Private & Corporate Greed vs Public Good & Neighbors - Why Regulation? Perfect Poster Child

Out-of-sight leads to "out-of-mind" irony!  How has this come to be?  Campaign money in their pocket and a tilted WI Legislature dominated by the GOP clothed in "all regulation (hence government)  is bad" - and bad for business.  As a significant agricultural state more analogies seem appropriate ... "We have had the GOP guarding the chicken coop" far too long.

I have an engineering friend who deals with zoning and regulation all the time.  He is glad to have some government "rules" or he would be building high rises without sprinkler systems - because the customer would want it that way in order to compete with other builders.

These "literal downstream consequences" are so easy to overlook until the stream becomes muddy or the trout disappear.

Perhaps even more ironic ... is the "groundwater" treated as a "free good" ... I only have to pay for the high-capacity well and electricity to operate it ... the water is free even it comes unwillingly from my neighbor. Remember water flows downhill even groundwater ... and campaign money is perhaps more important than the "public good".

 Assembly Lawmakers Debate High Capacity Wells 
"These are not our resources to give," says Representative Chris Taylor while speaking on the Assembly floor on the subject of high capacity wells. "They are our resources to protect for the people of our state and for their children and for their children." On May 2, 2017, author of the bill, Gary Tauchen, explains, "We need to recognize, too, that manufacturing and agriculture are the big job drivers in the state of Wisconsin."

As global groundwater disappears, rice, wheat and other international crops may start to vanish

... and in Wisconsin

WATER usage | HIGH-CAPACITY WELLS

State OKs pumping of 1 billion gallons from vulnerable aquifers

• STEVEN VERBURG sverburg@madison.com
• 
  

Since October, Wisconsin has approved requests from businesses for a billion gallons per month in new groundwater withdrawals from locations where the state’s own experts warned that higher pumping levels could be expected to harm vulnerable lakes, streams and drinking water supplies.

The increase was added by revising dozens of permits for high-capacity wells after regulations were relaxed in June at the urging of business groups and Republicans who control state government.

Meanwhile, the state Assembly is poised for a final vote on removing yet another layer of groundwater protection next month by ending the limited environmental reviews still allowed for certain existing wells. ...

"The Politics of Resentment" = Scott Walker's political rise == rural resentment against the "liberal elite"

WI 1848 Forward: Private & Corporate #Greed vs Public Good & Neighbors - Why #Regulation ? Perfect #GOP #PosterChild

WI 1848 Forward: #GroundWater #Greed vs Public Good & Neighbors - Why #Regulation ? Perfect #GOP #PosterChild

WI 1848 Forward: #GroundWater #Greed vs Public Good & Neighbors - Why #Regulation is needed - kids!

FB FAILED 30 MILLION USERS DATA BEING HARVESTED BY TRUMP CAMPAIGN AFFILIATE

FACEBOOK FAILED TO PROTECT 30 MILLION USERS FROM HAVING THEIR DATA HARVESTED BY TRUMP CAMPAIGN AFFILIATE

Mattathias Schwartz 3/30/2017

IN 2014, TRACES of an unusual survey, connected to Facebook, began appearing on internet message boards. The boards were frequented by remote freelance workers who bid on “human intelligence tasks” in an online marketplace, called Mechanical Turk, controlled by Amazon. The “turkers,” as they’re known, tend to perform work that is rote and repetitive, like flagging pornographic images or digging through search engine results for email addresses. Most jobs pay between 1 and 15 cents. “Turking makes us our rent money and helps pay off debt,” one turker told The Intercept. Another turker has called the work “voluntary slave labor.”

The task posted by “Global Science Research” appeared ordinary, at least on the surface. The company offered turkers $1 or $2 to complete an online survey. But there were a couple of additional requirements as well. First, Global Science Research was only interested in American turkers. Second, the turkers had to download a Facebook app before they could collect payment. Global Science Research said the app would “download some information about you and your network … basic demographics and likes of categories, places, famous people, etc. from you and your friends.”

“Our terms of service clearly prohibit misuse,” said a spokesperson for Amazon Web Services, by email. “When we learned of this activity back in 2015, we suspended the requester for violating our terms of service.”

... read the whole thing ... 

WI 1848 Forward: #FB FAILED 30M USERS DATA BEING HARVESTED BY# TRUMP CAMPAIGN AFFILIATE -2016 #election interference ... now 87 million affected 4/4/2018

Counties and Healthcare -- What's the real truth!

