Category Archives: economy

Economic Recession : Connecting Candidates, Trends, Values and Voting

Posted on November 3, 2008 by | Leave a comment

It’s a Bad Idea to Elect Candidates to Improve the Economy

Encouraging congregants to vote on Tuesday November 4, my pastor shared some very profound insights about how to view the issues. He said that we would be electing people who will be representing our views and our futures. Those we elect will make decision that will not only affect our own lives but our community and out nation He then followed with an insight applicable to all elections for all time.

The economy is constantly changing. The boom and bust cycles will continue no matter who is in office. We should not vote for candidates based on a troubled economy because it will eventually improve anyway.

Adding to his insight, I want to point out that our economy and its free markets are not some mysterious force operating outside the realm of human behavior. The economy is human behavior. The markets are the results of nothing other than human decisions. Intentionally or unintentionally, the problems and benefits of our economy are the results of human behaviors. The boom and bust cycles of our current economy are the results of policy decisions, trade and consumption practices, errors and neglect, as well as greed and irrational fears. Barak Obama and Congressional Democrats blame Bush for their own bad policy decisions and neglect of the mortgage markets that Congress created. And, Bush’s spending didn’t happen without their approval either.

The Obama Connection?

Cliff Kincaid, Editor of the Accuracy in Media Report, wrote an article on who is behind the economic collapse. To appreciate his argument, you must read the entire article. Here, I will try to summarize some of his main evidence to illustrate my point. Kincaid research points to Democrats as the primary actors suspected of generating the current economic crisis of New Deal proportions. His research ties US Treasury Secretary Paulson, who worked for a Democratic firm, Goldman Sachs to leading Democratic Party fundraisers, and to Barak Obama. Those suspected of creating the current economic crisis for political reasons would not be complete without George Soros, who has a reputation for creating national economic crises. Other writers have produced lists of former employees of Goldman Sachs who have filled leading positions in both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Many others are being investigated, according to Kincaid.

Recession and Election Cycle Trends

If I remember correctly, the past four or five presidents were elected during an economic correction sometimes called recession. According to financial expert John Mauldin, President George W. Bush inherited an economy already in recession from Democrat Bill Clinton. Oddly enough, Americans elected Clinton as President in part to solve the recession that occurred during George HW Bush’s term in office. We voted Ronald Reagan into office because of his plans to solve the deep recession inherited from Jimmy Carter. Many Republicans voted for Democrat and Baptist Jimmy Carter because of they believed his faith was real and because of his plan to solve the recession-sized energy crisis. Like my parents, many Republicans were sorely disappointed.

Learning From the Past?

It must be questioned whether the most educated people in the world are capable of learning from the past. It is claimed that many Republicans again favor a Democrat for president. That is certainly their right. Many religious leaders have championed the cause of the Democratic Party its candidates. Again, that is their right. Yet, the Democratic Party is more socialistic, more pro-abortion, more opposed to traditional marriage than ever. Their presidential candidate does have religious credentials. However, the religious aura surrounding Barak Obama is a cloud of illusion. I think it is more of a smoke screen for the sole purpose of winning an election. Whether McCain is sincerely Christian is debatable as well. However, his VP choice at least gives us hope for a strong pro-life and pro-family influence in the Whitehouse.

I return to my original point borrowed from my pastor. Whether economic crises are the result of evil intentions or simply bad decisions, they are the product of human behaviors. They have occurred throughout our nation’s history. As now, they have always been corrected by appropriate behavior and policy decision. This corrective process is already in motion. Therefore, whoever we elect as the next president is mostly irrelevant.

Voting Decisions and Issues of Unchanging Importance

My pastor continued his political exhortation with another and even more important insight. Instead of making our voting decisions based on a continuously changing economy, we would find better representation in government if we made our decisions based on unchanging criteria. Going back to the biblical book of Genesis, he reminded us of source of our moral values, the sanctity of human life, and of human dignity. These are the most important criterion. As history teaches, the decline of morality in societies always results in that society’s end. Therefore, in this pivotal election, we will choose whether morality and the sanctity of life will be upheld and strengthened or whether morality will continue to decline.

