The WikiLeaks memos is not a disaster. In fact I think it strengthens the U.S. positions in many international issues. It is true that the memos may put some people in danger, like freedom fighters in Iran. It is also incredible that a pfc can have access to so many secret information. We have to do a much better job of keeping information out of people who have no business having access to them. But so far the leaks are not so damaging overall.

For example it is now revealed that Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries are frightened by Iran. So they don't want Iran to have nuclear weapons either. So there will be no consequences in the Arab world if the U.S. or Israel decide to take out Iran's nuclear facilities. It may also give Iran pause to know how isolated they are in the world. The revelation that China may not be upset if North Korea is absorbed by South Korea may not be the whole truth. But the fact that China has not gone out of its way to deny it, shows that there is a grain of truth in it. This should also give Kim Jong Il pause.

Julian Assange claims that Hillary Clinton should resign because State department employees had been ordered to gather confidential information on foreign dignitaries. This is the worst indictment of our diplomats? The fact that our diplomats had unkind words about foreign leaders comes as no surprise. I am sure they say the same thing about our leaders. Imagine what they say about Bush and Cheney! Spying on each other is part of the diplomatic game. What these leaks have not shown, as least so far, is that the U.S. has engaged in double talks with allies and enemies. There is no evidence of the U.S. planning to use force to get what we want. So to me these leaks won't hurt, and possibly help, our image on the international stage. The only thing that we need to demonstrate is improving our ability to prevent leaks!

Most people want to wipe out deficits in both federal and state governments by making budget cuts rather than raising taxes. I want to make cuts and not raise taxes also, but is it a realistic goal? The co-chairmen of Obama's bipartisan deficit reduction commission offered a draft blueprint for wiping out some of the deficits last week. Among the spending cuts proposed and the savings by 2015 as reported by LA Times: 20.4 billion by freezing federal employees' salary for 3 years; 13.2 billion by cutting federal workforce by 10%; 4.6 billion by slowing the growth of foreign aid; 16 billion by eliminating all earmarks; 9.2 billion by freezing noncombat military pay for 3 years; 20 billion by cutting military procuremnt by 15%.

I would go along with all those above. But even the easiest one of them all, earmarks, have defenders in Congress. Obviously lobbysts and unions will be up at arms and people will complain that it will hurt our defense etc. Obama can help himself among independents by supporting these cuts, putting himself more toward the center. But the job cuts will not help him in the near term because unemployment is his achilles heel right now. The report also wants to eliminate all tax deductions and lower the tax rate and thus simplified the tax code. I am for that also. There is an increase in Medicare payments by the bendficiaries in the proposal. There is also a suggestion to increase the age at which retirees can start drawing social security. Again I agree with these. Again these will be met with stiff opposition and unlikely to pass Congress after all the lobbying are done.

It is the same situation in the state level. Everybody wants spending cuts but when surveyed the majority do not want cuts to schools, transportation, medicaid. These are the biggest parts of the state budget. So if you don't want to cut them, where are you going to cut enough to make a difference? In the long term we do have to decrease government workforce, salaries, and especially pensions. It used to be that you take a government job at a lower salary than in the private sector and get better pensions and benefits. But now the salaries negotiated by the unions (which contributes to campaign of politicians who vote on salary spending) have made public work much better than similar positions in private sector. So we have to change that but there is not enough political will to do so now. It will take years, if ever, to make the changes.

Last week on 60 Minutes there was a segment about a small town in Iowa where Maytag was located. When the Maytag factory shut down there was widespread unemployment and extreme financial hard times. This is played throughout the country and there isn't anything that the president can do about it. Manufacturing is going away because there is no way that we can compete with China if their wages are 0ne-tenth of those here, no matter what government polices we put in. On the other hand there was report from Silicon Valley that companies like Face Book and Google are raiding each others' intellectual talent. This raises the earnings of engineers and computer scientists dramatically. No government policies made a difference here either except maybe the freedom for entrepriuneers and venture capitalists to pursue their dreams.

This trend shows one reason why the Democrats got slaughtered in the heartland but did ok in the the coasts. Areas that depend on old industries are going to be in trouble just as people who do not have a good education. We must encourage better education especially in math and sciences if we are to compete in the future.

Obama' s trip to economic summits in Asia illustrate the weak position we are in. When we try to tell other country to change their economy from export driven to consumption driven like us, they laugh at us. They feel that we have no discipline and disapprove of the Fed's 600 billion dollar stimulus. I think in the long term we have to tighten our belt like not only China and India but Germany as well. Of course Obama can't do that because it will hurt in the short term and will doom his re-election bid for sure.

