303 Creative

 

I’m A Man

I stand outside creatin'
All the groovy kinds of love
I'm a man, yes I am and I can't help but love you so
I'm a man, yes I am and I can't help but love you so

And no man is God.

Justice “Not Merrick Garland” Gorsuch during oral arguments for the 303 Creative case slammed the State of Colorado for forcing a Christian baker to undergo a “reeducation program” after he refused to create a custom cake celebrating a same-sex marriage on the grounds that it violated his religious convictions.

That Christian baker is licensed by the state of Colorado.  That baker has his premises inspected by Health Departments of governments in Colorado.  That baker receives police, fire  and other protections and services from the government.  That baker accepts payment in US currency, not in barter.  Is it too much to ask that this Christian baker abide by the laws of our governments, even if those laws and regulations violate his religious belief.  The Supreme Court is being asked to be Caesar, not God.  It should be a good Christian and remember  Christ's teaching “ Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s."  The baker’s religious convictions are God’s.  The state of Colorado and the Supreme Court are not God, they are Caesar.  Is Justice Gorsuch under the impression that he is God?

Discontinuities

 

Go to the Mirror, Boy (See Me, Feel Me, Touch Me, Heal Me)

I often wonder what he is feeling
Has he ever heard a word I’ve said?
Look at him in the mirror dreaming
What is happening in his head?

Maybe our universe IS inside the mirror.

The original Star Trek ( yes, I am that nerdy), had an episode Mirror, Mirror where Captain Kirk entered an evil mirror universe ( the one with Spock with a Goatee!).  Our universe appears to be hyperbolic https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2022/07/forever.html. It may also be that evil mirror universe.

Random events appear to follow an exponential distribution.  Those random events, and that statistical distribution, are constrained to real positive values.   This may be a limitation of our universe.  If negative numbers are allowed AND the negative distribution is a mirror of the positive distribution instead of being confined to positive numbers, there is a discontinuity at the origin.  In other words, the Probability density function, PDF of the exponential distribution for all values of x, not just x>0, may be

(x≥0)*(λ*e^-λx) + (x<0)*( λ*e^λx)

Alito and Leaks

 

Up on Cripple Creek

Up on Cripple Creek, she sends me
If I spring a leak, she mends me
I don't have to speak, she defends me
A drunkard's dream if I ever did see one

The Supreme Court has a leak. Who will mend it?

I previously thought that Justice “Long Dong Silver” Thomas was the most dangerous man in America. I based that on his opinions and those of his wife. But with his leaks, Justice “Strip Search Sammy” Alito has pulled into the lead.

The draft opinion for Dobbs, which was written by Justice Alito and included the overturning of Roe v. Wade, was leaked in May. Now it has come to light that Justice Alito also leaked the draft opinion in the 2014 Hobby Lobby case, which he also wrote. I have watched enough episodes of the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Perry Mason, Scooby Doo, etc., to know that the criminal is usually the one who most benefits from the crime. Before the 2020 leak, Chief Justice Roberts was lobbying the other Justices to possibly not overturn Roe v. Wade. After the leak he ceased those efforts and Justice Alito’s draft opinion became the Court’s majority opinion. Given his history and the fact that Justice Alito benefitted the most from the leak, if you do NOT think that Justice Alito was the source of the leak, I have some nice ocean front property in Kansas I would like to sell you. 😏If Chief Justice Roberts wants to maintain control of his Court, not only should he adopt the position that supermajorities, which on the present Supreme Court means 6-3 opinions, are required, I believe that prior to the Hughes Court in the 1940s, the Chief Justice always required that its opinions be by consensus, Chief Justice Roberts should also never, ever, let Justice Alito write an opinion. If he doesn’t write the opinion, then maybe he won’t leak it.

Respect for Marriage Act

 

Why Don’t We Do It in the Road

Why don't we do it in the road?
Why don't we do it in the road?
Why don't we do it in the road?
Why don't we do it in the road?
No one will be watching us
Why don't we do it in the road?

We don't because the road is a public space, and “it” is a private action.

In the song, we all know what “it” is, and  “it” is a private action. The rules for public spaces are there, regardless of whether someone is watching you or not. And just as private actions are allowed in private spaces, and public actions are allowed in public spaces, public control should not exist in private spaces, and private control should not exist in public spaces. When a public group tries to control private actions in private spaces, or a private group tries to control public actions in public spaces, there is a problem.

The government is the public. It grants certain rights for example, to those who are married. Marriage means that health care of spouses, inheritance, etc. are protected by the government. A marriage, like all government actions in one US State, has to be acknowledged in every other US State. Just as a Driver’s license in Massachusetts is valid in Texas, Texas does not have the right to say how Massachusetts issues that driver’s license, ....or marriage license. And if a transaction happens in the public marketplace, then no one should have the right to object based on private beliefs. The public can’t change what is in a private heart. But the public can control what are acceptable public actions, subject to the rights of individuals guaranteed in the constitution. You should have to show actual harm to ban a public action. Being offended is NOT justification to ban a public action. But the public also does not get to change what is in a private individual’s, or a group of private individuals', heart. If you want the public’s protection in economic transactions, then you also do NOT get to also decide in which economic transactions you will participate. 

It is also why Justice Thomas is showing his hypocrisy in saying Obergefell, Lawrence, and Griswold were improperly decided but Loving which would affect him, was omitted from his list. Render onto Caesar, the things that are Caesar’s, and to God, the things that are God’s. There seems to be some confusion  among the Justices of the Supreme Court as to which things are which.

