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With the government shutdown, and the loss of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program shut down, I recall a man that I accidentally encountered half a lifetime ago, when I worked at FVCC’s Lincoln County Campus in Libby. There had been a program in the old Gymnasium, giving out food. This guy had received his supplemental food, opened the package, sat down between two cars where he wouldn’t be noticed, and started chowing down on a loaf of bread. I noticed him because one of the cars was mine – and he was both hungry and embarrassed at being seen wolfing down bread without even adding peanut butter.
And I think of SNAP – the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. I suspect that it has gone to some – possibly a lot of – illegal immigrants. That’s one of those spots where the data isn’t there. And when data isn’t available, it’s a pretty good guess that someone chose to make it unavailable. So be it. I see comments of generations on food stamps. I suspect there are more than a few native borne Americans who qualify there, too. The point is that personally, I like eating too much to want to see anyone as hungry as that guy was over 30 years ago. Then it was the mill and mine closed down – somehow it seems worse when people are going hungry because our elected senators can’t or won’t come to agreement.
See, I could anticipate the mills going down – back in the seventies, the USDA had FIP – the Forestry Incentives Program. Someone had already calculated out that the federal timberland harvests weren’t sustainable. Sure, the Spotted Owl and the Sierra Club got popular credit – but I first heard that the mills wouldn’t last at my eighth grade graduation in 1963. The closures weren’t a surprise – they were seen 30 years earlier – and the forester who predicted it at my eighth grade graduation wasn’t the first to do the calculation. And there was more excuse for the hungry man eating bread without butter or condiment, hidden by my Yugo, then, than there is with the government shutdown.
It’s not like I have no stories of tough times and food stamps. When I took the job teaching at Trinidad State, I showed up at the end of February – and found that my salary for 3 months was going to be paid out in six installments over the next six months. Essentially, I was on half pay and I had definitely not taken a job at double the money. The house I rented was next door to some nice looking duplexes – which I later learned were Trinidad Housing Authority. The lady next door made a point of claiming and borrowing her grandson for the occupancy checks – I’m pretty sure she was tipped off ahead of the checks. On the other hand, the lady next to her was surprised by the occupancy check on a Saturday morning – and I watched her boyfriend head out the back yard, and hurdle a 4 foot fence while wearing only his BVDs and carrying his pants and shoes. If it were an Olympic event, he would have been at least a bronze medalist.
But back to my thoughts at the food stamps – it was about a week after the guy’s escape from the occupancy. Renata and I were down at Safeway as I attempted to find the best marbled chunk of Holstein cow labeled ‘7-bone steak’ and marketed at 78 cents a pound. He and his girlfriend – my neighbor 2 doors down in subsidized housing – were just ahead of us in the checkout line – buying lobster with food stamps. Definitely a day without justice – though 40 years later, I’m sure I have a better story to tell about his run across the backyard, the uphill jump over the fence, and then getting dressed in the alley. I think the housing authority had some rule about a man in the house . . . and the housing authority had a man waiting in the alley the next time they did an occupancy check. So, yeah, I recognize there is some misuse of the system. I resented watching that couple leave the checkout with a lobster while I was carefully selecting the best looking cheapest cut of beef (well, actually the yellow fat attested to it being from a dairy cow). The system did, and likely still does get a bit of abuse.
With the shutdown, I’m thinking of the GS-5’s who are working without pay. Sure, there’s no pay going out for the 11’s, the 12’s, the 13’s – but I remember a COLA under Jimmy Carter, where the GS-4 and 5 employees received a lower percentage than the folks who were 7’s and above. That memory probably tells you where I was in 1979. In 1980, I corrected my 1976 presidential vote, making a personal contribution to Jimmy’s record as a one-term president. I haven’t changed my mind – people’s livelihoods and meals aren’t something to be capriciously used as bargaining chips.
So I’d like to make Congress a little more accessible to the average American. Let any new candidate fund his or her campaign with however much they can raise. On the other hand, limit incumbents to half the funding of their previous campaign. In a couple of elections, that should take care of the incumbent advantage. Then, to make moving to Washington DC affordable, well, Trump has pretty much shut down the department of education. They’re talking about moving a bunch of agencies out into flyover country. That will leave a couple of buildings that can be remodeled into Congressional and Senatorial dormitories. It would be a lot cheaper to live in a dorm than buy a DC house – and security for our elected officials would be easier. A congressional cafeteria in the dorm, armed guards on the doors – think of the savings to the taxpayer. I’ll play with this idea a little more – I like the thought.
