Cities and Development

It seems to me that cities, by and large just have it all wrong when they are doing development deals - or at leas the city I live in has it all wrong. If you are selling something you have one of then you are usually looking to maximize your gain in a one shot deal which means pick the highest price you can while ensuring there is still a least on customer. But if you are buying something then you are usually looking to minimize your outlay which means paying the lowest amount possible. How do you do that? Well by ensuring there are multiple sellers with product and let them compete.

But it seems to me that my City, and possibly others, always treat their real-estate like they are selling something (land) instead of buying something (development investment within their City walls). As such they are too often happy to enter into deals where there is only one developer involved. When others drop out because the cost is too high to make the deal that seems to be favorable. In the end they are left dealing with just one developer who can screw them over any number of ways because they are the only one at the table.

If they instead approach it as buying something they will have a vested interest in getting as many sellers out there and have them all compete to produce the best project for the least cost. This would also seem to indicate that development projects should have City investment involved - it is not a bad thing - and that community should have strong buy in to evaluate the best development proposal and what it brings the City. A developer who says "I don't need your investment" is saying "just give me the damn land already" and "I don't need your investment to help me figure out how to make the most money from your land". I.e. City's should find developers who will be partners in developing a city and have a vested interest in its improvement and the happiness of its people.

Furthermore I think that if a development project only gets one bid, or qualified bid, then it probably means the project was badly defined, or that the economic conditions are not suitable for pursuing that development. If either of those is the case then you probably shouldn't proceed - just wait. When there are multiple developers lining up to bid for your land and grants then that is when you'll get the highest and finest developments, and that is when you'll be able to extract the maximum leverage for improvements in the interests of we the people and not corporate profit making.

Remember that monocultures are almost always bad so a City that can only do a deal with a single developer is doing itself and its people a grave disservice. Free markets only work when there is an actual "market" - if there is only one seller then caveat emptor!

Growing middle class?

This article from the NYT asserts that increasing food prices are at least in part due to "a growing middle class". I'd love to know where they got that idea from, everyone knows the middle class is shrinking - the rich get rich and the poor get poorer - so don't you go blaming high food prices on a growing middle class.

Monique Davis named "Worst person of the world"

No sooner did I jump on my high horse to bitch about Assembly woman Monique Davis (see previous post) than Keith Olbermann of MSNBC came to the rescue with some righteous retribution - naming her today's "worst person of the world". Would it be too ironic of me to say "Ahmen brother!" ???

Why Church and State need to stay separate

Listen to this sound bite (mp3 audio file) as Rep. Monique Davis, a Chicago Democrat and member of the Illinois legislature goes off the rails. She just can't help herself from a religious tirade tearing into atheist Rob Sherman who dared to point out that maybe spending $1 million in tax dollars on a Pilgrim Baptist Church might be unconstitutional.

The context is unclear from the sound bite so I've no idea if the argument was valid or not. It sounded like the church may actually no longer be a church any more, and hence perhaps just an historic building - in which case spending money may be just a pure historic preservation issue and I don't know if there is anything against preserving a building that is no longer used as a Church. Maybe they would just keep the exterior and put in a library or a restaurant or convert it to lofts...

Anyway what is more interesting is how Davis just goes completely off the rails spewing such venomous hatred and crap while Sherman keeps his cool with "thank you for sharing your point of view". Note how the chair never makes an attempt to shut down Davis as she screams at him to leave but then tells Sherman he must keep his response on subject. Just who was out of order here? To paraphrase what Austin Dacey likes to say: a religious fundamentalist says "I'm right you're wrong so go to hell" but if there was such a thing as an atheist fundamentalist they'd say "I'm right, you're wrong - can't we just talk about it some more?" That seems to be exactly the attitude Sherman is following but really he never gets a chance.

This illustrates beautifully the modus operandi of the religious fundamentalists - eliminate all competition to your memes by eliminating those who might question you and labeling everything they say a blasphemy and outlawing such speech. Austin Dacey points out that this is now a big problem because the secular world has fallen into the trap of labeling all beliefs - religious, secular, whatever as "private" and hence not only not to be part of government, but also beyond public criticism. To keep church out of state they lost the ability to critique any aspect of religion, or any "private" belief on even the most obvious ethical and moral principles. In fact we are rapidly losing any chance of holding anyone, even government to such principles or even talking about them.

It is my belief - and I am happy to make that a public belief - that Davis couldn't justify any of her beliefs against any objective moral or ethical basis, and that Sherman could probably demolish her rationale blow by blow. That is what is feared most and the easiest way is to literally remove all critical speech from public life because, as Davis so eloquently puts it, it is "dangerous for our children to even know that your philosophy exists". Ms Davis - if atheism, secularism and the rest of our non-god fearing philosophies are just unfounded rubbish what have you to fear from a little spirited (no pun intended) debate? Never mind that the proposed expenditure that you are defending might actually be illegal, and that your proposed banning of someone from government for being an atheist is also illegal.

See RichardDawkins.net for more information about Davis' meltdown.

When the going gets tough, corporations get....

So this is exactly what happens when the going gets tough - people cut back, cut corners and corporations being "people" (well the Supreme Court says so!) they cut corners too. The problem is there really are no consequences for corporations to cut corners - the worst thing that can happen is their share holders loose a buck. Big deal - who does that hurt in the corporation? The employees, shareholders and in the case of Southwest Airlines some customers maybe - the executives and the corporate body itself bail out with a big fat parachute and live on to another, more lucrative day. This is exactly why we need government regulation - to keep corporations honest. Government puts bad people jail and it should be putting bad corporations in jail - but, thanks to George Bush, it doesn't. Because regulations "are bad for the economy". Oh, oh, hurt me people! Someone should tell those people that there are only two kinds of Republicans - billionaires and suckers. Which are you?