As the final primaries approach in the contest for the Democratic Party Presidential Nomination, Senator Clinton may wish to console herself with the following quote from the late Rep. Mo Udall (D-Ariz):
"The people have spoken: the bastards"
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Automobile Fuel Economy
One of the most implacable rules in existence is the Law of Unintended Consequences. We ignore it at our peril but rarely can we avoid it.
The Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 created standards (Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency or CAFE) for automobile and light truck fuel efficiency. The current standard for automobiles is 27.5 mpg and for light trucks is 20.7 mpg.
The first unintended consequence was that the full sized station wagon - a marvel of usefulness - was no longer offered. A gigantic loophole, whereby mini-vans and sport utility vehicles (SUVs) were classified as light trucks, created a whole new market and the need for families to move many children (and their junk) was preserved. Unfortunately these vehicles are much less efficient than the now extinct full sized station wagon could have become.
The second unintended consequence was the purchase of millions of overweight four wheel drive vehicles (SUVS and pickup trucks) by people - mostly men - who would have scorned a station wagon as "wimpy" or only fit for fathers and "girly men" and whose likelihood of driving in snow, off-road, or hauling hay is vanishingly close to zero. The result was a vast diminution in the potential reduction in gasoline usage.
The third unintended consequence resulted from the reduction in the cost of driving. Economics 101 includes the concept of supply and demand curves: simply stated, when cost goes down, demand rises and vice versa.
As the cost of driving went down, the miles driven increased: more distant vacations were a part of the problem but the largest part of the increase was suburban sprawl. As people moved further from cities, where their jobs were located, trips to work not only became longer in miles but took more time as commuters sat in traffic burning gasoline and going nowhere fast. When not in a traffic jam, average speeds have increased significantly with the expected impact on actual fuel economy.
With luck the new standards being promulgated will not result in too many more unintended consequences. Recent increase in the price of gasoline, while uncomfortable for all of us, are slowly beginning to change our behavior: moving closer to work, taking fewer trips by car and combining errands and shopping are rational and effective responses.
As cars are replaced, perhaps drivers will willingly buy more economical vehicles rather than the inappropriate behemoths that occupy too much road space now. But then, we can expect the miles driven to increase again.
We may be trapped in a circular problem where the only way to break out is for prices to become really high. To avoid massive economic disruption, that can only happen over a period of time but Senator McCain's suggestion that the Federal Tax on gasoline should be waived for the summer takes us totally in the wrong direction.
The sooner we start responding to higher prices, the better. Far better too, that a good part of the increased price comes from taxes (received by our government) than increased crude oil prices received by our "friends" in the Middle East and other ugly places.
Increased price = reduced demand = reduced price which can be supplemented by increased taxes to maintain the price status quo.
The Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 created standards (Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency or CAFE) for automobile and light truck fuel efficiency. The current standard for automobiles is 27.5 mpg and for light trucks is 20.7 mpg.
The first unintended consequence was that the full sized station wagon - a marvel of usefulness - was no longer offered. A gigantic loophole, whereby mini-vans and sport utility vehicles (SUVs) were classified as light trucks, created a whole new market and the need for families to move many children (and their junk) was preserved. Unfortunately these vehicles are much less efficient than the now extinct full sized station wagon could have become.
The second unintended consequence was the purchase of millions of overweight four wheel drive vehicles (SUVS and pickup trucks) by people - mostly men - who would have scorned a station wagon as "wimpy" or only fit for fathers and "girly men" and whose likelihood of driving in snow, off-road, or hauling hay is vanishingly close to zero. The result was a vast diminution in the potential reduction in gasoline usage.
The third unintended consequence resulted from the reduction in the cost of driving. Economics 101 includes the concept of supply and demand curves: simply stated, when cost goes down, demand rises and vice versa.
As the cost of driving went down, the miles driven increased: more distant vacations were a part of the problem but the largest part of the increase was suburban sprawl. As people moved further from cities, where their jobs were located, trips to work not only became longer in miles but took more time as commuters sat in traffic burning gasoline and going nowhere fast. When not in a traffic jam, average speeds have increased significantly with the expected impact on actual fuel economy.
