From 1608 when it was first invented, and for over 200 years thereafter, the flintlock was the firing mechanism of choice in the design of muskets, rifles and pistols. Nothing more advanced was around when the Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution. Flintlocks were the only models that James Madison, the Congress of the USA and the legislatures of the several states could have had in mind when the Second Amendment was drafted, debated and ratified.
Today, of course, we have progressed mightily. The traditional flintlock is still prized by hobbyists and reenactors. And it can kill, as a recent TV murder drama has reminded us, but modern American mass killers have better options for offing a few baker's dozens or so of victims and themselves before official bullets can end their slaughter of the lambs.
These random slayings occur with some frequency, as we all have had occasion to know. No need to repeat the litany of the killing fields fresh in recent memory.
Here's how to fire the flintlock. This is advice easily found on the Internet for today's affectionados:
"Load the barrel in the ordinary way [ramming it home with an oiled patch and the ramrod stored beneath the gun barrel], depending upon what type of gun you are shooting, rifle, smooth bore or pistol. Brush the pan free of all residue from the last shot, using your pan brush. If residue remains, wipe it out with a moistened cloth, then a dry one. Include the frizzen face and the edge of the flint in this wiping. Prick the touch-hole, to make certain it is clear. Place a few grains of priming powder into the pan, not more than 1/3 full, probably less. Close the frizzen, cock and fire.
"If you will make each of these steps a routine part of the procedure, and if you keep an eye on the flint edge for sharpness, the gun will fire every time. You'll notice after a few shots that your frizzen, flint and pan are getting pretty fouled, and inconsistent ignition will surely be the result. A small cleaning patch dampened with rubbing alcohol is best for wiping the face of the frizzen, flint and pan to prevent the buildup of soot that would dull your sparks. A good wipe down every few shots is all that's needed." ©1997 Brad Finch
Why am I telling you this? Because no mass killer worthy of the name would rely on such an awkward contraption today. He or she would be better off with a couple of box cutters. Yet our laws for the regulation of guns and ammunition are all descendants of the mindset behind the Second Amendment formed by the flintlock.
These days any blithering fool can legally, freely and instantly buy at gun shows his own miniature Gatling gun and spray a screaming, terrorized crowd in a mall, school, auditorium or stadium with several score bullets, optimized for best lethal effect, in the time it took one of General George Washington's patriotic soldiers of the Revolution to get off a single lead shot at a Red Coat and prime his weapon for the next "round."
It is deadly folly -- even though a generation of conservative jurists have argued otherwise-- to find that the original intent of the Founding Fathers was to have such lethal potential in the pocket or purse of every man or woman on any Main Street. To repeat, the most that our famous ancestors could have had in mind was the arming of every able bodied citizen with a Kentucky long rifle, powder,shot, an oilded patch and a ramrod.
Not a bad idea, that, although concealed carry might be difficult in Florida in the summertime. At least the wild animals and civilized humans targeted would have a modest chance on a partially leveled sporting ground.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Monday, December 10, 2012
The Coming Evolution of Obamacare
Updated August 30, 2013.
Florida and Texas are the largest of 27 states that either have said they won't establish a state run medical insurance exchange or have yet to decide what they are going to do about that pivotal part of the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," now and forever nicknamed Obamacare.
Another part of the act, Medicaid expansion, finds the states even more conflicted The Supreme Court has ruled that part of Obamcare is voluntary. Florida and Texas lead the south in near solid opposition, and most states haven't decided, despite the generous terms on offer if they do. The 17 million Americans now without health insurance, who would be newly eligible for Medicad, will have to cool their heels in emergency rooms a while longer.
On another front, over 1,700 businesses have received waivers postponing their participation in Obamacare until 2014. It seems clear that its roll out will be slow. Even after tardy businesses begin to comply it is quite possible that many will opt to pay a fine rather than offer their employees health plans that conform to Obamacare regulations.
Far from being dismaying, these developments are just what the doctor ordered for we who advocate a single payer federal system. They will let Obamacare evolve as follows:
1) Employers, already disposed to do so, will continue to shed or emasculate employee medical benefits the better to compete locally and globally. The penalties for not complying with Obamacare are not apt to rise at all, while the costs of health insurance will continue up. In time paying the fines will be the more sensible route.
2) In tandem with the decline in employer medical benefits, iinsurance exchanges -- whether federally, state or jointly run -- will gradually become the market places where most Americans buy health insurance.
3) Medicaid will expand gradually, but inevitably, as state intransigence wanes in the face of withering public outrage. This will save the Feds gobs of money in the near term while laying the blame for heartlessness where it belongs.
4) Gradual Medicaid expansion will buy the medical professions time to recruit and train caregivers from around the world to meet the expanding need. This would alleviate what could have been a biding war for suddenly scarce skills and a consequent steep rise in medical costs that might have proved fatal to Obamacare while in its cradle.
5) Medical insurance offerings will become standardized into a menu of plans easy to understand and compare, leading to markets competing predominately on price like retailers at Christmas time. This will squeeze profits more effectively than any number of costly regulations, and will lead the insurance industry to depart the medical insurance business except as contractors for the Feds.
6) As with flood insurance, hurricane insurance in Florida and earthquake insurance in California, government will fill the vacuum by popular demand. The five medical insurance programs -- Medicaid, Medicare, Obamacare, Tricare (for the military) and the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan (Civilcare?) -- run by the Federal Government will thus come to insure nearly all Americans.
This outcome may not be called "a single payer system," but it will look, act and quack like one. In a generation these systems will converge and a Health Security Administration will take its place along side the Social Security Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services. This will be called socialism, more black UN helicopters will be seen patroling our boarders and we will be accused of being just like Europe. And not a moment too soon.
Of course it will be far from socialism. Most of us will still have to select a plan from among insurance company offerings. Most of us will choose among benefit plans offered at work either as primary insurance or as a suplememt to Medicare. Others will shop through state exchanges especially if you work for a comany with fewer than 50 employees.
Doctors and other medical providers will still practice separately or in privately organizaed groups. Hospitals will still be free to be non profit or for profit corporations. We will still be constrained by which doctors and hospitals are acceptable to (cozy with) our insurers. The system will look a lot more like Germany's, which also keeps a role for insurance companies, than England's, in which medical resources are deployed by the state.
Obamacare will also like a Republican proposed plan, which was developed by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in response to Hilliary Care/. Yes, you understood right: Obamacare was first proposed by the Republicans under a different name. Wonder what happened? Join the crowd.
Florida and Texas are the largest of 27 states that either have said they won't establish a state run medical insurance exchange or have yet to decide what they are going to do about that pivotal part of the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," now and forever nicknamed Obamacare.
Another part of the act, Medicaid expansion, finds the states even more conflicted The Supreme Court has ruled that part of Obamcare is voluntary. Florida and Texas lead the south in near solid opposition, and most states haven't decided, despite the generous terms on offer if they do. The 17 million Americans now without health insurance, who would be newly eligible for Medicad, will have to cool their heels in emergency rooms a while longer.
On another front, over 1,700 businesses have received waivers postponing their participation in Obamacare until 2014. It seems clear that its roll out will be slow. Even after tardy businesses begin to comply it is quite possible that many will opt to pay a fine rather than offer their employees health plans that conform to Obamacare regulations.
Far from being dismaying, these developments are just what the doctor ordered for we who advocate a single payer federal system. They will let Obamacare evolve as follows:
1) Employers, already disposed to do so, will continue to shed or emasculate employee medical benefits the better to compete locally and globally. The penalties for not complying with Obamacare are not apt to rise at all, while the costs of health insurance will continue up. In time paying the fines will be the more sensible route.
2) In tandem with the decline in employer medical benefits, iinsurance exchanges -- whether federally, state or jointly run -- will gradually become the market places where most Americans buy health insurance.
3) Medicaid will expand gradually, but inevitably, as state intransigence wanes in the face of withering public outrage. This will save the Feds gobs of money in the near term while laying the blame for heartlessness where it belongs.
4) Gradual Medicaid expansion will buy the medical professions time to recruit and train caregivers from around the world to meet the expanding need. This would alleviate what could have been a biding war for suddenly scarce skills and a consequent steep rise in medical costs that might have proved fatal to Obamacare while in its cradle.
5) Medical insurance offerings will become standardized into a menu of plans easy to understand and compare, leading to markets competing predominately on price like retailers at Christmas time. This will squeeze profits more effectively than any number of costly regulations, and will lead the insurance industry to depart the medical insurance business except as contractors for the Feds.
6) As with flood insurance, hurricane insurance in Florida and earthquake insurance in California, government will fill the vacuum by popular demand. The five medical insurance programs -- Medicaid, Medicare, Obamacare, Tricare (for the military) and the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan (Civilcare?) -- run by the Federal Government will thus come to insure nearly all Americans.
This outcome may not be called "a single payer system," but it will look, act and quack like one. In a generation these systems will converge and a Health Security Administration will take its place along side the Social Security Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services. This will be called socialism, more black UN helicopters will be seen patroling our boarders and we will be accused of being just like Europe. And not a moment too soon.
Of course it will be far from socialism. Most of us will still have to select a plan from among insurance company offerings. Most of us will choose among benefit plans offered at work either as primary insurance or as a suplememt to Medicare. Others will shop through state exchanges especially if you work for a comany with fewer than 50 employees.
Doctors and other medical providers will still practice separately or in privately organizaed groups. Hospitals will still be free to be non profit or for profit corporations. We will still be constrained by which doctors and hospitals are acceptable to (cozy with) our insurers. The system will look a lot more like Germany's, which also keeps a role for insurance companies, than England's, in which medical resources are deployed by the state.
Obamacare will also like a Republican proposed plan, which was developed by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in response to Hilliary Care/. Yes, you understood right: Obamacare was first proposed by the Republicans under a different name. Wonder what happened? Join the crowd.
Monday, December 3, 2012
An Atheist For Jesus At Christmas
I hate the word, "atheist," perhaps because I am occasionally called one. Once I decided to think about important questions as if I was a scientist, holding all conclusions open to change as the facts change, I could not be a Christian in any orthodox sense. This despite a conventional and comfortable upbringing as a Methodist in a Protestant world. Nor does "agnostic" work because I will only believe posthumously and in the Presence, and what I seek is a way to knowledge, and a way to live, here and now on earth.
But I am not hostile to religion as the anti-science, as many atheists are, nor do I think I am superior morally and ethically to people afflicted by faith rather than doubt. Indeed I adhere passionately to the cause of freedom of -- and from -- religion. I am more than willing to tolerate the many kinds of folk myth and nonsense that infect and roil the world even unto these days. Indeed, as I found out yet again on one recent day, the music, the words and the pageantry of a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus have emotional power that reason cannot explain. I suspect that all ancient and rooted religions so affect their apostates.
Picture a choir, voices filling a chapel built in accord with scientific acoustics and festooned with greenery, candle light and stained glass. When the choir bursts into the music of Bach, Beethoven, Brittan and Handel -- Handel above all -- my eyes and sinuses testify to the mind's response. Perhaps also it is the Christmas hymns of childhood that fire the emotions. Who would not wish "Joy to the World?" To please Jesus with your drum? To go tell on a mountain a tale of servitude and redemption found, ironically, in the faith of oppressors?
More prosaically, Stetson University is a small faith founded college of our Florida neighborhood, now grown to university sized sophistication, that harbors an accomplished faculty and curricula for the musical and lively arts. That chapel is theirs. Students and teachers annually stage a Christmas show, which most years we attend with friends. The program is resolutely non-denominational: only the hard pews deliver a stern Calvinism. (Veterans bring pillows, and do not share.) Applause, like commercials on public television, has its appointed place.
More specifically, the moral teachings of Jesus are hard to ignore and harder to beat. If you do what Thomas Jefferson did and strip away the embroidery of miracles most certainly woven centuries later to warm the gullible, you are left with a set of simple, yet profound, rules for a moral life. They are easy to say and fiendishly difficult to live by. Jefferson's life, famously ambiguous, attests to this. Fluent in Greek, Latin and French and a master of English, Jefferson cut up new testaments in these languages and pasted together a version of his own containing only the sermons, parables and other teachings. Versions of it, with commentaries, are still around (search for "The Jefferson Bible" on Google, amazon.com or abe.com).
A fictional case of the profoundly simple in Jesus' teachings is found in "The Answer," a slight modern parable by the late writer, Philip Wylie. Set, and written, in the cold war era of the 1950's when hydrogen bomb testing was in vogue, it concerns the deadly fate of two angels urgently bearing identical golden books directly into the sites of thermonuclear tests, one in Siberia and another on an expendable Pacific island. One book, its dead bearer and its peasant discoverer are destroyed by a Stalin figure with patented cruel efficacy by another thermonuclear blast. The other angel's book is hidden by a young lad on a nearby island, where the angel crashed to earth, before investigators can find it's fatally stricken bearer. Subsequently, the plane carrying the American angel's body to Washington is unaccountably lost at sea.
The scene is set for Russian and American leaders to do what they do best: say nothing and hope nothing comes of it. But the American general in charge of the bomb test, who is the book's protagonist, is ordered back to the island of the stricken angel to conduct another nearby test. He encounters the boy and by a plausible plot twist or two knows to ask him what he is hiding.
"I never meant to keep it! But it is gold! And we were always so mighty poor. . . I hid it under an old rock. Come on, I'll show you." He did.
Then the author wrote: "[In the book] there was one message only, very short, said again and again, but [the general] did not know what it was until . . . he found the tongues of Earth. . . For the message of icy space and flaring stars was this: '---- --- -------'."
If you cannot easily substitute the proper letters, one per dash, you will never be sure of the answer to that half ironical, ubiquitious question of our day: What would Jesus say? Merry Christmas.
'
But I am not hostile to religion as the anti-science, as many atheists are, nor do I think I am superior morally and ethically to people afflicted by faith rather than doubt. Indeed I adhere passionately to the cause of freedom of -- and from -- religion. I am more than willing to tolerate the many kinds of folk myth and nonsense that infect and roil the world even unto these days. Indeed, as I found out yet again on one recent day, the music, the words and the pageantry of a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus have emotional power that reason cannot explain. I suspect that all ancient and rooted religions so affect their apostates.
Picture a choir, voices filling a chapel built in accord with scientific acoustics and festooned with greenery, candle light and stained glass. When the choir bursts into the music of Bach, Beethoven, Brittan and Handel -- Handel above all -- my eyes and sinuses testify to the mind's response. Perhaps also it is the Christmas hymns of childhood that fire the emotions. Who would not wish "Joy to the World?" To please Jesus with your drum? To go tell on a mountain a tale of servitude and redemption found, ironically, in the faith of oppressors?
More prosaically, Stetson University is a small faith founded college of our Florida neighborhood, now grown to university sized sophistication, that harbors an accomplished faculty and curricula for the musical and lively arts. That chapel is theirs. Students and teachers annually stage a Christmas show, which most years we attend with friends. The program is resolutely non-denominational: only the hard pews deliver a stern Calvinism. (Veterans bring pillows, and do not share.) Applause, like commercials on public television, has its appointed place.
More specifically, the moral teachings of Jesus are hard to ignore and harder to beat. If you do what Thomas Jefferson did and strip away the embroidery of miracles most certainly woven centuries later to warm the gullible, you are left with a set of simple, yet profound, rules for a moral life. They are easy to say and fiendishly difficult to live by. Jefferson's life, famously ambiguous, attests to this. Fluent in Greek, Latin and French and a master of English, Jefferson cut up new testaments in these languages and pasted together a version of his own containing only the sermons, parables and other teachings. Versions of it, with commentaries, are still around (search for "The Jefferson Bible" on Google, amazon.com or abe.com).
