My Reputo

Something I Can Agree with Obama On

2011-02-01T08:00:00.000-06:00

The White House is proposing cutting the ATF budget by 13%. While I would like to see an abolishment of it (and the corresponding regulations), I can certainly support this kind of a cut as a first step.

Shooting Saturday

2011-01-31T09:00:00.001-06:00

Four friends went to the firing range on Saturday near where Grant Wood painted his "American Gothic." There was enough armament to take over a small Central American country. After 3 hours of shooting, ammo boxes were considerably lighter. They went out to eat and three of the four had a beer with their lunch. By some miracle, not a single one became enraged and opened fire on the patrons in the restaurant. I'm not sure how this didn't make the news.

In an unrelated report, a prospector found a large deposit of lead and copper in the side of a berm. "This could be one of the richest veins on record," he was quoted as saying. Development is expected.

These are Mutually Exclusive Concepts

2011-01-31T08:00:00.000-06:00

Sometimes even the politicians come up with statements that are absolutely amazing in their complete disdain for logic.

"If the president is going to ask us to increase the debt limit, then he's going to have to be willing to cut up the credit cards" - Speaker Boehner

Let's see how this works. Pretend for instance that I make $210,000 a year and I have credit card debt of $1.4 million, partly because for the last few years I have been spending close to $400,000 a year. Now my wife decides to put her foot down and say enough is enough. I beg and plead for her to have our credit card limit increased to $1.6 million, because if we don't then we will have to declare bankruptcy. She capitulates as long as I cut up the credit card.

Huh? So if I cut up the credit card...how then does increasing my credit limit to $1.6 million stave off bankruptcy?

This is the exact situation that Boehner finds himself in (just add some extra zeros to my numbers above). Perhaps Congress and the President could use a little refresher course in budgeting 101, maybe even a session with the Consumer Credit Counseling Service.

For those of you who had hoped that the Republicans were going to turn things around, you were sorely mistaken.

Education in America: The Farce

2011-01-30T17:22:00.002-06:00

When I read an article like this one, I am not the least bit surprised. Being a trained engineer (we actually take science classes in college), a devote Mormon, and a firm believer in evolution (and not just the micro-evolution schtick that creationists make up; I am talking the full blown macro-evolution cat gives birth to a dog spiel that they try and dance around), I am usually appalled by the treatment of science in schools. Mostly thought I am appalled at the whole "qualifying teachers" aspect to education.

Study after study has shown that colleges of education have the lowest performing students of any of the colleges at universities. Go to any university campus and I guarantee you that there will be plenty of jokes among the student body about the education students. At Texas A&M, the joke was you went to college as an education major in order to find a husband. Does this mean that every one with an education degree is a blithering moron? No, there are quite a few smart ones that I have met (coincidentally, none off of the top of my head are actually teaching school).

To compare to the college of Engineering at Texas A&M, when I started as a freshman, probably 80% of the freshman in my dorm were engineering majors. By sophomore year that had dropped to less than 50% and by junior year it was down to 25% where it remained fairly stable through graduation. I never heard of anyone (not saying it didn't happen) who transferred into engineering from the business college or the education college. I did know one person who got a degree in psychology and then came back and got a degree in engineering after realizing that she didn't like her job options. Of course, if she had have started in engineering she would have been successful and saved herself $20K and 4 years.

So why the drop in numbers? Because some people can't hack it. It may be they aren't smart enough, it may be that they don't have the work ethic, it may be that they don't like dealing with fractions. That's OK. Unfortunately, we have turned education (at least on the public side) into a game of the lowest common denominator. If we know that the majority of our biology teachers are waffling (for whatever reason) on a scientific theory that is widely accepted and has been thoroughly debated to the point that those who dismiss it are seen as crackpots by the scientific community, then what hope do we have for English, math, and history.

Lest anyone try to say that Einstein was considered a crackpot with his theories, let us remember that he proposed something new that the scientific community had not had time to investigate. After years of investigation, we have come to realize he was right in many things and wrong in a very few (and those things he was wrong on were usually due to oversimplification of the issue).

Evolution is not some new theory, although based on the training the colleges of education give, it may very well be.

And if you think that evolution entails cats giving births to dogs, you are either dishonest or need your head examined.

9-Year Old VISA Violators

2011-01-14T09:30:00.002-06:00

Because we have already solved our southern border problem, we now are able to focus on those kids whose grandparents are taking them to DisneyWorld. I mean, isn't it obvious that this kid from England is trying to sneak his way into the US (even though he didn't know it). Probably trying to establish himself as an anchor baby to bring the rest of his family over.

I have a few questions. Why was the 9-year old's VISA denied, but the grandparents were not? How old do you have to be to even have "strong ties outside the United States"? Is the bond between parents and children not considered strong enough? Does EuroDisney suck that bad?

This is where the Disney company should step in and show the world how generous they are. All expenses paid to EuroDisney, 5 star hotel, breakfast with Buzz Lightyear, the works.

Government Run Amok, Again

2011-01-14T09:16:00.002-06:00

As many of you my know, I am not a proponent of government. I believe they have a few things (relatively few) that they should do, and should keep away from doing anything else. Besides that, as they grow in size (and in organization grows in size) the application of common sense decreases exponentially.

For instance, Houston doesn't want people to feed the homeless. This couple was not asking for a government handout and then embezzling the money, they were doing it out of their own compassion and the donations of those they contacted. Apparently food regulators demand that they get a permit and have the food prepared in a certified kitchen. The money quote:

The regulations are all the more essential in the case of the homeless, Barton said, because "poor people are the most vulnerable to foodborne illness and also are the least likely to have access to health care."

If you read that correctly, the government officials are saying that "its OK if the homeless starve, as long as they don't get a foodborne illness from someone's home kitchen." When faced with the choice of no food vs. food that has a low likelihood of having a foodborne illness, which would you choose?

While the regulators may defend that the regulations keep the public safe by ensuring that restaurants have appropriate cleanliness standards, I say BS. It is the customers that ensure that the restaurants have cleanliness standards (the regulators aren't at the restaurants every day or even every week). If a customer sees a roach crawling around on the floor, he is going to leave and probably tell all of his friends about it who then will not go to the restaurant. Hence, business is lost and unless the restaurant turns itself around, there will be no more restaurant. So it is in the restaurants best interest to maintain those high standards even without the regulators. The free market is a rapid and harsh punisher (of course the rewards are beyond compare).

It is a fact that home kitchens are several times less sanitary than restaurants. That being said, you don't see a neighbor dieing everyday from food poisoning. It is also a fact that garbage cans and dumpsters are several times less sanitary than the home kitchen, and usually not a good place to be scrounging food. But that is the option that Houston has provided for its homeless. (So I think that Houston - as in the government - should provide meals and shelter for the homeless? NO WAY. But stay out of the way of those people who do want to.

Government Logic

2010-12-21T08:00:00.001-06:00

Looks like the government is finally going to go paperless next year. At last. Of course that doesn't bode well for the Post Office to lose another 120 million letters each year (but then again, I am not sure if the government actually had to pay for mailing those letters). In any case, there will be 120 million less expenses that the Post Office has, so maybe it is a good thing (especially if they are losing money on each letter anyway).

But of course, the policy is too good to be true. In spite of allowing direct deposit or money recharged onto a debit card, there had to be exceptions for those few who A) don't have a bank or B) don't shop at places with a debit card. The government estimates the number at 275,000. I estimate that number at 0 (counting for the fact that if you meet both A and B above, you shouldn't be in charge of your own finances).

Near the end I saw this gem:

"In addition to the automatic waiver from electronic payments for those 90 and over, people living in remote areas who might have trouble getting to a bank can also petition for a waiver from the new rules."

Why give 90+ people an automatic waiver in the first place? Are we saying they are incompetent? Do we give them a waiver for registering to vote as well and just assume they are voting Democratic since the majority of seniors do?

And the waiver for people who have trouble getting to a bank? Sending them a check is suppose to help them get to a bank? At least with direct deposit or the debit card it will save them a trip. With this waiver you are forcing them to continue their unnecessary trips in this modern age. With global warming/cooling/climate change looming large, we should actually be fining these people. This waiver is completely backward. If someone has trouble getting to the bank, they should have no option other than direct deposit or debit card.

Then again, I am not in charge of the government. I would probably be cruel and heartless and just not mail out any checks period.

Tax Hike....Punt!

2010-12-07T08:00:00.000-06:00

In case you haven't heard, President Obama is willing to make a deal on "tax cuts." Basically, when one looks at it, the deal is nothing more than a punt, for both Republicans and Democrats. To begin, what are some of the major economic negatives in our country right now:

1. Deficits in the trillions of dollars (few countries even have a GDP of 1 trillion, and we have a deficit of 1 trillion).
2. Unemployment of 9%+ (or 17%+ depending on which figure you want to use).
3. Anemic job growth (in spite of the stimulus spending which saved or created 3 million jobs).
4. Social Security in the red (i.e. it pays out more each year than it takes in).

So the Democrats and Republicans are worried about a tax hike, which they both contributed to 10 years ago. Funny how those things come back to bite you. And in an election year no less. At least they managed it in the mid-term election year rather than the presidential election year (then again, I'm not sure they had a choice in the matter). And after much bickering and whining we get this:

1. No increase in the base rates for two years (in other words, the vote will be to increase your taxes in two years). Why President Obama would agree to this (as opposed to a three year moratorium), I have no idea. Unless perhaps he is sick of the whole thing and wants to get back to being a Community Organizer. Two years puts the tax increase right back in an election year, except that this time, the Presidency will be up for grabs and the Senate in a big way (I think the Democrats will be defending 20+ seats in 2012, while the Republicans only have 10 seats to defend). If recent history is any judge, then having a tax fight in 2012 won't go any better than it did in 2010.

On the other hand the economy may turn around. Except that one of the reasons that the economy hasn't turned around is the uncertainty in the tax situation. What does a two year moratorium on the increase do? Not much. Businesses don't usually operate on a one or two year plan. In my current position, I have things planned out for 25 years. Hiring new employees (i.e. creating jobs) is usually a multi year commitment. You have to train them before you can begin to get your investment out of them. If they are not going to make your company more money than what you pay them (salary, benefits, and taxes), then you don't hire them. If you do, you are stupid and will be out of business soon enough.

So not only will the two year moratorium on tax increases just delay the fight until another election year, it is not going to do anything to spur job growth. But that is OK, because we have...

2. Extension of unemployment benefits by 13 months. I'm not sure of the details, but this may just be an extension on top of the 26 weeks that the States provide (at the direction of the federal government), or it may be an extension of the 99 total weeks that the States and Federal government had been providing. If it is the latter, then that means unemployment benefits are going to last for three years. If you know that you will get a check each week for three years, and you are just the slightest bit lazy, what incentive do you have to even bother being serious about looking for work during weeks 1 through 104 (i.e. first two years). As near as I can tell, this unemployment extension is not being offset by any spending cuts, so that means the deficit problem we had above is going to grow.

But Nancy Pelosi says that every $1 in unemployment returns $2 to the economy. Really? Where does that $1 come from in this case? Oh yeah, the economy. So if we get the $1 for $2, why not double the amount in each unemployment check? Oh there are diminishing returns? Why didn't you mention that. Does it work the opposite way? So if we cut unemployment in half do we get $4 returned to the economy for every $1 in unemployment? Why not do that? $4>$2. Do you mind showing me how you come up with the $2 figure anyway, and show how leaving that $1 in the economy in the first place wouldn't have created $2 or more by its own.

3. A decrease in the payroll tax of 2% for 1 year. Why just 1 year? Oh, yeah, so we don't have to have this fight in two years during an election. Also, it appears that the cut will be in place of President Obama's signature making work pay tax credit which applied to most everyone equally, whereas the payroll tax "disproportionately" helps the wealthy. From a personal standpoint, I am all in favor of this. Social Security is a scam (government run mind you, but still a scam) and I don't expect to see any of the money that has been confiscated from me for it.

From an economic issue (particularly in regards to the problems listed above) I am torn. More money in the hands of consumers (all consumers, even the really rich ones) is a good thing. And Social Security is the largest tax payment that most Americans pay (particularly when you consider the "matching contribution" from your employer). On the other hand, Social Security proponents have prided the fact that up until last year, Social Security was a self sustaining program, it covered all of its expenses each year (and lent the excess to the goverment to spend at their leisure). Now we are going to take away 1/6 of the Social Security taxes (approximately $100 billion) in a year when Social Security is already in the red. That is going to decrease the solvency of the "trust fund" further, and add to the deficit. And since it is only for 1 year, it won't help create any jobs. (On the other hand, I may be able to convince my wife that I can use that extra $2000 in 2011 to go towards purchasing a Barrett .50 BMG or we could just put in a new shower in the bathroom. Tough choice!).

And then there is some other froo froo stuff. The funniest thing of all, if this passes. It will be in a House, Senate, and Presidency that is all controlled by the Democratic party. Since it has no provisions that will create jobs (it encourages stagnation), cut the deficit (actually it will increase the deficit), or shore up Social Security (it does the opposite) and it puts these same issues off to be fought over again in 2012, barring any major change in the world (which always seems to happen anyway), the Democrats will have voted on their own demise from the Senate and probably the presidency and solidify the gains that the Republicans made in 2010 in the House (although redistricting will accomplish most of that anyway).

Never let a crisis go to waste. But if your going to, make sure you waste it in spectacularly stupid ways.

BTW, I have no love lost on the Republicans punt of this issue. They have no power other than the filibuster, yet are still getting basically what they want.

Social Media Actually Affects People's Lives

2010-12-06T08:00:00.000-06:00

So someone saw that people were constantly glued to facebook or twitter and they needed an experiment to see that they were "addicted"? I could have told you that for a lot less money and pain on the part of the participants. Why anyone would surmise that an activity you spend hours on each day does not affect you is a mystery to me.

Facebook, yes, I have an account. I check it about once a week. I block all Mafia Wars, Farmville, Turdville, and any other stupid game or poll on it. If I am going to waste my time for hours with computer games it will be Halo or Civilization.

Twitter. Never even gone to the homepage. From what I surmise it is facebook for your smartphone. Since I don't have a smartphone, I have no need for twitter. I have never texted either.

How to Get Rich Quick!

2010-12-03T08:00:00.000-06:00

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/10/07/stimulus-checks-sent-dead/
So, all you have to do is register a bunch of dead/nonexistent people for Social Security (which has never happened before) and the money starts rolling in? And their excuse is that their deaths weren't reported to the Social Security Administration? Except for the 17,000 where it was the fault of the Social Security Administration for not properly processing the payments in the first place.

I have a more brilliant idea. Why not we just not have Social Security in the first place, then we won't have the screw-ups of sending payments to dead people? (Isn't it amazing how many of our government's problems/inefficiencies/waste/screw-ups are a direct result of the policies/regulations/laws of the same government).

But then all of the old people will starve to death?

Oh, yeah, just like they were starving to death for the first 160 years of our country before Social Security.

Glenn Beck's Rally and the NY Mosque

2010-12-02T08:00:00.000-06:00

We shouldn't build a mosque at Ground Zero and Glenn Beck shouldn't have a rally on the day that Martin Luther King gave a speech. Both ideas bring up the same question? Why not?

If the guy wants to build a mosque is not involved in terrorism, why oppose him? Because it is sacred ground? Don't we allow Japanese technology at the USS Arizona site? Isn't that sacred ground. And just where does Ground Zero begin and end? Is it just the footprint of World Trade Center 1 and 2, or are all of the World Trade Center buildings a part of it? Does it extend out from the epicenter 200 feet? 1000 feet? 2000 feet? So at what distance would building a mosque not be offensive?

Glenn Beck held his rally on a weekend (probably so more people could attend). Since he is religious himself and probably the majority of the crowd was, it makes sense to have it on a Saturday so folks can go to church on Sunday (or just travel back home). Plus it was going to be in the summer (better chance of good weather), after school got out, but before Labor Day (don't want to appear as if he is intruding on the Unions holiday). The weekend of July 4 is out since that would obviously be pandering to people's patriotic senses. That only leaves about 10 days that it could be. Based on his scheduled commitments, I imagine that probably half of those were not feasible when he was planning it. So after consulting the schedulers who "rent" out the National Mall, there was probably 3 feasible days to choose from. He chose one. So do momentous speeches make dates sacred such that other events can't happen on them? And who gets to be the arbiter of whether YOUR event is appropriate? (BTW, maybe we should tell the terrorists that so that they don't attack us on 9/11, then we can have a day that we can go to the airport without worrying about whether we have a 4 oz tube of toothpaste or a pair of nail clippers in our pocket).

Homeschool Help

2010-12-01T15:44:00.002-06:00

My Oldest Son is doing a graph for school and needs your input. Please answer the following question in the comments so he can gather some data:

What is your favorite movie?
A. Star Wars
B. Indiana Jones
C. Shrek
D. High School Musical

(Please choose your favorite from the four options given. Remember, this is from the mind of an early elementary kid, so please keep it clean. Thanks!)

Going on Mecca Time!

2010-12-01T08:00:00.000-06:00

Some day we all may be looking to Mecca for the time. Or not. There are delusionals in every culture. The Arab world is no exception. Once they get over the fact that they long ago ceded their scientific knowledge to western Europe, then they will realize that the rest of the world isn't changing to Mecca time any time soon.

To begin, official time isn't kept by a giant clocktower. The giant clock tower in Greenwich is a mechanical device which isn't as accurate as the atomic clocks that are around today. Coordinated Universal Time is based on these atomic clocks and clock towers (or computers) are synced to those.

If Mecca wanted to become the "official" time keeper, they should have come up with time zones and the idea of standardization more than a century and a half ago. As it is, the British did largely due to maritime requirements for navigation, and railway requirements for standarized timetables. Even if the Greenwich Observatory vanished overnight tonight, the location of the Prime Meridian wouldn't change. And my clocks would still read 6:00AM when I roll out of bed (depending on how many times I hit the snooze button).

So, perhaps the Arab world should focus on an accomplishment that is easier to change than the entire time keeping system of the world. The US has been on the verge of going metric for 40 years now. There is a lot of sand over in Arabia, perhaps the semiconductor field might be easier to break into. (Of course to compete with Taiwan, Japan, and Korea you would have to admit that women are just as capable as men in the sciences.)

Would You Believe that Flood Insurance is Bankrupt?

2010-11-30T08:00:00.001-06:00

Yes, the National Flood Insurance Program is nearing bankruptcy. And any Tom, Dick, or Harry that has a modicum of knowledge about economics could see it coming from a long way off. The National Flood Insurance Program is for places that are too great of a risk for private insurers. Why is this?

Because they flood all of the time. Ergo, private insurers are smart enough to realize that these are sucker's bets. And private insurers don't take sucker's bets. But the government (in the name of compassion) is more than happy to. Well for 40 years the NFIP has been insuring these homes that shouldn't be insured, and rebuilding them, and rebuilding them again, and sometimes rebuilding them some more. I had a friend in Houston whose parents lived in a flood prone plain. Their home was flooded (as in you are sloshing through water on the first floor) at least three times over a 10-15 year period.

For those who may live in the desert, there is a reason why we don't live in the ocean and have more experience exploring the moon than the seas. Water tends to have the nasty habit of destroying things. Even "waterproof" things. Floods have the nasty habit of bringing water (and whatever else is in the vicinity - mud, oil, gasoline, algae, mold spores, etc.) into places we don't want it. All that stuff tends to destroy things faster than water does. Here's an experiment for you. Take a wet washcloth (not dripping wet, just more than damp) and leave it on your 14 step coated (including waterproof polyurethane top coat) dining room table (or chair, or china hutch, etc.) overnight. Be sure to have your Mom or Wife or Significant Other's permission before you do it. Now imagine that the table is immersed in water, for three days, and there happens to be some nice solvents mixed in as well.

My wife and I bought one rental property that also happened to be in the a flood plain. To be more precise, the very back corner of the lot (which dipped down towards the gulley behind it) was in the flood plain. The building itself was at least 50 feet away from the flood plain. The place had never flooded (and didn't have a basement to flood first either) in the thirty years it had been standing. Two houses on one side of it did not have any part of their property in the flood plain. Yet, because of the layout of the building and the street, both of them were actually closer to the boundaries of the flood plain than my structure was. Yet, I had to insure my property with flood insurance.

Flood insurance cost as much (if not a little more) than property insurance. I am sure that the private insurer loved my property since there was little to no chance of it ever flooding. Yet the premium I paid was the same as a building that sat inside the flood plain. Insurance companies make their money based on risk. They try to figure out how much risk there is to action A, and then charge you X amount of dollars to cover that risk (based on the amount of people they insure that are going to engage in action A). They are a great barometer for things like safety since unlike a government dictate that says action B is safe, the insurance company has to put its money where its mouth is.

So, they will give you discounts for wearing a seatbelt (a safe action), but don't give a rat's rear end about how many guns you have in your home (something that is irrelevant to safety). If however, you do want to insure your guns against theft or damage beyond what your home owners insurance will cover (or your jewlery, or rare baseball card collection), then the insurance company may want to know how it is stored (i.e. in the closet = higher premium, case hardened multi bolt safe = lower premium)

For human induced risks (automobile accidents, home owners insurance), they have a lot of data and aren't worried about losing money on the deal. There is not some huge rash of car accidents that is going to bankrupt some company. For environmental related risks (huricanes, flooding, forest fires, etc.) they are more leary because the risk is less predictable. Hence, premiums are higher, policies are more restrictive and in some cases they just won't insure you (hence the NFIP). For crackpot induced risks (war and terrorism), they don't insure at all. Not because the risk is high (it is actually miniscule), however the localized costs are unpredictable and range from 0 to ginormous. Its a lot easier to predict how much damage a Category 5 hurricane will do to a major metropolitan area than what the next terrorist attack will be.

NFIP on the other hand, really doesn't care about the costs. They probably charge something similar to what a private company would charge for a less risky place. If they charged what the market rate was (i.e. what would be needed so that the NFIP was not underwater), then no one would be able to afford to live someplace like that. This is not rocket science, its risk analysis. Every successful business (insurance or otherwise) has figure this out long ago. Why can't our government (frankly, I don't care why not, I don't want the government in that business anyway).

Profit is an excellent incentive to determine the cost of risk. The insurance industry has been doing it successfully for centuries. Government hasn't done it successfully yet.

But then some people will lose their homes.

Yep, and then we won't have to pay to rebuild them over and over and over again. We sold that property after a year of holding it. There was no positive cashflow, the flood insurance basically ate it all up.

GUN "Almost" FACTS 101: Assualt Weapons

2010-11-29T08:00:00.001-06:00

There is a series of videos from the organization "Protest Easy Guns" titled Gun Facts 101 that can be found on YouTube. Comments are not allowed so originally I had the idea of fisking them with my own video. Alas, that takes way too much time. So I just will do a line by line analysis of the "Almost Facts" (in italics) that are presented. The first one is Assault Weapons.

What is an assault weapon?
An assault weapon is a made up term by the gun control lobby from the late 1980s used to confuse people into thinking that they are machine guns. They're not. Semi-automatic firearms are distinct from assault rifles or machine guns in that they only fire one bullet with each pull of the trigger. Don't believe me, then let's just look at the words of the gun control lobby:

"Assault weapons—just like armor-piercing bullets, machine guns, and
plastic firearms—are a new topic. The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the
public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic
assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a
machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on
these weapons. In addition, few people can envision a practical use for these
weapons." -Josh Sugarman Violence Policy Center report Assault Weapons and
Accessories in America 1988 at http://www.vpc.org/studies/awaconc.htm

So to start with this debate is about a made up term with the gun control groups trying to capitalize on the confusion their made-up term engenders.

An assault weapon is a gun that is designed to be spray fired from the hip.
Spraying from the hip is a Hollywood anachronism. No competent military or law enforcement agency in the world teaches people to shoot from the hip. It exposes the entire person's body to return fire, it is less accurate, and there is no backstop (like a shoulder) to aid in the control of recoil. Some light machine guns CAN be fired from the hip while a soldier is moving to another position, but this is mainly to lay down supressive fire, not actually trying to hit anything. However, it wasn't specifically designed for this purpose.

In fact no firearm in current use was designed to be “spray fired from the hip”. A pistol grip actually hinders your limited ability to shoot from the hip, because of the awkward angle that you have to put your hand and wrist in. Of course, if you only believe half of what you see on TV and in the movies you would think that the majority of people can be deadly accurate shooting from the hip.

They were created to be used in trench warfare when soldiers found that regular long rifles did not suit them in the trenches.
The last major war where trench warfare was widely used was WWI. It was basically a failure as an offensive concept, but decent for a defensive concept. If you wanted to take land or move your lines forward, you had to get out of the trench, which exposed your whole body and run towards the enemy line a couple of hundred yards away. Meanwhile, the enemy gets to sit in their defensive position with only a portion of their head showing and take pot shots at you for the 60 seconds it takes you to cover the distance. Mustard gas could be used by either side.

Where long barreled rifles might be a hinderance is the few times that one side actually got soldiers in the other side's trenches. During WWI the most common infantry weapon on both sides was a bolt action rifle. They also had a bayonet which was good for stabbing people. But the best weapon for invading a trench was the shotgun. Yep, the same one people had been using to hunt game for 50 years (and its predecessor for 100 years before that). The soldiers found that if they shortened the barrel it was much more manueverable in the tight confines of the trenches. Except when the gun control lobby talks about assault weapons, they aren't talking about sawed off shotguns, those were already regulated by the 1934 National Firearms Act.

They were used for decades primarily in war.
Well, if we are talking about the bolt action rifles that were used in the trenches of Europe, then yes, some bolt action rifles have been used by militaries for almost a century. However, if you are talking about the assault rifles (those selective fire weapons that “assault weapons” look like), well they haven't been around that long.

The first assault rifle, the Sturmgewehr (which happens to be where the assault rifle term is derived from) wasn't developed until the middle of World War II. The AK-47 was put in service after World War II and the M16 was developed at the beginning of the Vietnam war. So, yeah they have been used for decades. And since most every country with a stable government restricts ownership of assault rifles, they have been used primarily by the military.

On the other hand, the WASR-10 and AR-15, semiautomatic versions of the assault rifle (semiautomatic means one shot for one pull of the trigger), have never been used by any nation's military. The lack of selective fire makes them inferior to their assault rifle counterparts which can fire in single shot, burst, or fully automatic mode. So, no, assault weapons have never been used primarily in war.

About 30 years or ago or so the gun industry in an effort to address a declining gun sales,
In the early 80s, there was a slump in the gun industry. Heck there was a slump in the entire country, take a look at a graph of the stock market. Gun sales declined more than 30% between the middle of 1981 to the middle of 1982. The stock market declined a little over 20% during this same period. So the fact that the gun industry had a slump during a time of the US having a slump is no surprise. Furthermore, this slump was followed by a 60% increase in the US market, (meaning there was more wealth to be had) by 1984. This provided the perfect opportunity for firearm manufacturers to increase sells and market some of their pricier firearms.

modified a weapon for civilian use and started marketing assault weapons heavily towards civilians.
While some military firearms were modified into semiautomatic versions during this time, like the Uzi, firearm manufacturers had marketed “assault weapons” to the civilian population for more than a decade. The M1A is a semiautomatic version of the M14 Assault Rifle and came out in 1974. The AR-15 (semiautomatic version of the M16) had been marketed since the end of the Vietnam War when the Colt firearms company found that some returning soldiers liked the rifle they had become accustomed to in Vietnam. Even semiautomatic versions of the AK-47 were available in the US before 1980.

In any respect, the so called “assault weapons” market was a niche market throughout the 80s. A couple of events helped shape the increase in the popularity of assault weapons. First, the Hughes Amendment to the Gun Control Act banned the civilian ownership of any fully automatic machine gun that was not already registered in 1986. So, the supply of true assault rifles was limited causing their prices to drastically increase (from $1000 to $10-20,000). This now meant that the only economical way to own an AK-47 or an M16 was to purchase a semiautomatic version.

The second development, was that the patents on the AR-15/M-16 had all expired so several companies began making semiautomatic versions of the AR-15 that before only Colt could produce. Third, in the late 80s and beyond, there began to be serious talk about “banning assault weapons.” Firearm enthusiasts saw what limiting the supply of assault rifles had done from the Hughes Amendment, and firearm manufacturers saw the potential to capitalize on this.

So, whereas before in the 1970s and early 80s, the “assault weapons” was small and contained a relative few companies, the developments listed above caused “assault weapons” to rapidly gain market share. In other words, the popularity (and subsequent proliferation) of “assault weapons” was caused by the very people who sought to put restrictions on those firearms.

The danger with assault weapons is that bullets fired from assault weapons can go through doors,
Well, yeah, that is true. But then again, almost any rifle round including the venerable .22LR (what they shoot at Boy Scout Camp) can go through doors. Let's face it, they don't make oak doors like they did in the middle ages. Even the metal clad doors of today are usually foam filled. Foam is just not a good bullet stopper. About the only type of projectile that won't go through metal clad doors is birdshot. For wooden doors, all bets are off. And for the hollow core interior doors found in most homes in America, a good punch with your fist will go through it so how do you expect it to stop a bullet?

they generally can pierce many of the bullet proof vests that law enforcement wears,
OK, lets get something clear here. There is no such thing as a bulletproof vest. There are bullet resistant vests which are made in various levels of protection. As with most things, there are trade-offs. The more protection, the higher the weight and decreased maneuverability. In America, almost every police force wears vests that provide protection against the majority of handgun cartridges. Why? Because 95-99% of the time that they may be shot, it will be with a handgun round. “Assault weapons” like the AR-15, fire rifle rounds. They will go through pistol rated vests without a problem. Your average hunting rifle cartridge, like a .30-06 is two to 10 times as powerful as the cartridges used in “assault weapons.”

so they pose a particular threat to law enforcement.
Really? And what about the rest of us who don't wear body armor all day long. There is nothing like stating the obvious.

In fact we know from data that 1 in 5 law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty was killed with an assault weapon.
I like when people throw out statistics, they usually don't know what they are talking about. Remember, “assault weapons” fire rifle cartridges. Body armor worn by police is not designed to defeat body armor. Since this video was made in 2007, I looked at the FBI's report for Law Enforcement Officers killed or assaulted. http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/killed/2006/feloniouslykilled.html

For the previous 10 year period, 562 officers were killed (521 were killed with a firearm). Right below that number on table 27 is the number of officers killed with a rifle, 105. Or 1 in 5. Is this where they get their statistic, they don't say. Looking at table 33, we find that 79 were from the most common calibers of “assault weapons”, .223, 5.56, 7.62, and .30. Other calibers may be used in “assault weapons”, but these “assault weapon” calibers are also used in non “assault weapons.” Since the FBI doesn't define “assault weapons” they don't break any data out.

