Ayn Rand Shrugged Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security And Health Care For All

I OBJECT TO OBJECTIVISM

By Melvin J. Howard

The famous extreme capitalist Ayn Rand, who once said, "If money is the root of all evil, then what is the root of all money?" Alan Greenspan, the last Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, worked with her extensively on her book "Atlas Shrugged", released in 1957, which many claimed to be the most influential book at that time. In subsequent years Greenspan also contributed to Rand's publication "The Objectivist". Since money has become the backbone of so much of our social fabric and well-being. Then we should know a little something about the beliefs of those that run our governments and our financial system. Mr. Greenspan rigorous training in Ms. Rand’s philosophy, which is known as "objectivism" and whose fundamental features seem to overlap extensively with today's so-called neo-liberal economic policy. This philosophy of objectivism largely rejects the idea that capitalism and capitalists should have any social goals at all, and promotes the idea that all acts and intentions should be purely selfish. Not surprisingly Rand's work was a huge hit with the far right in America at the time, this was right after the McCarthy era when he accused everyone and their grandmother that they were a communist. In coming up with her rather extreme, theories it appears that Ms Rand had no interest in the field of physics.

If she had looked into the developments in Physics that took place in the early 1900s in the form of Quantum Mechanics and Special Relativity it would have been clear her philosophy would have hit a few stumbling blocks. Both of these radical developments in physics shook the foundations of Western thought premised on objectivity, independence of objects, the absolute nature of time, and certainty. Gradually this new way of looking at the world, replaced the old Newtownian (or classical) mechanics way of looking at the world, I call it Quantumnomics. Not only are today’s mainstream economic theories, and philosophies like objectivism, outdated by being based on the Newtonian or classical worldview, but also these same outdated views are reflected in our current monetary system. Nothing illustrates this better then what has happen to the financial system over the last 20 years.

The House Republican budget unveiled by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin leads me to suspect he is a pupil of Ms. Rand’s. For starters he would repeal President Barack Obama's health care overhaul in its entirety. The plan would slash federal spending by about $5 trillion over 10 years. Mainly by changing the fundamentals of Medicare and Medicaid. Here is how he would do it:

• _ People now 54 and younger would not get the same Medicare coverage their parents and grandparents have. Instead, future retirees would get a fixed amount from the federal government to buy insurance from a range of regulated private plans. The federal payment would go directly to the health insurance plan. Starting in 2022, the eligibility age for Medicare, now 65, would be gradually increased until it reaches 67 in 2033.

• _ Seniors already on Medicare and people within 10 years of retirement would be able to go into the traditional program as it exists today. Once the new program is set up in 2022, beneficiaries in traditional Medicare would be free to switch, but they would be under no obligation to do so.

• _ The government Medicare payment – called "premium support" by Ryan and a voucher by critics – would be adjusted so that beneficiaries whose health gets worse would receive more. Wealthier retirees would get a lower subsidy, and lower-income beneficiaries would receive extra help with their out-of-pocket costs. The payments would be indexed for inflation, but at a level that's expected to be lower than the current rate of increase in medical costs. Medicare now covers about 47 million retirees and disabled people.

• _ Medicaid, which covers about 50 million low-income and severely disabled people, would be turned over to the states. Washington would send each state a lump sum to cover services from prenatal care for low-income women to nursing homes for Alzheimer's patients. The block grant would allow each state to design its Medicaid program according to local needs. Low-income people would lose their current federal right to Medicaid. Safeguards would be spelled out in subsequent legislation, but that’s no guarantee states could stop accepting new applications in an economic downturn.

