The blog discusses current affairs and development of national economic and social health through unique idea generation. Consider the blog a type of thought experiment where ideas are generated to be pondered but should never be considered definitive as a final conclusion. It is just a pathway to understanding and one may equally reject as accept ideas as theoretical dribble. New perspectives, new opportunities, for a new generation. “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”—Thomas Jefferson
This meeting was a little longer at 1 hour which definitely means something important was happening. The conversations were deep and focused on water valve replacement which is expensive, some great stuff happening at the Bonifas Art Center, renewable energy sources, and an interesting idea to create an ice skating rink in Ludington Park. The city is in a problem resolution stage so if you have great ideas on how to fund and fix this problem, and it seems like a substantive solution that helps the community, I'm sure you can send them an email at the Escanaba Site. Good ideas can come from anywhere just make sure you are not sending people down rabbit holes without substantive well thought out plans.
A Scene on the Ice, c. 1625 I picked up some skates from Good Will 3 years ago. I'm ready!
The water repairs will be expensive but I believe if we piecemeal grants, money and options together we can get over this hump. Definitely not insurmountable. Water and energy independence is beneficial for towns this rural who are attracting residents and vacationers that need those services. My perspective on energy is if we can generate our own and still be connected to the grid we reduce risk of energy shortages (A different kind of discussion for later and likely more a county oriented issue.
What I found very interesting is the ice rink. I have seen them contribute significantly to lifestyle and aesthetics. Vacationers are likely to enjoy as well. It is unlikely to be super expensive compared to many other programs but we will want to make sure it is sustainable. Where I have seen them do well people come to the park, roast marshmallows over a fire (I have seen in Big Bear Cali a fire pit with a round protective grid over it.) and start to enjoy the outdoors. Considering we are a hockey and nature town it fits.
Another exciting meeting in DC MI. Issues such as the airport, land use, recall, taxes, energy independence, and citizen complaints were discussed. The county has a lot of great things going on for it and the area is becoming known as an investment hotspot and vacation mecca. A few lingering issues remain.
The broad range of topics covered during the meeting indicates that even small semi-isolated attractive places such as Delta County Michigan deal with many of the same issues as we might find on a state and national level.
There has been some commotion over a number of years related to allegations of good old boy networks, corruption, threats, and political extremism. They have not gone away but hopefully they will be resolved in the best interest of everyone soon.
As always my suggestion is to work in a bipartisan manner in alignment with our values in order to ensure the public's interest is protected and furthered. We do that best through integrity and transparency. Good governance comes from listening to the needs of the people and adjusting appropriately as to what is in their best interest.
Setting goals and achieving goals in the most efficient way. It comes from building consensus around shared visions. Community goals such as economic development, increased investments, additional recreational outlets, getting drugs off the streets, improving educational opportunities, or any number of other goals comes easiest with the work of many hands. Community engagement is not the problem, it is the pathway to success
As a side note, I have a deep and profound respect for the veterans who have sacrificed so much so people can speak and practice freely (with civility). Making our veterans a priority is a patriotic act.
Consumer sentiment rose .6% indicating increased probability of a forward leading economy (1 factor). (We should also remember inflation is still high but coming down so it won't likely have a huge negative impact on consumer spending.)
Year-ahead inflation inched up from 2.9 in January to 3.0% in February
This video is thought provoking and provides a new perspective on immigration and some long tail benefits. Immigrants could contribute up tp $7 Trillion to our economy over the next 10 years. My thought was finding methods of stopping new illegal immigrants before we have a chance to vet them and procure the societal resources to transition new comers quickly into productive careers/jobs (i.e. training and sponsorship).
One option is to find ways to transition immigrants most likely to stay on the tax payer rolls and contributing to the economy even if this ends up being on a short term basis. Likely controversial and it doesn't take away from the arguments for removal. Its more of an argument with what we are going to do with those who are already here and likely to stay versus what to do at the boarder or a determination of who stays and who goes (More bi-partisanship is needed.)
(If your asking me we should close the flood gates until we figure out what we are going to do in an orderly fashion.)
