The Happy Guppy (Restaurant)

The other night I was thinking about my grandson, and the fact that in the near future, he will be eating in restaurants with his parents much the same way as my wife and I took our children to various restaurants as they were growing up. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, fast food restaurants like McDonald's and their Happy Meals were very popular. But, do I want my grandson eating all those fried foods? I don't think so, so here is an idea.

What about a sushi restaurant for little kids? That is where the name Happy Guppy comes in. The menu would have no fried foods, no soft drinks and no meat products like beef, pork, lamb or fowl. The menu would consist of several types of raw fish, rice and seaweed and fruit wraps for dessert. Drinks would include juices and soy milk for those children allergic to cow's milk. Portions would vary to the size and age of the child, but parents could eat sushi with the kids too. Guppy meals will come with toys too, but these toys will center around the sea and all the good things that come from the sea.

The restaurant's tables would look like sand dollars and the seats would resemble clam shells. The atmosphere of the place would be clean and bright and the decor would be influenced by life from the sea. Now some people will think that I have lost my mind or that I am crazy to even suggest such an idea, but I think it is time that we realize that we have a health crisis in the United States that is of our own making. I think it is time for little children to have a choice between a Happy Meal and a healthy body. What do you think?

Stay tuned.

Saturday Is For Art & Three Old Sketches

The weekend is finally here, and it is time to put away all those other things and think about art. During the week, I wrote my blog, read other blogs, read the book I am reading, cut grass, planted sunflowers seeds, watched too much TV and rode my bike in Spring Grove Cemetery. These three pieces that I have posted were done around nine years ago when i went to a sketch group at the Cincinnati Art Club. The bottom piece is a collage of sketches that I put together for the club's annual sketch group show in 1996. The fact that I cut up several sketches and assembled them in an old window frame did not go over very well with the more conservative members of the club, and they let me know what they thought of my collage. Oh well, even in art, I don't seem to be able to please everyone. So, if you want to see the collage in more detail, click on the image and it will be enlarged. Then, you can either agree with those that didn't like my collage, or, you can enjoy the humor of the piece. (The sketches are all of women and the postage stamps, also in black and white, are all men, and postage stamps help to hold the sketched pieces in place.)

Have a safe and wonderful weekend.

Stay tuned.

For The Good Of All The American People

When you find someone that says it better than you can say it, I think it is appropriate to pass their words along. Here is an editorial that appeared in the Lexington (Kentucky) Hearld-Leader about Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and the financial reform legislation. I hope a few million people would take the time to read it. I think it sums up what I would have liked to have said, only better, so here it is.

McConnell to big bank's rescue (editorial)

FOXBusiness reported on Monday that Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell recently called on about 25 Wall Street executives, many of them hedge fund managers, to hear their complaints about proposals for regulating the financial industry.
With him was Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which raises campaign money for Republican candidates for Senate.
"The undercurrent of the gathering," FOX reports, "was undeniably political. ... McConnell and Cornyn made it clear they need Wall Street's help" to defeat the reforms by electing more Republicans in November.
On Tuesday and again Wednesday, McConnell took to the Senate floor to denounce a bill sponsored by Democratic Sen. Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate banking committee.
Interestingly, McConnell is disparaging the proposed reforms in words recommended by a pollster.
"If the outline of his speech sounds familiar," wrote Adam Sorensen on Time's political blog, "it's because it is the exact argument pollster Frank Luntz urged Republicans to make earlier this year in a widely publicized memo."
(Comparisons of McConnell's statements and the Luntz memo can be found at http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2010/04/13/a-gop-financial-reform-bellwether/.)
McConnell's statements are perfectly calibrated to inflame the public. He insists the bill would "allow endless taxpayer-funded bailouts for big Wall Street banks."
Their resemblance to the truth is another matter.
The provision that McConnell claims would allow endless bailouts emerged from a bipartisan collaboration by Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and Bob Corker, R-Tenn.
Warner, who learned a thing or two about capitalism as a successful dot.com entrepreneur before becoming Virginia's governor, told The Washington Post: "It appears that the Republican leader either doesn't understand or chooses not to understand the basic underlying premise of what this bill puts in place."
The provision to which McConnell particularly objects creates an orderly process for letting "too big to fail" banks fail, at the industry's expense, without taking down the entire economy.
The losers would be the management and shareholders, not the taxpayers. So onerous would this process be for failing financial institutions, says Warner, that it would serve as a deterrent to reckless decision-making.
McConnell, it should be remembered, voted for the bailout of the big investment banks in the fall of 2008, when it was the only alternative to global economic meltdown.
We have read that the Republicans have a plan for financial reform, but McConnell isn't talking up any solutions, just trashing the other side's ideas with no respect for the truth.
While the intricacies of financial regulation are complicated, McConnell's calculus is pretty obvious.
The high-stakes gamblers on Wall Street, luxuriating again in big bonuses, don't want any new oversight or regulation. Why would they, knowing that the government would have to bail them out again if their trading of worthless financial instruments goes bust and threatens to bring on the next Great Depression?
McConnell, unabashedly courting Wall Street bankers for political money, is happy to scratch their backs if they'll scratch his.



Read more: http://www.kentucky.com/2010/04/15/1224749/mcconnell-to-big-banks-rescue.html#ixzz0lGS7UZB6

I think, whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, you should try and understand the deceit that is taking place and who has who's back, and who is looking out for the majority of the American people. You do not have to be all that knowledgeable about the banking and investment industry to be able to tell who is protecting a stream of campaign contributors and who is looking out for the good of all the American people.

