Gay Marriage Now Legal in Virginia and Four Other States

This is Monday October 6, 2014 and so since it’s the first Monday of the month the supreme court must be back in session.  So what have we learned so far.  Well in a major non decision decision, the Supreme Court announced it was refusing to hear any cases involving gay rights in state marriage laws.  On the face of it this is an insane “ruling” because the inference is that “this issue just is not important or relevant enough for our times”.  What we know is that the number of cases the Supreme Court decides to hear keeps steadily dropping from what it was twenty or thirty years ago.  But it’s another case of “even when you make no decision, you still have made a choice”.  Because now gay marriages were just made legal in five states where they weren’t before.  These states are Virginia, Indiana, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, and Utah.  This now makes a total of 24 states where it is perfectly legal for gay people to marry.  There were seven separate cases pending where there was a lower court ruling on gay marriage, and in every one of those cases, the circuit courts had ruled in favor of gay marriage.  But these decisions were “stayed” pending a response by the Supreme Court.  Now that the court has “acted” these “stays” will soon be “vacated’ and gay marriage may not only become legal in these five states, but perhaps in six more including Colorado.  But they say that these rulings may not be carried out because “county clerks still have the discretion whether or not to grant marriage licenses to just anybody who applies”.   And don’t assume that your job is safe in these five states if you’re gay whether marriage is legal or not.   That truly is a case of the Devil being in the details.

The right wing has to get used to this and other 'cultural shock" such as the demographic time-bomb on things like custom, age, ethnic make-up and the like.  So in terms of politics it’s another reminder that we have moved into the 21^st century.  It would seem that poll numbers for Democrats being elected have turned more optimistic.  In Kansas that Pat Robertson guy is now fully ten points below his “independent’ rival in that governor’s race.  Even if that independent candidate hasn’t decided which party he’ll caucus with- - judging from the charges made at him by the tea party establishment that runs the Republican Party now about being pro Obama,  human nature dictates that you don’t ally yourself with people who call you names and just tried to defeat you.  But there are other red states with economic problems caused by republican governors that might flip democratic next month.  I guess Mary Landreau of Louisiana has risen in the latest polls against her rival.  And Clair Mc Haskell of North Carolina, the reigning democrat, is doing much better there.  Udall of Colorado is still in a dead heat with his Republican rival.   I would consider it a major victory if Scott Walker of Wisconsin went down and this is still a possibility.  But it’s so strange in a period when we are at war and people usually rally around a sitting President, and in an era when the economic news continues to improve- - and Health Care news is not a negative factor- - that the democrats would still be in such political trouble.  Also it’s strange because usually it’s a “blue dog” democrat running against a far right republican opponent.

Yesterday afternoon I was watching more of these economic “tutoring” tapes- - containing chapters.  In terms of this whole idea of “Monetezation of the debt” here’s a better explanation of how it works.  This buying up of bad debts- - bonds and such, is something that until Obama became President was seldom done.  Normally they inform me that about one trillion dollars is kept in circulation.  But now the Feds have boosted this figure to the spike of four trillion.  That’s like waking up and finding three trillion with a T dollars suddenly electronicly wired into your account.  Apparently the Fed has the power then to quadruple the amount of money in circulation and have it have No effect on either economic growth or inflation.  The only possible way the average person can benefit from it is to buy financial instruments mainly common stocks.  So your profits are courtesy the Federal Reserve who are bank rolling this bull market, and needless to say, could pull the plug at any time.  But you ask, where does that four trillion go?   Well the strange thing is that the Fed does something that would be patently illegal in the stock market.  They ANNOUNCE they are going to buy up debt instruments ahead of time and the other Banks engage in something called “Front Running”, which isn’t some kind of illegal drug deal or a new football play.  No.  Front running is going ahead of the Fed and buying up these debt instruments such as Bonds and such from other financial institutions ahead of the Fed acting on it, knowing you have a locked in, guaranteed profit.  In stock market lingo this would be acting in Inside Information.  Ordinarily you’d go to jail for that.   In this way the wealth gets “spread around” to all of the big Banks and not just the bank who sold the bad debt instruments to the Federal Reserve.  But of course the Fed with an extra three trillion has “cornered the market” and their OWN actions now makes these bonds and other debt instruments more valuable on the open market.  So it would seem to me the logical thing to do would be to STOP this practice, or better yet announce you’re going to do it and then NOT DO IT, and repeat this several times each time apologizing more profusely than the last- - till no Bank will believe a thing you say and won’t base Their financial decisions on what YOU say.  But the other obvious measure that comes to mind is a Wealth Tax by which this “windfall profit” is taxed and then distributed to the rest of us- - the other 95% who don’t own a lot of stocks and bonds.  This is not “stealing wealth from the rich” because nobody ever EARNED it.  Nothing was Produced or Created in order to get it.  Capish?   In the process people who do hold T Bills out there on Main Street- - just might get something for their investment.

