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| Friday, January 6th, 2012 | | 3:07 pm |
Peter Mayer's Winter Spirit concert on January 21st in Arlington, MA
Peter Mayer is an amazing singer-songwriter from Minnesota with a strong spiritual bent (mystical and scientific, not dogmatic -- he's a Unitarian Universalist), a quirky sense of humor, and an amazing way with a guitar. I'm bringing him to Arlington for a Winter Spirit concert because I love his music and want to share it. He will be joined by Matt Meyer, a local musician and UU worship leader. I hope you'll join us, and I hope you'll let other people who might enjoy this concert know about it too. Full details are: Peter Mayer Winter Spirit concert 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, January 21st First Parish Unitarian Universalist of Arlington 630 Massachusetts Avenue in Arlington Center Tickets are $12 in advance (at the Book Rack, 13 Medford Street in Arlington Center, or by emailing concert@firstparish.info) or $15 at the door. Or whatever you can afford -- I need help in covering expenses, but don't want to exclude anyone! | | Tuesday, November 1st, 2011 | | 5:28 pm |
wonderful Hajj video this Sunday at First Parish Arlington
The month of Hajj has begun, and more than two million Muslims are converging on Mecca for a pilgrimage that has roots before the time of Muhammad. In honor of the season, we will be showing an excellent film about Hajj this Sunday evening, November 6, at 7 p.m. in the parlor at First Parish Arlington. "Inside Mecca" follows three individuals -- an Indonesian businessman, a black South African man, and a white woman from the United States -- as they prepare for and go on Hajj. The film includes beautiful and fascinating footage of Mecca, explains the meanings of the Hajj rituals, and explores the personal experiences of three very different people. The film is about an hour, and then we'll have 20 or 30 minutes for reflections. If you are curious about Mecca or the Hajj, and you're in the Arlington area, please join us! First Parish is located at 630 Mass Ave in Arlington Center. Use the side entrance, facing the Robbins Library, and we will be in the first room on your left. Parking is behind the library or in the municipal lots on the other side of Mass Ave. Everyone is welcome, so please feel free to forward this invitation to anyone who might be interested in this film. | | Sunday, October 23rd, 2011 | | 5:12 pm |
I'm giving a talk tomorrow on stories about Muhammad -- what we can know about the historical person, some of the stories of miracle and wonder, multiple stories about Muhammad as a military leader, and multiple stories about Muhammad's relationships with women, all interwoven with reflections on story-telling. If you'd like to join us, the talk will be from 7 to 9 p.m. at First Parish Arlington, 630 Mass Ave in Arlington Center. The talk will be in the parlor, so use the side door, facing the Robbins Library, and the parlor will be the first room on your left. Parking is behind the library or in the municipal lots on the other side of Mass Ave. This program is open to everyone, so I hope you'll consider joining us! | | Wednesday, October 19th, 2011 | | 5:15 pm |
If you give hockey players a choice, most of them won’t wear a helmet. A helmet interferes with their play a little bit, and they will choose to do what they can to maximize their chances of winning the game. If, however, you give hockey players a vote, most of them will vote to make helmets mandatory. They know that if everyone wears helmets then no one has a no-helmet advantage over anyone else, and everyone has a bit smaller chance of getting paralyzed or dying. I just finished reading a really interesting book called Darwin’s Economy, by the economist Robert Frank. As just about everyone knows, Adam Smith talked about the ways that competition can make the world better for everyone. As fewer people know, Adam Smith also acknowledged that competition does not always make the world better for everyone. Drawing on Darwin’s insights about competition for rank and status, Frank explores the second type of competition. No matter how good we all get, not everyone can win the hockey game – or send their kids to the best schools. Indeed, whenever we are competing for rank or status, not for something everyone can theoretically achieve, there are systematic dangers that our individual choices will lead us to a situation that we don’t actually want, but we can’t change the system individually. So we spend more and more on housing, because expensive houses get our kids into the best schools, while under-investing in the mundane things that keep our economy ticking and prevent fatal accidents – such as bridge repairs. Frank’s primary intended audience is rational libertarians – people who agree with John Stuart Mill’s dictum that individual freedom should not be limited unless the lack of limitation causes undue harm to others. His goal is to take seriously libertarian ideas and develop a theory of government regulation and taxation that fits libertarian principles. His bigger goal is to help solve our country’s seemingly intractable economic, environmental, and political challenges. I recommend this book! | | Thursday, September 22nd, 2011 | | 11:59 am |
