Rupert Murdoch made a bold pronouncement today. In case you don't know this is the guy who has worked hard to make sure media (television and print) is focused on 1) generating revenue, 2) being owned by as few people as possible, 3) isn't required to adhere to anything resembling factual statements, and 4) continuing the fine tradition of yellow journalism. He's the mastermind behind the News Corp conglomerate. A modern day William Randolph Hearst. Today he announced that, within 12 months, News Corp websites would require some type of payment to view news and that the current model of internet news is on the way out.
His support for this statement is that "360,000 people downloaded a WSJ app for the iPhone" and that the online Wall Street Journal is thriving with a paid subscription model. Not bad evidence on the surface. But when was the last time the average Joe read an issue of WSJ? WSJ subscribers are mostly (though not completely) wealthier people and investors that have a vested interest in that type of news. It's a publication that caters to an upper class clientele. So Murdoch's biggest support is essentially "wealthy people pay for news, let's make lower class people pay too."
Now I'm not saying people shouldn't pay for the services offered by news outlets. People have always paid for newspapers and magazines. Commercials pay for air time for news programs. But there are major problems with combining concentrated media ownership (and thus viewpoints) and then nickel and diming people for news. Let's just look at a few.
1) You'll inevitably get monopolistic behavior and monopolistic pricing.
2) People will most likely only subscribe to a limited number of news sources, making their already low quality news even more biased in what stories are covered, what information is provided, the quality of sources used, and how the stories are presented.
3) We live in a society where information is valued even slightly more than money and that's because information makes money. So controlling who has access to information (i.e. only those who can pay for it) is devastating to those left out. It's another way to keep information in the hands of those that already have it and away from people that don't.
4) Journalism has become a much lower overhead business. Fewer in depth stories are being made and fewer foreign reporters are working. Communication and transportation costs are lower than ever. "24 hour news" is mostly opinion pieces that are cheap and quick to make. Online distribution has destroyed the need for printing facilities, warehouses of papers, and thousands of jobs. Advertising on tv, in print, and online is higher than ever. So lower overhead + higher advertising revenue = the need to charge online readers? That doesn't make sense.
5) Rumors, wrong information, and bad information are already rampant (fanned in part by the media). By reducing easy access to news, will this problem get any better? Personally, I doubt it.
I'm not opposed to some kind of subscription system if it is structured with reasonable fees and with provisions for those that can't afford it. Personally, I would turn to 3rd party sources and news outlets with better business models. But in principle I already pay for a newspaper and I'm willing to pay for the same thing electronically. The more important idea is this: we, as a society, need to determine what constitutes information that is so important we should disseminate it without regard to the all important Business Model and what information should be bought and sold. If we lock it all up with a price tag, we hurt the entire society and make a few people wealthy and powerful.
We'll see what happens. Murdoch has done wonders taking a news station that presents opinion as fact and has never, to the best of my knowledge, bothered to make a retraction or correction even in the face of overwhelming evidence that what they presented was false, misleading, and wrong, and turned it into a program that people rely on for news. So I wouldn't be surprised if he was successful in his endeavor.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
No explanation necessary
I'll address the topic of blog length in a future post. Right now though, here are some fun things that are happening right now. I'm not going to put any explanatory text in simply because common sense should tell you why these things are are really, really ridiculous.
1: Arguing/voting to ban abortion but NOT arguing/voting to increase funding for adoption, counseling, and family services.
2: Voting for spending increases but not voting to increase revenues (i.e. taxes), including for social programs ("liberal") and for military programs ("conservative").
3: Spending a career railing against drug abusers and demanding increased punishments but avoiding punishment and making excuses for your own drug abuse.
4: Claiming we need energy independence and reduced budget deficits due to oil while protecting and adding to the benefits derived by the oil/gas industries.
5: Demanding answers from Vietnam vets about their service (a la John Kerry) while not asking the same questions or requiring the same detailed answers from your own candidate (a la Bush II).
6: Arguing that global warming and climate science require more research to make the claims they are making and then not funding that research.
1: Arguing/voting to ban abortion but NOT arguing/voting to increase funding for adoption, counseling, and family services.
2: Voting for spending increases but not voting to increase revenues (i.e. taxes), including for social programs ("liberal") and for military programs ("conservative").
3: Spending a career railing against drug abusers and demanding increased punishments but avoiding punishment and making excuses for your own drug abuse.
4: Claiming we need energy independence and reduced budget deficits due to oil while protecting and adding to the benefits derived by the oil/gas industries.
