"Projects which must be protected from economics by special arrangements are suspect vehicles for long term development."
As I saw it then--and as I still see it now--there are four steps to institutional change. First, you have to get the big ideas right--you have to determine the right overarching concepts and intellectual underpinnings. Second, you have to communicate the big ideas effectively throughout the breadth and depth of the organization. Third, you have to oversee implementation of the big ideas--in this case, first at our combat training centers and then in actual operations. And fourth, and finally, you have to capture lessons from implementation of the big ideas, so that you can refine the overarching concepts and repeat the overall process.
I learned at JSOC,” McChrystal explained, “that any complex task is best approached by flattening hierarchies. It gets everybody feeling like they’re in the inner circle, so that they develop a sense of ownership. The more people who believe that they are part of the team and are in the know, the more you don’t have to do it yourself.”
“Decentralize until you’re uncomfortable, then scrutinize, fix, and push down and out even further, to the level of the sergeants.”
(B)ecause of the commander’s ability to reach down to the junior noncommissioned officers, a flat military organization puts—in the words of one admiral I interviewed—“performance pressure on everybody.”
I have learned from working with good NCOs over the years that Soldiers come first. This is in spite of the fact that every Army school I have attended has preached mission first. If you take care of your men, the men will take care of the mission.- empahsis mine. Yep, good stuff. It jives with my beliefs about management, as well as freedom and personal responsibility, and seems to work for the most successful military in the world operating in some very challenging environments. It would be interesting to see what the Israeli philosophy on these topics is.
We defeated Saddam Husseins Iraq. In it’s place we sowed the seeds of a western style democracy in the heart of the Islamic world, right next door to the evil theocracy of the Iranian Republic, the birthplace and spiritual heart of the modern Islamo-fascist movement. And we drew in thousands of Jihadi’s into a battlespace of our choosing, where our tactics, techniques, and equipment could perform at their peak efficiency. And we slaughtered them. In our way, not theirs.
There’s an old expression I just made up: There’s no liberal in a bear attack. In matters of life and death, like a bear ripping apart your house, there is no time to morally preen and pat yourself on the back for how smart you sound.
Back in the day, life was pretty brutal for everyone, so there just weren’t any liberals. Unserious people starved to death or were mauled by giant sloths. With death lurking around every corner, people had no time for useless worries like whether warming the ozone would kill unicorns or whatever.
Things are a lot easier now — so easy that even useless people can survive — and thus we now have to suffer liberals. But we have one brutal leftover from the olden days. War. And it’s not something a liberal is ever going to learn to deal with.
"A statement from the American Family Association explained, "Tampa Police arrested Robert Johnson in February 2008 for hanging out in the locker room–restroom area at Lifestyle Fitness and watching women in an undressed state. The City of Tampa's 'gender identity' ordinance could provide a legal defense to future cases like this if the accused claims that his gender is female."
"This ordinance will give lawful protection to cross-dressing males to patronize women's restrooms," the Florida Family Association said in a statement. "And men dressed as women or women who perceive themselves as men can also use men's restrooms."
I am less than sanguine regarding the immediate future. And that quote summarizes why pretty nicely.
To solve a problem caused by malinvestments resulting from easy credit at 1 percent interest rates, the Fed is supplying even more easy money at 0.25 percent. None of the malinvestments have been allowed to be liquidated.Housing prices have been propped up, banks and auto companies have been bailed out, regulations have been increased, debt covenants have been violated, unemployment insurance has been extended. In addition, there's the cap-and-trade bill, the healthcare bill, and a "czar" around every corner.
All of these increase the already-humongous burden on wealth creators. In short, the problems that caused the Great Recession have been compounded. Real output must then necessarily decline. How can anyone logically assert that we are in the beginning of a recovery?
“It is amazing that people who think we cannot afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, and medication somehow think that we can afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, medication and a government bureaucracy to administer it.”- Thomas Sowell
"When I see those in government, both locally and in Washington, spend and tax and come up each day with new ways to spend and tax—health care, cap and trade, etc.—I think: Why aren't they worried about the impact of what they're doing? Why do they think America is so strong it can take endless abuse?
I think I know part of the answer. It is that they've never seen things go dark. They came of age during the great abundance, circa 1980-2008 (or 1950-2008, take your pick), and they don't have the habit of worry.
...
We are governed at all levels by America's luckiest children, sons and daughters of the abundance, and they call themselves optimists but they're not optimists—they're unimaginative. They don't have faith, they've just never been foreclosed on."
"Give me twenty bucks," says Uncle Sam, to nephew citizen.
And the twenty is given for we trust our Uncle.
"Here's $17. There I've stimulated you. Oh, and here's how to spend it," says Sam.
"Hey, where's the other three?" says nephew citizen.
"That's to pay me to write the rules on how you should spend the $17 I gave you."
"But that's my $20 you took."
"What, you're anti-family? We're all in this together you know. So just be patriotic and give me your money so I can tell you how to spend it."
"Geez, what a bum."
"Now you're being seditious."
Read the whole thing here.
“Cheap money is a stimulant, also an intoxicant. If the dose is large enough, a substantial temporary effect can be brought about, but headaches follow. If the matter really were that simple, everybody could be an economist, and only the perversity of central banks would keep us from endless prosperity. Merchants and manufacturers will not be induced to increase borrowings, since interest on money borrowed is only one small factor in total costs. But if merchants and manufacturers will not use cheap money, speculators will”. Benjamin Anderson, Chief Economist of Chase National Bank, New York Times, April 1930
I believe that housing is one market where a lot of that cheap money went the first time, and the bursting of that bubble was the downturn of 2008. I don't know that all the nonproductive speculation went into housing, though. There will be more to come. IMO The recent stock market recovery is fueled by money looking for a home rather than on the strengths of the business activity of the underlying companies, which makes it a bubble unless the underlying business picks up to a point to warrant the stock values. Time will tell, but I'm not betting on a continued stock resurgence.
Ty Andros at Financial Sense University says the same thing, much more eloquently and with actual documentation. I swiped the quote from his article.