Some of you may have heard about the high school football team from Dearborn, Michigan, nearly all of whom are observant Muslims, so during Ramadan they practice in the middle of the night -- but they can't play teams from other towns in the middle of the night! Starting tomorrow, the award-winning documentary "Fordson," which follows this team and explores life in a working class Arab-American community, will be playing in Boston for just one week. This film sounds intriguing to me and I thought other folks might want to know about it. The director will also be there tomorrow evening to answer questions. According to an email from the executive director of the Center for Arabic Culture in Somerville that was forwarded to me, it took some intense lobbying to get AMC to bring this film to Boston. You can get information about show times and purchase tickets here: http://www.amctheatres.com/Movies/Fordson__Faith,_Fasting,_Football/ And more information about the movie and the Arab-American community in Dearborn here: http://fordsonthemovie.com/story.php | | Friday, June 3rd, 2011 | | 2:54 pm |
fun concert tomorrow
There will be a fun benefit concert tomorrow by the Gloucester Hornpipe & Clog Society, which will offer a rollicking evening of music from Celtic, New England, sea chanty, and Canadian traditions. All proceeds will go to the Rebekah Carter Fund to help pay the expenses of the 11- and 13-year-old sons of the step-sister of a dear friend of mine. Rebekah has been hospitalized since February after emergency surgery. She is now in a rehab hospital and expected to return to work eventually, but the concert will help hold the family together until then. The concert will be at 7 p.m. tomorrow, Saturday, June 4, in the Friends Meeting House in Cambridge, at 5 Longfellow Park (off Brattle Street). There will be a free-will offering with a suggested donation of $10. I am planning to go, and I hope to see some of you there! | | Friday, May 6th, 2011 | | 9:53 am |
update on Revenue Committee hearing
Thank you to everyone who responded with good wishes after my slightly-nervous post on Wednesday. The hearing yesterday went well, I think, and it was certainly fascinating for me. I’d never been at such a hearing, and I stayed from the beginning to the end, with the exception of about an hour when I was at a press conference in another part of the building. Lots of experience points :-). Hundreds of people were there, and something like forty (fifty?) people, including several legislators, testified in support of the Act to Invest in Our Communities. One person, the associate director of Citizens for Limited Taxation, testified against. Maybe there were other opponents when I was out of the room at the press conference, but given his complaint that the committee was hearing only from supporters, I don’t think so. I thought our little team of three did well in the testimony, and the third person I pulled in did a fantastic job at the press conference. He’s a small business owner here in Arlington and was very effective in that context. There was also another small panel of business owners explaining how their businesses depend not just on state-supported infrastructure (the T, for example), but also on having a big pool of highly skilled employees and customers, who could be driven away if Massachusetts changes too much due to spending cuts. A few other people mentioned that they would pay more under this Act but support it anyway. There were, of course, plenty of people talking about elder care and education – areas where spending cuts translate directly into individuals getting hurt. I care about those issues too, but I was glad there were some of us there looking at the bigger systemic issues that are so important for our state’s (and country’s) economic sustainability. And I was very pleased that we were not the only ones saying – yes, tax us more, it’s worth it! | | Wednesday, May 4th, 2011 | | 5:34 pm |
life's little adventures ...