What I will notice from a theory standpoint was that even relatively unskilled labor from recent immigrants (Typically the first generation has less skills then later generations who become Americanized ) can increase the economy. We see how some countries like China have used low cost labor to their advantage (Labor intensive general skills) . The other methods is to increase technology adaptations with training/education in advanced manufacturing and other industries to increase the value of human capital at the center of a supply chain (High skill specialization)
There are those in society that support extremism and corruption and unfortunately not enough backstops to protect the public or targets when it does occur. While we know there are dark souls who engage in these behaviors we struggle in holding this corruption to account for one reason or another. Exclusionary beliefs in race, religion, and social networks can lead people down dark paths in thought and behavior. In the hypothetical example I have been using there are four broad category crimes that are committed
1.) using threats of violence and hate narrative to enrich, exploit or harm,
2.) targeting and violations of freedom of religion and speech,
3.) failure to hold to account or correct when misbehaviors is found and
4.) manipulating the sick and dying for money (Ultimately dozens of crimes)
The Hypothetical Hate Example: A group of bigots and bullies went after minorities in their town. Because of close affiliation with a corrupted network of officers they were encourage and emboldened to mock the family publicly and openly. They spread rumors, they put locals on hit lists, yelled disrespectful comments in front of children, use the term nigger (meaning slave) near black children, they even targeted these children with multiple stops, tried to arrest minorities on religious holidays, retaliated against legitimate complaints by the community, disrespected veterans and were given a free pass by the local justice system to freely engage in these behaviors despite concerns. Awareness of crimes didn't change the course of thought and behavior.
To continue with the example. The incident started when a rogue officer pulled over one of the targets within a short time of the family moving back to their ancestral homeland. Without just cause the officer asked the person to sit in his car next to his drug dog, asked whether he had bombs (a Muslim sounding name), and ask why someone like him would live around here. The target ensured the conversation was polite but the directive nature of the questions appeared to be fishing. As though the officer didn't expect the conversation to be polite and hopes of the success of his goal directive behavior had diminished. No ticket was issued because there was no justification for the stop. When asked the reason for the stop, the answer was, "your air freshener" with a dismissive tone and smirk (No issues there either and there was a witness in the car for part of it. Maybe they thought something suspicious and found out it was incorrect but the line of questioning seems misplaced at the time but makes more sense when you see a series of behaviors over a long period of time after. Its helpful to give benefit of doubt so one would notice the oddness but not necessarily have any context. 9 out of 10 times interactions are positive so one doesn't necessarily jump to conclusions quickly.)
(Keep in mind that being pulled over doesn't mean anyone did anything wrong. i.e. over 5 years trying to arrest for volunteering, cashing one's own paycheck, pulling over kids, creating "investigations" to defame, so on and so forth in a way that would be crimes by all national and international metrics. They truly hated the person, family, and friends with a venom that cannot be rationally explained except through corruption and violent leaning extremism.)
That person was a veteran and had history of standing for the law and for a better society. Even putting themselves at risk to report crimes in other places that panned out to be appropriate and substantive. When push comes to shove that person has a history of doing the right things. In this case, the officers and perpetrators behavior was a direct reflection of their values and not a reflection of the targets (..other then race, religion and awareness this person had knowledge of corruption and the goal was to silence.) Corruption was discovered and the officers and group were seeking to protect against discovery through hate oriented intimidation and threats of violence.
(If your asking me I love police 100% and civil rights 110%. Couldn't care less how everyone else thinks about these things. All institutions serve the people and not the other way around. I respect the institutional purpose of justice but take consideration to lack of accountability. Our current political situation has pitted police and human rights supporters against each other. Any system with this many complaints certainly can find ways to improve and human rights supporters can encourage effective police-community positive relations to ensure safe communities and streets. The big goals are the same but toxic souls break that focus.)
In this example, the laws did not matter as extreme bigotries were reward financially and socially making an up front statement that any minority or person that is different than the homogeneous ethnocentric group will be treated as less than human and with few rights. There was a direct attempt to circumvent those rights in full view of many other officers and the local system defaulted. Community complaints were high, had no safe place to be reported, and most understand the unwritten rules of the area. (Remember, within some places there is fear even of officers of turning in corruption because they don't want to be rejected. Thus, I support good officers and those who serve the public. That is what we should do! We must strengthen the culture as it will help in public perception, in functionality and in recruitment.)
I do not believe in this example that free pass hate systems should be allowed to exist and function within our current justice system. It breaks trust with the population and this example highlight that. To fix problems like this, one would need to have a commitment to our higher ideals and take efforts to ensure such behaviors do not continue forward. Its a walk the talk type issue. Extremism and hyper politics seek to restrict freedoms in an effort to exploit the pain of double standards now deeply embedded in the collective conscious.
The next generation has a different value system and are much more inclusive. Where our generation failed, I believe the next generation will do better to help fulfill our national purpose in human freedom and opportunity. They will understand that encouraging strong policing that keeps streets safe but does so in a universal manner with respect for human rights.
Corruption is like a virus and spreads when unchecked. Its not about jail or losing jobs, its about accountability, correction, and improving to better protect the public and future victims; even when they are considered less than human. My suggestion for those exposed to hate and corruption is be positive, be polite, but be honest because that is what changes the broken aspects of systems society needs. If you keep telling the truth corruption must skirt around it or silence moral conscious through misuse of entrusted authority and further threats of violence and intimidation.