So, based on this I would say that 79 of 562 or 1 in 7 is killed by a so called “assault weapon.” However, that is because the “assault weapon” calibers are rifle cartridges, and the body armor is not designed to defeat it. Of course, even then table 39 shows that only 15 of these 79 deaths were cases where the bullet went through the body armor (because it wasn't designed to defeat it. The other 64 deaths were when a bullet hit where body armor was not protecting the officer (as in the officer wasn't wearing it or he was hit in the leg, groin, arm, neck, or head). All 64 of these deaths would likely have occured if it had been a pistol round instead. Only one death was from a pistol round that defeated the body armor. So our 1 in 5, which became 1 in 7 is actually "1 in 37 (15 in 562) police officers killed were killed by an 'assault weapon' caliber bullet which defeated their body armor". In other words, “assault weapons” are dangerous to police officers because they fire rifle rounds. Of course, regular rifles do to.

The US had an assault weapon ban for 10 years it expired in 2004,
Yep, from 1994 to 2004. It had a sunset provision attached to it because it couldn't get the necessary votes to pass without one. In 2004, Sen. Fienstein tried to renew the ban but the bill it was attached to was soundly defeated 8 to 90. The Democrats loss of the house of Representatives in 1994 was credited to the AWB, giving Republicans control of Congress for the first time in 40 years.

and the ban that was set up was riddled with loopholes.
This is a funny argument, especially since during the ban, and after, gun control groups were praising all of the good things that it did. Besides, there is nothing wrong with loopholes. If the gun control groups didn't want them at the time, then they should have lobbied more to get them taken out. Gun control groups didn't start saying that the AWB was “riddled with loopholes" until after it had expired and several non-partisan studies (including ones done by the government) found no connection between the AWB and a reduction in crime. Frankly, the amount of crime commited with “Assault weapons” is so small, that statistically, any changes probably would not show up anyway.

This chart shows the guns that were originally banned here on the left column,
This chart is very misleading, it calls the AR-15 and the AK-47 assault rifles. Assault rifles are capable of fully automatic fire and are used by militaries throughout the world. Any AR-15/M-16 or AK-47 that is capable of fully automatic fire is regulated by the 1934 National Firearms Act. The AWB did absolutely nothing to increase the regulation or ban assault rifles. Zilch. Nada.

and then the gun industry made some slight modifications to comply with law
That is because the AWB, defined an assault weapon based on the cosmetic features that a firearm had. Basically, it is like saying that if you have a spoiler, a sunroof, and two exhaust pipes on your car then it is a sportscar. Under this definition, a custom conversion van could be a sportscar. None of the features actually are important to the function of the car, they are there to look pretty. So what were the cosmetic features that constituted an “assault weapon”:

Folding stock – decreases overall length of firearm
Telescoping stock – allows different sized individuals to shoot the firearm comfortably
Pistol grip – due to the buttstock being inline with the barrel for better recoil control, this is necessary to have control of the weapon with the firing hand.
Bayonet mount – cool to have, but relatively useless. No known crime has been committed with a bayonet mounted on a rifle.
Threaded barrel (for flash supressor) – a flash supressor is a safety feature to decrease (not eliminate) the chance of flash blindness while shooting in low light conditions
Grenade launcher – No, not the kind that you see slung under modern military weapons, this was one that went on the end of the barrel. All of the grenades for it are restricted by the 1934 NFA so you wouldn't be able to get them, they are good for launching tennis balls though.
Barrel Shroud – this covers the barrel so that you don't burn your hand when you touch the barrel during or after firing.
Detachable magazine – lots of firearms have detachable magazines, the AWB singled out those that are not part of the pistol grip, probably so that they didn't accidentally ban the manufacture of pistols which every law enforcement agency in the country was using.

and ended up creating copycat weapons
Note that not a single one of these features affect the actual firing potential of a firearm. To be scientific, the potential lethality of a firearm is a function of its energy. Energy is a product of mass and velocity. Mass is the bullet size, velocity is a function of cartridge size and barrel length. These lethal features, bullet mass, cartridge size, and barrel length were not found anywhere in the AWB.

that were not within the spirit of the law
We are not in church here. Because the ultimate arbiter of the US laws, the Supreme Court, is made up of people, who are fallible and open to a myriad of interpretations, and not an omnipotent God, we don't rule in this country based on the “spirit of the law.” If we did that, then corrupt government officials could always invoke the “spirit of the law” whenever they wanted to put you away. That's a dictatorship or an oligarchy. We didn't sign up for that in 1787. Laws are written in very specific language so that their interpretation can be as narrow as possible. If we want to be governed by the “spirit of the law”, then lets get rid of the thousands of pages of federal law (including the constitution) and just pass a law that says “Be nice to people.” That would work!

but were within the letter of the law.
Exactly. The gun control lobby helped craft and pass a law that only affected cosmetic features. The gun manufacturers did away with those cosmetic features and sold essentially the same firearm, because the law only governed cosmetic features.

So even with the AWB we had assault weapons that were legally sold.
One thing to point out again, is that even if the law had have banned manufacture of something that actually affected firepower and no new pseudo law compliant “assault weapons” were sold, it did not prohibit the ownership or selling of pre-ban "assault weapons" already on the market. In other words, if you had a semiautomatic AR-15 that was manufactured in July of 1994, it was still perfectly legal to own and sell that AR-15 on October 1, 1994 and beyond. The AWB only banned new manufacture of certain cosmetic features. Although, even then that is generous, you had to have a certain number of cosmetic features, so really the AWB banned new manufacture of certain combinations of cosmetic features.

Some states like NY still have AWB in place, but in NY we still have those loopholes so that these post ban assault weapons can still be purchased in NY also.
Yes, some states like NY, MA and CA have never met legislation that supposedly limits firearms that they didn't like. Most of the rest of the country realized this silliness long ago.

The reason that they impose a particular danger is because the velocity
OK, now we get to actually facts again. As I already mentioned, danger=lethality=f(energy)=f(mass, velocity). However, the cartridges they fire are considered intermediate power rifle cartridges. The guns that hunters commonly use are full power rifle cartridges and just as deadly (if not more so) than “assault weapons.”

and the way they fire,
Huh? They fire by pulling the trigger. This isn't a unique feature for “assault weapons”, pretty much every handheld firearm since the 1500s has fired by pulling the trigger (in fact the term fire is derived from the fact that the first cannons and firearms had to have a lighted fuse -- the fire -- touched to the flashpan or fusehole to ignite the main charge). If we are going to quibble and say that we are talking about the semi-automatic nature of the firearms, well, those have been around since the 1880s. If they really mean fully automatic fire, well then they are lieing since no “assault weapon” is capable of fully automatic fire and wouldn't be regulated by the AWB anyway.

the fact that their designed to spray fire
Once again, this statement is untrue. A claymore mine is designed to spray fire, a showerhead is designed to spray fire. If an “assault weapon” was designed to spray fire, then it wouldn't have such essential features for aimed fire as butt stock, sights, and fore end guard. Also, it would be better suited if it was fully automatic, since spray fire with a semi-automatic is difficult to accomplish.

and that they are an attractive weapon to those bent on mass murders
Ah yes, if the criminals like it then lets get rid of it. Just as an exercise lets go through some of the largest mass murders in the US and see how many of them were attracted to the “assault weapons”:

9/11 – 3000 dead, weapon of choice – airplanes that had full fuel tanks
Oklahoma City bombing – 168 dead, weapon of choice – fertilizer explosive
Happyland Arson – 87 dead, weapon of choice – gasoline and fire
Bath School Disaster – 45 dead, weapon of choice – dynamite and pyrotol
Virginia Tech Massacre – 32 dead, weapon of choice - .22 pistol and 9mm pistol (neither of which was regulated by the AWB)

Are you seeing a pattern here? Mass murderers like to use explosives and fire. The only time that firearms are used for mass murder is when you have all of your “unarmed” victims in a small area with limited exits, like a classroom. And even then any firearm will work, the key is your victims are unarmed. You never hear of mass shootings at police stations, gun shows, or NRA conventions. Mass murderers don't seek out "assault weapons." The seek out explosives and fire.

such as the Columbine murders
Interestingly, only one of the four weapons used by the Columbine killers could be a considered an “assault weapon”. The TEC-DC9 was an AWB compliant version of the banned TEC-9 (remember the AWB meant that you couldn’t manufacture new ones, not that you couldn’t possess and sell previously manufactured ones). The Hi-Point 995 carbine wasn’t even first manufactured until after the AWB was in place. It was specifically designed to be compliant with the assault weapons ban. It isn’t used by any military in the world. There may be some police forces that have it, but that is because they don’t have the money to buy rifle caliber carbines.

Did I forget to mention that both of these guns are semi-automatic (remember one shot for one pull of the trigger). The other two weapons, a pump action shotgun and a double barreled shotgun, were in no way regulated by the AWB. The killers did saw off the barrels which violated the 1934 National Firearms Act.

and the DC snipers who used an assault weapon.
The DC snipers did use what gun control groups claim is an “assault weapon”. A Bushmaster XM-15 which is based on the AR-15 design. The XM-15 is a semiautomatic rifle (remember one shot per pull of the trigger) that fires a cartridge that is popularly used for target shooting and varmint hunting. Yes, varmints, like ground hogs and squirrels. They didn’t use any spray fire techniques, hence the name the DC snipers not the DC spray firers.

So did they choose this weapon because it was particularly suited to mass murder? Not really. One of the killers had served in the US Army and so was familiar with the M16 assault rifle (the selective fire kind). The XM-15 platform is a semiautomatic version of the M16. So he chose the weapon he was most familiar with. Is it a suitable weapon for a sniper? Technically, any weapon is suitable for a sniper if he can shoot a target from a concealed position. The DC sniper shootings were done at a range of 50-100 yards. Every rifle in existence can be an effective sniper weapon from this distance. Is an M16 or similar rifle used by military and police snipers? No, military and police snipers usually use a bolt action rifle designed for distance and accuracy. By this simplified definition though, any decent hunting rifle could be a “sniper rifle.”
In summary, “assault weapons” are no more deadly than any other firearm.

So, if you want to ban "assault weapons," at least be honest and say that you want to ban all firearms. Then we can sit down and have a respectful conversation. In the meantime, I'm going to go throw some lead down range.

And You WANT Government Run Healthcare?

2010-10-24T08:21:00.003-05:00

My wife blogs about a little bureaucracy at the school. And our kids only go one day a week as part of the Home School Assistance Program. Of course we all know that the smartest health professionals are hired by our public schools.

"The TROUBLE comes when you have to enroll your child in a school and you have three different states regulations and doctor's decision involved. If even one shot is given at the 'wrong' time according to your current state's bureaucrat's rules they'll kick your child out of school until you 'correct' the problem."

Generic Peanut Butter is Not the Same as Generic Drugs

2010-10-12T16:25:00.003-05:00

While driving home today, I heard a comment from a candidate for an office in Arizona. She was a physicist. While talking about how Obamacare was wrong for the country she brought up as support that we were all being forced to use generic drugs and sometimes they work, but sometimes they don't work as well as the name brands. With all of things that are wrong with Obamacare, generic drugs are not one of them (mandating generic drugs is, but mandating name brand drugs would be just as wrong, as is mandating coverage of pre-existing conditions).

First off, my guess is the physicist doesn't understand something about generic drugs. This can be excused. I'll take peanut butter as an example. If you go to Walmart, they sell the brand of peanut butter that God eats, Skippy. They also sell, Peter Pan and their own no-name brand. Or generic peanut butter. Generic peanut butter is not the same thing as Skippy. They are chemically different. The ingredients (and proportions of ingredients) are different. This is because Skippy's special recipe is protected by trade secret (which means the company doesn't tell anyone). Coca Cola, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, and McDonald's Special Sauce are likewise protected as trade secrets.

Trade secrets are good, if your company is able to keep it a secret. No one can breach a trade secret. Not because the courts will prevent them (on the contrary, the courts have no jurisdiction over mere trade secrets), but because the companies jealously guard the secret. I have heard (but can't confirm because I am not one of them) that there are only two executives at Coca Cola that know the entire formula and they are not allowed to be in the same location together. The KFC recipe of 11 herbs and spices is mixed at separate facilities and then combined at a third. A trade secret gives the company a monopoly on their corner of the world as long as the secret remains a secret.

Drugs on the other hand are not protected by trade secrets. Not a single one of them (at least not any that are anywhere close to coming to market). Drugs are patented early on in the process and as part of it, their chemical makeup is divulged. They are then tested, retested, retested, and retested before being blessed by the FDA. It is really a race against time from when the drug is patented to when it is finally approved and marketed to have enough time left on the exclusivity of the patent to make back the investment. The patent process protects the invention (in this case a drug) so that the owner of the patent has exclusive rights to make or sell license to make that particular drug.

Once the patent time runs out, it is fair game for anyone. Companies that make generic drugs don't waste valuable dollars on R&D, they make tried and true formulas which they get for free from the patent office. The drug they make is approved by the FDA because IT IS THE EXACT SAME AS THE ORIGINAL. OK, that is not true. Company A stamps their pill "R-87" while Company B stamps their pill "5N0P". The active ingredients are the same, the inactive ingredients are the same, the dose is the same (and usually the size and shape are the same - unless that is protected by a different patent).

So Skippy peanut butter tastes better than generic peanut butter because it different. Equate Acetiminephin works identical to Tylenol because they are the same thing. Whats more, in some cases the generic brands are made by subsidiaries of the name brand companies. Furthermore, in a lot of cases the generic companies will sell their drugs to everyone. So not only is Walmart Tylenol the same as K-mart Tylenol and Kroger's Tylenol and Walgreen's Tylenol, more than likely they came off the same assembly line and just were detoured to a different labeling machine.

So to say that generic drugs sometimes work and sometimes don't work as well as name brands is patently false. If the generic doesn't work one of two things is happening: 1) the name brand doesn't work either or 2) you have a psychological response that is inhibiting the drug (sort of a reverse placebo effect). In case #2, this is an expensive problem that you should be able to solve with a little positive thinking and getting rid of your irrational fears.

Office Supplies and Booby Traps

2010-10-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

It seems there has been some pilfering going around the office. It was brought up at our morning meeting s this last week. Why someone needs to "borrow" a stapler from one desk when they can ask their admin assistant to order the Whamodyne 9000 Paper Perforator, I'll never know. Personally, I think the company has an unlimited budget for office supplies. I have never been turned down for a request.

So after this was brought up, I raised a question:

Me: "Since we have this pilfering going on, can we booby trap our cubicles?"

Manager (immediately without thinking): "Everyone else can, but you can't!"

Me: "Why not me?"

Manager: "Because I have seen your teddybear mortar and I have heard your conversations about your hobbies. If I gave you permission I have no doubt that a) you would do it and b) it would be effective."

Logic Fail - As Seen At Work Edition

2010-10-05T06:59:00.002-05:00

Normally, I don't blog at work. But, I got in the office today and received the following email:

"This is a real issue across the board. Everyone cannot do everything well. Especially in speciality fields. "You can't count on a dentist for heart surgery" Both are MD's."

Um ... no. A heart surgeon has an MD (Doctor of Medicine). He went to medical school. A dentist has a DDS (Doctor of Dental Surgery) or DMD (Doctor of Dental Medicine). While the DMD may have MD in the acronym, it is not the same thing. A dentist goes to dental school. Dental school and Medical school are not anywhere close to the same thing. An MD that specializes in mouth stuff is called an orthodontist.

So while it would be correct to say that both are doctors, both are not MD's. Of course it would also be correct to say that a college professor and a heart surgeon are doctors.

Cheerleader Outfits

2010-09-18T16:07:00.003-05:00

As I sit and watch some college football, I have a question to pose. If your cheerleader outfit consists of a short skirt and a bare midriff, why do you have long sleeves?

Face it, in spite of all the athletic/gymnastic prowess that you profess (and probably do) have, as a cheerleader, you are eye candy. Your purpose at the game is not to rally the fans (the team will do that just fine if they play), your purpose is to serve to take the male mind off of a horrible game that he has probably paid $25-$100 for. Don't believe me, during a well played game that goes down to the wire, try either a) putting on a burqa or b) stripping down to nothing, and no one will notice you.

OK, that is not entirely true, if you chose option (b) then there will be a cadre of fans that will pay attention to you. Having gone to a university that didn't have cheerleaders, I remember when the game was turning into a blowout the conversation would end up being whether the opposing teams' cheerleaders were worth watching. After about 3 touchdowns they always were.

Of course, one thing that has continued to perplex me is why schools with conservative/religious values/reputations (Baylor, BYU, SMU, TCU, etc) even have cheerleaders? I guess the idea that they are athletes somehow convinces some people.

Movie Review: Reign of Fire

2010-09-06T08:00:00.000-05:00

The other night, my wife and I had nothing to do at home, so after flipping through the channel guide I asked if she wanted to watch a dumb movie. Sure. Reign of Fire was on. Now, I had never seen the movie before, but I had read about it at Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics.

It definitely lived up to its review. Stupid to the nth power. If I had have seen this movie when it came out, I would never have let my wife talk me into watching any movie with Matthew McConnahay (sic) in it. Having the image of the suave ladies man, just makes it hilarious to see him as a shave headed commando (still talking in the slight Texas drawl).

The whole idea of dragons not being able to see well at dusk and dawn sounded good, until you saw the final battle and saw that the dragon could see rather fine at dusk. And if all of your heavy weaponry didn't work, why would you even assume that a battle axe was going to do anything. (Hint: It doesn't.)

As with most stupid movies, I lost 2 hours of my life to this that will never be recovered.

Teen Mom: "I'm Broke"

2010-09-05T08:00:00.000-05:00

I saw this headline at the checkout stand at the grocery store on US Magazine. I have never read US magazine and have no desire to (as well as every other magazine that is on the checkout stand).

Why would a magazine boast such an obvious statement? Teenagers don't happen to have a whole lot of marketable skills - hence, the reason they are paid minimum wage as opposed to $100,000. I am assuming that the girl pictured is probably 15-17. Next, teenage moms, particularly single teenage moms are among the poorest demographic in the country. Turns out the lack of marketable skills combined with the expenses of a newborn end up resulting in poverty.

From reading more on the cover, I figured out that there is a reality show about teenage moms. Guess what, reality tv doesn't pay a whole lot (unless you have previously made a sex tape and are famous for being famous). The whole rise of the reality tv genre was to counter the fact that actor/actress based shows were getting very expensive.

So, if you are a network TV exec (remember the primary goal of for profit companies, even media ones, is to make a profit) and you have the TV show "Friends" which costs at least $6 million per episode with 22 episodes per season. And there are 8 million people that watch "Friends" regularly. That is $132 million each season.

On the other hand, someone pitches you the idea of "Survivor". There will be 16 episodes, and the grand prize will be $1 million dollars. All the contestants will just be ordinary people who want their 15 minutes of fame. Even though you are putting them in an exotic local, and you plan on spending gobs of money on sets and stuff, in the end, the cost per episode is only about $1 million. Total cost $17 million. Oh yeah, and you are going to get 8 million people to watch it. So which do you choose?

I can't imagine that whatever channel has the teenage mom show is paying the teenage moms anything more than $100,000 per season (probably more like $10,000). On it you probably have a bunch of narcissitic teens who are looking for their 15 minutes of fame. More than likely they are as good with money decisions as they are in deciding the best time to start a family.

So "Teen Mom: "I'm Broke"" - NO DUH!!

College Football and the DVR

2010-09-03T08:00:00.000-05:00

Last night, I found out why God inspired someone to make the DVR. College Football. I had started recording the Utah/Pitt game while I was out at some other activities. I arrived home and was able to start watching it at 9:45 (at the beginning of the 3rd quarter).

Fast forward was great. Slow motion was great. Skipping all of the commercials and halftime was great. Pausing so I could review the stats was great. In the end, I go through the entire game in about 1-1/2 hours. I was about 5 minutes late at the end to see overtime live, but thats fine.

I think I will have to do more planning so that I only take 1.5 hours per football game this season rather than 4 hours. That should make my wife happy.

Whoever invented the DVR, St. Peter has a free entry pass when you die!

Environmentalism Gone Nuts!

2010-08-31T06:00:00.000-05:00

At the office yesterday, we briefly discussed an issue with some equipment. It seems Mother Nature likes to continuously grow slimy lifeforms on said equipment which makes for a slip hazard when people walk on it. Solution: Use a biocide.

But not just any biocide, one that is safe for the environment. I heard this and my jaw dropped open. Herbicides kill plants (herb=plant, cide=to kill), pesticides kill pests (pest=pest, cide=to kill), insecticides kill insects (do I still need to spell it out?), fungicides kill fungi (pretty cool naming convention, huh?). So what do biocides kill?

Bio=life. That's right, biocides kill everything. There is no such thing as an "environmentally safe" biocide. That's why its called a biocide!

I kept my mouth shut. You can't win them all

I Ain't 16 Anymore

2010-08-30T10:00:00.000-05:00

Four days in the office, primarily spent sitting at a desk or a conference table, followed by a Friday morning of shooting rifles and shotguns, followed by a Saturday morning of playing softball, all leads to a Sunday of sore muscles and not being able to bend the way you want to.

I don't remember this happening when I was 16.

Guess What: Business Outsmarts the Federal Government, AGAIN!

2010-08-03T08:00:00.000-05:00

The new banking law just went into effect, lo and behold, the banks have found a way to recoup the fees that they lost from the law. I've mentioned this before, but this outcome was totally predictable. A "free" people (or group of people in the case of a business entity) whose purpose is to make money (which is the ultimate goal of every business, otherwise they would be a charitable organization) will ALWAYS outwit anything but the most draconian government. Profit trumps regulation every single time. Sure it may take a while, and the business may have to jump through some hoops, but regulation alone cannot deny profit.

Totalitarian governments on the other hand have shown that they can squash profits, of course then you usually end up with one of two scenarios: 1) the people revolt and throw off said tyranny (not necessarily in a violent way, case in point Shanghai and Hong Kong two of the most capitalistic places in the world despite being in communist China) or 2) the country remains as a third world backwater (a la North Korea), which will eventually lead to 1.

Rest In Peace Rosemary

2010-08-02T19:32:00.004-05:00

I found out this afternoon that my friend Rosemary passed away this morning after being diagnosed with cancer six months ago. I met her a little more than three years ago. Two years ago I began to help her and her husband rebuild their home which had been flooded. She was involved in her church, in the community, and raised a great family.

Last year, I took her shooting for the first time in her life at the age of 75. She was about 5' 2" and weighed maybe 110 pounds with all of her winter clothes on. While others were starting off with a .22 LR, she picked up the 9mm and asked how to load it. And then continued to shoot it after commenting that "That kicks a little." She continued on and tried out the AK-47, the SKS, the Saiga-12, and the Mosin-Nagant. Her comment at the end, "That was fun, I'd like to do it again."

Unfortunately, we didn't get the chance to go shooting again together. Perhaps John Moses, Jonathan, Samuel, Eliphalet, Oliver, Horace, Daniel, Edmund, Theodor, Sergei, John, Samuel, John, Richard, Nikolay, Sergei, Fedor, Christian, Hiram, Benjamin, Paul, Wilhelm, David or Leon will invite you to go shooting with them.

How Exactly Does One Go About Boycotting BP?

2010-07-17T08:00:00.000-05:00

With BP capping the well finally, I was wondering if someone could explain to me how they went about boycotting BP for the horrible, evil, wicked thing they did.

I mean, boycotting something like Starbucks is easy (like the Brady Campaign was trying to do), you just don't shop there. Boycotting a multinational entertainment corporation like Disney (like the Christian Coalition did when they began providing benefits to gay employee's partners) is a little more difficult. Sure you can not go see the "Disney" movies, but do you also extend it to not getting the Happy Meal toys? What about if your daughter's friend has a Disney Princess birthday party during your boycott?

Boycotting a state like Utah (which the anti Prop-8 tried to d0) starts to border on the absurd. So you don't travel to Utah. What about connecting flights through Salt Lake City? It is really funny since Utah wasn't the ones who passed Prop 8, and even if none of the Mormons in California voted, Prop 8 still would have passed. Of course the entertainment industry in California has a significant interest in the Sundance Film Festival. What about companies headquartered in Utah? Do those need to be boycotted as well? What if the company started in Utah but later moved to a more tax advantaged place like Delaware or the Bahamas? How about agriculture products like alfalfa and salt? Should those be included in the boycott? Finally, there is a big rail line that goes through the Beehive state. Do we not use products that were brought to us on that rail line?

Questions like these help to show why boycotts rarely (if ever) even have an affect on their intended target. If it is a small localized organization that is being boycotted, then you might (MIGHT!) have some success. With BP, you won't. Do you start with not buying gasoline from BP branded gas stations? Well, this is only going to have an effect if you were buying from BP to begin with. OH, except that those gas stations are simply that, BP branded. They are independently owned and operated and only sell gasoline that happens to have BPs special mix of chemicals (but the gasoline itself may have been refined by Shell, using oil from Exxon). So, what else do you buy from BP. Well, nothing directly. BP doesn't sell much of anything to end consumers. However, they do provide materials to other businesses that make stuff. Oil is used to make fuel, plastics, food, medicine, asphalt, tires, paints, etc. The list goes on and on. Oil is one of the most versatile products out there (which is probably why it is such a major part of our economy. So, I guess if you are going to boycott BP, you can just not use all of those products that are made from oil. Because some small fraction of every plastic water bottle you buy is going to BP (the oil all gets mixed together anyway).

Of course, then your life would be like living in the dark ages.

Public Parking in San Jose

2010-07-16T12:00:00.000-05:00

OK, I understand that parking is a premium in San Jose. The hotel had valet parking for $21 a day. The company may be paying for it, but I am not going to try to justify that. The public lot across the street from the hotel was $1.25/15 minutes, maximum of $20, and $9 overnight if you got there after 5 pm.

Except there were some caveats that weren't listed. When you arrived before 5pm, you got a ticket and then you would pay on exit to the boothman. If you arrived after 5pm, you paid $9 to the boothman right away and as long as you were gone by 8am, no other charge. However, the boothman wasn't there from midnight to 8 am. So, if you arrived before 5pm, you got a ticket and then if your car stayed there over night and left before 8am, you paid nothing since there was no one to take your money (and the gate was left open between midnight and 8am.

The second night I tried to explain this to the boothman since I was getting there before 5pm, but he didn't want to take my money. Oh well, I tried.

Movie Review: Transformers

2010-07-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

This can't be a full movie review since I didn't see part of the movie. It was on TV late one night and I was vegging. I will admit, the transforming was cool for about the first 10 minutes. Then it became annoying. I grew up with transformers, and part of the cool thing about them is that you could partially tell what the robot transformed into. These ones, you couldn't tell by looking at them.

Best line had to be "Based on the boy's pheromone levels, he wants to mate with the young woman." Which brings me to Megan Fox. Eye candy, yes. Acting ability, no. Lines, I don't remember her saying much.

The other thing that I found disappointing was the autobots, Optimus Prime in particular, were wusses to the nth degree (excepting Bumblebee). Optimus kept on getting beat up and it was up to the kid to beat Megatron at the end. Which reminds me, didn't Megatron transform into a gun (a giant Walther PPK) in the cartoons? I'm not even sure what Megatron was in this.

Finally, what the heck was this Allspark thing? A giant 100 foot cube that transforms down to a handy 1 foot cube for transport. Anyway, the storyline that I saw didn't make much sense, but maybe that was because I didn't see the beginning.

A Travel Dream

2010-07-16T04:00:00.000-05:00

OK, so it wasn't really a dream. It all started on Monday morning. Waking up, my stomach felt queasy. I had a flight that I needed to leave for in an hour or so. I got dressed and then proceeded to lay down on the living room floor. About 45 minutes later, I proceeded to the bathroom and violently relieved my stomach of its contents.

Vomiting does have a sort of cathartic release. Immediately before, I feel absolutely awful. Right after the stomach is emptied, I feel great. Except of course for the nasty taste that is left in the mouth. And the post vomit burps which taste just like vomit. So, the good feeling is a nice surprise but it is no reason to do something stupid like drink yourself silly just to have that feeling.

In any case, my travel/work plans just got shot. I left shortly thereafter to go to the airport. Normally when I am sick enough to throw up, I will do it two or three times with an hour or two break in between. At the airport I sat by the restroom, just in case. If I was going to throw up again, I wanted it to be in the bathroom not on the airplane. Thankfully, my first flight was delayed by about 25 minutes, and I threw up again about 10 minutes before boarding.

Throwing up once has that good feeling after it. The second time you throw up, the feeling isn't that good, because your stomach is mostly empty and your muscles feel like they are overly contracting. By the third time, your dry heaving and you just feel like you want to die. Thankfully, the second time was the end for me.

Originally, I had brought a ton of work related reading material to consume on the flights and during the waits in the airport (I was even planning on catching up on my blogs). Unfortunately being sick forced me to focus on keeping my stomach calm and I wasn't able to do much reading. The connecting flight boarded on time, pulled back from the gate, got in line for take off, and something in the cooling system was broke. So, we taxied back to the gate, they fiddled around for about a half hour and found a filter that was clogged.

Attempt two began, we pulled back from the gate, and find something wrong with an engine. Back to the gate. This problem was expected to take an hour or so and they were kind enough to inform us that all other flights that day to San Jose, Oakland, and San Fransisco were booked solid. They broke out the water and I had cup since I hadn't had anything to drink since the night before. They even let people deplane as long as they took their stuff. I elected to stay on the plane since I didn't want to move around too much.

After about an hour, the plane was starting to get really hot and they told all of us who were left to get off the plane, but leave our stuff on it. Shortly after we made our way to the concourse, they changed their mind and decided to change planes so those of us who had just got off the plane had to get back on to get our stuff. The new plane was delayed further for about a half hour but they never told us why. It had been five hours of waiting already so we were happy when they took off. They also gave us 7000 miles for the inconvenience.

I didn't mind too much since my being sick had already ruined the work plans I had for the day.

Top Shot 4: Shoot - No Shoot

2010-07-03T19:06:00.002-05:00

Well, once again I am almost a week behind. Since I have Monday off, I think I might try to blog the next Top Shot after I shoot off fireworks... er I mean light sparklers (because that is what the State of Iowa allows us semi-free citizens). The practice is shooting an AR-15 at black and white ceramic plates (while the reactivity of glass and ceramic is nice to see, I don't use them because they are a pain to clean up - then again, maybe the Top Shot Key Grip is the one stuck with that job, assuming they are being environmentally friendly).