Randy and I are going to testify before the state legislature’s Revenue Committee tomorrow to ask them to raise our taxes. The “Act to Invest in Our Communities” would raise the state income tax rate but also raise the exemption. Households earning under about $70K would get a tiny tax cut, somewhere around $100K people would start to pay more, and somewhere around $200K they would start to pay significantly more. Wish me luck! (In case someone wants to read my testimony, it’s under the cut.) (Randy and I divvied up topics, and at the moment I like his testimony more than mine, but I'll let him share it if he wants to.) ( Read more... ) | | Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011 | | 2:29 pm |
The No Labels Declaration
We are not labels – we are people. We care deeply about our country. We are frustrated and concerned about the tone of politics. We are passionate about addressing America’s challenges. We are Democrats, Republicans and Independents. Most importantly, we are Americans. We believe hyper-partisanship is destroying our politics and paralyzing our ability to govern. We may disagree on issues, but we do so with civility and mutual respect. We believe in the vital civil center — a place where ideas are judged on their merits. We believe that together we can make the future better and brighter — and give us what we all deserve — a government and a political system that works — one driven by shared purpose and common sense. We believe our politics can change, so that government will work again and produce better results. The consequences of inaction have never been greater, because the issues we face have never been more serious, more complicated, or more dangerous. And yet, we have a crisis of governance – A crisis that compels us to work together to move America forward. We must put our labels aside, and put the issues and what’s best for the nation first. A promising future awaits us. * * * * * I’ve been getting a little involved with a new organization called No Labels, which is trying to get people to set aside hyper-partisanship and division and work together to create practical solutions to practical problems. I agree with the big goal, and I’ve particularly liked how they’ve been talking about tax/budget/debt issues. I’ve been on several conference calls with the national leadership and various political figures, and they seem constructive to me. Lots of people say you can’t organize the political center, because centrists don’t care enough. No Labels hopes to prove them wrong. If you’d like to support this effort by signing the No Labels Declaration, it’s here: http://nolabels.org/about-us/declaration/ The first Massachusetts organizing meeting will be on the Northeastern campus on the evening of Tuesday, May 10. I’m thinking about going but haven’t decided yet. If you’d like details about location and such, let me know in comments. | | Friday, March 4th, 2011 | | 3:27 pm |
Every time I see today’s date I think of my grandmother, who died on this day 26 years ago. I still miss her. | | Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011 | | 1:24 pm |
Want to know more about what the Qur’an says about women, gender, and sexuality?
I'll be talking about gender in the Qur'an next Monday, March 7, from 7 to 9 pm in the parlor of the First Parish Unitarian Universalist in Arlington Center (630 Mass Ave). It would be lovely to have friends there. I think this talk would be helpful for anyone who is trying to sort through the various claims about how Islam views women. For example, the Qur'an never advocates stoning anyone. While the Qur'an is not a modern feminist document, I don't think it is nearly as misogynistic as some of its followers and critics claim. If you'd like to know more about what it does say, please consider joining us. | | Tuesday, February 15th, 2011 | | 4:07 pm |
Please sign this petition if you want women worldwide to have access to reproductive health care, including contraception and sterile supplies for childbirth. The UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund) is one of the key organizations saving women's lives worldwide, and the US has repeatedly refused funding to it because of abortion politics. It's on the chopping block again, and needs political support. http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-congress-fully-fund-unfpa | | Thursday, January 13th, 2011 | | 5:07 pm |
your tax cuts at work ...
