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In recent weeks, in his pitches to Congress and the public on the need to pass the economic stimulus bill, President Barack Obama has made several claims about what it would do. (Republicans, too, have made stimulus boasts of their own.) But these pronouncements are not a sure thing:

  • Obama repeatedly said the plan “will save or create up to 4 million jobs.” Obama downgraded that estimate to 3.5 million once the House and Senate agreed on a less-expensive compromise bill. The projections come from at least three economists, but all say there is great uncertainty in their estimates.
  • Republican House members claimed their substitute legislation tops that, creating “6.2 million jobs.” But their calculation is even more fraught with uncertainty and is not backed up by independent economists.
  • Obama said the bill doesn't contain “a single earmark.” But whether one calls them “earmarks” or not, the Senate certainly added items that will benefit particular states. For example: $50 million for programs under the California-Bay Delta Act and $500 million for National Institutes of Health facilities in Bethesda, Md.
  • Obama claims that funds in the bill will result in “every American” having health records computerized “within five years.” But experts doubt it can be done that quickly.
  • The president also says electronic health records will save billions of dollars. But the Congressional Budget Office says that even a decade of expected savings are unlikely to pay back the government what the government will spend on health IT.
  • The president said the bill will modernize the nation's electricity grid, reducing consumption by 2 percent to 4 percent. That's optimistic. Industry reports say that a new grid could reduce energy consumption by up to 4 percent, but not until 2030 and at a cost much greater than the stimulus bill would cover.

Analysis

Amid much debate and disagreement over an economic stimulus package, President Obama has been pushing a bill that he says will help the economy and American workers in all sorts of ways. The two chambers of Congress have agreed on compromise legislation that comes close to what Obama backed.

In his prime-time press conference Feb. 9, an op-ed that was published in the Washington Post and in speeches to both the public and government employees, Obama has made his case again and again, citing various claims about what the bill would do. We take a look at a few of his not-so-certain pronouncements.

Jobs, jobs, jobs

In the Feb. 9 press conference, Obama said: “And that is why the single most important part of this Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Plan is the fact that it will save or create up to 4 million jobs – because that's what America needs most right now.”

The president, along with stimulus supporters, has made this claim several times, stating that the House bill would create either 3 million or 4 million jobs by the end of 2010. On Feb. 11, Congress agreed on compromise legislation, which is $20 billion to $40 billion less expensive than bills passed by the two chambers; Obama said that bill would create 3.5 million jobs. The numbers are based on projections made by several economists – but those economists aren't completely sure. They can't be. As we pointed out recently on The FactCheck Wire, economic modeling is relatively new, and largely untested, particularly with the kind of recession figures we’re seeing today. Obama would do better to say “could create” or “experts estimate,” rather than making such a definitive claim.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, told the House budget committee on Jan. 27 that the House bill would lead to 3 million more jobs by the end of 2010 than there would be without the stimulus. A week earlier, he put the number at 4 million. But, as he told the Associated Press, there’s no guarantee.

Zandi, quoted by the AP: “The models are based on historic experience. And we're outside anything we've experienced historically. We're completely in a world we don't understand and know.”

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office gave a significant range in its job creation figures, saying that the bills would create anywhere from 1.2 million to 3.6 million jobs by the end of next year.

Christina Romer, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, and Jared Bernstein, from Vice President Biden’s office, published a report in early January that said between 3.3 million and 4.1 million jobs would be created as the result of a slightly smaller recovery plan. But, they acknowledged, “[T]here is considerable uncertainty in our estimates: both the impact of the package on GDP and the relationship between higher GDP and job creation are hard to estimate precisely.” They called their range “reasonable.”

Yet another economist, Allen Sinai, founder of Decision Economics Inc, has said the stimulus could save 3 million to 4 million jobs as well. But, he told the New York Times, “I’m not sure I believe my own models. We’re in uncharted waters here.”

With several economists coming up with similar figures, Obama seems to be on fairly safe ground. Still, Nobel laureate economists can’t agree on whether the stimulus bill contains the right kind of measures to aid the crisis-plagued economy or how much help spending and tax relief will bring. Nor can the economists the president relies on present their projections with a high degree of certainty. Obama might be right about the job-creation ability of the plan, but it’s also possible the effect of the stimulus will be more in line with the low end of CBO’s range – or, in fact, it could have no effect at all.

Jobs, jobs, jobs – the Republican version

House Republican Leader John Boehner and Republican Whip Eric Cantor have repeatedly claimed that a GOP alternative stimulus plan would create “twice the jobs as the House Democrats’ plan at half the cost” – that's 6.2 million jobs, according to Boehner. Sounds even better, right? If only someone could be certain of that number.

The figure comes from the House Republicans’ own calculations. When we asked whether any independent economists endorsed the Republican claims, a spokesman for the Republican staff of the Ways and Means Committee produced none. CBO did not analyze the GOP's substitute, which failed by a vote of 170 to 266 on Jan. 28.

How did Republicans arrive at their 6.2 million figure? The Web site of Rep. Dave Camp, the ranking Republican member of the Committee on Ways and Means and a sponsor of the substitute, explains that the GOP's estimate is based on a 2007 paper by economists Christina and David Romer, a husband-wife team at the University of California, Berkeley. Yep, that's the same Christina Romer who is now chair of Obama's Council of Economic Advisers.

The Romers' analysis of tax changes since World War II concluded that “tax changes have very large effects” on the economy. Specifically, they said their data suggested that a “tax increase of 1 percent of GDP [gross domestic product] lowers real GDP by about 3 percent” or lower, but at least by 2.2 percent. Flipping the Romers' calculations, GOP staffers figured that a tax cut of 1 percent of GDP would produce growth of 2.2 percent. Then, using a different report (Christina Romer's analysis of Obama's plan), the Republicans further calculated that their own party's proposed cuts would yield 6.2 million jobs over two years.

