On Obama’s alleged citizenship problem.

Barry Soetoro, Barack Obama, Sir William Wilberforce, or whatever his name is — has taken the office of President of the United States  despite some questions about the legitimacy of his citizenship. A significant number of the  people behind the various lawsuits have ties to 9-11 conspiracy theorists which is, rightly, a detriment to their credibility.   It is also true that a number of conspiracy theorists are prone to jumping on any number of conspiracy theory bandwagons which are a further credibility problem.   You know the type: the people who insist that you are a ’sheep’ unless you accept that the Illuminati caused 9/11 AND the Freemasons assassinated JFK AND the contrails of jet planes  are laced with mind control drugs AND nuclear reactors and Wi-Fi zones produce bad chi AND that George W. Bush is secretly a Satanist AND there are coded directions  on the backs of road signs to help the UN forces find their way to all our military bases when the globalist takeover comes AND Steve Wozniak is really an extraterrestrial.

November 1, 2008: Hawai’i’s Director of Health, and Registrar of Vital Statistics both testified to having seen Obama’s original birth certificate on record. As far as many reasonable people are concerned, this settled it.   I will not question the rationality of those who accept this.

That said, though I am not asserting anything about Obama’s birth, I am asserting that the case has not necessarily been settled.  The questions surrounding the details of his citizenship status from birth through his youth are somewhat legitimate ones unless the answers have already been conclusively provided.

For one thing, he is certainly not acting like a US citizen.   His asshattical treatment  of UK PM Gordon Brown appears to be borne of a grudge based in the quaint tribalistic notion of blood guilt (over the Brits’ treatment of the Mau Mau rebellion in what is present-day Kenya).  He is prepared to unravel our alliance with the UK based on events that concerned HIS ancestors in THEIR country, and that is  damned sure not the behavior of someone who considers himself an American first.   Does that mean anything regarding the facts of whether Obama qualifies as a natural-born US citizen? Maybe, maybe not.    As things stand, I want to see more facts.

But don’t go chucking Johnsons at me just because I’m not firmly convinced about this.       I am the rational one here.

A Proposal for Legitimate Wisdom: The I-CUBE

(Some modifications toward the bottom)

The most direct indicator of the fundamental health of a nation’s economy would not be stock market performance, unemployment rates, or interest rates.

Rather, we ought to make an attempt to more directly measure individual independence– the ability of individuals to support themselves, save money, and be flexible in their job options– an individual independence index. That is, the  III, or I³, or I-CUBE. I know, it’s silly to make too much of a fuss over what to name something before going into the substance of what the thing is.

What this would be, is a more direct measure of what the real economic foundation of a population is: the ability of individuals to support their households.  This could be done through a survey, which I would suggest limiting to three questions for a few reasons.  First, the kind of questions that need to be asked are complicated enough that more would be impractical.   Second,  for what is intended to be such a fundamental measuring device, it should certainly not be any more complicated than is practical.   Third,  it adds a bit more significant meaning to the name of I-CUBE/I³: rather than simply being a catchy abbreviation for three words beginning with the same letter of the alphabet it would actually  represent the fact that three significant dimensions are being measured.

These are the three questions, which would be administered to heads of households, attempting to get a large random sampling across all socioeconomic categories.

The I-CUBE Questionnaire for the Individual Independence Index

First, get total household income and number of adults and kids in the household, just for basic demographics and making sure the overall I-CUBE average is adjusted for known proportion of households in each income bracket.   It’s also  for calculating the poverty level which is used to calculate the scores.

Question 1: Preparedness

Suppose you were to lose your primary source of income.    What would be:

A) The total of all your current secondary sources of income, per annum (including the incomes of other members of your household) and–

B) — the total of all your currently readily available funds in savings accounts, other reserve funds, and any assets you are able and willing to liquidate in an emergency?

Add the answers to parts A and B together.

Question 2: Self-Sufficiency

How much money, in total, do you estimate you saved through the previous year by doing things yourself (including the activities of other members of your household)?

Note: Obviously includes the grocery store value of vegetables you grew yourself,  installation costs avoided by installing an appliance yourself,  plumbers’ or electricians’ fees avoided by installing fixtures yourself, the value of furniture you built yourself (minus cost of materials),   et cetera.  But don’t forget the value of doing your own lawn care, cooking, and interior cleaning — those will add a hefty chunk.

Of course, do not count projects that failed and had to be redone by a professional.

Question 3: Flexibility

Suppose again that you were to lose your primary source of income.  Suppose further that no jobs are available anywhere that use the same skill set in the same industry.   What is the  starting annual income of the next best job for which you currently qualify?

Conclusion

Divide all the answers by the current poverty level (use local figures if available) for the given household size in order to get something approaching a more absolute score.  Keep them separated into I-CUBE-1, I-CUBE-2, and I-CUBE-3 scores for semi-detailed reports, or add them together into the total I-CUBE for brevity.   Keep the personal I-CUBE scores of individuals private and confidential.

Obviously, one challenge would be getting an accurate measurement, as we’d either have to rely on the honesty of people’s self-reporting or an intrusive audit.  But assuming that we could get a reasonably accurate score, I dare say it would be pretty darn useful.

As far as single numbers go, it might be better for the composite I-CUBE score to include some adjustment based on how even the three subscores are with each other, rather than be a simple total of the three subscores.    It seems reasonable to say that an I-CUBE score set A of (1.00, 1.00, 1.00), is better than set B ( 1.40, .20, 1.40), even though both total to 3.00.   Maybe just take the difference from the mean of any subscore that falls below the mean, and apply that as a penalty to the composite I-CUBE score.  So set A would get 3.00, while set B would get 2.20.

My initial guess is that an I-CUBE score of 3.0 would be passing, 4.0 good, and anything over 5.0 excellent.  Below 3.0, I’d have to say, is a failing score.

For Epic Win:

Design the K-12 education system toward the goal of maximizing the population’s I-CUBE score.  My plan for that is coming next.