Occupy Tea Party

One thing that's puzzled me about Occupy Wall Street is how quickly it spread to well over a hundred cities. Even using social media (Twitter) to organize into groups, the crowds seemed to spring up much faster than you'd expect for a truly "grass roots" movement.

Another thing that had me scratching my head was the incoherent messages from individual members of these groups. If they all assembled together to protest something, wouldn't you expect everyone in the crowd to be angry about the same thing? YouTube is full of interviews with Occupy protesters who don't seem to have a clue what's going on! How is that possible?

Then came the bums. Homeless people from all over town were assimilated into the Occupy crowds. With them came drug addicts, drug dealers, street gangsters, and the like. Why did the Occupy protesters allow their movement to be polluted like that? Didn't they realize that those people would dilute their message by packing the crowd with people who were there for a completely different purpose? 

Ironically, the drug dealers thrive on capitalism, the very thing many of the Occupy protesters claim to despise!

Why did the union leaders quickly express support for the Occupy movement? How does corporate cronyism hurt union employees more than any other citizens? It seems to me that we have a President who supports the unions and who has been funneling taxpayer dollars into make-work union jobs at a record pace. These people should have no bone to pick with Wall Street or the President at the moment. After all, much of the money they take home to feed their families came through the very same banks and corporations they're protesting.

It's fairly obvious that these crowds were assembled and organized by someone with an agenda. They didn't really care that much about what the protest was about, either. They simply wanted bodies in the streets. They wanted media attention. They actually counted on the filth, violence, and anger. They wanted the crowds to be seen by all Americans, and eventually despised. But why? What purpose can that possibly serve anyone?

It didn't make any sense at first. But then it him me, like a bright light suddenly appeared and exposed the truth from within the shadows of mystery and confusion. These crowds were intended as surrogates. They were assembled to create negative impressions that could be transferred to another group - namely, the Tea Party.

Progressives fear the Tea Party. Despite their efforts to marginalize them, keep them out of the media, and paint them as racist bigot homophobe lunatics, they had no evidence to support those claims. They needed to incite the Tea Party, to make them angry enough to become violent. That would give the media ample footage to demonstrate to all Americans that the Tea Party was nothing more than a bunch of crazy people way out on the fringe of the right-wing. That would let them scare people into ignoring their message. Call them Nazi's and nobody will pay any attention to them anymore.

It didn't happen.  

The Tea Party eventually assembled in clean, well-behaved, and peaceful gatherings and meetings. They didn't cultivate anger and hostility. In fact, they represented just the opposite. They were concerned citizens who shared a common goal, determined to work together peacefully to spread their message and encourage change. 

The Progressives were not happy about this at all. If the "under-informed masses" who are the "swing voters" in America learned who these Tea Party people were and heard their message, it could signal the beginning of the end of years of Progressive infiltration into American politics. The 2010 elections proved that the worst fears of the Progressives were coming to pass. The next big election in 2012, the one that would give America another four years of the most Progressive President this country has ever known, might be lost to the Republicans. Worse yet, it might be lost to a Tea Party candidate. What the Tea Party stood for was poison for the Progressive movement. Something had to be done to stop them.

Enter the Occupy crowd. The Progressive machine went into action, filling the streets with their Useful Idiot armies. These were mainly union thugs who would do anything their union leaders asked, thinking they were somehow fighting to keep evil management from taking away their jobs, benefits, and pensions. They threw in college students, indoctrinated and thoroughly confused by their Progressive professors into embracing Marx, Che and Keynes, and fired up with class envy and anger toward the evil rich.  They knew that gathering these people in a public place would attract some unsavory characters. That's what they wanted. They wanted a crowd of angry protesters, modern-day hippies, drug addicts, confused idiots, dangerous criminals, and any other disgusting vermin these crowds would attract.

Then the media, either willingly or unwittingly, swooped in for the kill. At first they could portray the Occupy crowds as generally peaceful young citizens who were, in many ways, angry about issues that were very "similar" to Tea Party concerns. They established a common concern, big government and political corruption through corporate cronyism. The Progressives had managed to stage their own "Tea Party" movement, and they fully expected it to get completely out of control. That's what they wanted to happen. 

It did.

Eventually, the Occupy movement's media exposure focused on the negatives. They filmed anger, class hatred, racism, bigotry, violence, and vulgar filth. Then came the police. Scenes of crowds being dispersed with tear gas and bean bag guns were shown over and over on American television, and around the world as well. It was Breaking News everywhere. Even the under-informed paid attention.

