Pilgrim's Progress

Progressivism has been a proud, aggressive and often successful political movement since the time of President Teddy Roosevelt and Wisconsin's Senator Bob LaFollett. However, one of the flaws of progressivism is, at least in the arena of social justice, eventually the progress being made gets more and more rarefied. Yes, progressives have swept away many of the discriminatory laws and mores in the United States, but their follow-on targets represent smaller and smaller slices of our population (e.g., gender fluid rights) and, thus, the political payoffs get more problematic.

After all how many voters want to marry animals? But, this doesn't seem to slow progressives down. Soon it will be more bizarre rights being advocated ... man-boy love, human rights for simians and group marriages. Don't doubt me. To progressives, the social equality agenda seems never to run out.

Yet Progressives often keep their prejudices quite private while championing exactly the opposite in public. The Kennedys, the Clintons and many in the black movements (Jesse Jackson, Louis Farrakhan and Al Sharpton) come immediately to mind. Somehow, the general public chooses to ignore these inconsistencies.

Progressives are also often drawn into conundrums ... like embracing people who often violently oppose many of their other basic public tenets. For instance, many fundamental Muslims lethally oppose free love, homosexuality and religious tolerance ... yet are supported by progressives in a stunning display of hypocrisy. Even worse, progressives will not tolerate fundamental Christians with far less onerous strictures. I scratch my head over these inconsistent progressive notions.

Will progressives run out of paved road? Will they have fewer social equity causes to champion in the future? Or will the notion of more social justice ... or injustice ... as utilized by progressives begin to peter out? I hope so ... but I don't expect so.

Predatory Pricing

Jeff Bezos' Amazon is beginning to look a lot like the evil trusts of over a hundred years ago. This company has only been around for 23 years ... yet during this period it has earned virtually no profits from its Internet merchandising business, but it sales growth there has been phenomenal. In fact, if one subtracts out its Prime subscription payments, it actually has been selling on average goods below its cost (one definition of predatory pricing, a key element of a monopoly.)  Instead, it has been on a manic march toward capturing market share ... first in books and then spreading out into most every facet of goods that can be shipped.

Amazon's prices have been brutally competitive which, when combined with very efficient and well-managed logistics has created a very favorable customer experience ... and thus very impressive revenue growth, funded by a very liquid stock market ... which has been enamored by the revenue growth ... and unconcerned by lack of profits. (Actually, Amazon has generated some modest profits from its separate computer cloud business.)

The result? Devastation in the retail book selling business ... and now metastasis of this cancer into almost the entire bricks and mortar retail world. If Amazon keeps on its present path, more and more retail sectors will succumb to this predatory business model. The question, at least to me, is, has Amazon stepped over the line into illegal monopolistic practises?

This is a difficult question ... particularly since Amazon has a very loyal customer base ... people who might vote against any politician who tried to take corrective legal actions n against them. So what to do? Can we, as a country wait until some other more superior business model is invented to take down Amazon ... like Amazon's model is undercutting our previous retail near monopoly, Walmart? Unfortunately, a superior business model is not at all obvious.

However, if my careful-shopper wife is correct and Amazon has been quietly raising prices on most of its offerings, then it might be setting things up for some customer unrest ... since convenience can be achieved with other Internet shopping venues, say Ali Baba? And, if Amazon is planning to turn its Internet retail operation into a cash cow, I am certain that Bezos has his eye on another market he would like to monopolize with these expanding retail margins ... see: Bloomberg Chart/Article

My guess -- ground and air shipping (UPS, FedEx)? That is, unless President Trump, like Teddy Roosevelt once did with the trusts, decides to step on Bezos' expansionist empire. And it doesn't help Bezos' cause to keep attacking Trump with his personal megaphone, the Washington Post.

Sad if True

Lemmings

A Washington Post/ABC news poll indicates that, by close to a 2 to 1 margin, Americans think that the nuclear deal taking shape with Iran is a good thing ... see: Washington Post Article. Although there are a few bright spots in these poll results (almost 60% feel that such a deal won't prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon), the poll shows why the Obama administration is hell-bent on this bit of insane appeasement. Fortunately, Congress seems not quite so lemming-like.

Teddy Roosevelt claimed that the president has a "bully pulpit" to get his ideas across. Can we revise this thought just a bit?  Apparently, the president can also bully the American people into sealing their own sad fate.

For a much more rational assessment of these negotiations, read Paul Mirengoff's thoughts in the Powerline Blog.

God, I hope we walk away from this insanity ... even though John Kerry is beseeching a different almighty for a different result ... see: The Gateway Pundit.

Bully Pulpit

Teddy Roosevelt bragged that the president enjoyed a “bully pulpit” from which he could persuade societal change. President Obama feels he can enjoy this same Roosevelt leverage to combat climate change with extra-Constitutional measures … see: Washington Times Story. There is one major difference however … in Roosevelt’s day “bully” mostly meant “good” and “beneficial.” To Obama “bully” means “intimidation” and “my way or the highway.”

The Roosevelts

Like many, I have been watching Ken Burns' documentary about the Roosevelt's on PBS. So far it has included many interesting facts about Teddy Roosevelt of which I was unaware ... for instance, his actual derring-do (which I had understood to be manufactured) ... his many interactions with Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt ... and his early cowboy life in the western United States. The preponderance of the story has so far has concentrated on Teddy, but I am looking forward to more on FDR and Eleanor ... whose lives somewhat intersected mine.

In particular I have two recollections of this pair ... one, somewhat shabby and the other, somewhat poignant. First the shabby one ... even as a young child I can still hear the animosity that many in this country felt toward the Roosevelt's ... as exhibited by this joke I recall hearing (even with the inflections mimicking FDR's patrician way of speaking.) It goes thusly:

FDR -- We have a new weapon that will destroy all armies ... We have a new weapon that will destroy all navies ... We have a new weapon that will destroy all nations ... Eleanor, show them your teeth. (Sorry, not very kind ... but for the sake of an historic perspective, I repeat it.)

The other story involves me, at the age of six and a small playmate, Eliot. We were playing below our house in an alleyway when my father came home from work and called out to greet us. Eliot shouted up to my father that Roosevelt had died. To my lasting surprise, my father started crying. I say surprise because I thought my father, a Republican, didn't care much for FDR. But apparently the stress of the war and his understanding of how FDR had carried us (almost) through it, brought out this stronger emotion. My father himself died a few months later.

I look forward to the remaining episodes of this well-researched and carefully-produced documentary.

When They Were Young #3

The following early-life pictures come to you courtesy of reddit Pics. Enjoy!

John Wayne

Martha Stewart

Nikola Tesla

Susan Serandon

Teddy Roosevelt