A fictional case of the profoundly simple in Jesus' teachings is found in "The Answer," a slight modern parable by the late writer, Philip Wylie. Set, and written, in the cold war era of the 1950's when hydrogen bomb testing was in vogue, it concerns the deadly fate of two angels urgently bearing identical golden books directly into the sites of thermonuclear tests, one in Siberia and another on an expendable Pacific island. One book, its dead bearer and its peasant discoverer are destroyed by a Stalin figure with patented cruel efficacy by another thermonuclear blast. The other angel's book is hidden by a young lad on a nearby island, where the angel crashed to earth, before investigators can find it's fatally stricken bearer. Subsequently, the plane carrying the American angel's body to Washington is unaccountably lost at sea.
The scene is set for Russian and American leaders to do what they do best: say nothing and hope nothing comes of it. But the American general in charge of the bomb test, who is the book's protagonist, is ordered back to the island of the stricken angel to conduct another nearby test. He encounters the boy and by a plausible plot twist or two knows to ask him what he is hiding.
"I never meant to keep it! But it is gold! And we were always so mighty poor. . . I hid it under an old rock. Come on, I'll show you." He did.
Then the author wrote: "[In the book] there was one message only, very short, said again and again, but [the general] did not know what it was until . . . he found the tongues of Earth. . . For the message of icy space and flaring stars was this: '---- --- -------'."
If you cannot easily substitute the proper letters, one per dash, you will never be sure of the answer to that half ironical, ubiquitious question of our day: What would Jesus say? Merry Christmas.
'
Saturday, December 1, 2012
On Winning The Lottery
An Indulgent chapter from my rich fantasy life circa Christmas, 2012.
"I'd say $588 million is just about right. We could help the kids and do everything we want to," I told my wife at breakfast. "Why share? Let's buy a ticket and win the whole enchilada!"
Well, we didn't and we didn't, but that doesn't stop the fantasy reel from spooling its story through my head. As a film it could win Sundance.
Damn! Two other people, just as normal as we are, just won.
Power Ball! The name itself lights up the mind's eye. It conjures riches, dominance, a delightful, willful dance through life, clad in pearl drenched raiment, while riding a chariot of gold to the ends of the earth and back as the seas and the people part abjectly as you pass, offering you delicacies of food and drink for a coin or two from your endless purse.
Take a cruise! Hell, buy a yacht! Ride a Gulfstream! Go Express to the Orient! Break Monte Carlo! Impress Paris! Take London by storm and meet the Queen! Elect a President and sleep in Lincoln's bed! Address (and admonish) Congress! Proclaim world peace before the UN!
"First we should pay off the mortgage. And make a dent in the credit card balances. Could we have a live tree this Christmas? What about college for the grandchildren?" My wife is ever the practical one, even when dreaming.
"What about a new home for us and the live tree?" Overlooking the sea and the 18th green at Pebble Beach?" My reel is still running.
"We ought to do our best to lead a normal life," she said. "That's what real winners always say."
"Not til the money's gone," I said. "Mitt's not busy now. "He could help do a private equity fund, so the money will never run out. We could round up to a billion. Sounds normal enough for me."
"Wouldn't you rather do philanthropy with Warren and Bill? We have 23 children, grand children and great grand children, remember."
"Be practical. And remember whose fantasy this is."
Her voice turned flat. She said matter of factly, ending the dream, "All I remember is what you always said when I wanted to buy a lottery ticket."
"What?"
"If you don't play you can't lose."
"I'd say $588 million is just about right. We could help the kids and do everything we want to," I told my wife at breakfast. "Why share? Let's buy a ticket and win the whole enchilada!"
Well, we didn't and we didn't, but that doesn't stop the fantasy reel from spooling its story through my head. As a film it could win Sundance.
Damn! Two other people, just as normal as we are, just won.
Power Ball! The name itself lights up the mind's eye. It conjures riches, dominance, a delightful, willful dance through life, clad in pearl drenched raiment, while riding a chariot of gold to the ends of the earth and back as the seas and the people part abjectly as you pass, offering you delicacies of food and drink for a coin or two from your endless purse.
Take a cruise! Hell, buy a yacht! Ride a Gulfstream! Go Express to the Orient! Break Monte Carlo! Impress Paris! Take London by storm and meet the Queen! Elect a President and sleep in Lincoln's bed! Address (and admonish) Congress! Proclaim world peace before the UN!
"First we should pay off the mortgage. And make a dent in the credit card balances. Could we have a live tree this Christmas? What about college for the grandchildren?" My wife is ever the practical one, even when dreaming.
"What about a new home for us and the live tree?" Overlooking the sea and the 18th green at Pebble Beach?" My reel is still running.
"We ought to do our best to lead a normal life," she said. "That's what real winners always say."
"Not til the money's gone," I said. "Mitt's not busy now. "He could help do a private equity fund, so the money will never run out. We could round up to a billion. Sounds normal enough for me."
"Wouldn't you rather do philanthropy with Warren and Bill? We have 23 children, grand children and great grand children, remember."
"Be practical. And remember whose fantasy this is."
Her voice turned flat. She said matter of factly, ending the dream, "All I remember is what you always said when I wanted to buy a lottery ticket."
"What?"
"If you don't play you can't lose."
Friday, November 30, 2012
A Second Bill of Rights
The date of last substantial revision is 13 July 2013.
History and Intentions
The first Bill of Rights exists because the Constitution would not have been adopted without it. If the Constitution's principal advocates (Federalists) had not agreed on their honor to propose and support a Bill of Rights by Constitutional amendment as soon as the new government convened, the necessary nine states out of thirteen would not have ratified the Constitution. Opponents of the nascent supreme law (anti-Federalists) had vowed to defeat it if changes were not made, and the mood of the country was with them. The thirteen colonies had ousted one sovereign for trampling on its rights, and were loath to risk them under another possible tyranny unless traditional rights of individuals were secured.
Thus the first ten amendments to the Constitution specify what the United States may not do to its citizens. A second Bill of Rights must do the same if it is to legitimately bear that name. It must specify more acts that the government may not require of any individual, despite what the customs of society or the will of a political majority will tolerate or favor. Other amendments that would encode rights to education, work, a living wage, etc, have their merits and supporters, but are not acts that experience has taught us that any government must be forever forbidden to impose on its citizens.
James Madison drafted the first Bill from 500 years of cherished precedent in English law, beginning with the Magna Carta of 1215. In most cases the rights of Englishmen had been written into American state constitutions adopted after the Declaration of Independence from Britain. Most state Constitutional ratifying conventions forwarded their versions of a Bill of Rights as recommended amendments to the Constitution, along with their instruments of ratification, to the Continental Congress. In this way Madison's Bill of Rights virtually wrote itself from the near universal consensus of the times.
This will not be true of a second bill. No historical basis or present consensus exists for a new list of ways to enhance the rights of individuals by limiting the power of majorities. This essay is an attempt to create that list and a means to start building that consensus. Not being a Madison with his advantages of erudition and popular support, the writer does not expect -- though he may fantasize -- that his proposals will survive without change or be ratified any time soon. Of some 7,000 proposed Constitutional amendments, only 27 have succeeded.
Critics will note that many of "new" rights proposed below are already Constitutional law by Supreme Court decision. Such edicts, however worthy, can be overturned by a later court, and in some cases by the Congress, and may not be what successive Presidents have in mind when taking the oath of office to "preserve, protect and defend" the Constitution. Society itself is of two minds about the standing of judicial interpretations. Do they, or should they, tamper with the original intent of the framers? Such questions and objections vanish once the Constitution is formally amended. Rights belong in Constitutional stone to be safe from transient majorities.
A more valid objection is that rights tend to conflict and limit one another. The more rights we define the greater the chances for such conflicts and limits. We do not edit the Constitution when we change it. The original language protecting slavery is still there even though slavery was abolished by the 13th amendment. Later amendments take precedence over the unamended document and earlier amendments. Care, then, must be taken with the exact wording of each new amendment lest it unintentionally limit old rights rather than enhance all rights. Pride of prose has no place in this process. Help and comments are therefore invited. Those received so far have been most helpful.
Proposed Amendments (Informal Title)
Only text in italics is meant to amend the Constitution.
(Definition)
Unless otherwise modified in context in this Constitution, the phrase "the United States" includes and stands in place of any or all of the following: the Federal Government of the United States of American; the several states; and the territories and possessions thereof; within the jurisdiction thereof; and other such phrases of like inclusive meaning.
(Equality of Votes and Voters)
Legislative districts for the House of Representatives shall be established by the Supreme Court of the United States on the completion of each decennial census.
Legislative districts for other elected offices within the United States shall be established or approved by the highest civil court of jurisdiction on the completion of each decennial census.
All legislative districts within the United States shall be maximally compact, contiguous and equally populated, excluding all other criteria and all historical precedent.
All legislative district revisions shall apply to the first election after the decennial census and all subsequent elections until the next decennial census, effective with the first census after the adoption of this provision.
(Voting Rights)
No citizen, declaring a sole permanent residence, shall be denied the right immediately to register and vote equally with others in the voting places of that residence. A declaration of residency in one jurisdiction is valid in all other inferior jurisdictions completely or partially within its boundaries.
No citizen released or paroled from incarceration or other sentence for a criminal act shall be denied the right immediately to register and vote equally with others in the voting places of declared permanent residence. This provision shall apply ex post facto.
Voting, in person or by mail or by similar means sanctioned by law, including absentee voting, shall begin within four calendar days, excluding holidays, of when nominations for office and certification of ballot questions are legally closed, providing that such closure may not be less than four calendar weeks before the official election day.
Documentation requirements for registration shall be limited to the least necessary to prove identity and establish residency. Proof of identity required for issuing a United States passport need not be required and will not be exceeded. A certificate of identity will be issued to citizens at birth or naturalization, and will be honored, as will a United States passport, by all subsequent voting registrars.
(Sexual Privacy)
The private sexual acts of consenting adults shall not be prohibited by law, nor shall such acts be observed or revealed in any manner whatsoever without the prior mutual agreement of the parties thereto. This provision shall apply ex post facto and until the deaths of the parties thereto.
(Conception and Abortion)
The use, sale, distribution or instruction in the use of contraceptive methods and devices shall not be restricted.
The prevention or termination of a pregnancy, except at and beyond the medically determined case by case point of viability, is solely the individual choice of woman.
(Travel)
The right of citizens, not subject to lawful restrictions ordered by a federal court of jurisdiction, freely to travel beyond, and to return to the United States shall not be denied or purposefully delayed.
(Equal Rights)
Equality of rights and privileges under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex or sexual identity.
The Congress shall have the responsibility to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
(Capital Punishment)
Capital punishment is prohibited in all cases other than treason and convictions for two or more murders, or attempted murders, in the first degree.
(Citizenship)
A person under this Constitution is a single natural living individual. No law or interpretation of law shall confer person hood or the rights, immunities and privileges of the individual citizen enumerated or reserved by this Constitution upon any other entity whatsoever. This provision shall not be construed to impair legally enforceable contracts.
A person born in the United States is a citizen thereof. A person born of or conceived by a parent who is a citizen of the United States, is a citizen thereof without regard to location of birth, conception or any other factor. A person granted citizenship by law is equally a citizen.
No citizen of the United States may be deprived of the privileges and responsibilities of citizenship except at the citizen's own free request.
The Congress shall have the responsibility to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
(Loyalty)
No oath of allegiance or loyalty to the United States or any other political entity shall be required of any person who is a private citizen thereof.
If an oath is required by law of elected public officials, or other public officials appointed thereby, of the United States it shall be equivalent to an appropriate portion of the oath required of the President of the United Statesby this constitution.
The Congress shall have the power to specify an oath of allegiance to the constitution of the United States required of members of the Armed Forces of the United States as a condition of membership therein.
(Personal Information)
With the exception of evidence of criminal behavior made public in open court, writings by, images of, or information about, an individual from whatever source belongs to the individual and may not be used for any purpose other than law enforcement by legal warrant without the prior approval of the individual.
Arrest warrants and records shall not be disclosed until charges are brought or a fugitive is sought. Information about cases of arrest or questioning and subsequent release become the sole property of the individual arrested or questioned and may not be made public or used without permission of the owner except for further legally sanctioned investigation of criminal behavior or uses that preserve individual privacy..
Friday, November 23, 2012
Federal Taxes Fair and Simple?
Updated 4 July 2013.
Introduction
This rather longish essay will only scratch a very large surface by laying out the principles of Federal and related state and local tax reform. If you are philosophically convinced that the so called flat tax is both fair and simple then this essay was written with you in mind. I hope to convince you that equality of tax rate, while undeniably simple, is not as fair as equality of sacrifice.
As the question mark in the title implies, this essay is also a work in progress that can only be improved by suggestions from readers, even if they are made with a serving of scorn. I promise not to reply in kind -- unless you think that Grover Norquist is on to something.
What Can We Do?
Is it even possible for America's federal taxes to ever be both fair and simple? To a heartening degree, yes; completely, no. These two goals always clash when either is pushed to an extreme. A simple tax can be inherently unfair. A fair tax can never be perfectly simple. To get to a synthesis will require thought and give and take, but the result can be better than either extreme. This essay reaches for that goal.
To achieve it will also take patience, for a comprehensive change can fail if too abrupt. Change is best implemented in digestible phases stretched over time so people can adjust. During meaningful reform taxes will at first be more complicated than ever even as they become more fair.. Only if we stay a steady predictable course can we transit to a more fair and simple system
What we should seek would be far more sweeping than the deal President Ronald Reagan and Speaker Tip O'Neil struck 25 years ago. For example every special tax break in the federal code needs to be reconsidered, if not repealed root and branch. No lingering sacred cows. No important tax left unexamined and unchanged. We must rebuild the house we live in while already in residence. This is never easy.
Federal, state and local taxes all complicate our lives, especially when their rules and formulas unnecessarily differ. We will look for ways to reconcile tax structures among levels of government consistent with each level's independent constitutional power to raise (or lower) revenues. However, state and local taxes taken alone, are beyond our scope; except for those corporate and personal income taxes and gift and inheritance taxes levied below the federal level.
It's time to broadly define what are we talking about What are the important federal taxes and how to approach their reform? For that matter, how to define "fair" and "simple," and which is the more important? What else has to adjust as the tax codes are overhauled? Finally, what can we -- and should we -- do when?
One aspect of tax reform we need not talk about is revenue. A fair and simple tax code can raise as much or as little money as the country requires -- or will stand for -- by adjusting rates. Rate adjustment in turn depends on the needs and politics of the moment.
Another point of silence is math. We will elucidate principles and leave to those with super computers and modeling skills to compute the impact of those principles on taxpayers when they are married to specific rate structures.
A Fair and Simple Definition
Fair means equality of sacrifice. If you and I are stripped naked to the world -- no shoes, no clothes, no income, no assets, no service -- the first dollars we earn are all-important equally to both of us. As we struggle to earn more, our earnings will begin to diverge. One of us will fall behind. If I stay poor and you get rich, the last dollar I earn is more important to me than your last earned dollar is to you.
If I am poor enough, I need every last dollar. If you are rich enough, you don't need any more dollars. Would it be fair, then, for you to pay all the taxes? I might think so, but you and most people would not. However, everybody except you will agree that you ought to pay more taxes than me. Finally persuaded, you propose that we both pay at the same tax rate. You make ten times as much as I do, so you would pay ten times as much in taxes. This is usually called a flat tax because the tax rate is the same for everyone.
Fair enough? Not quite. There is a point, call it the "survival level." below which I cannot sustain life itself. There is another point, let's call it the "satiation level," beyond which you simply can't find the time or energy to spend any more. If my income is one more dollar than survival and your income is one more dollar than satiation, should we both pay the same amount of that dollar in taxes? Of course not. And that goes for every dollar in between these two levels if our sacrifice is to be as equal as math and politics mixed will allow.
Complete fairness, then, would mean that no income above the survival level should be totally exempt from taxation, and that the wealthy should be taxed at 100 percent beyond the satiation level. Such a rule would be elegantly simple as well. But what it wouldn't be is aspirational. Income just beyond enough for survival doesn't need the ambition stifling burden of an immediate tax bite. Equally, income beyond what any human can spend (even if married) is not income beyond what a financially successful person can risk by innovative investing, or can competently contribute to or manage for worthy causes.