As I mentioned in earlier entries in the coming years, more and more of society's resources will be going towards supporting retirees and increasing medical expenses for society as a whole (both workers and non-workers alike). This will be true whether benefits are funded in the public sector or the private sector, or both. Thus, Private Savings accounts and privatizing Social Security cannot solve the problem and discussion of these as a solution should also not be allowed to distract debate from the real issues. It is the increasing share of national expenditure devoted to healthcare. This effects all of Medicare funding, Medicaid funding, private medical funding. In fact, putting current contributions into private accounts will make the current funding situation worse, because these funds are now used to pay for current retirees and not "saving" for future retirees. In response to Rep. Ryan House proposal Senator Baucus has introduced a bill. The express the sense of the Senate that Medicare should not be dismantled and turned into a voucher program bill:

112th CONGRESS

1st Session

S. 789

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

April 12, 2011

Mr. BAUCUS (for himself and Mr. NELSON of Florida) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance

---

A BILL

To express the sense of the Senate that Medicare should not be dismantled and turned into a voucher program.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SENSE OF THE SENATE THAT MEDICARE SHOULD NOT BE DISMANTLED AND TURNED INTO A VOUCHER PROGRAM.

(a) Findings- The Senate makes the following findings:

(1) The Medicare program has been providing affordable health care for elderly and disabled Americans for decades.

(2) Forty-seven million Americans currently rely on the Medicare program for their health care.

(3) The Congressional Budget Office has stated that under the House Budget Committee fiscal year 2012 budget resolution ‘most elderly people would pay more for their health care than they would pay under the current Medicare system’.

(b) Sense of the Senate- It is the sense of the Senate that--

(1) Medicare should not be dismantled and turned into a voucher or premium-support program;

(2) deficit reduction should not be achieved by simply passing on the costs of health care to Medicare beneficiaries;

(3) guaranteed Medicare benefits should be preserved;

(4) medical decisions should be made by seniors and their doctors, not insurance companies; and

(5) deficit reduction should be achieved by lowering health care costs through delivery system reforms.

This disconnect into modern physics, while talking about the relationship between a capitalist society and the poor, may seem rather odd. Nevertheless it brings home my point that money is a social and psychological factor and so the beliefs and "science" adopted by those that create money and control the monetary system must take this into account. These changes in perspective, force us to think about things differently, to always acknowledge the interconnectedness of everything, and to recognize the ever-present uncertainty in everything. The capital markets of today do not operate in this fashion. Rather they treat people and objects as independent economic units, and discount the future as less important than the present. Furthermore they have limited mechanisms for coping with uncertainty as from financial crisis past.

Under this old or classical worldview central bankers use more or less traditional techniques for exercising some control over the economy, and a large part of this is maintaining the confidence of the markets in the monetary system. So people that don’t have much money don’t factor into central bankers decisions very much at all. This is a big mistake. Now on the surface many might think that there is no relationship between Central Bankers and the poor to speak of. However this ignores a very important fact the interconnectedness of everything and this is perhaps best considered within the context of the "Zero Sum Game". As income and wealth gaps have widened few people have more money, and the majority of those people are getting less. What have we learned over the past 50 years is this that economies that function as central governments or central planning are time bombs waiting to happen. And extreme capitalist or free market systems unrestrained are time bombs waiting to happen. Globalization is a fact of life whether we like it or not. We are all inter-connected and the classical models simply will not work. The ever-present uncertainty in everything is a reality. We need to solve the problem as a nation not as divisions of sound bites and political propaganda. If we keep ignoring these laws of Physics we should not be surprised of the catastrophic events that  follow. If you jump from a 30-story building you are going to fall and it will probably be fatal Physics 101.     

The Great Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid And The Health Care Debate

Let’s Talk Dollars And Cents/Sense!

By Melvin J. Howard

In the U.S. the main redistribution function and associated safety nets is a bit more like a type of "insurance" against personal economic disasters, whereby the risks of such events are spread across the society as a whole. For example, the risks of no longer having access to money due to retirement or disability - which is what Social Security covers - are borne by society as a whole, which has a much larger capacity to bear that risk, than do the individuals likely to experience such events. The drastic consequences of placing these risks on just individuals became very apparent during the Great Depression, that lead to the establishment of the Social Security system. The purpose of any insurance is to pool risks so that each individual in the pool lowers their own risk of some crippling disaster for a small annual fee paid to the pool. Therefore any insurance mechanism is necessarily re-distributive. "Insurance like" i.e. federal taxes such as Social Security are more re-distributive than any private sector insurance because those with the highest ability to bear the related risks (those with high incomes) get the lowest expected return on their contributions to the system.