Most people have no problem, except for Jim (who I think said he had never shot an AR-15 before - who in this world has not shot an AR-15, its only like the most popular rifle next to the AK-47). But he manages slowly. So at the competition it is a memory game as well. That makes it somewhat interesting. The Red Team rocks it, and the Blue Team tanks (although Caleb did shoot well).

So is there celebration by the Red Team? No, they are playing it cool and acting all macho. They get back to the house and the Blue Team immediately implements their plan and "nominates" Iain and Jim. Jim I can understand, he hit a wrong plate, and his specialty is historical rifles (which they shot in the first episode). Iain I am guessing was self nominating so that he could eliminate Jim. Frankly, Tara missed a shot too and it would have been nice to see her go against Jim. But whatever, the Blue Team is all smiles and giggles about it.

And guess what the Red Team does? Yep, they begin to whine. They whine because they won, they whine because the Blue Team isn't depressed, they whine, whine, whine. Its almost like they lost the challenge. Basically at this point I would not be disappointed is all of the rest of the Red Team is eliminated and we continue the competition with just the Blue Team (however, with the scant knowledge of reality shows that I have, I doubt that will happen - they may get down to 3 players and the Blue Team down to five and then they will combine to become the Purple Team for the rest of the game). In any case ... QUIT THE WHINING. You are all adults here (even Kelly is old enough to buy alcohol and apply for an FFL).

The elimination practice is with the TZ-99 pistol. I never heard of it before so I looked it up. Turns out to be a South African knockoff of a Sig. OK, well, why not just use a Sig? Anyway, they get to shoot at a moving target. Both Iain and Jim (forgot to tell you they were actually nominated) shoot well.

At the elimination competition they are shooting at plates on pendulums, so they have to hit the right moving plate, without hitting the other plate. Tricky, Iain scores perfectly, and then Jim gets to shoot. He appears to score perfectly including a line by another Blue Team member "Oh man what are they going to do for a tiebreaker?" But alas, it was just good camera editing. On Jim's last shot he broke the correct plate and the wrong plate that was lined up behind it. He shot suprisingly good for being a rifle guy that rarely (read never) shoots pistols.

The previews for next week appear to show them shooting a musket. That should be interesting. So far they have done historical rifles, Beretta 92F, long bow and crossbow, modern rifle and pistol, and musket?. Haven't seen any shotguns yet. Or cap and ball pistols. Or blunderbuss, or sling, or javelin, or chinese throwing stars, or cannon, or derringer. But there are 12 contestants left (which means probably 11 to 15 more types of weapons).

Zero Tolerance = Zero Brains

2010-06-29T08:00:00.000-05:00

At what point do we say enough is enough? Toy soldiers glued on to a hat violates a weapons policy? We are talking about molded pieces of solid plastic that are less than a millimeter thick. I don't think you could hurt let alone kill anyone with a toy soldier.

And the schools response, "Well, if you replace the soldiers with ones that aren't carrying weapons then the hat will be OK." So molded plastic in the shape of a radio that is a millimeter thick is soooooo much more acceptable than a firearm shaped plastic gun. I do have one question, what about a plastic molded holstered pistol? Is that acceptable if the main item the soldier is holding is a radio. How about if the pistol has a full flap so that you don't know whether there is a molded pistol inside? What if the soldier has a couple of plastic grenades clipped onto his plastic uniform.

These soldiers weren't even engaged in the act of pretend shooting at each other. It was just part of a patriotic theme. You know, soldiers, the ones that defend and protect the Constitution. But then again, they probably don't teach much about the Constitution anymore. I would guess that pencils, rulers, and scissors (which are all over the schools) are used as weapons far more often than some of the ridiculous things that "weapons" policies ban.

I'm the Technological Neanderthal??!!!

2010-06-29T04:00:00.000-05:00

The newest iPhone came out and guess what? I didn't get one. Not only that, I have no desire to get one, ever. I didn't get an iPad or an iPod. (alright I admit, I am only mentioning them to increase my Google relevance score). Recently, I was accused of being a technological neanderthal because I don't have a cellphone (to set the record straight, I do have a Tracphone, it just hasn't been used in more than a year). I thought this accusation was rather humorous.

I have more computing power in my home than my parents and all siblings combined. I was the first in my family to have a DVD player and a portable DVD player. I had a Palm Pilot for many years. I was the first with a webcam in my family and helped facilitate video conferences with the family.

I use MagicJack to make free calls when I am overseas. I am the one my father would call for technical support (until he got a Mac - sorry, I like my cheap computers that I know there is software for, and I don't think Microsoft is the devil incarnate - besides if you want to look at unfair business practices, you don't have to look any further than Apple, they just weren't the biggest fish on the block until recently so expect a lawsuit against them in the next couple of years - but I digress). I pride myself on being able to read a map and not having to rely on a GPS unit to find my way around different cites or even foreign countries.

I helped my wife make the conversion to digital scrapbooking. I have designed database driven websites (that make money) and taught myself PHP, Perl, and MySQL. I have had high speed internet at my home for almost 10 years.

Yet somehow, I am a technological neanderthal because I don't have a cellphone.

Sometimes Mother's are Wrong

2010-06-28T12:00:00.000-05:00

We all love our mothers. And our mothers love us. Sometimes though, mothers are wrong. Joran is no choir boy. He is a liar and all the evidence is pointing to being a murderer as well. Its OK, just because your son turns out to be a rotten human does not mean that you are a rotten human. I won't even say your a bad parent. Part of being human is we each get to make our own choices in spite of how our parents may have tried to mess with our minds (mine limited it to cereal rules).

Roads in Iowa

2010-06-28T08:00:00.000-05:00

I spent the last two weekends on the roads of Iowa with different results from a month ago. Last weekend I saw zero deer in eight hours (although there were a couple of mangled racoons or some such small dog sized varmint). This weekend I only saw one deer. So, I can surmise a few things:

1) the Iowa DNR issued a bunch of new hunting permits based on my suggestion
2) the deer got smarter and started avoiding major traffic thruways
3) it was too hot and rainy in the last two weeks and the deer while not smart enough to avoid cars, are smart enough to stay in shelter for the weather.

Hint: Jason Bourne Isn't Real

2010-06-28T04:00:00.000-05:00

Just in case you didn't know, Jason Bourne is not real. Even before Matt Damon popularized him in the movies, he was just a figment of an author's imagination on the pages of a book. He wasn't even loosely based on a real person like Indiana Jones was. He was, is, and always will be 100% fake.

Anyway, some criminal has some guns and manages to slip out the fire escape and people compare him to Jason Bourne. This news report is atrocious in its treatment of facts. At one point the binoculars are "trained on the Federal Reserve building", only later to be found beside a tripod by a window that overlooks the Federal Reserve. So which is it?

Then we find out that the investigation was stymied because of the most unusual tactic of ... wait for it ... using TWO fake names. Jason Bourne would be proud. Its not like this tactic is widely used in the criminal world. He has friends in the clothing industry which was substantiated with the designer clothes and European shoes in his apartment. I mean, we all know that you can't get designer clothes and European shoes in any mall in America. Besides, this was Los Angeles, not exactly the most cosmopolitan city in the US.

He had set up a machine shop in one room where he was "manufacturing the parts of assault rifles that ammunition magazines are slotted into ..." To the average person, this may sound ominous. In gunnie terms, he was probably making receivers from blank plate. The receiver is what is legally a firearm (i.e. it has the serial number stamped on it). There isn't anything wrong with making receivers (or making your own complete firearms). Furthermore, it is not that complicated. They do it in caves in Afgahnistan. They even do it in prison. If you own a file and a hammer, you have all of the tools you need to make a fully functional firearm. Everything just makes it easier.

Then there is this gem, "Detectives found a loaded sawed-off shotgun and handgun, an AK-47, ammunition and other weapons parts including a gun barrel. " This is the "cache" of loaded weapons they found. Three. A rifle, a shotgun, and a handgun. Notice that they don't say multiple shotguns, rifles, and handguns. A single rifle, shotgun, and handgun. I guess people who compete in Cowboy Action Shooting and Three Gun Matches don't realize they are carrying around a "cache" with them. And what is with the other parts including a gun barrel? A single gun barrel? So perhaps he could have made one other firearm with the parts he had (last I checked you needed at least one barrel to make a firearm).

Based on his past record, drug possession and theft, I am assuming that he already has at least one felony. Which makes his mere possession of the firearms illegal. Oh yeah, in the state of California. Guess all of those gun control laws kept us safe, because he didn't own, ... er I mean do anything wrong, ... er I mean hurt someone.

Top Shot 3: Bows and Arrows

2010-06-27T12:00:00.001-05:00

I guess I better do my review of this one before the next episode comes out. My wife watched it with me and during the middle I tried to make the comment that "at least there wasn't as much whining as other reality shows."

"Are you kidding me? There is just as much whining and these are supposedly grown-ups who play with macho guns all the time." Point conceded. "The only difference is that they aren't running around in bikinis." Shortly after this we had the bedroom scene of Bill whining while getting changed and I pointed out that now they had a half-naked fat guy, so my wife wasn't totally correct.

Anyway, the weapon of choice was bows and arrows. I shot a bow when I was younger for the archery merit badge. They made a big deal how this was an ancient weapon, the long bow. And that it could rain devastation from hundreds of yards. So for the contest today, instead of using a 180 lb yew wood long bow, they were going to use a 40 lb fiberglass long bow at only 100 yards (for a target that is 30 feet across). What? Why build up the great aspects of the weapon if you are not going to test it? I think it would have been much more fun to see the contestants attempt to pull back on a 180 lb long bow. Besides, the long bow wasn't used for accuracy, you had several hundred that all together loosed their arrows at another group of several hundred soldiers a few hundred yards away. There wasn't much aiming, you just needed to get in the general direction and the sheer mass of arrows would ensure that some would get hit.

What do you know from practice, there aren't a lot of bullseyes. Then again, this group was an assemblage of firearms shooters (a few of whom happen to have experience with other weapons). At scout camp, we were shooting 60 lb recurve bows, and at 100 yards after a day of training, I (and pretty much every one else) could hit a three foot target 2 out of five times. Maybe their training wasn't as good as the pimply faced kid that gave me mine. So we get to the contest and Kelly gets an arrow in the yellow. For a while it looks like the red team might actually win. Then JJ gets up and hits in the yellow. While the host makes it sound like the arrows are close, from the first shot I could tell that JJ's was closer. Yep, after official measurement, JJ's is several inches closer.

There is some minor background drama and to make a long story short, Bill and Brad get put in the elimination round. Brad is whining constantly about having to compete with a bow and arrow when he is an IPSC Grand Master. Wah, wah, wah. If anyone is rooting for Brad at this point, it is probably because you are even more whiny than he is. They go to their practice session and find out that they are going to be competing with the crossbow. As with the previous contest, they build it up as the great ancient weapon that it is and then use a modern equivalent, complete with scope. Brad is very sensible and states that he spent a lot of time practicing his loading.

At the contest, they are shooting apples, in a very loose "re-creation" of William Tell shooting an apple off of his son's head. Of course, William tell didn't have optics on his crossbow, and it probably was not made of specialized materials, but I digress. The teasers of the shot showed the instructor (fuzzy in the background) shooting an apple with a bulbous head which naturally caused the apple to explode into fragments when hit. I was hoping that Bill and Brad would be doing the same thing. No such luck. They had bolts with a simple target point that would fly right through the apple, in some cases, it wasn't apparent except when they showed it in slow-mo that the apple was hit. This was a let down from previous competitions when they had reactive and/or exploding targets. Brad won. Mainly because he could load faster. For as much as he whines, that guy does know a thing or two about strategy.

Bill leaves and doesn't bother to say goodbye to Kelly (who he had a tuft with earlier). Good riddance. Right now, Brad has won two elimination challenges. I am beginning to think that he might be the last of the red team. Next week (today) is a shoot/no shoot with AR-15s.

Protecting the Skys, One 6-Year Old at a Time

2010-06-27T08:00:00.000-05:00

The TSA is there to protect us. They are working hard to stop terrorists everyday. In fact, there are a whole host of stories where the TSA has prevented bad things from happening. There was that one time that they stopped a terrorist from detonating a bomb in his underwear ... oh wait, that was passengers on the plane. But there was that other time that they stopped someone from passing a note that said there was a bomb onboard ... oh wait that was the stewardess. Well, there have been a couple of unruly passengers that they stopped from boarding the plane ... oh wait, no they didn't airline employees identified them and had them removed.

So what has the TSA done? Well, they have strip searched amputee's traveling with their small children. They steal money from wheelchair bound passengers. They subpeona bloggers who re-post their security directives. They can't keep their hands off of 3 year olds. And they force mom's to drink their own breast milk.

But remember, this is the agency that is sooooo much more professional and better trained than the screeners we had before 9/11 who basically were minimum wage employees that left you alone. You know, the one's who let the 9/11 hijackers onto the plane as opposed to the one's now who let the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber onto the plane.

But we have the restricted fly list of those people who are so dangerous we won't let them fly. They haven't actually been convicted of anything, or even charged with anything, but we will only let them roam around shopping malls and have access to gas stations because large crowds are immune to burning gasoline, but we wouldn't want them to get onto an airplane with 200 other passengers and 3 ounces of hair gel.

So who is on the no fly list? Well to start with, some of the 9/11 hijackers on are the no fly list - yes, those ones who burned up in the plane crashes. We can't be too careful. Afterall, someone else may use that dead person's identity. There are heads of state (Bolivia and Lebanon - but not Iran and Venezuela). Robert Johnson is also on the list - not exactly the most common name, but pretty darn close. Ted Kennedy was on it, but he was allowed to rent a car without further scrutiny. Recently, it was discovered that a 6 year old girl was on the list. I thought it was just Iran that executed 7 year olds as spys. In America, we are much more civilized. We just subject suspected 6 year olds to strip searches and prevent them from traveling with their families.

The change in airport screening has done NOTHING to make air travel safer. The only thing that has made air travel safer is 1) reinforcing the cockpit doors and 2) passenger awareness that terrorists are going to blow up the plane. Surely if all of the Orange Alert Levels, 16 weeks of TSA training, and confiscation of nail clippers actually made an impact, then the TSA would be able to tout at least one example where a terrorist plot was thwarted. Afterall, there are millions of flights a year.

chirp ... chirp ... chirp

Don't hold your breath.

Top Shot Episode 2

2010-06-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

Top Shot episode 2 was shown on Sunday and as promised, I DVRed it and watched it later. I was rather liberal in use of the fast forward. Today was going to be a pistol shooting competition using a Berretta 92F (the same one they used for the elimination round voting).

There were a couple of pistol shooting champions and they did their requisite showing off (at least on the blue team Blake did). What I want to know by this time is what in the heck are they doing with all of their off time? Each team had 140 rounds to practice with. Assuming (and this is being generous) that you are spending 1 minute for each shot, then that is less than 2.5 hours per team. What about the other 14 waking hours of the day?

Is there a shooting range that they can just have fun at? Do they have airsoft set up in the basement? And did I hear that right, they are in California? Why go to such a gun unfriendly state for a show about firearms? Lots of questions.

What was good to see was the inexperienced pistol shooters took direction and followed it explicitly and were in many cases shooting better than the experienced shooters. Then there was Brad, the red team's expert. I understand that he shoots Glocks (he only mentioned it about 500 times - which means if we didn't have the video edited he would have mentioned it 10,000 times in real life). But this is a pistol at roughly 7-10 yards. You aren't doing anything fancy. If in your first five rounds you are shooting low and to the right, then adjust your aim for the next five shots. It's not rocket science!

There was enough coverage of him and other teammates comments about him that I was fairly certain he was going to be in the elimination round. The competition the next day was rather creative, shooting a plexiglass cover out the end of a tube. No paper or other target to see your misses. The red team was up first. The "inexperienced" shooters did well hitting on the first shot. Then the misses happened. Including Brad.

When the blue team was up, the old guy started off and missed, then again, from what I gather he hadn't shot a pistol before the practice session the day before. The rest of the team all hit theirs on the first shot, it was back to the old guy. He was taking his time and some of his teammates were whining, but it was good that he took his time and scored on his second shot. Plus he had 30 seconds to spare. The Blue Team won again. I think it was JJ who did his signature legs wrapped around his teammate's body jump. (Its just an immunity challenge, you didn't win Miss America or anything.)

So the red team gets to go to elimination again. Shooting at the targets, Andre again nails the bullseye (this guy seems pretty good, I think there are teammates that are underestimating him), and there is a tie for the second place person. Frank is the first competitor and an ammo box is brought out with the people's names to choose who gets to choose the second contestant. And Brad gets chosen (see I called it earlier).

Their elimination competition involves movement. Practice is relatively boring, but the competition is not. They get to ride a zip line and shoot at targets on either side of them. This looks really difficult. There are about 12 targets total. The first time through, they each hit 5 targets. So they get to go again. One of them mentioned possibly trying to do a little strategy (after the first couple of targets just focus on one side) but then didn't carry through.

The second time through Brad again hit 5 targets and Frank hit 1. Sorry frank. Brad was a real whiner. I hope they don't shoot Glocks at all during this competition (or at least not until Brad is eliminated). I was disappointed that neither tried to hit the bonus exploding targets, but then looking at the field, you probably would only have time for one shot inside of 10 yards while you were moving at 15 miles an hour (a sprint for those who need help with the units conversion). Certainly not an easy shot to make.

Episode 2 was better than 1. The teaser for Episode 3 was for the long bow. Not sure how that will work out for them. With Frank gone there are only a couple that have archery experience form their bios.

Lawnmower Problems

2010-06-16T04:00:00.000-05:00

With all of the rain lately, I decided to try and take advantage of a small window of opportunity when it wasn't raining and get the lawn mowed before I lose any kids in the grass. My philosophy on push lawnmowers (and lots of small engine equipment) is that their cost is so little relative to my earnings that I will fill it with gas when it stops and fill it with oil just before it seizes up and then basically do nothing.

I don't drain the fluids before winter. I don't sharpen blades every year. I certainly don't change the oil. I did have a riding lawnmower once when I had a half acre to mow. It came with the house and was about 30 years old. It would run out of oil about once a season and semi-seize up. I would put a quart or two in it and then wait an hour for it to cool down some, and it kept on working.

Small engines are designed to take the abuse of the casual home owner. Last year I didn't mow the lawn at all (my wife did it all), this year I have noticed that the lawnmower wasn't running real smooth. Choppy, changing speeds, although right before it ran out of gas it would rev up to its normal operating speed (and then promptly die).

So, halfway through the yard I ran out of gas. Got the gas can (which has gas that is probably 1-1/2 years old and didn't have the fuel stabilizer put in it last winter), and filled it up. Normally, the lawnmower starts on a single pull. But, this time, I could get it to sputter a bit and then it would poop out again. After several minutes it was time to get some tools out and check the thing out.

First thing I did was check out the air filter. The air filter is nothing more than a sponge with a hole in it. At the intake holes it was cakes with oily grass clippings. Well, that could be a problem. The lack of air would definitely affect the engine causing it to run rich for the amount of air (explaining the sluggishness), and then working fine at the end of the tank when it was just sucking a few fumes (and getting the fuel-air mixture just right).

So, I took it inside and cleaned it with some dish soap (dish soap is good for oil - they use it to clean off animals from oil spills - or at least that is what the Dawn commercials say). While the filter was off, I decided to check to make sure that gas was spraying through the carbeurator. A couple pumps on the primer and a nice stream of gas was spraying. So, I attempted to start the engine with the air filter off. No luck, it was doing the same thing as before.

So, the next thing to do was pull the spark plug. Sure enough, it was caked with carbon deposits. One of the problems with a engine constantly running a rich mixture is some of the fuel is left on the spark plug and chamber walls. This gets hot enough to smolder, but doesn't make a clean burn. Instead, it coats the surfaces with a black carbon deposit. Eventually, this gets thick enough that the spark won't happen, hence the engine won't sustain itself.

Some wiping off with a rag and a file to clean up the sparking surfaces and I was ready to go. Put it all back together and the lawnmower started on the second pull. I let it run for a while to be sure it didn't die. So, the next time I am at Lowe's I'll probably pick up a new air filter and a spark plug. After all, I have had the lawnmower for three years and I haven't done any maintenance on it until today.

Mental State of Candidates

2010-06-14T04:00:00.001-05:00

If you haven't heard about the Democratic primary in South Carolina, it is an ongoing bag of jokes that keeps on topping itself. To begin, the primary was won by a candidate who is dirt poor and did no campaigning, in spite of the other candidate being the one supported by the Democratic Party.

Then, we find out that the winner happened to have displayed not so appropriate pictures to someone and is charged with a felony (I am not sure if he was convicted or even if it has gone to trial.

Next, the loser decides to question whether the winner did something fishy to stuff the ballot box. My guess is, since he didn't do any campaigning, there is probably only a 50/50 chance that he even voted himself.

And now, the loser is questioning the mental state of the winner. I am sorry, what does it say about YOUR mental state when you are backed by the party and can't win your own primary against an alleged (or convicted?) felon who didn't even campaign, and then you have the temerity to suggest that this mental midget was able to hatch some brilliant ballot stuffing plan which has so far gone undetected by anyone?

The Democratic Party in South Carolina should just slink into a corner at this point and realize something went horribly wrong, but not make it worse by dragging it out and making the party look like imbeciles.

48 Hours Or Else!?

2010-06-12T16:41:00.003-05:00

British Petroleum has 48 hours to identify containment strategies. 48 hours or else ... what? The point of a deadline is to have some sort of consequence. Does the Coast Guard think that they are going to take over? After all, they have soooooo much experience stopping oil leaks.

Perhaps it is 48 hours or else we will beat them in soccer? Nah, that couldn't be it, we just tied them (besides, my guess is that most of the workers for BP in the Gulf are actually Americans - you know the whole multinational corporation thing).

What's the point of the unmentioned threat anyway? It is not like BP is trying to develop nuclear weapons. Usually, Obama saves his "or else" for crazy dictators bent on the destruction of the US. BP, well, they just want to sell us oil. It's not like they have been sitting on their butts doing nothing. Its not even like BP wanted to have a 100 million barrel oil leak into the Gulf of Mexico to begin with. Unfortunately, that is what we have.

Empty ultimatums (while at the same time trying to smooth things over with the homeland's head of state) won't stop the spill. It took 9 months to put out the oil fires and cap the wells after the first Iraq war, and that was on land. I don't seem to remember any ultimatums being given to speed up the process.

College Football Realignment

2010-06-12T08:00:00.000-05:00

With the move of Colorado to the Pac-10 (soon to be renamed Pac-11?) and Nebraska going to the Big Ten (will they finally change their name to something with Twelve in it?), the college football world is set to go through a shuffle of major proportions. Talk right now is about the formation of some super conferences with 16 teams and two BCS bowl births. And the Big 12 (soon to be Big 10) is right in the middle of it.

I see a few good things coming from this, while it does spell the breakup of one of the best BCS conferences (Big 12), I think it will also lead to the inclusion of some of the up and coming mid-majors into a BCS conference. In the end it is all about money.

The Pac-10 is going to want to get a piece of the Texas TV market so more than likely Texas (and probably Texas Tech) will go to the Pac-10. Oklahoma and Oklahoma State will also follow. Which then leaves one spot open. Many right now are speculating that will go to Texas A&M. As long time rivals with Texas, this does make some sense, however, it is not a done deal.

The SEC also would like to get a piece of Texas Football and Texas A&M makes a nice pick for them (granted they would prefer Texas, but Texas makes enough money on their own that they don't need the SEC. So, who would the 16th PAC-10 team be. Probably Utah. They have played well against PAC-10 teams in the past and have two BCS bowl wins under their belt (which is more than a lot of schools in the BCS conferences). The thing to get over here is BYU. Utah and BYU have been hand in hand from the beginning. Sometimes you just have to let them go.

Why not pick BYU? Well to their advantage they probably do have a more widespread fan base, but this also works against them. Their fan base outside of Utah is spread so thin that it wouldn't amount to much in the TV viewing ratings. Utah has been much more consistent in the last decade and already does a lot of recruiting out of California.

Back to the SEC, if they pick up Texas A&M then they need another 5 teams to get to 16. Florida St, Miami, Virginia Tech from the ACC are good candidates, as is TCU from the Mountain West if they want to increase the Texas market. West Virginia from the Big East.

This shakeup would then require a realignment of the ACC and Big East. Frankly the ACC would absorb the remaining Big East to reach its 16 teams. So, we are left now with a depleted Big-12. They're chance at survival results in absorbing the Mountain West conference. The new Big-12 would be dominated by Missouri, Kansas State, Boise State, and BYU.

Finally, the Big Ten will have four slots available. By this time Notre Dame should realize that they are going to get cut out, swallow their pride and join the Big Ten. The remaining three teams remain a mystery. Since it appears that the Big Ten (at least in words) is going to wait out the expansion, they may have the tables turned on them and be left with picking from the leftovers. Army, Navy, East Carolina, Bowling Green, SMU, and Houston are all possibilities.

The remaining conferences will probably do some realigning to consolidate into two super conferences as well. But the die will be cast. 64 teams in four super conferences leads nicely to a 16 team playoff.

Teacher's Caught Cheating

2010-06-11T12:00:00.000-05:00

Wouldn't you know, when there are incentives for high scores (and punishments for low scores), some people will cheat? It doesn't matter that some of these are the teachers and principals who would (at least used to) fail students for cheating, being a public school teacher doesn't make you immune from greed and self preservation.

Then again, society doesn't look at cheating like it used to.

"Proving" the Bible

2010-06-11T08:00:00.001-05:00

Why do some people feel compelled to "prove" their faith? Faith is not something you can "prove" by any universally accepted methods. That is what we call science. Science doesn't (except in the political world) delve into faith issues. Likewise, most people's attempts at "proving" their faith come to laughable attempts. It is called FAITH for a reason.

During my drive on the interstates of Iowa on Sunday afternoon and evening, I listened to about a half hour of a religious program on a radio station. Basically, Sundays bite for listening to the radio, but I needed something to keep me awake for the final bit of the drive. As part of the program a preacher was talking with the host about the Bible and how "we know" that the Bible is the word of God. He started out good by saying we shouldn't use circular reasoning, i.e. the Bible is the word of God because the Bible says it is the word of God. But then it went downhill from there. Below are a couple of the arguments he made and my personal views of how those are a bunch of bunk and don't "prove" anything.

The Bible is unique. After saying this he had to clarify himself, after all, every religious book (or any book) is unique. What he meant is that it was consistent over the period in which it was written of 1500 years and was written on three continents. Well, the three continents part is correct Europe, Africa, and Asia although of the roughly 1500 pages of the Bible, only about 20 are "in Egypt" and another 50 are "in Europe."

Then he tried to make a comparison, "it would be like me writing about God here in America and someone else writing about God in China and both of our accounts were consistent." Uh, no. While I will concede that the Bible is purportedly written on three continents, the comparison of the US to China is ludicrous. The Bible was written on three continents because the major location of the Bible (Israel) happens to be at the crossroads of those three continents. Not only that, but the actual area covered (from Rome, around the Greek cities, over through parts of Iran, down around Iraq and Jordan, and then looping around Cairo and back up to Rome) is an area no larger than the eastern half of the United States. But that doesn't sound as impressive to say that one person in New York and one person in South Carolina wrote about God and were consistent.

The next part of his consistency argument also has problems. The Bible was written over a 1500 year period. Well, if we consider that Moses wrote the first five books and the apostles wrote the last of the epistles, then yeah that is a 1500 year period. Except that we don't have any of Moses' original writings. Nor do we have any of the Apostles' original letters (and if we did we would have no real way of knowing since we don't have any samples of their writing to compare it to). So, what we do have are copies of copies of copies (ad nauseum). The earliest texts of the old testament date to only about the 2nd century BC. Assuming that the Apostles writings were written by 100 AD, the 1500 year timeline could be only a 300 year timeline. I hope that doesn't shake anyone's faith.

The preacher expanded his analogy and said that "it would be like me writing about God here in America today and someone else writing about God in China 1000 years ago and both of our accounts were consistent when read by someone 2000 years from now." Well, you sort of have to have some more qualifiers in there. Besides the geographic discrepancy that I already mentioned, the books of the Bible were not written in isolation. Later authors clearly had access to earlier authors works. Not only that, the authors in most all cases were immersed in the religious and cultural training of the people. All of the writers of the Bible were Hebrews, some of them just migrated to different parts of the three continents.

The last part of his analogy that I don't like is the false implication of a linear advancement in technology. Comparing someone living in the Information Age to someone a thousand years ago living in the Dark Ages is a stark contrast to someone in 100 AD living in the Iron Age to someone in 900 BC also living in the Iron Age. The technological advancement from 900 BC to 100 AD was minimal compared to 1000 AD to 2000 AD. In other words, in spite of the purported 1500 year separation and geographic distances, the authors of the Bible were very similar people. Hence, that they were consistent in their religious teachings (especially given that they had the previous writings to refer to) is not unique. Every major religion can probably make similar claims (and in 1000 years, every major religion will still be able to make those same claims).

The apostles all died for their beliefs and you don't die for something that you know is false. Alright, but again, every major religion can claim this in some way. Humans have shown that they are very good at persecuting others for whatever reason they come up with (skin color, lanuguage, religious beliefs, or just because they want the land). Oh wait a moment, what "proof" is there that the apostles all died for their beliefs?

Turns out, very little. There are historical traditions, but written accounts didn't really occur until the 1500's. The early church father's have some veiled references to a couple of the apostle's martyrdom, but nothing concrete. Besides, how would we know that an apostle killed in India was killed for his belief in Christ as opposed to just being a foreigner and ticking off the local cheiftain?

After this the preacher decided to get on to the topic of creationism and started touting the no transitional fossils, irreducible complexity, and Cambrian explosion arguments. I had had enough at this point. I was left to drive home pondering why if you are accepting the resurrection of Jesus on faith, you have to prove it in some convoluted way. If it was all just laid out with perfect evidence that required no faith, wouldn't that frustrate the whole faith, hope, charity thing and the faith, repentance, baptism thing?

Perhaps believers of all stripes should look at their life and examine why they believe what they believe. If you do it because of "proof" similar to what this preacher was saying, then maybe your faith isn't as rock solid as you think.

Ebay: Scrapbook Supplies

2010-06-10T20:52:00.003-05:00

Sometimes my eBay sales end up being good blog material (either that or I just like to plagiarize myself to get me traffic). This is an item I posted tonight.

