Time to break out an oldie but goodie

Lisa Ann Walter, actress, former talk-radio host and overall amazing woman posted the following on Facebook:

Just thought I'd share - in response to my lovely FB friend who said that Sanders' tax hike won't bone the "middle class" once again - only taxpayers making over 250k/year:
Here's the thing - Sanders has been in Vermont with the hippies too long.
...Depending on where one lives (los angeles), how many kids you have (4), and what the state of the (shit) public school system is making private school necessary - $250k/year won't even buy you a house in a middle class neighborhood.

Not after 50% taxes (and paying %'s to your representation, extras that the schools don't pay for your kids, like books & sports programs, etc) It certainly doesn't allow you to pay for your children's college education. It beats out to about 75k/year BEFORE paying all your bills including those "extras" for your kids. (which aren't extras - all kids need sports...AND tutoring to place well on standardized tests for college acceptance - especially if one had the bad sense to have white boys and not illegal aliens for children - and it's VERY expensive). Now cut that in half because being a single parent household. (Usually 250k is 2 working parents with REALLY good jobs).
Try to live in L.A. on under 40K a year. What middle class neighborhood has mortgages under $1500/mo? TMI? My point is that it's not equal across the board. Not all income means the same thing nationally. He is dangerous as fuck. Socialism CANNOT work in a country this size. The absolutely fucked state of health care as is under Obama-care should show people that. It's only better for people who are at the bottom rungs. Sanders' platform - being touted by lots of high-pro BIG INCOME HOLLYWOOD STARS - will effect them not one bit. They have too much money for it to matter. The very poor - illegal aliens, drug addicts (and I'm including marijuana) will get a big boost in their standard of living.
I'll be SHOCKED if Sanders actually makes corporations pay their fair share AT ALL...but certainly not BEFORE he rapes the middle class for the rest of their discretionary income. Shocked.
His policies will insure that everyone will have the same equally shitty standard of living. He's coming for your money, your freedom to choose your health care provider and your retirement fund...all of it. Young people like him because they're wearing the delusion of youth - and they all want whatever candidate says that pot should be legal. Cause they all think the government should support them, like their parents have always done, while they get baked and play video games.
Who's paying?
Who's paying, Bernie?

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The oldie but goodie I'm breaking out has its roots in a presentation that I co-delivered with the then headmaster of the expensive private school to the annual conference of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS).  The topic was financial aid in independent private schools and how to differentiate between the Statistical Middle Class and the Emotional Middle Class.

A Pew Research Center study released last December provides a calculator to determine which of the three classes your household falls into.  According to the study, 21% of American fall into the Upper Class, 50% fall into the Middle Class and the remaining 39% fall into the Lower Class when defining class by household income.  The calculator on their website claims that a family of four with an income of $140,000 falls into the Middle Class while the same family with an income of $150,000 is in the Upper Class.

Now as Lisa correctly notes, geography does play a big role in this.  This is illustrated by an article at  Bizjournals.com that shows the 2013 median income in Silicon Valley was much greater than the California statewide median of $61,320 or the nationwide median of $53,291.  But statistically, no matter how you slice it, someone who has a household income of more than $175,817 is in the top 5% of households according to data from the non-profit Tax Foundation.  You can't be in the Middle Class by any possible statistical definition when you're in the top 5% of the population by income.

This is where we learn about that Emotional Middle Class.  Families who aren't really wealthy or rich, but who have incomes that put them into the Statistical Upper Class, while they still see themselves as Middle Class.

It's a little about geography and a lot about perception.  

The state of the public school system may make private school seem like a necessity but the reality is, it is a choice.  A choice not available to those earning near the area median income without significant financial aid from that private school.  Because most such schools prioritize giving their limited financial aid budgets to the most needy, they usually run out of most of their budget before they get around to this Emotional Middle Class' need. 

Lisa wrote:  "Try to live in L.A. on under 40K a year. What middle class neighborhood has mortgages under $1500/mo? TMI?"  Let's look to the L. A. Times for the answer.  That link leads to an interactive map of Los Angeles that lists 272 neighborhoods by median income and ranks 265 neighborhoods from high to low by median income.  40 of those 265 have median incomes below $40,000.  Clearly some people are indeed living in L.A. with low incomes.

None of this information makes it any easier for a family with an income of $250K to live well in Los Angeles.  But maybe it can illustrate that no matter how they feel, by the numbers they are not in the Middle Class.

Sounds Great - But Isn't

This past week the Veterans Administration unveiled their plans for "transforming" the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center Campus.  The plan calls for construction of 1,200 permanent housing units for disabled and traumatized veterans and 700 temporary housing units for homeless veterans; according to an article in the Los Angeles Times.

Sounds great.  Problem solved.  Except it isn't.

18 months ago, Times columnist Steve Lopez wrote about the problems at the Cal-Vets Home already built on the West LA VA campus.  Not much has changed in terms of completing this project.

The settlement that was reached in the lawsuit filed against the VA back in 2011 required that non-veteran use of the 388 acres of the West LA campus be "curtailed" but it appears that the use of Jackie Robinson Stadium by UCLA and the Brentwood School athletic facilities on the VA grounds will continue.  What isn't clear in the news coverage of the release of the new "blueprint" for use of the campus is whether or not these tenants of the VA will continue to use these facilities for rents that are well below the market rate for such prime real estate.

The original gift of the real estate on which this campus sits was to providing housing to veterans.  Not to rent space to park buses.  Not to provide 20th Century Fox with a location to store sets.  Not to be home to the home games of the UCLA Bruins baseball team.

I can only imagine how the NIMBY neighbors of the West LA VA campus will rise up in outrage over the possibility of hundreds more homeless veterans taking up residence on a long-term basis right next to their million-dollar dwellings. 