In addition what is really happening, as we shall see, is that current workers contributions are always paying for current retirees in the system and there really isn't any "saving for the future" going on, as is so often presented to the public. Such a progressive risk sharing mechanism could not work in the private sector, which is why it was founded in the public system in the first place.

The following is a quote from Keynes' book "A Tract on Monetary Reform", written in the roaring 20's at a time of a roaring increase in income and wealth gaps globally, that covers both the government's role in market existence and in redistribution: "Nothing can preserve the integrity of contracts between individuals except a discretionary authority in the State to revise what has become intolerable.

The powers of uninterrupted usury are too great. If the accretions of vested interest were to grow without mitigation for many generations, half the population would be no better than slaves to the other half. Those who insist that the State is in exactly the same position as the individual, will, if they have their way, render impossible the continuance of an individualist society, which depends for its existence on moderation.

"Normally the largest and most debated government spending items in any country at any time is related to Military Spending, Social Spending, and Interest on Government Debt. Let’s discuss the very much forgotten, ignored and taken for granted relationship between money and tax.

Most residents of any country today will be charged taxes by their government on any income they make in their private activities. Tax is the most common liability all people must meet and therefore people like to earn all or some of their income, and accept payments in, a medium of exchange, or form of money, that can be used to meet tax liabilities. It is also in the government's best interest that people get paid in a medium of exchange that it accepts for tax payments, as well as in banks' best interests that checks drawn on bank deposits are suitable to the State as a form of payment to meet tax liabilities.

Therefore, to the extent that people are agreeable to a system of government taxation, everyone's best interests are served by a significant proportion of money in circulation being that which is acceptable to the State to meet tax liabilities.This is why our major medium of exchange today, is the U.S. Dollar, it is created through what is really a joint venture between the Treasury Department of the U.S. Government, and the private banking industry through their bank deposits, and the Federal Reserve's role in creating "high-powered money". Federal Reserve Notes created by the Federal Reserve System and blessed by the US Treasury as being legal tender for all debts Public and Private can be used to pay taxes, but most people use drawings on bank balances to pay tax bills instead. The State, through its role in issuing banking licenses, regulating banks and being the ultimate risk-bearer in the case of bank failure, blesses payments using bank-created money, which are just electronic records, as being good and well for meeting tax liabilities.

The mature development of this system of State-blessed, bank-created money really came about with the founding of the Federal Reserve System in 1913 and the re-introduction of the Federal Income Tax in this same year. These events both played a significant role in financing America's involvement in World War I. Today's U.S. Dollar money system, and the links between the State and the private banking industry, were further strengthened by State action, such as Federal Depository Insurance, after various learning experiences such as the '29 Crash and the Great Depression.

Today, many years later, many people don't think about these interesting ties between what the State accepts as payment for taxes, the money that banks create, and the money we get paid in for our work. Instead we just take it for granted that it's all the same "stuff". But it took many years and learning from financial collapses to get it to its present state and, indeed, part of its success and stability is the fact that most people never stop to think about it. So stable, so unquestioned even with the recent down-grade by S&P and so unchallenged is the US dollar system today, that the U.S. dollar and promises to pay U.S. dollars in the future by the U.S. Treasury are without doubt the safest of all financial assets in the world. Hence the U.S. dollar and U.S. Treasury bonds (promises by the U.S. Government to pay U.S. dollars in the future) are known as the "risk-free" set of financial assets. Risks of all other financial assets are higher and are measured against this "risk-free" benchmark. Of course there is a caveat that there are some risks - basically, that Washington D.C. will continue with grid lock negotiations on the federal budget. But right now there is no expectation of this in the market so the $USD retains its "risk-free" status especially compared with the global credit markets.