What we should learn is to work together as a society to create the strongest most trusted institutions we can that are effective and accurate. An evidence based results oriented approach to issues without worrying about the politics of it all. The goal should always to improve our community and our nation in a way that leads to future opportunities for the next generation. It is an oath we stand for nearly everyday but sometimes fail to understand its deeper meaning.
Hypothetical question: How do you envision a high functioning police department with community support from all demographics of society? If you can envision it....you can create it! That should be the goal. Unfortunately, some of these hate behaviors might be so embedded that there is no will to correct or serve a greater purpose. I'm optimistic. The youth have perspectives that might push us into a universal democracy where the legacies of segregation don't carry into the unwritten rules of our lived experiences. A pro growth human capital oriented strategy for an environment that requires the highest performance to ensure national competitiveness.
*This is a hypothetical example for illustrative purposes only. Feel free to discount. Theoretical dribble dribble.
Applied psychology is a beneficial field to become familiar with if one desires to manage and motivate people. What I like about this video is that it shows the growth in literary publications and psychological research slowly shifting from German oriented theory to an American practicality perspective. Science is an additive conversational process where new cultural perspectives and knowledge can shift theory in new directions.
Applied psychology is a respectable field and is used everyday by industries and organizations to maximize human performance on an individual and group level. The Timeline of Applied Psychology
The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.3 percent in January (up 3.1% overall over 12 months). The stocks took a beating, the dark clouds came forward, and people ran back to their villages to shutter themselves inside and stay safe! Ok it wasn't that bad. Short term traders, economic hyper focus, and of course other issues that sort of keep us on the edge of our seats. Its mixed information and data that doesn't truly lean up or down. I would think more up yet inflation is still eating at people's paychecks and some economists have said we might experience a recession this year. A few countries are cutting their growth forecasts. We may be lucky and not have recession at all. Perhaps we might have an economic expansion. We can try and forecast but often one only truly knows in hindsight in this current market. Its almost always a situation of more data needed but we have to do the best we can with the tools we have, and what we know right now, and what we may have learned from past (Interesting article in the Atlantic Convincing Economy related to economic feelings.)
One might wonder if the infrastructure improvements are heating up core inflation and what that heating up means for the speed of the economy, energy, manufacturing, and technology on a core transactional level. One would sort of need to look at each aspect of the index and its definition to grasp how the information was drawn. Definition Core CPI Consider there appears to be a lot of mixed theory on Core Inflation it general indicates a potential issue but what that issue might be is still unknown. It may not all be bad if its a short term market adjustment. Core Inflation and GDP Relationship.
(The theory I'm working on looks at things from a transactional speed-value-cluster level in terms of adaptation. It has been sort of ballpark correct but its not really worth anything yet. It might be someday if it gets developed. Maybe sell it on eBay for like $5 as a self-published book and make someone else rich! With spelling and grammar errors included for free! Also why we need to rebalance how things are done to ensure opportunities and maximum economic engagement. Strengthening the middle, entrepreneurial, and creative classes helps. I do it because I find problems interesting not because of I get a tangible benefit from it. Just saying :))
This is a great article and I think the author brought forward a solid analysis. I have read a few of these articles and like them because they are informative.
(With research one must seek out the emerging news and see how that fits with a model based on more historical controlled hindsight analysis that seeks to isolate causality. News leads the discussion on important topics and research determines the strength of possible associations. Read on a topic widely and you get an emerging literary study in real time that leads to insight into what some of the involved factors might be. Businesses must have up-to-date emerging knowledge to be nimble. Correlation and Casual. )
(As a sort of funny notice, look at the jump in auto insurance! I always wonder if my car insurance is market rate? 🤔ðŸ˜)
Another article I recommend reading is Inflation Won't Go Away because it does help us put in perspective that inflation is still moving in a downward trajectory overall. There are bumps, blimps, and oddities that happen during that process. Sometimes we focus exclusively on small adjustments and then assign bigger importance then needed. Thinking trends with multiple data points. While we might create a theoretical understanding that may explain inflation, we must also take a wide angle lens to put those changes in context. My suggestion overall is look at the tree and then step back and look at the forest. If you also have the ability step back again and look at the whole ecosystem. Each focus level teaches you something different.
"The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.3 percent in January on a seasonally adjusted basis, after rising 0.2 percent in December, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 3.1 percent before seasonal adjustment.
The index for shelter continued to rise in January, increasing 0.6 percent and contributing over two thirds of the monthly all items increase. The food index increased 0.4 percent in January, as the food at home index increased 0.4 percent and the food away from home index rose 0.5 percent over the month. In contrast, the energy index fell 0.9 percent over the month due in large part to the decline in the gasoline index." (BLS, Jan 24', pg1)