Considering how the low level of esteem for the VA in the minds of most Americans given the revelations of malfeasance involving the wait for care of veterans, and the allegations that many men and women died while waiting for that care; is this the right time for breaking yet another commitment?  I think not.

Fun Friday Factoids

Donald Trump guarantees he can defeat ISIS, Russia and China, but then meekly surrenders to Megyn Kelly by cowardly skipping the GOP presidential debate.

McDonald's is selling mozzarella sticks that have no cheese. They claim the cheese melted out of the sticks during cooking.

The physician who discovered Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) in the brains of dead football players is willing to bet his medical license that O. J. Simpson has CTE.  Well, O. J. is in a Nevada prison, maybe there's a sports book nearby willing to take that bet.

They're going to make new Delorean cars.  Replicas of the one from 1985's Back to the Future.  They will reportedly sell for $100,000 each.  They will probably sell like hotcakes.

A female LAPD detective who was arrested for allegedly filing a false domestic violence charge against her former boyfriend is free on bail and "assigned at home with pay."  Good duty while you can get it.

TMZ.com is reporting that a salon in Beverly Hills was robbed by a woman who "...snatched cash from the register, slipped it inside her vagina and tried to make a run for it -- but an employee stopped her until cops arrived."  I guess their editor made them use the word vagina because he or she didn't want to use the word snatch twice in the same sentence.

Vin Scully is being honored by having Elysian Park Avenue renamed Vin Scully Avenue.  That's pretty cool.

A tiger who befriended a goat rather than eating it got into a fight with his long-time friend.  Fortunately the goat was rescued before becoming a meal.

A man who was being evicted for nonpayment of rent now faces homicide charges after the constable performing the eviction shot and accidentally killed his daughter.  This one has to be read to be believed.  NYT article

Porn star Ron Jeremy is trending at the moment.  Only it has nothing to do with him.  TN Lt. Governor Ron Ramsey is accusing state representative Jeremy Durham of having had an affair with a former state legislator.  Politics does make strange bedfellows.

Ian Desmond was the regular everyday shortstop for the Washington National last year.  He turned down a $107 million seven year contract extension in 2013 and then this past year turned down a one season qualifying offer of $15.8 million from the Nationals.  No one has shown interest in him during the free agent negotiations thus far.  Shall we start referring to him as the new Jody Reed?  From Wikipedia on Reed's history with the Dodgers:  Reed was offered a three-year $7.8 million contract extension by the Dodgers after the season but turned it down in order to become a free agent. He eventually wound up signing a one-year contract with the Milwaukee Brewers for only $350,000 plus incentives.

Young women in one area in South Africa can get free tuition for college, provided they are virgins.  I kid you not.  Tuition for virgins

Trump Skipping the Debate

Donald Trump has tossed another set of insults at Fox News' Megyn Kelly and is using her as an excuse for his choice to skip.

With all of his self-professed being the best at anything he tries, Donald Trump has no real credentials to denigrate the journalistic abilities of Megyn Kelly.  His degree is in business.  He's never been a working journalist.  He is certainly entitled to his opinion but it should carry no more weight than the opinion of anyone else who has never been the one holding the microphone.

We've had presidential debates for decades.  Never before has one candidate, a front-runner no less, refused to take part in a debate because he believes one of the panel of moderators is not qualified to be on that panel.  Part and parcel of being in such a debate is that you have no control over who is asking the questions.  You only have control over your responses.

But the real reason that Donald Trump isn't going to be on the debate stage on Thursday night is that he's actually a very risk-averse person.  Let's be clear.  He isn't averse to taking risks with other people's money.  Just ask the investors who lost their shirts when investing in the Trump businesses that wound up in bankruptcy. 

Donald Trump is within inches of winning a presidential caucus in Iowa.  Now is not the time to take risks because he could finally say something that will alienate caucus-goers.  He switched from fawning about Ted Cruz to blasting him when Cruz closed the gap in the polls.  Trump then found a way to make a deal with Sarah Palin, which for some absurd reason stopped the gains being made by Ted Cruz.  Actually it isn't so absurd.  She'd endorsed Cruz before.  The absurd notion is that anyone gives any weight to anything this clueless woman says or does.

There is another factor in play here.  If Donald Trump is afraid of tough and/or unfair questions from Megyn Kelly, it is yet another strong indicator that Mr. Trump is not qualified to be our nation's president.  When you're the President of the United States, you don't get to avoid dealing with other world leaders you believe will be treating you unfairly.  You can't choose to exclude members of the press from the White House Press Briefing room just because you think they're asking unfair questions.

For his entire life Donald Trump has been living in a delusional world where he is the best at everything and anytime he doesn't like the situation; he can pick up his marbles and just go home.  Being a leader of a nation doesn't work that way.  He lack leadership just as his continued misogynistic commentaries show he lacks empathy and compassion.

Skipping the debate is just one more sign that this man isn't qualified to be elected dogcatcher, let alone president.

Tonight in America

Tonight in America, military veterans are sleeping in an underpass just to the South of the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center. 

Tonight in America, children went to bed hungry.

Tonight in America, men, women and children have no home.

Tonight in America, mentally ill individuals who need help aren't receiving it.  They are being ignored.

Tonight in America, three politicians are conducting a town hall meeting in Iowa.  The 30th most populous state in the U. S. will hold the first primary event, elevating its important far above those of states with much larger populations. 

Tonight in America, the people of New Hampshire are preparing to hold the first actual primary election.  New Hampshire is the 43rd most populous state. 

Tonight in America, senior citizens have to choose between buying food or paying the co-payment for the portion of their prescription medications that isn't covered by Medicare and their supplemental insurance.