With luck the new standards being promulgated will not result in too many more unintended consequences. Recent increase in the price of gasoline, while uncomfortable for all of us, are slowly beginning to change our behavior: moving closer to work, taking fewer trips by car and combining errands and shopping are rational and effective responses.
As cars are replaced, perhaps drivers will willingly buy more economical vehicles rather than the inappropriate behemoths that occupy too much road space now. But then, we can expect the miles driven to increase again.
We may be trapped in a circular problem where the only way to break out is for prices to become really high. To avoid massive economic disruption, that can only happen over a period of time but Senator McCain's suggestion that the Federal Tax on gasoline should be waived for the summer takes us totally in the wrong direction.
The sooner we start responding to higher prices, the better. Far better too, that a good part of the increased price comes from taxes (received by our government) than increased crude oil prices received by our "friends" in the Middle East and other ugly places.
Increased price = reduced demand = reduced price which can be supplemented by increased taxes to maintain the price status quo.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Earth Day
Today, April 22, is Earth Day.
The first Earth Day, in 1970, was scorned by many as an indulgence created by radical lefties and coincided with the 100th birthday of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (better known as V.I. Lenin). According to Wikipedia, Time Magazine even reported that the coincidence was believed by some to be a "Communist Plot."
Now we can recognize that the founders of Earth Day were ahead of their time and that, with too many people consuming too many resources, we are in serious danger of an ecological catastrophe worse even than the economic and ecological disaster that Lenin's ideology inflicted on the people of the USSR and of Eastern Europe.
While the actions of the baby boomers will have little impact on their own lives, there is an obligation to their children, their grandchildren, and to succeeding generations.
The old proverb 'Waste not, want not' provides excellent guidance too.
The first Earth Day, in 1970, was scorned by many as an indulgence created by radical lefties and coincided with the 100th birthday of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (better known as V.I. Lenin). According to Wikipedia, Time Magazine even reported that the coincidence was believed by some to be a "Communist Plot."
Now we can recognize that the founders of Earth Day were ahead of their time and that, with too many people consuming too many resources, we are in serious danger of an ecological catastrophe worse even than the economic and ecological disaster that Lenin's ideology inflicted on the people of the USSR and of Eastern Europe.
While the actions of the baby boomers will have little impact on their own lives, there is an obligation to their children, their grandchildren, and to succeeding generations.
The old proverb 'Waste not, want not' provides excellent guidance too.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Turn Off Your TV week
It's Turn Off Your TV Week.
It would be nice if more people were aware of the merits of turning off the tube - if only for a week - so this is my contribution.
Read a book, go see a play, take a walk, sit in the park. Just stop slumping.
I used to be able to say, truthfully, that I turned my TV on every two or three months and worried that it might burst into flames from all the dust that had collected in the back.
When I sold my house - nearly three years ago - I threw away my ancient idiot box and bought a modern flat panel machine. Now I only turn it on every two or three months but I no longer worry about it bursting into flames because there is no back in which dust can collect.
It would be nice if more people were aware of the merits of turning off the tube - if only for a week - so this is my contribution.
Read a book, go see a play, take a walk, sit in the park. Just stop slumping.
I used to be able to say, truthfully, that I turned my TV on every two or three months and worried that it might burst into flames from all the dust that had collected in the back.
When I sold my house - nearly three years ago - I threw away my ancient idiot box and bought a modern flat panel machine. Now I only turn it on every two or three months but I no longer worry about it bursting into flames because there is no back in which dust can collect.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
The Death Penalty
The U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling this week that put executions back on the table.
It is a curiosity - at least to me - that the states keenest on executions have the largest proportion of Christians among their citizens while the states with the highest proportion of unbelievers have abandoned the death penaly.
Would someone please explain to me how executions can be reconciled with the Sixth Commandment and Romans 12:19?
The Sixth Commandment is very simple: "Thou shalt not kill."
Romans 12:19 tell Christians who will deal with the problem: "for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord."
It is a curiosity - at least to me - that the states keenest on executions have the largest proportion of Christians among their citizens while the states with the highest proportion of unbelievers have abandoned the death penaly.
Would someone please explain to me how executions can be reconciled with the Sixth Commandment and Romans 12:19?
The Sixth Commandment is very simple: "Thou shalt not kill."
