"All of the Above" Obamas done oil production no favors

The Tesoro Refinery at Anacortes, Washington. By Walter Siegmund, license C.C. a.s.a 3.0 unported

Before I continue, I must admit a certain amount of shock in having to write this. Then again, perhaps I shouldn't be shocked. Democrat presidents have a long and proud history of taking credit for things they didn't actually do: Clinton gets credit for balancing the budget, something Newt Gingrich achieved and earned himself "resignation in disgrace" at the hands of the House Ethics committee for doing, perhaps why it hasn't been done since. FDR gets credit for New Deal projects that had already begun under Hoover - the most famous of which is the Hoover Dam. LBJ gets credit for desegregation, which was really an achievement of Eisenhower that continued through the time of LBJ. All throughout this century, Democrats have earned credit for doing things they didn't actually do (to be fair, this also includes bailing out "Government Motors" and the big banks.) I really shouldn't have been shocked to see it happen once more, this time with Obama and oil.

But there's a difference: all those other things that Democrats earned credit for, they either only slightly opposed, or even slightly supported. Never has something been so vehemently and destructively harmed directly by a president, not even through Congress with him only behind it, only to end up to his credit when it works against his plans. "Obamacare" was far more the product of Reid and Pelosi then Obama directly, but Obamas conduct with the Bureau of Land Management, and the abusive EPA that Obama himself presides over, comes from him directly. No one but the Chief Executive of the United States Federal Government is responsible for them before the American people, or should be.

Noting that, lets look over the track record of precisely what he's actually done, pertaining to oil production, as Chief Executive:

• Cancelled oil leases in the largest shale deposit of them all, at the excuse of "we don't understand how much water and energy it would use." The result of such policies is that oil and gas production on BLM lands is down 40%. In most western states, BLM lands make up 30-90% of the states land area.
  
• Purposefully delayed the decision on the Keystone Pipeline for years without any attempt to gather information to make a decision, or any clear rationale for why a decision could not be made in a reasonable time frame.
  
• Issued a moratorium on offshore drilling without any real effort to fix the underlying problems (namely, the lack of proper response networks on the Gulf.)
• Since the moratorium ended, Obama's Department of the Interior has only permitted one offshore lease sale. In other words, the moratorium never truly ended - Obama just made it look like it is over.

In North Dakota, 1574 miles from the Oval Office, oil production doubled from 2008 to 2010. North Dakota is one of only three states west of the Mississippi river to not have any BLM lands, the other two being Texas and Washington state. The section of the same oil shale formation in Montana has not been similarly developed, and the BLM owns that land.

Although North Dakotas unemployment is a boom time 3.3%, Montana remains average for the country, despite containing the western third of the Bakken formation. In Texas, the other non-BLM oil containing state, a much smaller shale deposit has been massively developed, helping to stabilize unemployment there to a reasonable five. Lastly, the largest of all the shale deposits, equivalent to seven Middle Easts, contained in Utah, Colorado, Wyoming and Nevada (all heavily BLM states, with around 40-90% of land area owned by Federal Government as BLM lands) is totally off limits, and even permits issued under Bush are cancelled and replaced with "research leases."

North Dakota, with no BLM lands, would never be directly affected by the Presidents pen, although the pipeline that leads from North Dakota to the Gulf refineries would, and has. In states near North Dakota, especially Wyoming, Iowa, South Dakota and Missouri, manufacturing jobs making the equipment for oil fracking are reasonably abundant, but the amount of equipment coming out of the facilities cannot keep up with demand. Investment to build new fracking equipment factories has been scarce, since with a Federal Government that seems out to get them, and Obama testing the limits of how much a President can do to hurt it, the future of such technology seems uncertain. Just what will Mister President manage to do next? The reality is that the growth of Americas oil industry in spite of Obama proves nothing except that the Presidents powers are, thankfully, limited.

Yet Mr. President has the supreme audacity to claim credit for the doubling in oil in a state he has less authority in, while reducing production by 40% on what he does have authority over and harming the infrastructure. Not directly of course, that would be too obvious, instead he quotes the oil output nationwide, where the progress in North Dakota and Texas outpaces everything else. Than he tells us he wants "all of the above."

A quick note to readers: If you want to know my sources, click on the gray text.

Foxes Gaurding the Hen House

I would like to begin by saying what I am not. I am not an anti-GMO nut, I am not an organics freak, I am not someone who irrationally hates technology, progress and industry. Far from it, I hate those who do. But for once in their sad, miserable lives, they actually have a point about something, and I am an engineer.

Regulation has been a crucial part of our industrial society since around 1900, maybe slightly before. Because of regulation, more soldiers in Iraq have NOT died from their rations then enemy fire, as happened in the Spanish American War. The conditions seen in "The Jungle" are now largely missing. People are living longer. Likewise, because of good Intellectual Property laws, America is the best place in the world to do high-tech and tech-sensitive business.

Even before now, Monsanto has, in various rulings and court cases such as Monsanto vs. Schmeiser, worn down our IP shield with such distasteful injustices as punishing a farmer for seed spreading on to his land by the wind. (Monsanto vs. Schmeiser.) Now, Obama, in his typical Chicago Politics fashion, has appointed a Monsanto man to head of the FDA.

As an engineer, I think GMO is a technology with tremendous potential to make new lands arable, make soil more usable, make pests less of a problem, lessen the load on irrigation systems, heal livestock diseases when used in feed, and even make food more nutritious. It may also help us understand, in its research use, the complex chemical interactions that make up nanotechnology and mechanics on the molecular level. However, none of this will happen if, in retaliation for GMO misused, the American public is forever turned against it. Monsanto wouldn't care - by then, they will have found more profitable sectors of commerce, just as before they were a chemical company. GMO doing well helps their competitors far more then it helps them.

Mr. President, you cannot let this irresponsible and dishonest company, with a known history of exploiting what little influence it has had, gain greater influence.

A much wiser idea, now that technology is, as it should be, accelerating, would be creating a corporate version of the RICO law to break up corporations with a known pattern of subterfuge of the democratic system. Monsanto could be broken up in to many smaller companies, each carrying the function of the larger firm with only the mildest of effects on the economy. The IP laws could be reset with additional legislative action, while the FDA could be seriously reformed to handle its responsibilities better. Mr. President, as a chosen representative of the Progressive movement, I ask you not to let one of its better accomplishments go to ruin. Mr. President, Monsanto Delinda Est.

Pipelines and Spoiled Brats

Obamas decision to reject the Keystone Pipeline was very disturbing in two ways: first, because it was precisely what was not needed right now here in America, and second because it shows our President to have no understanding what he is doing or why. At a time when the number one issue should be jobs, and the Keystone would not only provide these jobs in terms of construction and further development of the new oil shale fields that are Americas fastest growing industry right now, but also provide demand for manufactured goods like steel and foundry items from the suffering East and Midwest, our President, already facing a potentially difficult reelection, has decided that he will give up the last chance he has to make his reelection a cakewalk. If the economy booms, then none of the assorted clowns currently running for GOP candidate will even have a chance against him, but alas for Obama, this is one boat he has missed. His reason for this dismal choice for both himself and his country: the claims of some environmentalists.

Now the ball is in Canadas court. An alternate pipeline could run from the same locations in Alberta westward to a small, undeveloped port on an inlet 70 miles long called Kitimat in British Columbia. Not only would it carry oil to China, but it would also carry oil along the well developed Inside Passage seaway to the Puget Sound for refining at Anacortes, WA and the American market. But here, again, the Greens are not satisfied.

So why, precisely, are they not satisfied? The biggest reason they are not satisfied, though it is not the only reason, is because it will "delay the development of non-carbon energy sources." Now for environmentalists in America today, this means wind and solar. Wind is extremely unreliable, and solar is astronomically expensive. What's more, the fact that solar can operate off-grid gives it a natural niche market outside of the regular electric grid, so if it can't be successful with substantial government subsidies plus a niche market, then you know it really stinks. Wind, of course, is unreliable, and a smart grid that would make it more reliable by sharing power from different geographic points would also be so susceptible to electromagnetic storms from space as to naturally be completely destroyed and take months to rebuild every 8-10 years. The alternative proposition of battery farms would be outlandishly expensive and require constant maintenance. How precisely something that requires constant input of material resources can be "sustainable" is quite beyond me.