5: Demanding answers from Vietnam vets about their service (a la John Kerry) while not asking the same questions or requiring the same detailed answers from your own candidate (a la Bush II).
6: Arguing that global warming and climate science require more research to make the claims they are making and then not funding that research.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
It's all about the Benjamins
In the last two days I've seen several (that's approximately more than a few but less than a bunch) news articles promulgating one of the great American myths: everything (should) boil down to money and economics. As only two examples, I perused an article detailing how some cities are on the verge of dismantling their recycling programs because they are losing money and an article discussing how people should stop buying organic foods in order to save money.
That last article is just stupid. Aside from the fact that many "organic" foods are not, in fact, organic, encouraging people to continue using a system of agriculture that is known to be unhealthy and unsustainable is just ridiculous. Why not spend more money on food with a modicum of propriety in its creation and reduce expenses elsewhere such as using less gas or watching fewer bad movies at the theater? Why must we save money by cutting out those things that are often most beneficial? Sometimes doing the right thing costs more. We have to get over this idea that cheapest is best, easiest, and most correct.
We can't let hard economic times push us back into doing ridiculous things like not recycling. The problem is seeing recycling in dollar terms and not accounting for all the stuff that we don't put in dollar terms (i.e. positive externalities). Think of it this way: recycling stretches our resources further, it reduces expenditures of energy and time to dig up new resources, it prevents environmental problems from resource extraction, and when environments aren't mined, logged, or farmed for resources nature is allowed to do the things it does for us for free. That last point is VERY important. Think of all the things nature does FOR us that we currently don't pay for. Wetlands help clean our water. Forests and ocean algae provide oxygen. Forests and grasslands help retain soil fertility while reducing erosion. Aquifers store and clean water. River floods (think Nile or Mississippi) increase land fertility by depositing nutrient-rich silt created from rocks further upstream. The list goes on and on and on. If we keep leveling mountains, draining wetlands, and turning forest into corn and beef we will have to pay for the things that nature does for free (and usually does better). The small amount of money it costs to keep recycling programs running is chump change compared to the cost for us to extract all the resources, fight wars to grab more resources, and then replace nature's work with our machines.
We need to go beyond the monetary sphere. Some things are more important than money. If we reduce everything to monetary terms, we lose a lot of our humanity because we see only our own gain and our own rewards rather than our impact on other people and on our planet. The pursuit of money often means individual needs and wants triumph over what is good for the group. These are not mutually exclusive ideas but we often act as if they are. Everyone is so worried about "losing" something (think taxes) that they forget that money, like all things on this planet, does much more good when shared with the group than when horded by individuals. We need to find a better balance between the two concepts of money and humanity because community and group cohesiveness is necessary for our well being as individuals and as a species.
(As an addendum, I am not against capitalism. I believe that hard work and taking risk should be rewarded. The pursuit of money or success is not bad in and of itself. It's the larger cultural idea of "mine" that is the problem. We have the idea of capitalism so ingrained in us from day one that we forget it's only an economic philosophy. It says nothing about how to create socially, ethically, and environmentally responsible people. We must make these social concepts part of the economic philosophy. As long as they are separate, they will continue to be seen as opposing each other rather than as tools we can integrate to make the system and community stronger.)
That last article is just stupid. Aside from the fact that many "organic" foods are not, in fact, organic, encouraging people to continue using a system of agriculture that is known to be unhealthy and unsustainable is just ridiculous. Why not spend more money on food with a modicum of propriety in its creation and reduce expenses elsewhere such as using less gas or watching fewer bad movies at the theater? Why must we save money by cutting out those things that are often most beneficial? Sometimes doing the right thing costs more. We have to get over this idea that cheapest is best, easiest, and most correct.
We can't let hard economic times push us back into doing ridiculous things like not recycling. The problem is seeing recycling in dollar terms and not accounting for all the stuff that we don't put in dollar terms (i.e. positive externalities). Think of it this way: recycling stretches our resources further, it reduces expenditures of energy and time to dig up new resources, it prevents environmental problems from resource extraction, and when environments aren't mined, logged, or farmed for resources nature is allowed to do the things it does for us for free. That last point is VERY important. Think of all the things nature does FOR us that we currently don't pay for. Wetlands help clean our water. Forests and ocean algae provide oxygen. Forests and grasslands help retain soil fertility while reducing erosion. Aquifers store and clean water. River floods (think Nile or Mississippi) increase land fertility by depositing nutrient-rich silt created from rocks further upstream. The list goes on and on and on. If we keep leveling mountains, draining wetlands, and turning forest into corn and beef we will have to pay for the things that nature does for free (and usually does better). The small amount of money it costs to keep recycling programs running is chump change compared to the cost for us to extract all the resources, fight wars to grab more resources, and then replace nature's work with our machines.
