Climate Change; Full Disclosure

Hooray!

East Anglia will now release all climate raw data pending the negotiation of a number of non-publication agreements.

So, how long are we going to hang on to this data?  Long enough to pass cap and trade?  Long enough to put the world’s economies under the yolk of some global governance scheme courtesy the Copenhagen summit?  And, then we get to see the fraud beneath the surface?

No, full disclosure now for these reasons:

First, regardless of other commercial agreements, much of this data comes from grants backed by public monies.  Taxes.  My taxes.  My money.  I own that data.  It’s mine just as it’s any else’s.

Second, the data involved is increasingly becoming entangled in massive fraud.  Fraud that now clearly wades into the area of criminal.  We need this data out in the context of a full public inquiry.  On both sides of the Atlantic–England and the US.  We need to know what was being hidden.  Who hid it.  Who knew what and when.

Third, you have to show the conclusions that you present in ‘peer reviewed’ journals can be replicated.  That means you have to have the raw data so that other scientists can assemble the data to see if the same conclusion can be replicated.  You need to describe your methods and procedures so that others can re-do your experiment and, again, replicate your results and, ultimately, conclusions.  As a physician and engineer, I’ve been in the business of evaluating scientific experiments and studies to know that if you tried to present this data in a manner similar to global warming you’d be laughed out of any FDA drug approval process.

But, oh no!  The raw data at CRU is gone, the tapes and files thrown away during a move to a new facility!  All they have is ‘enhanced’ data!  How many billions of my tax dollars have gone into generating this data; and its all just tossed out.

The dog ate my homework.  Who did that?  Why?  Who knew what and when?

To the hacker that release the original e-mails; please hack again.  We need the raw data out in the public domain and now.  Unfortunately, you’ll probably be too late this time.

Obamacare; Throwing S#*t Up Against The Wall

And seeing what sticks.

The benefit of substantial Democratic majorities is to allow the glib leadership (in both houses and the oval office) a chance to fully take the reins and render perfection out of our oh so obviously broken-down health care system.  Now that they’re in control, they can rectify those glaring deficiencies with their brilliant solutions that seems to have just eluded millions of doctors, nurses and sundry health professionals too dim-witted to see the obvious solutions only apparent to the enlighten few that now run the executive and legislative branches our the federal government.

Except that three hundred million people have unique medical needs that somehow don’t fit into any tight delivery scheme.  Certainly not the lowest common denominator expectations that Obama’s “best practices” will generate.  ”Best practices” really do work except in the cases of exceptions.  Exceptions that occur about every time a new patient walks into your office.

Now that the Democrats literally have the votes to pass anything they want, they also discover that they will own what ever mess they will create when they move this country into the Nirvana of “reformed” and “universal” health care.

And, everyone is starting to discover, now that the Democrats are seriously scheming to destroy the best health system in the world, that as bad as our system may be, every alternative is worse.

There was a reason to rush this “reform” through in the dark of night.  That reason became abundantly clear when a whole summer’s worth of town hall meetings laid bare some of the myths that drove this reform need–those pesky peasants from fly-over country; just don’t know what’s best for them.   Those same said peasants also objected to the price tag because one trillion dollars is a lot of money.  900 billion dollars is a lot of money.  In fact, in the hurly-burly of making your household budget balance, 100 bucks is a lot of money.

In the process we learned that there are, as Mark Twain noted, lies, damn lies and statistics.  We learned that American medicine does the best job in treating cancer, shortest waiting times and bringing the latest medical innovations to the patient fastest.  We learned that American life expectancy is increasing.  We learned that, factoring traffic accidents and homicide, we have the best life expectancy on earth.  We learned that our infant mortality rate isn’t the best because we count premature births as live births unlike other countries who only count full-term births as live births.  And, we have highly skilled neonatologists that that actually try to save these premies.

We learned that for all the griping, most Americans are satisfied with their medical coverage.

We learned, surprise, surprise, that there will be rationing.  That rationing will be borne, in particular, by the elderly.  That rationing will be forced by penalizing the the top ten percent of doctors (in terms of resource use).

We learned, courtesy former Labor Secretary Reich, that if you’re old we’re going to let you die.  Further, don’t expect further increases in life expectancy since money for innovation will no longer be there.  Yet, for all the contractions and cuts in care and resources for care; for all the taxes proposed–many to fall squarely on the middle class–we still have “reform” that will destroy the level of care we have now and beggar this country, our children and their grandchildren.

Yet, folks like Reid and Pelosi persist.  Especially with their stalking horse for socialized medicine–the “public option.”  In some respects, it is almost an obsession of a gambling addict that keeps doubling the ante in the center of the table in hopes of winning the jackpot.

There is no reason for this “reform” when more reasonable alternative are available.  Equal tax treatment for all insurance plans whether purchased by an employer or an individual.  Allowing insurance companies to purchase plans across state lines.

No, the real reason is the push to bring the entire medical system under governmental control.  And, the folks pushing it the most are the Democratic leadership in both houses who all share a common trait of being superannuated Woodstock hippies who sense that this will be the last time, in a generation, that they can push medical socialization through.  For them, the leadership in particular, it will be the last time in their lives since most of these individuals are 70 or older.  These were the folks who were going to “change the system” by “working in the system.”  Now, at the end of their careers, having labored for so long in the vinyards of the hall of congress, they finally have the perfect convergence to get their dream of socialism through.  But, even now, their overreaching with things like the “stimulus” leave them just inches short.

They need to do this because socialized medicine is the surest vehicle to wreck a country.  France and Britain used to be major players in world affairs–with military muscle to back it up.  But, thanks to the enormous drain of resources by their respective social welfare programs, they are now, well, second rate.  Now, it is our turn.  This an attempt to so consume our country in spending and taxes so as to bleed every other priority dry–especially defense.  And, to run individual initiative and economic into the ground; bye bye American Exceptionalism.  These aging hippies will finally have the sure-fire solution to any future “Vietnams.”  A solution to America’s “horrible oppressions” in the world. Bankrupt America.

Aging Hippies and Congressional Leadership

The headlong, damn-the-torpedoes approach to health care “reform” is a function of democratic congressional leadership in the hands of a bunch of aging Woodstock era hippies.  Much of the top leadership hails from the early 1970’s, especially from the class of 1974; Democrats elected at the height of the Watergate scandal.  Many of these were the hippies or fellow travelers who were going to carry the revolution to the establishment by working “in the system” and thereby undermine the “system.”