SCRAPBOOKING
SUPPLY EXTRAVAGANZA

I really like the word extravaganza. In any case, I finally had enough of my wife spending hours and hours scrapbooking and chatting it up with all of her friends, so after sending her to the spa for a day I went into the craft room and gathered up all of the scrapbook supplies that I could find and now I am selling the whole lot on eBay! Click on any of the pictures for a larger image. Hurry and bid now before she gets home and strangles me.***

Here's the merchandise: It begins with this handy dandy tote bag. This black nylon bag was specially designed for scrapbookers, it has large pockets, plenty of pen holders, and a collapsible handle (like airline luggage) that you can use to roll it around where you need too. Wheels are still working. The snap clasps on the top are broken although one partial connects together. Bags like this range from $40-$100 new.

Next, we have not one, not two, not three, but SIX stamp sets. Some of these (perhaps all of them) are Close to My Heart wooden base with rubber stamps. Plus I have thrown in some odds and ends. There is an alphabet set, a short saying set,
a holiday set, a baby/kid/I don't know what else set, a flower set, and a hearts set. What more could you ask for??? All sets look complete (although if there is something out of the ordinary, then my wife switched something around). My wife tells me that sets like these are about $20 new.

Next up is the five hole punches. Not just any hole punches these are the one's that make fancy holes. Squares, curves, and something else. These things feel like they are made of cast iron, and I bet if your fingers were thin enough to slip in there you could punch a fun shape through your hand (not that I would advocate it, although your husband may want to do it if you are addicted to scrapbooking). These go for $5 to $10 at the scrapbooking stores (I think, I could just be making that up).

At this point, most people would be saying, this is enough, how could you provide anything else. Well, this is the deal everyone has been waiting for. Next up are some lovely markers. They are in a variety of colors and have both a fine tip and a broad tip. You'll be able to write and decorate to your hearts content (at least until the ink runs out).

There is also a handy dandy tool set. It is a Making Memories brand and comes with all the tools you need
to attach notions and other goodies to your scrapbook pages. There is a hammer, pliers, punches, and picks. The setting matte has seenlots of use and is still going strong. These tools are not flimsy and the set feels like it weighs 2 pounds. If you get tired of scrapbooking you could probably convert this tool set to leather working. Also, there are some metal book mounts (?). I have no idea what these are and my wife isn't here to tell me, but the package is unopened.

And since you have the tool set, you need an assortment of notions to go with it (isn't notions such a funny word!). I literally have no clue what these things are or how you are suppose to use them, but why not get them here at a discount.

We're not done yet. This prize package also includes a Xyron Sticker Maker. Put anything that is 2.5” wide, turn the handle and out comes a sticker. Try it on movie tickets, try it on a business card, try it on a squashed cockroach (or just put the cockroach through to squash it). With this bad boy you can make a sticker out of most anything!!! My wife says that the cartridge is new so this is good to go right out of the box!!! (I know the picture is sideways, I am just too lazy to rotate it).

Finally, there is the sticker carrying case with 12 x 12 sheet protectors for all of your paper, scraps, and sticker needs. Keep your stickers organized and ready to go. As an added bonus (not really, but just pretend that it is) 17 of the pages are already filled with stickers. There are letters, there is Disney, there is Thomas, there is theme pages, there are borders, there are churchy things, there are random bits of wisdom. In a nutshell, there is a whole smattering of everything. Most of the sheets of stickers have some missing, but there are some complete sets in here. The case zips closed so if the stickers do fall out of the page protectors you can keep the resulting mess contained.

There are also some other odds and ends that I included that really aren't worth mentioning. I have no idea how much all of this would cost if you had to buy it new. $200, $300, $5000, maybe even $100,000 (I'll admit I didn't go through everything so there is a small, although very unlikely, possibility that a stack of $100 bills made its way into the bag when I wasn't looking – there also may be some rare gold coins, but I doubt it – I guarantee there are no small mammals or citrus plants). I don't scrapbook so I don't know. It is about 30 lbs of stuff.

We'll start the bidding at $0.01. Bid on it for you sister, bid on it for your mother, big on it for your crafty brother-in-law. Just start the bidding!

All this can be yours, if the PRICE IS RIGHT (well, actually if you are the highest bidder then you win it all).

***For those of you who didn't get the humorous quip, my wife has actually converted over to digital scrapbooking and so she doesn't need all of these supplies. She culled them out herself and I took the pictures and wrote the ad. So please, no nasty emails, my wife and I love each other.

Engineering Packrats

2010-06-10T08:00:00.000-05:00

I changed positions in my company recently and took over for an engineer who had been in his position for a couple of decades and basically was the industry guru for his field. In this respect, I feel rather inadequate as a replacement, but it also is a major challenge then to be successful following in the shoes of a giant.

One thing that I have noticed throughout my career is that engineers are natural packrats. The older generation are paper packrats and it can be evidenced by my current position. There are at least 4 filing cabinets of documents and notes that are for my position, carefully gathered and sorted by my predecessor. Unfortunately, besides being packrats, engineers also are obsessive/compulsive in the way that they organize things. And no two are alike.

This makes taking over an engineering position difficult. Besides being a newbie to this area, I now have to sort through, mentally catalog, and try to assimilate 100,000 pages of information that is in a filing system which a) I don't know, b) has no index to describe it, and c) more than likely is diametrically opposed to my own OC tendencies.

I am a digital packrat though. I like to keep things electronically and throw out as much as I can. In my first job out of college, I was similarly dumped on with boxes of papers. I sorted through what I could, digitized much of it (using my own folder filing system) and then after 4 years boxed up the rest for the next guy to deal with (I still got emails for about 4 years from my successors to ask me to explain something about the documentation).

At my current position, there are two computer folders that I consider mine. The first day on the job, I literally spent 5 hours rearranging the folder and documents in them. I was half expecting some gnashing of teeth the next day as some of the other engineers had lost links to important information. But nothing. My rearrangement went unnoticed.

I cleaned off two shelfs of one of the bookshelfs by getting rid of the empty binders (that should give me enough room to bring the books from home that I may use at some point in my career). Oh yeah, and I have a big schematic on one wall that I spent a couple of hours color coding. Engineers can't get over the childhood urge to color everything.

Don't Throw Rocks at People with Guns

2010-06-10T04:00:00.001-05:00

Unfortunately, a Mexican teenager learned this lesson the hard way. Rocks happen to be a deadly weapon when thrown at people. It doesn't matter if the rocks are jagged or smooth, large or small. Rocks can kill people (that is why stoning was a form of capital punishment in the ancient world).

So, whether you agree with the family's story or the INS agents story is irrelevant. Don't throw rocks at people with guns. If your friends decide to do that, get away from your friends as fast as possible. I don't care if the people with guns are good guys or bad guys - don't throw rocks at them unless you are willing to risk being shot.

Oh wait, this choir boy happens to be a known smuggler. I guess the straight A student thing doesn't elicit so much sympathy now.

Don't throw rocks at people with guns, especially if you are a a known criminal.

Sugar Cereals and Other Parental Inanities

2010-06-09T12:00:00.000-05:00

We had a rule when it came to breakfast cereals when I was growing up. Only three boxes of cereal were allowed to be open at one time, only one of which could be a sugar cereal. The three boxes of cereal I can understand, its to keep the cereal from going stale. The one sugar cereal I kinda get, you don't want to encourage your kids to always be eating sweets, but then again, we would have donuts for breakfast about once a month, and there is no way you can convince me (except when I am trying to convince my wife) that donuts are healthy.

Another completely irrational cereal rule was that we could put one spoonful of sugar on a non-sugar cereal (to make it more palatable), but none on a sugar cereal. So the other day I decided to test out my parents wisdom. I chose Corn Flakes and Sugar Pops as my two cereals. Corn Flakes has 3 grams of sugar per serving (of course the way my brothers and I pour cereal, there is probably 6 grams of sugar per serving). Sugar Pops has 10 grams (20 grams the way we pour sugar). So how much in a spoonful of sugar? I weighed a spoonful of white granulated sugar and came up with a mass of 14 grams. So even accounting for the extra large bowl of cereal we had, the way we ate it there was just as much sugar in a "non-sugar" cereal as there was in a "sugar" cereal. Why not just let your kids have whatever cereal they want? That is what I do now.

Parents come up with all sorts of crazy rules to try and reign in our kids. Growing up you recognize this and swear that you will never do that when you are a parent, and then you find yourself doing the exact thing you swore to high heaven would never happen. Turns out, kids have a mind of their own and without rules (sometimes even with rules), they would probably get themselves run over or worse. I never wore a bicycle helmet growing up, not even in the Boy Scout Road Rallies I attended. My wife is adamant about our kids wearing their bicycle helmets, I'm OK with that. She feels it makes them safer (and it probably does in a small statistical way), so I don't fight it.

Every now and then I try to purge myself of the crazy rules that my parents ingrained in me. It usually doesn't work. You could almost say that parenting is sort of like brainwashing your kids into doing what you think is right for society. Without the brainwashing, you never know how the kids will turn out. And right now, with the chaos they already cause around the house, I want to hang on to as much control as I can.

Why Libertarians Will Never Be a Major Party

2010-06-09T08:00:00.001-05:00

Everyone knows about the Republicans and Democrats. Few know about the Libertarians. And fewer still can distinguish between a libertarian and a Libertarian. For the last 150 years, the Republicans and Democrats have slowly developed a political empire that has virtually shut out all other parties. Sure there was the Bull Moose party with Teddy Roosevelt, but that was more of a temper tantrum. Then there was Ross Perot. And there is the perpetual Green candidate and Libertarian candidate on the presidential ballot that garner's about 1% of the vote.

Our nation's political history wasn't always a two party machine. In the beginning there were a number of political parties and the Congress at times was made up of 4 or 5 political parties. Compromise between them was needed to get anything done. Of course, back then there was very little federal power so Congress didn't have a whole lot to do.

With the rise of the Republicans in the 1850's, the future political course of the US was born. The Civil War helped to consolidate federal power over the states and being an elected official in the US Government started to mean something. Now, you had power. Real power. With the gradual encroachment of the government through taxation and regulation, elected officials amassed more power.

With this increase in power, the two major players, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, needed to protect it for themselves. Neither party was large enough or popular enough to completely dominate the other, but together they were able to pass laws and regulations regarding elections, their funding, and such. These laws were made to ensure that the major players had advantages over any upstart in the political process. Those advantages came with access to money and power.

While there is an opening for any party to "rise up in the ranks", our political system has evolved into a two party political system. In actual practice, the chance of it happening is next to none. Which brings me to the title of this post. Libertarians want to be left alone and consequently, want to leave everyone else alone to live their lives. Which is why they don't win. Promising people the freedom to live their lives as they choose is nothing compared to the promise of a $500 rebate for buying a new refrigerator.

The two major parties want to control people (in spite of the rhetoric one of the parties uses - actions speak louder than words). They have both gotten into the habit of passing laws which cause problems and therefore need more laws to fix those problems. Never realizing that they are the reason for many of the problems in the first place. Libertarians don't lust for power, but would rather be productive members of society. Unfortunately, the federal goverment is a natural magnet for those who lust for power.

Zero Impact Living

2010-06-09T04:00:00.000-05:00

Zero impact living is the holy grail of many environmentalists. As with the mythical holy grail, it is an impossible goal. Unless of course you selectively define what zero impact living is. Using linen bags, and non-packaged food is great, and if it makes you feel good, ok. Go ahead and do it. But returning your milk bottles or egg cartons back to the store you bought them from is just passing on the responsibility of creating waste.

I read a book called "Garbageland" which was written by someone who was willing to buy into the whole recycling, no waste concept. After doing some investigation, it was found that somewhere around 40-60% of the stuff that is "recycled," actually goes to the landfill. So taking your egg cartons and milk jugs back to the store you bought them from, probably results in some of them being sent to the landfill. In other words, you didn't create zero waste, you just let someone else throw it away.

Why do we throw away so much stuff? Because it costs more to recycle it than it does to make new stuff from virgin materials. There are exceptions - metals primarily. My guess is every municipal recycling program is operated at a loss. Even with free raw materials, the price for re-used milk jugs doesn't cover the cost of sorting, cleaning and processing. Even with oil at hundreds of dollars a barrel. Copper wire on the other hand is a different story.

So do I make a conscious effort to "Live Green," heck no! I fill my recycling container up every week because otherwise I would have to pay extra to put it in the regular trash. I alternate between bagging my grass clippings and leaving them on the lawn. I have a garden, but haven't been very successful in the last year, except for brocoli. I make sure I always get plastic bags because they are used to line our garbage cans (there's great health benefits to not having bits of trash, rotted food, or poop lying around your house, it smells better too!).

I have been to farmer's markets in three states, only the one in Texas had competitively priced produce compared to the supermarkets. In the end, I would rather buy my produce from a company that ships it in on a truck from California than the farmer who lives 2 hours away that drives it in to the farmers market. Why? Because it is cheaper when shipped 80,000 lbs at a time across the country, rather than 1000 lbs at a time from down the road. (And those mass produced vegetables with all of their chemicals sure do look a lot better. Plus, in blind taste tests, people actually prefer the mass produced chemical laden produce. Go figure, we've progressed.)

When did this war of man/nature begin? Do we fault the Beavers for making dams and messing up the waterways? So why be upset when mankind builds a road to bring cheap produce all over the nation? The world is a much bigger place than we think, and in spite of the large sounding numbers as to the amount of trash we produce, it isn't that much and doesn't take up that much space. So, feel free to throw away that cheeseburger wrapper and not feel guilty. I certainly don't. And if you won't, then the next time I go to McDonald's I'll get two cheeseburgers and throw away a wrapper for you. Heck, I might even be kind enough to throw out the cheeseburger too and let one of Mother Nature's creations see what they are missing!

Rash of New Posts

2010-06-08T12:00:00.001-05:00

If you notice a rash of new posts (which is rather uncharacteristic of me) I am making an attempt to clean up all of the draft posts I have made. (Some of them are a year old.) I get lots of ideas and write a title, save it as a draft and come back to it another time.

Unfortunately, some things have piled up and I need to get them out. In many cases, I have updated a past news story with a more recent news story.

So, if you thing the writing stinks. It probably does. That is why I get paid to be an engineer and not a writer.

Change in Media Provider

2010-06-08T08:00:00.001-05:00

About two months ago I got a flyer in the mail with a deal that interested me. Cable, phone, and internet for $72 a month (which included all taxes). I'll call this Company A So I decided to look into it since we were paying $96 for phone and internet already. I'll call this Company B. After some searching on the internet, I found a few differences.

Company A's internet service was 20% slower than Company B's, but since I don't do online gaming, downloading of music or videos, this really isn't a big deal. Also, Company A's phone service did not include unlimited long distance, but 7 cents a minute. So for a $24 difference I could talk for 5.5 hours. Oh yeah, except I have the Magic Jack phone that gives me unlimited long distance, so while a slight hassle, not a big problem. Plus, not only would I get cable, I would get digital cable (and we all know digital is better than analog), plus a DVR. Now, this was only a 1 year teaser rate and the rate would be $145 after that year, but there was no contract, I could cancel at any time.

I talked with some friends at work and found no complaints from Company A, except for their HD service. I don't have an HDTV so I didn't care about that. So I was ready for the next phase of the research. I only really care about phone and internet so I was more than willing to stay with Company B if they would lower their $96 rate (it didn't even have to be down to $72, I probably would have settled for $80 or 85). I called them up and talked with a salesman.

"Thank you for calling Company B, how may I help you?"

"I got a flyer from Company A that is offering Cable, Phone, and Internet for $72. I currently am paying $96 for Phone and Internet. I don't care about the Cable, so I wanted to find out if you can give me a better deal on the Phone and Internet than $96."

"Let me see what I can do. Well sir, the only thing I can do is add Cable to your account. It is normally $49, but since you have Phone and Internet it would only be $20."

"I think you misunderstood. I don't care about Cable, I would like a lower price on my Phone and Internet or I am going to switch to Company A."

"I could increase your Internet speed for only $5 more per month..."

"Ma'am, I don't want to pay more money, I would like to get a reduction in rate. If someone is willing to give you cable, phone, and internet for $72 does it make sense to pay $96 for phone and internet alone?"

"Well, no. Let me transfer you to our retention department." I love it how service companies have a retention department. This is where I wanted to go in the first place, because if there is a deal to be made this would be it.

"Thank you for calling Company B, how may I help you?"

"I got a flyer from Company A that is offering Cable, Phone, and Internet for $72. I currently am paying $96 for Phone and Internet. I don't care about the Cable, so I wanted to find out if you can give me a better deal on the Phone and Internet than $96."

"Let me see what I can do. Well sir, the only thing I can do is add Cable to your account. It is normally $49, but since you have Phone and Internet it would only be $20."

"That is the deal the other lady just offered me and I already told her I am not interested in paying MORE money."

"Well, I can't match the deal they are offering."

"I am not even asking you to match the deal, I just want a reduction in the rate I am paying for Phone and Internet."

"I'm sorry there is nothing more I can do."

"OK, then I will be switching. Good bye."

A phone call to the Company A and I was all set. A couple weeks later, they were our and installed our new service. Phone works fine, internet works fine, 200 channels of tv, 80 channels of music work fine, and then there is the DVR.

I didn't know what I was really missing until I got the DVR. Now, I can set up the shows to watch (or the shows my wife wants to watch, or the kids want to watch) and let it record. No more having to pray that Mythbusters is on TV so that I can get a breather from the kids. There's always a few episodes on the DVR. Shows not playing at convenient times, no problem. And the fast forward through commercials is great. Now, if I can just figure out how to transfer shows to the computer through the USB port, I'll be in heaven.

A year from now, my wife and I will have to make a decision. Do we switch back to Company B who will probably be running the same or similar special or just cancel the cable and be paying $80 a month? We'll see. Home phone number portability has sure taken the hassle out of switching phone companies. Why Company B didn't want to just cut $10 off the bill and keep a paying customer, I will never know.

"Uncharacteristic" Anti-Gay?

2010-06-08T04:00:00.002-05:00

Rush is getting married, again. The author of this article points out that it is uncharacteristic of the "anti-gay" Limbaugh to invite (and pay) Sir Elton John to sing at his wedding. Unfortunately, this is where society has come. If you say anything derogatory about homosexuals (such as "they're permiscuous lifestyle leads to a higher incidence of HIV than the general population") then you are labeled as anti-gay. So, if you support marriage between one man and one woman, you are anti-gay.

Does this work the other way also? If you support marriage between two men, are you automatically anti-heterosexual? Maybe we should just say that we are anti-polygamous (except when we get our kicks watching "Big Love" on HBO). If I like vanilla, does that mean I am anti-chocolate? What about those who like neopolitan?

Just because someone doesn't support marriage between two men or two women does not make them anti-gay. Government sanctioned marriage in western culture is an outgrowth of the church weilding power over the state during the dark ages and middle ages. You didn't go to the Sheriff of Knottingham to get married, you went to the Friar Tuck. But then I guess, those people must just have been anti-government.

Perhaps, Rush Limbaugh likes Elton John as a singer in spite of his political views. Perhaps Elton John likes Rush Limbaugh as a person, in spite of his political views. Either that or Sir Elton can be bought for $1 million. If Rush were really as "anti-gay" (whatever that means) as the reporter believes, then perhaps Elton wouldn't be willing to sing at his wedding for any amount of money. Can you imagine Rev. King going to a KKK rally to give a motivational speech? Not me either.

Solar Storms are Going to Kill US!!! (Again...maybe)

2010-06-07T16:00:00.000-05:00

Watch out for the new scare of solar storms. I seem to remember a scare of solar storms a couple of years ago. And a couple of years before that. In fact, I think it has something to do with El Nino or La Nina. Or maybe just the 12 year, 30 year, 524 year, or 12,113 year solar cycles.

Look, there is not a whole lot we can do to fight off the angry sun god. So far, none of the scares have wiped out civilization as we know it. While I understand that this could be the big one, I am not betting on it (because if you did, the solar storm would wipe out all communications, electronics, and set off nuclear warheads - your buddy is going to have bigger concerns than paying you back). Face it, if there is a solar storm that wipes out civilization as we know it, WE ARE SCREWED. Actually, I think that might be one of the definitions of "screwed."

Of course, you can always buy gold to help protect you in the event of a solar storm. It would probably make a nice protective blanket that would keep your electronics safe! After all, they use it on the visors of the space suit helmets.

Roadkill

2010-06-07T12:00:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I spent 8 hours driving on the interstates (only interstates, no side roads) of Iowa. During that time I saw at least 30 dead deer on the sides of the road. Is this a sign that DNR needs to issue more hunting permits? They were all does from what I could tell.

I am not a hunter myself, but 30 deer at around 100 pounds of meat each, that it a 3000 pounds of wasted meat. Make those into deer burgers and you could serve 9000 meals. That's enough to feed ALL of the homeless people in Iowa for a month.

Top Shot Review

2010-06-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

Top Shot is a show on the History Channel that is a competition of 16 shooters for the title of "Top Shot." After one episode I am rather disappointed.

Quick Run Down: Survivor without the bug eating, naked fat guys, and 25-30 yr old girls wearing loin clothes and pretending they aren't using their sexuality to try and win. That being said, I am glad that I have the DVR and can pare the show down to about 10 minutes of shooting, thereby getting rid of the rest.

One of the bloggers I read, Caleb, is a competitor on the show. It was nice to see that he made the only competitive shot he was suppose to. Also, they didn't show him talking smack in the house (of course he is on the team that won the challenge). In any case, it sounds like the competition is going to start out as a semi-contest in one's proficiency with firearms and gradually devolve into throwing rocks (maybe it would be better if they ate bugs, had naked fat men, and scantily clad 25-30 yr old girls).

The first team competition was billed as a long range rifle competition with some of the rifles used in the 20th century. During the practice, I couldn't tell how far away the targets were, but they couldn't have been that far. And they had some one spotting for them. All of the rifles used iron sights only, and when the competition happened you found out that this was just a timed event at 50 yards and 100 yards.

50 and 100 yards is only a long distance when you are down by 6 and there are 30 seconds left in the game. But that sport doesn't involve rifles. Back to the competition. The 1903 Springfield rifle was the first one mentioned and the History channel made a big deal of it being the longest rifle in service. Well from its initial service in 1905 to the end of the Vietnam war (which is being generous since only a few were still in use as sniper rifles), is about 70 years. That is a pretty long time. It was billed as a rifle from WWI.

The next rifle was the Russian SVT-40. This was billed as the WWII rifle. It was first built in 1940 and was one of the first semi-automatic rifles. The third rifle was a Mosin Nagant. It was billed as a Korean War era rifle. Huh? This is the History Channel right? The Mosin-Nagant was a Korean War rifle? Technically, yes, but wouldn't it be more appropriate to say a WWII, WWI, Russian Revolution, Russo-Japanese War, and Boxer Rebellion Rifle? This is a rifle that was built in 1891 and saw widespread continuous service in the Russian army (far more than the 1903 in the US army) until 1960 (ohmygosh - that is 70 years like the 1903). It has been issued to a limited extent in Eastern block countries for another couple of decades and was one of the main battle rifles of all sorts of countries, including the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, which are still using it today. So, 2010 - 1891 = 120 years of service in wars throughout the world. Look, I am as proud to be an American as the next guy, we make better rifles than Russians, but come on now. Don't try to pretend that because we make better rifles, then they have been in service longer than any other. The Mosin-Nagant has been in service longer than any other because it is cheap to make and goes BANG every time (I have never had a dud in the hundreds of rounds of 40-60 year old ammo that I have shot).

The last rifle was the M14. The Vietnam era rifle. When the team competition time came, there was some crawling under barbed wire, jumping through mud puddles, etc. Since these were all military rifles, that sort of added to it. And they got to shoot at the targets (50 and 100 yards). They were exploding targets so all you needed to do was nick the edge. This was another disappointment. It turns the competition into a speed competition. Fastest bangs wins, with no regards to accuracy. No MOA groupings.

The blue team won without a hitch when the red team's second shooter couldn't hit the target. Place all of the blame you want on the spotter, but this was from 100 yards! You shouldn't need a spotter from 100 yards. I don't know how big the exploding circle was, but it looked to be at least 4 inches in diameter and possibly as large as 8 inches in diameter. 30 shots and you can't even hit 4 inches. At 100 yards.

So there is a shoot off for elimination. Frankly, I like Andre (the red team shooter who did hit his target). Lots of people were trying to make excuses for Mike (the guy who couldn't hit his target), so Andre was thinking that he would be eliminated. He is the first one to vote for who he thinks should be eliminated and shoots the target dead center. Only one other person hit the bullseye on theirs, that is icing the competition. I would want Andre on my team.

With the shootoff, it was Mike against the long range shooter Kelly, doing guess what? Long range shooting. 200, 400, and 600 yards. OK, that is long range shooting. This was with a Remington 700 (in .308 Winchester I assume), with a scope that was probably a 15X - 50mm. Naturally, Kelly cleaned Mike's clock and Mike was sent home. Kelly didn't really need the help of the spotter and during practice he made a smiley face on his target. My kind of guy.

As I said, next week I'll boil it down to just shooting in 10 minutes.

Taking Kids Out to Dinner

2010-06-06T12:00:00.000-05:00

Why do parents take kids out to dinner?

I don't know, but I still do it. For some strange reason. Usually because we have a coupon and the kids eat free. What I don't think I will ever understand is why we put up with our kids ordering Mac and Cheese for $4.49.

You can buy the stuff in bulk for 10 cents a box (25 cents if you go with the expensive brand). Restaurants must make a killing off of this stuff. Having eaten a lot of Mac and Cheese in my life, I know what boxed Mac and Cheese looks like. Only one restaurant I have ever been too makes their own Mac and Cheese.

I guess I make up for it by letting my kids have two to three classes of chocolate milk.

Gun Show Goodness

2010-06-06T09:30:00.000-05:00

Having read about Matt Snyder's gun show experience, it was a great weekend to go and see some of his "preconceptions" at the local gun show. I got permission from my wife (yes, she is in charge), called up a friend and we headed on over.

"An unspoken etiquette seems to dictate that vendors don't initiate conversation until a prospective buyer pauses for at least 10 seconds at a given display." Well, actually I think this is more a case of personality. There were some vendors there who barely said a word even when you talked with them. On the other hand, one of my favorite vendors (who I have yet to buy anything from) was his normal gregarious self and was able to spout off facts about any firearm that he saw someone touch or even take a second look at. When I first met him, it was a little nerve racking, I am the type of person who likes to shop without being bothered by salesmen until I have a question. Now it is always fun to spend a few minutes and watch his table while he talks nearly non-stop, carrying on three or four conversations at a time.

"This place is crawling with cops." Well, I saw three cops. One at the door, and two wandering around. Hardly what I would consider crawling. Of course there is something about thinking of committing a crime in a place where the person to gun ration is around 1:100 that just screams insanity.

"Nazi-themed tomes, for whatever reason, seem particularly popular." I'll be perfectly honest, I don't go to gun shows to look at books. I go to look at guns (and ammunition). At this particular gun show, there were probably three tables that had "Nazi-themed" anything. Mainly militaria. Of course, there was also Russian militaria, Japanese militaria, and don't forget those dastardly Yankee militaria at the same tables. Some people happen to like militaria, just because the swastika is a very noticeable symbol doesn't mean everyone who collects it subscribes to those philosophies. I have some South American coins, but you don't see me participating in a revolution every six months now do you?

"This is not the venue for selling machine guns." OK, anyone who has been to a gun show knows this. Only anti-gun groups still believe that the Mexican drug lords are arming themselves at US gun shows. While I was there, I didn't see a single machine gun, no live grenades (some dummies though), and rocket launchers had already sold out. As to why people like to bring up the $200 tax for buying machine guns, I don't know. This is one time when not indexing for inflation has been good (granted it would be better if there was no tax or registration).

"The clichéd caricature of the "gun nut" is not only white, but aggressively white." This is something I honestly haven't paid attention to before, so I thought I would look. Well suprisingly there were people of all races there. Now, I must say that the vast majority (95%) were white, but then again, where I live (and coincidentally where Mr. Snyder went to his gun show), the vast majority of people (98%) are white.

"... gun and knife shows are the male equivalent of window-shopping for shoes." Oh yeah, I can agree with this wholeheartedly. Since they have driven guns out of the shopping malls of America, we are forced to get our shopping fix at gun shows. It would be much better to bring firearms sales back into JC Penny and Sears. Put it right between the Jewelry counter and the Cosmetics Counter. Across from the Womens Clothing. That way, we could go in, do our browsing and still have our wife's in somewhat close proximity if we needed the checkbook.

"Six days, three gun shows, and 19 attempts to buy handguns sans permit had yielded zero sales." Yeah, in some states they have a "Permit to Purchase" for handguns (or long guns in the really unfree states). I haven't come across a dealer yet who would sell you a handgun without a purchase permit. So much for gang bangers coming in and buying whatever they want.

Basically, Mr. Snyder is mostly wrong. But I still had a successful day. My friend came out of the bathroom at lunchtime and said to me, "Isn't the gun show great. You can go to the bathroom and there is a guy cleaning a sword in the sink." Sword, as in three foot blade designed to cleave people in half. And nobody minds at all.

I had gone to this show with the goal of getting a youth rifle for my kids. I taught my oldest to shoot at Thanksgiving and needed to get something that was more in her size. In the past, there were usually three or four vendors that had Crickett rifles. During my first stroll around the place, I couldn't find any. During the second stroll I finally found one. It was the black synthetic stock, and was priced a little more (OK, a lot more) than I wanted to pay. As I started walking further down the table the father behind me said to his son, "We should sell our Crickett sometime."

I turned immediately and asked if I heard him right. Yes, they had a Crickett that their son didn't use. So one of the greatest freedom's of all (the private commerce of firearms) commenced. What price? How old? I'm willing to buy. Well, I just live a few minutes away, let me go home and get it. Done.

Thirty minutes later, the gunshow loophole was fully utilized as the father and his son handed over a high powered, bolt action sniper rifle, with a powerful scope, with the minimum length barrel the law allowed for greater concealability, all so that I could indoctrinate my kids in murder and mayhem (Can't you just hear Sarah and Josh crying their eyes out?). I in turn handed him four bills coated with evidence of the drug trade.

OK, so it was just a .22 Crickett with a 4X scope. And 80-90% of American bills have trace amounts of cocaine or other drugs on them. But, no papers were filled out, no drivers licenses shown, just two free people happy to do business. They sold a rifle no longer in use. And I gained something that my kids will use for a decade or more. Both of us were happy with the transaction. That is how America should work.

Oh yeah, I put the rifle in the trunk of my car with enough ammunition to take over a small Central American country. God bless America!