Debt II

 

Pretty Polly

A debt to the devil, Willie must pay
A debt to the devil, Willie must pay
For killing Pretty Polly, and running, and running, and running, and running away. 

Is our national debt to the devil?

To answer my own question, the national debt is an investment in the future, NOT a debt to the devil.  Since we have a fiat currency that is based on the national economy, our national debt should be a percentage of the national economy.  That way if the economy grows, the debt ceiling will also grow.  Also the debt ceiling should NEVER be set in unadjusted dollars.  The US currency has been subject to inflation, especially beginning with the Nixon Shock of 1971.   The debt ceiling should recognize this inflation.  If the economy is stated in current dollars, not in the dollars of a previous year, then the debt ceiling should also be based on the economy stated in the current years dollars, and not the dollars of a previous year.

It is arguable that there should not even be a national debt ceiling set by Congress.  Congress has the power of appropriation in spending bills.  And the ability to raise taxes to pay for that spending. Then why is there also a need to also impose a  national debt ceiling on that spending. The debt ceiling should not be used as a hostage to hold spending, or taxes, hostage.  Yes, if there is no debt there is no need for spending, or taxes, to repay that debt.  But then there is also no investment in the future.  If you believe in the future, and you believe in growth, then you have to also allow for debt. 

Equality

 

My Back Pages

A self-ordained professor’s tongue
Too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty
Is just equality in school
“Equality,” I spoke the word
As if a wedding vow
Ah, but I was so much older then
I’m younger than that now

I am older now but I wish I was younger.  What is equality?

The Microsoft Word Thesaurus lists the synonyms for equality as: parity, fairness, equivalence, likeness, impartiality, etc. And this highlights the problem with equality. Equality IS ALWAYS fairness and impartiality. Equality IS NOT ALWAYS likeness and equivalence. It is easy to treat those that are identical to me with fairness. It is much harder to treat those who are unlike me with fairness.

Which begs the questions, what is fairness? That same thesaurus lists the symptoms for fairness, not including equality, as: justice, impartiality, objectivity, etc. Which means that equality is not having your thumb on the scale of justice, letting things truly be random. Being fair is being objective and impartial and NOT favoring one outcome over another. Justice is not the Law. The Law should reflect Justice, but that Law is not perfect, and we can change the Law. We can not change Justice. It is an absolute. We can aspire to absolutes, but we can not be absolutes. A normal distribution of a group, i.e. a fair distribution, has a mean and a standard deviation from that mean. An absolute has a standard deviation of zero by definition. But humans are members of a group. As such, we are individuals, not absolutes. A standard uniform normal distribution of a group has a standard deviation of 1, not 0. Equality is accepting that fact and not insisting that everyone be like you, have a standard deviation of 0 from you

Equality is everyone sharing the same starting line, and letting true randomness govern the outcome. That is why jockeys in a horse race, or boxers in a match, have weigh-ins. It is why in golf there are handicaps, and why in chess there are rankings. If you beat an unequal opponent that is NOT a reason to celebrate. If you have to take actions to ensure that your opponent is equal, then that will be a victory to celebrate. Sometimes that may involve tying your hand behind your back, sometimes that may involve untying your opponents’ hands.

Bank Runs

 

I Gotsta Get Paid

I got 25 lighters on my 25 folks
Gonna break the bank run 25 more
Bout to reap the suits with 25 flows
I got 25 lighters well don't ya know
You know I gotsta get paid

It has been along time since we have had a bank run.

In the 19^th Century bank runs were common. (For those of you who are too young to remember bank runs, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPkJH6BT7dM.)  This is because banks do NOT keep enough liquidity on hand to pay out all deposits, nor would we want then to do so. There has to be a lender of last resort who can provide the liquidity to repay depositors when a single bank can not. Otherwise depositor demands at one bank can trigger a panic among depositors in other banks. In the 19h century that lender of last resort was banker J. P. Morgan. Since the Federal Reserve was formed, it has been that lender of last resort.

In crypto currency there is no lender of last resort. Crypto is also a commodity currency. There is a fixed amount of crypto that can be “mined.” Gold and other precious metals once served as the basis of a commodity currency. Sovereigns minted coins to guarantee that the currency was real gold, etc., and could be faithfully used in an economic exchange. But gold and other metals are bulky to carry which is why there is paper money. We had a gold currency because Isaac Newton, of Gravity and Calculus fane, when he was Master of the British Royal Mint, made a mistake on the price of silver. Before this mistake, silver was also commonly the basis for a nation’s currency. A remnant of that is the Pound Sterling which was a weight of sterling silver, and the dollar which was a Spanish coin in silver. When paper currency, which was easier to carry,  could be converted into gold, then it was still a commodity currency. Since the 1930s, Americans were virtually not allowed to own gold. The domestic dollar effectively became a fiat currency. It was worth what those printing the money said it was worth. Beginning in 1971, the dollar was also no longer internationally convertible into gold.

A commodity currency can NOT grow. It is constrained by the amount of that commodity. To allow growth, an economy should NOT have a commodity currency. But that begs the issue of what is the constraint on a fiat currency. The answer appears to be an amount that is consistent with the goods and services in the economy that it supports. If the economy grows, then the fiat currency should also grow by this amount.

As was noted, in crypto currency there was no lender of last resort and crypto was a commodity currency. Thus it should not be surprising that crypto currency markets such as FTX have collapsed. That most people did not own or invest in crypto currency is why a run on crypto did not also cause a run on the banks.