But, their 30 year journey was greatly frustrated by a misalignment of stars.  The last time the Democrats held the balance of power as they do now was in Jimmy Carter’s first two years (1977-78).  At that time these hippies were much too junior to exert much influence in the House and Senate.  And, so the dream to radicalize America fizzled.

But, now comes the next opportunity.  But, for the leadership, their last opportunity since many of them are in their 70’s and will literally be pushing up daisies  when the next opportunity comes around.  So, we see the most heavy handed legislative pushes on record to move health care “reform,” cap and trade and card check to remake America as some socialist utopia.

True to their boomer roots this leadership will push this agenda forward with out the slightest care about the consequences and damages their children and grandchildren will have to bear.  They care not a whit for unintended consequences since they will live their remaining years on a lush congressional pension and then be dead shortly thereafter.  They have exempted themselves from the maw of rationing that will be unloaded on the rest of America thanks to their socialized medical monstrosity.  And, they will be able to avail themselves of what was once the finest medical system on earth before their “reforms” grind American medicine into the socialized mediocrity that now graces England and Canada.

Reid plans to jam health care reform through on reconciliation or some other obscure parliamentary trick to side it through on 51 votes.  This will in effect kill the filibuster and turn the Senate into a more grandiose version of the House. Frankly, Reid has the votes; it only takes 51 votes to kill the filibuster right now.  But, once that rule is gone, it’ll never come back.  But, what does Reid care that he’ll turn the deliberative functions of the Senate into an over-glorified student senate.  He’ll be departed from the scene; hopefully as soon as November 2010.

And, this same leadership is fighting to jam this bill through before anyone has a chance to read it.  This may give Reid, Pelosi and company some cheap thrills.  But, it’ll be murder for their party.  Because the Republicans, going into 2010 and 2012 will have over a thousand pages of selective quotes from that unvetted bill to bludgeon the Democrats. Remember, the actual reform doesn’t take place until 2013.  So, the actual vote buying potential of this entitlement will not be around until after the 2010 mid-term elections.  Nor the 2012 presidential election.

To hell with all of you left on the Titanic, suckers, I’ve already got my place on the lifeboat.

GM; An Abortion Known As “Industrial Policy”

“What’s good for GM is good….”  You know the rest.  The irony, is that GM and the US government has been bound at the hip for nearly three quarters of a century.  It started with the Wagner National Labor Relations act.  And, ended there.  For this company, in particular, became the vehicle that has been the government-mandated honey pot for the UAW.  

Indeed, with governmental help, GM evolved into a Social Security agency and a Medicare agency; with three out of every four UAW members drawing down on retirement benefits.  It a wonder that GM had any time to make cars.  This charade led to GM’s current business model of manufacturing large cars, SUV’s and trucks to generate the profits needed to subsidize the lush benefits that the UAW now enjoys.  Moreover, the CAFE standards were originally conceived to keep small car production in the US, thereby guaranteeing more UAW jobs.  So, those same said large cars and trucks also had to subsidize small car production as well.

This delicate homeostasis succeeded until energy became politicized by the environmentalists.  The act of pumping gas became political statement.  And, scientific inquiry about global weather patterns became similarly politicized.  

An energy policy designed to create scarcity, to drive up the price of gas, succeeded with four dollar per gallon gas last summer.  And, GM’s balancing act collapsed.  Not that any of this ever had to happen.  Because, most Americans like large cars.  We are, generally, a country that has a very low population density.  Ours is under 100 persons per square mile as opposed to populations densities in the hundreds if not over a thousand persons per square foot in Europe or Asia.  We therefore, on average travel farther for a given trip.  And, given these longer trips will want to carry more.  Hence the need for a bigger car.

Energy policy that abandoned the flat-earth mythology of global-warming (sorry, climate change), could easily provide the necessary gas, well under two dollars per gallon, by off-shore drilling.  Extraction of shale-oil.  Nuclear power.  The energy densities of these sources outstrip all other sources.  It is only because of energy production politicization that “alternative” power sources are remotely economically viable. 

Yes, there are people who live in very congested inner-city areas who would want a very small car.  But, the free market is more than capable of providing such cars.  But, in America, we engage in gigantic carbon-footprint activities such as having, instead of aborting, children and that, with our low population density makes for a demand for larger vehicles–like Obama’s Tahoe.  But, how about letting individuals choose what they want to drive?  I guess not in Obama’s command economy.

So, welcome to the brave new world of econo-boxes.  Mandated by Obama’s acolytes in the EPA and department of transportation.  Actually, the brave-old world of econo-boxes.  Once again, thanks to Reagan and the prosperity his policies engendered, we have a whole generation of people who simply forgot or never experienced the world of the 70’s.  Remember the le Car?  Or, the Gremlin, Pinto or Maverick?  How about the incredibly sexy 1974 Mustang?  Or, a car so bad, it became the official wheels of Wayne’s World–the AMC Pacer.

And, so, the picture at the top of this post is supposed to represent the new, Obama controlled GM (h.t., Drudge).  What we have is a state controlled car company capable of being as innovative as the old Soviet block manufacturers that gave us the Lada or the Trabant.  GM is going to require permanent government subsidies to give away these cars.  Because, for those with some pocket change left after Obama’s systematic looting via taxes, you aren’t going to lay down one penny more on something out of GM.  We’ll also know when some lowly bureaucrat is out an about since they’ll be driving one of those ridiculous GM econo-boxes.  The GSA is going to become the official buyer of all products, GM.  How else to prop up the US Treasury’s investment in GM.

Since, Obama’s GM will keep the Cadillac nameplate, we’ll also be producing the Zil.  So, our solons will be able to look down upon all of us unwashed rubes as they are whisked to their oh so important governmental meetings.  We could even, like in the old Soviet Union, have special lanes reserved for the limousines of the high party big-shots.  

In a way, it’s fitting.  Keep  GM. Because GM has been the province of the government and the UAW since 1935.  Produce exactly the kind of cars that the enviro’s get wet dreams over.  And, keep the UAW as an object lesson, with three retirees for every worker on the line, for the future of Medicare and Social Security.