Thus taxes at these margins will not be strictly fair and far from simple, but perhaps we can make them equitable. Quantifying definitions of "survival," "satiation," "innovative investment," and "worthy causes," will be crucial exercises involving not so much higher math as fuzzy math. But, later on, we will make an attempt.
That is the case for choosing the graduated tax over the flat tax. The term graduated tax means that each increment (bracket) of income subject to tax is taxed at a higher rate than the previous increment. The size of each rate increment is calculated to maintain equality of sacrifice, i.e. fairness. Obviously the graduated tax lacks the simplicity of a flat tax. Indeed the traditional process of setting increments and the tax rate to be applied to each has been more political than mathematical. We need to reduce the political part to a minimum in the name of both fairness and simplicity.
Fairness also requires that all income -- wages, salaries, bonuses, interest, dividends, capital gains, pensions, gambling winnings -- be treated equally. (One exception to this rule is also fair: the stock paid as options in lieu of salary, or held by early investors, ought to be saleable untaxed when a start up company first goes public. Great risk deserves great reward.) Another exception is the earned income tax credit, an elegantly simple way to supply enough income for a living wage to the working poor. The EITC's potential remains high, as unfortunately does its potential for abuse.
Simplicity is close to fairness in importance, if only because it is human nature to reason that if something is too complicated to understand it's probably not fair either. Tax calculations should be simple in principle and easy to do with the aid of a computer program that embodies way more detail and nuance about the subject than you could, or should, ever need or want to know. Consider searching the Internet. It is easy to do: enter some search words and wait a few seconds. But in those few seconds mathematics of hideously impenetrable complexity have been at your service. Your tax bill, continuously calculated from basic inputs, will never be as popular as the Google-retrieved address of a lost lover, but if they are both easy for you to use why mind how complicated the formulas may be?
What can be simple and easy is aggregating income from all sources. Fortunately this improvement is happening already: tax preparation programs today can retrieve income numbers from employers, banks, brokers, etc., via the Internet. Our need to collect and file odd shaped slips of paper for use at tax time is already ending. (The next improvement will be for the IRS, which gets this information too, to provide it to your program electronically on its responsibility.)
Simplicity especially requires reform of deductions (which reduce taxable income) and credits (which reduce taxes directly). Another name for deductions and credits -- aside from "tax payers beloved friend" -- is tax expenditure. Tax expenditures attempt to reward you for perceived good behavior or to induce you to behave well. The big examples are deductions for mortgage interest, health costs, state and local taxes, dependents and charitable contributions, and credits for disabilities, old age, and energy conservation.
For those who don't itemize, about half of filers, taxes are already irreducibly simplified. It's the higher income itemizers that have a valid beef about complexity. Yet it will be this crowd that squawks the loudest when their favorite deduction items are dropped, chopped or capped. (Don't tax you/ don't tax me,/tax that fellow behind the tree!)
The ultimate in simplicity is to not tax at all. While that will happen when pigs fly, there is a strong case for the gradual elimination of the corporate income tax. (Simultaneously, though, the practice of wealthy individuals incorporating themselves to avoid taxes will have change, if not go away, if they are to pay any tax at all, let alone their fair share.)
Another area of simplification that the several states might consider is to adopt federal definitions and rules wholesale for what income is taxed and and exempted, setting tax rates as an add-on to the federal schedule. Some states do this already, letting the feds collect the money from individuals and transfer a lump sum to them for an administrative fee that is a fraction of what a separate state system would cost to operate. State legislatures retain the ultimate power to set and to change their tax rates
Simplicity is more important to the less well off, than to individuals well able to hire lawyers and accountants. In fact it is the government and the rest of us that benefit when taxes on the well to do are simple, transparent and unavoidable.
The Important Taxes
We will consider taxes on incomes, expenditures and wealth. The same criteria of fairness and simplicity will be applied to each one.
Incomes.
The personal income tax. The usual reform deal on offer is a reduction in tax rates and brackets in return for eliminating, capping or bracketing (as income is bracketed), such middle class sacred cows as the home mortgage deduction, tax exemptions of medical, retirement and other benefits and the deductability of state and local taxes. This inadequate deal is off the table. Tax rates should roughly follow the path of the economy: up in good years, down in bad ones. The number of tax brackets needs to be increased, not reduced. The so called flat tax is a non-starter, even if dressed up as a European style value added tax. It just isn't fair.
The corporate income tax. It is said that we have the highest corporate tax rates in the world, and, once all the loop holes are plugged, this will be true. Therefore, conservatives say, that the corporate rate should be lowered in the name of fair competition. I propose that we lead, not follow, the rest of the industrialized nations and gradually eliminate corporate income taxation all together. Our international competitors and trading partners will surely follow.
This move is basic economics. Any corporate tax is an expense to the paying firm. It is paid by higher prices for products or services and/or by lower profits on their sale. The more a company dominates its market the more it can raise prices and thereby pass on the tax to purchasers. In contrast, its smaller competitors, less able to raise prices and still be competitive, take the hit in their profits. The ability of a few big firms to carve up a given market is boosted by corporate taxes.
There is another perversity to the corporate income tax. Business lobbying for breaks and loopholes, and the corruption that ensues, is an inevitable consequence. So too are dodgy accounting practices, up to and including double sets of books. Business decisions shaped by tax considerations are seldom the best.
As an alternative to taxing corporate income, we could tax corporate behavior. Two prime areas are (1) energy from fossil fuel usage, the so called carbon tax, and (2) environmental impact, including natural resources used, water consumption, air pollution, trash generation. The purpose of these taxes would not be to raise revenue but to change unsustainable behavior.
These two taxes should apply mostly, perhaps exclusively, to the few thousand major corporations of international reach that dominate the national, and increasingly the world, economy. Critics will term this a tax on bigness. Without apologies, it is.
Payroll taxes. Unfairly characterized, they are those deductions that pick your pay packet before you ever see it by taxing you and/or you employer: social security, Medicare, Obamacare, unemployment insurance, worker's compensation insurance. In sum they fund that amorphous entity known as the social safety net. Except as noted, most are not addressed herein.
Social Security. Conservatives say that retirees would be better off if social security were an investment plan akin to the 401k plans so popular with businesses keen to phase out guaranteed benefit pensions. They have a reasoned case. However, the train has left the station on this one. The same money they would send to your personal retirement account is what today's retirees are counting on right now. A separate blog essay deals with Social Security.
Medicare, Obamacare. Another blog essay deals with this complex issue. We will be a generation before we get it right. Perhaps by then it will be as cheap, helpful and administratively simple as that enjoyed by the French today.
Expenditures.
Use taxes. Levies on an activity in order to create, staff and maintain the infrastructure the activity depends on. These include charges for transportation (gas taxes, highway and bridge tolls, trucking fees, airline ticket fees, rental car fees, auto license fees), venues (entry fees to parks, museums, concerts, exhibits and the like), and services (parking fees, recording fees, law enforcement fines,court costs, catastrophic insurance policies, postal fees).
The federal gas tax, which taxes gallons of gasoline used, and is for the benefit of the national highway systems, is dwindling as vehicles get more efficient and/or switch to electricity. A remedy that both raises funds for highway maintenance and rewards electricity use does not come to mind.
Sales taxes. Mostly levied locally on most goods and services except for tariffs on imports from abroad. A federal sales tax levied on Internet purchases and distributed to the states, perhaps on a per capita basis, is one way to reduce the inherent advantage of on line sellers, which no longer need or deserve the privilege.
Sin taxes. Gambling; tobacco and alcohol today; prostitution and recreational drugs possibly tomorrow. Obviously a special case of the sales tax, levied at rates designed to discourage legal behaviors that are bad for people and costly to society.
Wealth.
Property taxes. These include residential and business real estate, land, business equity, capital gains and luxury taxes.
The Inheritance and Gift tax. Call it the death tax if you want. It's certainly true that you die before it is paid, and your heirs are that much less compensated for their loss of your loving presence, but is not the community at large at least somewhat responsible for the fact that you successfully left a legacy. For example, did you really pay as much into Social Security as you received? Should your estate not pay it back? No, family farms, businesses and ancestral homes should not have to be sold in order to meet this government levy. A substantial deduction (law now), indexed for inflation (not in the law now), should allow for such transfers to deserving and responsible heirs as determined by the last wishes of the departed.
Inherited wealth should not grant any person or entity unearned economic and political power in a democracy, especially in one where money is allowed to talk so eloquently. The power of money in politics is bad enough without allowing it to speak from the grave.
The Important Deductions
All deductions reduce your taxable income. (Tax credits work differently. They reduce your tax bill.) Thus deductions are more valuable to higher earners whose income exposes them to the upper tax brackets than to poorer folk. Keep this in mind for what follows. Keep also in mind that eliminating one deduction, and retaining all others, or even eliminating almost all deductions while retaining a few, does little to simplify the tax code. The end result may or may not be fairer.
Mortgage Interest. The purpose of this deduction is obviously to promote home ownership. It has been successful at that, but it has also done much more, not all of it as beneficial. Among the unintended consequences laid at the door of this most popular of deductions is that it has subsidized urban sprawl by allowing the middle and upper economic classes to afford larger homes and lots than they otherwise could. Affluent homeowners in particular can more easily afford what are derisively called McMansions -- which they seldom need but often hugely enjoy -- partly at others' expense.
This deduction is capped for incomes above $1 million, which is no cap at all. If it survives at all it should be drastically lowered. The case for eliminating it altogether is that it helps many who don't need it and entices those who shouldn't to buy rather than rent. A case can be made for helping the first time home buyer, perhaps with a tax credit matching the sum the buyer has saved for a down payment up to, perhaps, $5,000. The credit would not be applicable just to the down payment itself, but would be spread out over at least two tax years as extra cash for any purpose related to home ownership: landscaping, furnishing, moving, etc.
One provision that definitely should be eliminated is the interest deduction on second homes. It helps mostly the well off and members of congress, who are perfectly capable of voting themselves an allowance for the expense of maintaining homes in their district and in Washington, DC.
Medical Expenses. Now that the Affordable Care Act (Obama care) is constitutional and relatively safe from repeal, this deduction is a relic, and will fall into disuse even if left in the tax code. Perhaps it is best ignored for now until we get a handle on who still needs it and why. Chances are technical modifications to the ACA will do more to eliminate the need for a medical expense deduction.
.
State and Local Taxes. The familiar argument for this deduction is that one should not be required to pay a tax on taxes. An apt rejoinder is: why not? The obvious remedy is for voters in those states to take matters into their own hands, and vote for representatives who will reduce their state tax burden. Or onto their own feet, and move to Florida or other low tax state.
Moving Expenses. Involuntary moves should be paid for by the entity requiring or enticing the move. Most are. Voluntary moves are no business of the tax payer. Beneficiaries of this break are moving companies and the affluent. It can be eliminated.
Charitable contributions. Phasing out this deduction would not be popular, nor is it called for. It should be phased out as incomes rise and should be available to all whether they itemize or not. Contributions to religious charities should be allowed, but deductibility of direct contributions to churches is a clear violation of the constitution's first amendment and should not be allowed at any level of government.
Personal Home Sale Capital Gains Forgiveness. In one way or another capital gains from the sale of a residence have long been avoidable. Today, you don't even have to roll the gain over into a different home of equal or greater value. Instead a gain of up to $500,000 for a couple, and $250,000 for a single filer is forgiven if rules are met about how long the home has been a primary residence and how long it has been since this deduction was last taken. The recent collapse of residential property values has in many cases made this deduction moot except for long time owners of relatively high value homes. The value to them of this popular tax dodge would rise considerably if, as recommended, long term capital gains were taxed as ordinary income.
A combination of the old roll over system and a one time forgiveness of gains when a home is sold after retirement is a better approach. I favor a two time roll over system: (1) when first home is sold and the next home bought and (2) when the last home is sold for a gain from the previous home. This would favor the careful home owner that buy wisely and stays put until old age forces a move.
The growing popularity of Continuing Care Retirement Communities (CCRC) would be boosted by this approach. Such communities typically require a substantial entrance fee plus a monthly maintenance fee in return for a continuum of care for the balance of a person's life. The writer lives in a CCRC and highly recommends this brand of retirement life.
Personal Deductions. These should continue indexed, as they are, for inflation. No useful tweaks come to mind.
IMPLEMENTATION.
The train has already left the station. A series of politically palatable tweaks will almost certainly be passed in the next few months in order to deal with the so called "fiscal cliff." This will present reforms such as those proposed with new realities to ponder and critique. Once the dust settles we can talk more again.
.
Introduction
This rather longish essay will only scratch a very large surface by laying out the principles of Federal and related state and local tax reform. If you are philosophically convinced that the so called flat tax is both fair and simple then this essay was written with you in mind. I hope to convince you that equality of tax rate, while undeniably simple, is not as fair as equality of sacrifice.
As the question mark in the title implies, this essay is also a work in progress that can only be improved by suggestions from readers, even if they are made with a serving of scorn. I promise not to reply in kind -- unless you think that Grover Norquist is on to something.
What Can We Do?
Is it even possible for America's federal taxes to ever be both fair and simple? To a heartening degree, yes; completely, no. These two goals always clash when either is pushed to an extreme. A simple tax can be inherently unfair. A fair tax can never be perfectly simple. To get to a synthesis will require thought and give and take, but the result can be better than either extreme. This essay reaches for that goal.
To achieve it will also take patience, for a comprehensive change can fail if too abrupt. Change is best implemented in digestible phases stretched over time so people can adjust. During meaningful reform taxes will at first be more complicated than ever even as they become more fair.. Only if we stay a steady predictable course can we transit to a more fair and simple system
What we should seek would be far more sweeping than the deal President Ronald Reagan and Speaker Tip O'Neil struck 25 years ago. For example every special tax break in the federal code needs to be reconsidered, if not repealed root and branch. No lingering sacred cows. No important tax left unexamined and unchanged. We must rebuild the house we live in while already in residence. This is never easy.
Federal, state and local taxes all complicate our lives, especially when their rules and formulas unnecessarily differ. We will look for ways to reconcile tax structures among levels of government consistent with each level's independent constitutional power to raise (or lower) revenues. However, state and local taxes taken alone, are beyond our scope; except for those corporate and personal income taxes and gift and inheritance taxes levied below the federal level.
It's time to broadly define what are we talking about What are the important federal taxes and how to approach their reform? For that matter, how to define "fair" and "simple," and which is the more important? What else has to adjust as the tax codes are overhauled? Finally, what can we -- and should we -- do when?
One aspect of tax reform we need not talk about is revenue. A fair and simple tax code can raise as much or as little money as the country requires -- or will stand for -- by adjusting rates. Rate adjustment in turn depends on the needs and politics of the moment.
Another point of silence is math. We will elucidate principles and leave to those with super computers and modeling skills to compute the impact of those principles on taxpayers when they are married to specific rate structures.
A Fair and Simple Definition
Fair means equality of sacrifice. If you and I are stripped naked to the world -- no shoes, no clothes, no income, no assets, no service -- the first dollars we earn are all-important equally to both of us. As we struggle to earn more, our earnings will begin to diverge. One of us will fall behind. If I stay poor and you get rich, the last dollar I earn is more important to me than your last earned dollar is to you.
If I am poor enough, I need every last dollar. If you are rich enough, you don't need any more dollars. Would it be fair, then, for you to pay all the taxes? I might think so, but you and most people would not. However, everybody except you will agree that you ought to pay more taxes than me. Finally persuaded, you propose that we both pay at the same tax rate. You make ten times as much as I do, so you would pay ten times as much in taxes. This is usually called a flat tax because the tax rate is the same for everyone.
Fair enough? Not quite. There is a point, call it the "survival level." below which I cannot sustain life itself. There is another point, let's call it the "satiation level," beyond which you simply can't find the time or energy to spend any more. If my income is one more dollar than survival and your income is one more dollar than satiation, should we both pay the same amount of that dollar in taxes? Of course not. And that goes for every dollar in between these two levels if our sacrifice is to be as equal as math and politics mixed will allow.