Tonight in America, billionaires continue to plot how best to spend tens of millions of dollars from their vast wealth, in order to influence this November's election outcome.

Tonight in America, our men and women are deployed around the world, in harm's way. 

Tonight in America, people without health insurance of any kind will go to emergency rooms, where their emergent care needs will be met.  But only those needs will be met.

Tonight in America, Ruth Madoff, the wife of convicted swindler Bernie Madoff is comfortably ensconced in a Connecticut home that was owned by her late son.

Tonight in America, Jordan Belfort (the real Wolf of Wall Street) is a free man.  He owes over $100 million in fines and restitution but reportedly has paid nothing toward that amount from his share of the profits from the movie about his life.

Tonight in America, people are ranting about the extreme threat posed to us by ISIS and letting their fear drive their thought process.

Tonight in America, a billionaire panders to prejudice and fear in order to try to gain the presidency. 

Tonight in America, more people are watching the WWE's Monday Night RAW than are watching the Democratic Presidential Town Hall on CNN.

Tonight in America, a friend of mine called us a sick society.  Is he wrong?

The turnover needs to increase

The 114th Congress has some interesting demographics.  There are 61 House members who are currently serving in their first year in Congress.  82 House Members are in their third year in Congress (there are two more who are in their second year)  145 out of 434  If you include them and calculate the average length of service in Congress, you get to the number 9.5 years of service.  Take out the freshman class and it goes up to 10.9.  Take out the sophomore class and it goes up to 13.2.

289 members of the House have an average of 6+ terms of service.  John Conyers, the longest serving member of the House is in the middle of his 26th elected term.  He is running for reelection, at the age of 86.  At least the voters in Manhattan will have a choice other than 84 year old Charles Rangell.  He has pledged not to seek a 43rd term in the House.


Over in the Senate, Vermont's Patrick Leahy is seeking another term, to build on the 41 years he's served thus far.  Apparently at 75, he feels that seven terms isn't enough and he needs an 8th.  Considering the average Senate member has served just under 12 years, Leahy is a bit out of step.  Or is he?

California's Senator Barbara Boxer isn't seeking reelection this November.  She's 75.  Dianne Feinstein's next election will be in 2018, if she runs again.  If she does, she will be 85 years old on election day.

We can't institute term limits for members of the House and Senate, according to the U. S. Supreme Court.  The bottom line is that because the deck is stacked in favor of incumbents, and because of the pervasive influence of Super PAC money, it's damn tough to beat a member of Congress who is seeking reelection.

During the reelection campaign of Ronald Reagan in 1984, a lot of people worried about his age.  Made noises about Alzheimer's and other potential infirmities.  Why doesn't that kind of thing come up in the campaigns for the House and Senate?

Good advice or bad advice?

This is a letter to "Dear Amy"

Dear Amy: Two years ago, my best friend “Jackie” ended our 15-year friendship because she felt “manipulated” and “put out” by me. Jackie asked me not to contact her, and I respected her wishes.
A few months before Jackie ended our friendship, I started decreasing the amount of time I spent talking with her. Most of the time, she and I talked about depressing events (such as gun violence) or superficial topics (like Kim Kardashian), and we would talk about these events for days. I felt depressed and hopeless (though not about Kim Kardashian, of course), and it just was not healthy.
Fast forward to now. I am engaged. While this is an exciting time, I also feel an overwhelming sadness that my best friend is not with me. I am not sure if our friendship can be repaired, or if I even want it to be repaired, but I don’t know what to do with this sadness. I just miss my best friend. What should I do? — Bride Without Her Best Friend

Here is Amy's response:

Dear Bride: Weddings and other important or ceremonial events often bring on grief and sadness for the people who are no longer in your life. It is simply part of the poignancy of a major life transition: Happy and sad seem intertwined.
Invite “Jackie” to your wedding, with a note saying, “I miss you! Brad and I hope you will share this special day with us.”
This would violate your “no contact” agreement, but this wedding could offer the two of you an opportunity to reset your friendship, even if this only results in cordiality.
You should not have any expectation that Jackie will attend your wedding, or even respond to your invitation, but you will feel better knowing you had sent this open-ended kindness her way.

I happen to think this is bad advice because it is advising the bride to engage in an incredibly selfish act.  If Jackie had any interest in rekindling the friendship, then it is up to her to reach out.  When she asked not to be contacted again, there was nothing ambiguous about that request.

The highest level of respect we can show to those we love and with whom we are friends is to respect the boundaries they set.  It's been nearly three years since my longtime best friend and I parted ways.  Last year, even though I had been asked not to contact her again, I sent her a quick note on her birthday just wishing her well.  Afterward I realized that had been the wrong thing to do.  She didn't want or need, nor did she acknowledge my note.  I should not have sent it.  If she wanted to get in touch again, it is incumbent on her, not me to make that move.

We delude ourselves into making choices that  aren't really what is best for the other person but we rationalize they are intended to be better for that person.  When someone is romantically interested in a person and the other person has no such feelings for that person, they'll come up with any reason to say "no thanks" except for the real reason.  "I'm not ready for that right now" or "It's me, not you." rather than simply saying "I just don't feel that way about you."  It can get worse.  When asked for a phone number, providing a false number is supposedly kinder than just saying no.  Is it really?  No it isn't.  It's designed to avoid the awkward nature of the discussion of not being interested.

My opinion is that the bride who wrote to Dear Amy should just press on, knowing she did the right thing by honoring her former best friend's final request to her.  Leave her be.  What is your opinion?