Romans 12:19 tell Christians who will deal with the problem: "for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord."
Monday, April 14, 2008
America - the good guys?
We are the good guys.
At least, we used to be the good guys.
Good guys don't do the things that bad guys do: torturing people, starting wars, ignoring habeas corpus, kidnapping people and delivering them to really bad guys who happen to be our temporary friends (aka extraordinary rendition) etc.
Good guys sometimes suffer in the short term but the world is on their side. In the long term, being the good guys pays off but it requires patience and consideration for others.
And the French find it a lot harder to be obstructionists!
Unfortunately [King] George [Worthless] Bush XLIII and his sidekick Vice President Cheney have little patience and a surfeit of arrogance. As a result they have taken the easy path and we have become the bad guys.
Whatever happened to President Ronald Reagan's 'shining city on a hill'?
It is hard to imagine that our next President - even the appalling Senator Clinton - could be worse.
At least, we used to be the good guys.
Good guys don't do the things that bad guys do: torturing people, starting wars, ignoring habeas corpus, kidnapping people and delivering them to really bad guys who happen to be our temporary friends (aka extraordinary rendition) etc.
Good guys sometimes suffer in the short term but the world is on their side. In the long term, being the good guys pays off but it requires patience and consideration for others.
And the French find it a lot harder to be obstructionists!
Unfortunately [King] George [Worthless] Bush XLIII and his sidekick Vice President Cheney have little patience and a surfeit of arrogance. As a result they have taken the easy path and we have become the bad guys.
Whatever happened to President Ronald Reagan's 'shining city on a hill'?
It is hard to imagine that our next President - even the appalling Senator Clinton - could be worse.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Travel and Security
Most people who travel by air should have reason to wonder about the effectiveness of the so-called security measures.
In the great list of oxymorons, "morbidly obese Transportation Security Agency Screener" has to rank up near the top. Yesterday, I spotted three of them at Dulles International Airport. What use would they be in the case of an unruly passenger?
As usual, the security screening was a farce. Any disabled person of evil intent - traveling with his or her own wheelchair - can easily smuggle large quantities of contraband past the checkpoints.
The biggest problem is political correctness: TSA screeners are prohibited from requiring a disabled person to transfer out of a wheelchair so that the cushion may be properly inspected. They don't have the needed skills or equipment either.
Then, there is the question of prosthetic legs. Again, political correctness prohibits asking a passenger to remove a leg so that it may go through the x-ray machine. Much the same applies to shoes: if you have a plausible reason to claim that removing shoes is too difficult, the only inspection is to swipe for explosive residue. There is no x-ray inspection of those shoes for metal and other weapons.
The good news is that the rules changed in a field in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001.
Before that, passengers on a hi-jacked airplane were instructed to sit quietly and to do what they were told while being flown to some third world hellhole from which, after three days of extreme discomfort, they would eventually be rescued. Given that the job of passenger on a hi-jacked airliner now includes a death sentence, I believe that the vast majority of us will attempt to take back the airplane and, if necessary, crash it before the nefarious designs of the hijackers can be brought to fruition.
That helps with the problem of using commercial airliners as cruise missiles. The question of blowing them up in flight is now the major issue. While law enforcement and intelligence services will block most attempts, one hundred successes will not outweigh a single failure.
The current system, however, allows the bureaucracy - and politicians - look like they are doing something. It won't save them from retribution after they fail but it keeps the pressure off for now.
Meanwhile we, the people, remain largely unprotected.
In the great list of oxymorons, "morbidly obese Transportation Security Agency Screener" has to rank up near the top. Yesterday, I spotted three of them at Dulles International Airport. What use would they be in the case of an unruly passenger?
As usual, the security screening was a farce. Any disabled person of evil intent - traveling with his or her own wheelchair - can easily smuggle large quantities of contraband past the checkpoints.
The biggest problem is political correctness: TSA screeners are prohibited from requiring a disabled person to transfer out of a wheelchair so that the cushion may be properly inspected. They don't have the needed skills or equipment either.