The interesting numbers come at the end.  Did you know that 35 counties have 1000 or fewer people, 307 counties have a population under 5000 and that 709 counties have a population under 10000.

That is over 1000 counties.  I have heard the "1000 county" argument as evidence that ACA is collapsing.  No particulars provided to clarify which 1000 counties out of slightly over 3000.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/County_(United_States)  ... derived from Census data.

981 counties have a population over 50,000; 

592 counties have a population over 100,000; 

137 counties have a population over 500,000; 

45 counties have a population over 1,000,000; 

and 14 counties have a population over 2,000,000. 

35 counties have a population under 1,000; 

307 counties have a population under 5,000; 

709 counties have a population under 10,000; 

and 1,492 counties have a population between 10,000 and 50,000.^[30]

I have been waiting for "the media" to bring this fact out.  I suspect that it is next to impossible to provide onsite hospitals, doctors, healthcare professionals or even a dentist or chiropractor in those counties let alone an insurance company interested in developing a marketplace.  That does not mean you cannot have healthcare coverage -- just means you are going to have to go a long way to see a provider.

The 1492 counties in the middle are going have fewer options too!

Florence Cnty WI >Social Not Just Physical Infrastructure should be Dems Party Strategy

6/12/2017
There are now 47 counties where no health plans want to sell Obamacare

Approximately 38,000 Obamacare enrollees now live in places where no health plans want to sell Obamacare coverage in 2018. This is a small fraction of Obamacare enrollees — about 0.3 percent — who mostly live in rural, sparsely populated areas.

July 2017

Rural Californians Want Price Relief From GOP Health Bill, But Most Won't Get It

Aaron Albaugh peers out from under the brim of his cowboy hat, surveying the acres of hay fields in front of him. The fourth-generation rancher is raising about 450 cattle this year, in this remote corner of Lassen County, California.

His closest neighbor lives a half mile away. "And that's my brother," Albaugh says.

"If I want to go see a movie, it's 70 miles, round-trip," he adds. "If I want to go bowling, that's 100 miles, round-trip."

SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS

Doctor Shortage In Rural Arizona Sparks Another Crisis In 'Forgotten America'

Living a half day's drive from civilization, you learn to do without, he explains. If your refrigerator breaks, you put your food on ice until the weekend when you can go buy a new one. With health care, it's the same thing.

NPR 2019.05.20  LIFE AND HEALTH IN RURAL AMERICA Poll: Many Rural Americans Struggle With Financial Insecurity, Access To Health Care

#Trump WI 1848 Forward: #Counties and #Healthcare -- What's the real truth about #GOP #Trumpcare #Ryancare vs #ACA a solution 

#Counties and #Healthcare -- 1,492 counties have a pop between 10,000 and 50k ... hence few options ... even fewer by #Trump - Pols constantly mislead ... don't expect insurers in low density counties- WI 1848 Forward - Support #Medicaid for #Rural WI 

This Article Won’t Change Your Mind -The Atlantic

This Article Won’t Change Your Mind - The facts on why facts alone can’t fight false beliefs - The Atlantic JULIE BECK is a senior associate editor at The Atlantic, where she covers health and psychology.

From the article ... I have added emphasis here and there ...

The theory of cognitive dissonance—the extreme discomfort of simultaneously holding two thoughts that are in conflict—was developed by the social psychologist Leon Festinger in the 1950s. In a famous study, Festinger and his colleagues embedded themselves with a doomsday prophet named Dorothy Martin and her cult of followers who believed that spacemen called the Guardians were coming to collect them in flying saucers, to save them from a coming flood. Needless to say, no spacemen (and no flood) ever came, but Martin just kept revising her predictions. Sure, the spacemen didn’t show up today, but they were sure to come tomorrow, and so on. The researchers watched with fascination as the believers kept on believing, despite all the evidence that they were wrong.

“A man with a conviction is a hard man to change,” Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schacter wrote in When Prophecy Fails, their 1957 book about this study. “Tell him you disagree and he turns away. Show him facts or figures and he questions your sources. Appeal to logic and he fails to see your point … Suppose that he is presented with evidence, unequivocal and undeniable evidence, that his belief is wrong: what will happen? The individual will frequently emerge, not only unshaken, but even more convinced of the truth of his beliefs than ever before.” ... 

Seems like the above is the nicest thing you can say about President Donald Trump and his alter ego ... Sean Spicer (what an ironic last name).