 

Knifing Pelosi

Rep. Steny Hoyer will allow investigations of “torture” to proceed with he inclusion of investigations of Pelosi’s knowledge.  Oh, there are the usual bromides about how the GOP diverting attention from the “truth” to a witch hunt about what the Democrats knew and when.  

The real truth is that Hoyer knows that everyone knew, the practice of water-boarding was very circumscribed and used with specific intent on specific suspects.  And, that specific intent was the fact that there was information, life saving information, that had to be extracted.  Hoyer also knows that this use of so-called torture was not used gratuitously to extract a confession for some Stalin-purge show trial.  

In sum, this subject as a useful weapon against the GOP is kaput.  And, Hoyer knows that too.  So, Hoyer is now going to use this weapon against an equally inviting target–Pelosi.  He’s got a payback to deliver.  Force her out and he’s the speaker.  Hoyer also knows that the minute Pelosi gets sworn in, these hearing are going to turn into the when-did-Pelosi-know hearings.  At this point, it won’t matter if former vice-President Cheney gets arrested with thumbscrews in his back pocket.

And, then the law of unintended consequences kicks in.  First, you can bet that if Pelosi gets called on the rug, she’s going to be sure she’s got as many fellow democrats who “knew” up there with her.  Further, with the long knives out, there’s a very good chance that just about every other agenda on the Hill is going to be dropped.  Especially, if there’s any chance that there’s going to be a shake up in the House leadership.  And, Obama might as well as take his teleprompter to Death Valley to yammer on about having his program priorities delivered to his desk by thus and such a date.

All of which points to the lack of leadership and executive experience of either Pelosi or Obama.  Obama farmed out his agenda to rich dilettante, by virtue of marrying well, whose first act was to come up with a “stimulus” bill that beyond caricatured the “tax and spend” liberal.  Then Obama came up with these torture memo releases with the full knowledge, despite his protestations to the contrary, that his fellow travelers would immediately use them in an anti-Bush show trial vendetta.

All of which, increasingly, will distract from issues that will really make or break Obama’s presidency–putting the country back on track to prosperity.  Executive experience would inform Obama that you need to focus your agenda, sort through all the chaff and distractions to find the real issues that need to be addressed and to pick your lieutenants very carefully.  Of which, Pelosi turned out to be a very poor choice.  Not that I’m complaining that hard.  There’s a very good chance that Obama’s agenda is going down in flames all over informed executive experience that would have told our President that there are somethings you just leave alone.

Inanities of High Speed Rail

Barry O, prime minister of the world, is now going to solve our traffic jams with high speed rail.  The brilliance of the guy just doesn’t stop.  Here it is, the solution, heretofore hidden from the rest of us lesser mortals, until his superior intellect hits on the idea and makes it clear to rest of us.  But, somewhere along the way Obama missed why the railroads got out of the passenger business–and unloaded Amtrak on us.  And, why intraurban mass transit it a horrible money loser propped up only by tax subsidies.  

Let’s start with the logistics.  Mass transit, of any type, depends on a lot of people going to and from the same destination at about the same time.  This requires densely populated corridors or two terminuses that have a lot of like minded people–like minded in that they want to travel to and from these two terminuses.  

Moreover, one must account for the fact that you don’t just travel from train station to train station (or airport to airport for that matter), but you must come from your home or place of business and ultimately arrive at another such destination such as a hotel or another place of business.  So, you step off your high speed train and you still may be miles from your ultimate destination.  

From my own experience, if I can reach a particular destination in four hours by car, it’s probably faster to do that than take the train or plane.  Simply because the time spent getting to, through and out of an airport more than makes up for the time saved by the actual flying.  Also, once you get to your destination, you’re going to need a car anyway.  If you drove, you have one.  If you flew, that’s even more time waiting for the car rental bus to transport you to the far reaches of the airport to get said rental.

Interurban high speed rail has the same limitations at either terminus.  But, even at 150 miles per hour, said train is going to be about half as fast as the plane.

Which gets us to speed.  You’re going to have to build trackage parallel to the existing trackage.  The existing trackage is completely saturated with freight traffic.  More importantly, the current trackage cannot support rail trackage if excess of about 80 miles per hour; about what you can do on the interstate highway system.  The high speed trains that run in Europe and Japan run on special trackage that will actually support train speeds well in excess of 100 miles per hour.  In sum, Obama’s high speed rail will need a parallel rail system solely dedicated to these high speed trains.  

By the way, the cost of materials is about $100 per foot of track.  Then there’s the cost of labor and cost of the underlying right-of-way. Here as of 2003. One rail is going to run you about $20 per foot.  A standard 200 foot wide right of way works out to about 24 acres of land per mile.

The next limitation is that European rail solutions will not work here.  Naturally, Obama and his bi-coastal elites think anything European is naturally superior.  But, on the practical side, Europe is generally crowded and densely populated.  Therefore, you are going to have a lot of people filling the criteria of a lot of people going to the same places at the same time.  Moreover, Europe is smaller making distances traveled shorter.  The overall effect is shorter, more heavily travelled corridors making such high speed rail a consideration.  And, there are such corridors in the United States; the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington being the best example.  By some mysterious coincidence train service exists there.  With the Acela Express leading the was with an average speed of 80 mph; it being impossible to get the money or past the NIMBY’s to construct trackage for exclusive use by the Acela.  So kiss 150 mph speed good bye.

Here’s the map from the White House web site showing the rest of the high speed corridors “envisioned” for the future.  You find a lot of the trackage is going to go over a lot of empty land.  Take a look at the Houston/New Orleans route; a lot of that goes over swamp just like the current Interstate 10.  Then there’s the Texarkana/Little Rock corridor.  Wow, must be lots of folks who need to get to the Bill Clinton Library.  Oh, and there’s that Tulsa/Oklahoma City corridor.

The fact of the matter is that the US has an overall population density of less than 100 persons per square mile.  Far less than the population densities of Europe or Japan that have hundreds if not over a thousand persons per square mile.  Our transportation system is reliant on the car for that simple reason–population densities are too low to make mass transit viable except in some select urban corridors.  Highways are cheaper to construct and maintain.  Highways allow people to travel at will, thereby eliminating the need to try to schedule or run train schedules that would result in very expensive conveyances with only one or two passengers.  For the really long haul, it’s far cheaper to pave two miles of concrete at each end of the trip; they’re call runways.

