I scored a goal in soccer today!!!! It was my first goal ever in an organized game. I am so pumped. We lost 2-14 or so, but who cares. I scored half of our team's points. And it was a really good goal too; it wasn't even sloppy or an accident or anything. And their keeper was really good. I'm so pumped. If you recall, this was my New Year's resolution. Funny, I really thought I was going to solve the ladder problem first. The ladders are improving, but not totally fixed. Goal scoring, however, is definitively achieved.
(In case you don't know, I play soccer but I am no good. I'm convinced the team lets me play because I am part of a 2 person set, and the other person is a superstar who more than makes up for my complete lack of skill. But today I feel legitimate.)
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Red Line Graffiti
Here are some interesting things I've found on the Red Line. First, the train interior, for reference.
Because I know some of you have never seen a train before. Yeah well I'm short on content, ok? Here's the graffiti that inspired me to start taking pictures of this stuff.
Looks like someone is against the T's plans to put cell phone reception throughout the tunnels. And, on that topic, the T is broker than broke, how are they going to pay for that? Anyway. Moving on.
The first graffiti was in a nice bold sharpie, but this one is harder to see in regular ballpoint pen. Let's try to gimp it. (Gimp = free photoshop-like program, if you are interested. Yay linux.)
This one is a little bit fascinating. The numbers are Texas area codes. 210=San Antonio, 409=Galveston, 713=Houston, 281=Houston suburbs. So why write down four Texas area codes on the T? I should have added some. Dang hindsight. And Lone Starter state? Starter? What is that? Only Mr. Cholo knows. What is that thing at the bottom? SA, TX for San Antonio? SAM TX? Who is Sam? Sam Houston? Sam Cholo? Or is it SA TX with a treasure map in the middle? Fascinating, I tell you. The texans are everywhere. They're drawing treasure maps and noting area codes on the Boston T. Maybe in case they lose there way on the treasure hunt, they can call home. Or at least they can call an unknown person from their town of 2.5 million+ people.
(I have had phone numbers that began with 3 of the 4 graffitied area codes, in case some random internet people are reading this. I began life with a 713 and when I was a kid they switched us to a 281. I went to college in a 210. I spent a lot of time sunning myself in the 409. Explains my fascination.)
I'll be on the lookout for any more interesting T graffiti. Any good installments from other public transit systems?
Because I know some of you have never seen a train before. Yeah well I'm short on content, ok? Here's the graffiti that inspired me to start taking pictures of this stuff.
Looks like someone is against the T's plans to put cell phone reception throughout the tunnels. And, on that topic, the T is broker than broke, how are they going to pay for that? Anyway. Moving on.
The first graffiti was in a nice bold sharpie, but this one is harder to see in regular ballpoint pen. Let's try to gimp it. (Gimp = free photoshop-like program, if you are interested. Yay linux.)
This one is a little bit fascinating. The numbers are Texas area codes. 210=San Antonio, 409=Galveston, 713=Houston, 281=Houston suburbs. So why write down four Texas area codes on the T? I should have added some. Dang hindsight. And Lone Starter state? Starter? What is that? Only Mr. Cholo knows. What is that thing at the bottom? SA, TX for San Antonio? SAM TX? Who is Sam? Sam Houston? Sam Cholo? Or is it SA TX with a treasure map in the middle? Fascinating, I tell you. The texans are everywhere. They're drawing treasure maps and noting area codes on the Boston T. Maybe in case they lose there way on the treasure hunt, they can call home. Or at least they can call an unknown person from their town of 2.5 million+ people.
(I have had phone numbers that began with 3 of the 4 graffitied area codes, in case some random internet people are reading this. I began life with a 713 and when I was a kid they switched us to a 281. I went to college in a 210. I spent a lot of time sunning myself in the 409. Explains my fascination.)
I'll be on the lookout for any more interesting T graffiti. Any good installments from other public transit systems?
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Thoughts on Iraq
I'm becoming a republican apparently. For anyone that doesn't personally know me, I'm a young white well-educated professional (scientist, no less) female living in Massachusetts. Not only that, but I left Texas because I wanted to live somewhere like Massachusetts, where gay marriage is legal. I'm not gay, I just like being part of a community that is capable of rational thought. When it's time for my yearly female appointment with the doc, I go to Planned Parenthood and wade through the protesters and wait in the waiting room for 2 hours because I think they are an invaluable institution for women's health and rights, and I want to support them with my fully-paying good health insurance. My point is that I should be a die-hard democrat. My Texan roots must be showing, because lately, I am trending towards fiscal conservatism and maybe not leaving Iraq right this very minute. (My social views are still firmly liberal, in case you were wondering.)
