Tale of the Magic Dragon

Betrayal.  The Vietnam War was full of betrayals.  And they didn't come from the enemy.   In Tale of the Magic Dragon, men who knew too much were sold out. 

 

Officially, the patrol never happened and nothing was said about the men left behind.  But former Green Beret Frank McTigue, a struggling private investigator, learns the truth when he agrees to protect pretty Lia, who had witnessed the murder of his former commanding officer.  A voice from the past dredges up unfinished business from his tour of duty in Southeast Asia. He can't let it go. Outnumbered and outgunned, he teams up with his Special Forces comrade at arms Odell Franklin.  They end up in a desperate fight where secrets are dear and lives are cheap--and find a glimmer of hope for redemption.

 Rated 5-Stars on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Available at

Available on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Tale-Magic-Dragon-Leo-Wang-ebook/dp/B00D9I4FRY.

At the iTunes bookstore at https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/tale-of-the-magic-dragon/id661953677?mt=11.

At Barnes and Noble at https://nook.barnesandnoble.com/products/2940044580077/sample?sourceEan=2940044580077.

At Smashwords (for downloads onto laptops, tablets and similar devices) at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/324189.

Also available at a number of other online booksellers; check your favorite one.

Why Did Obama Fire Bernanke?

Okay, President Obama didn't actually fire Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.  But it felt like that when the President strongly hinted a couple of days ago that he wouldn't nominate Bernanke for re-appointment.  The stock market followed up with a two-day belly flop of almost 560 points.  Much of that drop was because the Fed announced that it would indeed, contrary to infantile market expectations, eventually take away the quantitative easing punchbowl.  But the backdrop to this announcement was Ben Bernanke's short remaining term as bartender-in-chief.  That creates enormous uncertainty.  The financial markets love Bernanke, even though not all market players will admit it publicly because he was a policy pragmatist (read heretic in the eyes of many purists).  He gave the markets lots of sweets and never let them pout or fuss for long.  He never met an asset class he didn't like and tried to puff them all up.  (That's why virtually all asset classes are dropping now--Sugar Daddy is leaving town.)  With Ben's helicopter thumping away toward the horizon, it gets a lot harder to predict what investments might have actual economic value, so investors renew their love affair with cash.

But why did Obama choose this moment to put Bernanke on the stagecoach going out of town?  Obama is no economist, so it couldn't have been for an economic reason.  The President is a consummate politician, though, so one has to entertain the sneaking suspicion that he did it for political reasons.  A not uncommon reason for pulling the rug out from underneath an incumbent is because you foresee the need to blame him or her for something.  Maybe the President was concerned that the eventual end of QE would cause the markets to fall, and he wanted to be able to blame Bernanke and say he didn't re-appoint him.  But the very act of leaving Bernanke behind in the dust aggravated into prophecy fulfillment the markets' inclination to swan dive.  So, if this was the President's thinking, he may have contributed to the problem he foresaw and could end up taking some of the blame for the market's hissy fit.

The President is having second-term hiccups in a variety of ways--the IRS, NSA, State Dept., and DOJ come to mind.  Is he losing his grip?  Bernanke was the last man standing when it came to federal officials doing something to boost the economic recovery.  Why ax the most highly regarded civil servant in the country?

The financial markets hate uncertainty.  And they've gotten a belly full of it recently.  That's why the last two days have been bad for 401(k) accounts from sea to shining sea.  And the picture probably won't get brighter for months.

How to Improve NSA Surveillance

Despite the uproar, there's little chance of changing the scope and extent of NSA surveillance of Americans.  No politician wants to be blamed if there's another Boston Marathon-type bombing.  So they'll hide behind the usual gridlock and do nothing. 

That being the case, we might as well make the most of NSA's surveillance.  After all, it's being done on the taxpayer's dime, and taxpayers ought to get their money's worth.  Here are some ways NSA can make 'round the clock surveillance a better experience for all of us.

Package Delivery.  Since NSA knows where you are at all times, it could run a great delivery service.  Let's say you're on the road and forgot to bring your cellphone recharger.  An NSA courier could be dispatched with a new recharger in a flash.  And they'd want to make this delivery.  After all, it's harder to keep track of you if your cell phone battery is dead. 