This doubling down in the face of conflicting evidence is a way of reducing the discomfort of dissonance, and is part of a set of behaviors known in the psychology literature as “motivated reasoning.” Motivated reasoning is how people convince themselves or remain convinced of what they want to believe—they seek out agreeable information and learn it more easily; and they avoid, ignore, devalue, forget, or argue against information that contradicts their beliefs. ...

Again anyone count how many times President Donald Trump has been described as doubling down! WOW!

The sad truth about President Donald Trump ... or is it a fact ... it is circular ... he believes himself!

What are the manifestations/consequences ...

And in modern America, one of the groups that people have most intensely hitched their identities to is their political party. Americans are more politically polarized than they’ve been in decades, possibly ever. There isn’t public-opinion data going back to the Federalists and the Democratic Republicans, of course. But political scientists Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal look at the polarization in Congress. And the most recent data shows that 2015 had the highest rates of polarization since 1879, the earliest year for which there’s data. And that was even before well, you know.

Party Polarization, 1879-2015

See the graph ...

There is more to the article ... a very good read!  After you finish it try this...

NPR: Invisibilia: Flip The Script > Dealing With Hostility, Anger, Confrontation - The Opposite

WI 1848 Forward: This Article Won’t Change Your Mind - The #Atlantic #TheAtlantic #Trump #Facts #Fiction Skepticism 

#MotivatedReasoning - Doubling Down when you are wrong! The #Atlantic #TheAtlantic #Trump #Facts - WI 1848 Forward #ConfirmatoryBias 

Sen Tammy Baldwin vs Karl Rove vs OneNationAmerica.org == OneNation

This organization (as of 2/2017) is running cable television commercials (perhaps other markets) targeting Senator Baldwin.  You should know where they are coming from before you accept their message.

From ConservativeTransparency

One Nation is a nonprofit 501(c)4 addition to Karl Rove’s “constellation of Crossroads organizations.” The group “aims to advance well-constructed solutions to our country’s most urgent challenges: its plodding economy, massive debt, job-killing regulations and weakness in an increasingly dangerous world.”

In contrast to Crossroads GPS and American Crossroads, which plan to focus on the presidential race in 2016, One Nation is aimed solely at influencing Senate elections. And it’s wasting no time in getting to work: As of May 2015, One Nation had already purchased $2 million worth of radio, digital and print ads “touting” incumbent Republican senators facing tough reelections in 2016, including Sens. Kelly Ayotte, Mark Kirk, Richard Burr, Rob Portman, and Pat Toomey. The ads praise the senators for supporting trade-promotion authority and urge congressional action “to protect” Medicare and Medicare Advantage.  The spending included $325,000 on ads in New Hampshire in support of Ayotte, and $400,000 in Pennsylvania in support of Toomey. Its ads in Ohio praised Portman for “helping to lead the way” to consensus in Congress.

In October 2015, One Nation launched an ad buy in New Hampshire attempting to defend Sen. Ayotte on women’s health issues. They additionally purchased ads in Missouri defending Sen. Roy Blunt, which were supposedly focused on highlighting Sen. Blunt’s “ability to work across the aisle.”

Sen. Mitch McConnell’s former chief of staff, Steven Law, is the president of One Nation, along with its sister organizations American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS. Law is also executive chairman of the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC “devoted solely to retaining the Senate majority” that “aims to be the go-to destination for major Republican donors interested in Senate races.” Ian Prior is cited as a spokesman for the group; Prior previously served as communications director for Crossroads / Crossroads GPS and, prior to that, as National Press Secretary & Deputy Communications Director for the National Republican Congressional Committee. ...

Open Secrets has more!

POLITICS 01/05/2018 12:01 am ET Updated Jan 08, 2018 Wisconsin Is Quietly Becoming The Top Senate Race Of 2018 Sen. Tammy Baldwin is battling more outside spending by conservative groups than all of her Democratic colleagues. Combined.

But increasingly, Democrats point to another race as one they’re worried about: Wisconsin. That’s where Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin already has been targeted by an onslaught of outside spending from conservative groups. Party leaders say the odds remain in her favor, but they’re sure not going to take the race for granted. 

Conservative groups have so far spent at least $3.1 million against Baldwin, which is more than what all the other Democratic Senate incumbents on the ballot this year have faced combined (under $550,000), according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Sen Tammy #Baldwin vs Karl #Rove vs #OneNationAmerica.org == #OneNation #Conservatives spending $3.1 million (JAN 2018) so very early!