MassINC recently reported that the tax credits given the film industry cost Massachusetts taxpayers $323,838 per job in Massachusetts in 2009. Tax expenditures (special tax provisions) are generally a rotten way to create jobs, but they're one of the primary job-creation strategies of our state and country nowadays because they can be sold as tax cuts. If our tax code were really focused on fostering economic prosperity, it would eliminate special favors to specific companies and industries, have a moderate tax on corporate profits that affects all businesses equally, and use tax proceeds to support the strategies that have been shown to help companies and job-seekers in more cost-effective ways. Among other things, this would mean that businesses would spend more time doing their business rather than lobbying for tax credits, figuring out how to twist their practices to take advantage of a complicated tax code, and spending huge amounts on accountants and paperwork to calculate and manipulate their taxes. http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/623016/10cfd694f9/317388327/ddc25cded9/ | | Tuesday, January 11th, 2011 | | 10:27 pm |
| | Tuesday, January 4th, 2011 | | 12:51 pm |
A little factoid with big implications
I knew US tax rates were low in international terms, but I didn’t know how low. It turns out that we’re number 25 out of 27 OECD countries for which full data is available – only Turkey and Mexico are lower. This includes state and local taxes as well as federal ones. No wonder we’re having difficulties creating and maintaining a modern infrastructure! See the graph here: http://www.ctj.org/pdf/oecd111110.pdf | | Wednesday, December 8th, 2010 | | 11:32 am |
continuing to clarify my beliefs and goals
I had a good conversation with the Concord Coalition’s outreach person last week, and he sent me some useful materials in a follow-up email. I’ve continued to reflect, however, on whether I want to work with/for them. It would be wonderful to have colleagues and to be part of a larger structure – part of me hungers for that. But there are real differences between my focus and the CC’s focus. Of course, any organization has internal differences, but how much is too much? In the last couple days I’ve concluded the differences are too much. I respect the work they are doing, but I don’t think I can speak for them. Here’s how I just explained my position to the outreach person: ( Read more... ) | | Tuesday, November 30th, 2010 | | 9:40 am |
a brief update
A couple weeks ago I went to a conference co-sponsored by the Concord Coalition and the New England Economic Partnership. It was partly an economic forecast for New England (that part was on the front page of the Globe the next morning) and partly a discussion of the federal deficit and its likely impact and possible solutions. I was amused to be part of an audience that was presumed to be all economists. And I found the conference fascinating – though seven hours of listening to economics in one day is a bit much. One of my reasons for going was to get more of a feeling for some of the speakers – people I’d read and read about, but that’s not the same as seeing them in person. I ended up quite impressed with David Walker (former head of the Government Accountability Office and now CEO of the Peterson Foundation), Diane Lim Rogers (chief economist of the Concord Coalition), and Mark Zandi (chief economist of Moody Analytics). After the conference I talked with one of the staff people from the Concord Coalition, and we have a phone date to talk tomorrow about how and whether I might want to work with them. (For now this is volunteer, but they don’t currently have a staff person in New England.) I’m still in an exploration phase, trying to learn as much as possible and figure out where I can make the most difference. I expect that I’ll be organizing some events in 2011, but December is a time for laying groundwork, not for trying to get people’s attention. Yesterday I read David Walker’s “Comeback America: Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility,” which was published in September. In 1998 Clinton appointed Walker to a 15-year term as the country’s comptroller general – basically, our chief accountant, responsible for making sure the federal government uses its resources well. This guy knows a lot about how our government works, and doesn’t work. In 2008 he resigned from the GAO to devote his energy full-time to reducing the federal debt. He’s knowledgeable, passionate, and full of ideas about how to do things better. I found particularly interesting his chapters on how he reorganized the GAO to make it mission-driven, future-oriented, and effective at using resources, and how the same principles need to be applied to the Pentagon. In 2008, by his calculation, the GAO saved the federal government $110 for every $1 in its budget. Now that’s an effective agency! I’ve been going back and forth on whether I can best accomplish my goals by becoming part of a larger organization, such as the Concord Coalition or the Peterson Foundation, or whether it’s better to start a new organization that is more focused on building support for higher taxes. Or both. There are obvious advantages to having colleagues and joining an organization with infrastructure, money, and name recognition. But the CC and PF are