too and publish papers. At the other end, you have teachers of elementary or pre-school grades and special education, who have to love kids just as they are. Teaching implies that “you” are preparing someone else for the limelight and you are taking a backseat others in being recognized for intellectual accomplishments – until you get to the upper levels, into the “publish or perish” academic world.

A couple of newspaper articles demonstrate the problem. On Wednesday, Jan. 13, Emma Brown gave a Washington Post Metro Section article “The soul of an ambitious approach to up-to-date science instruction: Montgomery center develops lab exercises, shows teachers how to conduct them,” link here. Senior high school teachers generally have gotten there partly because of their mastery of specific content (as with the Praxis exams), but technology changes so quickly they need to be brought up to date anyway. The newspaper article presented an experiment in replicating DNA. I’m reminded of a recent AOL science story about a sea slug with chlorophyll – but an animal and a plant at the same time – and able to incorporate photosynthesis-related DNA from the food that it eats! Such processes may be more likely on alien worlds a few dozen light years away.

Then today (Thursday Jan. 14) Washington Examiner columnist Joetta Rose Barras writes (p. 9) “a damning evaluation for a D.C. teacher” link about a comparison of two elementary teachers in DC schools: a math teacher who had consistently raised scores of his kids, and a veteran teacher with 23 years experience and an $80000 salary whose kids consistently deteriorating in test score performance when in her class. Teaching in these grades is a selfless passion as an individualist sees things. You have to go back to the expectations laid out in Rafe Esquith’s book “Teach Like Your Hair’s on Fire” (2007).

Over a quarter of auto accidents involve cell phone use

An article in The Washington Post (in the “Breaking News Blog”) by Ashley Halsey III, “28 percent of accidents involve talking, texting on cellphones”, link here.

The advent of hands-free devices for cell phones, including the Jupiter Jack, makes it hard for police officers to see drivers using cell phones. Yet even without use of hands, talking on a cell phone can be distracting. (But listening to the car radio or even Sirius, a companion for decades, is not?)

The article points out the possibility of making cars block cell phone signals, or being able to offer police the ability to spy on cell phone calls and texting. Cars might have to have data recorders, since police now subpoena cell phone records to investigate accidents. Nineteen states ban texting while driving, but some states require police to have another reason to stop motorists first.

Senate health care bill would let insurance companies charge individuals for not meeting wellness targets

Here’s a little known trap in the Senate version of the health care reform bill. True, We’ve dropped the public option and offered exchanges, but we’ve proposed taxing employers who offer “too much” health insurance. We’ve gotten rid of the pre-existing conditions problem. But insurance companies will be able to surcharge those who don’t make certain wellness targets, not just weight, but blood pressure and blood chemistry as well. I wonder how HIV infection would fare in this. Cigarette smoking clearly would be an issue. The presumption is that wellness falls under “personal responsibility” and behavior. But it invites a kind of wellness Gestapo. Would it apply to employees in a workplace under a group policy? In some companies, it's already happening.

A similar problem exists today when people apply for long term care insurance, especially at more advanced ages. They have to meet certain monitoring targets over time before being accepted.

Adele M. Stan has the article on AtlerNet Jan. 12 here.

So, does McGwire's home run record mean anything now?

So, does Mark McGwire’s 1998 home run record (beating Roger Maris and Babe Ruth) become worthless because he admitted steroid use today? The MLB story is here. By the way, the MLB schedules for 2010 have been up for over a month. Spring training schedules are also available.

McGwire wants to resume his career as a hitting coach. Will he be credible?

But you wonder, what does all of this mean any more. What exactly makes a substance a performance enhancing drug? I can remember all the urban legends as a boy about what kinds of foods and farm-related “matter” made you a man, etc.

Wikipedia attribution link for Busch stadium(s). I thought that Busch had been one of the bigger parks when McGwire “broke the record”.