Investing in Gold

2010-05-30T16:00:00.000-05:00

GOLD! It is everywhere in the news. We have hit a new high, but gold may go to $1500 or even $2000, so there is still an opportunity to buy. And of course there are all the commercials that talk about gold out-performing stocks (if you conveniently forget certain periods of history), being a hedge against inflation (if you conveniently forget certain periods of history), and never losing all of its value (which is true, but is also true of every bankrupt company's stock certificates - they still have a heating value and can be used as a fuel source).

Gold is a rather mundane element. Up until the 20th century there wasn't much use for it (except money). Iron could be worked into all manner of tools, as could copper, bronze, brass, and steel. Gold had the intrinsic property of being shiny. Even in the 20th century, besides its decorative value, gold's only real use is in electronics and as a protective coating (it doesn't corrode).

Like every other commodity, the price of gold has fluctuated. Once Nixon completely dissolved the connection between gold and value of money in the early 70s, the price of gold has gone up and down. Before that time in America, the price of gold was mandated by law. So, if anyone tries to compare gold using a price scale that started before about 1975 with stocks over the same period is just pulling a fast one. Once the price of gold was no longer mandated by law (less than $40/ounce), it quickly traded up to a market value of $200/ounce).

So buying up gold, why? If you are doing it because it outperforms stocks, then you need to take a look at the historical record. If you are doing it because it is a hedge against inflation, you need to take a look at the historical record. If you are doing it because gold will always have value, then think about the situation you need it in.

Are you talking about a natural disaster where there is no access to electricity and ATM machines? Last I checked, the pimply faced kid at the grocery store didn't have a clue how to ring up a sale with gold. The manager knew about twice what the kid knew - nothing. Besides, I don't think they are going to be working at the grocery store during that time, and by the time you lug your backpack of gold down there, it will probably be all looted anyway. Using gold to conduct business requires that the population have an idea of what the value of gold is and a means of verifying that what you have is really gold. Our society has neither for small scale transactions. When the government controlled the price of gold they could do this by minting their own coins and stamping the value on it. Companies that buy and sell gold today have the technology to determine the amount of gold in an item, but unless you are buying your eggs and milk from Zales Jewelers, I wouldn't count on them.

How about a complete societal breakdown. Well, gold is nice because it looks pretty. But in the end it doesn't help you survive any. You can't eat it (well, you can but you don't get much nutrition from it), it isn't good for making tools (hoes, rakes, firearms, etc) because it is too soft, and it is heavy. Besides, even if you were going to do some small transactions with it, how are you suppose to break apart the 1 ounce gold coin (that is now theoretically worth $50,000) so that you can buy the two dozen eggs from the farmer for $30? If I was the farmer, I would much rather have a bolt of cloth, an extra shovel, or perhaps three gallons of gasoline. In other words, in spite of its theoretical worth, the practical worth of gold during this scenario is zero.

A lot of libertarians like gold. I like gold too, as jewelry. Do I think the US needs to get back on the gold standard - heck no. Do I think hoarding gold is worthwhile - heck no. Do I own gold (outside of jewelry and electronics) - not that I know of. Do I think you should drop everything and invest in gold - only if you are a moron, if you bought when gold was around $250 per ounce, then sell now and celebrate, if you are going to buy now at $1200 and ounce, don't cry when it falls back to $500.

What is the Role of Government?

2010-05-30T12:00:00.000-05:00

Problems are everywhere. You have them, I have them, we all want them solved, but for some reason, we just can't get rid of them. Which brings me to the topic of what is the role of government?

Listening to some people, you would think that government exists to solve everyone's problems. On the other extreme, some people would say that government has no purpose. The vast majority of people believe it lies somewhere in between, however, the in between part is rather large, so you would be hard pressed to get me to agree that we all want something in the middle.

One of the first things that people need to understand is that at the present moment, we have a finite number of resources. Let me elaborate on this concept further. Broken down to its simplest components, there are people and raw materials (although some might argue that people are raw materials). People have the capacity to create ideas and work. Through ideas and work, raw materials can be used to create technology. Technology may then make the kind of work that created it obsolete, but people still retain the capacity to create ideas and work.

So people and raw materials are resources. They are both finite. However, what can be created with people and raw materials is infinite. That does not mean that we have access to this infinite amount of technology now. What we have access to at this moment is finite. So knowing that resources are finite, if one subscribes to the philosophy of government solving every problem, then resources will quickly be depleted. But where along a scale do the resources run out (assuming anarchy at one end and totalitarian control at the other)?

Well, that is the wrong question first off. Because it supposes that government is actually capable of solving the problems in the first place. Government is nothing more than a collection of people and their raw materials. Sort of like a corporation, a collection of people and their raw materials. Or an athletic team, or a family, or even an individual. If government is going to solve a problem, shouldn't we compare how well it has handled similar problems to how other organizations have fared? Furthermore, shouldn't we look at objective evidence of both the means of accomplishing some objective as well as the objective itself?

Rarely do you hear about that in a political discussion in America. One group says "We want clean water", another says "We want drug free America", another says "We want 35 mpg on cars", and on and on. All of these things may or may not be good things. But the question should be, is it up to government to provide it?

John Locke talked about the natural rights of life, liberty, and property. I believe that the government should be focused on protecting these. Infringements on these natural rights in any form should be justified by an overwhelming evidence of benefit to another of the natural rights. Probably much to the chagrin of family and friends, at this point in my life there is very little that the government does that I support. Rather than voting for a new law to fix some perceived injustice, I would rather repeal the laws that caused the injustice in the first place. Voting for half-baked fixes only perpetuates the problem of the government creating problems to begin with.

From a federal government standpoint, we could still have 536 elected officials, but there would be no need for most of the millions of other government employees. Do I support term limits as a means to reform government? No, not at all. If you want to be in government your whole life that should be your choice. I would like to see the power that government wields minimized, that would naturally have the effect of keeping people who seek power out of government (which I believe is the major reason politicians want to be elected). Return the "service" part to public service and do away with salaries for elected officials (or at least limit it to the average salary for the whole nation).

From a state and local standpoint, that is up to the state and local constitutions. If a city wants to provide endless welfare benefits, fine by me (I won't live there), just support it from your own tax receipts. There is no reason for people from North Dakota to pay for the welfare largess of California.

I would just prefer if the government (federal, local, and state) just left me alone.

A Primer on Electricity Generation

2010-05-30T10:00:00.000-05:00

Most people in the United States take electricity for granted. Whenever we need something we simply plug it in and electricity magically powers whatever instrument we have. Having been in the energy business for my entire adult life, I thought I would write an introduction for the average person on where electricity comes from. Since the country is currently debating items that could drastically change how energy is produced in the US, it is important that people understand the basics how where electricity comes from. After reading this, you will probably know more about electricity production than 90% of the adults in America.

To begin let me start with what everyone does know about. Our homes. Most homes in America have two services of electricity: 240 Volt AC and 120 Volt AC. There are normally three wires that come into your home, two 120 volt wires and one ground wire. Large appliances like oven ranges, dryers, electric furnaces, and air conditioners use 240 volts, while all of the rest of your home uses 120 volts. The first thing to remember is don't ever try to plug a 120 volt appliance in a 240 volt outlet. For one, the plugs are different so it shouldn't work. Secondly, you are going to fry your appliance. If you do try to plug your 240 volt appliance in your 120 volt outlet most likely, you appliance won't work (it is not getting enough electricity), although it probably won't be permanently damaged.

AC stands for alternating current. This means that the direction of flow changes. In the US, we use 60 Hz or 60 cycles per second. So the direction of flow switches 60 times each second.

As an analogy, voltage can be looked at as pressure. Water pressure (from a water tower) pushes water through the pipes which is why it comes out when you turn the faucet on. Voltage pushes electrons (electricity) through the wires so that when you plug something in, it turns on. No voltage, no electricity. The other key term is amps or amperage. For the analogy, amperage is like the amount of electricity that is flowing. When a water faucet is off, there is pressure (voltage) in your pipes, but no water flow. When you turn the faucet on, you get water flow (amps).

Besides your normal appliances and lights, your doorbell runs on electricity as well. This is usually a lower voltage of around 12 volts. To do this, a transformer is connected to a 120 volt circuit. A transformer is a simple device that has two sets of windings, input and output. Based on the ration of loops per winding, will determine what voltage the output will be.

All of the electricity in your house flows in through a meter and a breaker box. The breaker box allows loads (lights, appliances, etc.) to be disconnected without affecting the rest of the house. The meter is where the electric company measures the amount of electricity you are using so that it can bill you.

Working backwards, the 120 volt lines that run to your house are probably coming from a transformer. As before, the transformer steps down the voltage from a higher voltage. Higher voltage allows for more efficient distribution of electricity over long distances. Depending on your locale, the power lines you see overhead could have any number of different voltages and more than likely there are several transformers in between your home and the major power lines. Major power lines have voltages in the neighborhood of 14,500 volts to 345,000 volts or more.

The major power lines run through substations. Substations are sort of like your breaker box for your home. They may include stepdown transformers, but they also include breakers and disconnects so that electricity can be cut off to different areas of a city or county without affecting the entire network. Neighborhood substations feed into major substations.

Major substations are like the clearinghouse for power. Major substations may be near a power plant or not. In all cases, major substations have incoming lines from several sources. Our modern reliance on electricity makes it impossible for a city to lose power just because one power plant is not producing electricity. It is not a matter of backup sources, all of the sources are the primary sources. To return to the water analogy, a city may have only one water tower, however it might use a dozen wells to fill that water tower. The residents of the city never notice that any of the wells are not working as long as the water tower remains full. The major difference, is that a water tower is storing water, electricity in the electrical distribution system is either used or not created. (More on that later.)

Major substations are fed by power plants. Besides some solar power plants (which account for less than 1% of all electricity production in the US), electricity at a power plant is created by a generator. A generator is a machine that rotates magnets passed wires (or wires past magnets). This creates electricity (you can generate your own electricity with a magnet and a piece of copper wire - but don't plan on running anything from it). Electricity and magnetism are related. Electricity creates magnetic fields and magnetic fields create electricity. A generator uses rotational energy to create electricity from wires and magnets (a motor is the opposite, it uses wires and magnets to create rotational energy).

A quick word about solar plants. There are really two types, direct conversion and generator conversion. Direct conversion uses solar cells (like what is found on a calculator) to generate electricity. The materials on the solar cells produce electricity when light shines on them (conversion of visible light to electricity). Generator conversion types use a generator like any other power plant.

The generators are turned by a turbine. A turbine is another rotating machine that has blades attached to it. As a fluid (usually steam) passes over the blades, it causes the turbine to rotate (like a pinwheel in the wind) which turns the turbine. Hydroelectric dams use liquid water to rotate specially designed turbines. Wind generators use a wind turbine which is open to the environment because air is the fluid that is pushing the blades. But the blades on the windmill are connected to a generator. All other power plants (coal, gas, nuclear, solar) use the same type of turbine, and in some cases if a company (say GE) designed two different types of plants (say nuclear and coal) at the same time (say 1975), it is very possible that they have the exact same model of turbine and generator. So except for those solar and wind plants I already mentioned, from the turbine out to the electric distribution lines they are all the same (and in some cases exactly the same).

And since all of the electrical lines are interconnected, the electricity is all the same. In other words, lets say that you are a rabid environmentalist and want to get all of your electricity from wind power. If you have a wind turbine in your yard and your house is not connected to the grid, then congratulations. However, if your house is connected to the grid, then you are getting electricity that was made from coal, oil, natural gas, nuclear, solar, and wind. There is no device you can put on your house that is going to filter out the "bad" electricity. 1 kilowatt of electricity from coal is indistinguishable from 1 kilowatt of electricity from solar.

So, why hasn't wind and solar energy taken off, in spite of promises that it would for the last 40 years? In a nutshell, the answer is energy density and reliability. (Coincidentally, the same issue that has kept the electric car from being the savior of mankind since the late 1800's). Energy density could be described as the amount of energy that can be derived from a certain volume. Wind and solar's energy density sucks rocks. Sure it is all over the world, however it is in such small amounts that huge tracts of land are needed to supply energy. For instance, an average size power plant is around 1000 MW. For a coal, oil, natural gas, or nuclear plant all of the equipment can be located on 50 acres or less (with room to spare and build walking paths for the employees at lunchtime). A comparable wind or solar farm would need several thousand acres to produce the same electricity. Wind does have an advantage over solar in this case, because 95% of the land could still be used for farming or other uses.

Energy density has to do with the fuel itself. Nuclear has an extremely high energy density. 95% of the mass of nuclear fuel is made up of non-fuel (uranium 238 that isn't fissile, stainless steel, zirconium, and some other metals). In spite of this, a nuclear plant produces only a few hundred tons of waste each year (which includes the 95% of non-fuels in the fuel). Compared to a coal plant which produces millions of tons in ash alone.

As you can begin to see, every type of fuel has its tradeoffs. So reliability is coupled with energy density to determine what fuels we use to make electricity. We need electricity all day long, although in varying amounts. Simplified, there is a base load and a varying peak load. The base load is the minimum amount of electricity that is needed. Plants that produce baseload need to be the cheapest plants that can be continuously run. Since plants will always be shut down for maintenance on a periodic basis, there is little to no "extra" base load, unless a new plant is started up. Coal, nuclear and hydroelectric plants are the vast majority of this country's baseload. Coal and nuclear plants also cannot just be started and stopped at will. The process takes several hours to days.

Peak load is during those times (daytime, early evening) when more electricity is demanded because of industrial needs. In hot climates, the use of air conditioning can greatly affect the peak demand. Because this electricity is not needed at all times, certain peaking plants are used. Natural gas is the primary fuel for these plants. Gas turbines plants are basically glorified jet engines (really, really BIG jet engines). They can be started up rapidly, and are designed to go through lots of start stop cycles. Solar is a great option for peaking plants since it is available at the prime peaking times. Unfortunately, it is not predictably available at the peaking times. Cloud cover can decrease the effectiveness of solar power to near nothing, so any solar plant is going to have to be backed up by a gas turbine plant.

Wind is even less predictable than solar. While some areas have great wind resources, Mother Nature doesn't always cause the wind to blow like the average of the last 30 years. Sometimes it is significantly below that. And when the wind isn't blowing, there is still the electricity demand. So while wind and solar may someday provide up to 20% of the electricity we use, there will be another 20% of unused fossil fuel capacity just in case. Running two power plants (even though one is inactive) is more expensive than running one.

Regulation of Reporters

2010-05-28T17:35:00.003-05:00

Michigan to me is a whacked out place. They are always running commercials in my state about going to work in Michigan or vacationing to Michigan. I have zero desire to do either one. My guess is the vast majority of Americans feel the same way, hence the reason their economy is in a worse slump than the rest of the nation.

But now one of their politicians is coming up with the bright idea of "licensing" reporters. This is a bad idea on so many levels.

First, that pesky 1st Amendment was made so that reporters would not have to fear or kowtow to any politicians. Now, whether a media organization decides to get into bed with the political party of their choice is their decision. That doesn't mean the government should step in to help us out.

Second, who is going to verify that the politicians that license the reporters are of good standing moral character? It certainly isn't a qualification and you can't say that politicians are even more moral and upstanding than the population at large. No need to mention names (Spitzer, Sanford, Craig, Clinton, etc, etc). While some reporters may "not know what they are talking about" some politicians know nothing of what they are making laws and regulations on. At least the reporters are just talking about stuff they don't know.

Third, just because it used for hair dressers, auto mechanics, and plumbers doesn't mean we should license everyone. Frankly, I see no reason to license hair dressers, auto mechanics, and plumbers through the government. Why not let private organizations provide their stamp of approval, you know the ones whose members actually engage in the trade for which they are approving. What do politicians know about hair dressing, auto mechanics, and plumbing?

Fourth, the chance for corruption from this is so great. Want to silence a reporter, just start planting some rumors of bad moral character. Do you not think that cronyism, kickbacks, and corruption reside in every single regulatory agency of the government? Then you haven't been paying attention to the news for the last 2 millenia.

I am not a real fan of reporters anyway. I don't trust most of them, and most of them don't know what they are writing or talking about. That being said, I will stand up for their right (yes, freedom of the press happens to be a right) any day, even though they may not like most of my political views.

The nice thing about the article is that only the one politician is sponsoring the bill and it has next to zero chance of actually being passed. Said legislator is on his way out and wants to start a "discussion." Why not propose a bill to round up people of a certain ethnic orientation that we are actively engaged in combat against and put them in internment camps? At least we have precedent to do that, in spite of being a really bad idea.

$73 Billion for Food Stamps?

2010-05-27T12:00:00.000-05:00

40 million Americans are using food stamps. At a cost of $73 billion (with a B). Something is just wrong with this when 13% of the country leaches money to buy food. I am assuming that those 40 million don't have cars, dvd players, computers, iPods, and Playstations. Because afterall, food is a necessity and why would you want to spend your money on play things if you need to eat? Oh yeah, because our welfare state has bred it in to some people. Its disgusting!

Put $73 billion into perspective. For 40 million people, that is $1825 a year. About $150 per month, per person. Our family's food budget is just under $100 per month per person. And we eat out fairly regularly. And I wouldn't consider us anywhere close to poor. If this isn't a bloated government welfare program, then I don't know what is.

The stigma of using food stamps has all but disappeared too. At one point in our nation's recent history, people were for the most part ashamed to use food stamps and tried to hide it as much as possible. Since the adoption of debit cards, it has made it less obvious that anyone is using food stamps. Plus, the government has gotten into a large ad campaign to "encourage" people to sign up for food stamps. What irks me is that probably 75% of the people on food stamps don't need it or are there because of conscious choices they made.

Case in point, when I was going to college, there were quite a few couples I knew who were living in subsidized housing and getting food stamps. And they had chosen to do that by going to school that they couldn't afford and not wanting to lower their standard of living below what they were accustomed to in their parents home. Every now and then my friends would offer us milk and cheese that they got as part of their allotment because it was too much for their family. I don't think my wife and I ever took any of it, even though that sure would have helped our food budget at the time.

So what would I do? Scrap the whole program. Why should the government be in the business of providing food for people? But, but, but ... then people will starve .... Uh, no. They won't. They may get their priorities in order and not buy the latest movie on Blu-ray and instead feed their family for a couple of days. Perhaps they will cut back on the beer and buy Wheaties instead (their both made from the same stuff, one just has more nutritional value and you don't have the hangover the next morning). There are lots of charities that provide food for the poor, and can feed a family for a lot less than $150 per person a month.

So, am I a heartless cretin? If you rely on food stamps, you probably think so. However, in my mind (and in practice) I can separate what are legitimate roles of government (blowing things up, printing money, and building some roads) and what should be the role of private charities. Unfortunately, I only get to selectively choose which charities I donate to. I don't get to selectively fund government programs.

Bans on Flying the American Flag

2010-05-27T09:30:00.000-05:00

When are groups going to learn that this (or this, this, this, this, this, this, and this) is just not acceptable to Americans? If you refuse to allow the display of the Stars and Stripes, you are going to look like a schmuck. In spite of our different political opinions, I find very few Americans who object to the flying of the American flag, apartment and condo restrictions be damned.

So why would anyone (or association) try to ban the display of the American flag? Probably because they are on some kind of power trip and get some sort of thrill from it. Almost invariably, any group that has tried to enforce a flag ban has ended up reversing their policy and/or apologizing.

At the beginning of the 1st Persian Gulf War, I remember news reports that the Saudi's didn't want the US flag on the outside of the US soldier's uniforms. So they put it on the inside of their helmets. It wasn't more than a week or so when the American public began to question why the Saudi's would ask us to save their butt's and simultaneously tell us how to dress. Sorry those two don't go together. That policy changed real quick.

I am still amazed that there one to two stories a month of some apartment organization requiring the removal of a flag from some WWII vet. I have been a landlord, and the thought of banning the US flag never occurred to me. Why does it occur to all of these people?

Taiwan Journey Home

2010-05-26T11:00:00.000-05:00

Well, after one day of flying and 4 days in Taiwan it was time to go home. We stopped at the hotel's breakfast buffet one last time and had a light breakfast of fruit and croissants. And then off to the airport we go. Since this was an international flight that passed through two countries, we had to go through security in Taiwan, Japan, and again in Chicago. In a nutshell, Taiwan let me wear my shoes through the screener and I didn't have to take out my laptop. Japan made me take out my laptop, but I still could wear my shoes. Chicago had me take off my shoes and take out my laptop.

In the end, I could have had a couple bottles of liquid explosives in my cargo pants and not one of the airports would have known. Then again, I am not a terrorist although the TSA likes to screen me as one, especially when I am traveling with small kids. In Chicago, the mother and her infant daughter in front of us in line were pulled for screening. Chicago also had the announcements of being at "condition orange" or whatever fancy color they have. Seriously, the get rid of that stupid announcement. What, when the color is yellow or green we don't have to report suspicious activity, but when the color is red or orange we do? Give me a break, your dealing with adults here and in most International airports in the US 75% of the foreign travelers don't have a clue what the color code is, and 99% of the travelers don't pay attention anyway.

The flight to Japan was relatively uneventful. We had a great meal on the plan (Japan Airlines, not American). In the Tokyo airport we had a 4 hour layover. I spent the first hour wandering the airport while my wife slept. I still had 8,000 Yen to spend. I collect coins and bills so spending the large bills helped to break it down into smaller, collectible amounts. Then I came back and woke my wife up so that we could go shopping. Primarily we could candies and treats for the family. Afterwards, we got a bite to eat at one of the cafe's. I have always wondered about the shops that you find in airports. For instance, a Mont Blanc pen shop. Who would buy a $200 pen at the airport? At the electronics shops in Tokyo airport there were video cameras identical to the one that we had, only for twice as much as we paid, and that is after taking into account the 30% discount the store was offering.

We boarded our plane to Chicago, another 777. My wife and I began with our meal and watching "The Tooth Fairy". I like the Rock in non-serious movies. Perhaps it is the dumb jock personna just doesn't come work in serious dramas (or I just don't like serious dramas). Shortly after the movie finished, I closed my eyes for a few minutes, and woke up 6 1/2 hours later. I had just slept longer in an uncomfortable airplane seat than I had in the uncomfortable hotel bed in Taiwan. The flight landed with no incident and we sailed through customs without being shaken down (I didn't even declare the $10,000 cash I had on me - ok, so it was $10,000 Taiwan which is about $350 American).

A short delay for our plane home and we arrived safely. All of our bags made it and none of the gifts were destroyed. I was most worried about the paintings and calligraphy, but my masterful packing had preserved them. I can't wait to go again (although if I can avoid the back to back 10,000 calorie days I'll be happy).

Taiwan Day 4: Tainan

2010-05-25T21:30:00.000-05:00

After a somewhat restful night of sleep, I woke up at 3am mostly refreshed. As usual, I found something to occupy my time until my wife was up and we went down to breakfast by at 7 am. We ate a more normal sized meal, after two days of having food crammed down our throats (OK, I admit we voluntarily did the cramming because the food was good and you just can't get Chinese food like that in the states).

When the stores opened up, we went to buy some jade and pearls. And it was over so quick that we had time to relax until my friend picked us up. This day we were going to Tainan, she said it has more touristy type things than Kaohsiung. At around 9am she and her husband picked up up to go. They do have freeways in Taiwan and the traffic there is as smooth as the traffic on freeways in the US (nothing like the city street heart stopper). We stopped at a rest stop on the way up and if you replaced the Chinese characters with English words then it would have been like any rest stop in the US.

The first place we went in Tainan was Anping Fort. This fort was originally built by the Dutch in the 1600s. Then after a war with the Chinese it was taken over by the Chinese. Later the Japanese cleaned house and built up more of the fort. Finally, the Chinese got the fort back after WWII, and being the good capitalists that they are, turned it into a tourist attraction. It was definitely as good as some of the historical sites I have been to in the US. There were a couple of museums with lots of artifacts that had been excavated. Map placards denoted where each part of the fort was and plenty of posters and maps explaining the history and different uses of the fort. In both Chinese and English. And of course, they had the gift shop which we naturally had to spend some money at.

My friend mentioned to me about the Taiwan lottery for our receipts. Basically, every receipt you get has a lottery number that is part of a drawing every two months. Prizes are up to $2 million (Taiwan). It seems the government found a way to "crack down" on under the table purchases by offering the lottery. All of the registers that print the receipts are connected to the lottery system and so the revenue department knows what your total sales are. People will ask for the receipts so they can have a chance to win. I like this idea, maybe we could adopt it in the states (or at least my state).

After Anping, we ate lunch at a small fast food place (Chinese fast food, not American fast food). My wife and I insisted that we don't get too much as we wanted to save plenty of room for the evening meal. After lunch we went to the Confucius Temple. At one point it had been a school but now it was more of a tourist attraction. The best thing about it was the traditional Chinese architechture with the rolled up roofs, pagodas, entry gates, and lacquer. My wife even found a sign in the ladies room that the English translation didn't make much sense, but sure sounded a awful lot like something Confucius would have said. In the middle of the courtyard was this giant banyan tree that had to have been a thousand years old. It's branches were being held up by posts since it had "died" and been brought back to life. Banyan trees are neat to look at with all of their knarled, intertwined roots and branches.

Those were the two main places we went in Tainan and then went back to do some shopping in Kaohsiung before dinner. I had a simple list: some presents for the kids and some paintings/caligraphy for our home. I also wanted to get some of the Chinese New Year door hangings, but since it wasn't near New Year, I figured it would be unlikely to find them. We first went to a department store and found some of the gifts that we needed for the kids. My friend's husband did some haggling in Taiwanese (which I barely understand any of) and got us about 30% off. Haggling is almost a requirement of shopping in Taiwan. They had some paintings, but they were rather pricey and I didn't want them. The best Chinese paintings and calligraphy are found in mom & pop shops.

After talking on the phone to her parents, my friend led us to a couple of other artwork and calligraphy shops. In one shop I found a calligraphy work that I wanted. It was done in various ancient forms of Chinese characters. Since it was unsigned (it didn't have the calligrapher's stamp) it was very reasonably priced. I didn't care about the stamp since I wasn't going to be selling it anyway. After some more haggling, we were able to get the mounting (basically smoothing out the wrinkled paper and gluing it to another piece of paper) included in the price. We would pick it up after dinner.

For dinner, my wife and I treated my friend and her husband to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. We hadn't been to one before and never lived in a city with one, so why not have an American steak halfway around the world. It was just as expensive in Taiwan as in the states, their portions are just as big, so my wife and I split a meal, and my friend and her husband split a meal. The food was great. We had an 8 oz filet minion and they had some other kind of steak. We ordered julienne potatoes but got french fries. I guess french fries are sort of like julienne potatoes. For desert we had the chocolate cake and they had the cheesecake. What we noticed is that everyone else in the restaurant was also splitting meals. (At $75 for the full meal - appetizer, steak, side, salad, and desert - it makes sense to split it.)

In the middle of the meal we had a surprise. My friend's parent's showed up with a Chinese painting to give us (from their home) and a set of New Year's door hangings. The door hangings were done by a famous artist and had his stamp on them. My friend told me that these were very valuable and I should hang them on the outside of the home where they would be weathered and ruined. I assured her that I wouldn't. I offered to pay her father for the paintings, and I gladly would have, but he refused. He wanted them to be a gift for us. Of all the things we brought back from Taiwan, I will probably treasure these gifts the most.

Since we had a flight at 8:30am, we said our goodbye's back at the hotel. We stayed up and packed our stuff until around 11pm.

Taiwan Day 3: Kending National Park

2010-05-24T17:00:00.000-05:00

Another night of little sleep (although progressively more than before, I think I had about 4 hours), and I was awake at some other awful hour of the morning when I should have been asleep. My wife woke up with a bit of a headache so on the way down to breakfast we asked the Hotel front desk where we might buy some medicine. Immediately they asked if we needed to go to the hospital, no, just medicine.

Breakfast was great again, although I tried to hold back since I was still full from the day before. At 7 am we were down in the lobby to wait for the tour bus. We told my friend about stopping by a pharmacy to pick up some Tylenol (she had lived in Canada so she knew the brand name). Naturally, they don't have Tylenol in Taiwan. So, if you are going overseas, make sure you know the medical name of the most common drugs you may want. For Tylenol it is acetiminaphen. The tour bus stopped by the pharmacy around the corner and we found the Taiwan version of Tylenol: Panadol (made by GlaxoSmithKline - actually the British version which is sold throughout the world). For those who think we pay an arm and a leg for drugs in the US, imagine this. I can pick up a knock off brand of Tylenol, in a 100 count bottle for about $5 in any city in America with a population of more than 5000 (and the name brand is still less than $10). The pharmacy we went to in this city of 1.5 million only had a 10 pack and it was about $5. Even taking into account economies of scale, that is expensive for an over the counter drug.

After the brief stop we were on our way to Kending National Park. We watched the Disney movie "Old Dogs" on the way down. The Taiwanese and Hong Kong people's impression of it: "Do Americans really take so many pills?" Convincing them that only old people do was a little more difficult since we had stopped at the pharmacy to get pills for my wife.

Taiwan was a little late in getting the National Park thing started. Of course when your country is being ruled or invaded by outsiders and then you are ruled by a military dictatorship for several decades while your standard of living changes from a third world nation to an industrial nation, that can put a damper on the recreational areas. The lower southeastern portion of Taiwan is part of Kending National Park, but it is really a conglomeration of parks with roads, towns, cemeteries, and even nuclear power plants in between. The other major difference with Taiwan national parks and the US national parks is safety. Go to the Grand Canyon and you have to physically climb over a fence to take a dive down the rock face. Kending, just step off of the rock cliffs or hop off the rock staircase and you get to plummet to the rocky crags below.

That being said, the views were absolutely beautiful. The second place that we went was a junky looking parking lot with a bath opening up into the forest. We were told there was a beach down that path. Sure enough, 100 yards down the winding path and the forest opens up to a beautiful beach with the prettiest blue water I have ever seen. It made the beaches we went to in California look like rejects. In spite of being at the beach, there weren't many people in swimsuits, lots of people went into the water in just their clothes. There were a couple of models on a photoshoot and they were the only ones wearing bikinis. The guys in our group (from Hong Kong) were excited to "see some skin" and had their girlfriends position themselves so that they could take photos of the models without being too obtrusive. My wife thought it was funny and took a photo of the guys taking photos of the bikini girls. We told them to come and visit us in the states and every beach in the nation would be full of girls in bikinis.

For lunch we went to a seafood restaurant and was served (guess what?) a 10 course meal. Once again we stuffed ourselves. In the afternoon it was a couple of more scenic parks and then down one of the market streets in a town (complete with three 7-11's, a KFC, and McDonalds). Lots of pictures were taken because we probably won't have a chance to go back there (besides there are lots of other things we have yet to see from Taiwan if we do).