Republicans point to Romer's position in Obama's administration, as if to prove their figures are justified. However, these aren't her calculations. Plus, the Romers stressed in that 2007 report that their estimates were larger than other economists had come up with and “are not highly precise.” (Indeed, in the CBO’s analysis, which it says gives a range that “encompasses a majority of economists’ views,” the nonpartisan group gives a high and low multiplier for several government measures; the tax cut multiplier ranges from 0.5 to 1.7.) More recently, Christina Romer, in a Jan. 9 paper estimating the effects of the Democratic plan, didn't use the 2.2 multiplier even though that meant a lower job estimate for the tax cuts in Obama's plan. Instead, she used a 1 percent multiplier.

We were unable to contact Romer directly, but a White House spokesperson told us the GOP analysis “makes a fundamental error” by assuming that added jobs from tax cuts would show up by the end of next year. “It fails to take into account the fact that tax changes affect the economy with delays,” the spokesperson said. Actually, even if the 2.2 multiplier were correct, the number of jobs added due to the GOP's proposed tax cuts would be only 1.7 million by the end of next year, according to White House calculations. GOP leaders themselves acknowledged in a document detailing their calculations that any such projections “are largely speculative, and the conclusions are generally dictated by the assumptions made by the authors.”

In other words, who knows? As macroeconomist Arnold Kling recently wrote, we'd have to construct alternate universes and try out different policies to see what effect tax cuts actually have in real life. Absent that, we're left with models that reflect economists' (or politicians') biases.

No earmarks?
 
Obama said in his Monday night press conference that the stimulus “does not contain ... a single pet project, not a single earmark, and it has been stripped of the projects members of both parties found most objectionable.”

The “pet projects” may not have been so easily identifiable in the House bill, but watchdog groups picked out some in the Senate version. “To say there are no earmarks, would not be an accurate statement. There are very few," said Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz, “[M]embers [of Congress] have gotten much more creative.”

Schatz rattled off a few examples that were in the Senate version: $198 million for benefits for Filipino veterans; $2 billion for a near-zero emissions coal plant, which would most likely go to the FutureGen project in Illinois; $500 million for National Institutes of Health facilities in Bethesda, Md. Members’ names weren't attached to the items. Still, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois has supported FutureGen, and why wouldn’t Maryland Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Benjamin Cardin be pleased to see funds go to their state? Such items meet the group's definition of what qualifies as “pork.” For the record, funds for the near-zero emissions plant were stripped out of the final conference report, but the Filipino veterans benefits and funds for NIH buildings are still there.

The investigative journalism site ProPublica, in a story published with MSNBC.com, identified several more questionable projects that members argue create or save jobs – for their own constituents. The Associated Press, too, found it noteworthy that Obama promised an audience in Elkhart, Indiana, that a bill with no pork would bring roadwork and perhaps a new downtown overpass.

Yet, any of these pet projects very well could lead to jobs. What critics see as “pork,” people who stand to benefit would see as necessary funds to boost local economies.

Pork for mice?

And, as Schatz notes, it’s much more difficult to identify who may have requested what. Republicans have charged that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi benefits from some pork in the compromise legislation: She has long pushed for protection for the endangered salt marsh harvest mouse in wetlands in the San Francisco Bay area, and the final bill calls for millions for wetlands restoration that could pay for such a “pet project.” But it was the Senate bill that said a sum of money ($50 million) “may be used for” programs under the California Bay-Delta Restoration Act. The House bill included no such stipulation, calling only for $50 million for a “Watershed Rehabilitation Program.”

It’s worth noting that the Senate also stipulated that another $50 million “may” be used for the Central Utah Projection Completion Act. Would that be $50 million of pork for Republican Sens. Orrin Hatch and Robert Bennett? Or a necessary stimulus for a vital project? The funding for both the California and Utah programs survived in the final conference report.

A Pelosi spokesman told the Washington Times that she had no involvement in directing the funds to the harvest mouse project, noting that “restoration is key to economic activity, including farming, fisheries, recreation and clean water.”

Obama may be right about the House bill, which was indeed stripped of a few items that representatives questioned, as he said. Our colleagues at PolitiFact.com also called the office of Republican Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona, an outspoken opponent of earmarks, and spokesman Matthew Specht told them: “Yeah, we agree that the House version can probably be considered earmark-free.”

Health IT

In his op-ed, and in his Jan. 24 video address, Obama repeated a claim about the stimulus bills' investment in electronic health records:

Obama op-ed, Feb. 5: “Now is the time to protect health insurance for the more than 8 million Americans at risk of losing their coverage and to computerize the health-care records of every American within five years, saving billions of dollars and countless lives in the process.”

During the presidential campaign, Obama often talked about electronic health records and the money that technology would save. But would it be billions? And can we computerize all of Americans’ health records in five years? Experts say it will be tough to speed up adoption that quickly, but they agree it's a laudable goal with plenty of money-saving, and health-improving, benefits. Health IT can do away with duplicate tests, reduce medical errors and bad drug interactions, and increase prevention efforts.

We dug into this issue last summer, finding that the adoption of electronic medical records has moved along at a crawl – only 12 percent of physicians and 11 percent of hospitals had electronic records systems in 2006, according to the CBO. The majority of doctors haven’t implemented the technology, experts told us, because it’s expensive, because not all of the many systems that are available can communicate with each other, and because it takes some time for an office to change its operations in such a major way. Dr. Rainu Kaushal, a professor of public health at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University, told us that the right policies could lead to 90 percent of practitioners adopting electronic systems, but “I think it's pie in the sky for the next five years.” Kaushal said eight to 10 years was a reasonable estimate.

Catherine Desroches, an instructor at the Harvard Medical School who has researched health IT, told us it would take “tens of billions to hundreds of billions of dollars to really have a fully interoperable national system.”

The compromise legislation includes $19 billion to speed up adoption. Most of the money would be in the form of payment incentives from Medicare and Medicaid for physicians who use electronic records.

We called Desroches again to ask for her take on the stimulus bill. Using the money for incentives for health care providers and infrastructure support, she said, could increase the rate of adoption, since those were the two main barriers she found in a survey of health IT use. As for getting all records computerized in five years, she said: “It’s certainly not going to be easy. But with a concerted effort at the federal level that actually has money behind it we could definitely speed up adoption.”

While the CBO agrees that health IT will save the government money in the long run, those savings are far outweighed by what the government will spend for the next 10 years.