When you think about saving for future retirement it is this status of the $USD that is critical to thinking about funding Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and Health Care. The understanding of State-sanctioned, bank-created money at such a fundamental level lies at the heart of this debate and helps us understand the reasons that a publicly funded U.S. pension system CANNOT be pre-funded by an investment trust in financial securities. This basic understanding of money is achievable for anyone, whether you have studied finance theory or not.

Health Care ,Politics and Money

Don’t play politics as usual with our health

By Melvin J. Howard

We have seen how money enables people to convince someone else to act in a certain way. It shifts their beliefs towards something you would like to have happen. But what else does money do? It also shifts your own beliefs – it convinces you that you have the power. But it is not the money that convinces you; it cannot possibly do that. You convince yourself, without a shred of doubt, that you have the ability! This teaches you two things: (1) you can convince yourself either way regardless of the money and the results happen regardless of the money and (2) you always, always, regardless of the money, have to convince yourself first of your ability so that you may use it.

There is much that has been hidden from most people for a very long time now; yet this does not mean it doesn’t exist. Things are not always what they appear to be. But you can always know them by their fruits. Welcome to the world of Health Care, Politics and Money.

You are about to see how you are playing a game within a structure that appears to be one thing but is actually another. You are playing a game with rules that are sometimes designed to stack the odds against you especially if you are not aware of them. You are playing a game you don’t even have to play, but you think that you do. You assume that the game you are playing in was designed for your benefit, and you fail to see that it may have been designed for someone else’s benefit but at your expense. Most of all, you are playing a game that has been altered to slowly erode your sense of self-reliance and self-determination. What you are about to see is that true democracy has not yet arrived on this planet – what we call democracy is not really democracy, and most of all very different from freedom. The founders of the United States put in place a constitution to bring in democracy, but somewhere along the way, it was hijacked, so to speak. What we now have is the exact same situation that has been going on in this planet for the last 10,000 years.

The ‘mighty’ ruling the ‘weak’ through simple means of deception. Each time the truth is known, the ‘weak’ realize that it is only their lack of information that is keeping them under, and things change. Usually, the ‘mighty’ adopt a new deception tactic which is used until that deception is reveled. That is the history of the world, a history that has repeated itself over and over, and it is not ridiculous to think that this has not stopped. Democracy by definition is the idea that the majority rule. Not minority, but majority. Now, even if democracy was happening perfectly and the majority did rule, that would still not amount to true freedom because the minority would be ‘forced’ to forgo their wishes and follow the majority. In other words, if 75% of the population believed the earth was flat, and 25% believed it was round, the 25% would be, in some areas of life, forced to live as if it was flat even when they could have lived according to their truth. So, democracy does not amount to true freedom that recognizes the sovereignty and divinity of every sentient being but that is another topic all together. Let us first look at the link between money and elections. What you will see is that elections are extremely predictable and follow a pattern that, once you learn to recognize it, can be used to have the outcome you want roughly 90 to 95% of the time.

The big corporations and the wealthy throw in large sums of money towards their candidate’s election. They do so because they know for sure it works. It is actually a race of who has the most money, in a sense. Interestingly, however, the general U.S. population is very non-participative. First, often only about 14% of Americans, on average, vote. The percentage that contributes any money to the proposed candidates (notice the use of the word ‘proposed’ instead of chosen, because the public often have nothing to do with choosing the proposed candidates) is even smaller. It is not only candidates that can collect donations for elections. Political parties also collect plenty of money every election cycle - from individuals, lobby groups and corporations. The founding fathers of the U.S. had a very high vision for humanity and freedom. Has that vision translated correctly or somehow became screwed along the way. The U.S. has two main political parties. The Democrats and the Republicans. The last time a U.S. president came from any other party except one of these two was in 1835. 1835 was the last year a non-Democrat and non-Republican sat in the White House. 1835. This means that, the way things are set up now, to have any chance of being president you must be a member of one of these two parties. Otherwise, your chances are next to zero. OK. Now, each of these two parties has its own set of core beliefs and the way it does things. 