Another reason they're not satisfied is because extracting tar sands is energy intensive. This charge is true. However, extracting oil from shale by current methods is not energy intensive, and as shale drilling becomes more and more common (tar sands is slightly older technology) the less expensive energy cost will be a deciding factor in terms of switching away from tar sands production to shale production. Right now, the massive expansion of shale drilling, especially in North Dakota where unemployment is only 3.5% (and lower near Williston) as a result, has driven up the cost of purchasing equipment for shale drilling. This is a good thing in the long run as it means more capacity will be available in the future, but in the short run means that shale is unlikely to replace any existing production until this bottleneck is widened. In the long run, this capital cost will be gone and shale will replace tar sands, especially since just the (much smaller far southern tail) of the Bakken Formation in North Dakota contains at least 3.65 billion barrels of oil, and I suspect that this analysis by the USGS was understated partially by pressure from the Obama administration and paritally by laziness, or as the report puts it: "They also combined their findings with historical exploration and production analyses to determine the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil estimates." The first rule of engineering is if you want to be lazy, always understate your result so that nobody cares.

Then there is simply the old environmentalist hatred of economic development. This is somewhat connected to the very last concern of environmentalists to be listed here, but this really is where I begin doubting the character of environmentalists as people. The reality is that, far from being some Garden of Eden, the third world is a place where illegal loggers destroy rainforests, poachers with machine guns kill off endangered species, massive sprawling cities come up over night and coal plants put mercury and radiation in to the air by the bucket full. It is also a place where in Monrovia, Liberia, the people poop on the beach, allowing untreated human sewage to go straight in to an aquifer while also stinking up the air and despoiling a beautiful 5-mile strip of pristine sand. The problem with environmentalists is they expect the full regulatory ability of a first-world country without the society or, frankly, resources, that made it possible. In short, they are spoiled brats.

And that brings us to our final environmentalist objection: locality. I shall begin by discussing the Canadian pipeline, as it is simply their most egregious abuse. All throughout the internet and journalism, we find various environmentalists and journalists, who know nothing about how development takes place, put up pictures of this pristine, perfect wilderness of tremendous natural beauty (that is, for the record, almost completely contained in an archipelago of Canadian National Parks and Provincial Parks) that supposedly will be completely destroyed by the pipeline and economic development.

To put it bluntly, no it won't. People only think it will because they don't live there. If they did live there, they would know that mountains rise straight out of the sea on both sides of the Kitimat Inlet, making any kind of construction enormously expensive, and that Kitimat is at the eastern end of that inlet and the beginning of a long, and nowhere near as pristine or beautiful, flat typical river valley. It also is located SEVENTY MILES EAST of where most of the wilderness is. In fact, this is why the pipeline is sent so far north instead of simply going to Vancouver - to avoid those eternally annoying in the sense that only an engineer can understand mountains. They would also know that if there's one thing the coastline of British Columbia has an overabundance of, its beautiful, pristine, undeveloped coastline. There are no roads on the coast of British Columbia and Alaska running North-South from the Vancouver Suburbs to Anchorage, Alaska, a distance of 800 miles, the reason why the most common accidental death in Alaska is plane crashes. It also won't because these areas are already protected as parks, both at the provincial and Canadian federal level, and there are far too many flatter, more valuable, riverside pieces of real estate nearer to Kitimat and the pipeline for lobbying by the businesses to even be profitable to them. It is also true that with a tidal range near 20 feet, any oil spill would not last very long but be swept out to sea pretty fast. But environmentalists think their asinine, immature, irrational fears justify the shutting down of an entire part of the world in economic activity, when everything that even can be done to protect that wilderness already is.

The original locality makes somewhat more sense, but only somewhat, to protest. That of course is the lands through the plains that the original Keystone XL would've run through. Of course, unlike BC, there are plenty of roads in the Plains, and even more in Texas. Lots of 2-lane or 4-lane roads going passed corn fields, unused infrastructure, tiny cities and all. This is true. It is also true that the Great Plains aquifer is pretty big, though one could counter that being so big its really not that easy to substantially impurify, and what oil would do is certainly no worse then what farmlands already do with fertilizers and pesticides. Oil also has the advantage over farmlands with their pesticides and fertilizers that it is not generally to the advantage of oil companies for their pipelines to be constantly leaking. It has yet another advantage that increasing land prices may drive the farms with their pesticides and fertilizers out of business. Further, there is the little matter of refining at Wood River, Illinois and Steele, Nebraska, right over the aquifer and the Mississippi River, where oil leaks and all manner of chemical spills are much more likely to happen then at the pipeline, and where the final expansion to Houston and Port Arthur could've eventually replaced those refineries by economies of scale, in the middle of a swamp where bacteria and a chemical-recycling ecosystem already can handle most water purity issues.

Yet even here, the same picture of the environmentalist as a spoiled brat emerges - unshaking, unwilling to compromise, loud, sort of like a toddler. Instead of seeing that some development, even if not constrained by the great mountains of the Kitimat Inlet, is neccesary to finance and safeguard environmental protection, they would rather shout and scream and yell and let everything go to some third world country where no chance exists for proper controls or procedures to prevent what they want to prevent. The result is that for every ton of smog they prevent in Southern California, two tons come across the pacific blown by winds from China, and the prairie starves, and no one even really pays close attention to what they are saying or any way of making a reasonable solution to the problem. There answer is to criticize China, a country doing its best to get out of poverty, who has no special interest in listening to much of anyone who lives on this side of the Pacific. The result also is that eventually, as people become poorer and poorer, the toddler who cried wolf may really get eaten after all.

We'll all be sad that day, just like any parent would be, but it doesn't change the fact that it happened, and that the child is gone forever and not coming back. When you yourself feed on irrationality, don't be too surprised if you eventually get fed to it. Environmentalists with no respect for reason will not be given reasonable attention, and this will be a collective judgement, not an individual one, applied to all environmentalists everywhere, whether they were part of the problem or not. They will not be heard, nor will anyone else about our very real environmental problems.

Evolution of a Meme

When the world-created the mind-numbing abberations of 4chan and reddit, I don't think anyone expected us to unleash a Golden Age of photography and art. Alas, it seems to have occurred!

Starting from the same birth group, 4chans /b/(random) board, also known as the seventh circle of Hell, as all the "Advice Dog" series, a simple, elegant and professional photograph of a wolf by Montana artist Jeff Vanaugha was cut up, cropped on to a pattern of colored rays and finally, TA-DA!!!:


But wait, there's more! We can't have too much of a good thing right? No, not possible, or as courage wolf would put it, "Get there, get more there!" We had to find more wolf pictures:


Sir Courage Wolf Esquire. This art is wonderful in that nearly anyone can claim it as their own, in this case a Britain and world in a crisis of identity.


Baby Courage Wolf, classic comedic juxtaposition. Did I mention that every one of these, has come in to being (including the original Courage Wolf) since June of 2010?


Insanity Wolf, a classic nightmare image with background clearly conjuring the emotions and thoughts required to contemplate it.

Finally, beyond adding to the great library of Meme, there are modifications of existing images:


Monsieur Le Courage Wolf. It may be art but it is not above the stereotype. It also is nowhere near as popular as the other deeper images that convey a far truer message or at least use better comedic forms. This brings up an important point: are unartistic television shows profitable because its what people want, or because they cost less to make and are more predictable, a crucial consideration for those who will spend money to advertise a product on TV, and they are still tolerable to the audience?

Insanity Wolf in turn became a major meme all its own, inspiring numerous spin offs. In the interest of limited bandwidth, we will largely no longer be showing many additional images. However, nearly all memes originated in similar ways - a first, followed by a second, followed by seconds of seconds, each time taking on the watermark and unique thoughts and emotions of the people who created in anonymity before it. I believe it was Ronald Reagan who once said "You would be surprised what you can achieve in life if you don't care who gets the credit."