CBO: Increased spending in the near term would be partially offset by Medicare savings in later years; as a result, those provisions would increase deficits by about $30 billion through 2014 but would yield savings in later years, reducing the net 11-year impact to $17 billion total through 2019.

It's worth noting that the CBO report only looks at government savings, not what insurance companies, doctors, hospitals or patients could potentially save from the use of health IT.

Power grid

During an early February speech at the Department of Energy to endorse the stimulus package, Obama said that “just these first steps towards modernizing the way we distribute electricity could reduce consumption by 2 to 4 percent.” He didn't mention any specific “steps,” but according to the Senate Appropriations Committee, the final compromise bill includes $11 billion for smart-grid efforts, including those to modernize the electricity grid. Industry projections show that the U.S. could reduce consumption by as much as Obama says, but it will take more than 20 years and a lot more money than the stimulus provides.

A study by the Electric Power Research Institute, an industry think tank, concluded that the deployment of a so-called smart grid “could potentially” reduce annual U.S. energy consumption by 1.2 percent to 4.3 percent of projected electricity usage in 2030.

But EPRI was looking at much more than the “first steps” that are in the stimulus bill. Rather, the EPRI report's projected consumption decline would come about through full transition, nationwide, to a smart grid that wouldn't be completed until 2030. A smart grid is an umbrella term for a variety of technological improvements to or replacements for the current system of electrical distribution and transmission from power sources to homes and businesses. Such improvements include wires that can handle more powerful currents and systems that can show a homeowner how much electricity a particular household item is using.

Rebis James, director of the Energy-Technology Assessment Center for EPRI, told FactCheck.org that only a “small fraction of homes and distribution centers” currently have such communication systems. A study commissioned by the Edison Electric Institute concluded that the cost of implementing a smart grid nationwide “will total about $880 billion.”

But money might not be the issue. As one power line developer told The New York Times, “We absolutely have no problem — underscore, no problem — financing our transmission grid.” Rather, the developers all point to regulatory hurdles that they say are hindering smart grid implementation.

When asked how close the U.S. might be to attaining the savings outlined in the EPRI report, James replied that it was “a long way away.”

Sources

Zandi, Mark. “The Economic Outlook and Budget Challenges.” Written Testimony of Mark Zandi before the Committee on the Budget, U.S. House of Representatives, 27 Jan. 2009.

Zandi, Mark. “The Economic Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act,” 21 Jan. 2009.
Fram, Alan. “FACT CHECK: Will stimulus create more than 3 million jobs like Democrats say? Maybe not.” Associated Press, 2 Feb. 2009.

Elmendorf, Douglas W. “Testimony on the Economy and Stimulus.” Congressional Budget Office, Director’s Blog, 27 Jan. 2009.

Elmendorf, Douglas W. Letter to Sen. Judd Gregg. Congressional Budget Office, 11 Feb. 2009.
Romer, Christina and Jared Bernstein. “The Job Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan,” 9 Jan. 2009.

Andrews, Edmund L. “Economy Shed 598,000 Jobs in January.” New York Times, 6 Feb. 2009.
 “Democrats’ ‘Stimulus’ Bill Under Fire, House GOP has a Better Solution.” U.S. House Republican Leader John Boehner’s blog,  2 Feb. 2009.

Cantor, Eric. “Smarter, Simpler Stimulus.” U.S. House of Representatives Office of the Republican Whip, 30 Jan. 2009.

The President’s Senior Economic Advisors’ Research Shows the Republican Substitute Could Create 6.2 million Jobs over the Next Two Years. U.S. House of Representatives Ways & Means Republican Press Office, 28 Jan. 2009.

State by State Breakout of Job Creation Under the Republican Substitute to H.R. 1. U.S. House of Representatives Ways & Means Republican Press Office, 5 Feb. 2009.

Romer, Christina D. and David H. Romer. “The Macroeconomic Effects of Tax Changes: Estimates Based on a New Measure of Fiscal Shocks.” University of California, Berkeley, March 2007.

DeLong, Brad. “Dueling Multipliers.” Grasping Reality with Both Hands blog, 29 Jan. 2009.

“Results of Applying the Methodology Advocated by Dr. Christina Romer and Dr. Jared Bernstein for Measuring the Job Creating Effects of the Republican Substitute to H.R. 1.” U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Ways and Means Republicans, 28 Jan. 2009.

DeLong, Brad. “Christie Romer Is Confirmed.” Grasping Reality with Both Hands blog, 31 Jan. 2009.
Grabell, Michael. “The Stimulus Bills: House vs. Senate.” ProPublica, 10 Feb. 2009.

Interview with Catherine Desroches, instructor at the Harvard Medical School,” 9 Feb. 2009.

Congressional Budget Office. “H.R. 1 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.” Cost Estimate, 26 Jan. 2009.

111th Congress, 1st Session. H.R. 1, as passed by U.S. House of Representatives.

111th Congress, 1st Session. H.R. 1 Amendment, as passed by the U.S. Senate, 10 Feb. 2009.

Interview with Tom Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, 9 Feb. 2009.

Grabell, Michael and Christopher Weaver. “In the Stimulus Bill: An Earmark by Any Other Name.” ProPublica, 5 Feb. 2009.

Woodward, Calvin. “FACT CHECK: Obama has it both ways on pork.” Associated Press, 9 Feb. 2009.
“Stimulus bill includes projects that some consider earmarks.” PolitiFact.com, Feb. 2009."

"Power Delivery and Utilization Update." Electric Power Research Institute, Jan 2009.

"Transforming America's Power Industry: The Investment Challenge, 2010-2030," prepared by the Brattle Group for The Edison Foundation. Nov 2008.

Wald, Matthew L. "Hurdles (Not Financial Ones) Await Electric Grid Update." The New York Times, 6 Feb 2009.

The Annenberg Political Fact Check is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. It is a nonpartisan, nonprofit “consumer advocate” for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics.

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On a recent morning as I exited Carl’s Jr. restaurant in Santa Rosa, I happened to see a young man rummaging through a garbage can on the other side of the parking lot. Walking to my car, I watched him pull out, open and inspect several bags of discarded remnants until he found something that looked good enough to keep.