Nothing much changes really. Within each party, there isn’t much argument on major philosophies of the party – only on details. So in essence, what you have is two parties representing two ideologies that both fit within the current system. I am using the U.S. as the examples here because it is the model on which most other democracies are founded. In the past there has been little chance for growth and change; maintenance of the current system i.e. status quo is what these two parties have maintained over decades.

I had mentioned earlier, about 14% of Americans vote and out of that only less than 1% of regular people contribute to the candidates (the vast bulk of the money comes from just a few hundred ultra-wealthy donors). The rest don’t participate at all in this democracy. The two main candidates are almost always financed by big business interest groups). The current system the way it is set up now binds these candidates to returning favors to those who financed them. That is just plain facts but this is not a political science lesson nor statement. It is about health care our health care and it should not be politics as usual. Our health care system was broken it was not sustainable in its current form and it needed to be fixed. Economically a quarter of the population is not covered which translate into our labor force. How can we compete globally if a major part of our work force is sick and can’t get the help they need. How can we show the rest of the world by example we are a compassionate Country.

When we do not even show our own citizens compassion when it comes to their health care needs. The call to repeal the new health care law is an exercise in futility and has much more to do with political grandstanding then anything. Granted it is not a perfect health care law and parts of it need to be changed. But come on to throw the baby out with the bath water for lack of a better term. I have not seen a creditable alternative presented just calls for repeal. If there is a creditable alternative please forwarded it over.  

THE ZERO SUM GAME AND THE COST TO THE GLOBAL SOCIETY

Trickle down economics has left us all thirsty!

By Melvin J. Howard

Most advocates of the “trickle down” theory often overlook a key part about our monetary system, is that it is a ZERO SUM GAME, because our money is entirely based on debt. The more of a positive net money balance I have, the more of a negative balance someone else has. I can put my positive balance to work earning more money, while I either sit around and do nothing, or go and work for more money. So the most likely situation for a positive balance person is that their positive balance will keep growing. Also, in the zero sum game, means that someone else’s balance gets more negative. The negative sum person would be unlikely to get a loan to start his or her own business, and so would have to go work for someone that already has money. Under current wage structures and interest rates for "high risk" customers it would be difficult for many negative balance people to ever get to a positive balance position no matter how hard they work. They have the added disadvantage that they can’t put a positive balance to work earning more money. Most likely their balances will get more negative, while the people that already have money will get more money to balance out the zero sum game.

With positive money balances always earning a positive return on capital, combined with no requirement for redistribution of wealth, which is implicitly prohibited by neo-liberal policy because it eases such governmental intervention, the results are clear. The rich will keep getting richer and the poor will keep getting poorer, and the more interest bearing debt-money you "invest" in developing nations the worse (not better) the situation gets.

Those that believe that the "trickle down" effect will result from investment in poorer (more negative balance) countries and neighborhoods demonstrate a poor understanding of the monetary system. In fact they believe in something that cannot possibly materialize, and is evidenced by the consequences of investment in developing nations. This situation is compounded by the fact that the banking system must not fail. What this really means is that the major section of the world-banking sector - namely the Western financial institutions - must not fail. This would actually be disastrous for rich and poor alike, as in the great depression. To reduce risk of banking system failure (which ultimately comes from sudden loss of confidence or trust in the system) institutions such as the IMF and World Bank have evolved into mechanisms for preventing banking system collapse. Unfortunately, however, what these mechanisms amount to is transferring the cost that could collapse the banking system outside of the banking system. And these costs end up being borne by those who have the least say in the financial system. This actually distorts free markets where, ideally, investors take personal responsibility for the risks they assume. Those that support so-called free market ideology and think that today's markets are actually consistent with this ideology are seriously misguided as proof by the recent global financial crisis. They overlook the biases and distortions built into today's markets, making them very inefficient and highly volatile.

