http://www.boston.com/…

RENO - A few tents cropped up by the railroad tracks, pitched by men left with nowhere to go once the emergency winter shelter closed for the summer.

Then others appeared - people who had lost their jobs to the ailing economy, or newcomers who had moved to Reno for work and found no one was hiring.

Within weeks, more than 150 people were living in tents big and small, barely a foot apart in a patch of dirt slated to be a parking lot for a campus of shelters Reno is building for its homeless population.

Like many other cities, Reno has found itself with a “tent city” - an encampment of people who had nowhere else to go.

From Seattle to Athens, Ga., homeless advocacy groups and city agencies are reporting the most visible rise in homeless encampments in a generation.

Nearly 61 percent of local and state homeless coalitions say they’ve experienced a rise in homelessness since the foreclosure crisis began in 2007, according to a report by the National Coalition for the Homeless. The group says the problem has worsened since the report’s release in April, with foreclosures mounting, gas and food prices rising, and the job market tightening.

“It’s clear that poverty and homelessness have increased,” said Michael Stoops, acting executive director of the coalition. “The economy is in chaos, we’re in an unofficial recession, and Americans are worried, from the homeless to the middle class, about their future.”

While the middle class is being wiped out and these tent towns are gathering more and more residents the federal government is bailing out the elite. Things just keep getting worse.

I recently demolished a wall of my bathroom. This resulted in a large amount of plaster, slats and several 2×3 studs. While pulling the nails out of the corkscrewed studs I asked myself, “What incentive do I have to reuse this wood?” If I leave it on the curb, the garbage men will come by, put it in their truck and it will go away. I don’t usually think about the price I pay for garbage service because I always seem to pay the same amount and the money trail from my pocket to the curb is incredibly obfuscated. Somewhere in the mix of taxes you pay is the money for people to regularly collect your garbage. Chances are we overpay. The net result of this system is we feel no real pressure to reduce the amount of waste we produce.

Waste disposal is a necessity. Just like we need to eat, we also need a way to safely handle the byproducts of our daily lives. It would be ludicrous for me to entrust someone else with the sole responsibility of feeding me. That person would have complete control over me. The same is true of the handling of waste. If we entrust this critical part of our lives to a government they have the power to inflict serious pain upon us. Sacrificing even this small amount of our individual sovereignty has consequences. It’s similar to a child who’s parents clean her room. She never learns the value of responsibility and paramount to that she does not feel empowered. It leaves us unable to function and dissatisfied.

Also not having waste disposal in the hands of the community makes reuse much more difficult. If I need a bench for painting items in my workshop it should be much easier for me to get one at the local dump than to purchase or build a new one. Also recall that we have specific regulations and liability issues that make reuse difficult. Currently the operator of a salvage yard is partially liable for actions I choose to take there and they are required to not salvage certain items for “safety” reasons.

So what options do we have to reform the waste management system? Real privatization, not the corporatism that currently exists, isn’t a terrible idea. If we were billed based on the amount of trash we created we would be more likely to reduce, reuse and recycle. This doesn’t solve the empowerment issue, but it does make us slightly more responsible for the waste we produce. Unfortunately private entities removing waste would have a tendency to make the garbage “disappear” by moving it to an area where it’s cheaper to dispose of it. This makes perfect business sense, but it also allows the community to continue to be wasteful without seeing the real effects. Don’t forget that as garbage is trucked to the poorer side of the state, with cheaper property values, the gap between the classes is even further highlighted. Nothing says “I’m better than you” like putting your waste in someone else’s backyard. Also the community is still placing a task vital to their existence in the hands of a separate entity. The power has just shifted from the government to a private corporation.

I propose that the best model to handle the waste management issue would be that of a community co-operative. By taking responsibility for the garbage they generate, a community can incentivize all three of the Rs and dissuade people from using hazardous or difficult-to-deal-with materials. The key to the success of this co-operative would be community ownership of the means of production, in this case the landfill and recycling facilities. By having people from the community work in the co-op and maintaining worker control of the organization’s decision making mechanisms you can assure a business that meets the needs of the community. The community becomes more educated about waste disposal and derives a sense of satisfaction from their self sufficiency. Labor can be used to pay for waste removal services so the currently unemployed can still afford this necessity. In time the ecological impact of the community would be minimized. It could also serve as a model for other community services. The benefits of community cooperation are endless.

