The Stimulus Bill Could Have a Good Effect on the Mahoning Valley

I've completed an in-depth review of the stimulus bill, better known as the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009". What that really means is that I opened the 647 page document and did some key word searches. I have a job and stuff so reading through it all was going to be impossible. Any way, here are some things that I think will be good for our area.

• A billion dollars for more police. No, my East side friends, that won't all be spent on cops for your side of the city no matter how much you wish it. However it should mean more for all our communities. President Obama wants to restore the community oriented policing that President Bush cut so that he could fund...I don't know, tax cuts for rich folks maybe? Anyway, I would imagine that by whatever formula is used to divide the money, Youngstown, Warren and the rest of this area should get a few more cops on the street.

• Buy American steel and iron. Our local congressman should get a tip of the hat (and probably more than a few steel worker votes) for the inclusion of this provision. It states that:
  

None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be
used for a project for the construction, alteration, maintenance, or repair of a
public building or public work unless all of the iron and steel used in the
project is produced in the United States.

The next time somebody is bashing Congressman Tim Ryan you can tell them he protected steel worker's jobs in the Valley. I know that's what he is supposed to do but a surprising number of politicians say one thing before election day and then do something different after. I know, I too was shocked to find out this could happen. Still, good on our guy for looking out for the Valley.

• No Money for Rod Blagojevich- Seriously! Out of 300 million Americans this is the one guy mentioned by name who is not allowed to get his hands on stimulus money if he were still Governor of Illinois. I guess that's what happens when you treat the President's ex-Senate seat like it's a Picasso you found in the attic.


• Contract visibility on the internet- If you use the this money on a project you have to post the contract on the internet and provide a link to it at Recovery.gov. Bloggers and tin foil hat wearing conspiracy followers are having their job made easy for them. In 7 years we've gone from no bid contracts to Haliburton to a law demanding contracts be posted where anyone can see them.


• Inspector General reviews- This law demands the inspector general of any Federal agency review concerns raised by the public for projects using these funds. There are Bush White House staffers who probably didn't realize they were accountable to the public so this provision must be quite a shock for them.

There's also some other stuff about fixing roads, bridges and the electrical grid but if these posts go on too long I get glassy eyed and you get bored. However, if you want to read the rest and see how we are going to spend the better part of a trillion dollars you can click here.

Oh, and you should probably send an email to Senator Voinovich encouraging him to vote for this bill. The House Republicans decided the economy was just fine and voted on party lines against this. George Voinovich isn't running for re-election so he is free to vote for what's best for Ohio.

Get Your Rust Belt Love

New items are up at Rust Belt Pop, just in time for Valentine's Day. We are featuring two new designs in the store, both related to Cupid's favorite day.

The first is our new Love design, featured on buttons, t-shirts, keepsake boxes, journals and, my favorite, the Flip Mino digital camera.

Love Flip Mino Digital Camera

Love Button

The second design is more cynical but hey, that's how some people roll. "Morally Bankrupt But Financially Viable" may be the best you can hope for in these hard times.

Ringer T

Remember, you can sign up for our newsletter on the right or at the store itself.

Kurt Vonnegut Inspirational Posters

I like Kurt Vonnegut. He was a cranky old man who was optimistic in his view of humanity's future but cynical about the way we treat one another. He was like a wrinkled old riddle and he wrote damned good novels. The folks at this website have a display up of motivational posters based on his writings. Click here to see the rest and have fun.

Is a Gas Tax a Good Idea?

There was an interesting article in The Vindicator Sunday, detailing how auto makers have to react to a very dynamic fuel market. After all, gas prices jumped up quickly, stayed high long enough to impact sales and the car makers drew criticism for not having enough high mileage/ hybrid cars for sale. Columnists and buyers alike took them to the woodshed because there was a glut of SUV's and pick up trucks on dealer lots when all we really wanted, at that time, were Prius'. Why couldn't their crystal ball predict that we would want high mileage vehicles? After all, the American public had spent the last twenty years buying monster trucks. How dare auto makers make and sell what we asked for?

Of course gas prices are back down and everyone who still has a job can afford a tank of gas. Those without jobs can't afford an internet connection so nobody knows what they think. In the meantime, though, the Big Three have faltered and gone to the government to beg for money. The government has given it to them because even George Bush can see that allowing another million to lose their jobs would be a bad idea.