The bus ride back to Kaohsiung began with some Karaoke (Mandarin and English). Then someone put the movie "Taken" into the DVD player. In case you haven't seen it, I am not sure what the plot is (more than likely something completely implausible), but the purpose was definitely to show Liam Neeson kicking the crap out of as many people as possible. I am sure he had some lines in the movie, but primarily I just remember him beating people up in so many different ways it was mind boggling. If you want a movie that has a coherent, memorable plot, scratch "Taken" off of your list. If you are just in the mood for non stop violent hand-to-hand combat, "Taken" is definitely one you should watch. (Oh yeah, and there was a Britney Spearsesque character, but I am not sure why she was in there).

Back at the hotel, my wife laid down for a nap, and I went window shopping. There was a mall in the lower floors of the hotel and I wanted to check out some prices on jewelry (pearls and jade) to help my wife figure out what she wanted. In one of the department stores, I spoke with a saleswoman extensively about the coral jewelry. That is what I really wanted to get my wife, a coral necklace. Unfortunately, the price tag on those was anywhere from $1000 (American) to $6000. Since I haven't been able to convince her on the utility of spending $4K-$6K on a Barrett 50 BMG, I can't see how she would strangle me for buying a $6K piece of jewelry. "But they had to kill some coral reef to make it, it is the ultimate symbol of man's dominance over nature!"

After looking for a while, I went walking about town. The streets were filled with small restaurants, 7-11s, and then other shops interspersed. I enjoyed walking around for an hour just seeing the area. One thing I did find was a laundromat right around the corner from the hotel. We could have washed our clothes there rather than the bathtub the the night before. Back at the hotel, my wife woke up and we ordered some dumplings and fruit from room service. I fell asleep by about 9pm (by this time I had gone 140 hours with maybe 16 hours of sleep interspersed). Suprisingly, I slept for around 6 hours.

Taiwan Day 2: The Wedding

2010-05-24T11:00:00.000-05:00

Well, after waking up bright and early (around 2 am), I watched a movie on the portable DVD player and waited for the sun to come up. Suprisingly it did at around 5AM. I was a little confused, until I realized that there is no Daylight Savings Time in Taiwan. That is purely a US energy saving scheme that failed to work once air conditioning became widespread (the energy savings on not having lights on for the extra hour is far outweighed by the energy consumed to keep the house cool during the hour that people are awake and it is roasting outside - but I digress, that is a blog for another day about 18th century ideas that were never updated for technology, sort of like mailing out census forms in 2010!).

My wife was awake about this time so we had plenty of time to shower and get cleaned up in time for breakfast. Now, the day before we had had breakfast at a little fast food place in the train station. At the hotel, the breakfast buffet was complimentary. In every hotel I have ever stayed out in America, England, and India that had a complimentary breakfast, the breakfast was mediocre in the States, odd in India, and a decent sized platter in England. But still nothing that I would write home to Mom about (although blood pudding in England is something to taste at least once, no more than once, but at least once).

The breakfast buffet was on the 41st floor so we still had a great view of the ocean and the shipping docks. And the buffet was probably enough to rival most casinos in Las Vegas (never been there but going next year so I can make a true comparison). It was a very interesting blend of western and asian dishes. Pancakes beside Kimchee. Cold cereal and congee. Even a garden salad if that was your fancy for breakfast. There was ham, sausage, bacon, eggs in 20 different varieties, and omelets. Along with this was noodles, chow mein, seaweed, and rice. A couple of soups. Some lunchmeat, cheese, and crackers. Milk, soymilk, orange juice, apple juice, coffee, tea, even hot chocolate. And the bread table was well represented by countries of the world: baguettes, irish soda bread, bread pudding, croissants, sour dough, italian rolls, plus plain white and wheat bread. And Fresh fruit.

This buffet was so big (and all you can eat) that you could stay there for a month and probably not have sampled everything. I and my wife had a good mix of western and asian foods. The one thing we didn't try was the oatmeal, it was way too runny. If we had have known what was ahead of us for the day, we probably would have skipped breakfast. As it was, we both pigged out.

My friend and her maid of honor picked my wife and I up at 8am to take us to her house for parts of the wedding tradition. There was no ceremony like we would envision in the US. Getting married was a matter of signing the correct legal papers and then doing whatever traditions you wanted. My friend's family was from China (coming over with the Nationalists in the late 40's) while her husband's family was Taiwanese (having immigrated from southern China a hundred or so years before). So in traveling to her house she told us all about the different traditions that we would see.

First, before the wedding the wedding pictures were taken. My friend had 5 or 6 dresses for her pictures. Wedding pictures in Chinese culture are a major affair that have the goal of making the bride look like a supermodel. And they do. In fact, I have never seen Chinese wedding pictures (even from poor people) that didn't look like supermodels. In one case, my wife came up to me and saw some pictures on the computer from one of my friends from facebook. She probably initially thought that I was surfing the Glamour or Style or Cosmo website until I explained it to her.

My friend was bejeweled by her mother and aunt to make it look like the family had lots of money. Then my friend asked an important question of my wife. "How do you go to the bathroom in your wedding gown?" She explained that you have others lift up the dress and look away to do your business. My friend decided to fore go the bathroom and just hold it until the afternoon. Since she didn't get to eat much that was probably fine.

The groom arrived a little later in a caravan of expensive cars (not necessarily owned by the groom or his family but in most cases borrowed from whoever has them), to make it look like his family had lots of money. Firecrackers were ignited as the groom exited the car. He started by touching a couple of oranges for good luck. Then coming into the home he had to go to the backroom to retrieve his "shy" bride. In the front room the bride's father and mother were seated and the rest of the family stood around while the groom's family was served a soup by the bride's family (soup plays a role in everything in China, while teaching one Chinese family about Thanksgiving in Canada, they asked what kind of soup we had with our turkey and stuffing - we don't - they made some anyway and that is the only Thanksgiving that I have had soup at).

After eating the soup, the bride and groom bowed three times before the bride's mother and father to thank them for raising her. And then the bride and groom exited the house to go to their new home together. The bride had an aunt holding a shade over the bride so that she wouldn't get any sun on her. In the west, we strive to get that golden brown for special occasions, in Taiwan (and China) they strive to get white (they even have whitening cream from Nutragena - no I am not making that up, my friend gave us a packet of it). After leaving the house, the bride drops a fan which is picked up by the bride's family to give them something to remember their daughter.

The entourage then rides to the bride and groom's new home. We got to ride in the Lexus SUV about 4 back from the lead car. All along the way, the lead car would periodically drop strings of firecrackers out the window, having them go off in the street. And this was on the busy streets. There were a couple of motorscooter riders that got a shock when the firecrackers started popping directly in front (or underneath) them. I kind of wish we did more of this in the US. It might help keep some driver's on their toes (and off their cell phones) if at any moment a string of blackcats could land on your hood and start popping off).

One of the traditions is that the couple's vehicle can not go in reverse while they are in it. This would portend a marriage that is going backwards. Because of this a lot of planning goes into getting cars positioned correctly before the bride and groom get in, scoping out the route beforehand for any construction that may detour the entourage. Of course, some things you can't plan for. At the couple's new apartment building, their car was suppose to drive up to the front door to let them out. Unfortunately the driver waited just a moment to long to do the turn and wound up half in the driveway - half in the street, and the front passenger corner a few inches from having the paint ground off by the concrete planter box. Big dilemma, the car can't go backwards, and they aren't at the front door. I suggested that the guests lift the vehicle up and move it. After about 15-20 minutes of waiting and consulting the elders (those that actually knew and cared about the traditions) someone declared that the entrance to the apartment building was right where the car had stopped, so they got out and went up to their apartment.

In their apartment, more traditions ensued. The bride and groom entered their bedroom and invited everyone in. The groom then jumped on the bed in hopes of having a male child. One of the family members then fed a gelatinous rice ball (sort of like large tapioca) to the bride and groom and they then swapped the balls while kissing. Yes, it doesn't leave anything to the imagination if you know that the 3/4" ball from the bride's mouth ended up in the groom's mouth and vice versa. My friend who was very proper and demure was embarassed beyond belief. The bride then sat by the window and looked pretty while everyone else (including my wife and I) took pictures with her, touched her for good luck, and ate our rice ball soup.

At precisely 10:30 (probably another good luck omen), we left for the hotel to prepare for the reception. I put the finishing touches on my speech and then we went down to the bride's preparation room. She was getting her hair and make up finalized and chatting with friends. She had not eaten much all morning (except the aforementioned rice ball), so I convinced her maid of honor to feed her a large dumpling all at once, rather than cutting it up. She ate it in a very undignified manner, but her parents weren't there to scold her. My wife and I then headed down to the wedding/reception/extravaganza.

I have been to several weddings in my life. Some were small, family affairs. Some were larger. I have never been to one with a sit down catered meal before, although I have seen them portrayed on TV and in the movies. Let me just say that the size and scope of this wedding (for a couple who came from rather average backgrounds) far exceeded the extravagance depicted in something like "Father of the Bride." The ballroom was the size of three basketball courts and jam packed with tables. There were literally 500+ people in attendance. The grooms family and friends on one side and the bride's on the other. Outside there was the greeting tables for the bride and groom where you dropped off your red envelope of lucky money for the couple (we had previously given them their "American" dishes earlier since wrapped presents are usually not given. Looking at the stacks of envelopes on the tables, I estimated there was probably in the neighborhood of $20K to $30K American (about $600K to $900K Taiwan) in cash.

The ballroom was a cacophony of noise, we couldn't find our table and eventually located the bride's father and asked him where we were suppose to sit. He sat us at a table with some relatives including the bride's uncle who was from England. He told us not to get too comfortable because he had been moved three times already. Eventually the program started and the bride and groom entered with much fanfare. There were Chinese dancers, flashing lights, rock music. I am guessing that the fireworks didn't go off because the hotel probably didn't want the liability. Up on the stage the bride and groom went through a cake cutting ceremony (although, we never ate any cake), and then filled a champagne fountain, and then the speakers started. During the first one, I realized that of the 500 people in attendance, probably 4 were actually paying any attention to the speaker. I quickly made some adjustments to my speech in my head to shorten it down from 10 minutes with audience participation to about 3 minutes with no audience participation.

Eating is a very social event in Chinese culture. As such, they don't get hung up on talking with your mouthful, reaching across the table, etc like we do in America. Also, it meant that there was a constant hum of conversation going on such that you could not hear the whisper of the person next to you. We had a great time. The dishes came out were wonderful. Twelve dishes to be precise (my wife and I were stuffed after the first three, but the food kept coming). Lobster Salad, Shark Fin Soup, Fruit platters, pastries, rice, noodles, etc. I have never eaten for three hours before (even at Thanksgiving). There was eating for three hours.

After all of the speakers were done, one of the people sitting at our table went up to the stage to sing. She sang songs in Mandarin, Cantonese, and English (and maybe Taiwanese as well). Very talented. The bride changed gowns to get in her toasting gown. She and the groom then went to each table (50 of them) to toast all of the guests. 50 sips (no matter how small) will probably make you a little tipsy. Near the end, the waiters were packaging up all of the leftover food for take homes (did I mention that there was a LOT of food?). We just took some of the desserts that my wife liked since we were staying at the hotel and probably wouldn't have to eat for the rest of the week. I estimate that I probably consumed 4-5000 calories at that meal (this was after pigging out at breakfast as well).

The bride changed again into her going away gown to thank the guests as they left (yes she wore three dresses that day, which were all different from the dresses she wore for her pictures - including her wedding gown). My wife and I went upstairs to our room, changed into our Kalahsnikitty T-shirts and then took a cab down to the Dream Mall to relax for the afternoon.

The Dream Mall is about twice the size of the Mall of America (in retail floor space) and has about 5 times as many stores. There is an amusement park on top of the mall with the Hello Kitty Ferris Wheel. Our hotel window faced the mall so we were able to see it all lit up at night. The mall was very well laid out with a "theme" for each floor: kids, teens, housewares, food court, furniture, jewelry, etc. We spent a couple of hours there and bought a few things and then made our way back to the hotel.

In the meantime, the main elevator in the hotel had decided to die. So we were able to get up to the 39th floor, but not to the 59th floor where our room was. We waited outside the ballroom we had been at for the wedding which was being set up for another wedding that was about to happen. We joked that if we were hungry we could always try to crash this wedding. We could have climbed the stairs, but our legs were already tired from walking around the mall. Besides, how long can a 85 story building last without an elevator. After about an hour, we were able to go up a service elevator.

Later that evening, my friend, her husband, some of her friends from college and us went to a guitar bar. There was a "famous" musician playing (and taking requests) in English, Taiwanese, and Mandarin. A smorgasbord of food was ordered, which made me wonder how Chinese people could eat so much in such a short amount of time and still be skinny as a rail. (I probably weigh close to twice what my friend weighed and I am not exactly an obese guy - her husband barely weighed more than she did). My wife and I left at around 9pm to go back to the hotel since we had both been surviving on minimal sleep. Didn't get much more that night.

Seatbelt Laws

2010-04-30T12:30:00.000-05:00

I heard on the radio that they recently passed a seatbelt law in my state that would require children in the backseat to be buckled up. Normally I don't pay much attention to idiocy like this because if you don't wear a seatbelt in a moving vehicle you are stupid (and as a parent if you don't require your kids to wear seatbelts regardless of where they are seated you are stupid and a bad parent to boot). That being said, when they came up with some statistic, my interest was piqued!

"According to Emergency Room doctors who see this stuff all the time, the leading cause of death for 13-19 year olds is automobile accidents." OK, there is something I can look at (I paraphrased what they said on the radio, it isn't word for word). Deaths from auto accidents is rather easy to determine, and the age range 13-19 is a definite.

My first problem with this is why quote a statistic of 13-19 year olds when the bill is about children wearing seat belts? Most likely because the bill defines anyone under the age of 18 or 21 or like Obamacare, 26 as a child. It helps the numbers more that way. But they are still pretty pathetic.

Over at the CDC is the WISQARS database. If you have read my blogs before, you know that I love it. Pure, unadulterated (for the most part) raw data for years on end. So I pulled up the leading cause of death for the year 2006. Suprisingly, motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death for people aged 13-19. Actually, they are the leading cause of death for people aged 1 to 34. Naturally, most people cringe at calling a 34 year old a child, so I can understand why they didn't include that end of it, but why not include the 1-12 year olds when quoting your statistic?

Because the numbers look better. Up to and including age 14 (which is below the legal driving age for almost everyplace in the US) there are around 1700 traffic fatalities a year. For 15-19 year olds there are about 4800. 20-34 year olds account for 14,000 traffic deaths, but the law thinks they are more responsible (sometimes), so we don't want to require them to wear seat belts.

Oh drats, I realized something, I was looking at the nation as a whole. Let me look at just Iowa. Turns out, motor vehicle accidents are the primary cause of death in 13-19 year olds (actually 15-19 year olds, but the numbers for 13 an 14 year olds are so small, that you can add them in and not change the numbers). That being said, from the ages of 0-19 there are about 55 traffic deaths (45 of which are in the 15-19 year bracket) each year in Iowa. I know that the death of a child is horrible, but is it worth having another unenforceable law?

Except it gets worse. WISQARS also breaks it out by cause (motorcycle, driver, passenger, pedestrian, etc.) Looking at these numbers of the 55 traffic deaths, only 14 are classified as car/truck passengers. Of course if we took out the deaths where a car was involved in a collision with a bus/truck (much larger vehicle), then the number decreases down to 8. Unfortunately, WISQARS doesn't say whether they were wearing their seatbelts or not, but I'll assume that 25% were.

So we have a law that is trying to pinpoint 6 deaths. Five of those deaths involve parents who are too stupid to buckle their kids up already, one is probably from a teenager riding with his friends and trying to show he is cool by not wearing a seatbelt. And a law is suppose to solve this? I doubt it.

The National Traffic Safety Board does an annual survey on seatbelt use. Iowa is at 91%. New Hampshire (which has no seatbelt enforcement laws) is at 69%. Comparing non-enforcement states to enforcement states as a whole, and you find that about 75-80% of people are not stupid (i.e. wear their seatbelts regardless of the law). In a nutshell, you shouldn't have to be told to wear a seatbelt. Of course, if you decide not to (or consequently decide not to wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle) then don't come to me for money when your brain is plastered over the road.

Taiwan Day 1: Taipei

2010-04-30T09:30:00.000-05:00

After getting to bed at around 11:30, I promptly woke up at 2 or 3 in the morning and could not get back to sleep. My wife was awake by 4 am. If I had have know this then I wouldn't have ordered tickets for the high speed rail at 7am. I would have ordered them for the first train at 6 am.

We started the morning with our first cab ride to the train station. $6 and it was a nice pleasant ride (no one is awake at 6 am). At the train station we picked up our tickets and then found something to eat. I think both my wife and I were determined not to eat at any “American” restaurants until the end of our trip. We picked MOS Burger. This is where I run into my first problem. I speak Chinese decently. I can even read about 1200 of the most common characters which gives me about a 60% comprehension of a newspaper. Unfortunately, menus are primarily made up of food terms which a lot of are among the next 1800 common words. So we ordered based on the pictures.

The high speed rail system in Taiwan is privately owned, privately operated train system that runs the length of the island. The trains travel up to 360 km/hr, although while we were riding it I never saw them post a speed above 295 km/hr (they post the current speed on the message board). To me though, the high speed rail is a trophy for capitalism. My friend had told me that two weeks before, an earthquake had struck Kaohsiung and the high speed rail was shut down for a week because of track damage. One week! Had this been a government operations, it would have been shut down for 6 months, the maximum speed reduced to 150 km/hr for “safety,” and the price of tickets would double. However, being a private corporation, they had every incentive (read profits) to get it back up and running (at normal speeds) as quickly as possible.

The hour and a half journey was a great view of the Taiwan countryside. Rice fields, fruit groves, interspersed among the temples, factories, and homes. We saw plains, hills, mountains, and forests all within the short trip. At Taipei, it was time to figure out how to ride the subway station. We could have just taken a cab, but that would start to get expensive. Fortunately, the subway was similar to every other subway I have ridden with regards to buying tickets and getting on board the correct line. We even got off at the right stop and walked up to the streets of Taipei.

Our first destination was the LDS Temple in Taipei. It was about a half mile walk down AiGuo Rd. from the subway station. This street is called wedding row in Taipei because the street is literally lined with wedding shops. We were later to learn that a wedding party/reception/extravaganza was a far bigger event than we had ever imagined. After wedding row, the street turned into small mom and pop fast food shops. Also, the motorscooters were out in force.

Motorscooters are the major mode of transportation in Taiwan. The rules of the road are a lot more flexible. Surprisingly, I never saw an accident (although I saw plenty of evidence of accidents from the scratched taxis and dented car doors). To put it in perspective, in the United States we rely on the rules of the road to keep us safe (most everyone uses their blinkers, the maintain distance and don't go weaving in and around traffic). In Taiwan, you rely on your driving skills and instincts to keep safe. You have to be aware of what a dozen vehicles around you are doing and be prepared to react in an instant as conditions change. Don't think about crossing the street except at the crosswalk when you have a green light, because you don't know what may be coming around the corner.

At the Taipei temple I learned something about clothes. For the worship service we change into all white clothes. I told the lady at the desk my pants size and she looked at me funny. They didn't have that exact size but she suggested something which to me was 5 sizes larger. I opted for the next closest size to what I thought was correct, which was only two sizes larger, I figured I could roll up the legs if I had too. In the dressing room I found out I was wrong. There was no way those pants would fit they were far too short. As I was taking them back to the desk it dawned on me that perhaps they measure the total length of the pants rather than just the inseam. Sure enough, that was the case in Taiwan. So I ended up with a pair of pants that I originally thought would be 6 sizes too long, but turned out to be just right.

Afterwards, we went across the street and ate at one of the Mom & Pop shops. The owner cajoled us with "Foreign Friends, come on eat here!" So we did. For around $2 we had a meal of soup and dumplings (my wife's favorite). We then walked across the street to the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial. Sort of the Lincoln Memorial for Taiwan, except that the size and grandeur of it far outdid every American memorial I have visited.

Next it was time for a subway ride up to the National Palace Museum. While many people would think that Beijing would be the place to go to see ancient Chinese art, they would be wrong. Taipei is the place to go. Back during the Chinese civil war, the Nationalists moved the vast majority of the art from the Palace Museum in Beijing to Taiwan. Probably for good reason since the Communists later purged the country during the cultural revolution. The museum boasts more than 600,000 pieces of which only about 60-70 thousand are on display at one time. The most disappointing part was not being able to take photographs. I understand the ban on photography back when there was only flash photography and preservationists were worried about the effect that the flash would have on old works. But the days of celluloid photography (i.e. film) are over. I can take hundreds of pictures with a digital camera (all without the flash) varying the setting each time until I get the perfect photo. And the effect on the work of art will be no different than if I had have just stood there looking at it.

Anyway, the people watching might actually have been more fun. Since Taiwan has the largest (and best) collection of Chinese art, a lot of mainland Chinese come to see it. Now there are some factors to bear in mind. China has a billion plus people. They have cities that make NY look small, the population density in the cities is extremely high. So people are used to being crowded, bumped into, and pushed out of the way. Additionally, the people from mainland China only have a limited time to visit the museum (talking with some tour groups, about one day) and may never get back to the museum again in their lifetime. Imagine trying to see everything in the Smithsonian in one day.

So, while my wife and I are relative ignoramouses when it comes to Chinese art, we were just there to see it, the people whose ancestors made this art were overbearing in some instances. While we may slowly walk along a display case, reading about each piece shown, a tour group would come up to look at one piece (which probably had a lot of significance to them). They had no problem pushing us out of the way, or just enveloping us (with no chance of excape). After about an hour, we decided what we would look at by going to things where there weren't tour groups.

Its interesting, whenever you see Hollywood depict people in a museum, they show people taking their time and enjoying each work of art. I wonder if Chinese films that depict people in a museum show a cacophony of tour groups running from one exhibit to another, pushing people out of the way for a better look. Pushing people out of the way isn't rude, it is just normal life for them.

After the museum closed at 5:00pm, we took some pictures outside and then walked over to the Silk Palace restaurant next to the museum. They had all you can eat Dim Sum. Dim Sum is a Cantonese cuisine, but I chose it so that my wife could try a multitude of new dishes (her Chinese food sampling in life had been somewhat limited). Then it was a cab ride back to the subway station and a subway ride back to the train station, and we made it to the train with about 10 minutes to spare. I slept on the train all the way back to Kaohsiung (too bad it was only 1 1/2 hours). We were in our hotel by midnight, and went to sleep.

Well, sort of again. The beds in Taiwan are hard, think of it as a board with a 1/4" foam pad on it. So my wife and I were piling pillows under our bodies to try and get a restful sleep. It works OK until you roll over. I was wide awake at 2 am.

Trip to Taiwan

2010-04-15T15:15:00.002-05:00

On Tuesday night my wife and I found ourselves staying up all night to get ready for our trip the next day. We wanted to shock our systems into sleeping on Taiwan time, before we arrived. Round about 1am, I actually packed the bags (our flight was at 8am). Since it was an international flight to Asia, we could each take two bags free. As such, I had told my friend in Taiwan to let us know what all she wanted. The bags were chock full of presents and other items for her. I did read the customs rules in Taiwan to make sure that I wasn't bringing in anything illegal (after all, it wouldn't look good for a Mormon to be arrested at the Taiwan airport for bringing in too much alcohol).

I tried to order our high speed rail tickets in Taiwan, but the credit card kept on getting declined. I was about to give up and call my friend over there, when I decided to call the card company and tell them that we would be traveling to Japan and Taiwan. Sure enough, after getting off the phone with them, the sale went through. We were able to get a couple hours sleep before our flight.

As usual, the TSA airport security was a joke. But they figured we weren't terrorists and since we could have two checked bags for free, I didn't have to attempt to use any super secret methods (i.e. cargo pants pocket) to get prohibited items (i.e. 4 ounce bottle of lotion) on board. They didn't have the new millimeter scanners at our local airport or at Chicago.

The plane ride from Chicago was on a 777. I had flown these over to England several times when I worked in a previous job, and so I loved the personal entertainment system. This one had about a dozen movies (which started every half hour or so you didn't have to wait 2 hours to watch a movie from the beginning) and another dozen TV shows. The games were expanded to 15 (when I had flown the 777 before it was only 6) but the response time of the controller was still mind numbingly slow, I really want them to boost their system so that I can play something like Halo on international flights. One disappointment was that there were no power outlets in economy class (some airlines have them), so that meant that our personal entertainment would only last as long as the battery life of the DVD player and the laptop - about 4 hours combined.

So my wife and I started off with a movie "The Proposal" starring Sandra Bullock and Dane Cook. I like Sandra, Jesse James should be shot for cheating on her. The editing on planes sure has declined as the scene where Sandra and Dane are completely naked (with some well placed hands) was included. Yes, Sandra is almost as good looking as my wife. The movie was a humorous romantic comedy and it killed a couple of hours. The most annoying thing though was being interrupted by the various flight announcements. I really wish they would let whoever was flying on a plane for the first time (or wanted a refresher of the safety briefing) to sit up front, and then leave the rest of us alone.

Lunch (or dinner) arrived and I remembered the other reason why I like international flights - they actually feed you! Salad, roast beef, roll, sushi, etc. The tray was full and definitely filled me up. After switching between some things and trying to sleep some (I had only had two hours of sleep in the last 36 hours) I finally settled on another movie "Did you hear about the Morgans?" starring Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker. I don't really care for either one of them, but the movie was halfway descent for another romantic comedy.

Then my wife and I listened to a book by John Stossel on how everything we know is wrong. That lasted until the battery on the DVD player ran out, about two hours. We got a turkey and cheese sandwich for our next meal when we were over the Bering Sea.

I finally decided to go for another movie and watched "Avatar." Not even making it past the first half hour, I can say it is probably one of the dumbest movies that I have ever not watched completely. I was bored out of my eyes and finally turned it off and got an hour or so of sleep.

In Tokyo (never been there before), the first thing I noticed is that the EXIT signs were green. Turned out they were green in Taiwan as well. I found an ATM machine and pulled out 10,000 yen. The card worked. Then looking through the shops, I found what I thought was apple juice. I was correct, although it was probably made from a different kind of apple than what we turn into apple juice in the USA.

For the final leg of our journey, we boarded a Japan Airlines flight. The flight attendants were all 20 something and beautiful. Turns out, in Asia, flight attendants are the de facto sex symbol (as my friend described it, sort of like the UPS men in the US). As such, they are all 20 something, all beautiful, and most of them speak 2 or 3 or more languages.

Another great airline meal, pork cutlets with Miso sauce, shrimp tempura, salad, apple jello. Of course the entertainment selection was lacking (but I really just wanted to sleep at this point although was unable to). I have noticed this on other foreign airlines I have flown (Lufthansa and India Air). Maybe us Americans are just picky about being entertained.

Finally, we arrived in Taiwan. No problem with customs, all of our luggage made it. And the wedding gifts didn't get broken (basically about half of our luggage was wedding gifts). One snag though. When I tried to use the ATM machine at the airport, it didn't give me any money. I'll have to call the bank again (it worked in Tokyo). Our hotel room is nice, on the 59th floor. After a shower, my wife laid down and probably got three hours of sleep or more (she just woke up). Me on the other hand, I tossed for about two hours and got up to blog. So I am running on maybe 5 hours of sleep in the last 60 hours. I probably won't have a chance again until tonight. Jet lag is SOOOOOO much fun!

Start 'Em Young

2010-04-14T01:55:00.003-05:00

Yesterday, my daughter helped me with the mail. When she got the stack inside she sorted through it and gladly gave me the bills and junk mail. Then she came to the SOG International catalog and promptly told me "Mine."

I tried to snatch it away from her but she was having nothing of it. So after chasing her for a while I asked "Do you even know what that is?"
"Shooting!"

With that, I had to let her have it. Eventually, after she took it apart piece by piece, I was able to to gather it up and put it back together so that I could look at it.

Start 'em young, and maybe you won't have to use that shotgun when she turns 16!

My Household Census Form

2010-04-04T21:00:00.000-05:00

Well, based on my last post, I sort of promised that I would put a copy of my census form online. So here it is. I have made an effort to transcribe my comments as best as possible in case you can't read the images. My comments are in italics, the normal text is the question it is in response to.
Page 1. Use blue or black pen. Okay that is black. Whatever happened to the #2 pencil?
Count all people, including babies, who live and sleep here most of the time. What about those who split their time 50/50?
Question 1 Number of people: VI This is in Roman numerals.
Question 2 This is stupid that you are asking since you just spent half of the column explaining who and who not to count.
Question 3 House with mortgage checked. But with the right lottery ticket it will be
Occupied without payment of rent Do people actually answer this?
Question 4 This is my work pager and I haven't replaced the battery in about two years but I probably don't want to talk to whoever calls anyway.
Question 5 Initials should be good enough.
Question 6 Although I do have one X chromosome so if you need to check both, feel free.
Question 7 Age: >30 Birthdate: This is according to the Hebrew Calendar.
Note: Please answer BOTH Question 8 about Hispanic origin and Question 9 about race. For this census, Hispanic origins are not races. That's ok, most of what is under "Race" isn't race either.
Question 9: See also Person #2, American Indian tribe: Don't know, but a G-G-G-G-G Grandmother was Native American. Japanese: Does this include Ainu? Other Asian: Turk, Indian (India kind) Some other race: I'm sure I missed something.
Question 10 Does Person 1 sometimes live or stay somewhere else? Duh!! College: Long time ago, Military: They wouldn't take me, Second Residence: I'd like too, Jail: I hope not, Nursing home: Eventually.

Person 2 Name: Again initials are fine, if not, contact the IRS, they have more info.
Question 2 How is this person related to Person 1? Mark ONE box. What happens if more than one is applicable?
Question 3: We do live in Iowa though!
Question 4: 29ish This date is the Islamic calendar.
Question 6 After coming out of Africa 2 million years ago, my ancestors have been all over the world.
Why are we stuck on Race? There is more space allocated to identify race than all other questions combined?
Question 7 Duh!!

Person 3
Question 4 Persian Calendar
Question 5 and 6 Everything that is in Person #1 and Person #2.
Question 7 Duh!!

