Update no.460

Update from the Heartland

No.460

4.10.10 – 10.10.10

Blog version: http://heartlandupdate.blogspot.com/

To all,
The follow-up news items:
-- The Times Square car bomber Faisal Shahzad (1.5.2010) [437/8] was sentenced to life in prison Tuesday after he pleaded guilty to a 10-count indictment in June, including charges of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction.
-- After last week’s pair of articles [459], I will add this independent assessment for your critical review:
“Terrorism, Vigilance and the Limits of the War on Terror”
by George Friedman
Strategic Forecasting, Inc.
Published: October 5, 2010 | 09:03 GMT
http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20101004_terrorism_vigilance_and_limits_war_terror?utm_source=GWeekly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=101005&utm_content=readmore&elq=110af4ce6e81499e968cd8097bb568e5
-- The Senate confirmed General James F. “Jim” Amos, USMC [446], to serve as the 35th Commandant of the Marine Corps – the first aviator to service as chief of our beloved Corps. He has a tough road ahead. As a side note, Jim was commissioned the same year as me.

Since we moved to the westside of town last year, I have “enjoyed” a 30 minute commute each morning and afternoon of the work week. This experience “blessed” me with bearing witness to humanity . . . well, at least the sliver microcosm of our little village on the Great Plains. Two words seem to perpetually flash into my little pea-brain – respect and balance. This is not the first time I have mentioned those two words, but I seem to be reminded of them more frequently during my daily “blessings” these days. A short sidebar appears appropriate. When I worked in Italy, I would have to commute from the engineering facility in Finale Ligure to Genova, on average, 1-2 times per week, which was an hour drive each way on the Autostrada. The rules of the road are similar in Italy as they are in the United States and most Western countries. The Autostrada is akin to our Interstate highways or freeways, except for one key difference – the drivers on the Italian Autostrada respect other drivers on the road. Why is it that in the United States we have drivers who do not understand respect or balance and purposely decide they will obstruct the flow of traffic on the inside (fast) lane(s) as if they have some divine mandate to enforce the speed limit regardless of the clot they produce in traffic? Most of the Autostrada, especially in Northwest Italy, is two lanes each way. The outside lane (often called the truck or lorry lane) moves at a quite modest 80 kph (50 mph) speed, while the inside lane tends to average 120 kph (75 mph) and on occasion speeds at high as 200+ kph (125 mph). With such proximate speed differentials, you would think they would have more accidents, but they do not. Why so? One word – respect. Vehicles that choose not to go with the fast flow anticipate and move over, usually well before the faster approaching car reaches them. The contrast between driving at much higher speeds in Italy and what I must endure each morning and afternoon in Wichita, Kansas, is stark, graphic and enormously disappointing. Mind you, I am not seeking the Italian Autostrada speeds; I am only asking for drivers to respect other drivers and the flow of traffic.
While I am in the mood, why is it that smokers feel they have some God-given right to defile the earth with their discarded cigarette butts? Why do some folks feel it is their right to throw their candy wrappers, drink cups and beer cans out their car windows onto the roadside? I support smokers retaining the right to enjoy the pleasures they seek. Likewise, I support and will defend the right of every citizen to choose how they wish to live their lives. All I ask in return is that they respect my rights, including my right to enjoy the scenery of this magnificent, big blue marble without their butts and litter. All of this is simply about respect.

On Wednesday, history was made. Philadelphia Phillies Pitcher Harry Leroy “Roy or Doc” Halladay III threw a no-hitter {1st no-hitter since Don Larsen in 1956; and only the 2nd post-season no-hitter in history} as the Phillies beat the Cincinnati Reds 4-0 in Game 1 of the National League division play-offs. The only miniscule minor blemish was a walked runner in the 5th inning. Congratulations Roy.

National Security Adviser General James L. “Jim” Jones, USMC (Ret.), resigned and became the latest White House staffer to leave the administration. Jim’s deputy Thomas E. Donilon replaced him as the President’s chief security advisor.

This week’s judicial reading came to the list as an interesting 1st Amendment case but more significantly as a rather strange oddity. The appellee was not a citizen with standing or a corporation injured by some oppressive law. The appellee is a book – John Cleland’s Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (AKA Fanny Hill, 1748) [458] – the object and catalyst for more than a few laws and judicial renderings – Memoirs v. Massachusetts [383 U.S. 413 (1966); no. 368]. The Attorney General of Massachusetts brought a civil equity suit to have the book declared obscene. The Court’s decision document offers no information to connect the dots. What instigated the case? What made conditions different from the original banning of this specific book – Commonwealth v. Holmes [17 Mass. 336 (1821)]. The contemporary publisher (G.P. Putnam’s Sons) did not participate in the case. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the decree. It is not clear how this case made it to the Supreme Court other than it was a direct state challenge to the 1st Amendment as applied by the 14th Amendment and perhaps an opportunistic moment to clarify or refine the Court’s previous obscenity ruling in Roth v. United States [354 U.S. 476 (1957)] [458]. In his concurring opinion for Memoirs, Associate Justice William Orville Douglas summarized the essence of the issue regarding obscenity (I will add morality) laws, “As I read the First Amendment, judges cannot gear the literary diet of an entire nation to whatever tepid stuff is incapable of triggering the most demented mind.” Simply, freedom can never be about the lowest common denominator. As support for his argument, Justice Douglas appended the text of a speech by Reverend John R. Graham at the First Universalist Church of Denver in December 1965, and titled: “Dr. [Norman Vincent] Peale and Fanny Hill,” in which he said, “[U]ntil we learn to respect ourselves enough that we leave each other alone, we cannot discover the meaning of morality.” Unfortunately, we are still struggling to learn that lesson. Nonetheless, is our faith that fragile that it cannot withstand criticism, doubt or competition? Are our moral values that vulnerable, malleable and weak that they cannot endure in contrast to those who do not share our values? Freedom is about choices. Let us not deny those choices to others just because we disapprove of the choices others make.