Spent most of last evening watching the CMA. This is due to the fact that it preempted Modern Family and my wife and I want to see if Gwyneth Paltrow can actually sing country. She did ok except we had to wait through almost the entire show to see her. I wonder why they want her play a country singer in a movie. Wouldn't it be easier to use Ashley Judd? This is the first time I actually watch this award show and here are the observations from a non-country music fan:

1. There are higher percentage of white people here than at hockey games, NASCAR races and Tea Party gatherings. In fact I didn't see one black person on the show or in the audience. I think they need to bring Charley Pride back, from wherever he is, to get some diversity. Charley is not only a country singer but likes baseball better than basketball. So he should be invited to many more white events even if he can't sing anymore.

2. Taylor Swift didn't win vocalist of the year. But if she won there would be zero chance that Kanye West would have interrupted her acceptance. (See #1 above)

3. After the Dixie Chicks bashed Bush a few years back, I was not surprised that they were not at the awards. But of course a group called Lady Antebellum won big. This sounds like a nod to pre-Civil War era but I don't know for sure. I also don't know why there are two men in the band since they are no lady.

4. Dolly Parton wasn't there but I am sure she kept abreast of what went on. I understand she was mad a somebody. She should have showed up and get it off her chest.

5. When I heard that Detroit was represented, I thought Eminem had changed his style. It turned out to be Kid Rock. So even in country music, Detroit rocks on.

Well, that is all I have to say about a show where I don't know most of the people and know none of the songs. I wish John Denver was still alive.

The voting must have been rigged. The Republicans must have stuffed the ballot or Sarah Palin convinced the Tea party to vote her way. How else do you explain that Rick Fox was voted out of Dancing With The Stars while Bristol Palin is still alive. Fox had the highest point total given by the judges on Monday night while Palin had the lowest so there must have been millions more votes for Palin than Fox. And those people who voted for Palin can't possibly be objective. Fox was way better in not only my opinion but the three judges. So if I am in charge of the Democrats I would protest the elections tonight given this irregularity in DWTS!

No surprise that the Republicans won big tonight although the Democrats manage to salvage the senate majority. As I predicted before there will gridlock no matter what happens tonight. I understand the majority of the people are upset by the state of the economy and they will blame the incumbents. But the idea that the Republicans or Tea Party people are going to do better is absurd. For example, one of the reason that people are unhappy with Obama is that they don't like the stimulus and the deficit increase because of it. The truth is without the stimulus the situation today would not be better and probably worse and the people would complain why he didn't do anything. If Obama had done nothing and somehow we have improvement in the economy, people would then complain that if he had done more, the recovery would have been sooner. I can guarantee you that if the republicans and McCain had won in 2008, we would be talking about a landslide for the Democrats tonight. The Republicans have absolutely no idea what to do.

On CNN tonight the Republican whip Eric Cantor was asked what big program he would cut to decrease the deficit. He was asked three times and he did not answer the question. He only said that the Republicans want the deficit to go back to the level of 2008. Gee, we still had a big deficit then and the economy was collapsing at that time under Bush. How about we go back to 2002 before we send troops to Iraq which certainly increase our deficit. Or how about we go back to before Bush when we had a surplus. Yes, the Democrats like to spend but if you think the Republicans are better, you are delusional because while the Democrats are in the pockets of the unions, the Republicans are in the pockets of corporations like Enron, AIG and Goldman Sachs.

The pundits are all talking about whether the control of Congress will change hands with this coming election. Everybody is making predictions about the outcome. I am going to make the prediction that the result won't matter. Whether the Republicans win one, none or both chambers, we will have complete gridlock over the next two years. Every politician says that he/she will create jobs, change Washington etc. But nothing important will happen no matter who wins.

Things are so partisan now that even with overwhelming majority in both chambers by the Democrats plus Obama in the White House, it was difficult to pass any significant bill. Even if the Republicans win both chambers, they won't have much of a majority, certainly nowhere near able to overcome a filibuster in the Senate. Even if they pass a bill, say repealing the Healthcare bill, Obama will just veto it. So the Republicans won't be able to do anything. Even if the Democrats retain majority in both chambers, they are going to be a lot weaker than before and they certainly are not able to bring out any big bill that will get any Republcian support. So I predict that the next two years we will have a do nothing but bickering Congress. There is nothing legislative wise that Obama can do. He will get re-elected if the economy makes a spectacular recovery. Short of that unlikely scenario, he will need either a big improvement in Afghanistan and/or some progress in the Israel-Palestinian negotiation. Even if he has a great economic stimulus plan that he just thought of, there is no way it can pass Congress and will not have worked in two years anyway. So Obama's fate will basically depend on luck, just as any other president.