So now we are all investors in the American automotive industry and, as investors, we expect our investment to yield a positive return. The thing is, do we have the maturity to further help ourselves by helping the auto industry with a gas tax?

Designing and building a car is hard. The article states there is a five year design process before a new car gets to the dealer's lot. Someone has to look into the future and discern what our tastes will be in five years, new technologies have to be invented and someone has to figure out where the cup holders will go. Now we're asking the car makers to accurately predict the price of gasoline and telling them to retool for hybrids.

A gas tax is exactly what we need. The reasons are obvious and plentiful:

• Being dependent on foreign oil means we are not secure- All the people in the world right now who hate us are the ones we buy oil from. This is probably a bad idea. (Except the Canadians. They still seem fond of us.)


• A gas tax would allow auto makers to design cars that are efficient and guarantee there will be a market for them- We're investing a lot of money in the automotive industry. It's in our best interest to make sure there is a market for their products.


• The additional revenue can be used for infrastructure repairs instead of borrowing the money- China's economy is in a tailspin too. That means they will be buying less Treasury investments, no matter how much crap you buy at Wal-Mart.

• The additional revenue can help fund research into green technologies- Somebody has to pay research scientists. Not every idea is a good one so subsidizing research until a pay off idea is found is necessary. Believe me, if someone knew how to make the hydrogen fuel cell work cheaply, they would be strolling along a private beach right now. Until then someone has to keep the researches in Ramen noodles until they do figure it out.

• More people will be encouraged to use mass transit- It's better to let someone else drive and listen to your iPod.

• Mass transit may become more attractive if it has more users- Let's all be honest. The buses look ugly and they never go where you want when you want. That could all change if enough people used them and demanded improvements.


• Less miles driven means less accidents- This is a no brainer. You can't have a car accident if you aren't driving and when gas topped $4.00 a gallon, people eliminated unnecessary driving.

We need to be mature about the gas tax proposals that are floating around. The car makers need a market and we need better, more fuel efficient cars. We need to be safer. Most importantly, we need to innovate. The technologies that will allow gas usage to be reduced or eliminated have not been perfected. That innovation needs to come from the United States so we can be a leader instead of a follower. Heck, it would be great if this research could take place in the Cleveland-Youngstown-Pittsburgh tech belt. It's up to us to decide if we want to pay a little more now for a lot of benefit later or if we want to save a few bucks now and pay India and China later when they invent the technology.

Mahoning Valley Cheapness Could Save America

Is the Mahoning Valley better prepared to weather a recession than the rest of the country? As the economy tanks I see many lifestyle stories on the news depicting how life has changed for people in the rest of the country. These stories detail how folks are changing their lives to deal with a slowing economy. I interpret "slowing economy" as being "scared out of their minds that they'll be broke soon". These stories clarify the differences between living in the Mahoning Valley and living anywhere else in America.

The stories generally provide a detailed list of things these folks have had to give up and how doing so has affected their standard of living. This is usually when I realize that living in a recession has been the norm in the Mahoning Valley for so long we didn't realize what we were missing.

Christmas Decorating- CNN ran a story during the Holidays about a couple in Georgia who were cutting back by hanging their own Christmas lights on their house. Imagine the inconvenience! While they were speaking about this hardship the husband was merrily stapling strands of lights on his roof a la Clark Griswold. I saw my neighbors hanging lights. Even the 80 year old guy down the street managed to get a string around his front door without consulting an electrician.

Housing- I like to watch house flipping shows. Flip that House, Flip this House or Property Ladder will do fine. Part of the reason I enjoy it is because I get to see people in other real estate markets around the country say things like, "$450,000 for a 1200 square foot 3 bedroom, 2 bath is a steal!" Uh, sure it is. You can buy whole neighborhoods for that kind of money in the Mahoning Valley. We didn't know we were living the high life.

Personal Spending- How to lists on cutting personal spending are my favorite recession articles. These lists really point out the differences between living here and living anywhere else. Use coupons! Buy generic and store brands! Don't drink $4 coffee! Buy things on sale! Brown bag your lunch! These are all things we already do. I wasn't even aware they still made Cheerios. All I ever see in my cupboard is ToasteeO's. No woman in my family heads to the store with less than a fistful of coupons shoved in their purse. And $4 coffee? I don't think we even have stores that sell $4 coffee around here, do we?