We need to go beyond the monetary sphere. Some things are more important than money. If we reduce everything to monetary terms, we lose a lot of our humanity because we see only our own gain and our own rewards rather than our impact on other people and on our planet. The pursuit of money often means individual needs and wants triumph over what is good for the group. These are not mutually exclusive ideas but we often act as if they are. Everyone is so worried about "losing" something (think taxes) that they forget that money, like all things on this planet, does much more good when shared with the group than when horded by individuals. We need to find a better balance between the two concepts of money and humanity because community and group cohesiveness is necessary for our well being as individuals and as a species.
(As an addendum, I am not against capitalism. I believe that hard work and taking risk should be rewarded. The pursuit of money or success is not bad in and of itself. It's the larger cultural idea of "mine" that is the problem. We have the idea of capitalism so ingrained in us from day one that we forget it's only an economic philosophy. It says nothing about how to create socially, ethically, and environmentally responsible people. We must make these social concepts part of the economic philosophy. As long as they are separate, they will continue to be seen as opposing each other rather than as tools we can integrate to make the system and community stronger.)
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
I know I sound like a broken record...
but you can't, and I don't know how to stress this enough, do something but act outraged when someone else does the same thing.
I know...we all do it. I'm as guilty as the next guy. I've done stupid things and then yelled at people for doing exactly the same thing. There's a difference between people though- if you do something stupid and learn a lesson and feel bad and won't repeat yourself, it's an honest mistake. If you're continually a douche bag, then that just makes you a stupid douche bag.
Back to the point- the next conservative person I meet that uses the phrase "class warfare" to describe Barack's proposed tax plan might just end up getting kicked in the throat. Allow me to explain.
For the past 28 years (barring a few years near the end of the Clinton administration) the tax burden has been increasing, in real and nominal terms, for the middle class and the poor. Meanwhile, it has declined for the upper classes (those making $250k or more). So for roughly 28 years conservative financial pundits, politicians, and high income households have been happily getting their way. Systematically favoring one class over another is class warfare. And favoring the rich in tax legislation over other classes fits that bill. So we've had 28 years of class warfare favoring the upper crust. Now, Obama plans to increase the amount payed by the rich and reduce the burden (hopefully in real terms) payed by the middle and lower classes. And now the conservatives are screaming "class warfare" so hard they might just push their little pooty-puckers out.
Wait a minute. Did I miss something? Twenty-eight years of reduced tax burdens (in real dollar terms) for upper class incomes doesn't count as class warfare but reversing that trend does? How asinine can you be?
There are pretty sound macroeconomic arguments for how tax policies and changes affect national incomes and there are lots of good reasons to question tax policy changes. Class warfare is a bullshit straw-man argument put up to hit people's emotional buttons and keep them from behaving rationally. Whether or not it's desirable or right to reverse the current tax trends rather than changing the system to a more fair one is a lively debate. But no matter what happens, you can't wage class warfare and then cry foul when the pendulum swings back. You can't always be on the winning team.
As for a solution, the way out of this mess is elegantly simple. It's way past time to implement a flat percentage tax. Everyone, excepting people already living in poverty that can't afford food let alone taxes, should be required to hand over some percentage of their income as taxes. Corporations should have to hand over a flat percentage of profits. These should be percentage based and not flat numbers since 10% of a rich person's money is the same punch to the wallet as 10% of a middle class income. It's the same reduction in purchasing power. A flat amount can never be fair. $1,000 is a drop in the bucket for someone making $250k a year but is significantly more damaging for a person making $35,000. Those taxes should go for things that individuals won't provide on their own such as highways, defense, research, environmental protection, and education. Things that benefit everyone. This system has no class warfare and everyone participates and owns an equal share of public works. Of course, this won't happen because the rich like their money and don't want a system that evens out the tax burden. Instead they'll keep calling shenanigans and class warfare and the middle and lower classes will continue to shoulder the financing of public goods.
No matter what happens, the bottom line is that waging class warfare but not calling it that (usually it's referred to as "allowing the markets to work" or "letting people keep more of what they earned") is just stupid. It's no different than being outraged by terrorists torturing captives yet engaging in torture or declaring other people must adopt democracy when there are known flaws in our own implementation. Being hypocritical is a poor example to set, especially if you want to be seen as a leader.