Our transport system is the reflection of the efforts of thousands of civil engineers and tens of millions of the traveling public who already worked through all of the above.  Yet, in their supreme arrogance, Obama and his toadies seems to think they have hit on a solution that has somehow eluded the rest of us since the invention of the wheel.

The really sad thing is that all of the above is already apparent to Obama.  But, all Obama cares about is coming up with any excuse to stiff our great-grandchildren as much spending as that quick little mind between those big ears can gin up.

Farts and Breath; the Audacity of Global Warming

Let’s just put the concept to rest; that global warming is bad.  Long before the emergence of SUV’s the earth has warmed and cooled.  Probably secondarily to solar activity.  The biggest advances in human civilization occurred during periods of warming.  Longer growing seasons, more more land, further north, available for settling and cultivation and so on.  Here we see a case that some of greatest advances in civilization occurred during such periods of warm.  The Roman warming, from 300 B.C. to 400 A.D. coincided with the rise of Rome and the Pax Romana.  And, when earth starting cooling in 400 A.D. tribes from the north were pushed against the boundaries of Rome.  Rome fell and the dark ages commenced.  

In general, a rough pattern emerges.  Civilizational advances during times of warming and contractions during times of cooling.  Rome and the Pax Romana rose during the Roman warming only do fall with the onset of the dark ages in 400 A.D.  The Medieval warming from 900 A.D.  to 1300 A.D.  I would submit one of the factors that led to the Renaissance.  Now, since the end of the little Ice age since about 1850 is our current warming period with its contaminant advances in science, technology and prosperity.  

It all makes sense.  Cooling periods make less land available for food production and living.  Relative scarcity and crowding will lead, as it did, to famines and plagues.  And death.

So, given that some of these past warming periods greatly exceeded our current warming period, we have very little evidence that we have anything approaching a crisis.  In fact, the historical record would clearly show that warming periods produced untold benefit for the human race and cooling periods the reverse.  Of course, the bi-coastal elite trust-fund babies aren’t terribly worried that they will have to suffer the least privation that lesser humans will have to bear with the next cooling.

Let’s look at what the EPA now wants to regulate in the name of global warming–nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons and perfluorocarbons.  These are gases released from volcanoes.  Go to Yellowstone National Park and smell the rotten egg smell around the geysers near Old Faithful.  Yes, sulfur compounds.  Naturally released from  volcanic activity that existed from time immemorial.  Long before an SUV ever graced the roads of Yellowstone NP.  (Lake Yellowstone is actually a super-volcano caldera.)  Maybe, in the name of global warming, Albert Gore needs to pave over Old Faithful.

And, the EPA wants to regulate methane and carbon dioxide.  The former is what we fart out and the latter what we breathe out.  We are going to regulate farts and breath.  

So, what we really have is a whole political movement based on fraud.  Not only is global warming not a problem, it historically has been times of some of the greatest advances in the human condition.  The warm that we now have is something to be welcomed and cherished; for hard times, dark and cold will come again.

The purpose of this fraud?  Global warming is the latest manifestation of a rapacious governing class, and their fellow travelers, to gin up a rationalization for even more power and revenue.  A rapaciousness so out of control that it will create any myth with only the thinnest veneer of “science” to create an excuse to regulate an newly discovered “health menace” and to impose an economy killing tax known as cap-and-trade.  Even if this regulation, at its core, is to regulate farts and breath.  Farts and breath.

 

 

A Case For The Ninety Percent Tax

Throughout the last ten to fifteen years, the executives that led these many financial, brokerage and banking firms on Wall Street, were a wholly owned subsisdery of the Democratic Party.  Who actually ran the social networks in the politically correct swamps of the Hamptons?  And, what did all of this butt-kissing buy?  Another Obama-style throwing under the bus.  The latest being the 90 percent tax on the AIG bonuses.

Good.

Maybe, at last, some of these oh-so avant-garde execuctives can now understand that when you’re in the business of creating wealth, you have a job that diametrically opposed to the role of government, which, in its Democratic-party form, is to skim wealth to buy votes.  And, if all of these bribes over the years would tame the ravenous wolf that is the taxman, they hopefully now understand that the demand for these bribes will only grow.

The silver lining of this 90 percent tax is that it will chase away more private sector players.  Hopefully, we may actually see some in the government realize that the real way out of this current economic downturn is through economic growth.  And, that growth will only come from the private sector.  More importantly, our oh so clever solons who now run the executive and legislative branches of our government may begin to appreciate that the private sector is to be respected and not regarded a flock of sheep to be fleeced to fund their personal whims and agendas.  It may even come to pass that trendy conversation out in the Hamptons may even find such topics as rule of law, bill of attainder, ex post facto, and property rights as passing the politically correct muster.

Obama The Incompetent

Leadership involves, among other qualities, the ability to adapt to a variety of changing contiditions; sometimes radical and very rapid.  Yet, Obama has yet to truly understand the nature of the conditions facing him.  and, he’s refused to adapt to those changes.

Obama spent his life in the unprecedented prosperity of Reagan’s economic policies.  Indeed, at least for his adult life, he has known no other.  Like Obama, a huge proportion of the American population simply doesn’t know of real hardship since the last such era was in the Carter era of 1977 to 1981.  When Obama started his quest for the White House some two years ago, he based his campaign on the then operative paradigm of nearly 30 years of essentially unbroken prosperity.  Prosperity that for many Americans has been the only economic paradigm they’ve ever known.

Obama’s campaign game plan was to use the current discontent to get elected and then, in a socialist remake of America, “spread the wealth” by taking the economic gains of the last 30 years and distribute such to his friends and favored constituencies.  Then, last September, the bottom fell out and the wealth that Obama was to redistribute vanished.  Yet, true to his baby boomer roots, he tried to have it both ways–redistribute wealth that was no longer there and take on the task of economic recovery.  (I didn’t say that was realistic.)  