Having done my own research, it is clear to me which candidate will defend the life of the unborn, the sanctity of traditional marriage, and the general morality our form of democracy has always required. Like the traditions of their respective parties, Democrat Barak Obama favors abortion and opposes defining marriage as one man and one woman because he supports the politics of sexual immorality. John McCain claims to be pro-life and favors overturning Roe v Wade because it was an erroneous ruling. He supports traditional marriage but believes it’s outside the power of federal government to decide on issues of marriage.

Voting Means Judgments—Of Candidate and Maybe of God

As Americans used to believe regarding disasters whether affecting national, state, and local communities, I too believe America is already experiencing God’s justice for the long official support for every form of immorality, for the brutal slaughter of millions of unborn children, for legitimizing unnatural and harmful behaviors of gays, and for many other crimes against God’s moral laws. If this assessment is correct, then this election is the most important and most pivotal of all elections in American history comparable to the election of Abraham Lincoln.

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(Note: The title of John Mauldin’s financial commentary referenced above presents the insightful and witty perspective of it gifted author; the title is “Electing the Janitor-In-Chief”. Mauldin’s work is profitable reading and can be accessed at his website www.fronlinethoughts.com)

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Future of Xenia Under One Roof?

Posted on October 24, 2008 by | 1 comment

By Daniel Downs

The Xenia Community Schools Under One Roof (UOR) plan is an exciting new innovative concept. A campus combining existing community organizations like the YMCA, Senior Citizens Center, hospital, Athletes in Actions, and others sharing costs and resources is popular and unproven. For example, a hospital serves people from outside the community as well as local residents. Connected facilities increase the potential for our youth to be targets of unsuspected criminals. A previous writer raised concerns about post-9-11 requirements for enhanced security and UOR increases that need even more. The UOR model like the Lake Local School High School in Union Ohio is too new to know what problems may or may not occur with great confidence. It is also not likely those that already have occurred will be advertised.

Another issue that needs to be raised is why should high school students alone benefit from the UOR plan? Why not junior high and elementary students? I understand why only senior high students would benefit from a hospital-based medical training facility. An on-campus hospital would provide beneficial services to both athletes and the elderly. That’s all good, but shouldn’t other Xenia students also benefit from the YMCA, Athletes in Action, medical services, potential interaction the elderly, and from similar affiliations?

I believe neighborhood schools with small class sizes and real parental involvement are the best kind. In California, Colorado, New York, Texas, and other states tried supersized schools and found them very problematic. Reports shows they have returned to small neighborhood or specialty schools because they are more effective and less problematic learning environments. That’s why Xenia’s plan to supersize elementary schools is a bad idea. An alternative to both supersized and neighborhood elementary schools is building small neighborhood sized elementary schools and middle schools on planned UOR campus. Why not revise the UOR plan to include all schools so that all Xenia children benefit? Yes, it would increase the current plan costs considerably. It would even increase the cost of busing, but it might be worth it.

What does not make sense is replacing one of the newest buildings in the school district. At least three elementary schools, all of them older than Warner Jr. High, actually should be rebuilt. If Xenia is going to invest in the UOR plan, why not go all out and either rebuild all schools on the new site, or rebuild other schools in their neighborhoods with an Olympian size swimming pool, health service facilities, upgraded science labs, and high tech communication and computerized infrastructure. Why let politics and unjust government funding strategies (government rip off of tobacco companies) rule Xenia’s future? Why not spend the extra dollars to build the best possible educational facilities meeting future needs today?

Well, here is a brief answer. About 62% of Xenia households cannot afford more taxes and the rising cost-of-living. The annual income of 32% of Xenia families and their children is at or below the poverty line. Another 30% have incomes at or below $40,000. Families with that level of income are also eligible for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). We should not forget that about 11% of Xenia householders are senior citizens. They certainly cannot afford more taxes along with rising cost of gas, food, heating, water, and most everything else. That leaves only 38% or nearly 4,100 households to pay for most of the over 50 million dollar Under One Roof bill. That is if the bond issue passes.

Besides the money issue, education is not about swimming, sports (can I hear a boo?), sex, or computers. It is about learning to read, write, do math and science, understand the lessons of literature and history, prepare for good citizenship and a profitable career. When it comes to school facilities, warm, cool, dry, safe school buildings are of utmost importance not the latest and greatest technologies and services, big high-tech labs, pool facilities, or sports stadiums. However, the amenities would be pretty nice and maybe even beneficial.

