Climbing a hill
A local Malibu real estate broker, Brant Didden, a partner of 4 Malibu Real Estate, is currently on the road to ascend K2, a 28,000-foot peak in the Karakoram Range in Pakistan, long considered one of the most difficult and dangerous climbs in the world because of the terrain and the unforgiving weather. The climbing group he is traveling with consists of experienced climbers from all over the world — all with experience climbing over 8,000 meters. They will make the climb over the next month or so. Didden is already in the area, and we will track his climb as we receive cell phone reports and pictures. See the detailed story in this week’s paper on page B1.
Nationally
A lot of things came to a head this week. Whenever the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) announces its decisions, there is always that last moment when everyone holds their breath after months of trying to read the tea leaves. Then you finally know, and you can exhale.
Because Congress is so stalemated and can’t seem to fix anything, the SCOTUS has grown in importance and finality. Two major cases dominated this session and touched almost every American. The Affordable Care Act hung in the balance. If the court went one way, it would have probably stopped subsidies to nearly 10 million Americans and gutted the entire statute, and, incidentally, have created one heck of a problem for the Republican Party candidates for presidency. They upheld the law, 6 to 3, which, in today’s world, is practically a landslide, and people who were previously uninsured or had pre-existing conditions can now get covered. There is another positive side; now that it’s the law of the land, they’ll be able to amend it if some of the pieces don’t work, and deal with unforeseen problems with the Act as they arise. The court’s decision gives all the partisans covering fire so they actually can go to work and act like a Congress without being accused of being a sellout.
The other major case is gay marriage. In a 5-4 decision, they said marriage was a constitutional right in all 50 states, and this was a gutsy decision. I thought they actually could have gone either way on this one. There is a sense in the court that they don’t want to get too far ahead of the public, but, in this case, public sentiment had moved so quickly and attitudes had changed, particularly among the young, that the county was ahead of the politicians in many places. There will be battles and rear guard actions fought, but, ultimately, both decisions will be accepted by most of the country, and we can all say we lived through a period when history was made.
The race issue is up front in America again. The murders in the church in Charleston, S.C. and the issues of race and race prejudice are foremost in many minds, perhaps for the first time in a good way. The murders were terrible and brutal and difficult for all of us to comprehend. To sit with people in prayer for an hour, to be welcomed into the prayer circle and then to murder nine of them is so difficult to understand that I believe, for the first time, many people realize that this is not just a race problem, but it is also a pernicious disease, which tears at the fabric of America and must be fixed.
Internationally
Some people have said to me that I should only be writing about local things and not deal with larger, national or international issues. At one time, that might have been true, but not anymore. The Greek government can’t cut an acceptable deal, so the U.S. Dow drops two percent (300 points). If you own stock, or have mutual funds or a 401K, you took a hit last week. And, if it makes you feel any better, you were not alone. Germany’s Dax is down 3.6 percent. Japan’s Nikkei is down 2.9 percent and China’s Shanghai composite is down 3.3 percent. I couldn’t find out how that converted into dollars, but my guess is, added all together, it’s billions, and maybe even beyond a trillion.
So, a little country like Greece is going to miss paying $1.9 billion due to their creditors, and the consequence is the loss of billions and billions of dollars to countries and investors all around the globe. That ability to send the world spiraling downward is something you call “power,” and if Greece didn’t realize it before, they do now, as do all the other European Union countries and the big three lenders. After all, it’s pretty clear that Greece borrowed a lot more money than they can ever pay back.
On the other hand, the creditors — the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission — are some of the savviest bankers in the world, and they knew full well what the Greek economy could handle, or they were overly optimistic about it. Meanwhile, I’m sure there were great big interest payments and fees that went with the loans, so I doubt that these loans were made out of altruism. What has become clear is what works for the big guys like Germany, may not work for the little guys like Greece. For Greece to accept the new austerity terms being offered just kicks the can down the road and puts Greece further in debt to the company store.
It looks to me as if it boils down to a couple of simple alternatives. They either have to write down the debt (a big short sale) to something that Greece can manage, or Greece has to walk. Either way, Greece is going to go through hell, so I think they might as well just bite the bullet and walk if the deal isn’t right.