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One of the problems of being 75 and having a toddler grandson is that the little guy is a plague vector. This time I was left with him, and the next day I had his runny nose and cough. I didn’t think it was fair – but diseases in general aren’t fair. The problem is, Remi handles the head cold better than I do.
Before retirement, I took these diseases in stride – eating OTC meds like candy and pushing through the day. My work was too important to take time off because of poor health. Now, retired, I’m making a little more sense – I’m awake this morning, feeling a little better than I did 36 hours ago, and as soon as I start feeling tired again, I will be headed back to bed. I used to claim that I would catch up on sleep when I’m dead. Still probably true, but correcting the sleep deficit now has some appeal.
After 72 hours, I’m breathing again – the nose no longer runs, and the world is a much more attractive place. At 6:00 am, a light snow covers the field, reflecting light before dawn. Simply enough, life is good. Again.
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The Brits seem to have started their own “no kings” movement. Personally, I think they did better with a queen – either Elizabeth seems to have done a solid job. But with Prince Harry and Prince Andrew both losing the title, it looks like the un-beheaded King Charles (so described as to avoid confusion with his beheaded predecessor Charles I) is running his own “no kings” program.
Both former prince Harry and Former prince Andrew, by all reports, were competent, well-regarded junior officers, one in Afghanistan and the other in the Falkland Islands. On the other hand, Queen Elizabeth (then Princess) trained as a mechanic and driver. While that sounds like an enlisted job, she was commissioned. Still, it may be significant that the lady did have vocational skills.
Now the first (beheaded) King Charles basically started the United Kingdom’s ‘No Kings’ movement – his problems with parliament started when he took over the job as king (1625) and ended when he was beheaded in 1649. Since his successor was a guy named Oliver Cromwell, I suppose you might say King Charles I and Oliver Cromwell basically started the ‘No Kings’ movement for the English-speaking world. And now Charles III is getting rid of spare princes.
As I look at King Charles (any of the three) and Queen Elizabeth (either of the two) I can’t help but believe the queens both did better jobs than the Kings. No princes may be a good step toward ‘No Kings’.
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I’m working at remodeling the old service station. The most interesting thing is that the repairs aren’t a whole lot different than what I read my old high school (now the middle school) needs – and the comments on that read like it would be cheaper and easier just to tear it down and start anew.
My first task was replacing the roof – once the leaks were repaired, other work could proceed. Like the old high school, we’ll be adding another frame to the inside wall – simply enough, the insulation of 1966 hasn’t been adequate for a long time. Framing in a second, internal wall will give seven inches for insulation . The copper tubing used for plumbing will be replaced by pex. Deferring maintenance – whether a building or a piece of equipment – just means you’ll be paying more later.
Someone early in the building’s history removed a load bearing wall. We put it back in, within a couple of inches of the original. The sheetrock cracks disappeared as the 20 ton hydraulic jack took out the sag – it shows where the work should have been done years ago – but it’s OK, the repairs are coming along.
Once we get the old store part fixed, the challenge will be getting the old logging camp cookshack moved a bit toward the south, and, if we can, getting a solid foundation under it. I’ve got the idea that the cookshack and bunkhouse were used in railroad logging down along the Kootenai until about 1936, and that Don Boslaugh brought them up to Trego to work in the impact with Westwood Acres 30 years later. There’s too much history in the old logging camp buildings not to do a little bit of restoration. Again, deferred maintenance is a debt that has to be paid sooner or later.
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Time was when I found humor in the Darwin Awards – it’s a little sick, but people did find some humorous ways to die. Hell, it’s a lot sick – but humor tends to be a case of something happening to someone else. It was here in Trego, when someone commented that it looked like someone in Brookings had just got a Darwin award.
For anyone unfamiliar with the Darwin awards, they’re given for removing oneself from the gene pool in some spectacular manner. The young man in Brookings did that – though I don’t know if he made it into the book. When I returned to campus (SDSU) I learned more – his mother was the department secretary on the floor below my office. And she was a friend.