So what can Xenia residents do? First, remember the UOR bond issue is our school officials’ latest plan to get Ohio School Facility Commission money to build new schools. If memory serves correctly, they’ve been trying to get a bond issue passed for 10 years or more. Second, low income and elderly citizens must also vote this November making sure their voice is heard concerning the UOR/school rebuilding plan. If Xenia citizens (especially, the 38% who will pay the most) decide to rebuild better schools now, why not go the extra mile and make sure the best plan for the best schools are built and paid for now. The often-chanted mantra is still true: ‘Costs will only go up’ and the nearly $50 million in tobacco industry ‘blood money’ will no longer be available.

Originally published on February 27 in the Xenia Daily Gazette

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Xenia Community Schools Rebuilding Plan : It’s All About the Money

Posted on October 23, 2008 by | 2 comments

By Daniel Downs

Part Three

If Xenia taxpayers want new schools or even the Under-One-Roof plan, they need to consider the costs. Xenia can change the structure of the school system and rebuild all but two new schools plus a new central office just to get the state to pay 46% ($56 million) of the total costs.
Under the new plan, the central office building, Cox, Shawnee, Simon Kenton, and South Hill school buildings will require reuse plans. The YMCA is moving whether or not voters approve of the Under-One-Roof plan. The library is considering using the YMCA to expand its services. The Senior Citizen Center is hoping to move as well. Other buildings in the downtown area requiring reuse including the old historic library located across the street from the both the Senior Citizen Center and YMCA, and the list goes on…. If these buildings will be reused for public purposes, Xenia taxpayers will have to foot the bill for any repairs or renovations. Ideally, private investors would be attracted to purchase any abandoned school buildings.

During the Xenia Community School District Forum, I suggested reusing Brenner Field House as a theater for plays and musicals. Unfortunately, the filed house was built over a garbage dump. So reusing Brenner may not such a good idea, according Robert Smith.

If all of the school buildings are going to be rebuilt per voter approval, why not build all of them on same property along with a new YMCA, Senior Citizen Center, Kettering Hospital out-patient center, and branches of several colleges. That way the elementary and middle school students would benefit from the YMCA, nearby health care, and possibly interaction with wise and caring senior citizens. It’s true project costs would be higher and busing cost would probably increase as well, but the benefits might exceed the additional costs.

As the meeting proceeded through old building reuse ideas, it dawned on me that almost all of the attendees except for maybe a half-dozen residents were past or present educators. There may have been two or three parents with children attending Cox or other Xenia schools at the forum. There were a lot of teachers present. One of them asked a pertinent question: what will happen to their jobs. What board member Bill Spahr didn’t say was that all of them would be placed in new positions at new schools.

Beyond reuse and employment issues, the bottom line is whether Xenia residents can afford a $66.5 million or more bond issue. As I pointed out in my February article titled What is the Future of Xenia Under One Roof, 62 percent of Xenia residents qualify for the hot welfare program called State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Nearly a third of Xenia residents have incomes at or below the poverty line. That leaves about 38 percent who still might be capable of handling more taxes on top of the rising costs for gas, food, and most other goods and services.

What happens if Xenia voters do not approve any rebuilding plan? Will any money still be available for renovating or rebuilding school facilities in the future? I asked the Ohio School Facilities Commission that question, but I never got a response. The tobacco securitization funds will no longer be available after 2009. After that time, a portion of any funds the General Assembly budgets for school renovation and construction will be available to deserving school districts to help fund building projects.

Maybe what Xenia needs is a very wealthy patron saint or at least a few generous patrons. If a golden giver is not available or willing, maybe Congress would be disposed to redirect some of it golden earmarked pork to Xenia to cover the cost of building new schools. It would probably be more effective than the current stimulus plan and certainly healthier than their economy-killing subsidies to the ethanol industry. If Congress doesn’t have a heart to share more of its pork with Xenia, maybe the State of Ohio would give us back our 9 cent surcharge on all of our gas and electric. It seems only fair seeing the state no longer intends to give any of it to citizens for windmills or solar energy and similar renewable energy enhancements. The state didn’t give much of it to homeowners anyway. A lot of it was redirected to cover other state programs. The question we should be asking is why renters and homeowners are subsidizing the energy industry instead of education. Let business subsidize their own growth and innovations. Of course, the problem is convincing those who represent us in the Ohio General Assembly that it is a better idea than those propositions being argued by industry lobbyists.