The Tea Party generally dismissed the Occupy movement as yet another example of America being infested by Progressives and a Federal government that's ever increasing in size and power. It galvanized them and helped convince them they were on the right track.

But what about the under-informed Americans? These are the people who don't pay close attention to politics. They're nearly consumed with their family, their jobs, their friends and community. They only consume news in little bites, just enough to stay current, or so they think. They're easily manipulated by the media. Many of them believe that political comedy and satire are always inspired by the truth. They think that a comedian wouldn't tell a joke about a politician or a political party or movement unless it had at least some basis in fact. The audience certainly would not laugh at a joke that was nothing more than a complete fabrication offered only as a vicious attack on innocent victims. That's not funny, after all. But, when the audience laughs, everybody can relax. No matter how mean-spirited a joke sounds, the victim somehow deserved the barbs.

They open their New York Times and scan through the pages looking for quick bits of information. They may turn on the television news channel and play it in the background while getting dressed in the morning. They give it their divided attention. The human interest stories grab their attention. The stuff in between makes an impression, but it's mostly subconscious. 

When the television news channel tells them something is really important, they believe it must be really important. Someone of "authority" took the time to bring this matter to their attention. Whatever that person tells them must have at least some degree of accuracy. If it's violent and ugly, it will leave a negative impression on them, even if that impression is only subconscious.

When the Occupy crowd and the Tea Party are "merged" into a single entity in the minds of these under-informed Americans, the result only benefits the Progressive movement. They've now managed to leave the impression that "crowds" of "protesters" are being dispersed with tear gas, defecating in the streets, raping each other, stealing from each other, interfering with small businesses, and generally causing chaos. They're painted as evil. The Tea Party is made up of "protesters" too, so they must be evil as well.

The Progressives hope that the "evil" paint will spill over onto the Tea Party, leaving the impressing that ANY protesters are simply the lunatic fringe of society. They can ALL be safely ignored. The police will take care of it. We can all relax.

Is the Tea Party message being drowned out by the noise and confusion of the Occupy movement? Think about it. What do you think?

The Earth Will Die

We call her Mother Earth because she gives all of us life. But, like any good mother, it's very easy for us to take her for granted. She won't always be around to protect us. She will die one day, and we will all die along with her. Well, actually not "we" who are alive today, but the people who swarm over her at the time of her death; who are less significant than fleas on the back of a dog.

Politicians who use scare tactics to trick people into supporting more taxes and government control are despicable. Those who accuse us of contributing to the death of our planet are not just despicable, they're also very wrong. Global Warming, now called Global Climate Change because the Earth isn't really getting warmer, is junk science. It's a combination of lying with statistics, logical fallacies, and plain old-fashioned lies. Why would anyone do this? Simple. To get your money.

Even if you fall for the crap, and trade money for peace of mind, nothing will happen, except that you'll help make some politicians and their cronies a lot richer. 

If you were selling chocolate fudge, and you were also in charge of the world, wouldn't it be in your best interests, financially, to convince everyone that chocolate fudge made you live longer and healthier lives? If you could, you'd pass a law making it mandatory for everyone to buy chocolate fudge. Those who refused to buy your chocolate fudge would have to pay a hefty fine, so they might as well eat your fudge. Of course, you'd also want to seize control of the manufacturing of chocolate fudge all over the world. Just to make it less obvious, you'd want some of your closest friends and "supporters" actually running the chocolate fudge factories. That would divert suspicion from you so the people wouldn't see how (and why) the trick was performed. Your friends could quietly pass some of the proceeds back to you later. After all, there'd be plenty of dough to spread around.

The irony of all this is that the Earth really will die one day. It could happen when the Sun grows old and expands beyond the orbit of our planet. The Earth will first burn to a crisp, then become vaporized as temperatures rise into the millions of degrees. Now THAT's Global Warming!  

It could happen the same way we suspect life on Mars ended. The molten iron that surrounds the Earth's solid iron core is cooling. Over time, that molten iron will solidify. When that happens, the Earth's magnetic fields will shut down. Those magnetic fields are like the shields on Star Trek. They protect the Earth from deadly radiation that's constantly pouring off of the Sun. With our shields down, the Earth's water and atmosphere cannot survive, and without those things, we can't survive either.