I think Juan Williams was just being honest, saying what a lot of people are thinking in private. He said that he is afraid when he sees people wearing Muslim clothes on the plane with him. I believe that he understands that this is an irrational fear because most Muslims are not terrorists and for those that are, they are not going to wear clothes that will bring attention to themselves. I believe that the 9/11 hijackers were not wearing Muslim clothes. Nor were the shoe bomber or the underwear guy. So he has an irrational fear which I don't think is a cause for getting fired. His firing is another example of political correctness which plays into the hands of organizations like Fox News which will use Williams as a victim.

I believe we are so polarized and self-centered that we can't accept other people's right to opinion. Bill O'Reilly's comment about Muslims killed us as oppose to adding the word extremist before the word Muslim, was insensitive. But I don't think Whoopi Goldberg and (I think it was) Joy Behear walking out was appropriate. If you disagree with another person's opinion or facts, debate him, not walk away or calling that person a racist, a socialist, or unpatriotic. This is a problem on both the right and left and if continue, will divide our country more and more.

Sharon Angle, who is running for the Senate against Harry Reid in Nevada, said recently that Dearborn Mich. is under Sharia law. I am pretty sure that if that was really the case, it would be all over the news nationally and my relatives in Michigan would have called me about it. So for her to make up something like that shows not only dishonesty but also stupidity. I don't like Harry Reid but it is mind boggling that she is ahead in Nevada.

The idea that a religion is going to take over this country is actually not new. Early in the last century it was thought that Catholics were not patriotic and that they answered to the Pope, not to our government. Even when John Kennedy ran for president decades later, he had to proclaim that he was American first and that his religion would not determine how he would govern. Obviously those fears were unfounded. I think the more people who subscribe to Angle's view, the easier it will be for the extremists to recruit for their cause and thus make us all less safe.

Being a head football coach is similar to being the president in certain respects. You work very hard and you hire the best people you can think of and hope for the best. If things go well, everybody thinks you are a genius. If things go badly, everyone thinks that you are an idiot. The same with the assistants that you hire. They were considered very bright in their previous employment, but will be bumps if things get worse even if you have worse players now.

I am thinking of Norm Chow who is the offensive coordinator for UCLA and Monte Kiffin, the defensive coordinator of USC. They both have been around for a long time and previously have been considered geniuses in their professions. I am sure they have not become stupid all of a sudden. But now that UCLA can't move the ball against high grass and USC have holes that a truck can drive through, the blame is on them. If this continue then it is not only their jobs are in jeopardy but those of their head coaches as well. Of course, when Chow and Kiffin were successful, they got too much credit. It is unlikely that Chow made Carson Palmer and Ty Detmer great quarterbacks by himself. Most likely the QBs abilities and other players around them made Chow looked great, even though he is a very good coach. Now with more difficult situations, Chow and Kiffin look very mediocre.

The same with Obama. He can't possibly know more about economics than the economic experts that he hired. No president is an expert on everything. He depends on assistants to guide him. When the economy is going well, he and his advisors are geniues. When things are going badly, they are idiots. Economics, like football strategy, is not an exact science. That is why there are completely opposite strategies coming from very smart people. Alan Greenspan was considered a genius by both Republican and Democratic presidents. But I watched a PBS documentary recently where it showed that Greenspan and others completely disregarded the dangers of derivatives. What president would have heed the warnings of lower rank economists over the opinion of Greenspan? The economy will determine the fate of the president. He depends on his advisors. He must hope that they don't make any mistake. The advisors, in turn, need to be very lucky.

Rutger student Tyler Clementi's suicide is certainly a tragedy. His roommate Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei, by posting of Clementi's sexual acts on the web, are certainly guilty of invasion of privacy. But this is not a hate crime, as liberal groups are saying. This is something stupid that 18 years old do in this age of the internet. Kids send embarrassing pictures and information about themselves thru the internet all the time without thinking about any consequences. If kids don't even worry about consequences to themselves, why would they think of others? Liberals have complained that young people sextexting should not be charged with pornagraphy. I agree with that. So I don't understand why this case would even be considered a hate crime.

Many lessons can be learned from this. Obviously people should learn about the consequences of posting things. Once it is done, it can't be erased. (Maybe I should think before I write any more!). Second, we must figure out how to tell kids that if something bad happenes, it is not the end of the world. While this invasion of privacy is horrible, it did not kill Clementi. I don't know if Clementi reached out for help but if someone he trusted could have tell him that this would not ruin his life, maybe he woud have chosen to live. The same with the girl who was fooled by an adult woman into thinking that a boy had dumped her over the internet.

One more thing that I thought of. That is, all this worry about Big Brother. Well, we are the Big Brother. Our privacy and freedom may be less restricted by the government than by ourselves! Technology gives, technology takes!