Stay tuned.

Bond Credit Ratings Have To Hold Water

It is simply amazing how bad so many people are being fooled and taken in by what the Republicans in Congress are saying about financial reform. I think, if it was almost anything but financial regulation that we are talking about, that the deceit could not be pulled off with such ease. Making a calculated bet that even with TV news and cable news programs lighting up the screen with a rebuttal to the Republican's outlandish assertions about the financial reform legislation, that because so many people do not understand what is taking place that they can get away with saying, "up is down", "black is white", and needed regulation that would help prevent "too big to fail" would do just the opposite.

If the Republicans in Congress can pull this off (their opposition to financial reform legislation), they should be given an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Nobel Prize for Bullshit. They are the masters of deceit!

The economy is showing signs of coming back. However, the housing problems that were, in my opinion, at the center of the financial crisis have not been settled. Give me one week, and the power to clean up the credit rating fiasco that masquerades as our credit rating system, and I will have the housing market moving in the right direction again. The creation of mortgage-backed bonds is a legitimate way to finance our housing needs, but the credit ratings that are placed on these bonds must mean something. When they mean nothing, they undermine the whole system of financing housing. Toxic assets are mortgage-backed bonds that are not worth the paper they are printed on. (I know, they are not printed on paper anymore, that they are in book entry form, so give me some literary license.)

Bottom line, fix the credit rating agencies and the flow of credit can once more begin. However, the Triple-A rating must mean something this time around. That is why the Federal Reserve Bank should pass on the validity of all Triple-A ratings before they are brought to market by the underwriters. The use of mortgage-backed bonds can work to bring back the housing market, but this time the bond credit ratings have to hold water.

Stay tuned.

Where Will That Get Them This Fall?

I have written about the genius of the Republican party in the past. They, members of Congress that are Republicans, like Mitch McConnell, are so very clever. They understand the level of knowledge of their constituents, and they take full advantage of that ignorance to keep their people in the dark with a barrage of disinformation and lies. Listen or read Senator McConnell's comments about the new financial regulations that is making its way through Congress. Even Elizabeth Warren said his interpretation of the legislation with regards to the bailouts is "nuts." But, just how many Republicans are going to examine the stupidity of what Senator McConnell said? How many people in Kentucky will examine the validity of his criticism of the legislation with regards to too big to fail?

My hope is that there are a few Republicans in the Senate that will realize that the new financial regulatory legislation is necessary to protect us from another "too big to fail" bailout, not guarantee that a bailout will be forth coming from the Federal Government! This is a complete misread of the legislation. But Senator McConnell knows that, as he is no dummy. But, the Republican Party can not let this black President continue to repair and fix damage after damage what his Republican predecessor left for him in the Oval Office. The Republican Party is at the end of its rope, especially in the South and Southwest. With nothing more than fear to pedal, where do they go after President Obama fixes their mistakes? So, in their desperation they move further to the right and into the hands of the tea party. Let's see where that gets them this fall.

Stay tuned.

Back Down The Same Road We Go

What caused the financial crisis that lead to the economic recession? The Congress held hearings last week and the people involved went before the Congressional Commission and lied through their teeth. It is never called lying, but rather the term CYA, known as "cover your ass", is perhaps a better description of what these people were doing.

To believe that no one realized what was happening is pure crap and we all know this. You don't have to be an Einstein to figure out what created the trillions of dollars of toxic assets. I have written over the last two plus years about the mortgage-backed bond market meltdown and how the credit rating agencies played a key role in inflating the housing bubble. The people at the top, such as the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank, the President of the New York Fed, the Secretary of the Treasury and a host of advisers, all played a part in the disaster known as the financial crisis of 2008.

I refer to our economy as the political-economy for a reason. No country's economy runs without some influence from the political powers regardless of the kind of government. Lobbyists cleared the way for this financial disaster to occur, and yet despite the severity of the recent economic disaster, these same lobbyists are once again pressuring Congress not to put in place safeguards, regulations, transparency and accountability for the future.

And, you know what? The lobbyists will succeed. Why? Because financial regulation is boring and the vast majority of the people don't know anything about this industry and don't care. Well, you get what you pay for, and in the case of the banking and investment industries, the people that are doing all the paying are going to get their way. And, back down the same road we go.

Stay tuned.

Even A Small Fire Can Destroy The World

"Art is a lie that makes us realize truth" was reportedly said by Pablo Picasso. But, what about lies that are repeated and repeated so that people may be deceived into believing they are the truth?

It has been said that politics is a rough and tumble sport and not for everyone. Yes, I agree, politics is not for everyone and not everyone is so inclined to ferret out the truth. Years ago, in a darker time, there was the BIG LIE. A known falsehood told over and over again so that people would come to accept it as truth.

What I see today from the political right and the Republican Party, their politicians and those that purportedly speak for their ideology both on radio and TV, is a barrage of lies. Lies repeated over and over in the hope that people who do not want to take the time to ferret out the truth, will accept these lies.

It is far easier to vilify someone than to challenge their ideas. Even the great Albert Einstein was vilified by the Nazis. His work was referred to by Nazis as "Jew Science".

Lies must be addressed. They can not be ignored. Nor can we pretend that if enough time passes, they will go away. Lies must be challenged head on. They must be taken seriously and they must be answered seriously.

Even a small fire, left to burn unattended, can destroy the world.

Stay tuned.