Enough with the Prop 8 Racist Crap.

I'm so sick of the B.S. racial blaming here.

1) Why are we talking about the 856,000 black people that voted for Prop 8, but NOT the 3,774,000 white people and 1,180,000 Hispanic people? 5 and 3/4 as many white and hispanic people (4 1/2 times as many white people alone) voted for Prop, and somehow it's the black voters' fault the thing passed? There are people who deserve to be beaten over this sort of misinformation.

2) Is it just me, or does some of the "this happened because black voters came out to vote for Obama" rhetoric sound an awful lot like "Black people shouldn't vote" and/or "a black man shouldn't have been running"?

3) Anyone else notice that some of the white anchors reporting on how this was black people's fault look a little... sheepish? "Gosh, I sure hope no one guesses which way I voted while I'm blaming the black people."

4) And finally, fellow white folk, how about we shut up about why we think 70% of black voters supported Prop 8, and actually go talk to some black voters who went that way and find out why. Let's get some information on what activist failure was here, and fix it. Because that kind of statistical flyer, however small in absolute numbers, shows a serious and embarrassing problem in tactics.

Well, that was sickening.

I had to get my car worked on this morning. And OF COURSE the television was on in the waiting room, and it was on the news, talking about the economic crisis with some so-called experts.

If ever I have wanted to hit the button that blows up the world because it's a lost freakin' cause...

Honestly, it was truly sickening. It made me want to hurt someone. Some highlights:
1) We shouldn't raise taxes on rich people because they don't like it. *jaw, meet floor. Floor, jaw. You two are going to be muchly acquainted.*
2) Besides, the rich people will cheat out of it anyway. (Um, isn't this like saying we shouldn't make serial killing illegal, since most serial killers are smart enough that they never get caught?)
3) Instead, we should take money away from the working classes and give it to the rich. This, somehow, will solve everything and there will be rainbows and unicorns and little kittens who never scratch or poop.

You know, I can't help but think that if we had econ 101 classes in middle school instead of college, our public policy discussions would look completely different. The only reason some of this bullshit is even allowed in polite discourse is because most people don't understand how money actually works -- and as evidence towards that, I present the percentage of non-regular readers who read that and went "Duh, don't you know how money works? You give some money to the store and they give you something in return."

That's one step out of hundreds or thousands, guys.

So, very briefly, how money works. Say, I've got a buck. I spend my dollar at my yarn store. I now have $1 worth of yarn and the yarn store lady now has a physical dollar bill. She spends that bill at the butcher's and gets $1 of meat.
That single dollar bill has now bought $2 worth of stuff. Butcher goes to buy something from the bakery, now it's bought $3 of stuff, and so on.

So, what happens if the baker puts it in the bank instead spending it? Now something interesting happens. The bank lends to someone else -- and suddenly that single physical dollar bill is two dollars -- one owned by the banker, and one simultaneously being used the borrower. This works as long as there is growth, so that the dollar the borrower spent returns more than a dollar, so they can return what they borrowed plus interest and hopefully keep something. However, if the borrower defaults, not so good things happen.

So, you can see that money on a large scale is a lot more complicated than a stack of bills.

Now, let's take a quick high-level look at so called "trickle down" economics versus bottom up approaches. At best, you can now see there's no advantage to giving the money to the rich. They won't be spending it, so they'll invest it and it'll get out that way. However, there are some problems with this.
1) It's a slower process than giving the money directly to the poor and working classes. The lower classes spend what they have; they have to. It immediately gets out flowing through the economy buying people food and electricity and houses and all that stuff people need. Give it to the rich, it has to go through the delay of going to the bank and getting lent and then the borrower spending it and so on.
2) Think about who borrows from banks. It's not people trying to meet their everyday needs -- those people don't get lent to. It's businesses and larger investors -- which can be small businesses and home buyers, but is OFTEN large corporations spending someone else's money so they don't put their own at risk, or the rich doing the same.
Furthermore, the richer you are, the more return you're going to demand for the money you invest -- which means the harder it will be for others to borrow it, and thus the more elite the borrowers will be.

What this amounts to is that money tends to move upwards. Oh, there will be little bits that temporarily go to the gardener or the maid or the burger flipper, but most of it moves upwards and stays there.

If you want a quick jolt to the economic system, you put money into the lowest levels. It circulates (and thus multiples) quickly there, improving the customer base which is required to be in place to support the larger business that money will eventually move into as it gets invested.
There is some decent argument for simultaneously injecting funds into the middle levels -- local business, that sort of thing -- so that they can be prepared for the growing consumer base coming from the low-level injection.

But there is no justification for taking money from the lower levels to put into the highest levels unless you are intentionally trying to crash 80% of the population, or you just don't care as long as you personally benefit. Unfortunately, look at who is in that last group: every corporation by definition, and thus the media that are corporate owned; and large chunks of our government.

Oh God, it's starting early.

"Some people don't celebrate Christmas and they won't even pretend! This oppresses me! Help, help, I'm being oppressed! Come see the violence inherent in the system!"
*head desk*


I did have the amusing realization that from right now until New Years, for some pagans, Nietzsche is right. God is dead. ^_~