Some memes also originated as spoofs of the websites where memes originate. Included are "Pedobear," an image of a "Protection Bear" posted whenever child pornography was posted in a 4chan thread, the joke, of course, being that he must show up for the wonderful child pornography, while his smiling bearish face juxtaposed with a creepy pedophile creates humor too good to buy! Also Redditors Wife, who is constantly being ignored in the interest of Reddit, and the various Pokemon memes (including one of Ash Ketchum as a Hispanic) that obviously spoof the fascination of 4chan users with such ridiculously retarded things - in both cases spoofing the readers as opposed to the site itself.

Lastly, let us consider the Baron Ducreaux, in some ways an expression of the longing in our society for civility, depth, and sophistication as it juxtaposes good manners and rap music:


Centuries ahead of his time, the French court painter Baron Joseph Ducreaux famously painted himself using body language that would not become the norm for another 200 years in imitation, according to the artist, of a Mockingbird. (Painting title: Portrait de l'artiste sous les traits d'un moqueur, translated Self-portrait of the artist in the guise of a mockingbird by KnowYourMeme.com) This is far from the only unusual painting that the Baron did in his time with the doomed court of Louis XVI, as he experimented often with facial expressions and features as a vehicle for describing personality, a crucial problem in an era before photography and easy travel, when portraits were used to show wealthy women and men their prospective mates. Though his painting are in the Louvre, what likelihood is there that the Barons work could've achieved such notoriety and widespread appreciation without 4chan, reddit, facebook, and the other pathetic wastes of time of the unwashed masses?

Unfortunately, such widespread appreciation has also inspired modification, including famously the Steve Buscemi Ducreux where Steve Buscemis face is inserted in the place of Baron Ducreaux's, but since in doing so the authors have satirized Steve Buscemi's manner and personality, have they not, albeit unwittingly, contributed to Ducreaux's legacy? By satirizing the satire, a new work of art has been born. Andy Warhol, in particular, DESIRED imitation with his simultaneously kitsch and inspiring works on Marilyn Monroe and soup cans, and purposefully sought out the field of advertising as a place to find true beauty.

There is too often a tendency to call putting weird strings and things on paper modern art, when the true modern art is right underneath our noses, evolving, as always, with the modern world. If any of you wish to further inquire about the art of Memes, I would suggest KnowYourMeme.com, a specialty news site that analyzes online trends, as a broad-based and reliable source.

All images from MemeGenerator.net, and with clear legal intent, discarded works.

The Great Confusion - a critique of "socially-conscious" enterprise

Wind farm in the Techape Mountains, CA, by Stan Shebs, license c.c. a.s.a 3.0 unported

Whether its renewable energy, microlending in Asia, or low-income housing, we end up hearing "socially-conscious" or "social entrepreneurship" frequently enough to nauseate. As I look through the news, at "socially minded entrepreneurs," I cannot help but notice just how insignificant they really are. For all of their "changing the world," only microlending appears to have changed much, and microlending was not started as "social entrepreneurship" but rather adopted by the figurative guild of "social entrepreneurs" later.

One of the great dangers of social entrepreneurship is the tendency to treat profit as a hurdle instead of an objective. Whereas standard business aims to sell enough at a good enough price to justify its existence, expand and attract others to compete, social entrepreneurship does just barely well enough to exist. Worse, sometimes it doesn't even do that, but rather siphons off funds from the taxpayers through government edict that could be put to better use. In the end, this destabilizes governments and entire economies, as America is only now finding out.

Sometimes people claim that social entrepreneurship can fulfill aspects of true progress that standard entrepreneurship could not. This, simply, is a lie. Take green energy for example. The claim is that we cannot create carbon-free/pollution-free energy without some kind of government investment, but the reality is that we already have such things. We have at least two extremely profitable carbon-free power sources: hydroelectric and uranium-based fission nuclear. We also have a moderately profitable one called Geothermal. Detractors will argue that uranium creates nuclear waste, hydroelectric floods land and threatens biodiveristy, and geothermal takes land in natural areas like the Valles Caldera. And yet they advance wind, which takes up far more land in natural areas then geothermal ever would, and hydro would in some cases, and harms biodiversity by destroying migratory birds, and solar, which, like all semiconductors, requires dangerous chemicals and chemical wastes in the production of solar panels, or else, in the form of solar-thermal, takes up vast land and destroys entire habitats like wind, while taking astronomical costs to build and in the end not being sustainable for the simple and basic reason that nothing built can last forever.

Another claim is bringing third-world countries out of poverty, but alas, every first-world nation was once a third-world nation, and every one of them was brought out of this condition by the expansion of private business. And today, in India, Brazil, Russia, Rwanda, Uganda and China, private business is bringing a few more home. Does this mean there is no role for government or charity? Hardly, this is all collectivist we have not even looked at taking care of individuals yet, but it does mean that your "social entrepreneuers" are wrong about precisely what that role is.

And then there's the matter of precisely what profit is. When most people here the word, they think of some fat guy in a suit who already has too much money (in this day and age, that more accurately describes politicians.) Most business today is done by a combination of ma and pa business and joint stock ventures, depending upon the sector. Indeed, "fat suit guy sole proprietor" has not been the dominant model since the late 1800's.

Joint stock ventures are made up of 1,000's of investors of every social status, both wealthy seeking more wealth and workers seeking a retirement through 401K's, putting money towards a limited liability venture that they are not in control of but still suffer the gains and losses of through stock price and dividend. When you create profit for your joint stock venture, that's a larger 401K for a soon to be old man as well as a larger portfolio for a serious investor (who is not always, but usually is, rich.)

But that's not all profit does! Profit also means that a large enough number of people will contribute a large enough sum to your product to make it more then worthwhile to produce. It also creates new investor groups, both ma and pa and joint stock, to create more production of the desired thing. This virtuous cycle puts out WHAT PEOPLE WANT IN THE GREATEST SENSE, instead of what is desired by a small "ecologically friendly" elite. Indeed, it is far more democratic then democracy, as democracy only considers yes or no and not the degree to which something is desired. Democracy is like a net of thick rope with 4 inch gaps and the free market is like the finest of satins - its holes nearly invisible.

Profit too prevents the waste of resources - if building space, workers and raw materials are demanded by a more profitable enterprise, the price will increase until finally the less profitable either go out of business or rearrange their assets, freeing up the building space, workers and raw materials. As our society decided "getting off of foreign oil" was the highest of all goals, E85 drove up the price of food to cause many of our poor to starve by taking tons of corn and turning it in to small quantities of motor oil. Meanwhile, oil prices continue to rise astronomically, and a few foolish legislators suggested increasing Ethanol content beyond what engines can take without corrosion.

The reality is that profit is a very lofty and socially honorable thing, that very much does empower all of society, and create the best world the given conditions can create for the common man. Treating it as a problem, instead of a solution, will lead to hubris and a small elite dictating things as "the right thing to do" instead of allowing nature and the common man to decide amongst themselves. There is no one so ignorant as one who thinks he knows what's good for his neighbor, and so much of the 20th century has been ruled and ruined by such men.

Full Extent of the Pacific Electric Railway, circa 1920. Public domain work of US Federal Gov't.

Operation Northwoods - 49 years later

Joint Chiefs of Staff 1962. Public domain work of US government.

Beginning with the title “Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba”, the Joint Chiefs of Staff set out to produce evidence of a phony attack to justify an invasion of Cuba in 1962. Among the "evidence," shooting down a civilian airliner, burning crops, and carrying out a terrorism campaign throughout Florida and even up to Washingotn DC are considered par for the course, acceptable prey for the beast. In a nation founded "For the people, by the people," a small intelligence elite contemplates killing thousands and blaming it on someone else to kill thousands more and gain influence with the grimmest of sobriety. Even law it seems is worthless to them. In typical bureaucratic fashion, the majority of the concern on the first page is with whose agency will be assigned responsibility for doing it.