News items

Ted Cruz was talking Obamacare in New Hampshire at a campaign stop.  He said "I’ll tell you, you know who one of those millions of Americans is who’s lost their healthcare because of Obamacare? That would be me," he told an audience in Manchester, N.H., according to Politico. "I don’t have healthcare right now."

But according to Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times, Senator Cruz has no one to blame but himself.  Hitzik's article claims that Senator Cruz was aware of the fact that Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas was ending all of its PPO plans as of 12/31/2015 back in July of last year.  So the reason that the Cruz family is now without healthcare is because five months wasn't enough for the Senator and his wife to find a new policy.

Reporter's note:  Maybe if Senator Cruz had just elected to purchase COBRA insurance when his wife took an unpaid leave of absence from her job at Goldman Sachs, he wouldn't have this problem.  And he wouldn't need to tell lies about it.

* * *

Sarah Palin blamed President Obama for her son Track's arrest on domestic violence charges.  She made this specious allegation in the speech she gave announcing she was endorsing Donald Trump.  Trump claims he encouraged her to make this connection.

Reporter's note:  Even if the VA hasn't done a great job in providing access to treatment for veterans of the second Gulf War and Afghanistan, this is coming from a woman who is a multi-millionaire.  Maybe she should have whipped out the checkbook if she was that concerned with Track's need for treatment.

* * *

Charlotte Rampling is one of the nominees for this year's Academy Awards.  She is nominated in the Best Actress in a Lead Role category for her outstanding performance in 45 Years.  In an interview in French on the European Network 1, she called the current #OscarsStillSoWhite uproar "racist to whites."   The backlash was strong and immediate.  A number of Tweets came from people who had seen her name trending and worried that she had died, so they clicked to see what was going on.  More than one said that this was worse than her dying.

Reporter's note:  It's her first nomination for an Oscar and I'm guessing she feels that this uproar is suggestive that she may not be truly deserving of the award.  Or at least that's a charitable interpretation of her remarks.  The truth is that the real problem isn't the utter lack of nominations going to people of color, but the systemic racism in terms of opportunity in getting work in the film industry for minorities in terms of roles that lead to award recognition. 

Or maybe she's just pissed she missed out on playing Coretta Scott King at some point.

* * *

The United States Marines Corp is looking for a few good...mountain bikes.  Well, not really, they're looking to keep the riders of those bikes from trespassing on federal property.  The West Sycamore Canyon bike trail in Scripps Ranch (San Diego area) runs up to Naval Station Miramar property.  There are signs posted that the area is off-limits.  Now 45 mountain bikers have had their bikes confiscated by the Marines.  The riders were also cited and forced to endure what one biker called "a walk of shame" back to their cars.  The Marine Corps says the bicycles will be returned once the riders take care of the citations.

Reporter's Note:  Signs need to be heeded.  If it says don't enter, just because others have done it before and gotten away with it doesn't mean you'll be as lucky.

* * *

According to an audit by the Nevada Taxicab Authority, passengers using taxis in the Las Vegas area are being overcharged by some $47 million annually.  A big chunk of the overcharge is due to a $3 fee assessed anytime a passenger in a taxi pays via credit card.  Auditors were also critical of a fuel surcharge that is calculated using much higher estimated costs for gasoline than what drivers are paying at the pumps.

Reporter's note:  Now that Uber and Lyft are operating in Las Vegas, this problem may begin to correct itself.  Las Vegas taxi drivers have made lots of money driving visitors to and from the airport and on short jaunts.  If I go to Las Vegas, I wind up renting a car.  It's cheaper than dealing with taxis.

* * *

In late breaking news, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced that it will implement changes in the rules that will double the number of female and minority members of the organization by 2020.

Reporter's note:  The important thing here is they are also changing the rules about who can vote.  New members will enter the Academy with a ten year term as a voting member.  They can earn another ten year voting term if they remain active in the industry.  Three such ten year terms, or status as an Oscar winner or nominee is the only way to become a lifetime voting member.  They intend to apply these rules retroactively to current AMPAS members.  This won't fix Hollywood's diversity woes, but it is a welcome step in the right direction.

The 88th Annual Academy Awards in Black and White - Part III

A lot of people have a lot to say about the lack of diversity at the upcoming Academy Awards ceremony.

Jada Pinkett Smith said this on FB:

Spike Lee is NOT calling for a boycott of the ceremonies, nor is he boycotting by not showing up himself.  He clarified his position, saying he has tickets to the Knicks game that night and that is where he will be.  “I have never used the word ‘boycott,’ ” Lee said. “All I said was my beautiful wife, Tonya, we’re not coming. It’s like, do you? We're not coming.”

AMPAS president Cheryl Boone Isaacs released a statement:

"Aunt Viv" from Will Smith's TV show "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" also had a take on the situation:

On a personal level, I would be just fine with every single person of color in the entertainment industry choosing to boycott the upcoming Oscar telecast.  Maybe seeing a completely Caucasian audience facing the presenters would accomplish something.  Or not.  In fact, not.

As for Janet Hubert, she's certainly free to say whatever she feels but claiming that a taking a position on the lack of diversity in Hollywood is silly when there are so many more important things going on in the world is ridiculous.  Do we drop discourse on all other issues because of world hunger, ISIS and the like?  Of course not.  Her perception of the relative import of this issue is just that.  Her perception.

Spike Lee went on to hit the nail on the head about the root of this problem.  “It goes further than the Academy Awards. It has to go back to the gatekeepers,” Lee said. “We’re not in the room. The executives, when they have these green-light meetings quarterly, where they look at the scripts and they decide what we’re making and what we’re not making.”