Originally published on April 29 in the Xenia Daily Gazette.

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What the Chemical Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know about Everyday Products

Posted on October 11, 2008 by | Comments Off on What the Chemical Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know about Everyday Products

A September 18, 2008 article published on AlterNet reports that the chemical industry has enlisted its lobbyists, scientists, and “yes we can” legislators in their efforts to discredit scientific and medical evidence showing bisphenol A (BPA) is destructive to animal and human lives. This research has been growing for decades. Yet, the federal government still panders to the big chemical companies and their big dollar lobbies.

The chemical industry is a $3 trillion dollar business and BPA is a billion dollar concern. What Dow Chemical and other businesses are concerned about is not the health of society but the potential loss a product that makes them $6 billion a year. The value of BPA-based manufactured goods, from cell phones and computers to epoxy coatings and dental bindings, is probably incalculable.

University of Missouri-Columbia scientists Frederick Vom Saal and Wade Welshons are credited are the first scientists to discover that miniscule amounts of bisphenol A (BPA), an artificial sex hormone and integral component of a vast array of plastic products, caused irreversible changes in the prostates of fetal mice.

Their findings has touched off a steady drumbeat that has led to a ban on BPA-laden baby bottles in Canada, mounting support for a similar ban in the U.S., major retailers pulling plastic products off their shelves, a consumer run on glass baby bottles and a blizzard of scientific reports raising increasingly disturbing questions about the chemical’s dangers at the trace levels to which people are routinely exposed.

Washington State University reproductive scientist Patricia Hunt found that low-levels of BPA scrambled chromosomal alignment of eggs in mice.

A Yale University medical school research team discovered that after injecting African green monkeys for 28 days with BPA at the level the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says is safe for people, the researchers found the chemical causes destruction of synapses in brain cells. In humans, these losses could lead to memory and learning problems and depression.

In April, a study published in Environmental Health Perspectives reveals scientific evidence that low-levels of BPA also damage the human immune system.

Could BPA be the root problem of the growing number of people with the Alzheimer and other degenerative diseases?

Another major problem with BPA is the ease with which the chemical can leach into our food, air, and skin cells. Plastics made with BPA break down easily when heated, microwaved, washed with strong detergents or wrapped around acidic foods like tomatoes, trace amounts of the potent hormone leach into food from epoxy lacquer can linings, polycarbonate bottles and other plastic food packaging. According to Dr. Mercola, cans of infant formula have been shown to be some of the worst offenders; just one to three servings can contain BPA levels that have caused serious adverse effects in animal tests.

The Chemical Industry and corporations like Dow Chemical are using every means possible to hinder any responsible action against their cash cow, bisphenol A. Earlier this year, the industry spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to defeat a California legislative proposal to ban BPA in food packaging. The Chemistry Council and allied companies and industry groups hired an army of lobbyists, including Navigators LLC, the Washington firm that ran Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2003 campaign and his 2004 budget reform drive. Tactics included an industry email to food banks charging that a BPA ban would mean the end of distributions of canned goods for the poor.

And more recently, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) forced Mary Gade to quit her job as head of the EPA’s Midwest office after her interactions with Dow Chemical. Gade had been locked in a heated dispute with Dow about long-delayed plans to clean up dioxin-saturated soil that extends 50 miles beyond its Midland, Michigan plant. The company had been dumping the highly toxic and persistent chemical into local rivers for most of the last century.

In an interview on May 1, 2008, Gade said of her forced resignation: “There’s no question this is about Dow. I stand behind what I did and what my staff did. I’m proud of what we did.”

The FDA recently evaluated these claims backed by over 100 studies, by health and consumer advocates, by lawmakers, and by scientists. The typical response of the FDA was to favor big dollar industry science.

According to Dr. Mercola, the FDA upheld their decision that BPA is safe and can remain in food packaging, including infant formula containers and baby bottles, despite the more than 100 independent studies linking the chemical to serious disorders in humans, including:

    * Prostate cancer
    * Breast cancer
    * Diabetes
    * Early puberty
    * Obesity, and
    * Learning and behavioral problems

There are several things you can do about this issue. You can ontact your state and federal representatives encouraging them to create and support legislation that will eliminate the manufacture and sale of products containing BPA. You can also buy products from a growing number of manufacturers that offer products without BPA. A list of BPA free resources may be found on Dr. Mercola’s website.