Frankly, she handled her son’s death better than I would have – though that may be small praise. The question was simple: How could he do something so stupid?” The answer was in the question – he wasn’t real bright, and he had read how to make a bomb from sparklers on the net. Reading the cautions would have been a good idea – but he was assembling his bomb in his lap when he pushed in one sparkler too many. I didn’t answer – and there was no honest way of saying he didn’t suffer.
But I haven’t read anything on the Darwin Awards since I listened to her grief. The humor was gone.
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I see that Governor DeSantis (Florida) is moving to eliminate H1-B visas from Florida’s university system. My experience with the H1-B visa holders is limited – and at least ten years out of date – yet DeSantis’ comments match my experience: “They come in with these brokers who make a fortune of this with arbitrage. They bring them in and they are indentured to the company. So, the company can basically pay them low and they say no, we got to do this. You have to prove there are no Americans. They will put an ad in the classified sections of a newspaper. Nobody reads that section of the newspaper… It’s all become a total scam”
The article explained the numbers: “The H-1B program exists to bring workers specifically from India and China: • 283,397 Indians in 2024 • 46,680 Chinese • Philippines came in at #3 — with 5,248.” My limited experience confirms DeSantis’ comments – Prasanthi was from India, and asked me to serve as a reference on her job applications as a way of getting out of the ‘indentured servitude.’ The last I heard from her was a very appreciative thank you note as she managed to get a job out of SDSU. She was hired to teach faculty to do distance-education courses, and it was a job I would not have taken – the technique was to assign busy work instead of academic inquiry. I will admit, I’m no fan of busy work. It fits right in there with group projects.
The point is, she was hired to do a job that this American would not do. I can’t say H1-B is always bad – but she was hired to teach me to present in a way that didn’t really improve my students’ research skills (in my opinion – I could be wrong, but don’t believe I am). DeSantis said “I don’t understand how is that specialized knowledge that only someone from these places can do. A $40,000 a year job working as the assistant at the athletic department? That’s an abuse of this whole idea. If there are things that the universities need, that somehow they just can’t find in Florida, to me, they, of all employers, would be the ones most responsible for why they can’t find what they need.” Like I said, his comments are pretty much in line with my experience.
Yet I learned a lot from working with Prasanthi – that there is a color discrimination in India that exceeds our own cultural racism, and that was a reason to accept the limitations of the H1-B to get to America. As I look at immigration, both legal and illegal, I realize that there is a lot more opportunity here than over there. And it seems to me that the difference between coming into the US as a mojado or with an H1-B isn’t so great – either way, it’s better to be in the land of the big PX.
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I noticed that Tim Walz has explained that EBT (once known as Food Stamps) creates $1.80 in economic activity for every dollar that goes out. Economic activity is a term that doesn’t necessarily mean what it seems. An old rancher described it as swapping pocketknives – “I spend ten grand buying a herd bull from my neighbor this year, next year he spends ten grand buying a bull from me.” That’s economic activity – each needs a herd bull, and they pay each other an inflated price to (hopefully) raise the value of their livestock to other potential buyers.
I took a class in economics back when I was a college freshman – the professor opened the first class by explaining no Republican had ever got better than a C in his class, then went on to explain Keynesian economics. I understood why – The Motley Fool describes Keynesian economics: “The United States has had a complicated history with Keynesian economics. While Keynesianism has frequently been used during downturns, the jury is still out on its long-term effectiveness.” https://www.fool.com/terms/k/keynesian-economics/
Not all “economic activity” creates wealth – pocketknife swaps merely create the illusion of value. John Maynard Keynes theorized that “government intervention is needed to stimulate demand and stabilize the economy, particularly during recessions.” While Adam Smith held that a free market would provide full employment (meaning employees would accept the wages offered), Keynesians held that government spending would increase demand. I’m pretty sure that the amount of government spending we have means we’re all Keynesians. No other choices in a world filled with deficit spending.
To Adam Smith, labor and the accumulation of capital were key components of economics – and Karl Marx basically agreed when he defined capital as dead labor (there are a lot of custom rifles built on old Mauser military actions, with new barrels and stocks added – pick your own example if you like). A pocketknife swap neither includes labor nor the accumulation of capital. It does include the illusion of value.
I figure the SNAP program increases labor (some share of producing and processing food) and accumulation of capital (though that may go more to Sam Walton’s heirs). But I’m skeptical whenever a politician uses the words ‘economic activity.’ After all, I ended a career one floor above the economics department.