The French word for king is "roi" and it bears mentioning in this discussion because there is an acronym known as ROI.  It is known as Return On Investment and it is the real king in Hollywood.  If the power people in Hollywood don't continue to generate a great ROI on the films they choose to green-light, their ability to turn the light green would disappear faster than Haley Joel Osmont's bankability did after A. I.

A good friend of mine (someone whose opinion I value very highly) and I were discussing this and this friend point out that one of the problems with Jada Pinkett Smith's rant is that she has the ability to make movies on her own.  Estimates of the combined net worth of Mr. and Mrs. Smith range between $200 million and $300 million.  That's enough money to go out and make any independent film you want to make.  Several such films as a matter of fact.  Tyler Perry makes his own movies and while they aren't winning Oscars, until the past few years, they were making money.

On the other hand, back in 2008 Jada Pinkett Smith was the executive producer of The Secret Life of Bees.  Her husband was the producer.  It was a terrific film.  It had people of color in almost all of the main roles.  It scored 78% with audiences on Rotten Tomatoes.  I'd have given it at least 3 out of 4 if I'd reviewed it for Tailslate.net.  Then she produced Karate Kid, a vehicle for her son, a television show that was a vehicle for her, and a couple of documentaries.  Oh yes, there was that dog of a movie, After Earth for her husband.  Then came 2014's Annie.  It made money, audiences liked it but the critics hated it.  Now she apparently has no productions in the pipeline.

Will Smith is currently involved in the production of a sequel to Hancock, a second Karate Kid movie and something interesting titled The American Can, the true story of a man's heroic efforts to save lives in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

So if the Smiths aren't happy with the types of roles that actors of color are getting in Hollywood, then in addition to calling for a boycott, maybe they should step up and attempt to be agents of change by providing the roles that minority actors currently don't get from those rooms that Spike Lee is talking about above.

In Hollywood, ROI is indeed King.  The Academy's voting membership is 94% Caucasian and 77% male.  Last year, in an effort to combat this problem 322 people were invited to join AMPAS, a record number.   Considering that the number of voting members of AMPAS was more than 5,800 at that time, and that apparently the only way a voting member ever leaves the group is by passing away, even at that rate, change in the demographics of the voting membership will continue to be slow.  Apparently in the room where films get the green-light, change is coming even more slowly.

More Broken Promises - This Time Regarding Pensions

The following is the text of an email I received, asking me to sign a Change.org petition.

"My husband worked for over 30 years for Yellow Freight, and he did it happily, knowing that all of his hard work came with the promise of a pension to support us in our retirement. In 2014, Congress decided that those promises don’t matter -- it passed the Multi-Employer Pension Recovery Act (MPRA), which allows for disastrous cuts to the pensions of those who are already retired and on a fixed income. The pension my husband earned will now be cut by 50%, putting our home and future in jeopardy. 

The MPRA was slipped into a must-pass Omnibus budget bill just days before it had to be voted on to keep the government from shutting down. This dirty tactic was the only way such an unfair law could get passed. Now, lawmakers like Sen. Bernie Sanders are trying to work to reverse the damage before it is too late, with the Keep Our Pension Promises Act (KOPPA).  

Tell Congress to protect seniors’ pensions. Pass the Keep Our Pension Promises Act.  For lawmakers, many of whom are financially secure and don’t need to worry about their retirement, stories like ours don’t seem to matter when they pass harmful legislation. Because of the MPRA, we are not sure if we can keep our home. Even worse, we have been helping two relatives with food and medical expenses, and will likely no longer be able to do so. We don’t live extravagantly. We rely only on the pension my husband earned, social security, and a few small investments.

I’m scared we will be expected to go back into the workforce in our late 60s if we want to survive. Even if we wanted to, my husband has a bad shoulder and hip from over 30 years of heavy lifting at Yellow Freight. I have a heart problem. It is a shame we are in a place where seniors even have to entertain this idea. The wealthiest country in the world can do better. Our lawmakers can do better.

People like us cannot afford laws like the MPRA. It must be reversed or seniors like us could find ourselves on the streets and living in poverty. Please join us in asking Congress to pass the Keep Our Pension Promises Act."

After reading this email I located and read the final version of this act as codified in the Internal Revenue Code.  I also read the adjacent code section that deals with the minimum funding requirements for pension plans.  Then I needed some extra-strength Tylenol to deal with the headache that resulted.

The bottom  line is this.  Congress stuck a modification to the law regarding pension plans into a consolidated continuing funding resolution and as a result thousands of retirees who went into retirement believing their pension benefits were secure are now facing cuts in those benefits.

This is not protecting the public as Congress is charged with doing.  That underfunded pension plans in risk of becoming insolvent is a problem is an undeniable fact.  The question is, how do we deal with this problem?  The solution was supposed to be the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation but that's not working out the way it was designed to.  Like every other government agency, it is broke.  The PBGC's deficit at the end of FY2010 was $23 billion and it has only gone up since then.

If banks are too big to fail, how can we let pension funds fail?

The 88th Annual Academy Awards in Black and White - Part II

I shared to my FB page a news story on how Jada Pinkett Smith and her husband Will Smith would be boycotting the Academy Awards ceremony next month.  One of my friends posted the following comment:

"If African Americans only make up 13.2% of the population shouldn't they get on average 13.2% of roles in Hollywood and in turn 13.2% of the nominations? Seems to me they are exceeding that number already. Am I missing something? Seems JPS might be a little bitter that her husband wasn't nominated for Best Actor in Concussion."