Person 4
Question 4 Mayan long count
5, 6, 7 are the same as Person #3

Person 5
Question 4 Indian Civil Calendar
5, 6, 7 are the same as Person #3 and Person #4

Person #6
Question 1 Whoops I messed up.
Question 4 Julian Calendar *
5, 6, 7 are the same as Person #3, Person #4 and Person #5
* It took me a while to realize this but asking age and date of birth is redundant. You only need the date.

You guys really need to get on the internet and allow us to fill out these forms online. The IRS has figured it out and that involves actual money (not the fake "we won't be able to build hospitals without the census" crap that I hear on the commercials). Hopefully, by 2020 you will have this all figured out.

If more people live here, turn the page and continue: I sure hope there aren't anymore living here right now, I can barely keep up with the number. Good thing our family reunion wasn't on April 1st or I might have 10-12 forms to fill out.

To whoever opens this, I hope you get a good laugh. All answers are absolutely truthful. If the information is not in the format you want then include more precise instructions next time. If you want to give up now, just send someone to our house, we can always use a good babysitter. To reiterate the # of people at our home is 六 (Chinese) or ٦ (Arabic) or ς' (Greek) or षष् (Sanskrit).

...take about 10 minutes... I spent 20 minutes but I was always good at creative writing.

Well, that was fun. Good thing it only comes along once every 10 years. Besides, as we have seen on the commercials, the country is going to come to a screeching halt without the census because capitalism doesn't work (you know, that supply and demand thing we keep trying to pretend doesn't exist). Yes, I did actually mail this form in. No, I didn't tape the postage paid envelope to a tire or anything.

The Census is Upon Us!

2010-03-27T10:00:00.000-05:00

Last summer, I got my visit from my friendly neighborhood census worker (who happened to be my backyard neighbor) in order to verify my address. I questioned then, since you're here, why not just ask me how many people live here.

At the beginning of March, I received the form letter saying that the actual Census letter would arrive in a couple of weeks. My curiosity was piqued and I went to the census website. I was hoping that I could just fill it in online and be done with it. I mean, I have applied for jobs online, trade stocks online, file my taxes online, opened bank accounts online, etc. Surely something as simple as letting the government know how many people live in the house with me could be accomplished with an online form, right?

BIG WRONG! This is one proof that there is no major government conspiracy to do anything. Government of it self is rather stupid, slow, inefficient, and ineffective. Departments truly don't talk to each other, even when it would be in their (and our) best interest to. Yes, I know that the government used the census to help round up the Japanese, Germans, and Italians in WW2. But they didn't get them all. I definitely don't support the government abusing the information it is given in this way.

On the otherhand, the IRS has the names and addresses (and email addresses if you file electronically) of probably 75% of the homes in this country. So why doesn't the Census Bureau simply request the address list from the IRS? I know, because more than likely the IRS would botch up the transfer and end up sending addresses, SSN, bank account numbers, and a list of donations to charity which would then be used in nefarious ways. And they probably wouldn't encrypt it during the transfer. Oh yeah, and it would be blind copied to all of the email addresses they have.

A review of their website shows that the Census is on twitter, facebook, flickr, and youtube. But for some reason, they still haven't figured out how to count online. Well what about false responses you say? Well, what about false responses with paper forms (or just plain made up numbers)? Does that not happen now? Have they not figured out how to deal with that in the last 200 years?

Back to the point of what I was saying. The Census does not do online reporting because in their own words "No. Not at this time. We are experimenting with Internet response for the future." What? I know that I have been filing my taxes for at least 7 years electronically. The Census only happens every ten years. So if they are experimenting now, we will probably have a Beta test in 2020 with a small portion of the population, an expanded Beta test in 2030 with a larger portion, and by 2040 we will all be able to answer online. Of course by that time, all of our brains will have microchips in them and we will be interconnected. Oh yeah and health care will be free.

So, anyway, the website also tells us that the reason that we get so many visits and letters is because it is optimized for maximum response. Yes, if you send out a mailer saying you are going to get a letter, then send the letter, then send out a postcard saying that you got a letter, it decreases the number of people that come to your door to ask you if you received the letter.

A couple of weeks after getting the letter saying that I would be getting the Census, I received my very own copy of the Census form. I was giddy, I had read all sorts of blogs and news stories of people who are only going to put the number of people in the house and nothing else. Ron Paul is doing it. Michele Bachman won't even fill it out. Then I opened the form and actually read it.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that part. Census day is April 1st. By sheer coincidence, April Fool's Day is April 1st. The questions are suppose to be answered based on information available on April 1st. Well, I filed the form away until April 1st. All sorts of things could happen between now and then. We may adopt triplets, I could get hit by a bus and die, my oldest daughter may decide to move out, my parents may decide to move in, there may be a natural disaster and we house some refugees, etc. All of these things could alter who is living and staying at my home on April 1st. Did I mention it is also April Fool's Day?

So, when people at work mentioned that they had filled out their census form, I informed them that they may be providing false information to the Census bureau which is a misdemeanor that carries a fine of up to $500. It turns out, the Census bureau wants you to return your before April 1st. Ideally, everyone's census form would be received by April 1st so they could be counted on April 1st.

The Census bureau prides itself on confidentiality. With respect to WW2, the Census bureau operated under a different set of rules so their sharing of names and addresses then wasn't illegal. But this is the newer, more improved, more confidential Census bureau (at least until the next national emergency when the .gov wants to suspend the rights of a portion of its population). That being said, I still plan on filling out the Census form, in total. That doesn't mean I have to make it easy for them.

Since the census form is printed in multiple languages, it must have people that can read multiple languages. So right off the bat, I figure besides Arabic numbers, I can use Roman numerals, Chinese numerals, etc. Next, I haven't found anything in the census form or the CFR that says I SHALL use the Gregorian calendar for reckoning time. Well there is also the Julian calendar (which isn't used anymore), there is the Jewish Calendar, the Islamic Calendar, the traditional Chinese Calendar, the Taiwan Calendar, the Unix time code, and the Windows or Mac time code. I'll have to see how many of these I can put in there. (I'll be sure to include a reference for them so that they can calculate it.) With 2012 coming up, the Mayan calendar could be a possibility, I mean, the world is going to end on December 21, 2012 (or is it the 20th - either way, the Mayans got it wrong as their world ended 500 years ago).

Names. Last, First, and Middle Initial. Well, I have the name I go by, I also have a Chinese name that I use with Chinese people (it also works for Korean and Japanese with a little translation). Then there is my nickname from college. The nickname my grandpa called me. And my superhero alterego. Which should I use... Making up names or putting obviously false ones like "Mickey Mouse" is illegal and something that ACORN would do. I'm not that way.

Then there is the age. We normally use solar years. How about calculating it by lunar years? Or maybe using the Chinese calendar to calculate one's age (which when one is born he is 1 year old - accounting for gestation - and then on Chinese New Year he advances one year - so it is entirely possible to be 2 years old according to Chinese reckoning and have been born two days ago).

Of course there is the infamous race question. We really need to get over "race" in America. It has come to the point that we don't even know how to define race. First there is the question on hispanic origin. The "other" category includes Spaniard. While normally I would answer "no" to this question, family history research has shown some lines of Spaniards that I am descended from. Sure, they are 500 years ago, but if race is going to be so convoluted maybe I still count. I'll have to cogitate on that for a few more days. And I'll have to decide whether my children count as Spaniards as well, or I have bred it all out of them. I may have the last Spaniard genes in the family. The next then asks for your race and includes terms that are more properly described as skin color, ethnicity, or national origin.

Places like China or India (with 1.5 billion people each) are given a single category. They have a box for Black, African American, and/or Negro. But what about Egyptians, Tunisians, or Libyans? Are they forced to choose Other. The concept of race is a throwback to 16th-19th century racists. Once genetics was discovered and people tried to "prove" their racist concepts, it quickly became apparent that there are no "races" that people can be divided up into. Perhaps we should change this question to just be skin color. Although then we would need to distiguish between northern and souther Europeans and between Aryan Indians (who aren't white) and Aboriginal Australians.

I could always use the "American" throwback or the "Human" in the other category, but then you are allowed to check multiple boxes. And if I am going to use the Spaniards in my genealogy to count myself as hispanic, why not use the Africans in my genealogy to also make sure that is checked. In fact based on my known family history and the proposed progression of migration out of Africa, I should check White, Black, Native American, Asian Indian, Other Asian (I am assuming that the Indo-Europeans in Turkey approximately 20,000 years ago count as other Asians). I have had some Chinese people tell me I have Chinese features so maybe I should choose that as well.

The last question is whether you sometimes live or stay somewhere else? I am sort of confused. Do they mean on April 1st, 2010 in particular or at any time in the last 10 years, or at any time in the next 10 years. If it is the first, well, I'll have to see. If it is the second, I could check "In college housing", "at a seasonal or second residence", and "for another reason." If it is the third, then I will tentatively check all of the blocks, because I don't know what the next 10 years holds.

Now for some other hypothetical questions. Do people who believe that life begins at conception include a pregnancy as an extra child in the census? If you are moving and happen to move out of your home in California on March 31st, drive across the country and spend April 1st traveling through Utah, Wyoming, and Nebraska, where does your family get counted? How do you handle deaths on April 1st, are they counted in the census or not?

Finally, you may want to ask why I am being difficult. Well, frankly because I can, and it is the Census workers job to count people, if the form is not going to be specific, why not be creative, I will be sure to include all of the information they need to get the answers in the format they want. Since the money has already been allocated to counting, if the census bureau doesn't spend it all, my guess is they will have one heck of a party with the leftover $20 million and maybe give out "Lifetime Service Awards" to some of their temporary workers to use up all of the funds. My goal is to make sure they use as much of their budgeted money as possible actually doing their job, counting people. So while others are "protesting" by only filling in the number of people living in the home, I am going to fill out the entire form. And probably include lots of comments as well. I might even post some images of it when I am done. 70 years from now when the records are made public, my great grandchildren can search through the forms and find out that I took my civic responsibilities with pride and helped to ensure that someone had a job (census worker, US Marshall, judge, jury, etc.) during these tough economic times. After all, I fully expect to get a visit from another friendly neighborhood census worker. I am just not going to fill out the form or answer any questions until April 1st (actually, probably April 2nd since I want to be sure that no meteor destroys our city on April 1st thus negating the need for all of the federal dough we are "entitled" to).

Health Care "Reform" Passes

2010-03-22T08:00:00.000-05:00

3/21/2010, the die is cast.

Mom's Six Figure Salary...NOT!

2010-03-10T06:00:00.000-06:00

Well, with the title alone I have probably offended every female who may ever read this including my wife and mother. Before you come tearing down my door with your butcher knife and righteous indignation, bear with me for a moment and let me make my case. Please note that this post is not a knock on mothers or wifes (I happen to like my mother and my wife very much). This is a knock on society's insecurities that lead people to trying to justify why they don't pitch in and help out at home.

Salary.com is on their ninth incantation of the Mom's Salary Survey. When the first one came out I remember reading it and laughing. To me it appeared that some children and husbands were feeling quilty about the lack of work that they did around the home and so decided to show their wifes and mothers (on Mother's Day of course) that their hard work was worth a "theoretical" $100K+. After some adjustments a few years ago which lowered the amount, the 2009 survey found that stay at home mother's were worth a salary of around $122,000 and working 96.4 hours a week.

Interestingly enough, the Bureau of Labor Statistics job description that most closely matches the overall role of a mother (and I am using the term overall role very loosely here) is Personal Home Care Aides. They make on average $9.47/hr so assuming a 40 hours at regular time and 56.4 hours at time and a half their annual salary would be $61K a year. So why the discrepancy? I set out to find out.

Using the Salary.com calculator for my family and area, I found that my wife is worth $118K using their average number of hours worked from the survey. I then came up with the following fallacies based on my own family situation and experience.

Fallacy #1 Salary.com pretends that working multiple jobs will get you "overtime" pay. I sure wish this was true. But it isn't. At one point in college, I had three jobs: photographer, electronics bench technician, and data entry clerk. Each was with a different employer, and in spite of the fact that I was working 60+ hours every single week, I NEVER was paid time and half. Turns out that employers don't really care how much you work at another job when it comes around to payday. Of course, I knew this going in. I still had to pay for college, so I had to work 60+ hours to earn the money. Making this one adjustment and calculating my wife's pay for straight time, we find that she is worth only $91K.

Fallacy #2 Salary.com uses wage rates that are unrealistic for the training/experience of the average mom. Their salary is based on the wages of the top 10 time consuming occupations that mother's do. I didn't have a problem with three of them: Housekeeper, Laundry Machine Operator, and Janitor (coincidentally, these could all be rolled up into the Housekeeper category and their wages were all around $9.50 per hour). For each of the others I disagreed with their wage or else my wife (and the average mother) does not have the qualifications to command such a wage.

Day Care Center Teacher (theirs: $12.43 per hour) - since it says teacher rather than worker, I am assuming that there is some level of certification required by the state. My wife doesn't have it so she gets $10/hour for this.

Cook (theirs: $12.70) - we are not talking fine restaurant cook here, we are talking cook. The vast majority of meals made at our home would probably rank in the fast food arena or maybe the decent sit down place. Having worked in both of these types of places before, and knowing that I was paid minimum wage at both, I'll give my wife $10/hour for this.

Computer Operator (theirs: $14.57) - if this is data entry, then I would have killed for this kind of money in college doing data entry, as I mentioned before I had a data entry position, and I made a little more than minimum wage. I'll give my wife $10/hour for this (are you seeing a pattern yet).

Facilities Manager (theirs: $32.67) - I think we are talking about something like a convention center or such. If this is the case than I can agree with it. If you are managing the facilities of a hotel with 30,000 square feet of convention space, I can see you getting $32.67/hour. However, we are talking about a 2000 square foot home. I'll give my wife $10/hour for this.

Van Driver (theirs: $14.70) - my wife was a bus driver in college. Guess what she made? Yep, minimum wage. I'll be generous and give her $10/hour.

Psychologist (theirs: $34.44) - last I checked, psychologists usually have an advanced degree, and are usually licensed in the state that they work. If you don't have either of these (degree mills don't count), you will be hard pressed to command the $34.44/hour wage. On the other hand, there are also help lines that are looking for people to answer phones, listen, and give advice. They are usually on a volunteer basis, but I'll give my wife $10/hour.

CEO (theirs: $65.36) - I worked at a small business where I think the owner was making about $130K a year ($65/hour). Since I took all the deposits to the bank, one day while waiting in line I calculated that his company was bringing in about $2 million a year in revenue. He had 10 employees and a small fleet of vehicles. Based on what I new of office space rental, equipment costs and probable salaries of the people in the office, I calculated that he was making $130K. For my family, we have less than a tenth of $2 million in revenue. So, I'll just be generous and give my wife $12/hour.

Using my figures and Salary.com's hours with no overtime, I get just under $50K.

Fallacy #3 Salary.com uses a self reported survey for the hours worked. Self reported surveys are notoriously bad at providing unbiased information. Self reported data is tenuous at best and in many cases pure fantasy. So I went over the reported numbers and adjusted them for what I think the amount of time my wife spends. Here is what I came up with:

Housekeeper (theirs: 16.5) - this is a littler more than 2 hours per day. I can live with that.

Day Care Center Teacher (theirs: 14.7) - well we homeschool our kids, although I have admitted in the past that my wife spends about 2 hours teaching (the kids also do a lot of work on their own) five days a week. Subtract out the days she doesn't teach and add in the days that she does planning and I will go with 15 hours a week.

Cook (theirs: 13.1) - well, we do once a month cooking that takes about 8 hours, then there is cooking each day which is probably only an hour (although I do some of it), and if we add in grocery shopping which is 2 hours a week then the total time is probably around 10 hours a week.

Computer Operator (theirs: 9.2) - I have not met a home yet that requires 9.2 hours to operate. Sure my wife spends 9.2 hours on the computer each week, but the majority of that is doing her hobbies (scrapbooking, playing games, etc.). So how about we limit counted computer time to budgeting, shopping, and activities that directly affect the family. I could maybe go for 3 hours.

Facilities Manager (theirs: 8.6) - on a week that we are having a party at our house, we spend 8.6 hours preparing (maybe), otherwise, about the only thing that I would put in this category is arranging play dates for the kids, which is about a 10 minute phone call each week. I'll round that up to 2 hours.

Van Driver (theirs: 7.3) - Yes, my wife spends about 7 hours each week driving the kids around. So, while I could quibble that part of that time is spent going places she would have if we didn't have kids, I'll accept the 7.3 hours a week anyway.

Psychologist (theirs: 7.2) - the majority of my wife and I's practice of psychology does not have to do with delving into our children's feelings. Its more along the lines of "good cop, bad cop" to determine which kid is at fault. But, I'll agree to at least 7 hours of it.

Laundry Machine Operator (theirs: 7.2) - laundry does take about 7 hours each week (including folding and putting away), but more than half of that time the machine is running and no one is actually doing anything. I'll give my wife 4 hours.

Janitor (theirs: 7.1) - how is this different from Housekeeper? I don't know, so I'll give my wife 0 hours since I already accounted for the cleaning and picking up in Housekeeper.

Chief Executive Officer (theirs: 5.5) - CEO stuff that my wife (or I) do: pay the kids allowance, plan the budget for the year, shop for big purchases, um ... Yeah, I don't see us spending 5.5 hours a YEAR on that stuff. But I'll be generous again and give my wife 2 hours a week.

So adding it all up I get 66.8 hours of work a week, 30 hours less than what survey found. I trust my numbers more, and I would be willing to bet if they made the people who take the survey record on a daily log for one month what they spent their time doing, it would be a lot closer to my numbers than Salary.com's.

And what does this get us for a total salary for the year: $34,096, which translates into $9.82/ hour. WOW! that is what I said Personal Home Care Aides were making at the beginning of this blog. Turns out, the reason they are making that amount, is because that is the value of the work that they do. I am not the only one who finds the Annual Mom Salary Survey ridiculous at its core.

So there are my reasons for mocking the salary survey. If you think I am going to trade my wife or mother in for a housekeeper and nanny, they you are the crazy one. If you are a mother and look to the salary survey to feel justified, then you should talk to a real psychologist about your self esteem issues. If you are a child or husband and you try to prop up your mother or wife with this claptrap, then maybe you should start lifting a finger or two around the house and help out.

People of the Gun

2010-03-09T06:00:00.000-06:00

Gun people are all racist, neophyte Republican, men who are probably missing a couple teeth and married to their first cousin.

OK, that kind of inflammatory language is really just a strawman, although it does include some ideas that I have read from people who have a fear of firearms. Well, they are wrong. People of the Gun is a tribe of people (I can't even limit to Americans) who believe in the right of all people to keep and bear arms (that would be one of those inalienable rights that everyone has, not just Americans).

The tribe started as the brainchild of Jeff Soyer in response to a column by Laura Washington. Besides guns, there is not a lot that this group agrees on. At the website you can read their blogs and find that the group includes Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, libertarians, and everything in between. There are engineers, biologists, programmers, and librarians. Young and old. People who hunt and those who don't. Having read most all of their blogs I can say that discussion topics are more varied than you probably would imagine.

But, we do have one thing in common. Which is why we are the People of the Gun.

Homeschooling Textbook Problems

2010-03-08T06:00:00.001-06:00

Apparently, many homeschooling textbooks don't do justice to evolution. Since my wife and I home school our children, this story actually interests me. Nothing can bring out the religious hysterics more than talking about evolution. Probably 80% of the population (including 99% of those who don't believe it) have any real concept of what evolution is.

Most of people's understanding is relegated to "humans evolved from monkeys." This is absolute and complete poppy-cock. From a taxonometric standpoint, humans are part of the superfamily hominoidea, or apes. Monkeys on the other hand, include all primates except lemurs, tarsiers, and bushbabies. So, monkeys are not apes, and apes are not monkeys. The correct simplified way of describing evolution is to say "humans evolved from apes."

Apparently though, there are some textbook suppliers that don't believe evolution and like to try to pretend it doesn't exist. I'm OK with that. There is nothing wrong with people teaching their kids any manner of bravo-sierra, we do it all the time in public school systems, why is it considered a problem at home? But really, this article was about non-creationist parents being frustrated about the lack of good teaching materials that don't have a Bible bent. I can sympathize for them, but I am not going to cry a river or whine about it.

The push for home schooling started in the 1980s (there was home schooling before, but in the 1980s is when people started to become vocal for it). It was mainly centered around the conservative Christian demographic who did not want their kids partaking in evolution, sex education, and not having a prayer to start the day (alright that is a gross exaggeration - maybe). Since then, it appears that the demographic has shifted and soon evangelical Christians will no longer be the majority. The Home School Legal Defense Association estimates that roughly half of home school families are evangelical Christian, which is down from the two thirds it was in 2000.

With roughly 1.5 million home schooled children this year, I had to do a quick idiot check. Half of 1.5 million is 750,000. According to this source, 26.3% of the US identifies itself as evangelical Christian. There are roughly 55 million children in grades K-12. So, to begin with 14.5 million school children are evangelical Christians. Which means roughly 5% of them are home schooled. I can buy that number.

So, since the home school movement started with evangelical Christians, they have a big jump on providing teaching materials. Wouldn't you know, they happen to put in their dogma. In fact the article mentions that the only scientifically sound biology text that one could find is from the Calvert School. That was nice to see since we use their curriculum in our family. Granted, our kids are all elementary age so we haven't delved into science too heavily.

Which brings me to my next point. Why is this a problem at all? Evolution (and all of the intricacies/complexities of it) is probably not going to be taught in any coherent text until high school. I remember learning about it from National Geographic as a kid, but it wasn't until high school that any kind of in depth review of it was done, and even then it was still rather superficial. Frankly, the vast majority of what I know about evolution, I have learned on my own (everyone should read Darwin!).

In any case, when my children get to be about high school age, what do I plan on doing for textbooks? Why go down to the local community college and pick up the text for Biology 101 or Chemistry 101 or Physics 101 or Calculus 101 or ... do you get the picture. College textbooks (particularly the intro ones) are perfect for high school students (in some cases that is what they use anyway). There is no need to try to create our own "non-religious" home school publishing empire, just use the "non-religious" publishing empires that are already in place.

Which brings me back to the original article I cited. Apparently, the number of people home schooling for religious reasons is rising. What are my reasons? In a nutshell, the public school system is a complete waste of time. We get all of our schooling done in about 2 hours a day and the kids have maybe another 2 hours of work on their own to do. Are they maladjusted? I don't think so, but then again, I am rather biased. Furthermore, I have complete control over what they learn and when they learn it. If my six year old wants to figure out how babies are made by reading the medical book, go right ahead (just don't bring it up during Sunday School, adults tend to blush at that kind of thing).

Before I end, let me bring up one final point about the ridiculousness of the "religious" biology texts. I will admit, I haven't ever read one. I have the Bible (the King James Version and the Chinese version). The original article quotes from Bob Jones University "Biology: Third Edition." Those who do not believe the Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God will find many points in this book puzzling ... OK, that is probably an understatement. Where do I stand. I believe the Bible is the inspired word of God, however I laugh at the concept of inerrancy. My question to them is "Which one? Which version of the Bible is the inerrant one?" They certainly can't all be inerrant.

To make things clear, inerrant means free of error or infallible. So, let's just take a simple look at something like the ages of the patriachs (Adam, Noah, Methusaleh, etc.). There are three major versions of the Pentateuch (first five books of Moses): Masoretic, Septuagint, and Samaritan. Most western civilizations are familiar with the Masoretic as most of our Bible translations come from that. The Orthodox Christians of Russia and Eastern Europe would disagree. And the Samaritans of Israel would further disagree. Even on something as simple as the ages of the patriarchs there is not agreement among them. Remember, to be inerrant means that there are no mistakes. Sure, the numbers are close (mostly), but inerrant means that they are infallible. Can anyone who believes the Bible is inerrant explain why the Masoretic text is the correct one and the other two are not? Can you do this without mental gymnastics? If you can't do this, then why would you even hope to get something like "Biology: Third Edition" correct?

So, now that I have offended a good portion of Bible inerrantists, I'll wrap this up. Biology (or any science) is not something to be explained by people who can't do simple math. Don't buy textbooks from them. On the other hand, there is a wealth of resources out there for home schoolers if they just open their eyes, it might not all be labeled "For Homeschoolers," but that is the beauty of it. Disneyland can be used to study physics, the grocery store can be used to study math, and whip out the old baseball cards and you have endless lessons in statistics that the kids will enjoy (or just use the cereal boxes at breakfast).

Racial Insanity!

2010-03-07T16:00:00.001-06:00

The Secretary of Education cannot visit a school in Alabama because they opposed Martin Luther King, Jr. What? Is there some place in the US, even in the south, that doesn't celebrate MLK day? Uh no, this has nothing to do with the holiday. This has to do with THE Martin Luther King, Jr.

Back in 1965 (let's see, 2010-1965=45 years), the principal, faculty, and students (I guess that is what the article means) of Robert E. Lee High School in Montgomery, AL publicly opposed MLK and the Selma-Montgomery march. If I did my math correctly, 45 years later that means our Education Secretary can visit the school because it would be an insult. Does this mean that Barack Obama can't have anything to do with the University of Alabama since George Wallace attempted to stop black students from enrolling there in 1963? (I wonder if Barack was watching the BCS championship game earlier this year - perhaps Jesse Jackson should condemn him for that).

I guess when it comes to racial issues, the children and grand children have to suffer for the sins of the parents and grandparents. I highly doubt that there is anyone still working at Robert E. Lee High School that was around when the Selma march occurred 45 years ago. My bet is that less than half of the faculty was even born then and probably only one or two people were even teenagers during that time and know what was going on.

That Mr. Duncan is going to the school to commemorate (NOT celebrate) the "Bloody Sunday" incident is very telling. I look at this as a way to say, "Hey, you bozos who opposed civil rights were wrong. And now we can commemorate our dead using your ground!" Except that the school is not still "opposed" to desegregation. As near as I can find, that sort of died out 45 years ago.

Do the self proclaimed civil rights "leaders" have nothing better to do than to continue to condemn people who have long since died? Good thing we can still make progress without them. Arne, if you read this, go to Robert E. Lee High School and tell people why you are there. Robert E. Lee will look up from his grave and smile at you.

A Quandary of Epic Porportions

2010-03-07T08:52:00.002-06:00

I have a quandary every time I see and article like this. Almost a hundred years ago (before nearly everyone on the planet today was born), the Ottoman Empire killed off a whole bunch of Armenians. Now, some in the US Congress feel the need to condemn this action and label it a genocide.

On the one hand, I am ecstatic that Congress is debating something that isn't going to increase my taxes or limit the rights of Americans. I support a lot of the frivolous-no-action legislation that is passed by our government, particularly if it is something that members can give long winded speeches showing that they support said frivolousness. You know, things like declaring National Hot Dog Day, or Congratulatory Bills to the World Series Champion, or even debating and voting on Mother of the Year awards. These are things that take up their time so that they can't screw up other things. In the end, if they screw up any of these frivolous items (which they amazingly do), since there are no actions at of it, and no money spent, it doesn't affect me.

On the other hand, we appear to be on the path of attempting to right all of the wrongs that have happened throughout history. The latest one to be debated is the Armenia genocide resolution. What would it do, other than saying that the Ottoman's were really bad...nothing. So why are we doing it? I have no clue, maybe to suck up to Armenia since they are strategically better positioned than Turkey? (Except that they aren't.) Did a million plus Armenians get killed back in 1915? Yes. Was it primarily a result of the Ottoman Turks? Probably. However, everyone who perpetrated it is long since dead (except for maybe a 12 year old boy who helped, of course he would be 107 now, so are we going to waste some resources trying him in a military tribunal and putting him in prison for the rest of his life - well, if it will prevent Congress from passing new programs, then yeah maybe we should).

Turkey is naturally upset because they are the descendants of the Ottoman Empire. Of course, if I lived there, I would say: "So what. If we aren't currently killing them or have policies in place that lead to that, why are you wasting your time?" Turkey recalled their ambassador to the US. Frankly, I think he should have just sent a nicely worded letter to the offending congressional committee saying that they really need to grow up.

Which is what we need to do. When we "condemn" actions of other countries (some of which no longer exist) that happened 100, 200, or 500 years ago, we are being childish cowards. How about condemning China for current human rights violations? Back it up with sanctions and not taking any more imports from them? Well, they happen to be one of the big boys. And we can't just stop importing from them. So maybe their human rights violations are not as important as the trade we have. In fact, maybe it is better to sacrifice "human rights" of the present population so that future populations can have freedom. Sanctions and shunning North Korea and Cuba have done nothing for the last 50 years. Cutting off business with Iran has only entrenched the extremist regime in that country over the last 30 years. Condemning people who can't fight back is easy. Asking the tough questions for those that can is much more difficult.

So far, the State Department and President Obama are taking the right approach. Keep encouraging Congress not do take this resolution further. This could actually end up as a win-win for everyone. Congress debates this resolution and doesn't get the "important" legislation passed. Therefore, we are better off in America since there are no new health care monstrosities, cap and trade debacles, or second stimulus bombs. In the end, the Congress doesn't pass the resolution and Turkey wins since we aren't condemning them for what their great grandfathers did. Armenia may not get what they want, but if all they wanted was a piece of paper condemning the Ottoman Empire, I can send them that.

Brady Scores and Crime

2010-03-04T18:00:00.001-06:00

Over at Snowflakes in Hell, Sebastian takes a stab at showing there is no correlation between Brady Score and Violent Crime Rate. I saw it and instantly said, "Why use one graph when four will say the same thing?" So I went to work.

First to understand the Brady Score, the Brady Campaign has developed a list of gun control laws they think should be implemented and grade each state from 0 to 100 (0 being "bad"). Supposedly these laws help decrease gun violence. Based on the fact that 80% of the states score less than 25, most of the governments in the US do not agree. The best score is from California, with a 79. The only other state with a passing grade (which I define as >60 - or a D-) is New Jersey. So, the Brady Bunch is not too happy with the way gun laws in the US are going.

Let's put them to the test by examining a couple of things. First, Sebastion graphed out violent crime rates. I decided I wanted to expand on that. If gun control laws are going to have any affect on crime, they are going to decrease gun crime primarily. So for my crime data I went to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports. This data is reported by law enforcement organizations to the FBI. They have tables that break down crime by the type of weapon used and the state. I looked at murders, robbery, and aggravated assault. Rape is normally included in the violent crime statistics but I elected not to include it since based on other FBI data less than 10% of rapes involve someone using a firearm. And compared to robbery and assaults there are much fewer rapes so the numbers (and rates) won't be affected too much. Using this same logic, I could exclude murders as well (there aren't that many compared to robberies or assaults), but roughly two thirds of murders are with a firearm so including it might help the Brady Bunch out (but not really since the number of robberies and assaults committed with a firearm is 35 times the number of murders).