The issue now is that the economic crisis that guaranteed his election is the weather change that he, Obama, has not the executive or leadership experience to sense or appropriately adjust for these changes.  Real leadership would have called for a immediate reordering of his priorities to delay the rest of his agenda to focus fully on the current economic crisis.  Moreover, he had four months to plan and make those necessary changes to re-order his governing priorities with specific plans to address this economic downturn.  But, Obama’s obsession with using this downturn as a vehicle to create America’s socialist makeover.

The real irony is that focusing and solving this economic downturn would have accrued such goodwill and political capital that his socialist agenda, in the long term, would have been a so much simpler sell.  But, that necessary political capital is being destroyed faster than the plummeting dow averages.  But, this precisely is the incompetence and inexperience of our commander in chief.  He is so focused on socialist agenda that he has not the flexibility and foresight of a true leader, of real executive leadership, to modify his course of action.  Nor, does he have the vision or creativity to use adversity as opportunities to achieving goals by alternate paths.

Minnesota Dreamn’

It’s my dream that the court proceedings trying to adjudicate the close senatorial election between Coleman and Franken could be turned into a “teaching moment” (I think that’s the liberal term) by throwing the entire election out and demanding a new election.  I don’t know that the courts have that authority, but they could in effect by demanding strict accountability for every vote cast.  

The point is not to come to some particular conclusion, but to establish legal president for what sort of electoral behavior will have standing in the courts.  So, I would propose that the courts demand a “chain of custody,” so to speak, that would ensure that there is a validity to every electoral evolution with the ultimate goal of making any given election free of any taint of fraud.

Who ever wins this election will win by a margin that falls within the margin of error.  It become even more important that every effort was made to insure the validity of each vote.  

Therefore, I would love to see the court demand that voter registration rolls are accurate.  Moreover, to have legal standing the state of Minnesota would have to demonstrate, in a very transparent manner and public manner, that voter rolls are kept scrupulously accurate.  Perhaps by insisting that voter registration close a certain specified number of weeks prior to an given election to allow the state of square those tallies.  

I’d love to see the courts then insist, for a successful challenge that each voter be matched to those voter registration rolls by means of biometric data–a governmental issued photo ID.  Then, finally to insist, again for standing in a court challenge, to have physical evidence (a marked ballot) to correlate with each vote tally.  I’d like to see strict physical accounting for each ballot published and no batches of ballots somehow being “discovered” in someone’s car trunk.  Finally, guidelines for the election judges to insure exacting and uniform standards treating the counting of each ballot.  In other words, I’d like to see the Coleman/Franken court challenge be turned into an exercise of exacting accountability every step of the way.  

Put it this way, would you like to see the decision for a radical mastectomy, made on the basis of a breast biopsy, that was handled in the same manner as some of the ballots that mysteriously appeared in some envelope that someone “overlooked.”  Speaking as a physician, that would constitute a slam-dunk malpractice action; just settle ’cause you’re never going to get it past the jury.

People make a whole big deal about the “right” to vote.  But, the right to vote, like any right, entail certain responsibility.  I could never see what was so difficult about voting with the old punch card; the ones of “chad” fame.  You simple check your ballot after marking it to make sure that the chads have been punched out.  Frankly, if you can’t do that you don’t belong in the voting booth.  In a similar fashion, it’s not rocket science to follow directions and put an “x” in a box next to the candidate of your choice.   Or, to fill out an oval if the ballot is to be electronically read.  

The first time I voted, I voted absentee.  That meant I just got a booklet and a punch card.  I then had to find a chad labeled, say #34, in order to vote for a particular candidate. I didn’t have the advantage of a voting machine that would allow me to line up the card and just punch a hole in the machine desk top to punch that particular chad.  Boy, was that stressful.  The state of Illinois should have provided me with psychotherapy afterwards.  But, of course, Obamacare wasn’t available in 1976.  

Seriously, though.  Participation in any democratic process requires a certain level of personal responsibility and, dare I say it, virtue.  And, if  you can’t cope with a little personal responsibility, you can move to Northern Pakistan where the Taliban will tell you what to do.

Get Out of the Kitchen

A little dust up occurred over the New York Post’s publication of a cartoon using the recent new item of police shooting a rampaging pet chimp to death and the recent stimulus package just signed into law by Obama.  The outrage is the alleged “racist” implications of comparing the dead chimp to Obama; Obama being black. Here

Whether racist or not, it’s just too bad.  Obama’s fellow travelers just need to suck it up.  Frankly, I think that the cartoon pokes fun at the grotesque overreach of the bill.  Passed in the dark of night with few if any of our congressmen or senators even knowing its contents.  To that end, the dead chimp represents the utter lack of thought or reflection over the looting of the public treasury for a law that will have decades of baleful unintended consequences.

And, any conservative would have the sense to know that blantant race baiting will more harm than help the case against Obama’s ideas and policies.  

I think the larger issue is the fact that when a black man is now the occupant of the Oval Office, we have prima facie evidence that racism is no longer an issue.  And, when and if you aspire and actually attain that office, you will have to deal with the baggage that comes with the office.  Part of that baggage is the reality that you better be prepared to take all sorts of slings and arrows.  Including any low blows that any critic may want to unload.  

But, if such low discourse is truly upsetting, the Democrats need to look in the mirror.  The last eight years have seen even our Senators referring to Bush as a Nazi.  And, this doesn’t even begin to address the coarse and utterly foul discourse in the liberal blogosphere.  Now, if some of this coarse political dialogue comes back to redound on Obama; well too bad.  

 

The Measure of the Man

As Nancy Pelosi is jamming this Trojan Horse of a “stimulus” bill, loaded with socialist manure, down the throats of America.  She’s moving fast since mulling over the details of what she really wants will ultimately kill the bill and spell electoral disaster for her party in 2010.   She probably knows that 2010 will be a disaster for the Democrats anyway.  So, she’s got to ram through a package with her socialist agenda before enough people get wind to stop it.  

Socialism doesn’t sell well in the light of day.  All it is is a pitch to join my tribe of 51 percent so we can take stuff from the undeserving 49 percent.  When enough Americans sit down and think about it, they realize it’s a bargain with the devil.  A bargain that leave one wondering if I will always remain a member in good standing in the 51 percent tribe.  