Complete fairness, then, would mean that no income above the survival level should be totally exempt from taxation, and that the wealthy should be taxed at 100 percent beyond the satiation level. Such a rule would be elegantly simple as well. But what it wouldn't be is aspirational. Income just beyond enough for survival doesn't need the ambition stifling burden of an immediate tax bite. Equally, income beyond what any human can spend (even if married) is not income beyond what a financially successful person can risk by innovative investing, or can competently contribute to or manage for worthy causes.
Thus taxes at these margins will not be strictly fair and far from simple, but perhaps we can make them equitable. Quantifying definitions of "survival," "satiation," "innovative investment," and "worthy causes," will be crucial exercises involving not so much higher math as fuzzy math. But, later on, we will make an attempt.
That is the case for choosing the graduated tax over the flat tax. The term graduated tax means that each increment (bracket) of income subject to tax is taxed at a higher rate than the previous increment. The size of each rate increment is calculated to maintain equality of sacrifice, i.e. fairness. Obviously the graduated tax lacks the simplicity of a flat tax. Indeed the traditional process of setting increments and the tax rate to be applied to each has been more political than mathematical. We need to reduce the political part to a minimum in the name of both fairness and simplicity.
Fairness also requires that all income -- wages, salaries, bonuses, interest, dividends, capital gains, pensions, gambling winnings -- be treated equally. (One exception to this rule is also fair: the stock paid as options in lieu of salary, or held by early investors, ought to be saleable untaxed when a start up company first goes public. Great risk deserves great reward.) Another exception is the earned income tax credit, an elegantly simple way to supply enough income for a living wage to the working poor. The EITC's potential remains high, as unfortunately does its potential for abuse.
Simplicity is close to fairness in importance, if only because it is human nature to reason that if something is too complicated to understand it's probably not fair either. Tax calculations should be simple in principle and easy to do with the aid of a computer program that embodies way more detail and nuance about the subject than you could, or should, ever need or want to know. Consider searching the Internet. It is easy to do: enter some search words and wait a few seconds. But in those few seconds mathematics of hideously impenetrable complexity have been at your service. Your tax bill, continuously calculated from basic inputs, will never be as popular as the Google-retrieved address of a lost lover, but if they are both easy for you to use why mind how complicated the formulas may be?
What can be simple and easy is aggregating income from all sources. Fortunately this improvement is happening already: tax preparation programs today can retrieve income numbers from employers, banks, brokers, etc., via the Internet. Our need to collect and file odd shaped slips of paper for use at tax time is already ending. (The next improvement will be for the IRS, which gets this information too, to provide it to your program electronically on its responsibility.)
Simplicity especially requires reform of deductions (which reduce taxable income) and credits (which reduce taxes directly). Another name for deductions and credits -- aside from "tax payers beloved friend" -- is tax expenditure. Tax expenditures attempt to reward you for perceived good behavior or to induce you to behave well. The big examples are deductions for mortgage interest, health costs, state and local taxes, dependents and charitable contributions, and credits for disabilities, old age, and energy conservation.
For those who don't itemize, about half of filers, taxes are already irreducibly simplified. It's the higher income itemizers that have a valid beef about complexity. Yet it will be this crowd that squawks the loudest when their favorite deduction items are dropped, chopped or capped. (Don't tax you/ don't tax me,/tax that fellow behind the tree!)
The ultimate in simplicity is to not tax at all. While that will happen when pigs fly, there is a strong case for the gradual elimination of the corporate income tax. (Simultaneously, though, the practice of wealthy individuals incorporating themselves to avoid taxes will have change, if not go away, if they are to pay any tax at all, let alone their fair share.)
Another area of simplification that the several states might consider is to adopt federal definitions and rules wholesale for what income is taxed and and exempted, setting tax rates as an add-on to the federal schedule. Some states do this already, letting the feds collect the money from individuals and transfer a lump sum to them for an administrative fee that is a fraction of what a separate state system would cost to operate. State legislatures retain the ultimate power to set and to change their tax rates
Simplicity is more important to the less well off, than to individuals well able to hire lawyers and accountants. In fact it is the government and the rest of us that benefit when taxes on the well to do are simple, transparent and unavoidable.
The Important Taxes
We will consider taxes on incomes, expenditures and wealth. The same criteria of fairness and simplicity will be applied to each one.
Incomes.
The personal income tax. The usual reform deal on offer is a reduction in tax rates and brackets in return for eliminating, capping or bracketing (as income is bracketed), such middle class sacred cows as the home mortgage deduction, tax exemptions of medical, retirement and other benefits and the deductability of state and local taxes. This inadequate deal is off the table. Tax rates should roughly follow the path of the economy: up in good years, down in bad ones. The number of tax brackets needs to be increased, not reduced. The so called flat tax is a non-starter, even if dressed up as a European style value added tax. It just isn't fair.
The corporate income tax. It is said that we have the highest corporate tax rates in the world, and, once all the loop holes are plugged, this will be true. Therefore, conservatives say, that the corporate rate should be lowered in the name of fair competition. I propose that we lead, not follow, the rest of the industrialized nations and gradually eliminate corporate income taxation all together. Our international competitors and trading partners will surely follow.
This move is basic economics. Any corporate tax is an expense to the paying firm. It is paid by higher prices for products or services and/or by lower profits on their sale. The more a company dominates its market the more it can raise prices and thereby pass on the tax to purchasers. In contrast, its smaller competitors, less able to raise prices and still be competitive, take the hit in their profits. The ability of a few big firms to carve up a given market is boosted by corporate taxes.
There is another perversity to the corporate income tax. Business lobbying for breaks and loopholes, and the corruption that ensues, is an inevitable consequence. So too are dodgy accounting practices, up to and including double sets of books. Business decisions shaped by tax considerations are seldom the best.
As an alternative to taxing corporate income, we could tax corporate behavior. Two prime areas are (1) energy from fossil fuel usage, the so called carbon tax, and (2) environmental impact, including natural resources used, water consumption, air pollution, trash generation. The purpose of these taxes would not be to raise revenue but to change unsustainable behavior.
These two taxes should apply mostly, perhaps exclusively, to the few thousand major corporations of international reach that dominate the national, and increasingly the world, economy. Critics will term this a tax on bigness. Without apologies, it is.
Payroll taxes. Unfairly characterized, they are those deductions that pick your pay packet before you ever see it by taxing you and/or you employer: social security, Medicare, Obamacare, unemployment insurance, worker's compensation insurance. In sum they fund that amorphous entity known as the social safety net. Except as noted, most are not addressed herein.
Social Security. Conservatives say that retirees would be better off if social security were an investment plan akin to the 401k plans so popular with businesses keen to phase out guaranteed benefit pensions. They have a reasoned case. However, the train has left the station on this one. The same money they would send to your personal retirement account is what today's retirees are counting on right now. A separate blog essay deals with Social Security.
Medicare, Obamacare. Another blog essay deals with this complex issue. We will be a generation before we get it right. Perhaps by then it will be as cheap, helpful and administratively simple as that enjoyed by the French today.
Expenditures.
Use taxes. Levies on an activity in order to create, staff and maintain the infrastructure the activity depends on. These include charges for transportation (gas taxes, highway and bridge tolls, trucking fees, airline ticket fees, rental car fees, auto license fees), venues (entry fees to parks, museums, concerts, exhibits and the like), and services (parking fees, recording fees, law enforcement fines,court costs, catastrophic insurance policies, postal fees).
The federal gas tax, which taxes gallons of gasoline used, and is for the benefit of the national highway systems, is dwindling as vehicles get more efficient and/or switch to electricity. A remedy that both raises funds for highway maintenance and rewards electricity use does not come to mind.
Sales taxes. Mostly levied locally on most goods and services except for tariffs on imports from abroad. A federal sales tax levied on Internet purchases and distributed to the states, perhaps on a per capita basis, is one way to reduce the inherent advantage of on line sellers, which no longer need or deserve the privilege.
Sin taxes. Gambling; tobacco and alcohol today; prostitution and recreational drugs possibly tomorrow. Obviously a special case of the sales tax, levied at rates designed to discourage legal behaviors that are bad for people and costly to society.
Wealth.
Property taxes. These include residential and business real estate, land, business equity, capital gains and luxury taxes.
The Inheritance and Gift tax. Call it the death tax if you want. It's certainly true that you die before it is paid, and your heirs are that much less compensated for their loss of your loving presence, but is not the community at large at least somewhat responsible for the fact that you successfully left a legacy. For example, did you really pay as much into Social Security as you received? Should your estate not pay it back? No, family farms, businesses and ancestral homes should not have to be sold in order to meet this government levy. A substantial deduction (law now), indexed for inflation (not in the law now), should allow for such transfers to deserving and responsible heirs as determined by the last wishes of the departed.
Inherited wealth should not grant any person or entity unearned economic and political power in a democracy, especially in one where money is allowed to talk so eloquently. The power of money in politics is bad enough without allowing it to speak from the grave.
The Important Deductions
All deductions reduce your taxable income. (Tax credits work differently. They reduce your tax bill.) Thus deductions are more valuable to higher earners whose income exposes them to the upper tax brackets than to poorer folk. Keep this in mind for what follows. Keep also in mind that eliminating one deduction, and retaining all others, or even eliminating almost all deductions while retaining a few, does little to simplify the tax code. The end result may or may not be fairer.
Mortgage Interest. The purpose of this deduction is obviously to promote home ownership. It has been successful at that, but it has also done much more, not all of it as beneficial. Among the unintended consequences laid at the door of this most popular of deductions is that it has subsidized urban sprawl by allowing the middle and upper economic classes to afford larger homes and lots than they otherwise could. Affluent homeowners in particular can more easily afford what are derisively called McMansions -- which they seldom need but often hugely enjoy -- partly at others' expense.
This deduction is capped for incomes above $1 million, which is no cap at all. If it survives at all it should be drastically lowered. The case for eliminating it altogether is that it helps many who don't need it and entices those who shouldn't to buy rather than rent. A case can be made for helping the first time home buyer, perhaps with a tax credit matching the sum the buyer has saved for a down payment up to, perhaps, $5,000. The credit would not be applicable just to the down payment itself, but would be spread out over at least two tax years as extra cash for any purpose related to home ownership: landscaping, furnishing, moving, etc.
One provision that definitely should be eliminated is the interest deduction on second homes. It helps mostly the well off and members of congress, who are perfectly capable of voting themselves an allowance for the expense of maintaining homes in their district and in Washington, DC.
Medical Expenses. Now that the Affordable Care Act (Obama care) is constitutional and relatively safe from repeal, this deduction is a relic, and will fall into disuse even if left in the tax code. Perhaps it is best ignored for now until we get a handle on who still needs it and why. Chances are technical modifications to the ACA will do more to eliminate the need for a medical expense deduction.
.
State and Local Taxes. The familiar argument for this deduction is that one should not be required to pay a tax on taxes. An apt rejoinder is: why not? The obvious remedy is for voters in those states to take matters into their own hands, and vote for representatives who will reduce their state tax burden. Or onto their own feet, and move to Florida or other low tax state.
Moving Expenses. Involuntary moves should be paid for by the entity requiring or enticing the move. Most are. Voluntary moves are no business of the tax payer. Beneficiaries of this break are moving companies and the affluent. It can be eliminated.
Charitable contributions. Phasing out this deduction would not be popular, nor is it called for. It should be phased out as incomes rise and should be available to all whether they itemize or not. Contributions to religious charities should be allowed, but deductibility of direct contributions to churches is a clear violation of the constitution's first amendment and should not be allowed at any level of government.
Personal Home Sale Capital Gains Forgiveness. In one way or another capital gains from the sale of a residence have long been avoidable. Today, you don't even have to roll the gain over into a different home of equal or greater value. Instead a gain of up to $500,000 for a couple, and $250,000 for a single filer is forgiven if rules are met about how long the home has been a primary residence and how long it has been since this deduction was last taken. The recent collapse of residential property values has in many cases made this deduction moot except for long time owners of relatively high value homes. The value to them of this popular tax dodge would rise considerably if, as recommended, long term capital gains were taxed as ordinary income.
A combination of the old roll over system and a one time forgiveness of gains when a home is sold after retirement is a better approach. I favor a two time roll over system: (1) when first home is sold and the next home bought and (2) when the last home is sold for a gain from the previous home. This would favor the careful home owner that buy wisely and stays put until old age forces a move.
The growing popularity of Continuing Care Retirement Communities (CCRC) would be boosted by this approach. Such communities typically require a substantial entrance fee plus a monthly maintenance fee in return for a continuum of care for the balance of a person's life. The writer lives in a CCRC and highly recommends this brand of retirement life.
Personal Deductions. These should continue indexed, as they are, for inflation. No useful tweaks come to mind.
IMPLEMENTATION.
The train has already left the station. A series of politically palatable tweaks will almost certainly be passed in the next few months in order to deal with the so called "fiscal cliff." This will present reforms such as those proposed with new realities to ponder and critique. Once the dust settles we can talk more again.
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Sunday, November 18, 2012
Travels With George
Updated last: 5 June 2013.
As a traveling companion George took some getting used to but now we consider him fondly and follow him more or less faithfully. George is not a human, even though we talk regularly.. He is a Global Positioning System (GPS) mostly for the car. With George, even when totally lost, we can still find our way. Usually. Now.
George's full name is George P. Schultz (GPS). He is named, obviously, after the avuncular statesman who served both Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan is numerous posts, including stints as Secretary of Defense and State. Our road warrior battle cry is, "Let George Do It!" Usually.
The first time we used George was very nearly the last. Camping out near Dulles Airport the night before a flight, we set out for a late dinner at a restaurant somewhere in the urban tangle of Northern Virginia. Spouse Carol, a former resident of these parts, was driving while I was riding shotgun. The Hopkins, who were friends when we ventured out, were in the back seat.
"I have a general idea where this place is," Carol announced. George said, "Recalculate. Prepare to turn right in half a mile." Carol said, "That doesn't sound right," and went straight in half a mile. George said, "Recalculate. In 400 yards turn back!"
A half hour of milling about smartly later, George and Carol were thoroughly frustrated with each other. We pulled over under a street lamp and I reprogrammed George. Correctly, I'm certain. "Now," I said, "Carol, do exactly what George says." Carol promised, and we set out anew for the restaurant.
"This looks familiar," a Hopkins said 20 minutes later. "We're near our hotel." Almost immediately, in front of our hotel, George proudly announced, "You have arrived at your destination." We ate satisfactorily at the bistro across the street from our hotel and turned George off for about a year.
I am directionally challenged, a homebody and slow to adopt the new. Carol gets out more and began to use George to find new addresses. She reported steady success once used to the fact that George did not know about the main entrance to our community. Or perhaps he just preferred sneaking out the back way.
Mostly we learned about George's quirks by using him to get to known destinations. He showed a distinct preference for interstates until we found the setting that changed his mind. He and Carol were frequently at odds over the best way to go. I stayed out of these fights because I had no clue who was right.
At times George seems almost human.When his satellite signal is obstructed, for example in tunnels, he exclaims, "GPS signal is lost!" in tones a pilot might use in a fog seeking the runway lights with fuel running low. One of his favorite expressions is an exasperated, "U-turn when possible." We are a trial to him I know.
But frustration flows both ways. Once when he announced that we had arrived at our destination we saw before us only an end-of-the-road barrier fence, beyond which was a railroad track crossing and a hint of a road long ago abandoned. In the distance was an open air pavilion which proved to be where we wished to be. Another day we knew just were we were headed and how to get there, but let George ramble on. After a few moments of "U-Turn where possible," and "In 100 yards turn back," we pulled up at home. George intoned, "You have arrived at your destination!"
We went on a long driving trip that took us from our central Florida home to as far north as the Canadian maritimes and as far west as Batavia, Illinois. We took George of course, but also had a complete set of AAA maps and tour guides plus a binder full of Map Quest printouts. George was most helpful in finding motels in the dark. But with all that prep at our backs there were times when we had to do the unthinkable: stop and ask for directions. Travel, like old age, is not for sissies.