Now, to simplify things I have to delete a few data points. For one, the Brady Campaign doesn't rank District of Columbia. By throwing this out it is definitely to their advantage as DC has stricter gun laws than California and have a very high violent crime rate - which is contrary to what the Brady Bunch would have you believe about the effect of gun control. Illinois also has to be thrown out since they have spotty reporting to the FBI. Their Brady Score isn't anything to write home about (28), but without consistent data compared to the other states there is no sense in including them. Finally, Florida gets thrown out as well since they didn't have a murder rate listed in the FBI tables. I have no idea why but I didn't want to go hunting for another data set just to include them. They score a 6 by the Brady's reckoning so in effect we have thrown out a low, medium, and high Brady score, but we still have 48 data points.

So I begin by re-creating Sebastian's graph with my data. As you can see, it is mostly similar to his, although my linear trendline is showing a slight decrease whereas his showed a slight increase. The R-squared value is the same 0.0005. In a nutshell, this says that 0.05% of the variability of the violent crime rate from the trendline can be explained by the Brady Score. In other words: there is no correlation! (You would expect something at least above 0.5 before you started claiming correlation.)

But, gun control laws would primarily affect gun crime, not necessarily all crime. So, let me run the numbers again. This time, the R-squared value has increased to 0.0176. That is light-years ahead of all violent crime, but still very dismal as far as correlation goes: there is no correlation!

Now, before we just leave this issue lets take into account population. Not with the rates, but with the Brady Scores. Let me create a population weighted Brady Score. By dividing the Brady Score by the population of the state and then multiplying by 5,000,000 (the average population of the states) I get my Brady Population Weighted Score. This helps to minimize the effects of those small states like North Dakota (by giving them a higher score). Unfortunately for the Brady Campaign, it does nothing for a state like Utah that has a score of 0. Violent crime has an R-squared value of 0.0525.

And firearm crime has an R-squared value of 0.0902. This is the absolute best that I could get the Brady Scorecard to show some sort of correlation to gun crime. Once again, there is no correlation.
To sum up the data: Gun control laws do not have any observable affect on violent crime or crimes committed with firearms. Remember, correlation may not be causation, but if there is no correlation, there cannot be any causation.

Happy Valentine's Day!

2010-02-14T06:00:00.001-06:00

What better way to celebrate Valentine's Day than with giving your wife a Kalashnikitty T-shirt! (Thanks Eric, perfect delivery time!) Yes, she received the flowers too (she said she only wanted flowers, but I know better), and we already had the Saiga. Our next mission will be to take photos of us in the Kalashnikitty T-shirts at the Hello Kitty Ferris Wheel in Kaohsiung, Taiwan!

If you're interested in getting your own Kalashnikitty T-shirt, Eric sells them 3-4 times a year, so I'll let you know when to email him next.

Shooting Range Trip

2010-02-13T19:15:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, my wife kicked me out of the house. OK, she didn't kick me out, just when I suggested I go shooting, she was more than happy to let me go. She had a surprise she wanted to prepare for me and it was easier to do with me gone. So I developed a plan in my mind. I had a series of things to do to work on some shooting skills.

1) Shoot hand thrown clays with the single shot 20 gauge. I shot clays for the first time over Thanksgiving and found out that my skills at "Duck Hunt" don't transfer over so well. So much for video games "honing" my killing instincts. I figured hand tossing them would be easier to get my tracking/leading skills practiced so I can impress my brothers the next time we shoot clays. Plus, I didn't want to have to reset the clay thrower each time.

2) Try out the CZ-82 that I just obtained. This was dependent on the store having Makarov ammunition.

3) Test out the bore sighter I recently purchased using the Saiga 7.62 and Highpoint 9mm Carbine.

4) Shoot the crap out of an old computer case filled with stuffed animals. The computer case is from our old computer in which I sold off all of the components and probably made 25% more than just selling the computer (Ebay is great!). The stuffed animals were once my kids. I intend to use most of them for the cannon, but after practicing with the cannon in January, one stuffed animal can survive multiple flights! So I combined these two. Computer case with stuffed animals.

So, I loaded up the car and I was off. There is lots of snow on the ground and it was just below freezing. Good day to go to the range, mainly because no one is there. The one I went to is about 25 minutes from my house and off the beaten path. There is usually not much traffic to bother you and on cold days there is usually not many others. As I drove past the rifle and pistol range towards the shotgun range, I saw no cars parked. Good sign. No one was at the shotgun range either.

Now, my first fear was getting stuck in the snow of the gravel lot. The road in had nicely packed snow which allowed me to drive comfortably at 50 mph, normally without the packed snow I can only do 35 mph. However, since the parking lot for the range had so little usage, there was only tire tracks in the 4 to 8 inch deep snow. In fact, I think I saw my tire tracks from when I was here last month. So I began by doing some donuts, peeling out quite a bit and generally clearing the area so that I would have an easier time of going forward from a stop. Then I carefully backed into a spot.

It was looking good. I opened the back door and carried my box of clays to one of the shotgun positions. All I needed now was the 20 gauge and the shells which were locked in my trunk. One thing to understand here is my car is 18 years old. The automatic trunk release did not work when I bought the car 8 years ago. In the last year or two, the trunk has remained stuck shut even when the key turns and the proper application of mechanical force needs to be applied to open it while maintaining the key in the "Open" position. So when I turned the key and it was stuck I expected this. I applied the proper force and the trunk opened.

I did have a sick feeling, and as I looked at the keys in my hand, my fear had been realized. The key had broken off in the lock. But at least the trunk was open! I did mention before on JayG's blog that I don't have a cell phone. When asked what I would do if I was stranded somewhere, I said I would walk (sort of like what they did for the last 500,000 years of human history).

I stood for a moment and had a quandry. As I mentioned before, the shooting range is rather remote and it could be a while before someone drove by (no one was going to be stopping though). I could start with my shooting plan and then flag a car down or I could start walking. I decided that it would be most responsible to do the shooting first and then worry about a ride home. After all, there were around 2-3 thousand rounds of ammunition and a half dozen firearms. So, if I was going to have to abandon the car, (I wasn't going to trek down the road with a couple of rifles and shotgun slung over my back and some pistols in my belt) it would be best to use up the ammunition so that on the unlikely chance that some miscreant did decide to wonder out into the boonies, break into my car, and steal some firearms, he'd still have to stop at WalMart to buy ammunition. Besides, I could always remove the bolts, slides, and cylinders and the firearms would be pretty useless (and that is a lot less weight to carry).

I pulled out the 20 gauge and a box of shells and headed over to the shooting station. I had decided to use the single shot, since it was very light so I could comfortably have it ready with one hand, and I bought it for $35 so if it got ruined in the snow, it is not a great loss. I may just abuse the thing one day to see what extent I can take it and it will still fire. I don't like to see guns destroyed (that is one of the saddest things to see on Mythbusters), so I don't plan on it any time soon.

I was using #7 steel shot (because that is what I had in the ammo cabinet - yes, I have an ammunition cabinet, it also happens to be the gasoline, motor oil, and any other flammable/explosive stuff cabinet that I don't want the kids to easily get their hands on). The trick with shooting clays is to line the barrel up with where the clay is going to be when they meet. Unlike what you may have learned from Hollywood, a shotgun does not throw up an impenetrable curtain of lead. A good rule of thumb is that the shot will spread about 1" for every yard. I estimate that I was throwing the clays about 10 yards in the air and out another 10 yards so depending on where I took my shot, I had a spread of 10-15".

What can make shooting clays difficult is that they are moving in three dimensions (and if you think about it, so is the shot). If the clay is still rising, you want to be pointing slightly above it, if the clay is falling you want to aim below it. Add to this a horizontal movement factor and that if as the angle the shotgun to the ground increases (i.e. pointing more upward), you need to compensate by pointing more above the target.

Mathematics wise, I can figure out the ballistics on paper, the reason why I am not competing in the Olympics is because you have to put that in practice, and you don't have to know jack about math to get into the Olympics. Practicing worked well. I was hitting about 2/3 of them and even had a string of 6 with no misses. It is very satisfying to see clays explode into dust. You definitely know when you have hit them.

While I was going through the first box of shells, a truck started coming down the road. I set the shotgun down and ran out to the road. (It is usually not a good idea, especially in rural parts of the country to run at vehicles while holding a firearm.) The man was nice enough to let me use his cell phone and my wife said she could be out there in an hour or so. We chatted briefly and he went on his way while I went back to practicing.

After a box of shells, I would go out on the range and pick up unbroken clays (no sense in leaving them out there without having served their purpose). Then start a new box. After two and a half boxes (about 65 rounds) I had made it through half of the box clays (about 45). I still had 10 rounds left and decided to try something different. I had a computer power supply with a big long strand of cords. The cords made a great handle to throw and I shot that a few times. Birdshot doesn't go through the metal case.

After finishing off all of the shotgun ammunition I had brought, I had another dilemma. I couldn't drive down to the rifle and shotgun range, and I had at least another 45 minutes until my wife got there. To wait in the car would be really boring (since there was no key to start the radio). So I made a compromise. You're not suppose to use rifles and pistols at the shotgun range (hence the name "Shotgun Range"), however, I was in dire circumstances. So I made a compromise. I decided I would only use the revolver (that way there would be no brass flying everywhere).

So I set up the computer case and started plinking away. I was using a European Arms Bounty Hunter .22 LR Single Action revolver. It has fixed sights. I was very pleased with how accurate it was (even with bulk ammunition). I was able to make a 1 inch group of six at about 7 yards.

Also, the ammunition wasn't penetrating the computer case (except after multiple hits in the same location. The baked on coating did make for a decent shoot & see target as the dark gray enamel would be chipped off, leaving a shiny dent. I went through about 150 rounds until my wife got there and was able to practice two handed (isosceles and weaver), strong hand, weak hand, point shooting, and rapid fire (which is fun with a single action). With the key from my wife, I decided to come home. I'll just have to save the computer case with plush toys for another day.

Turns out, she left the cheesecake recipe lying out which I saw as I washed my hands. When she asked after dinner and revealed her cheesecake if I was surprised, I had to admit that I saw the recipe lying out. She was mad (she has been trying so hard all of our marriage to surprise me).

OMG! It's a Threat to National Security!

2010-02-12T07:15:00.000-06:00

All right, this threat to national security is getting to be a little boy who cried wolfish. Michelle Obama recently stated that "childhood obesity" was a threat to national security. Well, I guess it is in good company. I would have never thought that some of these were threats to national security:

The budget deficit, climate change, outsourcing, pro-life groups, gay rights, conservatives and libertarians, illegal immigration, foreign oil, nuclear reactors, overpopulation, coal, Senator Shelby, drug cartels, gangs, Social Security, global economic crisis, wind farms (at least in Great Britain), iPhones (I think that the iPad is still safe), refugees, Bush hatred, Linux, blogs, homosexuality, the internet, AIDS, morality, unions, Dubai Ports, furbies, Tylenol, file sharing, cryptography, Windows XP, backlog of green cards, environmental laws, stealing copper, unlicensed software, North Korea, bees (or lack thereof), white supremacists, Google Earth (only in Belgium), US arms sales (to our friends), underwire bras, IBM, No Child Left Behind, ...

With all of these, one has to wonder what ISN'T a threat to national security? And who gets to be the final arbiter of what is and isn't? Perhaps we need a "Threat to National Security Czar" to sort it all out. Maybe we need a standardized definition of what a "threat to national security" is? Of course, if we did that most of the boogey-men would go away.

I am just going to start laughing at anyone that mentions "threat to national security." If anything can be construed as one, then the phrase is meaningless and just being used to scare people into action. It only took about 50 years of using the race card before it became meaningless. The national security card has bested that by becoming meaningless in less than 10 years. What's next?

The Federal Budget - Federal Debt

2010-02-05T14:00:00.000-06:00

This is one of a series. For the other parts click on the links below:

The Federal Budget - An Introduction

The Federal Budget - Spending Projections

The Federal Budget - Social Security and Medicare

The Federal Budget - My Budget

Debt is a big word in this country. Right now we are sitting on $12.5 trillion of actual debt (and another $10-20 trillion of defined benefit debt based on current law). Back in the 80's and 90's there was talk of cutting the debt in half. Now all we hear about is cutting the deficit in half. So let's start by defining those terms.

DEBT - the amount of money that the US owes.

DEFICIT or SURPLUS - the difference between receipts and outlays for a given fiscal year.

Now, some people think that the DEBT is calculated by adding up all of the DEFICITS (or SURPLUSES). If you are one of those, you would be wrong. That is because the DEBT is composed of two parts: public and intragovernmental. The PUBLIC DEBT is debt instruments that are held by parties outside of the federal government: Savings Bonds, Treasury Bills, etc. The PUBLIC DEBT is held by corporations, foreign governments, and individuals (like me and you). Pretty much anyone or organization in the world can buy PUBLIC DEBT.

INTRAGOVERNMENTAL DEBT are debt instruments held by other government controlled entities (like the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds). Basically, excess receipts (above what is paid out for the year) in the government trust funds is loaned to the government (yes the same government), and in return a trust fund bond is received. Governments can do this since they have the power to print/create money. You and I and every corporation out there would go to jail for fraud if we tried such a thing with our trust funds.

So how would this look in the real world. Let's say I make a promise to my kids to pay for their college. I get a job delivering pizzas to get the extra money. And, I get a piggy bank for them and put $9,000 in it a year (all of the pizza money is earmarked for my kids college). Since they don't have any college expenses right now, I then borrow that $9,000 from their piggy bank and put a piece of paper that says I will pay them back $9,000 +3% each year in interest. I have basically created $9,000 of INTRAFAMILY DEBT.

Let's go back to the DEBT and the DEFICIT/SURPLUS principle for a minute. Each year the big thing to talk about is the DEFICIT - mainly because the DEFICIT has gotten so large that it eclipse's the DEBT of the 80's (in 1984 the DEBT was $1.56 trillion, in 2010 the DEFICIT is projected to be $1.55 trillion). The goal Obama has proposed is to cut the DEFICIT in half, which would still make it larger than any year except Bush's last year budget (2009). DEFICITs have become the natural state of the American Government.

But what about Clinton's Surplus (or the Republican Congress' Surplus depending on how you look at it)? Again lets go to the definition. The SURPLUS happened because the US had less outlays than receipts. Now, in our personal world, we look at oulays and receipts as expenses and income (or revenue). This is where it gets a little hazy. The government (by law) has promised money to certain trust funds (for instance SS) and in some cases has even set aside taxes which (by law) can only be used for those trust funds. These taxes are part of the receipts. However, the excess for the year from the trust funds is loaned to the government (by law) and can then be used for whatever spending is wanted.

During Clinton's second term, the budgets showed a SURPLUS (less outlays than receipts) each year (1998-2001: I include 2001 since the fiscal year starts in October of the previous year). However, the DEBT went up, because a portion of the outlays were "financed" with the excess money of the governmental trust funds. In other words, the PUBLIC DEBT (selling of Treasuries and Savings Bonds) may have gone down, but the INTRAGOVERMENTAL DEBT (SS Bonds) went up by more than the PUBLIC DEBT went down. Hence, total DEBT still went up. In fact, total DEBT has gone up every year since 1940 except 5 ('47, '48, '51, '56, and '69).

How would this look in real life? Let's go back to our example. We'll assume that I have a $75,000 home loan and $45,000 of IOUs in my kids piggy bank (a total of $120,000), and I bring in $22,000 a year ($9,000 from pizza money and $13,000 from my regular job). My first kid just started college and needs $8,000 a year. So, I pay that and borrow the other $1,000 (increasing my IOUs to $46,000). This gives me with $14,000 ($13,000 + $1,000) to spend freely. If it was a Clinton year, I would only spend $13,500. So total outlays was $8,000 + $13,500 = $21,500. Therefore, I have a SURPLUS of $500 which I then apply to the home loan. So my total DEBT is now $75,000 - $500 + $46,000 = $120,500. Even though I had a "SURPLUS," my total DEBT went up because for accounting I am mingling the promised college fund (i.e. Social Security and other trust funds) with my regular finances (the rest of the budget).

Unfortunately, this is an Obama year, so the result is much different. Kid still needs $8,000, I still borrow the extra $1,000. However, I also need to take out a home equity loan of $17,000 to finance the remodeling that I am doing. So, at the end of the year I have receipts of $22,000 and outlays of $39,000 ($8,000 + $1,000 + $13,000 + $17,000). A DEFICIT of $17,000, although our total DEBT went up by $18,000 ($17,000 + $1,000). And if you want to have my numbers more closely reflect reality, just add seven 0's on to each one.

Now, can you really count the IOUs in my kids' college fund as debt? If you want to argue that no, it is fake anyway then look at the consequences. I tell my kids I am welching on the promise and they get all huffy. Since I am there dad, they can't get rid of me, however, they do eventually go off to college and work their tails off to pay for it. They don't ever trust me again, particularly with money matters and come to visit on the occasional Thanksgiving or Christmas. I grow old, and spend my lonely last years in a retirement home because my kids don't really like me and aren't going to pay for some nicer digs.

OK, so what about from a government standpoint. In theory, the government can just do away with the trust funds and make all of those IOUs worthless. In practice though, you would have to get 218 Congressmen, 60 senators, and a president to go along with it. None of these people would ever have a glimmer of ever holding public office again, and more than likely would face death threats if not actual assassination attempts (people get a little crazy when you take away their duely "earned income.") The chances of that happening are 0.

So what is going to happen? Well, when the second child goes off to college and I now need $16,000 a year, I can always get another job delivering pizzas. Except that there isn't not enough demand for that and all of the prime pizza delivering time is already being taken up by my 1st pizza delivery job. So eventually, I am going to have to start using my regular income. But we have already shown that is not enough, and so I'll have to take out another home equity loan.

Of course the bank isn't going to lend me money forever (just like investors will eventually stop buying US debt). At some point, they will say that my house isn't worth the risk of another loan. For them it is easy, they have a tangible point. For the real world, there is no known value that people will stop buying US debt, however, it is there somewhere as the debt grows faster than the economy, we get closer to it.

When that happens, the government still has another trick up its sleeve that I don't. It can print money. Now, with my laser printer and the right paper I could make an approximate facsimile of US currency and might even pass it off to the colleges as real money (kids DON'T try this at home - it is called counterfeiting and is illegal). Of course once they find out, the game is up and if they don't throw me in jail the minimum the college will accept is a certified bank transfer.

When the government continuously adds money to the supply, the hoi poloi eventually get nervous and inflation can happen. Rampant inflation. Not the late 70's type of inflation. We're talking Weimar Republic inflation right before its demise. Or Zimbabwe inflation. It is really the financial death spiral of a government. The paper money becomes nearly worthless, so more of it is printed until it gets to the point that the paper itself is worth more than the amount denominated on it. Lots of bad things can happen during this time.

So, let me introduce a term I made up: CUMULATIVE PRIVATE DECREMENT. The cumulative private decrement is a measure of the sustainable level of public debt (I exclude intragovernmental debt because it would make it look so much worse and all intragovernmental debt is funded by the private sector in the end). The % Private Decrement is first calculated by adjusting the % change in publically held debt and the % change in private GDP (GDP - government spending). The cumulative value is then added over a given period of time. I chose 1950 as my starting point since the budget figures for debt start in 1940 and I didn't want to start in the middle of a war (it tends to make the numbers look a lot worse since there is always massive spending during a war).

Basically, what this means (if I did my math right) is that public debt has increased 465% more than the economy as a whole has since 1950 (and really since 1970). From 1950 to 1970, debt growth was actually slightly less than the growth of the economy. This is sustainable. A government can increase its debt indefinitely as long as the means to service that debt (growth of the private sector) is also increasing at the same or faster rate. However, since 1970 the US has steadily increased its public debt at a rate that exceeds the economic growth of the private sector. The disappointing part is that the budget outlook for the next five years continues this trend. Public debt is expected to increase faster than private GDP. In other words, the situation is only going to get worse. And that's before you add in my less rosy predictions from The Federal Budget - Spending Projections.

Where the tipping point is, I don't know. I don't have plans to sell off the US Savings Bonds that I have. Then again, I don't have any plans to buy more in the immediate future either.

Brown Truck O' Goodness!

2010-02-04T17:34:00.007-06:00

The Brown Truck O' Goodness (read UPS) came today. In it was a nice brown 2nd day air package addressed to me, that required an adult signature. And inside was the black steel of a CZ-82. Fully functional, with two twelve round magazines. And I didn't sign it.

For those who don't know, I obtained my FFL C&R License last year. As such I am legally allowed to buy certain firearms online and have them delivered right to my front door. The C&R License came about as a result of the 1968 gun control act. Basically, before 1968 there was not much regulation of firearms dealers. Anyone could open a Sears catalog and buy the firearm of their choosing and have it shipped to them. The 1968 gun control act instituted the licensing scheme we have now.

So to sell firearms you need one type of license, however for collectors (such as myself) they created the Curios and Relics license. This license allows us to purchase firearms off of the Curios and Relics list (in a nutshell firearms over 50 years old), without having to go through another licensed dealer (which would increase the cost of the firearm). As such, we have to submit to a background check and are subject to inspections (not more than once per year) by the ATF.

The great thing about C&R firearms is there are so many of them (and perfectly functional too). One of the things that the Russians and Germans were good at (particularly when they had planned socialist economies - yes the Nazi's were socialists) is producing far more firearms than they could possibly use. The CZ-82 is the Czech version of the Soviet Makarov. It was produced up until shortly after the end of the Cold War.

An important part of having the C&R is it allows you to buy handguns across state lines. Without one you would only be able to buy them within the state that you reside. By being able to buy across state lines you are able to shop around and get the best price. That is free market capitalism (buying and selling communist guns), although it is rather disappointing that you need a license to engage in it.

Another "stick it to the man" point is with a C&R License you are able to bypass certain state laws. For instance, where I live you need a "Pistol Purchase Permit" to buy a handgun. However, for C&R guns since it falls under Federal Law, you don't need one when using your C&R License.

In semi-related news, my wife received her passport as well. It is a lot thicker than mine, although mostly because the jacket is triple thickness to have room for the microchip that is in it. We are wondering though why they didn't send her birth certificate back with the passport. In case you didn't know, when you apply for a passport you have to send in your original (or a certified copy) of your birth certificate. It is a little unnerving not having a clue where your birth certificate has wound up. If it isn't here by the end of the week, we are going to have to raise some Cain.

So there you have it, because of our gloriously efficient government I can have fully functional firearms shipped to my front door and they get the privilege of losing a primary form of identification (that most identity criminals would pay money for)!

UPDATE: The birth certificate came today. At first I thought maybe the application went to one center and the birth certificate went to another (you know, so that you could create more jobs). Nope. Both came from the same place. The passport came Priority Mail, the birth certificate came First Class.

The Federal Budget - Spending Projections

2010-02-04T14:00:00.002-06:00

This is one of a series. For the other parts click on the links below:

The Federal Budget - An Introduction
The Federal Budget - Federal Debt
The Federal Budget - Social Security and Medicare
The Federal Budget - My Budget

Projections of receipts and outlays are usually done for five years (plus the current year in progress) for each budget report. There are some hunches that I have about the projections based on my theory of government and bureaucracy. For this, I gathered together the projections from the last 10 years of budgets (2000-2009).

1) The receipt projections will be higher than actual receipts.

This is relatively easy to show. On average, the 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1 year estimates were 4% to 6% higher than the actual amounts. The current year estimate is about 0%. This makes sense, during the current year, you have a much better idea of the economic situation and revenue (tax receipts) is a fairly good correlation to the economic situation since 90% of receipts are from corporate and individual income taxes or social security taxes. Whereas it is difficult to predict booms and busts 5 years and even 1 year in the future.

2) The outlay projections will be lower than actual outlays.

This is also relatively easy to show. Estimates of outlays start at 10% under actual 5 years out and slowly decrease to 2% above actual in the current year. In other words, politicians get cold feet on a small portion of their spending during the current year as they are hammered about deficit spending.

An additional tidbit is that politicians tend to be overly optimistic on both ends, but consistently so on outlays. For the 50 estimates (10 years x 5 year outlook), 28 receipts were optimistic (predicting more receipts than actual). The difference is in the magnitude though. Optimistic predictions averaged 14% (i.e. they estimated 14% more receipts than actual) while pessimistic predictions averaged only 7%. On the flip side, only 3 of 50 estimates for outlays were optimistic (i.e. less outlays than actual) with an average of 3%. The pessimistic estimates were off by 8%.

The graph below shows the average receipt and outlay differences and their cumulative effect on the deficit predictions. Negative values indicate that the estimate was less than actual.

Now that I have a rough idea of how the projections have worked historically, I can make my own estimates of how the future budgets will look. So, I added up the FY11 budget deficits (the difference between receipts and outlays) and found that for 2010 through 2015 there is a projected total deficit of $5.8 trillion. Compare that to my guesstimate of $7.7 trillion without a year below $1 trillion. This is done by adjusting the budget estimate by the average difference that was found for the previous 10 years. Its not rocket science.

Year	Receipt		Outlay		Deficit
Year	Budget	Reputo	Budget	Reputo	Budget	Reputo
2010	2,165	2,167	3,720	3,652	1,555	1,485
2011	2,567	2,467	3,833	3,951	1,266	1,484
2012	2,926	2,812	3,754	3,870	828	1,057
2013	3,188	3,011	3,915	4,141	727	1,130
2014	3,455	3,299	4,161	4,544	705	1,245
2015	3,633	3,486	4,385	4,817	751	1,330
Total	17,935	17,244	23,771	24,979	5,835	7,734

One last point is to look at the rosiness of the projections. Politicians don't want to say that the economy is going to be in the dumps for 5 years, so every budget that comes out may have it declining for a year if we are in a recession, but then it snaps back better than ever. 2009 saw a year over year change in receipts to the federal government of -17%. 2010 is projected to change by 3% and then 2011 is estimated to increase by 19% (i.e. 2011 will bring in 1/5 more money into federal coffers than 2010) and then by another 14%in 2012 . How realistic is this? Well, in the last 50 years it has happened once 1977-78 (19% and 12%) and 1969 it went up by 22%. This time, the budget expects it to happen during the same time as a major tax increase (or the expiration of the Bush tax cuts). How has the receipts of the country faired with major tax increases to dramatically increase revenue? Well, 1993-94 revenue increased an average of 7.5% each year, 1991-92 revenue increased an average of 4.5%, 1942-43 revenue increased an average of 66%, 1936-37 revenue increased an average of 23%, 1932-33 revenue decreased 21%, and 1917-18 revenue increased an average of 135%.

So, it appears that in times of a World War, raising taxes will increase revenue (of course if you look at the size of the tax increases during those times, they far outstripped any tax hike we have now). However, other issues were in play as well. In World War I, the income tax was new and it was relatively easy to include a whole bunch of the population that previously had not been paying taxes into the tax system under the guise of patriotism. In World War II, the Social Security taxes were just ramping up and people are more willing to pay taxes to finance a war. Other than that, major tax increases have only had moderate effect (nothing close to the 16.5% average that is estimated in 2011-12). In fact, based on the 1932-33 numbers, this tax increase could result in a large decrease in revenue.

In conclusion, the spending projections (and accompanying receipt projections) are a fantasy. They only faintly resemble reality, but that is what is used to make promises of "X billion invested over the next X years." In the end, a current Congress cannot bind a future Congress to do anything.

The Federal Budget - An Introduction

2010-02-04T11:00:00.005-06:00

With the FY11 budget coming it I thought I would do a blog about it. After looking it over, I decided to divide it into a series of blogs. So here are links to the four parts:

The Federal Budget - Spending Projections
The Federal Budget - Federal Debt
The Federal Budget - Social Security and Medicare
The Federal Budget - My Budget!

The first thing to understand about the budgeting process for the federal government is that it isn't anything like budgeting for a company or yourself. Definitions of terms are very important. So I'll try to define them as I go through. Some may argue that the budgeting process is designed to hide what politicians don't want us to see. This assumes that the federal bureaucracy is an calculating, efficient, well-oiled machine! This flies in the face of everything we see the federal bureaucracy (or any bureaucracy) do for that matter.

I am a firm believer in the idea that the government and its bureaucracy is slow, dim-witted, and wholly inefficient. Furthermore, I would postulate that this is exactly the way that the founding fathers intended. As such the government is incapable of "hiding" information from us. The best it can do is obscure it with their bumbling. They can't even do this very well.

Frankly, the two areas of government (politicians and bureaucrats) have competing interests based on a similar goal. Politicians, by and large, want to be re-elected (job security) and must hide information from the public that would hinder their ability to be re-elected. Bureaucrats want to keep their jobs, and in so doing must produce something to justify it. Their products (i.e. reports) invariably have the exact information that some politician doesn't want you to have. It may not be in the most convenient format, and it may be rather redundant (hence production of even more reports of the same, ergo job security).

The annual Budget Report is a perfect example of this. Year to year, probably about 50-75% of the report is identical. Once you get back to the historical tables (where comparisons can actually be made), you find that the same information is repeated about 30 different ways. And most of those show the complete ineptitude of the federal government.

Why is the federal government so inept and how can we make it efficient? Well, that assumes that you want it efficient in the first place. As I said previously, our federal government was designed to be slow and inefficient. The Founding Fathers did not want to have power focused at the federal level, but rather at the state level. As such, they gave a limited set of powers to the federal government. All others were reserved for the states or the people (note not given; rights can be delegated to a government by people; government gets all power from the people and therefore has no ability to take away rights, only infringe them; this is true for all governments throughout the world, those people who knowingly accept the infringements of their government are accomplices to it).

For about 100 years, the states guarded their powers jealously from the federal government. Unfortunately, through times of crises like the Civil War, World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II, those powers were ceded to the federal government by the states. This then increased both the amount of federal spending and the amount of federal taxation.

How we fund our government has radically changed. When the Income Tax amendment was passed one of the arguments for it is that it would only affect the rich (doesn't that sound familiar). When Social Security was enacted, it wasn't targeted to the entire population, only a small subset (the rich and their employees). In the last 75 years, how we fund our government has radically changed.

Based on the OMB historical numbers, in 1934 more than 70% of the government's receipt were through excise taxes, gift and estate taxes, and customs duties (except for estate taxes, all voluntary activities that one could choose to participate in). Approximately 15% of the government receipts were from individuals in the form of income taxes and social insurance or retirement taxes. By 1970, those roles had been reversed and in 2009, more than 80% of government receipts are from individuals and less than 8% are in the form of excise taxes, gift and estate taxes, and customs duties.

So read on in the series to see my thoughts about the federal budget.