Is it possible to investment ethically?

That is, not profit off of business practices that I don't agree with. This has been an issue that's troubled me for some time. How to identify and promote profitable organizations whose dealings are consistent with my ethics. Something along the line of green investing and fair trade organizations but with a broader scope. I would like to find companies which, among other practices, have fair labor policies both internationally and domestically, good environmental concerns and engaged with their local communities. This list doesn't apply to a large majority of companies listed on stock markets.

I've also wished that I had more control over what the federal government spends my 'borrowed' social security payments on. Given the option, I would invest/spend in green and biomedical research, some infrastructure and foreign aid but I would not support weapons or weapons research.

Evolving social priorities?

The current (2012) presidential campaign got me thinking about economic principles and the goals of these principles. Bill Clinton did a good job in summarizing the politically palatable aims of the Mitt Romney compared to Barack Obama: "you're on your own" compared to "we're all in this together." I would actually argue that the Obama administration has not lived up to the goal of "we're all in this together" but that has been well stated elsewhere and I see no need to reiterate.

I want to focus on the implied aims of the 2 proclamations "you're on your own" and "we're all in this together" and to take it a little further. To my mind, the "you're on your own" policy was in effect for the majority of (human) historical record and well illustrated in pre-enlightenment Europe where first persons to realize an opportunity were able to acquire maximum amount of resources and retain them through multiple generations. The "we're all in this together" policy is perhaps most apparent in the modern Nordic countries of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden with modest income inequality and generous social safety nets.

So to summarize:
pre- enlightenment = grab and hoard as many resources as possible
post-enlightenment = some communal sharing of resources

So the questions this brings to mind is where would further social evolution take the economies of the western world? …
Could it be (a) each to their potential; (b) each to their ability; (c) each to their happiness or (d) each to their will.

Additionally…
- How might such goal(s) be achieved?
- At what cost can they be achieved?
- What would such societies look like?


This all presupposing that climate change does not result in a retrograding of western culture.

The debts of the 1%

Disclaimer: I am neither an economist nor an expert on tax policy.

Prior to the initiation of the Occupy Wall Street protests, leaders of the Republican party fervently argued that ‘America is broke’ and because of this, this nation needs to undertake austerity measures along the lines of reducing social welfare programs and placing limits on Social Security and Medicare outlays.  I would argue that this country isn’t broke. We have an accounting disparity… the G.W.Bush administration borrowed the excess taxes collected by the social security administration to fund enormous loans to the wealthy and corporations in the form of tax cuts.  Well the country is now in need and calling in the debt… it’s time for the wealthy and corporations to repay their loan and pay more taxes!

Living without god

Disclaimer: I am not a theologian.

I’ve never been much of a follower nor had a strong need to join a church and the evangelical Christian born again movement has completely repulsed me from any such inclination. This is due to a major contradiction in what is commonly understood about the Christian God and Jesus Christ. Contrast an omnipotent, all knowing and infinity compassionate God to a God who restricts entry to heaven to those who accept Jesus Christ as their savior, regardless of personal behavior. The former predates, negates and likely supersedes the latter which, to my mind, would argue live a moral life and trust the afterlife to the compassion of God.  Therefore, faith in God does not preclude an afterlife.

Biscuit/scone recipe with variations

A favorite with many whom I've fed over the past decade. The basic recipe is from Julia Child's Julia’s Kitchen Wisdom.  I've made it hundreds of times with many variations inspired by notes and recipes by Elizabeth David, Laurie Colwin and Kim Boyce. This is a very forgiving recipe… I've varied the ratio of flour, liquid and fat by as much as 25% and have gotten very good results. The original recipe is below with variations following the instructions.

2 cups flour: 1 1/2 cups all purpose + 1/2 cup cake or 2 cups pastry

1 2/3 tablespoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon sugar: granulated

3/4 cup: shortening

1 cup liquid: milk

Sift together flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.

