A Commencement Address

Robert Reich, President Clinton's secretary of labor and currently a professor at Berkeley, has posted a commencement address. He titled it "the commencement address that won't be given." After you read it, you'll know why. [The following is censored. Be sure to read the original.]

He uses blunt language to describe the hurdles facing this years' college graduates:
1. Jobs - "you’re going to have a hell of a hard time finding a job. The job market you’re heading into is still bad. Fewer than half of the graduates from last year’s class have as yet found full-time jobs. Most are still looking"
2. Salary - "But even when you get a job, it’s likely to pay peanuts.
Last year’s young college graduates lucky enough to land jobs had an average hourly wage of only $16.81, according to a new study by the Economic Policy Institute. That’s about $35,000 a year – lower than the yearly earnings of young college graduates in 2007"
3. Career prospects - "But this parchment isn’t as valuable as it once was. So much of what was once considered “knowledge work” – the kind that college graduates specialize in – can now be done more cheaply by software. Or by workers with college degrees in India or East Asia, linked up by Internet."
4. Debt - "In a few moments, when you march out of here, those of you who have taken out college loans will owe more than $25,000 on average. Last year, ten percent of college grads with loans owed more than $54,000."
5. Future - "If unemployment stays high for many years, if the wages of young college grads continue to fall, if the costs of college continue to rise and state and local spending per college student continues to drop, and if the college debt burden therefore continues to explode – well, you do the math."

He offers some thoughts we should all consider: "You see, a college education isn’t just a private investment. It’s also a public good. This nation can’t be competitive globally, nor can we have a vibrant and responsible democracy, without a large number of well-educated people."

Reich is absolutely right, and that is the main reason it isn't good for my blood pressure when I hear the clever fools running legislatures in many states (including our own) talk as though it is only the students who are "customers" of education.

Balderdash!

To quote a former presidential candidate: "If you think education is expensive,try the cost of ignorance!"

On Labor And Capital

"Labour is prior to, and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labour, and could never have existed if labour had not first existed. Labour is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."

Abraham Lincoln

Seventy Years Ago: May 21, San Francisco

Here's an extract from the May 21 1942 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle:

"The San Francisco Chronicle:

"Last Japanese Leave San Francisco - 1942: For the first time in 81 years, not a single Japanese is walking the streets of San Francisco. The last group, 274 of them, were moved yesterday to the Tanforan assembly center. Only a scant half dozen are left, all seriously ill in San Francisco hospitals.

"Last night Japanese town was empty. Its stores were vacant, its windows plastered with "To Lease" signs. There were no guests in its hotels, no diners nibbling on sukiyaki or tempura. And last night, too, there were no Japanese with their ever present cameras and sketch books, no Japanese with their newly acquired furtive, frightened looks."

There was not a hint in the article that many of those being rounded up and transferred to concentration camps were American citizens. There was no mention of the fact that we were also at war with Germany and Italy. No mention of the fact that baseball star Joe Dimaggio's father had been a vocal supporter of Mussolini. There was no mention of any relocation of Italian Americans or German Americans.

This was a disgraceful episode in our history.

Can anyone tell me with a straight face that this was not racism at work?

Another Trail of Tears.

Second Primary

Last Tuesday was the official canvass of the North Carolina 2012 primary election. Candidates eligible to request a second primary election when the leading candidate received less than 40% of the vote, or candidates eligible to request a recount, had to submit their requests by lat Friday.

The second primary is scheduled for July 17. Here are the contests for which there will be a second primary or a recount:

Pursuant to GS 163-111 the following candidates have requested a 2nd Primary to be held on July 17, 2012: (Deadline for 2nd Primary requests is 05/17/2012 at 12 noon.)
Candidate Name - Office (date request received)
Scott Keadle - US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 8 - REP (05/10/2012)
Jim Pendergraph - US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 9 - REP (05/14/2012)
Vance Patterson - US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 11 - REP (05/11/2012)
Tony Gurley - NC LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR - REP (05/11/2012)*
Mike Causey - NC COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE - REP (05/15/2012)*
Marlowe Foster - NC COMMISSIONER OF LABOR - DEM (05/14/2012)*
Kenn Gardner - NC SECRETARY OF STATE - REP (05/14/2012)*
Richard Alexander - NC SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION - REP (05/10/2012)*
Ronald Rabin - NC STATE SENATE DISTRICT 12 - REP (05/14/2012)
Robert B. Clark III - NC STATE SENATE DISTRICT 21 - DEM (05/09/2012)
David Curtis - NC STATE SENATE DISTRICT 44 - REP (05/14/2012)
Arthur Williams - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 6 - REP (05/14/2012)
Jim Crawford - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 32 - DEM (05/17/2012)
Wil Neumann - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 109 - REP (05/10/2012)

Pursuant to GS 163-182.7 the following candidates have requested a recount:
Larry Shaw - NC STATE SENATE DISTRICT 21 - DEM (05/16/2012)
Stephen LaRoque - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 10 - REP (05/16/2012)
Richard Johnson - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 55 - REP (05/09/2012)
Danny E. Davis - NC HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISTRICT 119 - DEM (05/16/2012)

* Contests in second primary in Pamlico County: (1 Dem and 4 Rep)

Americans Elect: Crash On Takeoff

Last April 13, in the latest attempt to form a third political party, Americans Elect filed the requisite number of petition signatures to be listed as an official political party in North Carolina. On May 15, the party admitted that its on-line convention had failed to generate enough support under their own rules for any candidate to be nominated.