And, it not like that’s a great deal anyway.  You may wind up with a little more as compared to the 49 percent tribe.  But, only the elite, the self-styled philosopher kings really benefit; and do so in spades.  Seriously, look at Daschle.  Here’s a guy who gets in trouble for failing to pay 140 grand in taxes for the receipt of $250,000 of service being driven around in a limo.  A man of the people?  A prairie populist?  The new William Jennings Bryan?  Most people don’t have  the luxury of being able to deal with a $140,000 tax bill for income of a quarter of a million dollars of limo service in addition to another five million in consulting fees.  Five million trading on insider contacts.  This must be the new Grange movement now moved to Washington DC.

But, it not just the agenda that has a short shelf life.  No, Nancy has the measure of the man that now occupies the Oval office.  And, Obama has an equally short shelf life.  Once beyond this “stimulus” package and the honeymoon, Obama’s wheels are going to really come off.  Even now, he’s running with one wheel in the sand.  Already, you get a feeling that this guy isn’t ready for prime time.  His “indispensable” tax-dodging treasury secretary’s performance is already giving you the feeling that Obama hasn’t thought it through.  Or, he doesn’t care as long as he keeps his party’s interest groups well fed.

Cabinet nominee after nominee keeps falling to the wayside.  Tax dodging seems to be a common characteristic.  Or, influence peddling.  And, now Senator Gregg.  Obama still hasn’t got a full bench.

Surprising?  Not really.  Obama’s apprenticeship has been in the protected bubble of Chicago politics.  Promotion in the system is reward for party loyalty.  Every elective post is pre-ordained by the party leadership; with an election to provide the veneer of democracy.  So, instead of a mentorship of leadership, Obama grew up in an environment of promotion for political loyalty.  Now, he’s the ultimate leader with no experience in leading.  It’s one thing to fool enough people with enough promises to vote for you.  It’s quite another to lead.  To deliver on those promises.  To deliver on whatever he meant by “change.”  And, it another to lead when events, like war or economic crisis, develop a life of their own.

Socialism must exist, insulated, in a bubble of unreality.  And, there are other socialist gangs of 51 percent who want to puncture your bubble to take your stuff; there is no honor among thieves.  Very likely, you will see such a challenge in the form of a foreign policy disaster.  Iran detonates a nuke this year.  Maybe said nuke will be detonated over a US carrier task force in the Persian Gulf.  Or, Israel launches a preemptive strike against such a detonation.  Or, North Korea does something stupid on the DMZ; maybe with a nuke.

Obama will react like a deer staring into your headlights.  For the next three years and nine months.

The Islamofascists of Penzanze

Rush Limbaugh makes a point of noting that Somali pirates are Muslim terrorists. Moreover, while Somali’s fundamentalist militias have been hostile to these pirates, evidence suggests that some of the ransom money has found its way into the coffers of Al Shabaab, a group on the US terrorist list. 

So, now we have the Saudi flagged tanker, the MV Sirius Star, seized on the high seas off the coast of Tanzania hundreds of miles from the Somali bases. With the money involved, the question is whether a fix is in.

Consider, even in this day of GPS technology, that finding things on the high seas is hard to do, even supertankers. Especially, when you consider the visibility from the vantage point of a small craft. If you’re in a speedboat, you’re low in the later, bobbing in and out of troughs of successive waves. Yet, these “pirates” managed to track down one ship; a real prize by virtue of the millions of dollars worth of oil. And, do so having watercraft capable of operating far over the horizon out of sight of the shore.

Given the tens of thousands of ships that ply these sea lanes annually, one could argue that this was just getting really lucky. Or, did someone know exactly where to go. And, if so, given that this is a Saudi flag ship, is this some shake down scheme to funnel money into these Muslim fundamentalist terrorist groups.

I mean, “How could we help it? We just had to pay. We’re just trying to get our guys back.”

Ayers Ghosting for Obama?

A number of posts on other web sites are now commenting on Obama’s hidden past. There’s evidence that Obama was once a member of a socialist party, the New Party. (Power Line) Something never mentioned by Obama. Much like the Obama memory hole down which his Columbia years have disappeared. Ayers was just a guy living in the neighborhood back then, too.

More of a pile up of dirty laundry that Obama and his enablers in the MSM seem to be hiding. It begs the question; if socialism and folks like Ayers are such great things for this country, shouldn’t it would be readily apparent and be shouted from the roof tops? 

Now, another interesting commentary and allegation. No, this is not conclusive. But, worth investigation. Here’s a post on the American Thinker that thinks that Ayers ghosted Obama’s memoir, Dreams of My Father. If true, Obama’s in good company with his plagiarizing vice-presidential running mate. There’s nothing new about politicians having ghost writers. But a 34 year-old ward heeler? And, if so, it’s not that he had editorial help, but who that editorial help was. Read the post and decide.

But, if true, we really have a guy who’s never going to be ready for prime time. Dreams of My Father, came out in 1995. Obama was 34 then. Sorry, but what kind of insights does a community organizer and Chicago machine foot soldier have to offer to the world? Besides, at that point in Obama’s career, he should have written the darn book himself as demonstration of his credentials of his worth for further advancement. And, seriously, what in heaven’s name is a 33 year-old doing writing an autobiography. Usually, at that age, you’re in the process of building a career. Obama’s got a self-esteem problem on steroids. Besides, autobiographies are for old folks, who by a lifetime of experience, actually might have some wisdom to offer. 

By contrast, George Washington was a Major in the Virginia militia at the age of 20. Between the ages of 22 and 26 was involved in the French and Indian War. At the age of 43, Washington was the commander-in-chief of the continental forces of the American Revolution. And, it was Washington that saw that conflict to a successful conclusion in 1783. That’s executive experience; somehow all done without a soul-searching autobiography.

Or, if we’re talking about publications, Jefferson, at the tender age of 33 was the principle author of the Declaration of Independence. And, JFK, in 1943, at the age of 26, was in command of PT 109.

 

Mrs. Palin Goes to Michigan

There’s a posting on Urgent Agenda that comments on Gov. Palin’s offer to go to Michigan in spite of McCain’s having written off the state. The implication of the offer being the ability of Gov. Palin’s bona fides as everyman (and woman) to connect and turn around this recession wracked state for McCain.  Mr. Katz, of Urgent Agenda, suggests that she could do a whistle stop tour with her United Steelworkers of America husband at her side.