Along these lines, it could be argued that much of the hardships forced upon the people of Indonesia and other Asian countries after the Asian financial crisis were the result of excessive risks taken by Western financial institutions in search of large returns or profits. It turned out that if these institutions were to bear the full costs of the risks they took leading up to the crisis then the whole financial system may have faced collapse. Through the IMF bailouts they effectively passed these otherwise bankrupting costs to parts of society that would not threaten the financial system, because they are not costed in its accounts. This, as usual, meant the poor, workers and Mother Nature, who form the balancing item of the biases built into today's unfree and inefficient markets.

Banks are supposed to manage risks to prevent themselves from going insolvent or losing market confidence. Regulators and supervisors are supposed to be watching to make sure they actually manage these risks both in their own interests and to avoid broader financial crises. In this fashion the regulators should represent the public interest to ensure that banks are not taking such excessive risks that the public may eventually have to bail them out to avert a financial disaster. But more and more it seems that crisis prevention and exercise of the precautionary principle are being pushed out the back door in favor of the wishes of a global finance sector that wants less supervision. It prefers a system of cure (in the form of bailouts) after risk taking gets out of hand, to the publicly preferred system of prevention whereby financial players take on less risk and accept lower returns.

This preference for cure over prevention is encouraged by the bailout mechanisms. One "cure" (or bailout) leads to another crisis down the track, leading to another bailout, another crisis and so on. For every bailout income and wealth gaps increase, because the funding of the bailout must come from places that are not accounted for in the financial system. This is simply because the financial system would be put at risk if the full costs of the risk taking were born by it. Then investors would lose confidence and the whole financial system may collapse. The costs that do not appear on financial accounts are additional burdens to the poor and excessive natural resource extraction. In effect, that is what funds bailouts so that the cost of the bailout will not hit the books of the financial system. This is the mechanism whereby risk takers do not take full responsibility for the risks they assume but rather pass that responsibility on to those outside the financial system. This system of cure over prevention obviously provides higher overall returns to the banking system than would a corresponding regulatory regime focused on prevention.

ANSWERING LIFE'S QUESTIONS

In Honor Of The Mars rover Curiosity Life Just What Is It?

By Melvin J. Howard

I have just finished the book by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow (author of The Drunkard's walk) also a good read called The Grand Design. I am a big fan of science and scientist some of whom might not be household names yet like Mr. Hawking. But are no less important to answering life’s most perplexing questions. In their book, Messrs. Hawking and Mlodinow take you on a tour of fundamental physics and cosmology, laying the foundation that our universe is only a tiny part of a much larger picture, the multiverse or the M Theory. The universe we see is big, with over a hundred billion galaxies, but it's still finite. The multiverse idea suggests that there are other regions, equally impressive in size, where conditions might be quite different, right down to different physical laws or different numbers of dimensions of space. To think not to long ago for scientist just to even ask the big questions like what if the earth is not the center of the universe they put their life in jeopardy. Some even waited until they were on their deathbeds to publish their work out of fear they would be persecuted and prosecuted. Sounds far fetch in this day and age of revolutionary technology but the dogma was the law of the land. I for one have many questions and curious about the world in which we all share.

        

For instance I know the binary code for Melvin J. Howard is 01001101 01100101 01101100 01110110 01101001 01101110 00100000 01001010 00101110 00100000 01001000 01101111 01110111 01100001 01110010 01100100 but what is my code for life? Who am I, how did we get here, what are we doing here, what is real, is space and time an illusion, what happens when you die? What is the difference between black, white, brown and yellow people or is there any difference at all? Why do people fall in and out of love? Why do some people commit horrific crimes is it chemical or biological? What happened before the universe began? Why can some people smoke until they are 90 and some get cancer not ever picking up a cigarette? Why do I feel the sense of a loved one even though they are miles apart? Are thoughts just chemical reactions? Are there other worlds? Scientist, doctors, biologist and physicists have answered some of these questions but there plenty more work to be done. So scientists are hard at work trying to find the answers. Some like Messrs. Hawking and Mlodinow trace the logic of quantum mechanics, general relativity and superstring theory, showing how a variety of existing universes isn't merely possible but arguably natural. In string theory, space inevitably has extra curled-up dimensions that we can't see. But there are many ways for dimensions to curl up, and each of them leads to different "laws of physics." Then there's inflation, not the kind that the chairman of the Fed is trying fight off the (Monetary Kind). But in this kind that predicts that an extremely tiny region of space can blow up into a universe-sized domain. Modern cosmologists believe that inflation, once it starts, can keep going forever, continually creating new "pocket universes" with different conditions in each one. Without research none of these discoveries would have never been made. Medical or scientific research is crucial in understanding where we come from and where we are going. What makes our body and the universe tick what’s in our genes?