So the Iraq war. I am very confused about it. I'm reverting to the bulleted list system. My inner scientist demands it.
- It's obvious we shouldn't have started the whole thing. Remember, back in 2003 was it?, remember how the ENTIRE WORLD said, "It's easy to topple the Iraq government, but rebuilding the country is going to be really really hard and it's going to take forever. Bad idea, don't go there." That should have been our first clue. The whole entire world, as I rememeber.
- But we did. And we bombed their whole country and toppled their government and with it their way of life. Maybe they hated their way of life and they're glad this happened. That is something I don't know about.
- So it was probably a bad idea. But it happened and the United States is responsible. Next step: rebuild.
- We try to rebuild and just as the entire world said, it is really hard and taking forever. And now we say, that was a bad idea, we shouldn't have gone there.
- So now we're talking about leaving Iraq. This is good for our troops (Number of US deaths in Iraq: 3,974. US wounded: 29,320)
- But is it good for Iraq? (estimated Number of Iraqi deaths due to US invasion: 655,000) I do not know the answer to this question. Is our leaving good or bad for them? If you know the answer to this, leave a comment. Please.
We bombed their whole country. Do we owe it to them to stick it out for a really long time and help them rebuild? What do you owe a people in a situation like this, vs what you owe your own soldiers? I don't know. But imagine, if someone successfully invaded the United States, overthrew the government, and bombed everything. They did this in the name of liberating you from the oppressive evil regime of George W. Bush, and now they're going to help you rebuild with this new kind of government that is better. Well ok. But it's rough going because all the roads and buildings and the place you used to work are bombed and there are outlaws running around all over the place killing people. So then, after a few years, the invading government has a scheduled regime change, and the new regime says, that was a bad idea, we shouldn't have gone there, sorry but we're leaving your country in ruin. Have fun rebuilding yourself with no funds and no idea what you're doing.
Can you imagine how pissed you would be? I might be pissed enough to become a suicide bomber.
I don't know the answer. I don't even know if our presence in Iraq is helping or hurting. What do you think?
So the Iraq war. I am very confused about it. I'm reverting to the bulleted list system. My inner scientist demands it.
- It's obvious we shouldn't have started the whole thing. Remember, back in 2003 was it?, remember how the ENTIRE WORLD said, "It's easy to topple the Iraq government, but rebuilding the country is going to be really really hard and it's going to take forever. Bad idea, don't go there." That should have been our first clue. The whole entire world, as I rememeber.
- But we did. And we bombed their whole country and toppled their government and with it their way of life. Maybe they hated their way of life and they're glad this happened. That is something I don't know about.
- So it was probably a bad idea. But it happened and the United States is responsible. Next step: rebuild.
- We try to rebuild and just as the entire world said, it is really hard and taking forever. And now we say, that was a bad idea, we shouldn't have gone there.
- So now we're talking about leaving Iraq. This is good for our troops (Number of US deaths in Iraq: 3,974. US wounded: 29,320)
- But is it good for Iraq? (estimated Number of Iraqi deaths due to US invasion: 655,000) I do not know the answer to this question. Is our leaving good or bad for them? If you know the answer to this, leave a comment. Please.
We bombed their whole country. Do we owe it to them to stick it out for a really long time and help them rebuild? What do you owe a people in a situation like this, vs what you owe your own soldiers? I don't know. But imagine, if someone successfully invaded the United States, overthrew the government, and bombed everything. They did this in the name of liberating you from the oppressive evil regime of George W. Bush, and now they're going to help you rebuild with this new kind of government that is better. Well ok. But it's rough going because all the roads and buildings and the place you used to work are bombed and there are outlaws running around all over the place killing people. So then, after a few years, the invading government has a scheduled regime change, and the new regime says, that was a bad idea, we shouldn't have gone there, sorry but we're leaving your country in ruin. Have fun rebuilding yourself with no funds and no idea what you're doing.
Can you imagine how pissed you would be? I might be pissed enough to become a suicide bomber.
I don't know the answer. I don't even know if our presence in Iraq is helping or hurting. What do you think?
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Money money money
I have not been knitting too much lately. I have been doing other things, like reading and learning new programming languages. One of the books I read was about the federal budget, and it made me rethink my political priorities. Where Does the Money Go? by Scott Bittle and Jean Johnson is the book. I have been meaning to do a post about this for a while, but it is a little bit daunting and I kept putting it off. Let me see if I can hit the high points.
- Our government spends a lot more money than it makes. We know that already. But I for one did not really understand where the extra money comes from.
- First of all, the deficit is the amount of money the government spends more than it makes in one year. The debt is the total amount the government owes, or all the deficits and interest added up over the years.