The most recent episode starring George was the most bizarre. We were in a medical complex looking for a new doctor's office, when George suddenly ordered a recalculation and took us off in a new direction. "Lets see when he is up to," I said. We were early. But when we made the fourth tight left turn in a row, a certain unease set in. As a former programmer of old fashioned computers, I knew what a loop was.
On the eighth left turn in a row, we stopped and called the doctor's office for directions. After the appointment Carol and a friend went on a planned trip and I prepared George to return home. Damned if George didn't take me back into his loop-the-loop. I turned him off and made it home alone.
George has been off since. I am concerned about his mental health. To be fair, we have not treated George as well as we might. He has never been fed an update for example. We are looking into that, and with proper nourishment we hope to have him back on his game in no time.
5 June 2013.
It is with profound sadness I report the demise of George. He was with us for about five years and we were used to each other. I am uncertain about the proper ratio of GPS years to human years, but it was probably time. We have not needed to buy a replacement for George. We are listening to Siri now. It's a little disconcerting when we talk back to Siri and she slips us a zinger in reply. Insanely great, Mr Jobs.
As a traveling companion George took some getting used to but now we consider him fondly and follow him more or less faithfully. George is not a human, even though we talk regularly.. He is a Global Positioning System (GPS) mostly for the car. With George, even when totally lost, we can still find our way. Usually. Now.
George's full name is George P. Schultz (GPS). He is named, obviously, after the avuncular statesman who served both Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan is numerous posts, including stints as Secretary of Defense and State. Our road warrior battle cry is, "Let George Do It!" Usually.
The first time we used George was very nearly the last. Camping out near Dulles Airport the night before a flight, we set out for a late dinner at a restaurant somewhere in the urban tangle of Northern Virginia. Spouse Carol, a former resident of these parts, was driving while I was riding shotgun. The Hopkins, who were friends when we ventured out, were in the back seat.
"I have a general idea where this place is," Carol announced. George said, "Recalculate. Prepare to turn right in half a mile." Carol said, "That doesn't sound right," and went straight in half a mile. George said, "Recalculate. In 400 yards turn back!"
A half hour of milling about smartly later, George and Carol were thoroughly frustrated with each other. We pulled over under a street lamp and I reprogrammed George. Correctly, I'm certain. "Now," I said, "Carol, do exactly what George says." Carol promised, and we set out anew for the restaurant.
"This looks familiar," a Hopkins said 20 minutes later. "We're near our hotel." Almost immediately, in front of our hotel, George proudly announced, "You have arrived at your destination." We ate satisfactorily at the bistro across the street from our hotel and turned George off for about a year.
I am directionally challenged, a homebody and slow to adopt the new. Carol gets out more and began to use George to find new addresses. She reported steady success once used to the fact that George did not know about the main entrance to our community. Or perhaps he just preferred sneaking out the back way.
Mostly we learned about George's quirks by using him to get to known destinations. He showed a distinct preference for interstates until we found the setting that changed his mind. He and Carol were frequently at odds over the best way to go. I stayed out of these fights because I had no clue who was right.
At times George seems almost human.When his satellite signal is obstructed, for example in tunnels, he exclaims, "GPS signal is lost!" in tones a pilot might use in a fog seeking the runway lights with fuel running low. One of his favorite expressions is an exasperated, "U-turn when possible." We are a trial to him I know.
But frustration flows both ways. Once when he announced that we had arrived at our destination we saw before us only an end-of-the-road barrier fence, beyond which was a railroad track crossing and a hint of a road long ago abandoned. In the distance was an open air pavilion which proved to be where we wished to be. Another day we knew just were we were headed and how to get there, but let George ramble on. After a few moments of "U-Turn where possible," and "In 100 yards turn back," we pulled up at home. George intoned, "You have arrived at your destination!"
We went on a long driving trip that took us from our central Florida home to as far north as the Canadian maritimes and as far west as Batavia, Illinois. We took George of course, but also had a complete set of AAA maps and tour guides plus a binder full of Map Quest printouts. George was most helpful in finding motels in the dark. But with all that prep at our backs there were times when we had to do the unthinkable: stop and ask for directions. Travel, like old age, is not for sissies.
The most recent episode starring George was the most bizarre. We were in a medical complex looking for a new doctor's office, when George suddenly ordered a recalculation and took us off in a new direction. "Lets see when he is up to," I said. We were early. But when we made the fourth tight left turn in a row, a certain unease set in. As a former programmer of old fashioned computers, I knew what a loop was.
On the eighth left turn in a row, we stopped and called the doctor's office for directions. After the appointment Carol and a friend went on a planned trip and I prepared George to return home. Damned if George didn't take me back into his loop-the-loop. I turned him off and made it home alone.
George has been off since. I am concerned about his mental health. To be fair, we have not treated George as well as we might. He has never been fed an update for example. We are looking into that, and with proper nourishment we hope to have him back on his game in no time.
5 June 2013.
It is with profound sadness I report the demise of George. He was with us for about five years and we were used to each other. I am uncertain about the proper ratio of GPS years to human years, but it was probably time. We have not needed to buy a replacement for George. We are listening to Siri now. It's a little disconcerting when we talk back to Siri and she slips us a zinger in reply. Insanely great, Mr Jobs.
Saturday, November 10, 2012
The Climes They Are A-Changin’
Come gather ‘round, Florida
Wherever your home
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown . . .
The climes they are a-changin'
It only takes a few changes in Bob Dylan’s classic protest lyrics from the 1960s to adapt them to 21st century Florida. Of course its not rebellious youth that we in God’s Waiting Room should be worried about.
Nor is it the routine menace of hurricane season. We know the drill for that. Fill the water jugs, charge the batteries, lay in the tinned food, check the shutters, bring in the patio furniture. Pray. Been there, done that for years.
No, the worry we need to embrace is defined by two terms, feedback and tipping point, and how they translate the meaning of Dylan’s lyrics from a metaphor for social upset to a story about what’s happening at sea as the globe gets warmer.
Bluntly, the oceans are rising, and we are only now learning how soon they will rise and how high their sun fueled storms will surge and how far and deep the resulting mess will penetrate, percolate and stagnate. We do have an adequate sample from which to learn though: Andrew, Katrina, Irene, Sandy.
Until recently climate scientists were predicting a meter's rise in average ocean heights by the next century, but now, according to an article in a recent Scientific American, they find that sea ice and the arctic and antarctic glaciers sea ice helps hold back are melting faster than their most pessimistic predictions.
Although the Scientific American writer was too cautious to say so, the new uncertainty over timing leaves us to wonder: do we have decades, years, months -- or what -- to prepare for a Florida that is largely under water?
What is feedback in this context? Sea ice is white and so reflects the sun's rays back into space. When it begins to vanish, the darker waters absorb more heat, melting more ice in a cycle of "positive" feedback -- a chain reaction that feeds on itself and picks up speed. Fortunately sea ice already displaces its volume in water and thus doesn't cause the seas to rise when it melts. Except, of course, for the fact that warmer water takes up more space than colder water.
When glaciers begin to melt, the melt water trickles down and puddles beneath them as a lubricant. They slide ever more speedily, especially where there is less sea ice to slow them at the ocean's edge. Again positive feedback that, this time, dumps new water into earth's bath tub at an accelerating rate.
Skiers know about tipping points. When fresh snow piles up on slopes it balances ever more precariously. When it can't balance any more we call the result an avalanche. Greenland and Antarctic glaciers may never move that fast let us hope, but a tsunami or two is not out of the question.
What these twin concepts of feedback and tipping point tell us is that global warming will not be upon us gradually, but in fits and starts, storm after increasingly giant storm. Debating whether the warming trend is natural or man made is irrelevant. The unintended consequences of the industrial revolution are upon us and may well unfold no matter what we do.
Remember the old Bill Cosby routine? Cosby is Noah and God speaks to him. "Noah, build an ark." Silence. "Noah!" "What!?" "Build an ark." Long pause. "What's an ark!?" What indeed.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Abortion and the Beginning of Life
Abortion is one of those words that when used in public causes a universal grimace. In the enlightened 21st century this cringe is mental and not usually visible, but there was a time in the memory of many living when its utterance was taboo.
When I first heard and understood what it meant, I was reminded of my first taboo word that wasn't for cussing. It was uttered in a Reader's Digest magazine article that I read in early adolescence, provocatively titled, "A Stunned and Shocking Word." After an appropriate buildup, the word was revealed as masturbation. I made sure Mother didn't notice what I was reading.
Surprisingly, the author declared that flogging the fella was okay. And in time the "sin of Onan" and its feminine equivalent (popping the button?) became no longer the stuff of superstition and myth, but an accepted alternative when a sexual partner is absent, indisposed or not yet found. Case closed.
Both words bring up the unromantic side of sex. Masturbation was once thought a perverse way to enjoy its pleasures that was, you might say, always immediately at hand. Abortion, more seriously, was deemed the killing of an unborn and unwanted child. Both words named acts condemned as unnatural and sinful. The origin of these attitudes is so lost in the mists of prehistory as to make them seem instinctual.
It took longer for abortion to be found legally a woman's sole right and responsibility, at least in America, by the Supreme Court's "Roe v Wade" decision, of nearly two score years ago. Though still highly controversial, abortion is legal to varying degrees in many if not most countries, and mere mention of it is no longer taboo.
But,still, there is that inner cringe when we say the word. And the case is still open for endless arguments, frequent demonstrations and the occasional riot. At the heart of the controversy is the question of when life begins. Arguments have been marshaled for every way station from ejaculation to birth. About all the two camps agree on is that nobody is for the official killing of babies once they are breathing, although some local Chinese authorities have come close to enforcing infanticide and some Indian societies are ambivalent about baby girls.
The pro-choice position can be summed up as that "nature is indifferent so it's up to a woman to decide." The pro lifer's rejoinder: "God will really get you for that!" "That," encompasses every intervention from condoms, foams, pills before and/or after, D and C, vacuuming and wire hangers to the hybrid "partial birth" dissection.
Some of the words in that litany are slogans, others can be defined. Before we go further, we need to define our terms, at least for the stages of procreation. Let's begin with the fun part.
Coitus. The sexual coupling of two humans, limited for today's purpose to one male and one female of the species. No knot or ass holes need apply. When this behavior, which as every one past puberty knows, or imagines, is fun to do (recreation), was linked logically with making babies (procreation) is not known. To imagine the future consequences of present pleasure is something even modern humans can fail at, despite the example and urging of generations of priests and parents.
Ejaculation. The spurting of male semen into the female vagina at the climax of the sex act. Viewed under a microscope, the male sperm looks lively, a miniature tadpole moving with purpose to a destination. In a crowd they mimic a running of the Boston Marathon.: off with a bang, jostling for position, keeping a steady pace before sprinting for the finish line. A beckoning egg previously moved into position (ovulation) will reward the winner with its embrace.
Fertilization. One sperm only is elected to be the daddypole. He fertilizes the egg (ovum) and all the thousands of others are frustrated also rans They wiggle a while longer and die, their lovely life's potential wasted by a callus nature, or nature's God, depending on what you believe. Either way we humans are either indifferent or relieved at their fate, not anguished over the loss of multitudes of potential fellow creatures too late to the egg.
Implantation. "The attachment of a fertilized ovum (zygote) to the wall of the uterus." That's the way my dictionary puts it. The happy couple has found a home in the womb. Two sets of genes have formed a unique join, and "What God hath joined together let no man put asunder." That fine sentiment notwithstanding, spontaneous abortion occurs frequently, most often in the weeks that follow.
Division. Cells, the basic unit of life, divide and multiply. That's not all they do.
Differentiation. At some point the cells began to specialize into the multitude of the kinds of cells it takes to turn a blob into a human.
Gestation. The period between implantation and birth, which Barny Frank has said is that part of a child's life of the most interest to Republicans. (But what does he know?) The zygote once implanted is termed the blastocyst. It's cells divide, proliferate and specialize until after the fourth week after fertilization when it is sufficiently formed to be termed an embryo After the eighth week the evolving infant is technically a fetus ( foetus in the old spelling), and keeps the title until birth. By then most women have a pretty good idea that they are preggers.
Conception. The alert reader will have noted that this term so far has no place in the technical terminology of reproduction. Coitus begins the train of events that is usually unstoppable absent contraception. Ejaculation by a fertile male into the unprotected female takes the decision out of their control. Fertilization joins two sets of genes into a unique whole. Implantation provides a home for the consequent cell. Gestation nurtures the dividing cell into an infant able to live outside the womb. Perhaps conception begins when the happy couple decide to "make a baby" (or just make whoopee) and ends when the cord is cut, and is thus more of a term of art than of scientific nomenclature.
Back to the question: When does life begin? Both medical and legal considerations are behind the division of the gestation period into trimesters. The first trimester ends, arbitrarily, after 12 weeks. The highest risk for spontaneous abortion is deemed over. The second trimester ends after about 28 weeks at the point of viability or "quickening." The child is "at term" after 37 weeks and is considered "full term" at 40 weeks, at which time it is okay for husbands to wonder when "you are going to have that thing" because "it's been a while!"
So when does life begin? After much scientific harrumphing the honest answer is, "who knows?" There are those who say, "Life begins at forty." Perhaps the only answer is legal and political. The Supreme Court's decision is increasingly divisive but has proved to be a practical answer, balancing the promise of the baby against the state of the mother, well as as any. That it is judge made law with a tenuous grounding in the Constitution is not to the good, but the USA isn't the only society to reach similar conclusions in recent times.
Life is a continuum after all and it is hard to find a point in the process of procreation when non-life becomes life. The right of a woman to be equal in law and society to a man enters in. While a modern invention it is not lightly to be tossed aside. Consensual sex would seem to be the first prerequisite, even though women should be free to accept a child conceived by rape or incest if they decide to for whatever reason.
The "rights" of fathers need not concern us here. They enter the picture once a child is born. As an active male I have no idea how many children I may have conceived, and mostly like it that way. Other men may disagree, even while seldom if ever turning down chances for an extra curricular romp in the hay. Our inherent nature makes it difficult to consider consequences at a time like that. Gentlemen of course do what the lady says.
That nature, and nature's God, should it exist, is indifferent is manifest in the number and frequency of ways that gestation is interrupted and/or goes tragically astray. It is also proven by the fossil record of the number of species, including of primates much like ourselves, that have become extinct. We have already preempted Darwin's precept of natural selection with other animals we have domesticated, well before Darwin's time. Why not do the same thing for ourselves?
One answer is that we don't know how, as is evident by the horrible mess we have made when we have tried. The eugenics movement and the Nazis are indeed cautionary tales. But we will never reach the stars in our present form.
When I first heard and understood what it meant, I was reminded of my first taboo word that wasn't for cussing. It was uttered in a Reader's Digest magazine article that I read in early adolescence, provocatively titled, "A Stunned and Shocking Word." After an appropriate buildup, the word was revealed as masturbation. I made sure Mother didn't notice what I was reading.
Surprisingly, the author declared that flogging the fella was okay. And in time the "sin of Onan" and its feminine equivalent (popping the button?) became no longer the stuff of superstition and myth, but an accepted alternative when a sexual partner is absent, indisposed or not yet found. Case closed.
Both words bring up the unromantic side of sex. Masturbation was once thought a perverse way to enjoy its pleasures that was, you might say, always immediately at hand. Abortion, more seriously, was deemed the killing of an unborn and unwanted child. Both words named acts condemned as unnatural and sinful. The origin of these attitudes is so lost in the mists of prehistory as to make them seem instinctual.
It took longer for abortion to be found legally a woman's sole right and responsibility, at least in America, by the Supreme Court's "Roe v Wade" decision, of nearly two score years ago. Though still highly controversial, abortion is legal to varying degrees in many if not most countries, and mere mention of it is no longer taboo.