focused on deficit reduction, while I am equally concerned about under-investment in the public structures that we need as a country. It’s not that they don’t share that concern at all. Here’s David Walker on the issue: “One option – cutting investments in America’s future in order to finance our large and growing mandatory spending programs – is another way of cheating the next generation. Unfortunately, today we are both cutting our investments in the future and handing our descendents a mountain of debt. That is a double whammy for young people and the unborn. It’s not just irresponsible, it’s immoral and downright un-American. … The ultimate goal of cleaning up our fiscal policy is not to avoid a recession or even to balance the budget per se – it’s to pass on the kind of healthy, vibrant nation that we inherited.” So fundamentally we’re in agreement, but there’s a difference in emphasis. The CC and PF beat the drum a lot about the need to reform Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. In my opinion, Social Security doesn’t need a lot of change to be financially sustainable, just some moderate and reasonable adjustments that are in keeping with the history of the program, and I’m worried that over-stating its problems is part of an ideological political attack that I want to be very careful not to assist in any way. Health care inflation, on the other hand … that is the root of so many of our problems. I’m looking forward to my conversation with the CC person tomorrow … | | Thursday, November 18th, 2010 | | 9:00 am |
Someone mentioned a website where you tell it what foods you have in the house and it suggests recipes using those ingredients. I’m hoping someone can point me to that link again? Yesterday was my second delivery from a company called Boston Organics. Once a week they deliver a box of all-organic produce. I get to choose the fruit/veggie proportions as well as the size of the box, can give them a “not this” list, and can make special requests (including excellent bread from Nashoba Brook Bakery). I decided to give them a try after Arlington’s farmers’ market closed for the season, and so far I’m pleased. But having stocked up at the farmers’ market in its last two weeks, and now getting weekly additions, I’m a bit over-supplied with winter squash, apples, potatoes, onions, and kale. There are worse problems! | | Thursday, November 11th, 2010 | | 10:32 am |
[Edit: Nixed on the grounds of the comment from yagagriswold. Back to the drawing board ... ] I hope I’m not getting people sick of this name-choosing process! But I’d like to run one more idea past you folks: Invest in Our Country:
A Pro-Tax NetworkThe primary issues I’m thinking about are: (1) Make it clear what the organization stands for. (2) “Paying Our Share” is the name that gets the most positive responses, but also the most negative responses. I’m concerned about a name that strikes multiple people as smug and distasteful. I also found helpful beccalive’s comment about not wanting to foreground vexed issues of fairness; that verbalized a disquiet I’ve been feeling. (3) “Invest in Our Country” is (to quote beccalive) a “summary of what I think taxes ought to be.” I like that. (4) But is it too long? My impression is that business names are usually one or two words, while not-for-profit names are often three words (where little words like “in” don’t fully count). I notice that three friends in the techy/business world have suggested avoiding a name longer than two words, but most commenters did not object to three-word names on grounds of length. “Invest in Our Country” fits on one line of my draft business card in a nice big font, which is one of my criteria. So I think it’s OK, but it does add up to a lot of characters in an email address! (5) I like reclaiming patriotism, but names that do so explicitly seem to feel polemical to me, and I don’t want to be polemical – we have enough strident voices around. A title that refers to “our country” feels more gently patriotic and therefore more comfortable for me. (6) Most importantly, I guess, this is the first name that I’ve felt I could live with in a long-term relationship. But so far it’s been only an hour, so I’m not sure whether to trust that feeling. I’m feeling some time-pressure about this issue because there’s a conference next Wednesday at the Federal Reserve building in Boston on reducing the deficit, where several people I’ve been reading are speaking. I want to get a better sense of them and their organizations, so I’m going to the conference, and it would be helpful to have business cards printed by then. Thoughts? Reactions? Connotations? | | Wednesday, November 10th, 2010 | | 10:16 am |
I’m currently considering five [edit: six] names for a pro-tax organization, listed below in alphabetical order. If you have time and interest, I’d appreciate any sort of commentary you might want to give – what you like or don’t like, what the connotations are for you, other suggestions, anything. Citizens Investing in Our Country Doing Our Share Patriots for Taxes Paying Our Share Pro-Tax Network Taxes Are Great (TAG, we’re it!) Thank you, everyone, who has given me supportive feedback during this exploration. I’m somewhat amazed how many of my friends seem to think this is a good idea. |
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