This fallacy is worthy of a blog post.  Yes my friend, you are indeed missing something.  The reality of the situation.  The Ralph J. Bunche Center for African-American Studies at UCLA published a study in 2014.   The study examined a number of factors, including the share of lead roles in theatrically released films that went to minorities.  Using 2010 Census data which showed that 36.3% of the population of the U. S. is "minorities."  Since minority actors were cast in only 10.5% of lead roles in the 172 films reviewed in 2011, it can be concluded that minority actors are grossly underrepresented in terms of their percentage of our population.  Women, who make up a much larger slice of the population were also underrepresented, as they received only 25.6% of the lead roles in those films.  

I did my own study of the last 20 years of Oscar nominations.  If we apply the 2010 Census data to this study, since there were 100 nominations in each of the 4 acting categories over the past two decades, there should be roughly 36 nominations of minority actors during that period in each category; using my friend's "logic" (and I use the term very loosely).  Here is how the numbers came out:

Best Lead Actor - 14 minority nominations, 2 wins
Best Lead Actress - 9 minority nominations, 1 win
Best Supporting Actor - 10 minority nominations, 4 wins
Best Supporting Actress - 14 minority nominations, 5 wins

Again, following my friends logic, 36% of each of the 20 years of wins should have gone to a minority.  That's 7+ wins per category over two decades and only one of the four categories came anywhere near 7+.  In terms of nominations, the number of minority nominations isn't even in the same zip code as the population demographics my friend cited.

The truth is that only one thing matters in the minds of those who make the decisions about which movies get made.  It's a three letter acronym that I will share in the third and final part of my look at the Oscars in Black and White.

The 88th Annual Academy Awards - In Black and White

Here are the nominees for Best Actor in a Lead Role:

Bryan Cranston for Trumbo
Matt Damon for The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio for The Revenant
Michael Fassbender for Steve Jobs
Eddie Redmayne for The Danish Girl

The nominees for Best Actress in a Lead Role are:

Cate Blanchett for Carol
Brie Larson for Room
Jennifer Lawrence for Joy
Charlotte Rampling for 45 Years
Saorise Ronan for Brooklyn

The nominees for Best Actor in a Supporting Role are:

Christian Bale in The Big Short
Tom Hardy for The Revenant
Mark Ruffalo for Spotlight
Mark Rylance for Bridge of Spies
Sylvester Stallone for Creed

And finally, the nominees for Best Actress in a Supporting Role are:

Jennifer Jason Leigh for The Hateful Eight
Rooney Mara for Carol
Rachel McAdams for Spotlight
Alicia Vikander for The Danish Girl
Kate Winslet for Steve Jobs

We all know the one thing every single one of these 20 actors have in common.  They are all Caucasian.  12 of the 20 have something else in common.  They have been nominated for an Academy Award for portraying a real life person.

Now does that explain why there isn't a single non-White actor or actress among the list of the nominees?  Of course not.  The explanation is a confluence of factors.  First and foremost is that the people who have the power to greenlight movies in Hollywood appear to believe that for the most part that White actors will results in higher box office receipts than non-White actors will.

Some will say that the recent success of Star Wars Episode VII - The Force Awakens disproves this notion.  One movie that would have done boffo box office with little regard to who was cast in the key roles anyway doesn't disprove a thing.  Bear in mind that we're talking about people who really don't give a damn about who is cast in the films they fund as long as those films make money.  Directors care.  People whose focus is the art of movie making care.  People whose focus is on the bottom line don't see black and white.  They see ink.  Black ink and red ink.  And too much red ink means your career in Hollywood is on the fast track to Nowheresville.

There are limits as to who you can cast in films when you're telling the stories of real people.  Denzel Washington and Will Smith are outstanding talents, but they couldn't play the role of Hugh Glass in The Revenant.  I think Ken Watanabe is a genius but you couldn't cast him as the lead in Steve Jobs.

Now when it comes to fictional characters, there is no good reason that roles can't be cast without focusing on the racial origins of such characters.  I'd love to see Idris Elba as James Bond.  I think he'd do a great job.  When fans of the Marvel Comic Books that are the origins of the character of Nick Fury heard that Samuel L. Jackson had been cast in this role, they cried foul.  Too damn bad.  It's a fictional character.  Stan Lee created the character and he apparently he did not have a problem with it.  I would have much preferred to see a man cast as Jack Reacher who had the physical presence of the character from the novels, even if that meant casting a non-white actor.

But I don't make those decisions about greenlighting movies.  The people that do have this apparent bigotry in making such decisions and we can accurately label it as systemic racism all we like.  It won't change a thing.

No one has a constitutional right to be a movie star.  If a producer wants to cast Jennifer Lawrence instead of a non-white actress in a role in a movie he or she is putting up $150 million to make, that's his right.  The EEOC can't tell him that person they must cast a person of color in the lead role.  It might well be a good business decision to do so, but it's more akin to leading a horse to water and trying to make it don a thong bikini.

Acting, writing and directing aren't jobs like bank teller, automobile mechanic and so on.  We can have discussions about which performers can do roles that were done by others but the bottom line is we just don't have the right to force the money people to treat everyone fairly.  Nor can we force an Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences that still remains primarily a "good old boy's club" for older boys when all is said and done; to recognize and extol the virtues of fine acting, writing and directing by people of color.  No matter that their doing so would mean they would finally be doing the right thing.

Walmart Store Closings Annoucement by the Numbers

Numbers

269
16,000
154
10
11,598
60


269 is the number of  Walmart stores that will be closed worldwide as the world's largest retailer announced on January 15, 2016.  16,000 workers work in those stores.  Of these 269 stores, 154 are in the U. S., representing roughly 10,000 employees.

More than 95% of these stores being closed are less than 10 miles from another Walmart store and the retailer is hoping to place as many of these workers as possible into those nearby locations.

There were 11,598 Walmart locations worldwide as of 11/15/2015, so the number of stores being closed represent only 2.3% of their footprint.  The 16,000 workers who may potentially lose their jobs represent 0.7% of the worldwide Walmart workforce.  That's of little comfort to those people who may lose their jobs.