And if you're traveling with a small child and need is a package of disposable diapers and some wipes, NSA could deliver them for a modest fee, even to the highway rest stop where you discovered what you forgot to pack.  This would not only please many a distressed parental taxpayer, it would also give NSA a stream of fee revenue that could supplement its multi-billion dollar budget. 

Chatline.  There are many lonely people, and NSA may be among the few that care to listen in on their phone calls.  Perhaps NSA could operate chatlines, to help the lonely find companionship.  Maybe NSA will get lucky and a frustrated terrorist will unburden himself on a chatline, confessing to having fantasies about pressure cookers. 

Dating Service.  If you're single, NSA already knows how bad your personal life is.  They know everything about you--and everyone else.  Since they know so much, they might as well operate a dating service.  With all that they know, they should be able to find the perfect match for you in only three nanoseconds of processing time on their massive supercomputers.

Grocery Shopping.  NSA could doing your grocery shopping and bill your bank account, all without you having to do more than tell them your grocery list.  You can pick up the phone and say what you need.  No need to dial because NSA's monitors will pick up your request anyway, and they can send one of their personnel to the supermarket.  Billing your bank account will be a breeze, since they already know the number and track everything that goes on in it.  Indeed, there's no reason for NSA to stop with groceries.  It could keep you well-stocked with beer and wine, pick up and return your dry cleaning, and arrange for pizza to be delivered in time for dinner.  You'd have to pay fees for these services, but think of the convenience.

Concierge Services.  There's more.  NSA could offer the full range of concierge services.  They could get you movie tickets, make dinner reservations, call cabs, send personnel out to be your personal shopper, and so on.  They already monitor your credit card and banking activity, so they know what movies you see, where you have dinner, and what your personal shopping consists of.  Might as well make the situation a win-win by offering citizens some conveniences now available mostly to the 1%.

Rebranding NSA.  NSA has an image problem.  It's portrayed by its detractors as an intrusive ogre that laughs derisively while steam rolling over civil liberties.  A common strategy in the business world for such a problem is to rebrand oneself.  NSA could leverage its massive knowledge of every intimate detail of your life by offering services like those described above, and change its name to, say, NSA Deluxe Lifestyle Services.  After all, nothing pleases citizens more than seeing government work for them.

The Good Deficit

You already know we're in Oz.  The government manages the federal deficit by making across the board cuts everyone thought would be so extreme that both Democrats and Republicans would work together to find a more rational solution.  Ha ha ha.  The joke's on us.  The government manages the debt ceiling by kicking the can down the road every few months.  The can is getting awfully dented.  And most tellingly, a surprisingly large number of the members of Congress bear a distinct resemblance to the flying monkeys in the movie.

But even as there were bad witches in the movie, there were also good witches.  There are good deficits as well.  Government spending for things that government is particularly good at is generally desirable, even if it requires deficit spending.  For example, government is good at national defense, education, law enforcement, and building or subsidizing transportation systems.  Government is also very good at funding basic research.  Deficit spending to pursue these goals is money well spent because it fills gaps that the private sector leaves open.  These kinds of spending protect and enhance the national wealth and welfare.

There's another problem that should be tackled, even if it requires deficit spending.  The unemployment rate for Gen Y (a/k/a the Millenials) is much too high.  It's generally about twice the level for Baby Boomers, and the less educated Millenials have even higher rates of unemployment.  Those that are African-American and lack college degrees need not apply, especially if they are male.  Large numbers of the better educated Millenials are burdened with heavy educational debts.  The ones with debts of $100,000 or more could face decades of 21st Century-style indentured servitude to their creditors, whose claims they cannot oust in bankruptcy proceedings except in extremely distressed circumstances. 

Millenials who are unemployed and underemployed represent wasted human capital. Modern economies are knowledge based, and human capital is the most important form of national wealth.  A vivid example of the overarching importance of human capital can be found in the aftermath of World War II.  Germany and Japan, the devastated losers (who deserved to lose), had only limited industrial capacity and not enough food to feed their populations.  But they also retained the advanced industrial knowledge they had acquired in building and supporting their massive and highly capable war machines.  Required by Allied occupation authorities to turn that knowledge to peaceful purposes, the two losing nations rebuilt their economies rapidly, and within three decades became industrial powerhouses.  Because they still had their human capital after the war, they could rebuild their tangible assets and prosper.