- The extra money comes from other countries, mainly Japan and China. We owe them lots of money. Like 9.36 trillion dollars.
- We have to pay interest on the debt. This comes to over $400 billion per year, and is more than we spend on the Iraq war.
- There are three things that the federal government is required to pay for:
---- Medicare
---- Social Security
---- Interest on the debt
- All other spending is discretionary. Even really important things, like the military.
- If we keep going with the same levels of taxes and spending we have now, by the year 2042 there will be no money left for anything except Medicare, Social Security, and interest on the debt.
- I suppose we could just borrow even more money from other countries to pay for the rising interest payments, but this cycle is clearly not sustainable. And at some point, if we continue on this path, other countries might start thinking that the US government is not such a reliable investment anymore, and then we can just say goodbye to the stock market. Probably the dollar too.
- It will take big big changes to fix this financial problem. Currently politicians propose to balance the budget by eliminating wasteful spending and raising taxes for the wealthy. This is not enough money to even balance the budget for one year, let alone have a surplus and start paying down the debt.
- They usually talk about tax cuts for the middle class too. Well, 9 out of 10 Americans identify themselves as the middle class. So someone is going to be disappointed there. Either they'll cut too many taxes and we'll continue in this debt hole, or people who think they are middle class are going to find themselves in the supposedly wealthy class, with higher taxes. Hey, just like the AMT.
- No politicians will discuss this problem beyond the "cut government waste, raise taxes on those greedy wealthy people" mantra, because then they will not get elected. Ross Perot tried. Imagine a politician saying they're going to raise your taxes while simultaneously reducing grandma's Medicare and Social Security benefits. Forget it.
- The only way to change it is to raise awareness among the American people. If it's important to the public, it will be important to politicians who would like to get elected.
I could go on. Maybe next time I'll talk about out of control Medicare spending and the pharmaceutical lobby.
-----------------------------
Update: Social Security Privatization
Jenn asked about social security privatization. I don't know the details, but here is how I understand it. Sorry if some of this is basic information. I'm trying to sort it out in my own head by writing. Maybe you know how social security works already.
Working people and their employers pay FICA taxes, and the government in turn gives that money to retired seniors. This is a great idea if there are a lot more people paying than receiving. That has been the case in the past, but it's about to change once the boomers start retiring. It seems the whole problem with the system revolves around the large number of baby boomers relative to other generations. For the past many years, FICA collected more money in payroll taxes than it needed to pay out to retirees. The very responsible thing to do would be to invest the extra money for when the boomers retire, because the ratio of younger people(paying taxes):boomers(receiving $$) is not as favorable as boomers(paying taxes):older people(receiving$$), and there is not going to be enough money from the younger generations' FICA taxes to pay out to the retired boomers. So the government put the extra money in a trust fund, and proceeded to borrow from the trust fund for other federal government programs. Consequently, the social security trust fund is full of IOU's.
This is bad, but not the end of the world. There still will be lots of young people working and paying FICA taxes, and that money will still go to retirees. They just won't get as much money as they are entitled to. I think the estimates are that they will get 70%. Now we can get mad and yell at the federal government for irresponsibly borrowing from the trust fund, but really if they hadn't done that, then they would have had to either cut programs that people like, or they would have to raise taxes. Then everyone would be yelling at them anyway. So they can't win, really. Not that I'm suggesting we don't yell at the government. I'm just saying its kind of complicated.
Ok maybe you knew all that stuff already. Now I'll try to answer the actual question. I think privatization comes in as a solution to this business of the government being a poor custodian of your retirement funds. Under privatization, you would have your own account that you put money into over your working life. The money would be invested in the stock market or some kind of thing that earns interest. I'm sure there will be some options. Then you draw money out when you need the funds for retirement, and the government can't touch it. Sounds like a 401K or IRA. Here are pros and cons, as I understand them.
Pros
1. The government doesn't spend your retirement funds.
2. You can leave it to heirs when you die. (I think)
Cons
1. If the market is down when you retire, you lose.
2. If you are a bad investor, you lose.
3. Transitioning from our current system to a private one will be tricky, since it's hard to save for yourself and pay for current retirees. It will take decades to make the switch.
4. I can't help but wonder what will happen if you unexpectedly live to be 103. What if you run out of money in your oldest days? That is one benefit of our current system, the money doesn't run out if you get too old (just if the government spends it on other things).
Whew, that was long. Check out the wikipedia page on this subject for more. I'm sure I left out some pros and cons. If you think of more, leave a comment. We'll have a comment convo.
- Our government spends a lot more money than it makes. We know that already. But I for one did not really understand where the extra money comes from.