TED: Why we need Social Security and Pension Systems - NOT Numerate Pop!

Sort of a British talk but with International perspective!  Today Trump proposed that financial advisers do not have to take their clients interests into account when providing advice.

Considering financial markets let alone numbers are beyond most of us ... that is fraud waiting to happen.  Eliminating Social Security will create hundreds of millions of "suckers".

Think you're good at guessing stats? Guess again. Whether we consider ourselves math people or not, our ability to understand and work with numbers is terribly limited, says data visualization expert Alan Smith. In this delightful talk, Smith explores the mismatch between what we know and what we think we know.

In general most of us are not good with numbers let alone statistics.  See the Kahneman piece on Thinking, Fast and Slow.  It is another point on why we get things wrong just when it is critical that we get them right.

As an aside one has to wonder why the GOP and its leaders, like Ryan, are always trying to do in Social Security.  It is not bankrupt and projected to be solvent for years to come, and there are so many ways to adjust it without being unfair.  It comes down to the fact that corporations have to pay in a matching amount to your contribution.  Cutting that in any way amounts to big tax cut for businesses and shareholders.  So obvious it is easy to miss.

#TED >Why we need #SocialSecurity and Pension Systems - We are mostly NOT Numerate people! #Kahneman i.e. few people can really count or save like they should!  WI 1848 Forward

Corporate #TaxBreak NOT #TaxReform WI 1848 Forward: The real reason the #GOP wants to cut #SocialSecurity

Social Infrastructure: Wisconsin Alternative Budget vs Divide and Conquer Walker

WATCH: Citizen Action of Wisconsin Presents Alternative State Budget

WAUSAU, WI (WSAU) -- Citizen Action of Wisconsin has been touring all over Wisconsin and presenting their alternative budget entitled "A Wisconsin Budget for All". Tuesday the group made a stop in Wausau. 

Robert Kraig, Executive Director of Citizen Action of Wisconsin, says they've found a way to improve through large issues in their alternative budget. 

He said, "The idea is to show them if we close some big tax loopholes that go mainly to well-connected corporations and a few wealthy people, that we could make major new investments. So, A Wisconsin Budget for All shows, for example, we could have a free tech college education, we could raise wages for low-income people substantially."
Kraig says the group was very surprised by some of the results of the research they did leading up to presenting the alternative budget. 

"Researchers actually went to coffee shops, bars, and restaurants and talked to people and what we found actually is that people would actually like to spend more on universities, more on schools, more on infrastructure, but they feel like if they send that money to Madison it'll basically be stolen there and go to special interests," Kraig said.
Kraig wants this alternative budget to get people talking.  ...

A Wisconsin Budget for All 

For too long, we’ve all been told that there’s not enough money in the budget to help our communities thrive. That is not true. Actually, there is enough. Making a budget is about making choices. Lawmakers can choose to help private special interests that rig the system, or lawmakers can choose to promote the common good.

Simply cleaning up the tax code by closing two loopholes that the well-connected have created for themselves can restore nearly $900 million to the budget to invest in crucial priorities that your community so desperately needs. After all, that should be what taxes are for. They’re not supposed to be for feathering the nests of those who manipulate the system. They’re supposed to be our joint investments for improving our lives and for bolstering the vitality of all of our communities across Wisconsin.

There are three core areas — work, education, and health — where this restored funding would make a huge difference for hard-working Wisconsin families like yours and for the life of your community.

Read the full proposal, “A Wisconsin Budget for All” and learn how we can push for a budget that will help all our communities thrive.

• Supporters of A Wisconsin Budget for All: 9to5 Wisconsin • Citizen Action of Wisconsin • Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups • Community Advocates Public Policy Institute • League of Women Voters of Wisconsin • Lutheran Office for Public Policy in Wisconsin • Madison-Area Urban Ministry • National Association of Social Workers, WI Chapter •  SEIU Wisconsin State Council • Wisconsin Alliance for Women’s Health • Wisconsin Council of Churches • Wisconsin Council on Children and Families • Wisconsin Democracy Campaign • Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC) • Wisconsin Faith Voices for Justice • Wisconsin Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals • Wisconsin Friends Action Network • WISDOM

• Social Media: Follow A Wisconsin Budget for All on Facebook.

#SocialInfrastructure : #Wisconsin > Responsible-Alternative #Budget vs #Divide&Conquer #Walker #GOP -> " #GriftersOnParade " - WI 1848 Forward