This make me think back to my mother’s side of the family which has union involvement in the coal mines of Western Pennsylvania going back to the turn of the last century. For them, the union wasn’t an ideological construct, but a bargaining tool to assure the basics of wages, benefits, work rules and safety standards. In fact, there’s come ambivalence from one occasion when a mine closed completely in part of union officials overreaching in their bargaining demands.

The point is that there are many folks like the Palin’s who work for a living with out making any ideological statement. Food on the table, clothes on the kids and a roof over your head. It is the ordinariness of the Palins that so stand in contrast with the bi-costal power centers of New York, Washington and LA. 

In many respects, Washington is developing into a monied aristocracy. There is a self-selection aspect that those who go to Congress, and particularly the Senate represent above average socio-economic circumstances in the first place. The Senate is littered with millionaires. Those who do go, wind up staying and doing very well. Bill Clinton from Arkansas and Hillary from Illinois, now carpetbag in New York. In a home worth millions. All derived from a purely political career. Obama, the good machine foot soldier, now sports a 1.5 million dollar home. And, so it goes. 

Its not that the Palins are dirt poor. They’re a hard working family that makes ends meet from a union job and a commercial fishing business. And, they’ve done well. By doing well the Palins display those qualities that allowed Sarah Palin to rise from PTA member to governor. Relatives and acquaintances in and about Wasaslia are engaged in small businesses of a similar nature.

To look at Biden and Palin, one could see the stark differences. In Palin was a sense of a place, of a rootedness in a real home town. Someone who mows the lawn and takes out the garbage. In Biden, there is just a creature of Washington. Nominally, he’s a Senator from Delaware. But, he and so many of his Senate colleagues could easily switch places with no one the wiser. What is his common touch? What is his Delaware-ness that makes him so unique and rooted to his state.

You could easily imagine running into Palin and the first Dude on a Saturday morning at Home Depot. You could easily imagine discussing home projects, lumber, nails and school travails of your respective children. Could you really do the same with Biden? Doubtful. For all of Biden’s Scranton “roots,” it is the ordinariness of the Palins that is so refreshing. It is that ordinariness that speaks of the real strength of America that can prevail in the face of any challenge.   

 

 

Where’s Obama; Where’s Pelosi

The contrast is so stark.

On one hand, McCain comes to Washington to encourage the House GOP to stay in the game and come up with a rescue plan. He knows it will not make everyone happy. But, he did it in the name of serving country, placing partisanship on the back burner. Also, knowing there were delicate negotiations going on, he pulled his punches in the debate last Friday night.

What was the response?

First, is Obama AWOL. Obama, as presidential nominee is the leader of the Democratic party. Had he publicly said so, he could have easily gotten the votes needed for the passage of the financial rescue plan by the House. But, he did nothing. Once again, Obama was “present.”

Then we have Pelosi. There’s no sugar coating her speech just before the vote. It was blatant partisan attack. It did what it was designed to do; cause the rescue bill to fail. And, I suspect that her speech was well orchrestated with the Democratic leadership.

Its obvious was the play is. Pelosi feels that she will retain a majority in the House, regardless, and is confident that the Senate will retain a Democratic majority too. So, she’s got nothing to lose. 

Rather, she’s trying to prolong the crisis and even worsen it so as to saddle the GOP with the blame while keeping Sallie Mae and Freddie Mac intact as Democratic favor machines.

Damn the long term consequences; no matter if we descend into another depression. It is now clear this crisis is being used to re-create the conditions of the 1932 election and to relive the New Deal glory days. 

 

 

Who and What Caused the Crisis on Wall Street?

This is a brief post courtesy Power Line to further disseminate a very understandable video about the Wall Street Crisis.

I’m Back in The (OODA) Saddle Again

The concept of the OODA loop–observe, orient, decide, act–in the context of McCain’s performance after naming Palin as his running mate was first brought up by Michael Barone. It’s a fighter pilot concept of anticipating and thinking ahead of your opponent in an aerial dogfight. And, Obama just discovered he’d got no clue as to how to out think the old fighter pilot.

First, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are political creatures that have become Democrat favor machines. They generate campaign cash for Democratic candidates and favors to favored constituencies by creating a mechanism to have the private sector provide housing at below market costs.

Second, the Democrats, ever living for the glory days of the New Deal, were planning to use this financial meltdown to recreate 1929. Markets crash, depression sets in, massive Democrat victory at polls (presidential and congressional) and on to New Deal II.

In fact, the bailout deal everyone was expecting was to be rubber stamped was just a down payment on the first act of the New Deal II with pork aplenty and scheme to massively redistribute wealth by allowing judges to rewrite the terms of a failing mortgage. The Democrats were using this bailout to protect their favor machine while having the GOP shoulder the blame. (Here’s Ed Morrissey on the Democratic ACORN bailout.)

Enter McCain. He’s completely hijacked the process and is literally holding the Democratic party, and Obama in particular, hostage. All unable to leave Washington until a deal is completed. Obama a prisoner to the process until he votes yea or nay on said deal–in the glare of the publicity that McCain created Obama can no longer vote “present.”

And, there must be a deal. Anything short is going to give McCain and the GOP the bludgeon to hammer the Democrats all the way to November. With McCain in Washington, doing the peoples business, every campaign must stop. Remember, McCain, Obama and Biden are being paid to be full-time senators, not presidential candidates. Oh, Palin isn’t a senator; she can still campaign (tee hee).

But, McCain is going even further. He’s bringing all of his maverick and anti-pork bona fides to the table. There will be a deal. It will be a clean deal to address the problem at hand. It will be his deal. Anything short will again be a club McCain’s hand to beat the Democrats over the head over waste, fraud and pork barrel spending. 

McCain is so playing with Obama’s mind. He’s so inside of Obama’s OODA loop. Here’s Obama, down in Florida, diligently cramming for the debate tonight like a college student two days before the final after having spent the entire semester partying. Here’s Obama practicing his preening to “look” presidental. Here’s Obama thinking that this financial disaster going to put him on the final glide path to a smooth landing in the Oval Office.

Then, smugly flying his fighter to victory, he checks his “six” and finds the old fighter pilot locked on for a kill. All of his best laid plans upended, he’s dragged to Washington and forced to be a bystander as McCain takes the lead and solves the problem. Before someone again makes a crack about “military intelligence” being an oxymoron, they’d better look at the candidate that lived and breathed OODA as a matter of survival.