News from the economic front:
-- The President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago Charles L. Evans called for the Fed to do more to stimulate the economy, including a new effort to purchase U.S. Treasury bonds and potentially a declaration that inflation should rise for an unspecified time beyond its 2% target.
-- A Paris court sentenced former Société Générale short trader Jérôme Kerviel, 33, to three years in prison and ordered him to pay €4.9B (US$6.7B) in damages for orchestrating one of the largest trading debacles in banking history in January 2008 [353] – one of the primary precursor events to the international financial system collapse later that year. The court found Kerviel guilty of all the charges against him, including forgery and breach of trust. Kerviel made a string of unauthorized trades with the bank’s money (actually, other people’s money). The final straw was a €50B derivative wager he placed without telling any of his supervisors.
-- On Tuesday, the Bank of Japan unanimously and unexpectedly cut its benchmark interest rate from 0.1% to a range of 0.0 to 0.1% -- the first change of Japan's key rate since December 2008.
-- The International Monetary Fund forecast global growth will slow more sharply than expected in 2011, as advanced economies slash their budgets amid the continuing sovereign debt crisis. The U.S. forecast yielded the largest decrease for 2011, from a previous estimate of 2.9% to 2.3%. The PRC’s growth rate is estimated to fall slightly from 10.5% to 9.6%. The EU is forecast growth estimate decreased from 1.7% to 1.5%.
-- The Labor Department reported private-sector employers added 64,000 jobs in September, while overall, nonfarm payrolls declined by 95,000, as the USG continued to release temporary census workers, and state and local governments also cut employment. The unemployment rate, which is calculated with a separate household survey, remained unchanged at 9.6% in September.

Comments and contributions from Update no.459:
Comment to the Blog:
“Thank you for highlighting Germany's final reparation payment. I had not been aware that the reparations continued. This is a fine illustration of the results of a mean-spirited approach to life. The Tea Party and worse should study this, but I doubt very much that they will.
“I take the obvious position in the conflict between Constitutional freedom versus the Department of Homeland Insecurity's desire to know the contents of my political opinions, the activities in my bedroom and every imaginable thing about each of us.
“I will point out that George Friedman's article has nothing to do with Bob Woodward's book. I read down to the second subheading and skimmed the rest. It's pretty much technical gobbledygook to me, but seems to be both very technical and very academic military strategy stuff.
“While it is no news that generals do not appreciate civilian oversight, the issue retains its importance permanently in any nation that would call itself free.
“The long paragraph on the 1961 decision is beyond my reading ability; I am not an attorney.
“The information in your last paragraph on the ‘flash crash’ ought to serve as a warning to regulators and others that the markets and the corporations involved in them need more supervision. That will probably not happen, though.”
My reply to the Blog:
To be frank, if I had not seen the Der Spiegel article about the final reparations payment, I would not have known either. The contrast also rests on those massive, destructive reparations after WW1, which set stage for an even great world war, versus no reparations after WW2 and the massive expenditures of U.S. Treasure in the Marshall Plan yielded a peaceful, prosperous Japan, Germany and Italy. There is the lesson.
I share your “obvious position.” However, the question remains: where is the threshold? As I stated, I can support giving the IC greater access, if we had a means to filter and control the passing of derived information from the IC to law enforcement or the public domain. If we cannot devise a means to achieve that level of filtration, then I will not support enhanced surveillance capability, and I must then accept the greater probability of successful attacks on the Homeland and our citizens. A citizen’s fundamental right to privacy and freedom is far more important than the threat we face with our contemporary Islamo-fascist enemies.
I was too succinct in my description of the connection between Friedman’s essay and Woodward’s book. What I meant to say was Friedman offers a different perspective into the strategic questions POTUS has to face. I’ve not read Woodward’s book, and I’m not likely to read it. So, based solely on the Press reportage, Woodward appears to have sensationalized the mortal decisions Obama faced during his review of the strategy regarding the Battle for Afghanistan and the larger War on Islamic Fascism. My apologies for implying Friedman’s essay was a review of Woodward’s book.
Yes, flag officers often see civilian oversight as intrusive and hobbling. The current “revolt of the generals” is nothing new. I just wanted to make that point, as well as state my opinion that we are a very long way from “Seven Days in May.”
My little review of Communist Party v. Control Board was not about the law per se, but rather about the society question of where we draw the line regarding the 1st Amendment? We accept that the 1st Amendment does NOT protect a citizen who causes injury to others. The question is the cited case was, at what level is a citizen’s 1st Amendment rights no longer protected when an external organization influences his actions, i.e., when does the citizen become an agent for a foreign power?
Now that the SEC & CFTC have issued their report, presumably Congress will pick up the baton and run with it. To my knowledge, the financial reform law does not address computer-driven trading or check-valves and safeguards against machine triggered panic. Hopefully, Congress will rise to their responsibilities, but I’m afraid whatever happens will have to wait until the 112th Congress.

My very best wishes to all. Take care of yourselves and each other.
Cheers,
Cap :-)