As a nation, we can't afford to let the human capital of Gen Y atrophy.  They are starting their working lives now, a crucial time for developing the skills of a self-supporting adult.  It's in your twenties and thirties that you learn how to apply all your book learning to the practical needs and purposes of the working world.  Learn those lessons well, and you'll be productive for 40 or more years.  Failing to learn them can result in permanent stunting of one's career.

Add a heavy load of school debt to the mix, and we can see how unemployed and underemployed Millenials could become a permanent economic underclass, unable to escape a shadow world of part-time jobs and episodic contract work, trailed by the baying of creditors hounding them at every turn. 

It's time to revive the Civilian Conservation Corps, 21st Century style.  The CCC of the 1930s employed some 3 million young Americans over the course of its decade of existence.  They were paid very modest wages, most of which were given to their parents (although the employees also received food and housing in addition to their pay).  They did mostly physical labor, as such work was integral to America's 1930s industrial economy.  The program was very popular with the American public, as it gave young people a chance to develop work skills and get a start in adult life.

A comparable program today could include jobs requiring manual labor.  America's highways, bridges and other infrastructure need a lot of maintenance.  America's cities need to be cleaned up, and abandoned buildings torn down, so that redevelopment can begin.  But there are many white collar jobs that need to be done as well.  Rural areas and inner cities lack physicians and other health care providers.  Many school districts are strapped for funding and need more teachers and staff for everything ranging from special education to music and drama.  Many jurisdictions have gravely inadequate funding for public defenders.  Criminal defendants, whom the law in its majesty presumes innocent until proven guilty, have little means to defend themselves and give their presumption of innocence tangible effect.  The poor need legal services for civil matters as well, such as battling indifferent landlords.  The list could go on.

CCC-21st Century jobs should be real jobs, not make work.  We can't ask taxpayers to pay people to dig holes and fill them up.  The pay should be low, because these aren't meant to be career jobs.  They are a way to give young people a start.  Part of the compensation should include generous provisions for government assistance in repaying school debt.  In effect, the government would help young people offload their school debt so they can get a fresh start in life.  Yes, yes, yes, there are countervailing considerations about holding people responsible for their debts and not bailing people out, etc., etc.  But we let egregious spendthrifts stiff their creditors for non-education debt as a matter of course in bankruptcy.  And we bail out really large financial institutions run by millionaire executives.  The burden of educational debt is getting to be too much.  As some guy put it about 400 years ago, the quality of mercy is not strained.  Let's be realistic instead of Puritanically moralistic.

Those CCC-21st Century employees who haven't gone to college could be compensated with the right to educational subsidies, akin to the GI Bill.  These young people could then go to college with less need for debt.  Their human capital would be enriched.

This isn't a perfect solution, and won't solve all the problems of Gen Y.  But it would give many of them a start.  And that's what they need.  Deficit spending for another CCC would be money well-spent.  The private sector isn't helping these people.  Government action is the only alternative.  We don't need more stimulus in the form of Federal Reserve money printing.  We could benefit greatly from stimulus in the form of deficit spending invested in our young adults.

How Government Inflation Policies Would Smack the Middle Class

The federal government proposes to use inflation to smack the middle class.  The Federal Reserve has an inflation target of 2%, and some Fed officials, fearing that deflation is around the corner--have recently been openly grousing about how inflation--running just above 1%--is too low.  They want to take away your spending power faster.  One of their primary tools for fueling inflation is to obliterate positive interest rates--or, stated otherwise, to deprive you of interest income.  Your faint memories of the distant past, when interest income actually required you to fill out Schedule B for your tax return, will become entirely ethereal.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration has proposed to use a less generous inflation adjustment (the Chained CPI) for Social Security recipients and federal and military retirees.  The Chained CPI would also be used to adjust tax brackets, with the effect that taxes would be higher than under the currently used CPI.  In other words, the Fed wants to increase inflation, while the President wants less protection for retirees and taxpayers from the ravages of inflation. 

Those whose incomes are middle class or lower (i.e., $100,000 a year or less) tend to be vulnerable to inflation.  They have little discretionary income left after necessary monthly expenses, and consequently, not much of a buffer against increases in inflation.  Retirees are especially defenseless.  Add the heavier taxes resulting from the Chained CPI, and the federal government's inflation policies could effectively reduce middle class and retiree incomes in real terms.