- First of all, the deficit is the amount of money the government spends more than it makes in one year. The debt is the total amount the government owes, or all the deficits and interest added up over the years.
- The extra money comes from other countries, mainly Japan and China. We owe them lots of money. Like 9.36 trillion dollars.
- We have to pay interest on the debt. This comes to over $400 billion per year, and is more than we spend on the Iraq war.
- There are three things that the federal government is required to pay for:
---- Social Security
---- Interest on the debt
- All other spending is discretionary. Even really important things, like the military.
- If we keep going with the same levels of taxes and spending we have now, by the year 2042 there will be no money left for anything except Medicare, Social Security, and interest on the debt.
- I suppose we could just borrow even more money from other countries to pay for the rising interest payments, but this cycle is clearly not sustainable. And at some point, if we continue on this path, other countries might start thinking that the US government is not such a reliable investment anymore, and then we can just say goodbye to the stock market. Probably the dollar too.
- It will take big big changes to fix this financial problem. Currently politicians propose to balance the budget by eliminating wasteful spending and raising taxes for the wealthy. This is not enough money to even balance the budget for one year, let alone have a surplus and start paying down the debt.
- They usually talk about tax cuts for the middle class too. Well, 9 out of 10 Americans identify themselves as the middle class. So someone is going to be disappointed there. Either they'll cut too many taxes and we'll continue in this debt hole, or people who think they are middle class are going to find themselves in the supposedly wealthy class, with higher taxes. Hey, just like the AMT.
- No politicians will discuss this problem beyond the "cut government waste, raise taxes on those greedy wealthy people" mantra, because then they will not get elected. Ross Perot tried. Imagine a politician saying they're going to raise your taxes while simultaneously reducing grandma's Medicare and Social Security benefits. Forget it.
- The only way to change it is to raise awareness among the American people. If it's important to the public, it will be important to politicians who would like to get elected.
I could go on. Maybe next time I'll talk about out of control Medicare spending and the pharmaceutical lobby.
-----------------------------
Update: Social Security Privatization
Jenn asked about social security privatization. I don't know the details, but here is how I understand it. Sorry if some of this is basic information. I'm trying to sort it out in my own head by writing. Maybe you know how social security works already.
Working people and their employers pay FICA taxes, and the government in turn gives that money to retired seniors. This is a great idea if there are a lot more people paying than receiving. That has been the case in the past, but it's about to change once the boomers start retiring. It seems the whole problem with the system revolves around the large number of baby boomers relative to other generations. For the past many years, FICA collected more money in payroll taxes than it needed to pay out to retirees. The very responsible thing to do would be to invest the extra money for when the boomers retire, because the ratio of younger people(paying taxes):boomers(receiving $$) is not as favorable as boomers(paying taxes):older people(receiving$$), and there is not going to be enough money from the younger generations' FICA taxes to pay out to the retired boomers. So the government put the extra money in a trust fund, and proceeded to borrow from the trust fund for other federal government programs. Consequently, the social security trust fund is full of IOU's.
This is bad, but not the end of the world. There still will be lots of young people working and paying FICA taxes, and that money will still go to retirees. They just won't get as much money as they are entitled to. I think the estimates are that they will get 70%. Now we can get mad and yell at the federal government for irresponsibly borrowing from the trust fund, but really if they hadn't done that, then they would have had to either cut programs that people like, or they would have to raise taxes. Then everyone would be yelling at them anyway. So they can't win, really. Not that I'm suggesting we don't yell at the government. I'm just saying its kind of complicated.
Ok maybe you knew all that stuff already. Now I'll try to answer the actual question. I think privatization comes in as a solution to this business of the government being a poor custodian of your retirement funds. Under privatization, you would have your own account that you put money into over your working life. The money would be invested in the stock market or some kind of thing that earns interest. I'm sure there will be some options. Then you draw money out when you need the funds for retirement, and the government can't touch it. Sounds like a 401K or IRA. Here are pros and cons, as I understand them.
Pros
1. The government doesn't spend your retirement funds.
2. You can leave it to heirs when you die. (I think)
Cons
1. If the market is down when you retire, you lose.
2. If you are a bad investor, you lose.
3. Transitioning from our current system to a private one will be tricky, since it's hard to save for yourself and pay for current retirees. It will take decades to make the switch.
4. I can't help but wonder what will happen if you unexpectedly live to be 103. What if you run out of money in your oldest days? That is one benefit of our current system, the money doesn't run out if you get too old (just if the government spends it on other things).
Whew, that was long. Check out the wikipedia page on this subject for more. I'm sure I left out some pros and cons. If you think of more, leave a comment. We'll have a comment convo.
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