There is this Moslem holy day called the Hoj, or the Hodge or something where they make this annual pilgrimage to Mecca to do sacrifices of animals, like we saw in that film in Dr Levy’s class.  I believe this was the holiday being celebrated when Malcolm X had this epiphany about all the races working in harmony and changed his position on race.   This is a commemoration of the time Abraham offered his son Isaac up for sacrifice (burnt offering) on Mount Moriah.   This event is not even celebrated anywhere on the Jewish calendar of holy days, or that’s my understanding.  But then again the Moslems celebrate Jesus as a prophet.  It’s too bad the tea party doesn’t recognize Jesus as a man of God, and in that way, they might listen to and heed what Jesus says.

Let me speak again on the topic of forgiveness.  If a President pardons you, or a utility company decides to just wipe out all the outstanding debit owed to them, have they or have they not made some sort of “judgement”.  Yes.  They have ajouticated the case in your favor and declared you innocent of “iniquity”.   So when Jesus tells us all “Do not judge”, can’t it by inference be taken to mean “do not forgive”.  Because you may not have the means or even a thing called “standing” to forgive.  What if the sin is aimed at you but God comes along and states “No- - one tenth of the sin is against You but the other nine tenths of the sin is against Me”.  Then only God can forgive that nine-tenths.  But also- - - this is a tricky point of law- - how can you forgive someone - - a million dollars in debt when you yourself have less than a quarter million in “equity” yourself?   Or - for instance what if you are insane at the time you grant said forgiveness?   One could argue that you were not competent to forgive.  Let’s put this another way.  Suppose both you and your friend, the one you forgive- - owe in common to some third party.   He borrowed from you to pay some of his debt - - - but you pay him in I O U’s given to you by other people you counted as assets that didn’t pan out.  Do you see?  Can you come back and say “Oh I forgave him so he’s not guilty”.   Or look at it this way.  You have a polluted well and a gunman comes to you and says “Give me water from that well”.  You say “sure, fine”.  You “let him have your way” but you can’t help it is the water either of you drinks from that well is bad- - and now your gunman friend gets sick from drinking it.

I am puzzled why Vice President Joe Byden is criticized for speaking the truth.  Because both Turkey and the UAE gave massive funding to ISIS to help fight Assad, and people in this country favored that at the time.  We were told it was more statesman-like than giving military aid to the moderates in Syria directly.  Now Joe Byden is told by the White House that he made a diplomatic boo-boo in saying this.  So few of these gaffs by the Vice President are what I’d call really gaffs, but most are just media hysteria.  The smartest thing we could do not is just let ISIS fight it out with the Assad forces.  I haven’t forgotten that dire warning from my friends on “the other side” that somehow dire things would happen if we crossed the invisible line and did bombing in Syria.  The Republicans continue to call this a “show stunt’ war only for the benefit of getting the President’s polling numbers up before next month’s congressional election.  The President will be making another of his endless money raising trips to Los Angeles soon.

They have exposed part of the anti proposition 46 fraud here in Los Angeles.  Because this supposedly "unstable data base" vulnerable to hackers- - is in fact a very secure State run data base that has never been hacked in the six years it's been around, unlike Chase Bank, in which millions upon millions of accounts were hacked, fortunately not mine.  They also said that proposition 46 will save money according to some impartial state economic analysis comission.  The anti proposition 46 would have you to believe just the opposite.  By getting bad doctors out of the system FEWER cases of malpractice should occur from what there otherwise would be.

If we were going to talk about "what is morally upright and honest" then in fact there would be NO paying illegal aliens under the table and letting those people off, employer and employee alike without paying their owed taxes.  In this way the rest of people who do pay their taxes, would not have to pay so much for the same government services.  Also if you're into the free market, if you are establishing what a "Free market" would be, it would be what you'd have to pay people to do the same back bending work, with NO help from illegal aliens.  They drive down the wage base.  A fair figure for base wage would be whatever it would take to fill the positions using NO illegals at ALL.  Comprende?

There was a firey car crash in Irvine and five teenagers were killed.  The lone survivor was a sixteen year old without even a learners permit driving a relative’s car.  He is in critical condition.  The other five teenagers seem to range younger than the driver being in the eighth and ninth grades in many cases.  Meanwhile there was a beating of a former LAPD police officer outside Angel Stadium.  Alcohol seems to be involved.  Unlike that car creash of teenagers last year whom I got a Reigel VI vibe of a "good death' - I'm not picking up any cosmic vibes from this one.

Once upon a time in April of 1975 there was a man who was looking forward to coming home after his state of - - internment.   His parents said he could come and live at home again - - and pay rent.  Then Bones appeared to him fresh from the dog pound and had a savy word of advice for him.  He said “Paying $950.00 for a lousy apartment in the house of the LORD is better than getting free rent from Satan for a luxury suite.  But then Bones in a moment of “mia copa” said “Of course I’m not good at taking my own advice because I looked and exclaimed “Behold - my deliverance cometh”.   (Selah)