Amazingly, Walmart is going to give the workers who do lose their jobs 60 days of severance pay along with resume and job interview training.

So what is driving this?  In spite of five consecutive quarters of increases in same-store sales as reported by CNBC, the retail behemoth is forecasting lower earnings this year.  They had previously announced they would be reviewing store performance with an eye to closing locations that aren't doing as well.  Most of the stores being closed are the Walmart Express locations.

The issue is competition.  Walmart has identified Amazon.com as a major competitor.  Is this the beginning of the end for the giant brick and mortar retailers that cater to the bargain hunting shoppers?  Probably not.

I haven't been inside a Walmart in ages.  Last time I shopped at one, it had a McDonald's inside.  It had a bank inside.  There was an income tax preparation business operating inside of the Walmart.  It was gigantic.  You could spend hours and hours wandering the aisles.  While online retailers can be very competitive with brick and mortar stores, they can't offer the experience of going shopping.  I can easily buy books from Amazon but I'd rather go to a Barnes and Noble and just browse until I find something I like.  The question is, are there enough people with my mindset to keep such places going.  It's a question I don't have an answer to.

Who Can Afford to Buy a House in Los Angeles?

A friend of mine posted this on Facebook today:

"Curious (not at all intended to be snarky): if homes in modest, formerly middle-class neighborhoods are now selling for $1.2 million and up, and you need to make at least a bit more than $200K per year to afford the mortgage payments (according to a conversation I saw elsewhere this morning), who is buying these houses? Who (what professions?) makes more than $200K per year?"

Do you have to have an annual household income of more than $200K to be able to afford to buy?  Bankrate.com tells us that if you want to buy a $1.2 million home and can put 20% down, the mortgage will run you $55,000 per year.  Add property taxes of $15,000 and you're looking at laying out more than 1/3rd of your gross income to buy.  But you're suddenly only paying income tax on $130,000 of your $200,000 income so Uncle Sam and Governor Moonbeam are eating a big chunk of your annual housing cost in tax breaks.  Is it doable?  Sure.  But it's all about priorities.

Lots of families are more focused on putting kids into private schools and that's an expense that can really make buying a house in L.A. difficult, if not impossible, to afford unless you have a really strong income.  Do you eat out, or economize by eating at home?  Are you driving a new car every year or every other year?  Or do you drive your car until it dies somewhere on the freeway?

Last year I was privileged to look at the incomes of my clients and that's more than 250 residents of this area.  And I can't share a single bit of that data because of my responsibility to client confidentiality.  But I can tell you that most of our preconceived notions about what professions and skills are currently paying are way off-base.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics tells us that the mean annual wage for an attorney working 2,000 hours in L. A. County was $127,000 in 2014.  I know lawyers who aren't my clients who do much worse, and others who do much better.  According to the City of Santa Monica's pay scale, the lowest annual salary for a City Attorney in S.M. is $245,000.  Close to double the mean salary in the county.  On the other hand, a Deputy Los Angeles County Counsel working in Child Support services starts out with an annual salary of $77,184.

Maybe the key to being able to afford to buy one of these homes is to go into education in the private university sector. I was going to include an image of the list of most highly compensated employees at USC and their FY2014 salaries but I couldn't make it readable for you.  So I'll choose a few.

Former USC president Steven Sample is at $1.3 million, just edging out the current president C. L. Nikias at $1.2 million.  Strange, since Mr. Semple left the university back in 2010 according to multiple sources.  He is supposedly teaching a course, but that's a lot of money to pay a professor who isn't teaching in the medical school.  Many USC med school professors earn more than $1 million from the university.

But I've digressed a bit.  The truth is, lawyers, doctors, many people in the entertainment industry and so on earn more than enough to buy a home.  Especially if they're willing to cut back on other lifestyle choice expenses.  Lots of people are homeowners because they inherited homes, or because they were the recipient of generosity provided by family or friends.

The bottom line, one I try to make all of my clients understand is that it is best if you can buy.  After ten years of renting an apartment, you have nothing to show for it but ten years of having had a roof over your head and a stack of 120 rent receipts.  Own a home for the same period and you have ten years of equity and large tax breaks.

Who can buy these homes?  Maybe you can.

 

It's Golden Globes night

 

Typical Hollywood/entertainment industry awards night.  Streets are closed off to traffic.  Crowds of fans standing along the Red Carpet access points anxious to get a glimpse of a star.  The hair is coiffed and moussed to perfection.  Love handles and pot bellies firmly restricted by Spanx.  Earrings and other bling fastened securely in place.  Toes cramped in uncomfortable shoes.  And that's just the men.

Much will be written about the fashions worn by the women and men who walked the Red Carpet on this night.  Much will be written about who were the winners and losers.  Who was slighted by not being nominated, who was insulted by their failure to win their category. Almost without exception every winner tonight will thank the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) in their remarks, along with loved ones, professional colleagues and the occasional psychic or therapist.

But the one entity that won't be the subject of much attention is the HFPA itself.  They will not release or publish their membership list.  According to the website Vulture.com, back in January of last year, the following names were the active membership (and therefore, those who vote on who will receive the Golden Globe Awards).