Immediately experiencing a complete disappearance of any hunger for the food that I had just purchased for myself, I approached the young man and handed him my breakfast and a $20 bill that had been floating around in my purse. The gratitude in his sunken eyes was testament to the fact that, in the words of a song by the band, Downhere, “We are a Cathedral made of people, in a Kingdom that the eye can’t see ...”
 
There’s more to this or any simple act of kindness, for that matter, than might meet the eye: Today’s physicists now believe that our entire universe is made of interconnected strings of energy; that the appearance of separation of matter is an illusion, and that energy can never be destroyed.

Astronomers have also pinpointed a timeframe, around 16 billion years ago, for when this energy began its rapid, eternal dispersal throughout space, but no one thus far has told us exactly where it originated or what caused it to finally have its Big Bang.

Some 2,000 years ago, however, a radical rabbi began stirring up trouble among his peers with wild notions of a Loving Father, a Kingdom and an invitation for all to join the banquet here on Earth. He told his followers that following death, He would be back, that they would know Him in anyone they met – if they just had the eyes to see.

Furthermore, he gave his disciples a mission: Remember me by spreading this message to the whole world, high and low, rich and poor, to every tongue and every nation. What a Kingdom he dreamed of, where everyone could recognize their connectedness, in a beautiful banquet of life and love here in the Kingdom of our own lovely planet!
 
Unfortunately, His message was/is often misunderstood, twisted, and distorted by a lot of people, who, bless them, thought/think they were/are doing the right thing by Jesus. Even still, can you imagine if the Kingdom actually did come, on Earth as it is in Heaven? (If you are reading this and you have a problem with the whole concept of Heaven, replace the word with Peace, tranquility, etc., like it was for you before you were born. Do you have any recollection of pain or suffering before you were born? No. So just go with that for the moment.)

Many great teachers and leaders have imagined, worked for and even died for such a Kingdom; a Kingdom that, in fact, already exists, albeit mostly invisibly within Earth’s inhabitants. Can this Kingdom become free from its prison within our hearts, so that Earth can be the banquet of peace and justice that so many have envisioned?
 
I believe so, but freeing this Divine energy we were all born with requires a new perception – from all realms of the religious spectrum. This, in a nutshell, is what I think Jesus came to Earth to teach all of humanity. He knew, long before today’s scientists could prove it, that His life was found everywhere, even down to underneath a rock or inside of a piece of split wood. This is why I know that I met Jesus today at the garbage can.
 
To folks on the liberal side, I implore you to live up to your “tolerant“ liberal label and not be prejudiced, hateful and discriminatory of the very people whom you think are prejudiced, hateful and discriminatory … Are your enemies’ hateful arguments winning you over? No? Well then, guess what? Your hateful arguments are likely to keep the fire of discontent burning on their side as well.

How can the two sides come together when each side says the other side has to make the first concession? It’s ridiculous to think that you will attract support by being just as ugly as your opposition. Do you disparage people of faith, calling their God silly, or just a myth, or do you proclaim that they must be ignorant or intolerant if they go to a church that you perceive as different or intolerant, or if they go to church at all?

Are you, yourself, ignorant of the fact that Jesus spoke in veiled language and parables for very crucial reasons – and that to throw Him out with the bathwater you, yourself are guilty of being ignorant and intolerant? Do you think you will win converts to your quests for ending the war, protecting the whales, feeding the poor, etc., by repelling millions of potential partners?

Do you realize that you are ignorant of the fact that many people of faith are working harder for a lot of these same causes than you could ever imagine? Are you aware that Jesus was more Liberal than you could even try to be? Standing in your own corner all the time, throwing stones, you are unlikely to see the real picture.
 
On the conservative side in this country, many people appear to also be greatly inspired by the Bible, which they often use to explain how they arrived at their strict or “family values” viewpoints and interpretations. Let me remind you that God’s new covenant is still in effect, and has been since the most liberal of any priest on the face of the Earth first spoke the words that announced the new law: Love. Every commandment was neatly summed up in that law!

Jesus put an end to the thousands of years of suffering under the burden of hundreds of very rigid, xenophobic and hateful religious rules that kept anger and fear in the forefront of everyone’s life. Can you get past the pre-new covenant times and try doing things Jesus-style? If you want someone to agree with you, open your heart, see Jesus in them and act accordingly.

Many people disagreed with Jesus and look how they treated him. Maybe the person you hate has a point to consider that you hadn’t thought of before. If Christ could forgive the very people who nailed him to the cross, how could you possibly hold on to feelings of anger toward people who don’t share your religion or who don’t vote the way you vote? Is it your business or God’s business? Will you bring more people to the Light by hating them or by loving them? Seriously, how can people possibly “know we are Christians by our love," as the old song goes, if you go around breaking the most important commandment?
 
Then there are those who think they don't have any religion. Are you one of these? Believe it or not, everyone has a religion! For some it is conspicuously found in the honest following and devotion of the words of great Avatars, but for others it is found in money, success, playing video games, bossing your employees around, keeping a clean house, surfing the Internet, etc., ad infinitum. Do some people make keeping their car washed and polished into a religion? The answer is yes!

To discover your religion, just figure out where most of your attention goes, because that’s where the bulk of your energy flows. Someone might be the biggest fan of Buddha, or maybe he proudly wears a golden crucifix around his neck, for example, but if his life’s energy is given over to becoming rich and powerful, his religion is not Buddhism or Christianity; it is money that he worships.
 
Today when I fed the man in the parking lot, not only was I feeding him, but I was feeding Jesus, and I was feeding myself. We are, all three, interconnected in the “cathedral made of people” created by the God of the Universe. From a scientific standpoint, the energy that freed itself from my body probably resulted in a corresponding release of his happiness neuro-peptides, which hopefully also caused the movement of neurons that wired together to form a memory of this simple act of giving.

Someday this received love might be remembered and shared with others, thereby keeping the flow of love on its neverending expansion. Will it save his life, get him off the streets, cure his addictions or be the one thing that gave him reason to live for another day? Who knows. I’m not in the business of deciding that. I can only do my part each moment in helping to spread the God-given Love energy to everyone I encounter, in whatever way I can.
 