Clothing- Every story or cost cutting list includes shopping at thrift stores. There isn't a city in the Valley without a thrift shop until you head south over Midlothian. Everything north of it has a place to buy used clothes. I'm convinced the reason our style doesn't change in this area is because we're all buying each other's T-shirts, flannel shirts and jeans.

Entertainment- All the articles say we're supposed to cut back on going out. Well, that's done. Once we get married around here we restrict ourselves to a night at Quaker Steak and Lube a couple of times a year and a trip to the dollar theater. Let's face it, our biggest entertainment splurge is cable TV.

So folks, we've been recession living for decades. What's really surprising is how much we have to offer the rest of the country.For the first time in history, our knowledge of cheapness is an untapped goldmine rather than a liability. Our innate frugality could very well save this country billions of dollars if anyone bothered to ask.

Digging Out with the Orange Beast

You see this snow blower?


This snow blower is a game day player. This snow blower shows up. When winter pounds Northeast Ohio and dumps half a dozen inches of snow in the driveway, the orange beast digs you out. It may be old, it may be cranky and it may take ten good yanks to get started (that's right, no electric start on this machine) but once the smoke clears, the driveway is as good as clean.

I've owned the beast for ten years. I don't really know how old it is but it may have come from the 80's. I got it free because the previous owner couldn't get it to start. A new plug, a clamp on the throttle and a new gas tank brought it back to life. The orange beast shows its gratitude every time winter dumps on us.

I've been in Sears. I've seen the fancy new Craftsmen behemoths that look like they can clear twice as much snow in half the time it takes the beast. But you know what I don't see? Heart. They look too new and too pretty to take out and ding up. The orange beast has heart. It wants to be driven until it just won't start anymore. I'm happy to oblige.

Rosa Brooks on Gaza

LA Times columnist Rosa Brooks has a good column on the crisis in Gaza. She thinks every party involved is exhibiting more than their fair share of stupidity. I'm inclined to agree.

Hamas Style:

Use suicide bombings and rocket attacks on civilian targets as a method of warfare. Don't stick to military targets. Instead, blow up civilians on buses and in cafes. Adopting a deliberate policy of war crimes and crimes against humanity helps ensure that few of the world's governments will want to go anywhere near you.

Israeli Style:

Undermine and isolate potential interlocutors who might be able to represent the Palestinians. First, destroy Palestinian Authority infrastructure and withhold funds and supplies needed for critical social services, thus helping to push ordinary Palestinians into the arms of Hamas, with its ample social services programs funded by Iran and private Arab donors. Then, when Hamas wins Palestinian elections, isolate Gaza and undermine Hamas.

Pittsburgh's Success After Steel

There is a very nice article up on the NY Times website concerning Pittsburgh and the city's success after steel. It touches on many things that are relevant to the Mahoning Valley; deindustrialization after the steel industry collapse, a shrinking population and economic success by changing focus to new industries. You can view it by clicking here.

What really caught my attention was this attitude:

“The emphasis was on fighting the presumed causes of the decline by getting rid of low-cost foreign imports or providing more subsidies,” said Harold D. Miller, president of Future Strategies, a consultancy. “The assumption was that steel will come back and we’ll go back to the way we were.”

Pittsburgh seems to be doing many things right and Youngstown is mimicking some of those ideas. Pittsburgh's unemployment rate is 5.5%, which about half of what our area experiences. To achieve that they have utilized their education base. The city "used the local universities to pour state funds into technology research". Youngstown is currently focused on helping YSU

expand and become a more integral part of the recovery effort. Most striking though is the role entrepreneurship in computer software and biotechnology played in their economic growth. The Youngstown Business Incubator has all the support it could ask for and only awaits some folks with good ideas. Hopefully that effort can pay off.

The most profound thing, though, is the attitude of the people within the article. While they know of people who get laid off and take side jobs to tide them over until they get called back, the most successful seek employment re-training. No lesson could be more relevant to the Mahoning Valley, with so many workers recently savaged by lay off's.

Fox "Doomsday" Headline is more Science Fiction than Science

You see this picture down below?

It's taken from the Foxnews.com website from this morning around 8:30. I looked at that thing and thought, "Damn, if the economy doesn't get us, the sun is going to". However, I've noticed a tendency for the Fox News folks to be a little, oh, shall we say, dramatic, when laying out their homepage. That skepticism paid off.