It could happen sooner, too. There's all kinds of junk flying around in space. Thanks to gravity, our Sun and planet Earth itself are giant vacuum cleaners. The Earth is in orbit around the Sun only because of its forward momentum. It's actually falling into the Sun at a constant speed. Our momentum causes centrifugal force which perfectly balances out the force of the Sun's gravity. But what happens when a giant lump of rock wanders into our solar system? Once it gets close enough to the Sun, it will be pulled in toward the center. If we're lucky, these rocks will miss us. They'll swing around in a huge elliptical orbit and come around again in thousands of years. This happens all the time. We call them comets. But what happens when one of these comets happens to pass too close to the Earth? If even a very small comet slammed into the Earth it would immediately kill every living thing on the planet. A large enough object could blow the planet apart, turning us into another asteroid belt.

I won't even get into the other ways we might all die, like global thermonuclear war, an epidemic of an incurable disease, genetic mutation, alien attack, and so on. 

My point is that none of these things can be prevented by mankind. Our world is going to die one day. Odds are, we'll know it's coming, and there won't be a damn thing we can do about it.

Even if the Earth is getting warmer, and even if that warming is somehow caused by mankind, we're far more likely to die from one of these other causes before we could possibly commit suicide.

So the next time a politician, or a professor, or some other person of "authority" tries to frighten you into thinking that the sky is falling, pay close attention to the "cure" they're proposing. If it involves stealing your money or your freedom, there's a very good chance you're being conned.

The Lemonade Link

Many children in America first tasted Capitalism by giving others a taste of lemonade. As a kid, I raided my mother's cupboard, fetched some Kool Aid and a bag of sugar, whipped up a pitcher of the stuff, grabbed a pile of paper cups, and set up a store in my front yard. I made a sign from a piece of cardboard and a magic marker. I wanted to raise money for something, I don't recall what, so I set my price based on the cost of buying that thing.

Let's say the toy I wanted cost $100 and a pitcher of Kool Aid yields twenty servings in tiny paper cups. If I sell my Kool Aid at $5 per cup, I'll end up with the hundred bucks. I can close up shop, take the bus to the store, buy the toy, and live happily ever after. Right? Uh, nope.

Nobody would buy my Kool Aid for $5 per cup. That's too much to pay, even for some adult passing by who thinks my little venture into entrepreneurialism merited encouragement. After my ice started to melt, and a few people told me my price was way too high, I'd change my strategy. I could ask someone how much they'd be willing to pay for a nice, cold, refreshing cup of tasty Kool Aid. Let's say they tell me they'd happily pay 25 cents. No problem! I'll sell them for 25 cents a cup and make only $5 for the pitcher. I can always make 19 more pitchers, sell them all, and end up with my hundred bucks. Right? Uh, nope.

When I run out of Kool Aid and sugar, mom tells me I have to buy some more. I can't run my Kool Aid business at her expense. So I learn the first lesson in Business 101: Stuff you sell costs money to make. I give mom my $5 and ask her to buy more Kool Aid, sugar and cups. She does, and I make another pitcher. Great! At this pace I'll have my toy in my hands in no time! Right? Uh, nope.

Because it costs me $5 to make $5, my profit margin is zero. I can make and sell Kool Aid at that rate forever and I'll never get ahead. I may have a zillion happy customers, but I'll be working for nothing. No problem. I'll raise my price to 30 cents. Maybe fewer people will buy at that price, but at least I'll make a nickel a cup in profit. My total earnings will be $1 per pitcher, after expenses. I'm on my way to getting that toy now! Right? Uh, nope.

I get a bunch of my friends together and hire them all to run Kool Aid stands all over the neighborhood. Since I make a buck a day from my stand, twenty stands should make me $20 a day. Heck, I'll get my toy in less than a week now! Right? Uh, nope.

You see, I was working for free. My labor costs were zero. As sole owner of my corporation, I was taking the $1 profit out in the form of a dividend. You could also call it wages. My friends don't get anything in return from investing a day in their life selling Kool Aid for me. If they demand $1 a day in wages, my profit from each of their stands would be zero. Therefore, there's no point in expanding. It's not profitable. Besides, I might flood the market with Kool Aid, making it much harder to sell. The "Supply" of Kool Aid would now exceed the "Demand," to put that in business terms. I'll just have to work for 99 more weeks before I can buy my toy. Right? Uh, nope.

Let's say it takes me all day to sell one pitcher of Kool Aid. But, over the course of the day the ice melts and I have to waste the last five cups. I would have made $6 selling 20 cups at 30 cents each. But selling only 15 cups leaves me with only $4.50. Instead of making a dollar profit, I've lost 50 cents. The next day, I'll just raise my price to 50 cents a cup. That should do the trick. Right? Uh, nope.