But,still, there is that inner cringe when we say the word. And the case is still open for endless arguments, frequent demonstrations and the occasional riot. At the heart of the controversy is the question of when life begins. Arguments have been marshaled for every way station from ejaculation to birth. About all the two camps agree on is that nobody is for the official killing of babies once they are breathing, although some local Chinese authorities have come close to enforcing infanticide and some Indian societies are ambivalent about baby girls.
The pro-choice position can be summed up as that "nature is indifferent so it's up to a woman to decide." The pro lifer's rejoinder: "God will really get you for that!" "That," encompasses every intervention from condoms, foams, pills before and/or after, D and C, vacuuming and wire hangers to the hybrid "partial birth" dissection.
Some of the words in that litany are slogans, others can be defined. Before we go further, we need to define our terms, at least for the stages of procreation. Let's begin with the fun part.
Coitus. The sexual coupling of two humans, limited for today's purpose to one male and one female of the species. No knot or ass holes need apply. When this behavior, which as every one past puberty knows, or imagines, is fun to do (recreation), was linked logically with making babies (procreation) is not known. To imagine the future consequences of present pleasure is something even modern humans can fail at, despite the example and urging of generations of priests and parents.
Ejaculation. The spurting of male semen into the female vagina at the climax of the sex act. Viewed under a microscope, the male sperm looks lively, a miniature tadpole moving with purpose to a destination. In a crowd they mimic a running of the Boston Marathon.: off with a bang, jostling for position, keeping a steady pace before sprinting for the finish line. A beckoning egg previously moved into position (ovulation) will reward the winner with its embrace.
Fertilization. One sperm only is elected to be the daddypole. He fertilizes the egg (ovum) and all the thousands of others are frustrated also rans They wiggle a while longer and die, their lovely life's potential wasted by a callus nature, or nature's God, depending on what you believe. Either way we humans are either indifferent or relieved at their fate, not anguished over the loss of multitudes of potential fellow creatures too late to the egg.
Implantation. "The attachment of a fertilized ovum (zygote) to the wall of the uterus." That's the way my dictionary puts it. The happy couple has found a home in the womb. Two sets of genes have formed a unique join, and "What God hath joined together let no man put asunder." That fine sentiment notwithstanding, spontaneous abortion occurs frequently, most often in the weeks that follow.
Division. Cells, the basic unit of life, divide and multiply. That's not all they do.
Differentiation. At some point the cells began to specialize into the multitude of the kinds of cells it takes to turn a blob into a human.
Gestation. The period between implantation and birth, which Barny Frank has said is that part of a child's life of the most interest to Republicans. (But what does he know?) The zygote once implanted is termed the blastocyst. It's cells divide, proliferate and specialize until after the fourth week after fertilization when it is sufficiently formed to be termed an embryo After the eighth week the evolving infant is technically a fetus ( foetus in the old spelling), and keeps the title until birth. By then most women have a pretty good idea that they are preggers.
Conception. The alert reader will have noted that this term so far has no place in the technical terminology of reproduction. Coitus begins the train of events that is usually unstoppable absent contraception. Ejaculation by a fertile male into the unprotected female takes the decision out of their control. Fertilization joins two sets of genes into a unique whole. Implantation provides a home for the consequent cell. Gestation nurtures the dividing cell into an infant able to live outside the womb. Perhaps conception begins when the happy couple decide to "make a baby" (or just make whoopee) and ends when the cord is cut, and is thus more of a term of art than of scientific nomenclature.
Back to the question: When does life begin? Both medical and legal considerations are behind the division of the gestation period into trimesters. The first trimester ends, arbitrarily, after 12 weeks. The highest risk for spontaneous abortion is deemed over. The second trimester ends after about 28 weeks at the point of viability or "quickening." The child is "at term" after 37 weeks and is considered "full term" at 40 weeks, at which time it is okay for husbands to wonder when "you are going to have that thing" because "it's been a while!"
So when does life begin? After much scientific harrumphing the honest answer is, "who knows?" There are those who say, "Life begins at forty." Perhaps the only answer is legal and political. The Supreme Court's decision is increasingly divisive but has proved to be a practical answer, balancing the promise of the baby against the state of the mother, well as as any. That it is judge made law with a tenuous grounding in the Constitution is not to the good, but the USA isn't the only society to reach similar conclusions in recent times.
Life is a continuum after all and it is hard to find a point in the process of procreation when non-life becomes life. The right of a woman to be equal in law and society to a man enters in. While a modern invention it is not lightly to be tossed aside. Consensual sex would seem to be the first prerequisite, even though women should be free to accept a child conceived by rape or incest if they decide to for whatever reason.
The "rights" of fathers need not concern us here. They enter the picture once a child is born. As an active male I have no idea how many children I may have conceived, and mostly like it that way. Other men may disagree, even while seldom if ever turning down chances for an extra curricular romp in the hay. Our inherent nature makes it difficult to consider consequences at a time like that. Gentlemen of course do what the lady says.
That nature, and nature's God, should it exist, is indifferent is manifest in the number and frequency of ways that gestation is interrupted and/or goes tragically astray. It is also proven by the fossil record of the number of species, including of primates much like ourselves, that have become extinct. We have already preempted Darwin's precept of natural selection with other animals we have domesticated, well before Darwin's time. Why not do the same thing for ourselves?
One answer is that we don't know how, as is evident by the horrible mess we have made when we have tried. The eugenics movement and the Nazis are indeed cautionary tales. But we will never reach the stars in our present form.
American Tribes
The election driven political squabbles over the tragic event in Libya in which that country's respected American ambassador and three of his staff were killed will, let's hope, abate soon so cooler, less partisan heads can sift the evidence and report back.
Meanwhile one way to consider the probable causes of the chain of events behind this most regrettable outcome is to think about tribes. Libya, like most African and middle eastern nations, is a tribal society. Their tribes have names and leaders and occupy known regions. Suppressed under Quaddafi, they formed militias and united long enough to dispose of him and his (tribal) henchmen with NATO help.
Then they mostly reverted to ancient and customary rivalries. The process of building a nation is underway but may take a generation to complete. One heartening signal that a new Libya may even be possible was that thousands of Libyans turned out to demonstrate their sorrow and anger over the death of our countrymen. How many places in the world -- or even here at home -- could such a gathering be possible?
Tribal thinking is an ancient as humankind, and is not confined to what we euphemistically refer to as "developing" nations. We have tribes, too, and not just on western reservations. What we refer to as "office politics" has its roots in olden tribal ways. Our every organization has its tribes, be it governmental, corporate, religious or merely suburban.
So, not surprisingly, does the U.S. State Department. Like every far flung organization its every field office is a tribe while its headquarters (Called Foggy Bottom for where it sits in Washington) is a nest of contending tribes. The old adage, "Where you stand depends on where you sit," applies here. Rivalry between the center and the outposts is endemic.
That urgent request for more security sent to State from the Libyan outpost was in all probability not the only one received that day. As with many other such requests from around the world it was at bottom a bid for more money. Like the Navy headquarters where I worked for 20 years, first thoughts were no doubt: Do they really need this? How much? and Where -- and who -- do we take it from?
Lost in the instant accusations of an inept response by Washington to the Libyan outpost's request, was that the request wasn't refused. Marines traditionally guard our diplomats abroad, usually with efficiency and success. Lately State has used contract civilians, especially in Iraq, not always with great success. Neither resource is instantly available, however.
Washington's immediate answer, only occasionally noted by the press, was to suggest that the embassy hire Libyans. From a headquarters viewpoint this was brilliant. Locals would cost less, speak the language and can use the work. Red tape involved in requisitioning Marines from the Defense Department or contracting with the private sector is avoided.
Back in Libya this dismaying answer no doubt raised more questions: Which Libyans? Who will talk to them? Train them? Trust them? Even with email this back and forth takes time.
Diplomats have two contradictory jobs. One is to represent American abroad. The other is to stay safe. Outreach vs vigilance. It takes diplomacy, which takes time, is defensive and can only react to the unexpected offense.
Conclusion: these tragedies will happen from time to time. They are nobody's fault but someone has to take the responsibility. No doubt the Republicans would like to fire Hillary. But first they will have to get the American people to fire Obama. Then they will get another chance to change human nature.
Meanwhile one way to consider the probable causes of the chain of events behind this most regrettable outcome is to think about tribes. Libya, like most African and middle eastern nations, is a tribal society. Their tribes have names and leaders and occupy known regions. Suppressed under Quaddafi, they formed militias and united long enough to dispose of him and his (tribal) henchmen with NATO help.
Then they mostly reverted to ancient and customary rivalries. The process of building a nation is underway but may take a generation to complete. One heartening signal that a new Libya may even be possible was that thousands of Libyans turned out to demonstrate their sorrow and anger over the death of our countrymen. How many places in the world -- or even here at home -- could such a gathering be possible?
Tribal thinking is an ancient as humankind, and is not confined to what we euphemistically refer to as "developing" nations. We have tribes, too, and not just on western reservations. What we refer to as "office politics" has its roots in olden tribal ways. Our every organization has its tribes, be it governmental, corporate, religious or merely suburban.
So, not surprisingly, does the U.S. State Department. Like every far flung organization its every field office is a tribe while its headquarters (Called Foggy Bottom for where it sits in Washington) is a nest of contending tribes. The old adage, "Where you stand depends on where you sit," applies here. Rivalry between the center and the outposts is endemic.
That urgent request for more security sent to State from the Libyan outpost was in all probability not the only one received that day. As with many other such requests from around the world it was at bottom a bid for more money. Like the Navy headquarters where I worked for 20 years, first thoughts were no doubt: Do they really need this? How much? and Where -- and who -- do we take it from?
Lost in the instant accusations of an inept response by Washington to the Libyan outpost's request, was that the request wasn't refused. Marines traditionally guard our diplomats abroad, usually with efficiency and success. Lately State has used contract civilians, especially in Iraq, not always with great success. Neither resource is instantly available, however.
Washington's immediate answer, only occasionally noted by the press, was to suggest that the embassy hire Libyans. From a headquarters viewpoint this was brilliant. Locals would cost less, speak the language and can use the work. Red tape involved in requisitioning Marines from the Defense Department or contracting with the private sector is avoided.
Back in Libya this dismaying answer no doubt raised more questions: Which Libyans? Who will talk to them? Train them? Trust them? Even with email this back and forth takes time.
Diplomats have two contradictory jobs. One is to represent American abroad. The other is to stay safe. Outreach vs vigilance. It takes diplomacy, which takes time, is defensive and can only react to the unexpected offense.
Conclusion: these tragedies will happen from time to time. They are nobody's fault but someone has to take the responsibility. No doubt the Republicans would like to fire Hillary. But first they will have to get the American people to fire Obama. Then they will get another chance to change human nature.
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Death and Magical Thinking
The inevitability and finality of death are facts that no one accepts at first. Fear of death is instinctual, a heritage of our animal roots. We knew that fear long before we were advanced enough as a species to be conscious enough to imagine the triumvirate of time. But now we are conscious and we do know the present, remember the past and can imagine the future, including our own death.
Accepting that image of our own death is another thing. Unlike the colorful scenes that easily form when we contemplate a day at the beach, death imagined is first a dark, formless bruise. Our first reaction is to reject the whole incomprehensible idea--at least for ourselves. That first rotting corpse or grinning skeleton, is hard evidence indeed that others die, even though our conscious memories of the living person linger.
They also linger less comprehensibly in dreams, as hallucinations and coincidental likenesses glimpsed in a crowd. From these mental hiccups we draw the comfort of an alternate hypothesis: their spirits live on. Our spirit must live, too! Maybe -- with no more flesh to liquefy and bones to turn to dust -- forever! Maybe we all live on in the company of other souls, and even hobnob with the spirits of forests, seas, rivers, savannas, deserts, mountains, caverns, wind, rain, sun, moon and stars.
So thought our primitive ancestors. These were things to wonder about, perhaps around the fire at night, in a grove of trees dispensing fermented fruit, followed by joyful carryings on and leading to dull aches and dim memories of regrettable excess the morning after (Original gin begets original sin, in the words of Philip Wylie).
In every tribe some told better stories while others were adept at expounding the morals and lessons of right and wrong conduct, reward and punishment, found in the stories. Beliefs grew from such crude beginnings to become belief systems, then full fleshed religions. Armies of gods grinning behind every thing and event, bush and tree, became hierarchies of spirits on mountaintops that only occasionally walked among men to meddle disastrously in their affairs.
Then one of the gods became the One God, and other deities his subordinate family, approachable only through prayer but alive to the wants and worship of every person, the fate of every sparrow, especially if properly approached through handy respectful rituals commanded by His priestly interpreters.
Next God stood alone, remote in time and space, architect of the machinery of life and engineer who put it into motion, but left the steering to his natural laws. We were on our own to choose between good and evil -- until, perhaps, a day of judgement.
Today, in some learned quarters the seed of life is a singularity and the Big Bang that expands space/time into a universe fit for life fills in for God. Scientists have superseded priests and "In the Beginning" is a hot topic of theory and experiment, of chalk board equations, particle accelerators and a full spectrum of telescopes on earth and in space. (Only the old laws of right conduct, separated as Jefferson did, from the fables, remain eternally relevant and surprisingly uniform across the boundaries of major faiths.)
Like the evolving varieties of life itself, new more sophisticated ways of describing our origins coexist with all the old ones. Old beliefs persist out of ignorance, but not only for that reason. Evolution without purpose, a throw of the dice in the service of mere survival and leading to nothing but memories in the dwindling minds of the living, is as cold as the void of space and even less acceptable.
Where is the comfort in that? The stories we prefer to tell have happy endings. Better a tribal myth to ease the passage from being to nothingness. My father, who died at 85, said it succinctly and by his lights did it best: "I have lived here long enough. I want to join Bess." My mother had died two years before. He refused treatment, quit eating and drinking and died in days, happy to join her for all imagined eternity.
But tribal myths conflict and thus cannot all be true. And when we are not slaughtering each other to settle which religion is the one true faith, we consider uneasily the possibility that none of them are. As scientific thinking catches on, and the old magical feelings lose their hold, an increasing strata of humankind bows to the evidence and faces even death without superstitious denial -- if not without most of the old fear and a residue of incredulity (Me? Die? Not me! Well, maybe.).
For the great mass of humankind science, too, is magic, as incomprehensible as a lightening strike or a rainbow to our prehistoric predecessors. For most folks today a quadratic equation is as much mumbo jumbo as a Latin mass, while a hydrogen bomb is uncomfortably akin to Armageddon and an astronaut of equal awe as an angel. The more science dispels magic and mystery from its ancient places, the more it seems that our popular culture peoples our imagined world with voodoo and vampires. The science fiction of imagined futures regresses into unscientific fantasies of seers and shamans, dragons and potions. Evidence of scientific accomplishment is seen as proof of a wide ranging conspiracy ("Those moon landings were faked! In Area 51!").
Okay, you're convinced. The fact and fear of death is the root cause of magical thinking. Alcohol numbs the fear, then causes the hangover that engenders guilt, which turns magic into religion and lets the priesthood twist fear and guilt to their power hungry advantage. But why, why must we die? What is the reason for death and how do we go about eliminating it?
Death is the inevitable result of sexual reproduction. The only form of life that is even theoretically immortal is the single celled creature that replicates by division as the cells in our body do. Life forms proliferate by evolution. Evolution in turn is fueled by accidental mutations of the genetic code winnowed by natural selection. Only mutations that convey an advantage compete, win and survive.
Advantage for what? For -- and only for -- reproduction. Afflictions that lead to death by disadvantage in the struggle for life only after a species normal reproductive time span has passed will persist because they can. Nothing gets rid of them. Prostate cancer, for example, can kill you but usually only after you are a grandfather.
Why then did sexual reproduction evolve? Why did nature equip us with a sex life? If you suspect that it was not out of the goodness of nature's heart, you are right. In essence it is because two sets of genes, one from each sexual partner, is better for the species than the one with which the amoeba must make do. The doubled variety means that your offspring are more flexibly equipped to respond to and survive the contingencies of life, be they new predators, parasites or climate swings.