Prior to the Freedom of Information Act, both this operation and an experimentation with human mind control known as MKULTRA were totally classified, with no clear timeline for the information to eventually be released. Even with such an act, many executive level documents can remain classified with a proper judicial review. However, in 1976, less then 9 years after the law had come in to effect that revealed these horrifying actions of our government, the "Government in the Sunshine Act" created the following exemptions:

1. Information relating to national defense,
2. Related solely to internal personnel rules and practices,
3. Related to accusing a person of a crime,
4. Related to information where disclosure would constitute a breach of privacy,
5. Related to investigatory records where the information would harm the proceedings,
6. Related to information which would lead to financial speculation or endanger the stability of any financial institution, and
7. Related to the agency's participation in legal proceedings.

That "protects" nearly all documents worth declassifying. As if this wasn't enough, further legislative and other actions have extended exemption 1 (Reagan, executive order 12356), created a new exemption for law enforcement (Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986), increased response time deadlines to act requests (20 days instead of 10, Electronic Freedom of Information Act of 1996) and restricted access to presidential records (Bush, executive order 13223). Later, a ban on foreign requests (Intelligence Authorization Act of 2002), further extending the deadline to 30 days (Open Government Act of 2007), and allowing reclassification of previously declassified work (Obama, executive order 13526) after undesirable requests were added to the bill. Later executive orders revoked some extent of 12356 and 13223, while the OPEN act also required extensive paper trails on redactions or deletions from declassified documents, but the fact that IT CAN BE DONE remains troubling.

Now it is true that some military materials really must be protected, but surely we can find a better, more legally protective phrasing then "Information relating to national defense"! What does that even mean? And why does law enforcement get a free pass, except for the case of harming a judicial proceeding? Wasn't law enforcements protection in clause (5) more then enough without this additional "Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986" thingamajigger? And what, precisely, would "lead to financial speculation or endanger the stability of any financial institution"? Just how much would that cover, when one considers how many actions have an effect on the economy? And why do executive orders get to extend the act, should that not be the responsibility of congress?

The reality is that government will always be up to evil deeds, and the only thing that stands against them is the common people and interested parties. We must learn to "counter ambition with ambition" as James Madison phrased it. Secrecy except when 100% necessary is the best way government can thwart that process, and the best way that government can eventually take all power for itself. Even when it is necessary, it is a tragedy, and still harms our nation.

John F. Kennedy eventually rejected Operation Northwoods, but it was at his desk, ready to sign, and with the stroke of one pen thousands of innocent people would've died to start a pointless war with a nation that did not attack us. Since then, the act that released the information about Northwoods has been curtailed and limited by amendment after amendment from bill after bill and many executive orders. The court system would also be subverted to frame innocent men and women of bombings and murders. In the foulest of all corruptions, government would shatter law.

Northwoods showed once again, along with what Congress has done since, that the only one you can count on to look out for you is you, and that there are no limits to the cruelty and lies of an over-expanded government. There is no reason to believe that a Northwoods could not occur today, and even less reason to believe that man like Obama, unlike Kennedy, would sign it. Indeed, it is even possible that "Fast and Furious" may be part of such an operation, a thought that occurred to me immediately after it happened. Though I am not personally of the opinion that 9/11 was such an operation, and part of my reason for this comes from my own examination of Al Qaidas apparent game plan, it is easy to understand from whence the paranoia came. Truth is, we have much reason to be afraid, and more reason to act to end the tyranny of an oversecretive, overextended, legally subversive government, and to end this tyranny in the most law-abiding, peaceful way possible: at the polls. Just as the British did with HM James of York, so we can do with our own corrupt elites.

Leading the Party - How Romney would be a disaster for the GOP

The Black highlights significant dips in the Generic Congressional Vote relative to the democrats, while the red lines and green lines indicate where Romneys vote has rapidly increased (red) or staggered to gradual decline (green). Screenshots from RCP Polling Averages, Fair Use, with a few basic visual annotations. I apologize for the hazy quality - Blogger could not fully handle the image.

The RCP Polling average, at realclearpolitics.com, averages a whole series of generally accepted polls while discluding major outliers to form a scientific estimation of the actual vote. Mitt Romneys slip in the polls in June corresponded with an improvement in the Generic Congressional Vote. Later, when Perry also appeared to have many of the same problems to Conservatives and, given the evidence above, others, the Congressional Vote slipped once again. In short, Romney, though popular himself, as a standard-bearer for the greater Republican Party is a disaster, and the fruits of this disaster would show itself in (at best) stagnation in the congressional races of 2012 should he be the nominee. At worse, the Republicans could end up not only failing to take the Senate, but losing the House, as their generic congressional ballot is often underperforming the Democrats.

Most reasonable Republicans agree that getting rid of the Reidosi dominated congress is as important as getting rid of Obama. Romney looks presidential, talks soberly (though I wouldn't say well, as that requires that you actually say something), has a nice suit and nice hair, and isn't Obama. Because of this, a lot of people are willing to vote for him for President. But a lot of those people will also see him as the representative of the Republican Party, and will conclude that it is every bit as corrupt, unethical, lukewarm and openly fat cat Wall Street elitist as it was in 2008. They'll still vote for Romney, because he's not Obama and looks like a President regardless of what he does, but they won't vote for Republican candidates outside of Romney. It will also prevent the discussion of ideas that leads to congressional majorities, instead having a presidential race focused entirely on personalities and handing the congressional races directly over to California Environmentalists and Wisconsin Public Sector Unions.

And why would it be any different? Most Americans, outside of the most venom-filled, unthinking and partisan branches of the Republican party, know that George W. Bush is just as responsible for our nations current situation as Barrack Obama. Romney represents the Republican party of Bush. Romney represents Republicans with no principles, who will do anything to get elected, will accept bribes like Ted Stevens, know nothing about Main Street or the physical economy (Romney is, after all, the quintessential Wall Street number cruncher who thinks that the economy is a math equation) and have no trouble trampling on the rights of ordinary Americans or casting all good economic sense to the wind (including what he actually knows) simply to be "popular."

Romney represents the kind of thinking that forces Americans to buy a private good and favors a gradual government takeover of the economy - something which he has not only done, but seems rather proud of. Romney, frankly, should move to the countries that follow his way of thinking, putting everything in the hands of corrupt elites, namely the Sudan, Burundi, Zimbabwe, Chad, the Central African Republic or any number of other African Kleptocracies. Maybe then he would realize why an Ivy-Leagueized America is not a good idea and that public-private collusion is not a virtue.

And should we elect him, just what will he do? Will the man who inspired Obamas entire economics agenda really depart from them substantially? Will he kowtow and get along well with the Democrat Congress that he helped elect? Just what will he do?

Update 10/9/11 - As Mr. Presidents approval ratings continue to drop in the RCP average to their lowest point ever this week, now approaching that crucial 40% mark, it seems that more and more the legitimate interest of the Republican Party needs to be selecting a man who can lead the entire party to victory in all 50 states. Winning the electoral college by more votes is not going to help the Conservatives govern. Winning the electoral college, and then winning the Senate and House by more, will.

The Gospel of Joseph Stalin, Chapter 5: The Parable of the Green Fool

Secretary General and Loving Father Stalin, who only sends those who really need it to Siberia to be worked to death. Photo taken by CCCP, public domain for all good comrades. Here

"Someone in the crowd said to him, “Liberal, tell my brother to divide the tax money with my solar power company.”

"¹⁴ Comrade Stalin replied, “Individuals, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you? Can't you tell I have the general will to look out for...” ¹⁵ Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; you might turn in to a conservative! But for now you're just a useful idiot...”

¹⁶ And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain country yielded an abundant economic harvest. ¹⁷ He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no way to prevent the world from changing.’

¹⁸ “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my coal power plants and build bigger solar panels across miles of beautiful, open Desert, and there I will have my electricity. ¹⁹ And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of power laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’

²⁰ “But the general will, now extended to include the cute, furry creatures of the forest, said to him, ‘You fool! Yellowstone will erupt this very night, cover the Western United States with lava and block the sun for 50 years. Then where will this stable world you have prepared for yourself go to?’