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, has an elegantly geometric structure that allows it to play its crucial role as the chemical carrier of an organism's genes. Each DNA molecule is made up of two very long polymers connected by the bonding of hydrogen atoms and coiled in the shape of a double helix. Each of the two polymers contains many structures called nucleotides, which, in turn, may be further broken down into three parts: deoxyribose (a five carbon sugar), a phosphate group, and a nitrogenous base. There are four different nitrogenous bases that might be present: thymine, cytosine, adenine, and guanine. These four bases are the foundation of the genetic code. Sometimes represented as T, C, A, and G, these chemicals act as the cell's memory, instructing it on how to synthesize enzymes and other proteins. These four nucleotides encode everything an organism needs to live and protects this information with incredible accuracy. In a human being, each cell holds 46 separate DNA molecules, each containing, on the average, about 160 million nucleotide pairs, yet this massive amount of information is stored and replicated almost flawlessly.

Proteins not only make up the structural bulk of the Homo sapiens body but also include the enzymes that carry out the biochemical reactions of life. They are composed of units called amino acids linked together in a long string; each string folds in a way that determines the function of a protein. The order of the amino acids is set by the DNA base sequence of the gene that encodes a given protein, through intermediaries called RNA; genes that actively make RNA are said to be “expressed.”

The Human Genome Project was to seek not just to elucidate all the proteins produced within a Homo sapiens (“ Human beings “ ) but also to comprehend how the genes that encode the proteins are expressed, how the DNA sequences of those genes stack up against comparable genes of other species, how genes vary within our species and how DNA sequences translate into observable characteristics. Layers of information built on top of the DNA sequence will reveal the knowledge embedded in the DNA. This data will fuel advances in biology for the next century.

WHEN DO WE KNOW WE EXIST?

Every facet of human existence and survival is held in place by the assumptions we maintain regarding ourselves and the universe around us. Can you imagine the impact on society if suddenly we had to come to terms with the fact that everything we think of as solid and real is actually an illusion? Not here at all, or only here if we agree that it is here. Religion and philosophy have evolved, as consciousness has tried to understand itself and explain its relationship to what it sees as the physical universe in which it seems to operate. Great thinkers and teachers from different religions and philosophies throughout time have described their view of who we are, where we are, and what we are doing here. In the past few years scientists and scholars in a variety of disciplines have been making concerted efforts to answer an ancient question, namely, How exactly do the physical processes in the brain cause consciousness i.e. when do we become aware? Is it when one are all of the following:

hearing, seeing, tasting, touching, smelling, pleasure, pain

·  attention, presence, perceptiveness, experience, memory

·  intuition, responsiveness, sensing the grain and flow of things

·  self/reflexive awareness, self-sense/identity, proprioception/body-sense, 

authenticity

·  interest, openness, curiosity, passion, purpose, intention, desire, will, 

engagement, courage, commitment

·  attitude, bias, perspective, worldview/paradigm, assumption, belief

·  feeling, emotion (all emotions), reaction, sentiment, bliss, joy, misery,

  suffering, hope, etc.