The party had been supported by high profile backers with deep pockets and had attained ballot access in more than half of the nation's fifty states. The effort to nominate a slate lasted just a bit longer than the Wright Brothers' first flight.

I have some advice for third party enthusiasts: forget about presidential elections. Start at the grass roots in one or more states that might be receptive. Go for the state legislature. The goal might be to elect enough legislators that your third party would be invited into a legislative coalition.

If you want to put an end to partisan politics, here is a Washington Post article on what won't work - and what might [but I wouldn't hold my breath].

Jobs

"When a great many people are unable to find work, unemployment results."

- Calvin Coolidge

In some respects, Calvin Coolidge was more progressive than many Tea Party Republicans and their economist lackeys. These folks latterly have attributed unemployment not to the inability of workers to find jobs, but to their interest in taking a vacation. And Republicans in the Congress and in state legislatures have done their best to make it even harder for people who work for a living to find jobs.

South Avenue Public Comments

There has been some reaction from citizens of the town about the town board's action to approve the proposed contract for a land swap. Today's Town Dock has three letters from citizens.

A lot of questions have been raised, not only by the general public, but also by members of the Parks and Rec committee.

I learned last week that the contract was finalized by attorney Scott Davis representing the town and attorney Steve Weeks representing Chris Fulcher. Steve Weeks is a competent attorney who aggressively protects his clients' interests. He is the attorney who saved the town's bacon when Scott Davis lost the suit against Mr. Lacy Henry over South Avenue at summary judgment - before ever getting to trial.

The best advice Scott Davis ever gave the town, back in 2002 when the town asked him to represent us in the suit against Lacy Henry over South Avenue, was to retain a litigator. He was right.

But Scott Davis not only isn't a litigator, he has not proven much of a negotiator and has not always provided the town with competent legal representation.

However the present negotiation is resolved, I think it is past time for the Town to retain a different lawyer or firm as town attorney.

Political Conventions

Since I am a member of the Pamlico County Board of Elections, I am prohibited from publicly advocating or opposing the election of any candidate or ballot measure appearing on the ballot. But I am specifically allowed to be a delegate to party conventions.

This coming weekend, I will serve as a delegate to my party's district convention. Later, there will be a state convention, and finally the week of September 3, the Democratic Party will hold its national convention at Charlotte.

People sometimes ask what my party stands for. I know no better source than the speech delivered by William Jennings Bryan 116 years ago at the Democratic Party Convention of 1896. The issues haven't changed, though details may differ. Here are some excerpts:

"When you come before us and tell us that we shall disturb your business interests, we reply that you have disturbed our business interests by your action. We say to you that you have made too limited in its application the definition of a businessman. The man who is employed for wages is as much a businessman as his employer. The attorney in a country town is as much a businessman as the corporation counsel in a great metropolis. The merchant at the crossroads store is as much a businessman as the merchant of New York. The farmer who goes forth in the morning and toils all day, begins in the spring and toils all summer, and by the application of brain and muscle to the natural resources of this country creates wealth, is as much a businessman as the man who goes upon the Board of Trade and bets upon the price of grain. The miners who go 1,000 feet into the earth or climb 2,000 feet upon the cliffs and bring forth from their hiding places the precious metals to be poured in the channels of trade are as much businessmen as the few financial magnates who in a backroom corner the money of the world.We come to speak for this broader class of businessmen....

"What we need is an Andrew Jackson to stand as Jackson stood, against the encroachments of aggregated wealth....

"Those who are opposed to this proposition tell us that the issue of paper money is a function of the bank and that the government ought to go out of the banking business. I stand with Jefferson rather than with them, and tell them, as he did, that the issue of money is a function of the government and that the banks should go out of the governing business....

"My friends, it is simply a question that we shall decide upon which side shall the Democratic Party fight. Upon the side of the idle holders of idle capital, or upon the side of the struggling masses? That is the question that the party must answer first; and then it must be answered by each individual hereafter. The sympathies of the Democratic Party, as described by the platform, are on the side of the struggling masses, who have ever been the foundation of the Democratic Party....

"There are two ideas of government. There are those who believe that if you just legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, that their prosperity will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea has been that if you legislate to make the masses prosperous their prosperity will find its way up and through every class that rests upon it.

"If they dare to come out in the open field and defend the gold standard as a good thing, we shall fight them to the uttermost, having behind us the producing masses of the nation and the world. Having behind us the commercial interests and the laboring interests and all the toiling masses, we shall answer their demands for a gold standard by saying to them, you shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold."

OK, the rhetoric is a bit over the top by modern standards, but the underlying struggle is pretty much the same:

Trickle-down economics or rising tide economics?

YOYO's or WITTS?