²¹ “This is how it will be with whosoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich towards the general will."

Meet the Proles

Public Domain image by Pearson Scott Foreman

One thing that never ceases to shock me is the tendency of the electorate to hold on to oft repeated lies, even resfuse to hear statements to the contrary of them, and with no candidate has this been more true then Sarah Palin. What do people get out of speaking venom and lies against her? What is it about Palin that makes people not only swallow the lies about her hook, line and sniker, but then dismiss any challenge to those lies as unworthy of their hearing?

In "1984", there were some, shall we say, non-characters called the Proles. They are humans who are non-people, are so lost in their hate, anger, fear and willful ignorance that they will simply hate upon without question whoever the small elite decides as a target, not even quoting their own memories against it. They can be controlled by a single broadcast of the radio.

I don't know what brought America to the brink of becoming Oceania, but something did. Something made us so thoroughly lose ourselves in hate, anger and political parties that we will ignore all reasoning thereafter. Something made us that lazy, that cowardly, that inhuman. I'll leave you to figure out what it was, but when was the last time that someone attacking Sarah Palin gave a good reason why?

Any particular lies you would like addressed will be handled in the comment section.

UPDATE 10/5/2011: Sarah Palin will not be seeking the highest office in the land. She announced that family concerns have simply become too great. The only person in the world who can defeat Sarahcuda is her own daughter, and it seems that she has proved this adage once again.

The Heroes of 9-11

Recently declassified government photo of the work at the 9-11 site. Public domain

A lot of articles are going to appear about the threat of further terrorism, the losses, how America has changed et cetera, but for the moment, I want to look in to the past, not to see the evil that perpetrated these attacks, but the heroic people who rose to meet them. Some of the stories will be familiar, nearly common knowledge even, but some of them will not be. All of them, however, demonstrate what makes America great.

Todd Beamer

An accountant at Oracle, Todd also taught sunday school with his wife Lisa for six years and had two children, David and Drew. After their plane was hijacked, Todd and other passengers made attempts (13 successful) to call home by both in-plane and cell phones*. Todd, in his, did not quite get through but instead ended up on the phone with GTE Supervisor Lisa Jefferson*, and, as he and others were told of the attack on the WTC, a resolution was made to jump the hijackers. After briefly panicking when the plane jerked southeast, Todd recited the Lords Prayer with Mrs. Jefferson,* and then is quoted as having said "You guys ready? Lets roll." 4 months after his death, his youngest child and only daughter, Morgan Kay, was born.

Lieutenant Heather Penny

Stuck between a logistical rock and hard place, the USAF had a difficult choice to make that morning: take time to properly arm its aircraft, or catch up to the planes quickly. When the choice was made however, Lieutenant Penny didn't question it, but simply to the sky with her orders to ram flight 93. Not even equipped with gun ammo, her F-16 had nothing but its own physical force to stop the terrorist plane before it reached Washington. When asked about the experience, she had nothing to say but this: "We had to protect the airspace any way we could"

Fabrizio Bivona

Just as some are inspired to die for their country, some, in outrage, are inspired to live for it. That describes the fate of NYC Paramedic and Firefighter Fabrizio Bivona perfectly. Many of his fellow paramedics didn't come home that day, and left alive, he has seen firsthand the real impact that 9/11 has had on 1,000's of survivors and families. He describes himself as having served on counterterrorism teams "before it was popular," and appreciates the progress and attempts at progress that were made by the Bush administration, but also laments the "politicization of homeland security." Inspired to act, this common man made an unsuccesful attempt at a US Congressional Seat to raise hell, and though preferring the notion of others stepping up to fulfill this noble cause, has not ruled out making another attempt in the future, saying he is thoroughly disgusted by the Obama administration on this issue. "I see the frontline to the survival of America—where the front lines have been drawn—is now inside our government. For me, I always want to be where the fight is."

Joe Irizarry

Prior to 911, Joe had an ordinary boring life of driving the subway trains underneath Manhattan. At the Courtlandt Street subway station, at the foot of the towers, Joe arrived just in time to have his train literally shook by the impact of the planes. Knowing something was wrong, he looked around him, and saw people en masse fleeing the debris of 9/11, and kept his doors open several minutes to offer refuge from those running away from a mysterious smoke he did not know the source of. "The smoke was coming down so I had no idea what was going on in the streets. I just wanted to make sure the people were safe." According to witness Linda Di Silvio, he executed his good decision well, being in charge and keeping the whole train car of people under control. "Joe was, you know, the brick there." Finally, when he knew it was too close to collapse, he gunned it out of the station for Continental Avenue, the end of the line. Joe would not realize he was a 911 hero until he made it to the crew room, and was told about the towers collapse.

Mike Cammarta

22-year-old Mike Cammarta, a former Little League World Series participant, left just one last message to his family when he rushed in to the WTC on 9-11: "I am going to the World Trade Center, a plane just hit it. Just tell everyone I am all right." He was stationed at Ladder #11 as a student, hoping to graduate from Fire Academy to carry his Uncles badge and the tradition of his family. He was even to take his uncles shield number, 1138. Throughout all his days, he counted the experience of playing right-field in the Little League World Series at the age of 12 as one of the most fantastic of his life, and on the 5th Anniversary of the 911 attacks, Little League International commemorated him with his uniform number permaneantly affixed to the stadium walls and admittance to the Hall of Excellence of the Peter J. McGovern Little League Museum.
Welles Crowther

A successful NYC equities trader, Welles still found the time to serve his country as a volunteer firefighter, and in the finish, he would give far more time then he ever realized. Still a young man not even yet over his youthful eccentricity of carrying a red bandana, he helped someone to safety who then, wondering who had helped him, had somehow gotten a hold of his mother. His mother sent a picture, and immediately the helper was known to be Welles. Welles himself perished, but the people he helped lived.

Ret. Sargent Major Tony Rose

After his office was nearly taken out by the impact of the plane on the Pentagon, the Sargeant Major, feeling hot and dark like Hell, searched for a way out. Barely finding it, he heard the cries of those still inside, and with a few other survivors, found a flooded utilities that was just cool enough to pry through the wreckage. Working in shifts and having to tunnel their way around fallen electric live wires from the ruined walls, they gradually carried seven survivors to safety, while confronted with the sheer gruesomeness of the attack in the form of the body parts of a small child.

Gary Smiley

There's an old cynical saying that "No good deed goes unpunished," and certainly this maxim has been true for Gary Smiley. One of the most decorated living paramedics of 9/11, Gary Smiley suffered through extensive surgery and medical care to recover from the 9/11 attacks. During this process, he was shortchanged by the Fire Commisioner of NYC during his period in the hospital, not being given full pay and being held back for elite assignments as he recovered from his 9/11 injuries. He has had to face NYC in lawsuits as a reward for his heroism, lawsuits in which Commisoner Salvatore Cassano has claimed, and still claims, he somehow earned his current position. Cassano was responsible, according to His Honor Morgenthau, for ignoring a smoking gun warning that caused the fatal fire at the Deutsche Bank after the towers collapsed.



*APPENDIX - 911 Conspiracy Theories surrounding cell phone usage on flight 93

It is often said that cell phones cannot be used at 10000 feet. However, when looking at the assumptions behind the prediction that the cellular "handshake," could not be carried out, I noticed a few inconsistencies:

1 - Not all of the calls were cellular, some of them were using in-plane phones (including Todd Beamers.) The "handshake" phenomenon may also help explain why Beamer was not able to get through to his wife and kids, but instead ended up on the phone with a business manager for the in-plane phone service.

2 - Only a total of 13 calls out of 33 passengers on board were successful. Considering as nearly all passengers on the plane had cell phones, and most who failed would've tried several times, this seems somewhat consistent.

3 - Somerset County is flat and underpopulated. As a result, their will be fewer cellphone towers for the same area by far. This may also explain why similar phone calls did not occur on the other flights. It may also help explain why the terrorists were not expecting cell calls to be a problem - they may have been thinking like our conspiracy theorists.