I know...we all do it. I'm as guilty as the next guy. I've done stupid things and then yelled at people for doing exactly the same thing. There's a difference between people though- if you do something stupid and learn a lesson and feel bad and won't repeat yourself, it's an honest mistake. If you're continually a douche bag, then that just makes you a stupid douche bag.
Back to the point- the next conservative person I meet that uses the phrase "class warfare" to describe Barack's proposed tax plan might just end up getting kicked in the throat. Allow me to explain.
For the past 28 years (barring a few years near the end of the Clinton administration) the tax burden has been increasing, in real and nominal terms, for the middle class and the poor. Meanwhile, it has declined for the upper classes (those making $250k or more). So for roughly 28 years conservative financial pundits, politicians, and high income households have been happily getting their way. Systematically favoring one class over another is class warfare. And favoring the rich in tax legislation over other classes fits that bill. So we've had 28 years of class warfare favoring the upper crust. Now, Obama plans to increase the amount payed by the rich and reduce the burden (hopefully in real terms) payed by the middle and lower classes. And now the conservatives are screaming "class warfare" so hard they might just push their little pooty-puckers out.
Wait a minute. Did I miss something? Twenty-eight years of reduced tax burdens (in real dollar terms) for upper class incomes doesn't count as class warfare but reversing that trend does? How asinine can you be?
There are pretty sound macroeconomic arguments for how tax policies and changes affect national incomes and there are lots of good reasons to question tax policy changes. Class warfare is a bullshit straw-man argument put up to hit people's emotional buttons and keep them from behaving rationally. Whether or not it's desirable or right to reverse the current tax trends rather than changing the system to a more fair one is a lively debate. But no matter what happens, you can't wage class warfare and then cry foul when the pendulum swings back. You can't always be on the winning team.
As for a solution, the way out of this mess is elegantly simple. It's way past time to implement a flat percentage tax. Everyone, excepting people already living in poverty that can't afford food let alone taxes, should be required to hand over some percentage of their income as taxes. Corporations should have to hand over a flat percentage of profits. These should be percentage based and not flat numbers since 10% of a rich person's money is the same punch to the wallet as 10% of a middle class income. It's the same reduction in purchasing power. A flat amount can never be fair. $1,000 is a drop in the bucket for someone making $250k a year but is significantly more damaging for a person making $35,000. Those taxes should go for things that individuals won't provide on their own such as highways, defense, research, environmental protection, and education. Things that benefit everyone. This system has no class warfare and everyone participates and owns an equal share of public works. Of course, this won't happen because the rich like their money and don't want a system that evens out the tax burden. Instead they'll keep calling shenanigans and class warfare and the middle and lower classes will continue to shoulder the financing of public goods.
No matter what happens, the bottom line is that waging class warfare but not calling it that (usually it's referred to as "allowing the markets to work" or "letting people keep more of what they earned") is just stupid. It's no different than being outraged by terrorists torturing captives yet engaging in torture or declaring other people must adopt democracy when there are known flaws in our own implementation. Being hypocritical is a poor example to set, especially if you want to be seen as a leader.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Thank you Monsanto
Today I'd like to give a big shout out to all those companies, corporations, executives, and fraudsters that have decided to enrich themselves and their shareholders at the expense of common sense, humanity, social responsibility, dignity, and existence. I'm referring to the marketing of products under the general label "green" although this also applies to things labeled "eco-friendly" and "environmentally sound".
When it was first thought up, the green label was supposed to represent something. It was supposed to represent products that used natural, renewable, non-toxic, and biodegradable ingredients rather than non-renewable petroleum based chemicals with unknown side-effects, high toxicity, and thousands of years of existence in our landfills, water supplies, and soil. What we have now in the market place it a travesty and a tragedy.
Take a good look at most "green" products and you'll find names synonymous with corporate excess, massive environmental damage, refusal to clean up their messes, and a general lack of good social and environmental stewardship. Look at the ingredient list and you'll find things that are most certainly not natural, renewable, or biodegradable. And every day it gets worse as corporate lobbyists and political fools gut legislation intended to clarify what can and can't be sold under green labels. By gut, I mean allow things to be sold as green that aren't green at all.
It's no different than what happened to the organic movement. Look at your organic foods. You'll find a vast majority of "organic" and "natural" foods still contain garbage (high fructose corn syrup, preservatives, artificial flavors, etc). Organic meats are not organic at all. Remember- chicken can be marketed as "free range" as long as it has ACCESS to a pasture. By access, these farmers provide one small door (often smaller than a chicken) and they provide it late in life when the chickens are already accustomed to roost life and will never leave the door (because they are chickens and they are stupid).