In a large bowl, work shortening into flour until rough meal (do this by cutting with knives or rubbing with fingers). Add milk and with a spatula, fold milk into the flour mix until combined but take care to not overwork the resulting dough. Turn mixture out onto a floured surface and pat out (or roll with a rolling pin) dough to about 1/2 inch thick (sprinkle top with flour if too sticky). Fold into thirds like a letter and repeat.  Pat/roll out to about 3/4 inch thick.  Cut 2 1/2 inch biscuits with a cookie cutter. Press together dough remnants, pat out, fold once and cut as above. Space 1 inch apart on a greased and flour baking sheet and bake at 425 degrees for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned.

variations…

flour: use up to 1 1/2 cups barley or oat flour; try white whole wheat flour (available from King Author); add 1 heaping tablespoons of raw wheat germ. I still need to try adding 1-2 tablespoons almond meal.

baking powder: the amount Julia Child recommends is a bit on the high side; I use one heaping tablespoon for a double recipe.

sugar: for a sweeter biscuit, add up to 1/3 cup sugar; can use brown sugar and other less refined sugars and although I have not tried more fluid sugars such as honey or maple syrup, there's no reason they should not work (see below for more information). I prefer to eat my biscuits with honey so I don't add it to the dough.

shortening: can replace with butter or combined with some portion of cream cheese.

liquid: this is where the greatest variation can occur… I have used many combinations of the following: water, soy milk, almond milk, cow's milk of all fat levels, yogurt, buttermilk, cream (any fluid dairy product I might have; a great way to use up leftovers), homemade marmalade, homemade raspberry jam, eggs and apricot puree*. Just vary the amount of liquid to achieve the proper dough consistency.  When marmalade or jam is used, take care to not add too much sugar. Honey and/or maple syrup can be incorporated into the dough as part of the liquid component also. I once used some leftover sweetened cream cheese/whip cream topping (great for fruit tart base or dessert topping)… yummy!

Note: To make scones, add 1/4-1/3 cup sugar and replace some of the liquid with 2 lightly beaten eggs. Other additives: 1/2 cup dried fruit (raisins, dried cranberries; dried kumquats are my favorite); mini-chocolate chips; 1/2 tablespoon grated orange/lemon zest.

Apricot puree* can be made by placing ~4-6 oz. dried unsulphured apricots into a oven safe crock. Add water to cover and cover crock. Bake at low temperature (~300 degrees) for 1-2 hours. When cool enough to handle, mash with spoon for apricot puree.

Biscuits can be served with honey, jam/marmalade or used for strawberry shortcake (or other fresh fruit shortcake). A new one for me is flavored cream cheese [beat 8 oz cream cheese with homemade kumquat/orange/Clementine marmalade to taste (start with 2-3 heaping tablespoons)].

Shortcake… mix 2-4 cups of cut up fruit with a squeeze of lemon juice (or a spoonful of balsamic vinegar) and a few tablespoons of sugar. Rest at room temperature for about 30 minutes to extract the juice. Spoon fruit mix over split the biscuits and top with sweetened whipped cream (or try sweetened cream cheese/whip cream).

post script… Making these biscuits is how I learned to make pie dough. When first started, I would use the flour mix to generously coat the (cold) shortening or butter as I held it in one hand while cutting it with a butter knife in the other hand. I would continue this until the little coated balls of butter were the size of peas. Over time, it became faster to cut the butter into larger chunks and rubbing it into the flour by hand. To make pie dough, find a good recipe and handle the ingredients as described, chill dough, roll and fit to pie dish.

A Constitution wiki?

Disclaimer: I have no expert knowledge of the Constitution; in fact, I’ve never read the Constitution in full.  Nor do I have any web development skills.

A number of people in the news media and some running for public office have called for the dismantling of Social Security, individual mandate in healthcare and various departments of the Executive branch of the U.S. government by arguing they are unconstitutional.  As I am ignorant of such matters, a Constitution wiki might come in handy…

Link the specific text(s) of the Constitution to page(s) which lists the agencies and departments which have been established on the basis of said text.  Perhaps further enhancement may link the information pages to the actual agency website.  It would also be informative to link Supreme Court decisions to the text of the Constitution with a summary of the cases and a brief discussion of their implications (along the lines of a Nina Totenberg perhaps?).

This would be a wonderful learning and teaching tool.

It could also be expanded to the state constitutions.

Something similar could also be applied to pending legislation in Congress.  This has the advantage of using crowd sourcing to decipher deliberately abstruse legislation.  This could result in much better governance in that power is constrained not only by other branches of government but by all citizens.

All posts…

The subject(s) of these postings are mine and mine alone.  They may not be unique but these are my words and thoughts (unless otherwise attributed).