As a result, I think we can conclude that the cell calls were in fact valid.

Fast, Furious, and Frightening

ATF Logo. Public domain work of Federal government.

This is not news. In fact it has been forgotten. It shouldn't be though, which is why I'm bringing it right back up again.

According to Human Events, over 2000 guns were sold, 700 were located after crimes, and only 3 were given tracking devices, and those had bad batteries. While human tracking may or may not have been used, we do know that at least 2 federal agents have been killed in connection with Operation Fast and Furious and that at least 1300 guns have not been located. When compared with the ease of GPS tracking, it is clear that an inferior method, at the very least, was chosen.

The motto of the Mexican drug mafia is "silver or lead," and violence from Northern Mexico has spilled over the border in to the United States many times, most famously with Pancho Villa in the 1920's. Although highly romanticized by many, the violence with Villa led eventually to the burning of Columbus, New Mexico and a punitive expedition.

Narcotics trafficers in America have been known to firebomb houses, kill innocent citizens, despoil the desert and harm private property. They are the complete antithesis of law and order, and all things public spirited. I don't know exactly what the US had in mind when it armed these drug dealers, but being the legitmate government of the American people was not it. This is not something to be forgotten or forgiven, but something that the American people have a duty to hold their government accountable for in every way that they are able.

Politics is Comedy

The Clown Chili Peppers. Attb: Rick Dikeman at the English Language Wikipedia, license c.c.a.s.a. 3.0 unported.

Any frequent reader of this blog will know that there are few more enthusiastic supporters of the Tea Party then me, but I must give one mild criticism.

It has often been said that in many ways the Tea Party needs to learn. Being a new "organization" (more like "tribe") this is undoubtedbly true, but what precise due they need to learn? If one says "learn to tax people and give bailouts," then surely we have already seen the fruits of these decisions, the very standing on which the Tea Party was organized against the establishment of the Republican Party. Indeed liberals, your prayers against the hypocrisy of the Bush Administration have been answered.

If one says dealing with racism, while there are certainly racists in the Tea Party (and every other party I might add), I challenge you to give any example where a poilcy that could be considered racist was supported simply because it was racist. You will find none, but rather, a plethora of wasteful, ignorant and dangerous policies that undermined American law and order, or laid waste to our federal budget. It seems once again that the "unwashed masses" are more intelligent then our isolated, and steamed in a lost and perverted academia till no nutrition remained, vegetables of elites.

Rather, there is something far more fundamental, far bigger, and far more important at this moment in time that they must learn. If they do not learn it, they will fragment, and unlike a traditional party the Tea Party has no answer for such a fragmentation, all will be lost, and politics as normal will continue.

To understand what and why, let's step back for a minute and look at a great and foolish debate taking place in the tea party today: whether to increase taxes. It's easy enough to see why this debate would happen, and easy to deride the opposition to doing so. As a Texans put it, and what greater pleasure is there in life then hearing Texans speak, "do you honestly think not going to the mall and not using your credit card will pay off your debt?"It's easy enough to dismiss this crowd as toddlers, infants, those who were born yesterday.

Yet they have a very real intuitive fear, and one that is correct. For every dollar saved from the deficit by "Revenue Increases," there is just a little less pressure on congress to end our dangerous habits. Then there is a little more pressure to expand existing government entities and assets to facilitate new ends, possibly even ends with some merit, bringing us to precisely where we are now 4 years later, with less ability to borrow and, thanks to higher tax rates depreciating our economy, less ability to pay off. This is a very valid fear.

Why is it so hard to believe that one thing can be done at one instant and another at another? If you rearranged the lines in a movie, would they neccesarily make any sense? Or would the very point of the film be lost on its viewers?

Sometimes one must hold a gun to the head, must threaten and coerce, especially when one possesses only one house of congress, and has substantial detractors even among its own adopted party in the other. Sometimes one must also rearrange the scene to rearrange the decision. Politics is not a game for straight-talk or fairplay, especially not when dealing with other politicians, and exceptionally stubborn and heartless ones as we've found.

Politics is an art of timing and discretion. If the claim that increasing tax rates is indeed true, there will come a time for it, but that time is not now, especially since government can also raise revenue by selling government assets, such as public land with substantial mineral and oil reserves or quality soil for farming, and that dilapidating spending not only will help balance the deficit, but can alleviate the burden facing businesses with their excess of regulation and paperwork, a burden that currently equals $10,585 per employee for a small business, and close to $8,000 per employee for larger firms. The cost to our federal budget of regulation is $1.75 trillion, or more then the current budget deficit. This is a figure that comes from the Small Business Administration, a entity that the Obama administration has some ability to control and doctor with spinning.

Not only would selling these lands and relieving these costs to business reduce our deficit through spending cuts, but as Senator Marco Rubio recently pointed out, they would also unleash an economic torrent of growth likely far greater then the "10 day reprieve" the tax increases offer. As one can tell, things are not as they once seemed. The "balanced approach" folks really do not have the sense that the mind would conjure for them. We need to cut spending, and any attempt to raise revenue artificially will only slow such a process and damage the economy. Eventually, revenue will be raised - if we do it right, tax increases may not even be neccesary.

Take your turn, wait your time. It may seem hypocritical, but it's a fight we didn't start and we're in it. Know what to say and when, and realize who it empowers and who it humbles. Control your tongue, and let all the chips fall in place, for "there is a season and place for everything under the sun." (King Solomon, translated from book of Ecclesiastes). Don't let haste make waste, rather realize that politics is comedy, and your power is also a grave responsibility.


WORKERS OF THE WORLD, UNITE!

The Story of Kenmore

The City logo of Kenmore, WA

All along the lake, east of Seattle, are mighty hills and muggy swamps, but there was one place in the far north, right where the lake ended, where the hills turned in to a plain. This spot had plentiful timber, and since it was the termination of the lake, and also flat, the first roads built eastward and northward ran through it. Further up the Sammamish River, which runs through it, was a great floodplain, but here, at this one place, the floods did not occur. Instead were great strands of timber, 20 feet in diameter and 300 feet in to the air.

A young McMaster from Kenmore, Ontario came to Seattle in 1889. A month after he got there, the city had burned down, and his future looked bleak. Kenmore, Ontario was in turn named for the Scottish village of Kenmore, on the Loch Tay in the highlands, by a McLaren who came there long before, from Kenmore, Scotland, and always had the Highlands in his blood. McMaster was not willing to throw in the towel, and heard tell of the great virgin timbers of the lakes northern shore, and knew of the roads that crossed there and the flat plains. He also knew of a river that, with the taming of the floodplains, was now deep enough for steamboats, and a canal they were building from the lake to the sea.

Not much later, he started a Shingle Mill at this point on the lake. There were many sawmills around, but shingle mills were less common, and greatly in demand as the population grew. He also built a great log boom, that both helped feed his shingle mill when demand was high, and helped feed sawmills on the lake when demand was low. Though the entire logging operation was abandoned in 1920, the growing community of Kenmore, named by McMaster for his former home, preserved the boom, maintaining it as a fishing and swimming dock for the good of all.

The community also took an abandoned barn, and in 1952, made it in to their first library. They built a school, and roadhouses, and restaurants, and expanded the road. They built parks, great ones that are still around, and preserved a beautiful old Mission style Seminary as part of St. Edwards Park. The road they maintained and expanded is now 522 Highway, a "State Route" that is a major eastward path in to Seattle. The road north, however, now runs further West, though the older road is maintained for local traffic as 527. St. Edwards Park is now a State Park.

In 1946, a swamp in Kenmore, unused for anything for many years, attracted the attention of three high school friends united after World War II. Jack Mines, Reg Collins, and Bob Monroe built a hangar in the swamp, and purchased a single plane, an Aeronca Model K. Over the years, service would increase in both volume and respect, and today, Kenmore Air is one of the largest seaplane operators in the world, and they are still based out of Kenmore, WA. The managerie of planes, dozens upon dozens of them, on the lot by the road is one of the richest sights you'll ever see.