I personally choose to worship the One who gave His life for teaching simply and most humbly that we can discover the Kingdom by remembering always that our path must be walked with Love – the eternal energy gift that exists inside and outside us. A church is nice, a Bible is nice, putting money in the offering plate on Sunday is nice, but the main point is to be the Love that we so desperately want to see in the Kingdom.

Some may call Him crazy to actually die for such a simple idea, but if He could die for it, I can certainly live by it; in the pew and at the garbage can.
 
Gale Tompkins-Bischel attends United Christian Parish in Lakeport.  

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Columnist and contributing writer Mandy Feder.

 

 

“If you always think what you always thought, you'll always do what you always did and you'll always get what you always got, and think what you always thought.” – Anonymous



It was a moment of silence for me – the pen swooping swiftly across the paper – equal pay for equal work. It seems so simple and equitable like the lessons we were taught in primary school.


The day President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law on Jan. 29, I sat with eyes fixed to the television on CNN.


The passage of the bill means that women can challenge unequal pay.


A woman with cropped blond hair and librarian-style glasses told of her plight in a voice that sounded like that of the Coal Miner’s Daughter.


Lilly Ledbetter was employed as a supervisor at Goodyear Tire & Rubber plant in Gadsden, Ala. from 1979 to 1998.


She worked as an area manager for most of her career. The majority of people in her position were men.

 

 

 

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Lilly Ledbetter stands behind President Barack Obama on Thursday, January 29, 2009, as he signs the act named for her, which addresses equal pay among male and female workers. White House photo by Pete Souza.
 

 

 

 


At first her salary paralleled the salaries of the men performing substantially similar work. Over time Ledbetter’s pay stagnated compared to the pay of male area managers who had the same or even less seniority.


At the end of 1997 she was the only woman in the position of area manager and the pay discrepancy was blatantly obvious. Ledbetter was paid $3,727 per month while the lowest-paid male area manager received $4,286 and the highest paid received $5,236 per month.


The act addresses fairness and equality in an era of desperation.


It also makes the statement that maybe the best man for the job is not always a man.


I’m not touting womanpower, just human power and basic human rights.


It’s simple. It’s like picking a bushel of apples, or in Lake County, pears. If a man and a woman both contribute the same amount, why would the man walk away with more pieces of gold?


According the National Women’s Law Center, the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act reverses the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling in 2007 and restores the ability of victims of wage discrimination to hold their employers accountable for injustice and challenge the practice in court.


“This is truly a monumental achievement for women – and all workers. The Supreme Court stripped workers of their ability to fight wage discrimination but now a new president and Congress have stepped in and restored their basic legal rights,” said Marcia D. Greenberger, co-president of the National Women’s Law Center. “Employers will now be held accountable for each discriminatorily reduced paycheck, because every time pay is unfairly lowered, it’s a violation of the law and fundamental fairness.”


It takes perseverance and patience to fight the good fight or envision the big picture as Ledbetter learned in her experience, Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., 550 U.S. 618 (2007), U.S. Supreme Court.


When I consider equality for women, I often look to famed sociologist, philosopher, feminist and author, Mary Wollstonecraft, born in 1797, an avid advocate of independence and education for women.


During an unlikely era she stood firm about the importance of self-discipline, honesty, frugality and social contentment. She placed the responsibility of sensibility, economics and political theory on women while fully appreciating the role of motherhood. She died from complications associated with childbirth when her daughter, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, author of “Frankenstein,” was born.


In the spirit of strong women, strong humans, Ledbetter stood in front of a crowd in Washington DC, her image on the televisions of many millions, proving that we all have a voice.


The world is tumultuous at best now. The simple act promoting civilized and fair behavior provided some respite from the cold winds of war, poverty and overwhelming hopelessness.


Mandy Feder is an award-winning writer and editor who now joins Lake County News as a columnist and contributor.


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Columnist and contributor Mandy Feder.




“No need to state the obvious,” my father used to say.

I’ll be rebellious for just a moment though.

February is Black History Month. The United States has its first black president, Barack Obama. We typically and rightfully celebrate the lives of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks and Harriet Tubman during February.

There are famous black figures and some unsung heroes who I would like to honor this month.

An article “Greening the Ghetto” by Elizabeth Kolbert appearing in the New Yorker (Jan. 12) explores the work of Van Jones, founder and president of “Green For All.”

Jones is attempting to find a solution for poverty and global warming at the same time.

In the article Jones is quoted as saying: “I love Barack Obama. I’d pay money just to shine the brother’s shoes. But I’ll tell you this. Do you hear me? One man is not going to save us …”

Jones is building what he calls an “everybody movement,” and it moves across the lines of class and color to achieve solutions for all. He wants to involve young people in the green economy.

This society is often disconnected, focusing on differences rather than commonalities. There is reason to celebrate a leader in this era seeking to bond rather than separate for the sake of common good.

About 15 years ago I was fortunate enough to see Maya Angelou speak. I have been reading her work since I was nine or 10 years old.     

Angelou is a poet, award-winning writer, journalist, activist, performer, director and professor. She is a three-time Grammy Award winner for her autobiographical spoken-word recordings.

As she spoke in her deep, haunting tone, filled with painful truths and hard-earned triumphant joy, she became three-dimensional. All the writing I read so intently for years jumped from the pages and had a voice.

What an honor it was to be in the same room and breath the same air as her.

Similarly, a couple of years ago I had the honor of attending a jazz performance where Wynton Marsalis led a band that literally brought tears to my eyes.

President Obama and Frederick Douglass have a lot in common for two men born in different centuries. Douglass was an abolitionist, women's suffragist, editor, orator, author and reformer. He also ran on the US Equal Rights Party ticket for vice-president with Victoria Woodhull, the first woman to run for president of the United States.

He believed in equality of all people, whether black, female, Indian or immigrant. He often said, “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong.”

On a lighter note, sometimes hilarious, sometimes political, sometimes profane and always relevant, Chris Rock gives power in a poignant punch with raw and unbridled humor.