So once again greed triumphs over good. The organic movement was about healthy eating and being aware of where you food comes from and making it as healthy and chemical free as possible. The green movement was about making products less resource intensive, less chemically harmful, and less prone to remaining in our water. Instead, these have become marketing buzzwords, advertising fodder, and a sop to people that still want to consume but want to feel less guilty about consumption's harmful side effects.
To be fair, there are a large number of products that ARE green and a large number of companies and people working hard to make sure their products do as little damage as possible while still making a profit. Using lemon juice and baking soda instead of bleaches, ethers, and alcohols is great. Removing pesticides from food and allowing cattle to eat grass (which they evolved to eat) rather than corn (which they did not) is wonderful. And using fewer resources to make the same product is commendable (though not necessarily deserving of a "green" label). The problem is that green is green is green to the average fool shopping for a product. Most people don't have the capability to know which products are actually more environmentally friendly than others. But I think we can all agree that marketing things as green because you removed 2 ingredients while leaving the other 12 is lying. Selling "green" window cleaners that still contain man-made chemicals with long lifetimes and toxic breakdown products is unethical. And using your market position and money to make environmental protection rules laxer and the punishments more lenient is just messed up.
The greenest, most environmentally conscious thing you can do is NOT BUY THINGS IN THE FIRST PLACE. Buy less and we'll use less resources. Buy less and we'll have fewer chemicals ending up in our water and soil. Buy less and our landfills will stop filling up so fast. For those of you that can't have a conversation without worrying about terrorists, then buy less so that less money goes over seas to fund terrorist activities (surprise!- it's not just oil money that funds terrorism even if that's what the news told you).
Long term vision and common sense people. Lets get some.
When it was first thought up, the green label was supposed to represent something. It was supposed to represent products that used natural, renewable, non-toxic, and biodegradable ingredients rather than non-renewable petroleum based chemicals with unknown side-effects, high toxicity, and thousands of years of existence in our landfills, water supplies, and soil. What we have now in the market place it a travesty and a tragedy.
Take a good look at most "green" products and you'll find names synonymous with corporate excess, massive environmental damage, refusal to clean up their messes, and a general lack of good social and environmental stewardship. Look at the ingredient list and you'll find things that are most certainly not natural, renewable, or biodegradable. And every day it gets worse as corporate lobbyists and political fools gut legislation intended to clarify what can and can't be sold under green labels. By gut, I mean allow things to be sold as green that aren't green at all.
It's no different than what happened to the organic movement. Look at your organic foods. You'll find a vast majority of "organic" and "natural" foods still contain garbage (high fructose corn syrup, preservatives, artificial flavors, etc). Organic meats are not organic at all. Remember- chicken can be marketed as "free range" as long as it has ACCESS to a pasture. By access, these farmers provide one small door (often smaller than a chicken) and they provide it late in life when the chickens are already accustomed to roost life and will never leave the door (because they are chickens and they are stupid).
So once again greed triumphs over good. The organic movement was about healthy eating and being aware of where you food comes from and making it as healthy and chemical free as possible. The green movement was about making products less resource intensive, less chemically harmful, and less prone to remaining in our water. Instead, these have become marketing buzzwords, advertising fodder, and a sop to people that still want to consume but want to feel less guilty about consumption's harmful side effects.
To be fair, there are a large number of products that ARE green and a large number of companies and people working hard to make sure their products do as little damage as possible while still making a profit. Using lemon juice and baking soda instead of bleaches, ethers, and alcohols is great. Removing pesticides from food and allowing cattle to eat grass (which they evolved to eat) rather than corn (which they did not) is wonderful. And using fewer resources to make the same product is commendable (though not necessarily deserving of a "green" label). The problem is that green is green is green to the average fool shopping for a product. Most people don't have the capability to know which products are actually more environmentally friendly than others. But I think we can all agree that marketing things as green because you removed 2 ingredients while leaving the other 12 is lying. Selling "green" window cleaners that still contain man-made chemicals with long lifetimes and toxic breakdown products is unethical. And using your market position and money to make environmental protection rules laxer and the punishments more lenient is just messed up.
The greenest, most environmentally conscious thing you can do is NOT BUY THINGS IN THE FIRST PLACE. Buy less and we'll use less resources. Buy less and we'll have fewer chemicals ending up in our water and soil. Buy less and our landfills will stop filling up so fast. For those of you that can't have a conversation without worrying about terrorists, then buy less so that less money goes over seas to fund terrorist activities (surprise!- it's not just oil money that funds terrorism even if that's what the news told you).
Long term vision and common sense people. Lets get some.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)