·  care, compassion, empathy, mutuality, resonance, appreciation, 

loving-kindness, friendship

·  intelligence, learning, reflection, analysis, synthesis, pattern-seeking, information processing, understanding

·  knowledge, information, ideas, understandings, models, designs

·  concepts, language, names, articulation, metaphors

·  certainty,arrogance, uncertainty, doubt, confusion, humility, agreement, 

dissent

·  ethics, morality, integrity, principles

·  choice, values, decision-making, judgment, evaluation

·  imagination, aesthetic sensibility, vision, story, ingenuity, inspiration

·  wisdom, spirit, enlightenment, transcendence, a sense of the sacred, awe, 

wonder

·  humor, amusement, enjoyment, playfulness

·  mystery, ambiguity, nuance, sense of paradox

·  forethought, anticipation, worry, plans, strategy, tactics, guidance,

  predictions, scenarios (future-sensing)

·  management, direction, governance, leadership (bridging between decision, will, and plans with real action in the world, supporting the ability to act).

Can consciousness be explained in terms of brain activity? What makes a mental state be a conscious mental state?  The laws generating all chemical, biological, neurological processes are now perfectly known. Never before in history, science has been able to explain the principles, which originates all biological processes until now. This represents a true turn in history. All that physics will discover in the future will have nothing to do with the biological processes in our organism, or any other organism. Even if there are still some things not perfectly known in astrophysics, these astrophysical processes do not affect biological processes, which are due uniquely to the laws of quantum electrodynamics.

IT’S IN THE MATH

The laws of physics consist of a system of mathematical equations. The mathematical structures exclude the possibility that these equations can be modified; in fact, even a slight change in a mathematical equation would generate radical changes in all its solutions. They have already found billions and billions of correct solutions from the laws of physics; if we changed them, we would suddenly cast away all these correct solutions. On the other hand, every day they find a systematic experimental confirmation of the laws of physics on ever-new systems. To hypothesize that the laws of physics are wrong would be equivalent to say that all these billions and billions of systematic and quantitative experimental confirmations are only a lucky coincidence. The laws of quantum electrodynamics, discovered in the beginning of last century, have never been changed. On the basis of the number of experimental tests, scientist can say that quantum electrodynamics is the oldest scientific theory in history. This one is for all the researchers out there job well done. Now more then ever funding is key to advance further studies in all of these fields. Whether this ambitious conception is actually correct remains unclear. The important lesson of "The Grand Design" is not so much the particular theory being advocated but the sense that science may be able to answer the deep "Why?" questions that are part of fundamental human curiosity.

HOW THE GOVERNMENT OF CANADA STOLE $150,000,000.00 FROM ME

By Melvin J. Howard

Family values, For the benefit of the family, For the welfare of children or how about this one assigning your spousal support rights to the ministry what does this all mean? These are all very lofty sayings to pull at your heart strings but what it all comes down to is what I found out about is  $$$$$$$$$ Money.  Since the 1980’s government accountability has been out making money was in but at what cost. Money and the bottom line have swept into areas that were previously isolated from market forces such as government services. Partly this has been a good thing you have more choices. Yet there has been a cost to society more people in more occupations are chasing money or being chased by bean counters. When profits and performance are the only measure of success ideas about fairness go out the window. And this is where the problems lies some have become adept at turning money into influence so when they break the rules they escape punishment. I am going to show over time how Canada more specifically the Province of British Columbia stole $150,000,000.00 from me by colluding, corruption and just plain lying and because of this I have found out that my NAFTA case is not over at least in the civil sense starting with this document.

On January 5, 2008 I submitted a Notice of Arbitration to the Government of Canada  Under The Arbitration Rules Of The United Nations Commission On International Trade Law And The North American Free Trade Agreement. Followed by a Revised Amended Statement Of Claim on February 2, 2009. A copy of those complaints is attached to this affidavit as an Exhibit "B and C" respectively.

These complaints originated as far back as September 13, 2003 when I and affiliated companies purchased an Ultrafast EBT Scanner in the United States to be used in a diagnostic imaging facility that was refitted in Calgary Alberta. As a result through the actions of the Government of Canada our equipment was expropriated at total loss of $2,300,000.00 not including leasehold improvements this was the first lost I experienced due to unfair trade practices. A copy of shipping and financial documents is attached to this affidavit as Exhibit "D".