But once you can no longer conceive or carry a child nature is done with you. Nature's insults to the body continue and accumulate. Late blooming harmful mutations passed on from your parents express themselves in ways that weakens your immune and other systems and organs. A cascade of bodily failures ultimately robs life from even the most hardy of us.
A gloomy picture, but not entirely so. While far from eliminating death, we have lately found ways to postpone it, to lengthen life and improve the quality of the life we live. Life expectancy has nearly doubled in the span of today's elderly, mostly because more children and mothers survive the trauma of birth and children born alive overwhelmingly make it to maturity. The age at which the elderly die has improved also, but more importantly, more of us stay active and reasonably healthy much longer.
These advances did not not come from prayer or any other form of magical thinking, but from the application of logical thought and scientific method. No amount of fantasizing will put rotting flesh back on bones that crumble into dust at a touch and breath life into the assembly. But patient application of the scientific method has the potential to perpetuate our species and enhance our ever longer lives to a degree as limitless as the stars.
Who needs magical thinking? Not me. No now. Not ever. To hell with it. I'd rather die.
Accepting that image of our own death is another thing. Unlike the colorful scenes that easily form when we contemplate a day at the beach, death imagined is first a dark, formless bruise. Our first reaction is to reject the whole incomprehensible idea--at least for ourselves. That first rotting corpse or grinning skeleton, is hard evidence indeed that others die, even though our conscious memories of the living person linger.
They also linger less comprehensibly in dreams, as hallucinations and coincidental likenesses glimpsed in a crowd. From these mental hiccups we draw the comfort of an alternate hypothesis: their spirits live on. Our spirit must live, too! Maybe -- with no more flesh to liquefy and bones to turn to dust -- forever! Maybe we all live on in the company of other souls, and even hobnob with the spirits of forests, seas, rivers, savannas, deserts, mountains, caverns, wind, rain, sun, moon and stars.
So thought our primitive ancestors. These were things to wonder about, perhaps around the fire at night, in a grove of trees dispensing fermented fruit, followed by joyful carryings on and leading to dull aches and dim memories of regrettable excess the morning after (Original gin begets original sin, in the words of Philip Wylie).
In every tribe some told better stories while others were adept at expounding the morals and lessons of right and wrong conduct, reward and punishment, found in the stories. Beliefs grew from such crude beginnings to become belief systems, then full fleshed religions. Armies of gods grinning behind every thing and event, bush and tree, became hierarchies of spirits on mountaintops that only occasionally walked among men to meddle disastrously in their affairs.
Then one of the gods became the One God, and other deities his subordinate family, approachable only through prayer but alive to the wants and worship of every person, the fate of every sparrow, especially if properly approached through handy respectful rituals commanded by His priestly interpreters.
Next God stood alone, remote in time and space, architect of the machinery of life and engineer who put it into motion, but left the steering to his natural laws. We were on our own to choose between good and evil -- until, perhaps, a day of judgement.
Today, in some learned quarters the seed of life is a singularity and the Big Bang that expands space/time into a universe fit for life fills in for God. Scientists have superseded priests and "In the Beginning" is a hot topic of theory and experiment, of chalk board equations, particle accelerators and a full spectrum of telescopes on earth and in space. (Only the old laws of right conduct, separated as Jefferson did, from the fables, remain eternally relevant and surprisingly uniform across the boundaries of major faiths.)
Like the evolving varieties of life itself, new more sophisticated ways of describing our origins coexist with all the old ones. Old beliefs persist out of ignorance, but not only for that reason. Evolution without purpose, a throw of the dice in the service of mere survival and leading to nothing but memories in the dwindling minds of the living, is as cold as the void of space and even less acceptable.
Where is the comfort in that? The stories we prefer to tell have happy endings. Better a tribal myth to ease the passage from being to nothingness. My father, who died at 85, said it succinctly and by his lights did it best: "I have lived here long enough. I want to join Bess." My mother had died two years before. He refused treatment, quit eating and drinking and died in days, happy to join her for all imagined eternity.
But tribal myths conflict and thus cannot all be true. And when we are not slaughtering each other to settle which religion is the one true faith, we consider uneasily the possibility that none of them are. As scientific thinking catches on, and the old magical feelings lose their hold, an increasing strata of humankind bows to the evidence and faces even death without superstitious denial -- if not without most of the old fear and a residue of incredulity (Me? Die? Not me! Well, maybe.).
For the great mass of humankind science, too, is magic, as incomprehensible as a lightening strike or a rainbow to our prehistoric predecessors. For most folks today a quadratic equation is as much mumbo jumbo as a Latin mass, while a hydrogen bomb is uncomfortably akin to Armageddon and an astronaut of equal awe as an angel. The more science dispels magic and mystery from its ancient places, the more it seems that our popular culture peoples our imagined world with voodoo and vampires. The science fiction of imagined futures regresses into unscientific fantasies of seers and shamans, dragons and potions. Evidence of scientific accomplishment is seen as proof of a wide ranging conspiracy ("Those moon landings were faked! In Area 51!").
Okay, you're convinced. The fact and fear of death is the root cause of magical thinking. Alcohol numbs the fear, then causes the hangover that engenders guilt, which turns magic into religion and lets the priesthood twist fear and guilt to their power hungry advantage. But why, why must we die? What is the reason for death and how do we go about eliminating it?
Death is the inevitable result of sexual reproduction. The only form of life that is even theoretically immortal is the single celled creature that replicates by division as the cells in our body do. Life forms proliferate by evolution. Evolution in turn is fueled by accidental mutations of the genetic code winnowed by natural selection. Only mutations that convey an advantage compete, win and survive.
Advantage for what? For -- and only for -- reproduction. Afflictions that lead to death by disadvantage in the struggle for life only after a species normal reproductive time span has passed will persist because they can. Nothing gets rid of them. Prostate cancer, for example, can kill you but usually only after you are a grandfather.
Why then did sexual reproduction evolve? Why did nature equip us with a sex life? If you suspect that it was not out of the goodness of nature's heart, you are right. In essence it is because two sets of genes, one from each sexual partner, is better for the species than the one with which the amoeba must make do. The doubled variety means that your offspring are more flexibly equipped to respond to and survive the contingencies of life, be they new predators, parasites or climate swings.
But once you can no longer conceive or carry a child nature is done with you. Nature's insults to the body continue and accumulate. Late blooming harmful mutations passed on from your parents express themselves in ways that weakens your immune and other systems and organs. A cascade of bodily failures ultimately robs life from even the most hardy of us.
A gloomy picture, but not entirely so. While far from eliminating death, we have lately found ways to postpone it, to lengthen life and improve the quality of the life we live. Life expectancy has nearly doubled in the span of today's elderly, mostly because more children and mothers survive the trauma of birth and children born alive overwhelmingly make it to maturity. The age at which the elderly die has improved also, but more importantly, more of us stay active and reasonably healthy much longer.
These advances did not not come from prayer or any other form of magical thinking, but from the application of logical thought and scientific method. No amount of fantasizing will put rotting flesh back on bones that crumble into dust at a touch and breath life into the assembly. But patient application of the scientific method has the potential to perpetuate our species and enhance our ever longer lives to a degree as limitless as the stars.
Who needs magical thinking? Not me. No now. Not ever. To hell with it. I'd rather die.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
The Sexual Continuim
Sexuality in humans is far from the binary absolute beloved of traditional moralists and assumed by large majorities of the public. When we contemplate carefully the male and female divide we find that aspects of the other gender are never absent in even the most masculine or feminine of individuals.
The mixing begins at conception. Nature bequeaths to the zygote a genetic inheritance taken equally from mother and father. For a time the developing fetus cruises in neutral until chance intervenes and a bath of hormones flips the sexual coin. Unlike when opposing captains at mid-field decide who kicks off, the decision is not binary. Most of us land mostly heads or tails, male or female, but no coin lays absolutely flat.
Some few even balance on edge, clear evidence that the genetic code of evolution is indifferent to individual well being and no more accurate than it has to be for the species to survive. We call these babies hermaphrodites: they are adorned in varying degrees with both sets of genitalia, at least briefly until an arbitrary choice can be made. Doctors can reduce the superfluous plumbing, but usually have no clue which way to swing, and therefore get it wrong nearly half the time over the whole population. Adult sex change operations are in part a modern admission of their errors.
Most of us grow up with genitals within the range of ordinary design and dimension, and with hormonal balance to match. Others do not. We ordinary ones are not normal, but usual. Others are not abnormal but unusual. Nature does not care about this range of differences and neither should we.
Of late western society is slowly coming around to this position. The United States is slower than most, as the usual stereotypical thinking is bolstered by its national excess of religiosity. Laws prohibiting same sex marriage is the cardinal (pun intended) example. Adherence to the christian precept of "love one another" is not so excessive in our country that we can afford to denigrate any source of loving couples.
A major scientific question, still unresolved, is whether homosexual orientation is innate or learned behavior. Like all such questions that require separating nature from nurture for an answer, it may be unresolvable. Which, for example, is bisexuality? For sure it is overt. Perhaps that is all it is, an overt manifestation of our blend of genes from both sexes. Amoral Nature admits for numerous ways of sexual gratification after all, and few among us would have trouble naming them all, perhaps with a blush or two.
Sexual experiences are so intense that, an athletic few aside, none of us have trouble remembering vividly the first and best of them. It is possible that our earliest encounters are imprinting, thus setting orientation for life. Such an origination would be as equally binding as one genetically based and no more susceptible to a "cure." It is equally possible that a genetic structure leads us to encounters that reinforce innate tendencies. These are interesting speculations that are becoming less important over time to anybody other than experts as public tolerance grows. More, preferably apolitical, research is needed.
Another major question: why would inclinations and activities not conducive to reproduction persist and to what evolutionary advantage? The answer may be found in the long gestation period of our species and the extended helplessness of the infant and child. Sexual pairs that stay together and nurture their children are more successful if they bond closely through mutual understanding, respect and empathy for each other. Despite the jokes men and women really can understand each other and have an innate drive to do so which is expressed in seemingly endless cultural variations.
These variations include sexual expressions which meet with varied degrees of acceptance or condemnation, of celebration or taboo. Stages of society and of human development influence the kinds of sexual behavior that is accepted or at least tolerated. Oral sex for example is found in most primate societies, is highly satisfying, and is not any more so for opposite than same sexual partners. So, too, is mutual masturbation, while anal sex is not unknown between married heterosexual couples in conventional suburban bedrooms.
Anciently, sexual practices of all kinds have been subject to social restrictions and proscriptions, usually by elites as a way to enhance their own status and dominance. Perhaps the most perverse of these has been the attempt to divide pleasure from procreation in order to deny the former and emphasize the latter. All major religions employ this particular perversion to strengthen their hold on their followers through cycles of sin, guilt and redemption. Technology in the form of effective measures of birth control and disease prevention, has happily turned this use of taboo on its head, to the benefit of women especially, but also to the good of men more inclined to good will than oppression. Technology, however, cannot end the odious practice of genital mutilation of girls and young women on the cusp of adulthood.
The sexual continuum has a darker side that goes beyond religious and social dominance practices. Rape and sexual assault are committed by (mostly) men so avid for dominance and control they forgo the supreme pleasure of mutual enjoyment. The pedophile, that most despised of creatures, seems stuck in fantasy, from an earlier time, an imprint that never evolved further. Most pedophiles were themselves molested as children, experts say, and may be taking displaced revenge, perhaps unconsciously.
Vladimir Nabokov's novel, "Lolita," turned into cinematic gold by actors James Mason, Shelly Winters. Peter Sellers and others, is the closest we have to a deep exploration of the mind of a case of sexual arrested development. No such exploration exists to my knowledge into the mind of a predator priest, coach, scout leader or gym instructor, while science has done little beyond reinforcing the cliche that pedophilia is incurable.
The desire for sex and sexual companionship does not cease with age, though it does fade in intensity and is a victim eventually of a cruel incapacity. Once women are past menopause Darwinian evolution plays no part in shaping the sexual practices of the elderly. Few men of advanced age enjoy the sexual companionship of the young, nubile and fertile. Offspring are rare from such unions in any case as contraception prevents what little conception aged sperm does not.
This leaves the field to culture. As ever more of us live ever longer, the grips of shame and convention loosen ever further. For now there is only pleasure, as the urge and the possibility of procreation become impossible. Even disease, that other fear inhibiting sexual adventure, is less a threat. Now only jealousy, loving commitment and/or habit keep us choosing monogamy. Stay tuned: the wheel is still in spin.
The mixing begins at conception. Nature bequeaths to the zygote a genetic inheritance taken equally from mother and father. For a time the developing fetus cruises in neutral until chance intervenes and a bath of hormones flips the sexual coin. Unlike when opposing captains at mid-field decide who kicks off, the decision is not binary. Most of us land mostly heads or tails, male or female, but no coin lays absolutely flat.
Some few even balance on edge, clear evidence that the genetic code of evolution is indifferent to individual well being and no more accurate than it has to be for the species to survive. We call these babies hermaphrodites: they are adorned in varying degrees with both sets of genitalia, at least briefly until an arbitrary choice can be made. Doctors can reduce the superfluous plumbing, but usually have no clue which way to swing, and therefore get it wrong nearly half the time over the whole population. Adult sex change operations are in part a modern admission of their errors.
Most of us grow up with genitals within the range of ordinary design and dimension, and with hormonal balance to match. Others do not. We ordinary ones are not normal, but usual. Others are not abnormal but unusual. Nature does not care about this range of differences and neither should we.
Of late western society is slowly coming around to this position. The United States is slower than most, as the usual stereotypical thinking is bolstered by its national excess of religiosity. Laws prohibiting same sex marriage is the cardinal (pun intended) example. Adherence to the christian precept of "love one another" is not so excessive in our country that we can afford to denigrate any source of loving couples.
A major scientific question, still unresolved, is whether homosexual orientation is innate or learned behavior. Like all such questions that require separating nature from nurture for an answer, it may be unresolvable. Which, for example, is bisexuality? For sure it is overt. Perhaps that is all it is, an overt manifestation of our blend of genes from both sexes. Amoral Nature admits for numerous ways of sexual gratification after all, and few among us would have trouble naming them all, perhaps with a blush or two.
Sexual experiences are so intense that, an athletic few aside, none of us have trouble remembering vividly the first and best of them. It is possible that our earliest encounters are imprinting, thus setting orientation for life. Such an origination would be as equally binding as one genetically based and no more susceptible to a "cure." It is equally possible that a genetic structure leads us to encounters that reinforce innate tendencies. These are interesting speculations that are becoming less important over time to anybody other than experts as public tolerance grows. More, preferably apolitical, research is needed.
Another major question: why would inclinations and activities not conducive to reproduction persist and to what evolutionary advantage? The answer may be found in the long gestation period of our species and the extended helplessness of the infant and child. Sexual pairs that stay together and nurture their children are more successful if they bond closely through mutual understanding, respect and empathy for each other. Despite the jokes men and women really can understand each other and have an innate drive to do so which is expressed in seemingly endless cultural variations.
These variations include sexual expressions which meet with varied degrees of acceptance or condemnation, of celebration or taboo. Stages of society and of human development influence the kinds of sexual behavior that is accepted or at least tolerated. Oral sex for example is found in most primate societies, is highly satisfying, and is not any more so for opposite than same sexual partners. So, too, is mutual masturbation, while anal sex is not unknown between married heterosexual couples in conventional suburban bedrooms.
Anciently, sexual practices of all kinds have been subject to social restrictions and proscriptions, usually by elites as a way to enhance their own status and dominance. Perhaps the most perverse of these has been the attempt to divide pleasure from procreation in order to deny the former and emphasize the latter. All major religions employ this particular perversion to strengthen their hold on their followers through cycles of sin, guilt and redemption. Technology in the form of effective measures of birth control and disease prevention, has happily turned this use of taboo on its head, to the benefit of women especially, but also to the good of men more inclined to good will than oppression. Technology, however, cannot end the odious practice of genital mutilation of girls and young women on the cusp of adulthood.