I predict a final vote in the Senate at about 3 pm EST. Then, McCain’s going to walk up to Obama, pat him on the back, say “good work–and see you in Oxford in a couple of hours.”

 

It’s the Thermodynamics, Stupid

Here’s my contribution to the debate over ways to be energy independent. And, commentary on new “carbon free” alternatives (you’ll see why I put carbon free in quotes).

First, a BTU is a BTU. It doesn’t matter what it source or how it’s used. It credits and debits much like your check book. Energy can be neither created or destroyed. I can only change form. In this case, the use of energy for the purpose of transportation, we’re talking about heat and mechanical work.

Second, transportation is a matter of converting heat to work. This conversion is subject to a number of constraints and laws of nature. And, waving a wand (or a congressional vote) isn’t going to change a thing. You simply cannot legislate water into flowing uphill. 

So, lets work through the issues:

First, as I mentioned, you need to convert heat to work. Some how you need to burn something to generate energy that can be converted to work. One of the biggest concepts that needs to be understood about this conversion is it’s not and cannot be 100 percent efficient. That is for every BTU derived from burning, you will only get a fraction of that BTU in actual work–turning the wheels on your car. This efficiency is limited by the the temperature differential between the heat source and the cold “sink.” The greater the differential, the greater the efficency in converting heat to work. The physical limitations are generally the maximium operating temperature of the materials comprising the engine and, for the heat sink, atmospheric temperature. Above certain temperatures, metals will melt or degrade, for example. For a Rankine cycle engine, the efficiency is also limited by the properties of the working fluid; generally water. That is you can only heat to certain maximum values at certain pressures. Then you have to factor such variables as wind resistance, friction and so on. To paraphrase Thatcher, real world facts are conservative.

For an internal combustion engine, you can get a 20 percent, maybe a 25 percent efficiency (theoretical maximum of about 37 percent). A Rankine cycle engine (a steam turbine engine), most commonly found in power generation plants maybe works at an efficiency of 40 percent (theoretical maximum of about 60 percent). If you got 100 percent, you’d have a perpetual motion machine (which is why the patent office requires a working model for any perpetual motion machine).

Now we come to the concept of work and its relationship to mass. Work is a function of force and distance. And, force is a function of mass and velocity (squared). The more mass, all other things being equal, the more work is required and therefore the more energy is required. That’s why the guy who installs your gourmet kitchen granite counter tops comes to your house in a full size pickup truck and not a Prius.

So, we need, in order to be portable, a portable power plant and a portable source of energy. It’s no accident that this is the reviled internal combustion engine. Weight for weight and volume for volume, a tank of gas is the most efficient was to carry around the BTU’s you need to move yourself and your stuff around. And, the internal combustion engine is the most efficient way to convert that tankful of BTU’s into work to move your stuff around.

There’s nothing magical about the Prius. Fundamentally, it is small light-weight car powered by a gasoline internal combustion engine. That is, the ultimate source of the energy for conversion to work is gasoline burned in an internal combustion engine. Other efficiencies are derived by using the kinetic energy of deceleration to recharge the batteries. But, you’re burning gas. And, your burning gas in a updated econobox (remember the Gremlin?) with the addition of batteries. 

One wonders, if fact, if you couldn’t get an equally efficient car by getting rid of the weight of the batteries and just putting in small engine and solely relying on gasoline alone (we’ll pass on the fact that now you just have an updated Gremlin without batteries–not very vogue). Thermodynamically, about the only real benefit you’re getting is turning the energy of deceleration into electrical power. Braking your car into a stop is converting work into heat; you just put some of that energy back into the batteries. You’re still at the mercy of an internal combustion engine and its thermodynamic efficiency of 25 percent. And, remember in order to get the kinetic energy of deceleration to convert to electrical charge, you have to accelerate the car in the first place–courtesy the gas engine.

Or, okay, you can get a car that charges up by plugging it in at night. But, that only means that your burning coal at a power plant to power your car. And, we all know that “clean coal” is just a Rovian catch word to get the “bitter” coal miner rubes in West Virginia to vote for Bush.

Of course, none of this considers real world issues. A small econobox probably works in urban settings for short distances. But, batteries being less efficient sources of power that a tank of gasoline–heavy and bulky–tend to fall down when you need to go farther. You need to dispose of those batteries at the end of their useful life; and batteries are full of all sorts of heavy metals that we don’t want leaching into the environment.

Weight equals safety. Yes, we could airbag our cars till the cows come home. But, pound for pound, you add another 100 pounds in structural weight, you’re safer.

We’re not a densely populated country. Our population density is about 80 persons per square mile as opposed to polulation densities of hundreds of persons per square mile in Europe. That means, on average, a typical trip for an American versus his European counterpart will be longer. It’s simple harder to make mass transit work here for that reason. Mass transit will work along densely populated corridors where there’s a high probability that a lot of people want to go to roughly the same places at roughly the same time.

But, a doctor making an emergency visit to the hospital at two in the morning is not taking the bus. Nor, did the ambulance crew pick you up on your trip to the emergency room. In fact, the ambulance is probably a converted Ford F350. Take a look in the back of a modern ambulance; there’s a lot of stuff that won’t fit into a Prius either.

Finally, there’s freedom. Freedom from being at the beck and call of transportation run at the pleasure of the government (intercity buses and light rail; Amtrak). Philosophically, if you look at every fortune amassed in America, all carry the common denominator of bringing to the common man something heretofore reserved for the rich. Henry Ford’s Model T did that in the arena of personal transportation; a coach, horses and livery was simply out of reach for all but the rich. A fact, by the way, not lost on our bi-coastal elite. 

And, contrary to every conspiracy theory, what we have on the road today is reflection of the transportation needs unique to this country and constrained by the laws of thermodynamics.

 

McCain Can’t Use the Computer; Thanks to the Viet Cong

This probably isn’t news, (from Power Line) but just to further pass it along it should be noted that John McCain can’t type on a keyboard, tie his shoes or comb his hair because of the severe war injuries received (beatings) while a POW.

But, that’s Barry; typical gutter Chicago machine politician.