Now that Rudy has finished a bad 6^th place in Iowa, his campaign is peddling the line that he never really competed there.

I guess they have to explain why he received half as much support as Ron Paul even after Rudy “won” an early debate by demanding an apology from Paul.

Don’t buy the BS!

Almost two months ago, I predicted-ahead of everyone else on the blogs or anywhere in media in the world- that Barack Obama will win the Iowa caucus. Most people thought I was kidding; especially since my prediction was made before the polls started coming in, showing that he was consistently doing well in them. I am not going into why I pulled this off; sometimes you just have hold on to your trade secrets. Yet, any one who has followed my writings on Obama since January last year, knows that I have been consistent in my analysis and fears. Tonight my prediction came through and true; Barack Obama won in Iowa. This is one of the biggest political stories in the history of the USA. Ever.

Imagine the top executives of a corporation voting each other shares of stock, enriching themselves and diluting shareholder equity. Imagine elected officials getting together with the lobbyists for a select group of interests, handing out billions of dollars in favors, and immediately raising taxes and cutting services to pay for it. In that case, people might finally realize what is happening in this country in general, and in Albany in particular, and do what it takes to stop it. But that isn't the way it works. What you generally have is a two-part fleecing,and by the time the hammer falls on the victims everyone has forgotten all about the beneficiaries.

In business, in good times stock options are issued but offset by share buybacks, so stockholder's equity is not diluted — until later when unfortunately "circumstances beyond anyone's control" require that new stock be issued and capital infusions sought. And in politics the winners, the abusers, get their favors paid out of the public treasury funded by debts, deferred costs, advanced revenues, and higher returns. And then when pension funds are going broke and debt service starts eating the budget, there is "no choice" but to make "tough decisions" and raise taxes, cut benefits, cut spending, and raise fees. Those tough choices somehow never include taking back any tax breaks, excessive spending levels, and rich pensions and benefits for those cashing out. "Realism" requires that others pay the price, and since the price has been deferred as part of the two-part fleecing, it must be paid with interest.

Many on the left side of the spectrum have made the excellent point that most of the experts who were disastrously wrong about Iraq are still being listened to with respect despite their previous misjudgments.

Thursday’s Huffington Post has a column that makes that point.

And it pains me when the Kristols and Friedmans of the world, who were so wrong on Iraq, keep drawing pay checks (big ones), while other columnists — who got that story right and were brave enough to say so — have been sidelined by the mainstream media.

Bill Hammond of the Daily News writes in favor of capping the permitted increase in school property taxes in New York State, in order to prevent school districts from continuing to ramp them up no matter how much aid they receive.  I'm glad that someone is willing to concede that New York State school spending outside the city is too high, far higher than is needed for a superb education let alone an adequate one.  Hammond recommends capping property tax increases at 2 1/2 per year, as Massachusetts has.  As I've noted many times, however, a tax cap based on a percentage increase from the current level merely guarantees that those who have spent the most will continue to be permitted to spend the most, forever, while those spending less (admittedly a shrinking group) can never catch up, no matter what.  Worse, thanks to STAR, it ensures that those currently spending more will continue to receive more state education assistance than those spending less. 

In my prior post, I provided and discussed New York State’s overall Medicaid spending in 2005, and spending by category of service. In this post, I’ll briefly discuss spending by age of beneficiary — a spreadsheet is attached for your further review. As noted, New York State accounted for 6.5% of the people in the United States, 7.3% of the poor people (2006 data), 9.3% of poor Americans over age 65 — and 8.4% of Medicaid beneficiaries. But there is a group for which New York’s share of U.S. Medicaid beneficiaries is much closer to its share of the overall population — those 18 and under. And, for that same group, spending per beneficiary is generally 25% to 50% higher than then national average, a fact related to the higher cost of living here. For those in some other age groups, spending per recipient is 70% or more higher than the national average, and/or New York State accounts for 10% or more of U.S. Medicaid recipients. I don’t think anyone is prepared to concede that New York State is cheating its children out of required Medicaid-financed services. So perhaps the number of child beneficiaries, and spending on them, is what one has to expect given the state’s higher poverty rate, higher cost of living Downstate, and one would hope greater generosity. New York should expect to account for 8% to 11% of the nation’s Medicaid spending, despite accounting for just 7.6% of its personal income. For other groups, another explanation is required for higher spending.

Last week I wrote about the theory of the two electorates. One point I was trying to make is that media coverage of politics is so often wrong because those in the informed electorate assume that the vast majority knows more than they do.

An article in Monday’s New York Times about how Rudy Giuliani has dropped in the polls is a good example of the media refusing to understand this.

From The Times:

Mr. Giuliani’s position has changed notably from even a month ago. For much of this year, Republicans had expressed admiration, and some surprise, at the extent to which he appeared to have dealt with concerns about his views on abortion and gay rights, as well as his private life. Mr. Giuliani showed significant leads in most national polls; he routinely drew warm and enthusiastic receptions from audiences more conservative than he. His advisers say that a recent run of negative news reports, focusing on an extramarital affair and his association with Bernard Kerik, the disgraced former police commissioner that Mr. Giuliani recommended as homeland security secretary, is beginning to take a toll. “I am a little disappointed with his personal life,” said Elisabeth Ackerson, speaking about Mr. Giuliani after attending a Town Hall meeting for Mr. Romney on Saturday evening in Londonderry, N.H. She said was trying to decide among Mr. Romney, Mr. McCain and Mr. Giuliani.

With a load of extra work, hurting fingers and wrists, and a schedule overload, I’ve haven’t been able to write much. So rather than a lecture, I’ll ask a question. If you could choose five questions for the Presidential debates (primary or general), what would they be? The questions actually asked tend to disappoint me, as they are either policy softballs or regurgitations of character assassinations that, given the character of many of the candidates, amount to beating dead horses. If I were asking the questions, they would be probes of the values behind policies, which is what I tend to write about.