George Washington Carver was a scientist, botanist, educator and inventor. He was called by Time magazine in 1941 “Black Leonardo,” referencing Leonardo da Vinci.

He placed emphasis on advocacy of sustainable agriculture, improvement of racial relations, mentoring children, poetry, painting and religion.

Oprah Winfrey survived abuse and molestation. She was a runaway at 13 and was sent to a juvenile detention home where she was denied admission for lack of beds.

Her broadcast career began at 17, when she was hired by WVOL radio in Nashville and two years later signed on with WTVF-TV in Nashville as a reporter and anchor.

She saved a struggling Chicago talk show that in less than a year became “The Oprah Winfrey Show.”

Winfrey is also a distinguished and serious actress, which stirred the desire to create HARPO Productions Inc.

Fact: HARPO is Oprah spelled backwards.

She was named one of the 100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century by Time magazine, and in 1998 received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

What’s more American than baseball? Jackie Robinson was born in Georgia in 1919 and raised by a single mother of five children.

He excelled at all sports. At UCLA, he became the first athlete to win varsity letters in four sports: baseball, basketball, football and track. In 1941, he was named to the All-American football team.

Money problems forced him to leave college. He enlisted in the Army and after objections of racial discrimination. He left the Army with an honorable discharge.

In 1947 Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers, pioneering integration in professional sports.

He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York in 1962.

We all speak in our own tongue, bringing beauty and change to the world in an individual manner. I think of the exterior of a person as a soul shell, the container of that particular human being. While I am pleased to honor each of these incredible people for their contributions to the world during this important month, the month of my own birth, I’m glad to belong to one race, the human race.

Mandy Feder is an award-winning writer and editor who is a Lake County News columnist and contributor.

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Posted On

I am a native Californian and have lived here my entire life, mainly in Northern California. My work took me to Southern California, where I bought a home in a town which had been annexed by the city of Los Angeles many decades before. This took on great significance when I became active in this community. Planning, or lack of it, should be taken much more seriously by ordinary citizens. Bad land use decisions are costly, both in fiscal terms and to the quality of our lives.


As a volunteer member of the neighborhood council’s land use committee, I listened to scores of proposals by dozens of developers. Some were good projects that added value to the community and improved the business environment and some were not.


Back in 2004, a Las Vegas developer, backed by a corporation in Arlington, Texas, proposed a large gated community on 900 acres of beautiful but rugged undeveloped hillside. He hired a major law firm and numerous consultants to lobby the City of Los Angeles for a zone change and a general plan amendment. There was heated opposition, but citizens didn’t stand a chance against this array of legal and financial firepower – he got his subdivision in a supposedly protected Scenic corridor, in violation of an existing specific plan that citizens had written and which the city had approved to prevent this exact sort of thing.


His plan – to put in the roads and infrastructure and sell the subdivision’s parcels off individually or in small groups to other developers!


Provensalia’s unfolding has been like “déjà vu all over again” for us. Our property is in Big Valley, some distance from the site, but we have been following this for several years. Local residents are pointing to many obvious and alarming red flags, but the Clearlake Planning Commission and Clearlake City Council seem to be unaware that it is their job is to comprehend the consequences and costs if they make the wrong decision. Aren’t they concerned about potential financial fallout from this project? This could affect all Lake County taxpayers, but the cost could be thousands of dollars for individual Clearlake property owners and ratepayers if this goes badly.


This doesn’t even start to address planning policy issues or the environmental problems created of this type of development. These are just a few issues that should be causing severe alarm and concern to Clearlake officials, not to mention the residents who will ultimately pay the bill when it comes due.


Unclear ownership?


To recap, Agustin Rosas-Maxemin owns Armax International Inc. with offices in San Francisco and Mexico City. He purchased the property initially but (maybe?) he’s out of the deal now. According to Dick Price, Rosas-Maxemin sold his rights to the project “after Rangel de Alba decided not to have him continue.”


According to the Armax Web site Price is their project manager. He works there, but he talked Jorge Rangel de Alba into buying out his boss? And he's still on the project? www.armax.com/index2a.htm.


Rangel de Alba also “owns units” in an Armax luxury condo project in San Francisco. This may be an “orange” flag. Was this sale really an arm’s length transaction? An arm's length transaction is one in which the parties involved are entirely independent of each other, deal with each other as strangers, and have no reason for collusion.


A family affair


“SF’s fashionable crowd turned out for the opening soirée where a portion of the evening’s sales benefited Raphael House. The family shelter is dedicated to helping at-risk families find stable housing and financial independence, while providing daily comforts and one-on-one support. Celebrants at the party included: Goyard franchise owners Patrick and Luisa Hagemeister-Rangel de Alba, Norman Hagemeister, Jorge Rangel de Alba with his daughter Mariana Hagemeister – the family also owns Bang and Olufsen and Roche Bobois). Goyard owners Alex and Jeanne Signoles flew in from France.” www.newyorksocialdiary.com/socialdiary/2006/08_25_06/socialdiary08_25_06sanfran.php

 

European Designs owns the stores that sell Goyard, B&O and Roche Bobois. Brothers Norman and Patrick Hagemeister own the franchises for these products and Patrick is the CEO of European Designs. He’s apparently married to Luisa Hagemeister-Rangel de Alba.


Jorge Rangel de Alba is pictured with his daughter, Mariana Hagemeister. Obviously these two families are very closely connected – doesn’t Rangel de Alba “own” the stores?


Implausible ignorance


Recall that Price says he got Rangel de Alba to sell off the additional land originally included in the Provensalia proposal to Starlite Ventures LLC. Starlite Ventures formed on June 15, 2005, and the property was transferred on June 23, 2005, for $2 million. Starlite has no Web site or phone – shell corporations don’t need locations, employees or phones.


Price says he doesn't know who is behind Starlite Ventures. “They made a point of not telling me who it was.” However, Starlite Ventures LLC is apparently Eric Villaseñor and, as noted, Villaseñor is CFO of Hagemeister’s company, European Designs. http://europeandesigns.net/european-designs-about-us.shtml.


This does NOT appear to be an arm’s length transaction – that’s a red flag.

 

What’s the motive?