In 1978, a science-based naturopathy university named Bastyr built itself in Kenmores southern outskirts. The university was started as extensive new legislation at both the state and federal levels had made times for natural medicine turbulent. With the National College of Naturopathic Medicines departure to Portland, Washington state legislators were threatening to suspend all licensing of naturopathic professionals as no college any longer existed in the state. A series of determined NCNM graduates understood that a school firmly built on scientific principles would not only save licensure in Washington, but grow respect for naturopathy nationwide. In the words of Dr. Mitchell, one of its founding fathers, "It was built on the best visions of what a really high-quality naturopathic institution could be." Far from being a stereotype, Bastyr sought full accredation and a scientific basis, and in my personal experience, also created one of the most helpful and down-to-earth professional climates I have ever found anywhere.

For many years they fared well with no city government, growing in population, wealth and serviceability, though they were recognized by the post office as an address, but in 1990, a bill by the Washington Legislature known as the "Growth Management Act" created development committees. These development committees told Kenmore that they would either start a city government, annex in to a neighbor, or let the county decide. The GMA also created a massive bureaucracy for the rezoning of land that leaves abandoned malls unused for decades and creates a major shortage of land for the kind of manufacturing and industry that any state but Washington would love to have. The GMA even, according to a farmer from Stanwood I spoke to, forces paperwork to be filed and consultation with bureaucracy to be made before any field larger then 10 acres can be tilled or planted. By 1998, against the will of its citizens, Kenmore was a "city," though it had been the size, stature and utility of a city for many years.

Despite the fact that Kenmore was built by individuals doing their thing and giving, voluntarily, to the communty, the State had to slip their greedy hands in to it. They forced Kenmore to do the "right thing" and waste tax dollars that never needed to be spent hiring people who never needed to be hired. And all in the interest of "Growth Management."

Sources: (In order of usage)

The public displays at Log Boom Park, Kenmore, WA

Kenmore Air Harbor Inc., "history"

Bastyr University, "At A Glance: Founding of Bastyr University"

Reagan Dunn, son of former Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn (R-8, till 2006), with regards to Totem Lake Mall and other underdeveloped or abandoned commercial properties. (GMA)

A farmer from Stanwood, WA with approximately 100 acres of vegetable growing land (GMA)

Image: Public Domain, official logo of city of Kenmore, click here for link.

Transportation and Time

Public domain, courtesy of Jorge Barrios

At a certain time during the Dark Ages, there were no cities in most of Europe, but just thousands of farms, spread across the clearings and meadows of Europe, and old Roman roads built long ago, crisscrossing between them. At the junctions of these roads, there might be ruins, that would go unnoticed as would whatever tiny, insignificant traffic crossed through them. The ports didn't operate in Europe, even as far away as Italy and Turkey, because of Viking raids, except in a few areas like Ireland, Danegild, and Normandy where the Norse set up there own, and the regions became wealthy as a consequence. In those days, all was done out of the manor house, and trade was very limited. Manors were extremely, bitterly poor, and highly self-sufficient, and noble lords had extreme authority and martial responsibility.

But then technology, bit by bit, began to improve. Castles allowed for the defense of harbors, opening the ports and the seas. Modern quarying developed, and with it a supply of marble. Trade with the Islamic empire brought spices and coffee to the new ports, while increases in population and the size and number of manor houses brought about an ecological disaster, the destruction of Europes forests, and with it the need to travel ever further for lumber and its replacements, clay brick and coal.

At the intersections of roads, you have the fastest route on average to anywhere. While going down the road your travel time to one particular place would decrease, for a few limited industrial enterprises that is indeed good enough, your travel time to all the other places those roads go to will increase so much more. Further, more customers and workers and material will cross through the intersection then anywhere else. Lodges, markets and taverns would set themselves up first, and then manufacturers and stables and warehouses would set up near the market, and with all of these little brick houses would sprout along every alleyway and available road as workers too chose the fastest transportation for their life.

Eventually, highly specialized businesses, utilizing the economic base of the city, would set up as well. These would include law offices, accountants, computers (in that day meaning people who would crunch numbers for you), moneylenders, and craftspeople like blacksmiths serving both sword and plowshare. Church and Government too would notice the city, and the workers and citizens serveable through it, setting up bureaucracy and courthouses, which in the dark ages didn't exist, along with fortresses, great cathedrals, universities and libraries, and comissioning artists and clockmakers to celebrate their authority in great squares and plazas. Criminals too would benefit from the economic base of the city, utilizing its many highways, services and people, as would entertainers.

The reality is that cities are a giant device for the conservation of time, by quickening transportation from one place to another, and the conservation of energy, by decreasing the distance that freight and people must travel to get to its customers and clients. Cities, in the end, are the product of their transportation, and the customers, employers, industry and resources they afford within a reasonable distance. If a city loses this, it has nothing, and is only an overpriced piece of land, but it is because of the ability to save people time, and as a result, allow them to live more, and do more, that people will pay 300 times as much as the same quanity of land in the country to own it. In the words of Ali from Burlesque, when talking about why she left Iowa, "I looked around and realized that I didn't see anyone I wanted to be." You can be more and do more in a city because where you go to do what you want to do is reachable in reasonable time.

Now in the recent past, people would live sixty miles out of the city and commute to wherever it was they worked. When people lived and worked in one place their entire lives, that made sense, but in a world where people change jobs on average every 2 years, it makes sense to be as close to as many employers as possible, and since industrial employers will opt for cheaper land along whatever railroad line leads to their suppliers, while extremely common businesses (e.g. drugstores) will opt for more minor, inexpensive junctions that they have the capacity to serve, not all of them will be in the big city. As we go in to the future, we find the employees act more like businesspeople, and the need for speed (and with it, the city) becomes greater then ever.

Some cities, like Seattle, are still stuck in the past imagining that transportation is just a quality of life issue, something we can tinker around with in social engineering and throw immesaurable costs on to, but across the lake from Seattle, Bellevue, on I-405, the eastern bypass of I-5, and the third city eastward on I-90, has expanded and improved its interstates, with its own money. The result has been a building boom, dozens of new towers, 40 stories tall, going up and new businesses moving in. Meanwhile, Seattle has lost its largest bank, Washington Mutual, to the financial slowdown, and no one seems quite set to replace it. But they still continue to toy with forcing people on to trains that zig zag at 35 mph instead of heading straight where they go. Voters constantly complain about transportation expense, but what they don't realize is that transportation is the heart and soul of their city life, is what allows them the opportunities they have.

Megafeature: A Summary of the Stings

Source Photobucket

One of the more remarkable innovations of the T.E.A. party has been the use of "sting" operations. These sting operations involve a hapless victim that the teamen in question feel is being disingenuous, and a disguise of a figure that they feel he or she will be honest to. Sometimes the plot itself is so absurd that its practicality serves as a lesson regardless of the result, and then even more absurdly, it is vindicated. Such an example was the sting operation against a ground manager of a Planned Parenthood clinic, who has since been fired:

Planned Parenthood Sting Video

The most disturbing part of this video comes at timemark 8:38, when the manager informs a pimp how to avoid being detected by the law, how to avoid arrest, so that he and his enslaved Columbian girls, scared and far from home, can continue violating the states prostitution law and abort the babies thus produced. The most troubling aspect, however, is the callous and unthinking way she talks to one of the most evil kinds of villains that can exist: a slaver, and not just a slaver, but one who violates females through forced prostitution.