Paoula Abou-Jaoude (Brazil)
Mario Amaya (Colombia, Puerto Rico)
Vera Anderson (Mexico)
Ray Arco (Canada)
Husam “Sam” Asi (United Kingdom)
Rocio Ayuso (Spain)
Ana Maria Bahiana (Brazil)
Gilda Baum-Lappe (Mexico)
Philip Berk (Australia, Malaysia)
Elmar Biebl (Germany)
Silvia Bizio (Italy)
Jorge Camara (Dominican Republic)
Luca Celada (Italy)
Jean-Paul Chaillet (France)
Tina Johnk Christensen (Denmark)
Rui Henriques Coimbra (Portugal)
Jenny Cooney-Carrillo (Australia, New Zealand)
Jean E. Cummings (Japan)
Yola Czaderska-Hayek (Poland)
Patricia Danaher (Ireland)
Ersi Danou (Greece)
Noël de Souza (India)
Gabrielle Donnelly (United Kingdom)
George Doss (Egypt)
Mahfouz Doss (Egypt)
Dagmar Dunlevy (Canada)
Armando Gallo (Italy)
Margaret Gardiner (South Africa)
Barbara Gasser (Austria)
Andre Guimond (Canada)
John Hiscock (United Kingdom)
Helen Hoehne (Germany)
Anke Hofmann (Germany)
Nellee A. Holmes (Russia)
Munawar Hosain (Denmark, Germany, United Kingdom)
Yoram Kahana (Germany)
Erkki Kanto (Finland)
Theo Kingma (Australia, the Netherlands, Cuba)
Mirai Konishi (Japan)
Ahmed Lateef (Hong Kong)
Elisa Leonelli (Italy)
Gabriel Gustavo Lerman (Spain)
Emanuel Levy (United Kingdom)
Lisa Lu (China)
Lilly Lui (Hong Kong)
Ramzi Malouki (Algeria, Belgium, France, Morocco, Tunisia)
Michele Manelis (Australia)
Karen Martin (Germany)
Paz Mata (Spain)
Juliette Michaud (France)
Kristien Gijbels Morato (Belgium)
Aud Berggren Morisse (Norway)
Yukiko Nakajima (Japan)
Yoko Narita (Japan)
Aniko Navai (Hungary)
Janet Nepales (the Philippines)
Ruben Nepales (Dubai, the Philippines)
Alexander Nevsky (Russia)
Yenny Nun-Katz (Chile, Peru)
Scott Orlin (Germany)
Mira Panajotovic (Serbia)
HJ Park (South Korea) (only member of HFPA who is also a member of the L. A. Film Critics Association)
Alena Prime (Tahiti)
Serge Rakhlin (Latvia, Russia, Ukraine)
Patrick Roth (Germany)
Mohammed Rouda (Lebanon, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom)
Frank Rousseau (Belgium, France, French Antilles)
Ali Sar (Russia)
Frances Schoenberger (Germany)
Elisabeth Sereda (Austria)
Dierk Sindermann (Austria, Germany, Switzerland)
Judy Solomon (Israel)
Lorenzo Soria (Italy)
Hans J. Spürkel (Austria, Switzerland)
Magnus Sundholm (Sweden)
Aida Takla-O’Reilly (Dubai)
Meher Tatna (Malaysia, Singapore)
Jack Tewksbury (Argentina)
Hervé Tropéa (France)
Lynn M. Tso (Taiwan)
Katherine Tulich (Croatia)
Kirpi Uimonen Ballesteros (Finland)
Alessandra Venezia (Italy)
Marlène von Arx (Switzerland)
Noemia Young (Canada)

83 names and the only one I recognized is the one who is using the name of a Sergei Eisenstein film released in 1938 rather than his real name of  Sasha Kuritsyn.  Everyone who is anyone in the movie or television industry is at the Beverly Hills Hilton tonight to pay homage to the recipients of an award that less than 100 people decided.  That's one serious power base.  So how do you become a member of the HFPA?  The following is lifted from the application on the HFPA's website.


Please submit the following information:

1. Letter of appointment as a Hollywood correspondent from a foreign publication of recognized standing, published outside the continental United States. This letter should describe and support the “standing” of your publication: circulation, age group, etc.
2.  Four complete and original issues from such foreign publication(s), each with one or more articles/interviews which must include your byline. If your publication(s) are not in Roman characters, please add a detailed, signed translation of the publication(s) title, date, title of the article and your name as they appear in the publication(s). Please highlightthe information. (These publications must be dated after June 30, 2014.)
3.  Evidence of payment from your foreign publication(s).
4.  Letter of recommendation from each sponsor detailing how long you have been covering the entertainment industry while residing in the greater Southern California area and possible additional information regarding your journalistic activities.

So you need references, two sponsors and there is an initiation fee of $500.  A sum the applicant will easily recoup five to ten times over in swag received during their first year of membership.  You must also publish four articles on film per year, in media originating outside the U.S., while maintaining a permanent residence in the U.S.  HFPA rules limit them to adding only five new members in any one year, although membership appears to have been fairly static.  Many of the current members have been part of the HFPA for decades, including one woman who is nearing her 60th year of membership.

83, 97, 101, however many members this organization has at any given moment, the amount of influence they have in Hollywood is enormous.  A Reuters.com statistical analysis of the financial impact of the Golden Globe awards and the Academy Awards on box office receipts shows the Golden Globes have a much more dramatic impact on those receipts.  This analysis shows that a film that wins a Golden Globe can expect a boost in box office receipts of $14.2 million, while an Oscar will push those receipts higher by "only" $3 million.

There's nothing untoward to be found in the HFPA financials.  I looked at their last three years of tax returns and find that fiscal responsibility in the organization is improving.  That doesn't mitigate my concern about so few wielding so much influence in a multi-billion dollar industry.  

People have whispered allegations that Golden Globes have been bought and sold by entertainment industry power players.  There is no hard evidence of this.  But when you consider the number of votes needed to win a Globe, versus an Oscar or an Emmy, IF someone were to try to buy an award, the Globes would be the easiest to target.