Price says he doesn’t believe the parcel sold to Starlite can be developed “due to terrain, trees and lack of an entry.” And “The city’s oak tree ordinance, adopted earlier this year, also would challenge the property’s development ...” Why is Price working so hard to make this point? Why do they want it to look like they “sold” $2 million of “unbuildable” land, which they apparently still own? What’s that about?


Can the Clearlake Planning Commissioners or council members explain what is going on here?

 

Who is accountable?


Unfortunately, it appears that Rangel de Alba will be more or less untouchable if things go badly for Provensalia and the city of Clearlake. There won’t be much recourse if he doesn’t keep up his side of the sewer deal and anything else Clearlake gets stuck with, but they could try giving him a call at one of his shops on Avenida Presidente Masaryk in Mexico City. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avenida_Presidente_Masaryk


To give an idea how much money may go through Rangel de Alba’s checking account, he was also a principal in a $190 million merger between two Mexican remittance companies via a shell corporation located in Arlington, Texas. (This transaction can be verified using www.google.com.) However, remittances decline during a recession – this has already been reported in the financial pages of major newspapers like the Wall Street Journal.


Business partner B&O seems to be having their share of troubles, too, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bang_&_Olufsen. In this economy it's anyone's guess how privately-held luxury furniture dealer, Roche Bobois is doing. http://www.rochebobois.com/sites/tendances/index.php?langue=en&pays=us


The Price Group


A number of people have pointed out that the last thing Lake County needs is yet another paper subdivision. Don’t we have enough problems with erosion, illegal dumping, and criminal activities on our existing problem properties?


Dick Price was a principal in Fox Hills, a golf and housing development in Merced – about three quarters of the way down in the Los Banos Enterprise article it mentions the development has NOT “made much visible progress so far.” www.losbanosenterprise.com/114/story/31267.html,

http://foxhillsgolfcommunity.com/html/featured.htm


Price sold off his interest in Fox Hills to some other developers a few years back so maybe he made out okay when the music stopped and everyone ran for the chairs ...


Greater Fool Theory: “Observation that any price (no matter how unrealistic) can be justified if a buyer believes that there is another buyer who will pay an even-higher price for the same item.” ~ www.businessdictionary.com


Here is another red flag of a different sort than Price’s statement that he has no idea who bought that unbuildable parcel – the Price Group’s estimated annual sales revenue is $165,000. He is clearly not in a position to pony up millions for sewers.


www.usadirectlenders.com/pdf/Fox_Hills-Judge_OKs_building_on_protected_ag_land%5B1%5D.pdf


www.manta.com/coms2/dnbcompany_ggj1mm.


Additional oddities


It’s been reported that Rosas-Maxemin also has a development named Provinsalia (with an “i” instead of an “e”) in San Jose. “That Provinsalia consists of 72 hillside homes between 1,500 and 2,000 square feet each – built in a style ‘reminiscent of those found in Provence or Tuscany’ – and ranging in price from $432,000 to $733,700, according to the Armax Web site.” The Yahoo map on the Armax web site links to a parcel next to a development on Sands Drive between a school and another tract development.


By sheer coincidence I was in this neighborhood recently. Nothing I saw bore even a remote resemblance to Provence or Tuscany. The ambiance is better described as “United States of Generica.” You need GPS because every winding suburban street looks exactly like the last one you drove down.


When I called the San Jose offices for Provinsalia, the phone numbers listed on the Web site were disconnected with no new number or rang with no answer. Maybe Provinsalia is 72 condo units on Sands Drive – crammed onto Highway 87 freeway frontage road in the middle of a very built-up area about two miles south of downtown San Jose. I have no plans to return in the near future to verify this. However, you will find that Provinsalia web page VERY difficult to access from the Armax Web site home page and it is not listed on the site map. It’s almost like it’s hidden or been removed or something . . . so here’s the link: http://www.armax.com/projects/provensalia.htm.


Conclusion


No case has been made that this project will result in a gain for Clearlake, rather than merely a profit for the developer upon sale by the current owners of the land.


To spell it out clearly, if the land has decreased in value, the owners can attempt to increase its value by changing the zoning and subdividing it. This may enable them to sell it for a higher price. They do not have any actual legal right to require that this be done for them. If Clearlake doesn’t allow a subdivision and golf course, they have not been denied anything to which they are truly entitled. They still have the right to use the land as allowed under the zoning that existed when they bought it. This is the same right that we all have as property owners.


The notion has been floated by someone who should know better that future residents of Provensalia will earn an average of $61,000 per year. That is an interesting claim given the average income in this area. Others have already pointed out the absurdity of raising the average per capita income by importing people who make more money as opposed to increasing economic opportunity for existing residents and improving the multiplier for local enterprises. Instead Clearlake seems to be bent on opening two national big-box retailers which will have the exact opposite effect by ensuring that our money LEAVES Lake County more quickly! But I digress ...


Do Clearlake’s decision-makers believe that these residents will be “extreme commuters” who spend three or more hours a day driving to and from places that do have jobs that pay $60,000 per year? This is a way of life with no future. If they don’t understand by now why that is not sustainable, they need to educate themselves. May I recommend “The Geography of Nowhere” by James Howard Kunstler?


Furthermore, a person with yearly income of $61,000 is able to afford a house costing a maximum of $244,000 and more conservative lenders would put that figure closer to $180,000. What developer is able to pay for extensive infrastructure and then build a custom home on a third of an acre and sell it for $200,000? Will these be manufactured homes?


Perhaps the theory is that every household in Provensalia will have two fully-employed members in each making an average of $60,000 per year so the homes can be sold for $400,000 or $500,000, despite the reality of Lake County’s real estate market. Has Mr. Nieman been on www.lcaor.com recently?


In the absence of due diligence by the public officials of Clearlake, it falls to local journalists and concerned citizens to do their own investigation of the financial standing and past history of the parties involved with this project. They must hold local officials accountable. They must consider carefully what the probable outcome will be if problems arise from this development.


Back in my old community, the developer described in the beginning is grading hillsides because his subdivision approval would have expired if he failed to “break ground” within the required time. Of course, no gated community is going to be built in the foreseeable future, but now the ground has been disturbed, creating the conditions for erosion and mudslides.


