Capitalism Update

No Love for Sale,

But How About A Kidney?

Last week’s federal corruption fishnet drew in a boatload of the Garden State’s garden-variety little-fish crooks and one pure capitalist visionary.

The little fish included three mayors and other officials accused of taking care of newfound friends for newfound cash. They also included rabbis so concerned with kosher practice the feds say they even koshered questionable money, soaking it overnight in a “charity” and returning it clean and bloodless (less customary fees and handling, of course).

The accused capitalist visionary was Levy Izhak Rosenbaum, who feds say saw a market, filled the needs of that market and made a profit doing so. Those acts might mark him a capitalist of the first order, on a par with the founders of Google, or Microsoft or Apple, except for one niggling detail.

The market Rosenbaum allegedly entered was the niggling detail.

It was the market for human kidneys.

And that, since 1984 and the Reagan administration no less, has been illegal.

Even a cursory examination shows that both Republicans and Democrats are condoning and encouraging actions that both deny capitalists the benefits of their foresight and risk-taking, and also deny consumers the potential tinkle-down benefits. Consider:

n Every year, more than 4,500 persons in the United States die while waiting for a kidney transplant. There is a scarcity, because although we all have two kidneys and most can function on just one, the amount available for transplant remains below demand. Some folks won’t donate organs after death, some mess them up in the process of dying. But any way you look at it, there is a demand for human kidneys.

n Although not legally available because of the strict anti-capitalist human organ laws of the U.S. and other countries, there is an available supply of kidneys. As mentioned, we can all function with just one. That leaves most of us with an inborn amount of product we can put into the marketplace. For a price, of course. (This is Capitalism 101 – Altruism 101 meets weekly in the U.S. Capitol).

Well, when you have a demand aka a willing buyer, and a supply, aka a willing seller, all you need is the services of a broker to introduce the two. Actually, you don’t really need the broker. In theory, you could do all that yourself, like buying and selling a home.

But it’s daunting to match the right buyer, house and price and execute the complicated dance of bidding, negotiating, agreeing and closing. Ditto for a kidney. How healthy is the donor? How old? Right tissue match? Who pays for the surgery? Where? In anything complicated, most of us need a broker.

That market need was filled by Rosenbaum, the feds say. He found folks in Israel who needed cash and had a spare kidney. He found folks in the United States who had cash, but needed a kidney. And he’s accusing of bringing them together and taking care of the details.

Note that these weren’t stolen kidneys or counterfeit kidneys. He’s accused of helping the rightful owners of kidneys sell them to willing buyers, making a profit or, if you will, a commission.

If we were talking about diamonds or steel or real estate or many other items, this would be a success story. Instead, it’s the story of yet another anti-capitalist act by the federal government, a government with its head in the cloud of laws and no heart.

Sheesh – government without a heart.

Wonder how it might find one. . .

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Intelligent Machines?

Not To Worry. . .

Worrywarts have come to love the Sunday New York Times because there’s often fresh stuff to worry about and yesterday’s issue was no exception, offering the worry that machines may come to be smarter than people.

The article by John Markoff nicely details how far machine intelligence has come and where some fear it may be going, including concern that “further advances could create profound social disruptions and even have dangerous consequences.”

Although anyone who has wrestled with one of the phone machines used by service companies to avoid giving service may debate the point, the skill and autonomy of machines is growing.

Even detractors admit that many machines are as bright as freshman Members of Congress, and cost less besides.

Still, there are many signs that machines have yet to develop intelligence equal to humans and as a public service, some top examples are listed here, a roll call of recent human achievement that even the best and brightest machines could never duplicate:

n War In Iraq. No machine could ever have made the decision to go war with Iraq at a cost of lives in the thousands and treasure in the trillions to eliminate weapons of mass destruction that weren’t there. And no machine could have taken more than six years to swap one corrupt, family-and-faction-centered government for another corrupt family-and-faction centered government. Proud results of human, mostly American, intelligence on display for all to see.

n Worldwide Recession. No machine could have so steadfastly looked the other way while New Age Rumplestiltskins spun gold not just from straw, but from manure in the form of securities backed by securities. When the manure finally began to stink more than the economy could bear, only human intelligence could have bailed out the spinners and returned them to their task.

n American Health Care. No machine could have devised a system where rising costs deliver declining results, except for the 40-50 million who live – and often, die – outside of the system’s reach. And no machine could persuade many of those who are in the system that change would be an assault on their precious right to pay more for less.

Beyond these great recent human achievements are countless little things that only a human could do. Have you ever seen a machine smoking? Or drunk? Or texting while driving?

Or how about a machine that hates on the basis of color or language or gender? Or one that consumes more energy than it needs? Not a single widget has mastered even the fundamentals of these uniquely human and simple tasks. Humans master most of them effortlessly while yet children.

No machine on its own has yet to murder, lie, cheat or steal. Only ages of evolution could have developed those skills so easily embraced by the human intellect that yet elude machines.

Bottom line: In spite of concerns raised in the Times article, machines learning to think like humans isn’t a legitimate concern.

No machine would be so dumb.

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Human-Animal Hybrids Ban --

Jackass Senators Not Exempt

Reforming health care, nuclear proliferation, an economy still on life support and other nuisance issues could deter the focus of some senators from important things, but not Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas and Mary Landrieu, Democrat of Louisiana.

No, those two leaders in a bipartisan display refused distractions and instead co-sponsored the Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act of 2009. Brownback offers information on his website, and Landrieu, perhaps with commendable reticence, on her website search offers only this from 2008.

The act itself is pretty self-explanatory, forbidding laboratory blending of genes between humans and animals.

As with many bold leaders, Brownback and Landrieu find others following their trailblazing path as co-sponsors. According to Brownback’s site, that includes Senators Jim Bunning (R-KY), Richard Burr (R-NC), Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Bob Corker (R-TN), John Cornyn (R-TX), Jim DeMint (R-SC), John Ensign (R-NV), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), James Inhofe (R-OK), Mike Johanns (R-NE), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Mel Martinez (R-FL), John McCain (R-AZ), James Risch (R-ID), John Thune (R-SD), David Vitter (R-LA), George Voinovich (R-OH), and Roger Wicker (R-MS).

That Mary Landrieu is the only Democrat in this Republican herd and also the only woman simply proves that the urge to sponsor a bill like this can transcend issues of gender and party, not to mention common sense.

Or as Brownback puts it on his web site:

"My background is in agriculture, and for a number of years we have been working with crops and animals to produce a superior soy bean, a superior cow, and so-on. We can genetically engineer safe products and herds that are disease resistant or that possess more desirable attributes. But doing this in plants and livestock is very different than doing this in humans.

"The issue is that when you make changes in the germ-line, such changes are passed along to one's offspring. You could make a change now that could be passed along through the gene-pool for the rest of humanity. We do not know what the full effect of this could be, and it could be disastrous.”

Although Senator Brownback is correct that changes in the gene pool can have unintended consequences, we should point out that not all traits – intelligence, for example – necessarily pass from one generation to the next. Or maybe the Senator has made that point.

Since the bill focuses on laboratory efforts, the co-sponsors, many from states with large rural populations and lonely cow or sheep herders, seem to have taken care that What Happens In Pasture Stays In Pasture. And because of that focus, no analysts have suggested it would affect sitting member of Congress, whose link with jackasses and elephants is common knowledge, although no language in the bill specifically exempts Members of Congress from the ban.

Still, the Republic stands more secure when stalwarts such as Brownback, Landrieu et al man the ramparts to see that we do not develop horse sense. To carp that they do so only because they would be unemployed if the public did is to miss the point completely.

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