With the sluggish U.S. economy 70% dependent on consumption, it makes no sense for the federal government to deploy inflation as a weapon against those with middle class or lower incomes.  Reduce incomes and people will consume less.  If these federal policies somehow stimulate greater economic growth, it isn't hard to figure who will benefit the most from that greater growth, and it ain't gonna be the lowest 80%. 

The Chained CPI hasn't become law yet, and not all Fed officials want to ignite inflation.  So the worst may not come to pass.  But the lowest 80%, already facing uncertain employment prospects and stagnant wages, really don't need to be squeezed by inflation policies that make sense only to those well-to-do people who are insulated from their impacts.

News Flash: Republicans Don't Like Profiling

Well, it appears that Republicans don't like profiling after all.  At least, not when Tea Partiers are profiled by the IRS.  When the targets of profiling are black or Muslim, well . . . . 

Of course, the IRS should not have profiled Tea Partiers.  As liberals have been saying for decades, profiling is unfair and illegal.  But the level of outrage emanating from the right is pathetic, at best.  Profiling is all too common, and we shouldn't get any more outraged over the IRS's profiling of Tea Partiers than we do over the profiling of blacks, Muslims and other people.  Finding a conservative commentator who'd agree with this point would take longer than the IRS took to process Tea Party nonprofit applications.  And that's the problem with political discourse these days.  The point of view too often taken is "If it hurts me, it's bad.  If it hurts people I don't like or don't care about, it's okay."  Profiling is unprincipled.  But so are way too many participants in today's political mosh pit.

Beware of Overpriced Assets

The delirious exuberance of stocks today is reminiscent of the stock market just before its earlier peaks in March and April 2000, and in the fall of 2007.  Prices move up in defiance of risks and uncertainties.  Stock indices set records every week.  Bulls overrun the markets.  Bears have become a seriously endangered species.

Even as financial messiahs proclaim a brave new market in spite of the stumbling economic recovery in America and recession in the rest of the industrialized world, let us recall the sources of the last two market busts:  highly overpriced assets.  In the late 1990s, the bubble was in tech stocks.  In 2007-08, housing and real estate mortgages were grossly overpriced.  In both instances, the sheer quantity of inflated assets ensured that when the markets turned, losses would be enormous.  Given the dazzling rise of stocks over the past few years, it behooves us to ask if there is a comparable risk today?

The answer would appear to be yes.  Investors have poured vast amounts of money into bonds of every stripe and variety.  Bond valuations, even of junk bonds, have reached highly optimistic levels.  Bonds are priced for perfection.  If any imperfection appears, losses--and a lot of them--will follow.

The most obvious risk to bondholders is that the Federal Reserve and other central banks will step back from the extremely accommodative policies they have instituted.  This will happen sooner or later, probably sooner in America and later in Europe and Japan.  When it does, bondholders will incur losses, and those losses will be big simply because of the huge amounts of money that have flowed into bonds. 

The Fed seems to think it can manage the process of shifting from quantitative easing to unwinding its $3 trillion plus balance sheet (i.e., quantitative tightening).  Perhaps it can do so without causing severe short-term turmoil in the markets.  But it can't circumvent a basic problem:  when interest rates rise and bond prices fall, a lot of losses will be incurred.  These losses must land somewhere.  They might be shifted from one investor to another by means of derivatives and other hedges.  But someone, ultimately, has to take the loss. 

The fact that losses in the financial markets have to land on someone somewhere wreaked havoc on the world's major economies following the real estate crash of 2007-08.  Investors around the globe who bought mortgage-backed securities, CDOs, CDOs squared, and other such financial alchemy paid the price for drinking too much of the Kool-Aid du jour.  We live with the resulting economic pain even to this day.

The bond markets are like a coiled spring that presents a similar problem. Extremely high prices have been paid for bonds, and bondholders face serious risk of losses when rates rise.  The sheer quantity of potential losses is the scary thing.  Those losses will have to land on someone, somewhere, and that will be painful.  The Fed's quantitative easing program has only exacerbated the risks, and the Fed's near term success in preventing depression has burnished its image of competence, which may have blinded bond investors to the dangers of the market downturn that must take place eventually.  As history repeatedly has demonstrated, the Fed is fallible and its fallibility is accompanied by serious consequences for the financial markets and the economy.

