Jay, I have never ever mistaken you for a flaming pinko liberal!

Jay -

Have you considered the converse, that private sector pensions have become too skimpy, and a generation of aging paupers awaits us with dire consequences.

Everyone recognizes that public employee pension and retiree benefits commitments are unsustainable, but little has been said about a major shift in the social contract between private sector employer and employee.

In too many instances, Wall Street demands for corporate"efficiency" has become code for "squeeze your workforce so we can harvest fatter bonuses." The pension disparity between the public sector janitor versus the private sector janitor is a useful distraction from the fault line separating the highest earning ten percent from everyone else.

The collapse of consumer spending overnight is nothing compared to the long term impact on the demand side of private sector employees' shrinking pensions. Today's Wall Street titans forget the old Detroit admonition about paying ones workers enough money to buy ones cars.

- Steve Lebowitz, Annapolis

When Rodricks was on WBAL that was pretty much his MO, kudos to him letting you on his show.

And everyone knows when you don't want to hear something because you know it's true you plug your ears.

Keep up the fight, Jay!

Interesting. He had me on back in Nov to discuss a punitive tax on abandoned property. I pointed out that the original idea had been suggested within the greater context of a discussion on cutting property taxes and spending. I suggested the elimination of pensions as well as corporate welfare deals such as how Legg Mason got 20 years tax free on their new $200M building. He cut me off saying that would be a great topic for another show he'd like to have me back on, but never made good on the promise. I suggested perhaps it was because the idea was unpopular with his listeners and friends. Perhaps I was right.

There's a big difference between traditional redistribution from the top down versus the opposite which is often the case with these pensions. One is debatable, the other is unacceptable.

Finally, your politics have always struck me as a fairly independent mixed bag and I'm always surprised when you're labeled one thing or another. If you care at all about the environment or people killed mining coal, you're a flaming liberal. If you don't like paying for a benefit almost no one outside government gets at a time we're staring down the barrel of insolvency, you're a crazy, anti-Obama, birther tea partier. It shows the blind, partisan ideology that permeates most Americans. It's "pick a side and conform to it!" It is a very top down, authoritarian mindset that discourages independent thought and analysis.

Thanks for the thoughts, Josh. You nailed it on the authoritarian trend. JH

He called me a tea-partier!
Me thinks Hancock the self-ascribed umpire has rabbit ears! Don't like the heat; leave the kitchen.