Sources:

Alternet September 15, 2008

Current Natural Health Newsletter October 11, 2008

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Ohio Led-Democrats Trample Down Law to Get More Votes

Posted on October 1, 2008 by | Leave a comment

According to a report by the Washington Post, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled late Tuesday to deny the Ohio Republican Party’s emergency motion for an injunction limiting same-day early voter registration and voting. Under the direction of Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, county boards of election are allowing voters to register and vote on the same day, during a one-week window from Sept. 30 through Oct. 6.

Republicans argue that because state law requires voters to be registered for 30 days before casting a ballot, the procedure should be banned. Brunner said the process should continue because the votes will not be counted until Election Day. The Supreme Court of Ohio and a federal district court in Cleveland on Monday agreed with Brunner.

Politicians making it easier to register and vote is good policy. Shredding current law with the blessing of the Courts is another, which what SS Brunner and her blacked robed supporters sitting on high did.

Is it really to reduce long lines or to enfranchise more voters? Not really. Violating current law can never be justified by great political schemes. Scheming democrats know leftist activists are in the hoods convincing people to register and vote. The hint is that if they do their brotha’ will help them become more middle class through better community welfare programs. This is standard policy of get-out of poverty by voting for their Democrat (read it quick and cough a few times) benefactors.

This practice has been going for a long time and the poor are still poor. They still have the same issues with blighted neighborhoods, poor city services, low-income, crime on every street corner, little good health care, poor diets, and on and on. Unless they are true believing dependents on sugar daddy uncle Sam, they still have the same problems they have had for decades.

Some of advocates like ACORN, and others are seeking to help the poor. Sometimes they do. They helped them get loans and mortgages that they cannot not pay. They often have had to pay 3-4 times more to get payday loans for quick cash. Some inner-city poor actually work hard but still have little hope to achieve the American Dream. Many are single parenting moms, who should vote.

The problems is–and I have worked for ACORN while living in another state–multimillion dollar activist organizations like ACORN do not help people move beyond poverty they maintain. It’s true they make being poor a little better. With the cooperation of Washington politicians and rich elites, many poor are enabled to enjoy much of the good life, meaning having a decent place to live, cars, cell phones, computers, nice clothes, good food, and other stuff. It must be wonderful to have all that stuff only for the price of human dignity, much dependency, and little freedom.

Leading Ohio Dems desire to continue their paternal role over their poor benefactors. They also want the blessing of the superiors in party and on Capitol Hill. I’m sure Obama and company will shower may blessing on them and their grateful children.

I think the poor would show less prejudice by voting for McCain and Palin. They would be better off if while doing so they speak with one voice their demand for serious investment in their community, more justice economic policies to assist all willing to work to move out of poverty in order pay their own way. And just think, real prosperity and productivity would increase the local tax revenues and circulation of earned money, more consumerism, more employer-employee purchased health care insurance, paid more genuinely qualified loans, and the economic and political elites would still see the wealth trickle up into their coffers.

Wouldn’t that make a better world in which to live?

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Vectren’s $27 Million Natural Gas Rate Increase and Your Opportunity To Not Pay It

Posted on September 6, 2008 by | Leave a comment

All of the jubilation over gas prices declining may soon be over. The bad news is not that gasoline is going to rise again; that is inevitable. The bad news is that your property taxes and natural gas bill may be increasing shortly.

Property taxes are going up because our government reassessed property values upward. If local voters approve the various November tax levies, you will be paying an additional $202 in 2009. Three levies that will increase you property taxes are Xenia Community School bond issue, Greene County Children Services and Community Mental Health operational issues.

According to the Office of the Ohio Consumer’s Council (OCC), Vectren asked the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio for permission to raise its natural gas delivery rates. Vectren wants to raise the $7 customer charge listed on your monthly natural gas bill to $16.75 beginning this November and ending in April 2009. From the low usage period beginning in May and ending in October, Vectren proposes to decrease the rate to $10 per month. Vectren’s ultimate goal is a winter monthly rate of $20.04 and summer rate of $11.96. The customer charge covers the property and facilities, metering, meter reading, billing, and other administrative costs.