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In 1960, I learned that the first snow of winter could be expected around Halloween. As a young adult, my winters included snow surveys – being paid to ride snowmobiles. Now, at 75, I’m reaching a stage where the body refuses to stay warm in the cold – I can almost understand the snowbirds who winter in the south and return north for the warm months. But not yet – I can still get in a few good hours in the Fall, as the leaves drop from the Serviceberries and the needles turn yellow on the Western Larch. With the yellow needles interspersed in the green of the Douglas Fir and Ponderosa Pine, and a glance upwards showing snow on Mount Marston and Stryker Peak, late October is our prettiest season.
Now, it’s about time to put the snowplow back on the old Ford – soon snow will cover the trees and give the winter scenery. NOAA has some projections for us that suggest we can expect colder temperatures than normal and more precipitation. Which translates to a bit more time bringing in firewood:
Ah, well, I expect we will still encounter a January thaw and then March will bring Spring again. The extra snow should help fill the pond. I forgot to buy a 2,4,D mix with nitrogen fertilizer to hit the Canada thistles with a Fall growth surge that takes the root reserves from them – and I probably need to look for some Semaspore bait for next year’s grasshoppers.
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In 1963, I entered high school. Minimum wage was $1.25 per hour. Five silver quarters – well, 90% silver. A couple of years later, they replaced that silver currency with clad coins. As I write this, the spot price of silver is a little over $52 and ounce. Gold in 1963 was $35 an ounce. Today it’s $4250. But at 13, I wasn’t interested in gold and silver. I do remember the prices on some of the rifles. The Ithaca model 49 – looked like a lever action but was more like a single shot Martini – was going for a twenty dollar bill.
I saw one used at Cabela’s for a penny under $300. The Colteer – a single shot bolt gun from Colt – cost $19.95 new, and was priced at $400 as I viewed their inventory.
A single shot 22 bolt gun, made in 1957 – now selling for 20 times its original price.
I’m not sure that the price of gold reflects perfectly on the value of our currency – perhaps the increased value of old rifles is a better measure. In 1957, a nickel would buy a chocolate bar – and, while the chocolate bars shrank by the mid-sixties, nickel bars could still be found in 1966.
Land values – in the fifties, land in Trego was pretty well established at $30 an acre. The twenty to one ratio from old rifles doesn’t fit there – but the hundred and twenty to one ratio of gold seems closer to the increased land prices.
The Canadian dollar is now worth about 70 cents US. In my youth, when we still had silver, US coins were 90% silver, Canadian coins were 80% silver, and the Canadian dollar stayed constant at something like 90 cents US.
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Looking for information online is getting a bit harder – a search for “Irish Democracy” yields this commentary from search assist: “Irish democracy refers to the system of government in the Republic of Ireland, which is a parliamentary representative democracy. This means that the government is elected by the people and is accountable to them, with powers divided among the legislature, executive, and judiciary to ensure checks and balances.” Artificial Intelligence at its finest – you have to scroll down to get to https://www.econlib.org/the-pros-and-cons-of-irish-democracy/ which begins with “If regular democracy isn’t doing so well, maybe it’s time to fall back on “Irish Democracy.’ That’s what Yale political scientist James Scott calls the passive resistance of a society that doesn’t like what its rulers are doing to it. In his book “Two Cheers for Anarchy,” he writes, “One need not have an actual conspiracy to achieve the practical effects of a conspiracy. More regimes have been brought, piecemeal, to their knees by what was once called ‘Irish Democracy,’ the silent, dogged resistance, withdrawal and truculence of millions of ordinary people, than by revolutionary vanguards or rioting mobs.”
Perhaps it was best phrased by Heinlein: “I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.” Another of his reminders is: “Taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed.”
Henlein died in 1988 – and still made the observation “Government! Three fourths parasitic and the other fourth stupid fumbling.” The thought could describe my neighborhood in 2025.
Still, when legislators reduce the choices we can make through voting – and our elected officials have done that, Irish Democracy becomes the only alternative. We do need to be careful that we do not accept Irish Handcuffs – the technical definition is a drink in each hand, but the hazard is holding on to something, refusing to set it down, and for that reason being compelled to inaction.
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