When I get out there and open my stand the next day, people who used to buy my Kool Aid just keep walking. They glance over, see the new price, grumble something about "ripoff" and then walk across the street to a little girl who has just started selling Lemonade for 30 cents a cup! I've got to go back to the 30 cent price. I can't compete with that girl if I don't. I don't know how she does it, but she MUST be making a profit at that price. I just KNOW it! Right? Uh, nope.

I ask my dad for help. He says he'll go find out how my competitor is able to make a profit. In business we call this intelligence, market research, competitive analysis, maybe even espionage. My dad learns that my competitor's parents have been subsidizing her little business venture. They're "helping her learn business" by making her pay only HALF the cost of the materials and GIVING her the rest. Little do they know, they're not actually helping her. In the real world, nobody gives you anything for free. Well, unless you're a "green energy" company and the guy you supported became President and handed you some taxpayer money. But I digress. My dad won't help me, even though he could, because he doesn't think that would teach me how business really works. I hate him for it now, but I'll thank him later. But all I have to do is stick to the original plan, except to make sure I sell all 20 cups in every pitcher. I'll make my $1 profit every day, plus I'll come away from the experience with a more realistic view of how business really works. All is good. Right? Uh, nope.

At the rate of $1 per day profit, it will take 100 days to earn the money to buy that toy I want. Well before that happens, Winter will come and it'll be too cold to sell Kool Aid. The best I can hope for is that my parents will get me that toy I want for Christmas. Maybe if I bribe them with the $40 profit I made during the summer? Perhaps.

Now lets break this down from a purely business perspective:

The Kool Aid and sugar are my raw materials. They cost $5 per pitcher.

The $6 I get from selling each pitcher are my gross receipts.

Costs:

Materials = $5

Total operating costs = $5

Income:

Inventory = 20 cups of Kool Aid

Unit price = 30 cents

Total gross receipts = $6

Profit = Income minus Costs = $6 - $5 = $1

The profit is paid to the only shareholder, me, as a dividend.

Now imagine that the Kool Aid stand is Apple Computers. They make something called an iPhone and sell them for $500 each. Of course, they have a LOT more things going into the "Costs" side of the balance sheet. But, essentially, the principles are the same. This is hypothetical, because I don't have access to Apple's financial records, but:

Costs: 

Materials = $550,000,000

Research & Development = $35,000,000

Legal expenses = $10,000,000

Marketing = $50,000,000

Labor = $800,000,000

Shipping and Distribution = $250,000,000

Taxes and fees = $100,000,000

Total operating costs = $1,800,000,000

Income

Inventory = 5,000,000

Unit price = $500

Total gross receipts = $2,500,000,000.

Wow, Apple is rich! They make $2.5 BILLION dollars a year from this one product! Uh, nope.

Profit = Income minus Costs = $2.5B minus $1.8B = $700,000,000

Still, that's a LOT of money. If they had 70,000,000 shareholders, each one would get a $10 dividend for this one profitable product.

Again, I have absolutely no links to support these numbers. They're completely made up and probably WAY WAY off.  I wasn't trying to analyze Apple Computers. I set out to prove another point.

Let's say that Apple pays $800,000,000 to Chinese workers who each make about $2,000 a year. Let's say that American workers doing the same job would cost $30,000 a year to do the same job. That means that the American workers make about 15 times what the American workers make. Good for them, right? Uh, nope.

If Apple made those iPhones here, their labor would cost 15 times as much, or a whopping $12,000,000,000. That would raise their total operating costs to $13,000,000,000. If they kept the prices the same, they would lose money. In fact, that would turn a $700M profit into a $10.5B loss! In order for Apple to break even, making NO profit at all, they'd have to sell each iPhone for $2600. Just like my 50 cent Kool Aid, most people would just walk on by mumbling something about 'ripoff' as they passed without buying. That's the end of the story, right? If Apple didn't outsource their labor, there would be no iPhones at all, right? Uh, nope.

You see, some other company, either in America (think Google or Microsoft), or in some other country, WOULD make the iPhone, and they WOULD outsource, and they WOULD sell their equal quality phones for $500 each. Apple would no longer exist, but someone else would take their place.

What's the solution to this nightmare? Certainly American workers cannot feed their families on a $1500 a year wage! We certainly can't afford $2600 iPhones!

I think I know the solution, but I'll save that for the next post.  In the meantime, I hope somebody tries to dispute my math. Plug in the real numbers, if you can. See if you can show me where I'm wrong. I'm willing to learn! When you realize that I'm right, see if you can come up with some actual solutions to this problem. We'll see how close we come to the same conclusion.