The most recent political book I’ve read is Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture on loan from Blog of Bile’s very own xyz.  It is a collection of short essays in the field of anthropology and sociology.  Each essay attempts to shatter preconceived notions and explain in greater detail human actions which the author has deemed befuddling.  Amongst the topics discussed are cows as sacred animals, pig lovers and haters, primitive warfare, the idea of an aggressive male, extreme consumption and extreme donation, cargo cults, a history of messiahs, the violent origins of Christianity, early witchcraft and witch trials, and the contemporary resurgence of disdain for objectivity.

The book is a relatively easy and quick read, only slowing down at the end where the author feels it necessary to defend himself from the hordes of sandal-wearing druggies that are going to attack him.  The author is selling his theories as to why certain anomalies in culture exist.  Unfortunately due to the imperfect nature of his science the results are quite subjective.  Despite Mr. Harris’ ardent pleas for objectivity at the end of the book I find some of his explanations to be lacking in sufficient evidence to support his claims of causation.

On a positive note, he does an excellent job of introducing the history surrounding these topics.  There is a lot of good information in the book, mostly revolving around things that are not easily disputed such as recorded history.  This book is an excellent catalyst for debate.

Rather than go through each topic, here are some of the highlights that stick in my mind:

• A good analysis of childbirth and war are used to attempt to explain why males are dominant in most of our societies.
• Some interesting history of egalitarianism, reciprocity and “the big man” in primitive societies.
• A decent early history of Christianity, including the movements leading up to it and Paul’s initial reformation of the church following the death of Jesus.
• A scathing essay on the futility of modern movements attempting to change society by changing individual consciousness.  Scathing is an understatement, perhaps scalding, blistering or even face-melting would be more appropriate.  I think this is the essay bile would enjoy most.

Here are some problems I had with the book:

• He starts with a good premise, “I hope to present probable and reasonable solutions, not certainties.”  But by the end of the book he is so wrapped up in defending himself he comes across like an early evangelical minister telling “God’s honest truth”.
• Don’t quote the King James translation of the bible when entering into debate over the origins of Christianity.  Sometimes Mr. Harris addresses the original Aramaic, but at other times he seems to disregard the translation process that led to the quotes he chooses to use.  This part of the book could use bolstering.

From the fact that people are very different it follows that, if we treat them equally, the result must be inequality in their actual position, and that the only way to place them in an equal position would be to treat them differently. Equality before the law and material equality are therefore not only different but are in conflict with each other; and we can achieve either one or the other, but not both at the same time. -Friedrich August Hayek

A society that puts equality… ahead of freedom will end up with neither. -Milton Friedman

http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/…

MR. GIBSON: And in each instance, when the rate dropped, revenues from the tax increased. The government took in more money. And in the 1980s, when the tax was increased to 28 percent, the revenues went down. So why raise it at all, especially given the fact that 100 million people in this country own stock and would be affected?

SENATOR OBAMA: Well, Charlie, what I’ve said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness.

MR. GIBSON: But history shows that when you drop the capital gains tax, the revenues go up.

SENATOR OBAMA: Well, that might happen or it might not. It depends on what’s happening on Wall Street and how business is going.

Sounds like Christian socialism to me. At least Marxists believe that socialism will raise efficiency and the standard of living of the people. This guy just wants equality. Suffering is fine as long as it’s equally distributed among the population. I’m not sure you can even have a discussion with someone like that. They have no concern for earthly comforts. This kind of belief is a short step away from Mother Teresa’s beliefs that human suffering brings us closer to God.

It pays so well.

http://www.usatoday.com/…

State and local government workers are enjoying major gains in compensation, pushing the value of their average wages and benefits far ahead of private workers, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data shows.

The gap is widening every year, rising by an average $1.02 an hour last year and $2.45 an hour over the past three years. The better pay and benefits for public employees come as private-sector workers face stagnant wages and rising unemployment.

State and local government workers now earn an average of $39.50 per hour in total compensation, reports the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Private workers earn an average of $26.09 an hour.

How do you compete with that? They can practically pay whatever they want because tax payers are forced to handle the bill and most competition is removed through statute. The makeshift jobs many of these government employees have simply wouldn’t exist in a free market so their salaries are inflated because they exist period. Unfortunely government employee salaries are hardly a major component of the budget otherwise we would hit a breaking point where those in the private sector could no longer afford to subsidize the rest of the population.