Then there's the issue of government waste. For this we get the NPR sting, a sting against an organization that is supposedly a national radio station of the United States but has long been suspected of bias in favor of progressives. The NPR sting demonstrated (sort of, well get to that in a minute) numerous bigoted statements, from comparing conservative Christians to the Taliban, to hating upon gun owners and the federal standards enforced upon NPR that they do a more then good enough job bending already:

This sting is not without controversy, in fact it may be without support. Sources from all across the political spectrum, as far left as the Huffington Post and as far right as the Blaze (Glenn Becks newspaper/amalgamator) have criticized O'Keefes video for its extremely unethical and dishonest editing techniques. Many, in fact, the left-wing Brudowsky praised Glenn Beck for his extremely professional, objective, and powerful dissection of the "NPR Sting," and I am among many whose respect for Mr. Beck, an icon of the Tea Party and the right in general, has greatly increased. While Becks criticism is in general the most thorough and useful to read through, there is one particular quote from the Huffington Post criticism that I find especially potent:

While Schiller does say the Republican Party has been "hijacked" by the tea party and Christian evangelicals -- and is "fanatically involved in people's personal lives" -- it is evident in the full tape that he is not giving his own view but rather quoting two influential Republicans, according to reporter Folkenflik. Schiller does not challenge those assertions, but they are not his.

O'Keefe is also famous for his ACORN stings, including one where, with his girlfriend, he attempted (and nearly did, with extensive assistance offered) to acquire starting funds for a prostitution house that he would pay back on interest that ACORN could use for political campaigns. Before this, he attempted to have Lucky Charms removed from the Rutgers cafeteria because it is "offensive to his Irish heritage" and apparently caught a conversation with the dining chiefs on tape exposing the absurdity of the situation. He stated that he is "still in [his] bunker producing more videos. We're releasing another video in San Diego right now. I'm focusing on doing what I do best." Although congress looked to punish ACORN with a defunding bill, a Federal Court has ruled that such actions would be the exclusive remedy of the Judicial Branch. This is not the first time recently that we have seen our governments dormant constitutional protections awoken from their sleep, and everyone is watching as the American people push for reform and government officials pit "ambition against ambition" in a classic display of democratic, Madisonian magic.

The organization Life Dynamics dialed up 800 calls to Planned Parenthood stating that they needed an abortion for a 13-year-old to cover up impregnation by her 22-year-old boyfriend. This is illegal in all 50 states, but Planned Parenthood did not report any of these incidences. Just for the record, I actually support the actions of Planned Parenthood in this regard, as concealing a pregnancy is, at least in my mind, a good (if not the only good) reason for abortion as it is a case where putting up the baby for adoption is simply not good enough. This said, I know that many disagree with this sentiment, and technically it is against the (stupid) law, which requires all suspected cases of abuse to be reported to authorities by medical professionals.

And then finally, and greatest of all, is ClimateGate, the sting operation that may have fundamentally altered global environmental politics, and that the Democrat Party at large insists on ignoring the ramifications of. The product of a hacker, 1000 emails among staff at the UK's Climate Research Unit have been made public. Although FactCheck.org, in its examination of ClimateGate, disagrees that it disproves anthropogenic global warming, a conclusion a self-interested Saudi came to, it does agree that the emails show scientists "sometimes being rude, dismissive, insular, or even behaving like jerks" while the public has rightly responded to attitudes and interpersonal aggression, such as declaring global warming "settled science" along with the climategate emails, clearly not conducive to good science. While the ClimateGate emails may or may not (I have not read them myself) show the science to be false, they do show the scientists to be false, and with the alternative sources offered all being government entities (NOAA and NASA), we the public are left with little more then a few university degrees on which to trust theories that could fundamentally alter our lives.

Unfortunately, and we see this clearly with ClimateGate, named for the much lesser WaterGate, "operations" like these can only have a true impact (where the much better funded and marketed "Supersize Me!" failed) when a cultural context exists to support them.

To create such, we have a play with many characters. There's an arugula growing, elite talking, Harvard Law-Chicago Cesspool Obama intent on breaking the budget with spending in excess of even Bush. There's an irrepressible lady from California and gentleman from Nevada who seem intent on shattering any popular or political movement against them. There's a lightbulb ban, an "individual mandate" (thou must purchase something, approved by thine bureaucratic overlords, if thou seekest to breathe) and big shot corporations receiving welfare while "99ers" go cold and hungry in the street. There's government destroying cars to make people buy more and a liberal establishment that wants congress to pass a bill so they can read what's in them. There's an American people who do not even understand all the "Hope" and "Change" that their initially lauded leader has brought.

In short, political overreach, and too much game playing, manipulation and intrigue for an American people who know they will be the ones to pay the bill.

Responding to the controversy, Slate commisioned blogger Weigel held a twitter conversation with one of the publishers of the original, edited, NPR Sting video. The exchange is revealing. The actual conversation reveals an NPR chief quoting a top donor for the Republican Party as saying he voted for Obama because he's scared of the xenophobic, gun-toting, racist post-Obama Party. When Weigel challenges him on this account, the publisher responds: "No, it's really not. Go ahead and try to make the argument Schiller isn't CLEARLY agreeing with them. Go ahead. Moron."

To the publishers credit, the actual tone expressed in the original quote does indicate, at the very least, a fear that the Kingmaker may be right. And a Kingmaker is generally held in high esteem. Also to the publishers credit, while this "edit" is not good journalism, username "simon templar" is not a professional journalist, and clearly feels very overwhelmed as this tweet reveals: "nobody likes an access journalist/tweeter. we'll get you the info/emails you asked for eventually, I'm sure." It is also worth noting that every controversial remark attributed, falsely or otherwise, to the NPR head in the sting, is commonly found among liberals on the internet and in IRL, including, of course, the "gun-toting nutjobs" line that is argued over in this article.

"simon templar" is a common man, pushed in to uncommon work. He is, in fact, out of his league, but right now, who IS in their league?

Which leads me to my next point, what's become irrelevant. While teamen with camcorders flood the internet with "stings," documentaries by top Hollywood directors like Oliver Stone (e.g. "W") go totally unwatched and unremembered. I can't even remember the last time a story about a Hollywood star, a bigshot CEO, or a Harvard professor made the papers. The only "elites" who still seem to make papers, in fact, are the politicians we're all scared of and a few big media demagogues, like Krugman and O'Reilly, who are little more then highly paid whipping boys for the common citizens. In the words of Scripture: "the last shall be first, and the first shall be last."

And then there's the Middle East. While here at home we break our own elite peacefully, using the full well-oiled machinery of our democracy and a thousand years of Western legal wisdom, the streets of Benghazi are soaked in blood. The alleys of Bahrain lay covered in shell casings, and aircraft streak over the Mediterranean carrying every sort of explosive payload. In Egypt, the army, a traditional symbol of tyranny and distrust, is helping to provide for what the Arab world doesn't have, insisting on all parties respecting each other and disarming those who would hurt the people. That Army has so much to be proud of, and I know I would be proud to carry an Egyptian rifle right now. In this great moment to be alive, the long oppressed show the irrepressible, stubborn, freedom-loving and faithful spirit of humanity. They also almost exactly mirror the tea party, using many of the same methods, and the sheer tinyness of the media involved makes it nearly impossible for the government to stop the word. The government is stopping army ants with an elephant gun.

And then there's Japan, where ordinary men and women, Japanese and others, have volunteered their time by the truckload to rebuild and service the survivors*, and where the nations eyes lay flatly and squarely pointed towards the power plant workers risking their lives to bring a reactor under control. "She said in an entry on social networking site Mixi that her boyfriend, who also works at the plant, had tearfully told her "you go ahead to safety", before she evacuated in a company car." (Hindustan Times)

And in Britain, flash mobs have become a common occurence.

We find a world suspiciously popular and self-driven, where the elites find themselves unneeded and out of touch. This is the world where Obama is trying to force huge, coercive government actions and sweeping reforms led by, you guessed it, the elites. This is the world that Obama, half Harvard and half machine politician, an outdated relic from a time period that mostly ended in 1910, finds himself in. The past meets the future, my friends, and usually, the future wins.

*Source note: You will need to browse to the end of the article to find this information. Here's a quote:

Fumio and her daughter were among the roughly 600 people (men, women and children of all ages) who had taken shelter on the gymnasium's wood floor, beneath the basketball hoops and nets. Evacuees were offered food, such as warm milk and rice — some of which had been taken from a home economics class — and a place to sleep. A flat-panel television was broadcasting news of the unfolding catastrophe, which by then was focused on the potential meltdown of reactors within the Fukushima nuclear plants.