This outcome was predicted by a number of citizens back in 2005, but officials with the city pooh-poohed their concerns. It’s anyone’s guess when the economy will recover, the huge over-supply of housing inventory will be eliminated and there will again be a hot market for 4,000 square foot houses, but it’s certain that the bulldozers will continue to wreak havoc in the hills behind town for some time to come.


Roberta Actor-Thomas lives in Kelseyville.


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Posted On

I heard it said, a long time ago, that life in America was more stressful than in any other industrialized nation … Being a newly arrived immigrant at the time (I know immigrant is a very dirty word today, but I cannot avoid using it), I did not understand what that meant, as life here seemed rather easy, with many opportunities for success, and many rewards.


Thirty years later, and having lived for a significant amount of time in a total of three very different nations, I think I may have come to know the meaning of such stress.


Stress is a mental experience, that affects the body and the emotions, but that does not necessarily have to do with actual outer circumstances or events, rather it is often rooted in specific beliefs and perceptions. It is how we handle life that causes us to be stressed, rather than life itself, most of the time.


Life here seems to be handled with high expectations, standards of perfections that are not seen in too many other cultures, that are often deemed to be “substandard” by Americans. Even Europeans are looked upon with some disdain for having supposedly lower standards in some aspects of their lives. Some environmental causes are met with the comment: ”So you want us to live like Europeans?” as if Europeans still lived in the dark ages.


The flip side of this pursuit of materialistic happiness, which goes with the pursuit of superficial perfection, is stress, as nothing is ever good enough, and no one can ever be satisfied with what they have, they consistently want more, bigger, louder, brighter, faster. Even food has to be large, and as it gets bigger, shinier and more perfect, like plastic, it looses its content, with almost no nutrition.


So this plastic culture focuses almost entirely on appearances. Damn the content, worship the superficial. People eat perfect-looking empty or chemical food, they elect individuals who “look presidential” and are clueless or have no integrity or character, they watch mind-numbing movies and flashy news and entertainment, they live in huge houses made of cardboard, and they attempt to look and act as if they were still 20 in their 40s, with fake body parts whenever they can afford them.


Indeed the struggle to appear perfect also targets physical appearances and personal lives. People don’t just want perfect trappings; they want perfect lives, some according to Hallmark ideals in the domain of relationships. They also want perfect bodies, women still being generally pressured to strive to look like the 16-year-old anorexic models who fill the pages of popular magazines.


Happiness must also be perfect, and anyone who feels sadness or grief, or anything even slightly negative, better get over it quickly and according to some predetermined and orderly steps defined by the experts, or else it is concluded that there is something wrong with them and that they need psychotropic medications, which are given to the public by doctors like candy these days.


Normal anger is not tolerated, but violence is, and pervades society precisely because people are taught to bottle up their everyday anger and frustrations, to control their behaviors and suppress their feelings, until they go postal or psycho, or implode in depression. So while no one should ever express normal, rational anger or pain, everyone better have a gun and some medication, as fear and paranoia become rampant.


Children are not immune from a pressure to perform, to excel, and to compete madly, the latest being that toddlers can be taught to read. Perhaps they will be made to have read Shakespeare and Homer and do calculus by the age of two … after all, you can never induce a person to aim for the best too early, or so it is believed.


What is lost in this process of striving for superficial perfection and performance? Some American tourists made a comment, while visiting Venice, reputed to be one of the most romantic cities in the world … they said it wasn’t bad, but it needed a coat of paint. They were apparently oblivious to the soul of the place, and wanted it to look like Las Vegas.


Soul, heart, poetry, charm, substance, meaning, authenticity, these things are lost, in people as well as the outer environment, when outer perfection is sought with such neurotic determination. There is definitively a huge yet unconscious hunger for these attributes in America today, as can be seen in the current trend of “distressed” furniture which people with so called disposable income and some sophistication like to acquire, looking for some traces of soul in their decor. Because this hunger is unconscious, the attempt to restore “soul” in everyday life is indeed feeble and superficial, and as everything else commercially exploited.


The poetic dimension of life, so crucial to the soul, that without it withers and dies, is severely lacking in this speedy plastic and concrete “perfect” American culture, so seemingly practical and materialistic yet without respect for actual matter, without much respect or love for land, water and air, and so fundamentally alien to nature, as can be witnessed when, traveling by air, perfectly straight lines and square angles are seen to define cities and impose their very odd, unnatural order on curvy, naturally wiggly hills and valleys.


What is also lost here, and the source of the most intense stress in the final analysis, is self-acceptance. High standards mean relentless self-criticism, each one of us being trained to be our very own “coach,” beating and whipping ourselves into guilt and ever greater demands to become better in all areas of our lives, not from natural growth and inner inspiration, as should happen given some care, trust, and natural time, but by trying to lift ourselves by our own bootstraps.


Mistakes are frowned upon and learning time and performances are condensed to the speed of light. Those who fail or appear to give up are pariahs, akin to lepers … they are “losers.” It is ironically believed that there is something seriously wrong with those individuals who do not have the drive to relentlessly struggle to better their lives according to other people’s standards, and almost everyone is conditioned to want it and want it yesterday … from the hurried business executive to the spiritual seeker demanding instant enlightenment.


For these very reasons, because growth does not happen naturally and on its own terms, from the inside out (there is no time to live, only time to race through life, to get and perform rather than be), people who forcefully achieve the goals society teaches them to seek frequently end up feeling fake, and have an occasional “identity crisis,” as their outer life does not match their inner life.


Yet most do not experience such necessary redemption, they simply navigate unaware on the edge of meaninglessness and despair, attempting to function while quickly pursuing what is called happiness with ever more and better stuff, ever more effective medications, greater and madder sources of entertainments and escapes, and a belief that if they could only reach the epitome of what they think is perfection in one aspect of their lives or another, they would be satisfied at last, they would feel worthy and could rest on their achievements for an instant … until artificial standards are raised again, and a new race begins, and the gerbil is back running in the wheel inside his/her mental cage, going absolutely nowhere with great speed and impressive determination.


Raphael Montoliu lives in Lakeport.


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