The sexual continuum has a darker side that goes beyond religious and social dominance practices. Rape and sexual assault are committed by (mostly) men so avid for dominance and control they forgo the supreme pleasure of mutual enjoyment. The pedophile, that most despised of creatures, seems stuck in fantasy, from an earlier time, an imprint that never evolved further. Most pedophiles were themselves molested as children, experts say, and may be taking displaced revenge, perhaps unconsciously.
Vladimir Nabokov's novel, "Lolita," turned into cinematic gold by actors James Mason, Shelly Winters. Peter Sellers and others, is the closest we have to a deep exploration of the mind of a case of sexual arrested development. No such exploration exists to my knowledge into the mind of a predator priest, coach, scout leader or gym instructor, while science has done little beyond reinforcing the cliche that pedophilia is incurable.
The desire for sex and sexual companionship does not cease with age, though it does fade in intensity and is a victim eventually of a cruel incapacity. Once women are past menopause Darwinian evolution plays no part in shaping the sexual practices of the elderly. Few men of advanced age enjoy the sexual companionship of the young, nubile and fertile. Offspring are rare from such unions in any case as contraception prevents what little conception aged sperm does not.
This leaves the field to culture. As ever more of us live ever longer, the grips of shame and convention loosen ever further. For now there is only pleasure, as the urge and the possibility of procreation become impossible. Even disease, that other fear inhibiting sexual adventure, is less a threat. Now only jealousy, loving commitment and/or habit keep us choosing monogamy. Stay tuned: the wheel is still in spin.
Monday, July 2, 2012
My Way of Spider Solitare
If you play bridge you will understand my approach (and addiction) to the serious business of Spider Solitaire. If you don't care for bridge, all is not lost. Read on anyway.
In both games the first thing you do after dealing a hand of cards is to evaluate it. In bridge you can pass a weak hand. The SS equivalent is to re deal. In either case you are not penalized for not playing the hand. Of course in bridge all must pass before the hand is re dealt, while in SS you are the lone ranger deciding for yourself.
In bridge you evaluate your hand by counting points according to whatever bidding system you and your partner have adopted. I have devised a point count system for SS.that so far lets me win between one fifth to one fourth of the four-suit games I elect to play. (I assume you understand the rudiments of playing SS. People who play easier versions of SS may wish to first experience the frustration of taking their game to the four suit level before reading further.)
Since few of the hands you deal are worth playing, my evaluation system begins with a set of quick discard techniques. Don't bother to play a hand if::
--The Trips rule: The ten cards face up after a deal contain three or more cards of the same numerical value, i .e. three sixes or four sevens, etc.
-- The Sequence Blocker rule: Face up cards contain any combination of three cards that are Kings or Aces.
-- The Same Suit Sequence rule: Face up cards don't include at least three cards of the same suit in sequence (2ht, 3ht, 4ht, not 2ht, 4ht, 6 ht). Four or five card sequences are even better if you have the patience.
With practice in using those rules you can get rid of an unpromising hand in a few seconds. Use them in any sequence you are comfortable with.
If a hand passes this screen it is time to identify your points. Do this before starting to play the hand. More rules:
-- Two cards of the same suit you can join into a sequence count three points; each additional card in sequence counts four points.
-- Two cards of different suits in sequence count one point; each additional card counts one point.
-- Cards of different suits in sequence that are in sequence with and higher in value than two or more cards of the same suit in sequence count one each. Example: 6di, 5spd, 4ht, 3ht = 5 points.
-- One card of a different suit in sequence with and lower in value than two or more cards of the same suit in sequence counts as zero. Example: 4ht, 3ht, 2di =3 points.
The logic behind these counting rules is fascinating, at least to me, perhaps because I made them up. If you are just interested in counting and playing, permission is granted to skip past all these italicized words of wisdom.
When a card is joined with another card in the same suit, neither card needs to be moved ever again unless for a good tactical play: two points. Whenever a card is moved from the down stack another card is exposed and thus informs your play: another point. Experience suggests that the longer the same suit string the better the odds that it will get even longer: thus three points for two in sequence and seven -- rather than six points -- for three in sequence, ten for four, etc.
When a card is joined with another card in a different suit from a down stack another card is exposed and also informs your play: two points. However, that join must be unpacked in order to win: minus one point for a net of one point.
Time to add up your points, again before starting play. Some guideposts as you add:
-- The Ten Point Rule: Don't bother to add up your points further unless you can see a two card same suit sequence to go with your three card sequence you identified under the Same Suit Sequence Rule (see above) or you have a four flusher (four cards same suit in sequence) or better.
-- The Straight Flush Rule: Draw a straight flush in poker you're in, right? Same with Spider -- almost. The other five cards should not run afoul of the Trip Rule or the Sequence Blocker Rule (see above).
Note: it is irresistibly tempting to honor this rule in the breech.
-- The Threshold Rule: My results suggest that you need a minimum of 15 points before a game is worth playing if you wish to win at least one fifth of all games in a set. You may of course set your own threshold. There are no Spider Solitaire police.
At long last we are ready to commence to get ready to actually play a game. Your mouse is no doubt getting twitchy tailed. Some useful philosophy first.
Deals of 15 or more points are rare. I often deal and evaluate 50 or or more hands before finding one worth playing. This can get boring. The temptation to play a hand of fewer points than your threshold can easily overwhelm better judgement. One remedy that occasionally works is to make a game out of the evaluation process. How many hands can you scan in a minute? Over 20 is splendid; under 10 is poky. If your first impressions is do not play, deal another hand; the splendid look of a high point hand is soon unmistakable.
If you occasionally play a hand "anyhow," and lose, don't beat yourself up. You are not therefore a bad person -- just weak. You will have ample company.
My version of Spider has the "New Game" Button right next to the "Deal" button which, if you don't have a tight rein on your mouse, can get you another set of ten cards on top the initial set which you have just judged not worth playing. Arrrrrgh! I have never, repeat never, been able to recover from this unenforced error. Why the hackers that gave us this splendidly demanding game did not pause at your request to order two ten card deals in a row and ask if this step is one you really wish to take is beyond me. They ask that helpful question often enough otherwise.
I just thought of some more philosophy.
You may wonder why three cards of the same suit in sequence count 7 points while three cards of mixed suits in sequence only count 2 points. These additional counting rules explain my philosophy (inspired by the works of John Rawls):
(1) Join a card of the same suit to another in sequence for one point. This move turns a stack card face up for another point. Once joined two (or more) cards of the same suit need not ever be split again (but of course may be split later for good tactical play): third point.
(2) Join a card of a different suit to another in sequence is also one point. The move also turns a stack card face up for another point. However, this sequence must be split if the game is to be won: minus one point for a net of one point.
(3) Join additional cards of the same suit to a sequence pair in the same suit for three additional points plus one bonus point. This rule, more arbitrary than logical perhaps, places a premium on the length of the opening strings in the same suit. After all, 8 strings of 13 cards in the same suit, King to Ace, is your goal, isn't it?
It's time to play! An evaluation system is helpful, but a good playing strategy is vital. Most SS hands are won or lost in the opening play before the second round of ten cards is dealt.
I use the following rules of thumb as a guide when playing a hand:
(1) Build all possible same suit strings first. Then concentrate on opening up one or more empty columns When you can't do both empty the column. See (4) below.
(2) Next form strings of mixed suits, starting always with higher order cards and when possible ending each string with two or more cards of the same suit.
(3) Whenever two or more strings headed by the same high value card can be appended to another string, with each exposing a down card, methodically try them all, using the "undo" function to back up your play and start over.
(4) As you play preserve and build on same suit strings first, then mixed suit strings. The sole exception to this cardinal -- and obvious -- rule is to empty a stack of down cards and create an open column whenever possible. Open columns are the key to purifying and lengthening strings, to unpacking mixed strings and ultimately winning the hand.
(5) Whenever possible avoid placing Kings in open columns except to retire a completed string. Avoid placing Aces in open columns as well. If you have a choice leave Kings and Aces uncovered if they cannot immediately be moved.
(6) Before dealing another set of 10 cards stop and ask yourself if you are intuitively satisfied with the way you played the last set. If not, undo it completely and play it again. A good memory for what you did before will be handy here.
(7) Play every game to the bitter end, even if you "know" it is hopeless. Learning from failure is a virtue (John Rawls).
(8) If you were able to retire two or more strings of 13 cards before reaching a losing impasse look things over and consider replaying the game from scratch rather than starting a new game.Your odds of winning a replay can be better than winning a new deal.
Be warned. Spider Solitaire is highly addictive. There is no known cure, not even a twelve step program, and it may cause carpal tunnel syndrome. Played in moderation ( four to six hours daily, no more) it will keep your brain's synaptic nodes in trim, reduce time spent consuming alcoholic beverages (which do not make you any smarter) or smoking funny cigs (ditto) and if discussed avidly at family gatherings will measurably reduce their length and frequency.
In both games the first thing you do after dealing a hand of cards is to evaluate it. In bridge you can pass a weak hand. The SS equivalent is to re deal. In either case you are not penalized for not playing the hand. Of course in bridge all must pass before the hand is re dealt, while in SS you are the lone ranger deciding for yourself.
In bridge you evaluate your hand by counting points according to whatever bidding system you and your partner have adopted. I have devised a point count system for SS.that so far lets me win between one fifth to one fourth of the four-suit games I elect to play. (I assume you understand the rudiments of playing SS. People who play easier versions of SS may wish to first experience the frustration of taking their game to the four suit level before reading further.)
Since few of the hands you deal are worth playing, my evaluation system begins with a set of quick discard techniques. Don't bother to play a hand if::
--The Trips rule: The ten cards face up after a deal contain three or more cards of the same numerical value, i .e. three sixes or four sevens, etc.
-- The Sequence Blocker rule: Face up cards contain any combination of three cards that are Kings or Aces.
-- The Same Suit Sequence rule: Face up cards don't include at least three cards of the same suit in sequence (2ht, 3ht, 4ht, not 2ht, 4ht, 6 ht). Four or five card sequences are even better if you have the patience.
With practice in using those rules you can get rid of an unpromising hand in a few seconds. Use them in any sequence you are comfortable with.
If a hand passes this screen it is time to identify your points. Do this before starting to play the hand. More rules:
-- Two cards of the same suit you can join into a sequence count three points; each additional card in sequence counts four points.
-- Two cards of different suits in sequence count one point; each additional card counts one point.
-- Cards of different suits in sequence that are in sequence with and higher in value than two or more cards of the same suit in sequence count one each. Example: 6di, 5spd, 4ht, 3ht = 5 points.
-- One card of a different suit in sequence with and lower in value than two or more cards of the same suit in sequence counts as zero. Example: 4ht, 3ht, 2di =3 points.
The logic behind these counting rules is fascinating, at least to me, perhaps because I made them up. If you are just interested in counting and playing, permission is granted to skip past all these italicized words of wisdom.
When a card is joined with another card in the same suit, neither card needs to be moved ever again unless for a good tactical play: two points. Whenever a card is moved from the down stack another card is exposed and thus informs your play: another point. Experience suggests that the longer the same suit string the better the odds that it will get even longer: thus three points for two in sequence and seven -- rather than six points -- for three in sequence, ten for four, etc.
When a card is joined with another card in a different suit from a down stack another card is exposed and also informs your play: two points. However, that join must be unpacked in order to win: minus one point for a net of one point.
Time to add up your points, again before starting play. Some guideposts as you add:
-- The Ten Point Rule: Don't bother to add up your points further unless you can see a two card same suit sequence to go with your three card sequence you identified under the Same Suit Sequence Rule (see above) or you have a four flusher (four cards same suit in sequence) or better.
-- The Straight Flush Rule: Draw a straight flush in poker you're in, right? Same with Spider -- almost. The other five cards should not run afoul of the Trip Rule or the Sequence Blocker Rule (see above).
Note: it is irresistibly tempting to honor this rule in the breech.
-- The Threshold Rule: My results suggest that you need a minimum of 15 points before a game is worth playing if you wish to win at least one fifth of all games in a set. You may of course set your own threshold. There are no Spider Solitaire police.
At long last we are ready to commence to get ready to actually play a game. Your mouse is no doubt getting twitchy tailed. Some useful philosophy first.
Deals of 15 or more points are rare. I often deal and evaluate 50 or or more hands before finding one worth playing. This can get boring. The temptation to play a hand of fewer points than your threshold can easily overwhelm better judgement. One remedy that occasionally works is to make a game out of the evaluation process. How many hands can you scan in a minute? Over 20 is splendid; under 10 is poky. If your first impressions is do not play, deal another hand; the splendid look of a high point hand is soon unmistakable.
If you occasionally play a hand "anyhow," and lose, don't beat yourself up. You are not therefore a bad person -- just weak. You will have ample company.
My version of Spider has the "New Game" Button right next to the "Deal" button which, if you don't have a tight rein on your mouse, can get you another set of ten cards on top the initial set which you have just judged not worth playing. Arrrrrgh! I have never, repeat never, been able to recover from this unenforced error. Why the hackers that gave us this splendidly demanding game did not pause at your request to order two ten card deals in a row and ask if this step is one you really wish to take is beyond me. They ask that helpful question often enough otherwise.
I just thought of some more philosophy.
You may wonder why three cards of the same suit in sequence count 7 points while three cards of mixed suits in sequence only count 2 points. These additional counting rules explain my philosophy (inspired by the works of John Rawls):
(1) Join a card of the same suit to another in sequence for one point. This move turns a stack card face up for another point. Once joined two (or more) cards of the same suit need not ever be split again (but of course may be split later for good tactical play): third point.
(2) Join a card of a different suit to another in sequence is also one point. The move also turns a stack card face up for another point. However, this sequence must be split if the game is to be won: minus one point for a net of one point.
(3) Join additional cards of the same suit to a sequence pair in the same suit for three additional points plus one bonus point. This rule, more arbitrary than logical perhaps, places a premium on the length of the opening strings in the same suit. After all, 8 strings of 13 cards in the same suit, King to Ace, is your goal, isn't it?
It's time to play! An evaluation system is helpful, but a good playing strategy is vital. Most SS hands are won or lost in the opening play before the second round of ten cards is dealt.
I use the following rules of thumb as a guide when playing a hand:
(1) Build all possible same suit strings first. Then concentrate on opening up one or more empty columns When you can't do both empty the column. See (4) below.
(2) Next form strings of mixed suits, starting always with higher order cards and when possible ending each string with two or more cards of the same suit.
(3) Whenever two or more strings headed by the same high value card can be appended to another string, with each exposing a down card, methodically try them all, using the "undo" function to back up your play and start over.
(4) As you play preserve and build on same suit strings first, then mixed suit strings. The sole exception to this cardinal -- and obvious -- rule is to empty a stack of down cards and create an open column whenever possible. Open columns are the key to purifying and lengthening strings, to unpacking mixed strings and ultimately winning the hand.
(5) Whenever possible avoid placing Kings in open columns except to retire a completed string. Avoid placing Aces in open columns as well. If you have a choice leave Kings and Aces uncovered if they cannot immediately be moved.
(6) Before dealing another set of 10 cards stop and ask yourself if you are intuitively satisfied with the way you played the last set. If not, undo it completely and play it again. A good memory for what you did before will be handy here.
(7) Play every game to the bitter end, even if you "know" it is hopeless. Learning from failure is a virtue (John Rawls).
(8) If you were able to retire two or more strings of 13 cards before reaching a losing impasse look things over and consider replaying the game from scratch rather than starting a new game.Your odds of winning a replay can be better than winning a new deal.
Be warned. Spider Solitaire is highly addictive. There is no known cure, not even a twelve step program, and it may cause carpal tunnel syndrome. Played in moderation ( four to six hours daily, no more) it will keep your brain's synaptic nodes in trim, reduce time spent consuming alcoholic beverages (which do not make you any smarter) or smoking funny cigs (ditto) and if discussed avidly at family gatherings will measurably reduce their length and frequency.
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