Then, there is the question of prosthetic legs. Again, political correctness prohibits asking a passenger to remove a leg so that it may go through the x-ray machine. Much the same applies to shoes: if you have a plausible reason to claim that removing shoes is too difficult, the only inspection is to swipe for explosive residue. There is no x-ray inspection of those shoes for metal and other weapons.
The good news is that the rules changed in a field in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001.
Before that, passengers on a hi-jacked airplane were instructed to sit quietly and to do what they were told while being flown to some third world hellhole from which, after three days of extreme discomfort, they would eventually be rescued. Given that the job of passenger on a hi-jacked airliner now includes a death sentence, I believe that the vast majority of us will attempt to take back the airplane and, if necessary, crash it before the nefarious designs of the hijackers can be brought to fruition.
That helps with the problem of using commercial airliners as cruise missiles. The question of blowing them up in flight is now the major issue. While law enforcement and intelligence services will block most attempts, one hundred successes will not outweigh a single failure.
The current system, however, allows the bureaucracy - and politicians - look like they are doing something. It won't save them from retribution after they fail but it keeps the pressure off for now.
Meanwhile we, the people, remain largely unprotected.
Friday, April 4, 2008
The Bureaucratic Imperative
It appears that most government employees were out sick when they were scheduled to attend the class where they were to be taught how to spell the words C-I-V-I-L, S-E-R-V-A-N-T, C-U-S-T-O-M-E-R and S-E-R-V-I-C-E. And they never took the makeup class either.
Instead they appear to be guided by the Bureaucratic Imperative.
Here are some rules - with thanks from the writings and sayings of various sources including James Boren, Morris Udall, and Professor C. Northcote Parkinson :
Rule #1: To look busy without actually having to do any work
Note that meetings are an excellent way of passing the time of day without actually having to do any work.
Rule #2: To remember that if you control the agenda and the minutes, you control the outcome.
This is Bureaucracy 101 but has become harder to execute, at least in the upper reaches of government, with ever rampant leaks to the media
Rule #3: Never, ever, under-spend your annual budget – even if you have to waste vast sums of money. The reward for under-spending is to have your budget cut next year with extremely detrimental impact on your prospects for promotion.
Rule #4: To cause as much aggravation as possible to the following classes of people: ordinary taxpaying citizens; persons employed by (I won’t say ‘working for’) other governments – foreign or domestic; persons in other departments of the government that employs you; and, if there is no alternative, to aggravate person in your own department.
The abuses of patronage hiring in government were legendary but, at least, there was some accountability. Government employees were expected to deliver services of an adequate quality so that their patrons would be re-elected for eternity. If not, termination was swift and brutal.
Civil Service rules protect the employees but at the expense of citizens and taxpayers. The pendulum has been swinging towards employees for over 100 years. It is time for a change - even though the the current administration's political appointments have been marked by cronyism without competence. Cronyism is bearable but not when it is accompanied by incompetence.
Instead they appear to be guided by the Bureaucratic Imperative.
Here are some rules - with thanks from the writings and sayings of various sources including James Boren, Morris Udall, and Professor C. Northcote Parkinson :
Rule #1: To look busy without actually having to do any work
Note that meetings are an excellent way of passing the time of day without actually having to do any work.
Rule #2: To remember that if you control the agenda and the minutes, you control the outcome.
This is Bureaucracy 101 but has become harder to execute, at least in the upper reaches of government, with ever rampant leaks to the media
Rule #3: Never, ever, under-spend your annual budget – even if you have to waste vast sums of money. The reward for under-spending is to have your budget cut next year with extremely detrimental impact on your prospects for promotion.
Rule #4: To cause as much aggravation as possible to the following classes of people: ordinary taxpaying citizens; persons employed by (I won’t say ‘working for’) other governments – foreign or domestic; persons in other departments of the government that employs you; and, if there is no alternative, to aggravate person in your own department.
The abuses of patronage hiring in government were legendary but, at least, there was some accountability. Government employees were expected to deliver services of an adequate quality so that their patrons would be re-elected for eternity. If not, termination was swift and brutal.
Civil Service rules protect the employees but at the expense of citizens and taxpayers. The pendulum has been swinging towards employees for over 100 years. It is time for a change - even though the the current administration's political appointments have been marked by cronyism without competence. Cronyism is bearable but not when it is accompanied by incompetence.
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