Rather than alerting us to an imminent danger from solar flares, this story is actually from space.com and reports on the conclusion of a study that looked at what the effects of a large solar storm could be. If you click on the Space.com link you'll notice that their headline doesn't quite have the apocalyptic zip that Fox's does. So Fox is taking a study and throwing it up on their homepage with a colorful graphic and a headline that includes the words "Solar Doomsday" in large font rather than a headline that says, "Study Identifies Vulnerabilities to Solar Storms".

Maybe they could do a whole series of these doomsday stories:

"Loch Ness Monster Could Swallow You Whole!- If It Were Real, Experts Say"

"Cancer Bad for You!- If You Have it, Study Reveals"

"Nuclear War Could Kill Millions!- If Such a War Takes Place, Government Reports"

Senator Jim Webb Tackles Prison Reform

I like Senator Jim Webb. He's a democrat that isn't afraid to be independent and he pursues good legislation, like writing an updated version of the GI Bill. He is a decorated Marine and has served as Secretary of the Navy. When I saw the headline stating he was going to take on prison reform, I was intrigued.

After all, this is a tough guy who isn't likely to be painted as soft on crime, even if he is a democrat. His interest in the prison system stems from "his experience in the military, a culture that is "disciplined but fair."

The Washington Post article contains this insight, which I think sums up a very well thought out position:

"I enjoy grabbing hold of really complex issues and boiling them down in a way
that they can be understood by everyone," he said. "I think you can be a
law-and-order leader and still understand that the criminal justice system as we
understand it today is broken, unfair, locking up the wrong people in many cases
and not locking up the right person in many cases."

Our current culture of locking up non-violent offenders with violent offenders seems like a good way to make better criminals and not better citizens. Maybe Webb's effort, when he completes it, will show a better way.

Things I'd Like to See Less of in 2009

Every once in while certain things seem to last long after I've tired of seeing or hearing about them. When that time comes and those annoying items are still on the shelf long past their expiration date, I feel the need to share them with you.



Billy Mays- Enough already. This guy's a pitchman for everything from Mighty Putty to the Big City Slider hamburger maker. He seems friendly enough but his booming voice has enough force to shatter TV speakers if you don't grab the remote fast enough. The only guy on TV more annoying is the Shamwow headset guy.



Colon Cleansing- Really? Are we talking about cleaning your poop chute on TV now? These are discussions you once had with your doctor or your mom if things took a turn for the worse. Now I can't scroll through the digital program guide without seeing a half hour infomercial devoted to the subject. I don't want to talk about this subject and I sure don't want to hear strangers talk about for 30 minutes.



Marital Aid Ads on Talk Radio- WKBN is now apparently accepting ad money from anyone who can write a check. If you have your kids in the car, you'll want to turn off the radio during the commercial breaks before you hear all about the products that can make you perform like a stud in the bedroom. Honestly, neither the woman who has a lisp while trying to sound alluring nor the two guys who just start randomly talking about how bad their love life is is going to make me fork over hard earned dough for snake oil.



Hearing about Jim Traficant- Ugh. Did you know Jim is about to get out of prison? Did you know he was really innocent? Did you know he just did what all politicians do and it was a conspiracy that got him locked up? Did you know the Mahoning Valley wouldn't be in the mess it is if he hadn't gone to jail? It's time to let him go folks. He did the crime, he did the time and now it's time for us all to part ways with Jimbo. Let's let him live his life while the rest of us move forward corruption free.



Bertram de Souza Writing about Jim Traficant- Hey Bert, any chance we'll see a column regarding politics in the Mahoning Valley that doesn't mention our disgraced former congressman? I know things have been slow since the Feds cleaned house and locked everyone up but it seems like you aren't even trying anymore. Last Sunday's cloumn didn't have anything new about Traficant but you managed to sneak him in by writing about what someone wrote about your column. Come on, man, you can do way better than this. You've got a city owned convocation center losing money, judges fighting the city over a new court, layoff's throughout all local governments and the old Trumbull county engineer had his daughter-in-law and son-in-law working for him. That's the kind of muckraking I want to see.



That's it for now. If any one of these things were less seen or heard of in 2009, the year could be a winner. I've got my fingers crossed.