By promoting ultra low interest rates for five years, the Fed has allowed a massive build-up of investment in overpriced bonds.  While central bank intervention in a crisis is to be applauded, a years-long distortion of market forces will surely do bad things, and bad things have been done.  The only question now is when and how we will suffer the consequences.

How Is GDP Financed?

It may seem strange to ask how GDP is financed.  GDP simply measures the total market value of final goods and services that an economy produces.  It is a way to measure national income, not a measure of assets on a national balance sheet. 

But the way GDP is paid for does matter.  If large quantities of borrowed money finance GDP, then GDP in future years may be less sustainable than GDP produced by organic growth (i.e., GDP derived from people and companies spending their earnings, rather than borrowings).  The pauper nations of the EU, mostly located on the southern rim, are good examples.  They borrowed heavily (or their banks borrowed heavily) to finance consumption.  For a while, their GDPs grew.  But debt, unfortunately, has to be repaid.  A nation's whose GDP is heavily dependent on borrowed money will eventually have to pay the piper.  If those payments are burdensome enough, the nation's GDP bubble will burst, and recession will follow.  That isn't hypothetical; look at Greece, Ireland, Cyprus and Spain.  Indeed, look at the EU as a whole, which is sinking into recession even as we blog.

In America, the picture ain't pretty.  Even though GDP is nominally growing, in the first quarter of this year at an annual rate of 2.5%, the question of sustainability looms.  The federal government is constraining its borrowing (partly because of sequestration and partly because of Social Security and income tax increases).  Thus, the federal budget wouldn't be a source of GDP growth. 

But the Federal Reserve's quantitative easing program is.  The Fed is pumping $85 billion a month into the economy through purchases of financial assets.  Over a full year, the QE program would pump $1 trillion into the economy.  That's equivalent to about 6% of America's $16 trillion GDP.  It wouldn't be accurate to say that $1 trillion spent on QE results in $1 trillion of GDP.  Much of the money printed by the Fed for QE is recycled back to the Federal Reserve System in the form of member bank deposits at Federal Reserve banks.  This process is a near wash (except that it gives the depositor-banks riskless profits).  But QE is boosting the economy.  Our stock market--bizarrely exuberant in the face of a tepid economy--needs its regular fix of QE to maintain and increase its high.  The real estate markets seem to be getting a boost from the Fed's purchases of mortgage-backed securities.  Increases in asset values such as these appear to be creating a wealth effect that boosts spending (mostly by the top 10%).  That is probably a primary source of GDP growth today. 

But QE is similar to borrowed money.  At some point, the Fed will start selling down its more than $3 trillion balance sheet.  This akin to debt repayment.  It will remove money from the economy.  When there is less money to spend, there may well be less economic growth.  The Fed is hoping that the economy will be organically growing briskly by the time it goes into QT (i.e., quantitative tightening).  But there's no way to know for sure that will be the case.  The Fed may have to shift to QT because of a rise in inflation, whether or not growth has revived.  Whatever the reason for QT, it will constrain growth.  In some circumstances, it could produce a recession. 

Like toothpaste and genies, QE on the loose isn't easily put back into the place where it came from.  There's no riskless way to execute QT.  It's possible that continuation of the Fed's QE program could stimulate the economy to resume vigorous growth.  But that's far from certain.  And every additional month of QE heightens the risks that our economy is becoming overleveraged.

Will the Affordable Care Act Lower Health Insurance Costs?

In 2014, two of the most important provisions  of the Affordable Care Act take effect.  These require health insurers to accept all applicants without regard to prior medical conditions, and to provide unlimited coverage.  Although some recent news stories indicate that health insurers are raising premiums in 2014 to compensate for these provisions, it's possible to foresee a time when these same provisions will constrain the growth of health insurance costs. 

These requirements--no exclusion for prior medical conditions and unlimited coverage--provide powerful incentives for insurers to manage health care rationally.  Currently, many health insurers endeavor to limit their exposure to the costliest patients (i.e., those with existing medical conditions and those needing very expensive care).  In other words, insurers attempt to avoid covering those most in need of coverage.  It's no surprise that the most common reason for individuals to file bankruptcy is unmanageable medical bills.  It is perhaps surprising that most of these individuals have some health insurance coverage--but not enough. 