At the same time, Vectren proposes to reduce its delivery service rate. This is a charge based on the volume of natural gas delivered to your home. The current rate is $0.1199 per CCF (100 cubic foot) for up to 50 CCF. Above 50 CCF, the rate decreases to $0.1044. Vectren wants to reduce further the rate beginning this November to $0.10937 and to $0.01397 in May 2009. In November 2009, Vectren proposes to reduce the delivery rate further to $0.08754 during the winter months and $0.07534 during the summer season. Vectren probably hopes consumers will think they are balancing the cost of natural gas delivery by further reducing this rate, but you will see later that it is not the case.

Using US Department of Energy data, the average Ohio residents used about 834 CCF in 2007 of natural gas in 2007. Extrapolating this data to Vectren’s 318,000 customers, natural gas customers in the Miami Valley used about 265,076,177 CCF and paid Vectren around $29.7 million in delivery costs. Applying Vectren’s proposed new rates, local customers will pay $29.6 million from November 2008 to October 2009. During the next 12 month period, local customers will pay a measly $21.7 million.

By comparison, Miami Valley customers paid about $26.7 million in customer charges. Applying Vectren’s proposed increases, local customers will pay $51 million during the period from November 2008 through April 2009. Vectren’s ultimately wants Miami Valley customers to pay $61.1 million a year beginning November 2009.

The total first year increase to Miami Valley natural gas users is $24 million and addition $2 plus million the second year, which is a total increase of $26 million.

Vectren’s proposed delivery rate increase does not include the cost of natural gas. It does not include a pipeline replacement cost recovery rider that will be added to every customer’s bill. It does not include the other half-dozen cost and lost revenue recovery riders also billed to all Vectren customers. It is not reflect the increasing profits made from commercial customers. It does not reflect increasing profits from fees charge to other gas companies for delivering their gas to your home.

Vectren’s CEO has about $202 million reasons for increasing your natural gas rates in order to continue growing Vectren’s investor dividends. I image most of the board of director are similarly motivated. And that is not all; they also intend on owning all public pipelines paid for by all member of our communities. As wrong as that is, Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) collusion with Vectren’s plans is unconscionable.

That is why all natural gas customers have an opportunity to oppose Vectren’s proposed plans. You can write PUCO at the address listed below:

Public Utilities Commission of Ohio
Attn: Docketing Division
180 E. Broad Street
Columbus, OH 43215

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E-Commerce Sales Continues to Climb

Posted on August 20, 2008 by | 2 comments

The Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce announced today that the estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the first quarter of 2008, adjusted for seasonal variation, but not for price changes, was $33.8 billion, an increase of 0.8 percent from the fourth quarter of 2007. Total retail sales for the first quarter of 2008 were estimated at $1,024.2 billion, an increase of 0.1 percent from the fourth quarter of 2007. The first quarter 2008 e-commerce estimate increased 13.6 percent from the first quarter of 2007 while total retail sales increased 2.8 percent in the same period. E-commerce sales in the first quarter of 2008 accounted for 3.3 percent of total sales.

(Click on the graph see the original and enlarged version.)
 

The above graph shows continuous growth (aka, inflation) in retail and e-commerce. In 2002, e-commerce owned 1.3 percent of the retail market. By the end of the first quarter 2008, the estimated retail market share was the same as the last quarter in 2007: 3.3 percent. That may not be earth shaking but it is still nearly a 300 percent gain in 5 years.

When annual retail and e-commerce sales are compared, the figures get more impressive. From the beginning of 2002 to the end of 2007, traditional venues of retail sales increased 30 percent. Over the same period, e-commerce sales increased by 185 percent–not exactly a feat to be laughed at.

What could increase e-retailing sales even more?
In my opinion, someone needs to invent virtual manufacturing and distribution comparable to the Jettisons–you baby boomers know what I’m talking about. That way, anything you want can be had nearly instantaneously over the Internet, cellular, or by satellite. Think of it in terms of Star Trekk. Instead of “beam me up, Scottie, retail commerce would be something like “download my goodies” or “beam down my order, thank you very much!” Now, such an invention would revolutionize e-retailing.

2002=3135091 44652 2007=4042835 127090 1.289543111 2.846233091

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