By forbidding insurers to squeeze out those in the greatest need of coverage, the Affordable Care Act now steers insurers' attention toward managing care rationally and providing the best quality, most effective care.  Preventive care, such as regular physicals, screenings, immunizations, wellness programs, and so on will take priority. People will hopefully fall ill and injure themselves less often and perhaps less severely.  In the long run, this fundamental change in approach may lower the growth of premiums, as improvements in health from better preventive care hopefully reduce the need for medical treatment.  Premiums will rise next year for many--but only because they're getting better coverage.  And that improved coverage may pay off in the long run.

Your Social Security Benefits: Countering the Chained CPI

The President has proposed using the Chained CPI as the measure for cost-of-living increases in Social Security benefits, and other federal and military retirement benefits.  The impact on benefits would be to reduce the annual increase by about 0.3%.  While this amount seems small, it accumulates over time.  After ten years, your benefits would be reduced by 3-4% per year.  After twenty years, the reduction would be around 6-7% per year.  If you receive Social Security for thirty years, the reduction would be around 9% or more per year.  For those relying heavily on Social Security, which could be up to half of all recipients, that can hurt, especially considering the unstoppable, uber-inflationary costs of medical care for the elderly.  The Chained CPI proposal is criticized for hitting the most elderly and vulnerable the hardest.  Women take a bigger hit than men because they live longer and depend more heavily on Social Security.

The Chained CPI would also increase taxes.  Tax brackets and certain other features of the tax system are adjusted for inflation.  If the adjustment is smaller, as it would be with the Chained CPI, the effect would be to raise taxes.  As with Social Security benefits, the tax increases would fall most heavily on those at the lowest income levels (who otherwise are taxed lightly).

If you're wondering if implementation of the Chained CPI would affect you, the answer is yes.  It affects everyone, although the well-off would suffer the least in relative terms.  The likelihood of the adoption of the Chained CPI is difficult to predict.  Conservatives and many moderates generally like the idea, although the white Boomers at the heart of the Republican Party will sooner or later figure out that they would take a bullet for their party's ideology from the Chained CPI.  When they do, we'll find out if there's a cure for stupid.

Anyway, how could you counter the impact of the Chained CPI, if it's adopted?  Save more.  Start saving more now, and save more every month.  It's hard to estimate how much more, because the answer would depend heavily on the specifics of your financial situation.  But a rough guesstimate might be 1% of your income or a bit more if you're in your 20s or 30s, 2% for those in their 40s, and 3-4% if you've reached the Big 5-0.  This may not sound like much, but try doing it (remember, this amount would be in addition to other saving you should be doing for retirement).  A lot of Americans can't.  Those who fail should acquire a taste for dog food, because it looms in their futures.

President Obama may think that proposing the Chained CPI keeps federal spending at a relatively stimulative level in the near term future, to help pull the economy out of the Great Recession, while reducing long term spending to help control the deficit.  But if rational Americans begin saving more to compensate for the lower benefits and higher taxes promised for their retirements, the near term impact of the Chained CPI would be to reduce consumption and retard recovery.  And continuation of the Great Recession would prolong the large deficits we now have.

The President seems obsessed with attaining a Grand Compromise.  He seems to think doing so will burnish his legacy.  That's weird.  Consider the Presidents who attained greatness through compromise.  There's . . . uh . . . well . . . I mean . . . you know . . .  Okay, look at the flip side of the question.  Consider the great Presidents.  George Washington, who lost 7 of the 9 major battles he fought in the American Revolution, didn't compromise with the British.  Abraham Lincoln, who dallied initially with compromise until the Confederates digitally and martially expressed their views, became the great non-Compromisor who rid America of the curse of slavery.  Franklin Delano Roosevelt, greatest President of the 20th Century, allowed Republican leaders as much input into the New Deal as Mozart had into Jailhouse Rock.  Let us recall the great proponents of compromise in America's history:  Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, and John C. Calhoun.  Their accomplishments as progenitors of accommodation are known to as many as 26% of all high school students for a period of time not exceeding 36 hours before and 2.14 minutes after exam time.  This is a desirable legacy?  Well, maybe in the eyes of some, but, please, not at the expense of those least able to bear that expense.