Alternate Energy, reduced carbon foot print, Nuclear Power

Was listening to Joe Leibermann explaining a "Alternate Energy Bill" that he is sponsoring. The newsie asked Leibermann if John McCain was ready to support the bill. Surprise. Leibermann said McCain refused to support the bill unless it contained language favoring nuclear energy.
All Right. Way to go. Nuclear has zero carbon footprint, nuclear will keep my lights on after the sun goes down, and it works every day, even if the wind doesn't blow. And it's safe. In fifty years no one has been hurt by nuclear power. Three Mile Island didn't hurt anyone, despite all the press coverage.
Alternate power from sunlight or wind isn't dependable. You don't get any solar power after the sun sets, and you don't get any wind power on a calm day. The electric company has to supply power after dark and on calm days. Building wind and solar plants is a waste of money, 'cause they have to build coal or gas fired plants as well to supply power all the time. That means spending double the money.
I'm glad McCain is willing to ignore mouthy greens and support the only alternative power scheme that will actually generate real power.

McCain cannot be bought . Causes lag in fundraising

Last figures I saw had Obama and Clinton both raising nearly twice as much money as John McCain. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise. A lot of campaign money is given to buy "access". If you have have donated serious money to a man's campaign, he will probably answer his phone when you call. And after listening to your pitch, there is a chance that he will actually get out there and do something for you. Certainly Hillary can be swayed by money. Probably Barack as well.
How about flinty old John McCain? Not very likely. Every knows that McCain is his own man and does his own thing. So why bother to buy access to a man who isn't going to do what you ask?
Is that the reason for the lag in fund raising?

NH working to raise the price of lightbulbs

Concord is mulling over banning incandescent lamps (plain old light bulbs) to save electricity. But why? The compact fluorescent bulb saves enough electricity to pay for itself in 400 hours of burning. That's figured on 10 cent a kilowatt hour electricity and $4 for a new compact fluorescent. Sales of compact fluorescents are strong, clearly people have heard the word and are converting over to the more efficient lamps. No government policy needed, the economics are driving the change over.
Why outlaw the plain old bulbs when the new bulbs are taking over anyhow? There are plenty of bulbs in the world that only light up for brief intervals, and use negligible amounts of electricity. Consider the light inside your refrigerator. It doesn't stay on very long, but let it burn out, and you cannot find the milk, let alone something way in the back. There are a lot of light bulbs like that in out buildings, cellars, attics, and other seldom visited places. If an owner chooses to replace such a bulb with a 75 cent incandescent rather than a $4 compact fluorescent why not? Think of all the decorative fixtures and appliances that require small incandescent lamps. Is it fair to require the owners to to junk these things when the bulb burns out? Will I be able to buy replacement lamps to fit my Christmas light string?
Or is banning incandescent lamps just a way for politicians to make a feel good gesture toward greenness with out spending any state money? Or does it cater to the natural desire to boss people around just for the sake of bossing.

Is the FAA targeting American Airlines?

American's fleet of MD-80's, which have been carrying passengers for 20 years, all of a sudden became unsafe to fly, with American canceling hundreds of flights and stranding 250,000 passengers.
How come the sudden change from reliable passenger hauler to safety of flight hangar queen? Could it be the FAA inspectors have a grudge against American? And after the Oberstar house hearings last week, no one is going to challenge a line inspector on anything.
According to the Wall St Journal, the MD-80 furore involves the spacing of wire tiedown clips (Adel clamps) . FAA was complaining that the clips weren't on a ONE INCH spacing. In a prior life I was a flight line supervisor. If the wire bundles were secured with Adel clamps every 12 inches we were happy. I never heard of any aircraft requiring tiedown clamps on a one inch spacing. The clamps are 1/2 inch wide, space them every inch and you might as well put the wires into conduit.
The Air Worthiness directive that caused all this trouble was only issued in early March. Surely they might allow a little more time to comply with an Air Worthiness directive without grounding the MD-80 fleet and stranding 250,000 passengers.
Then the the paper pushers came up for air. FAA will now allow carriers to submit their their interpretations of maintenance rules to the FAA for approval before they instruct their mechanics. This ain't right. Aircraft are maintained by the book. There is one book for each aircraft, written by the maker's engineering department. We don't write separate books for each airline. let alone have FAA approve each airline's special book. We stick to the right book, with no variations. Sounds like FAA is demanding each airline paraphrase the maker's book and submit the paraphrases for FAA approval. That will keep a bunch of GS paper pushers employed for decades.
Aircraft are complex, and no one on the flight line pretends that he knows everything about the aircraft. Instead, everyone has a copy of the book. When questions as to proper procedure arise (and they do, trust me) everyone pulls down their copy of the book. And complies with it. No arguments. If it's in the book, we do it by the book. And we have one book for everyone. Even FAA inspectors should be going by the book. They should not be re writing the book.
Good thing I don't fly much any more. Bad enough they want me to take off my shoes. Worse they now cancel my flight and leave me stuck at the airport.

The Second Civil War Ronald Brownstein

Sub titled "How extreme partisanship has paralyzed Washington and polarized America." It's a very recent book (2007) . It gives an interesting account of the politics of the last 20 years. For those that lived thru the period, it is a good nostalgic read. The author describes the "great sorting out" when the Solid South decided to leave the democratic party and join the republicans. In the good old days, the solid south voted democratic, and had done so ever since the Civil War. The Civil Rights Bill of 1964 was pushed thru by the national democratic party, over the dead bodies of the southern democrats. After that, southerners found they could join the republican party without causing total revulsion among their neighbors.
The result was the conservative southern democrats joined the conservative republican party, and the moderate republicans from the northeast switched to the liberal democratic party. The result was considerable more unity in the two national parties. By the 1990's the division between the parties in Congress was as sharp and rancorous as it had been before the Civil War. The strength of the two parties was fairly equal by the '90's so controversial legislation had little chance of passage.
The author decries this as total gridlock and calls for a return to the more mellow 1950's. I fail to agree with this viewpoint. I see the great sorting out as clarifying the issues to the voters. In the mellow 1950's it was hard for citizens, even real news junkies, to know what their party stood for, and what it might do if elected. Today the choices for the voters are more understandable.
The author does not discuss the rise of contentious issues since the 1960's. Things like drugs, abortion, gay rights, and immigration just were not issues in the 1950's and 60's. They hadn't been invented yet. When you have more contentious issues on the table you are going to have a more polarized electorate. The other thing the author fails to discuss is the fading of the unity forced upon us by the great challenges of the depression and World War II, and the Soviets. Twenty years of facing down existential challenges will foster a lot of political unity.
The author is a reporter for the Los Angles Times, and once co authored a book with Ralph Nader. His liberal sympathies seep out in the text.

The Petraeus-Crocker hearings

C-Span carried the hearings live. General Petraeus looked and sounded good. Crocker did OK, although there were a couple of times where he should have answered "Yes' or "No" and didn't. Ranking committee member John McCain was impressive. McCain's questions where real questions, which prompted the witness (Petraeus) to offer more and useful information. The committee democrats just made anti-war speeches. The democrats tried hard to get Petraeus and Crocker to commit to a withdrawal date, but they wisely refused. You don't tell the enemy when you plan to go home, that just makes the enemy hunker down until you leave him in charge.
Crocker is negotiating a "status of forces" agreement with the Iraqi government. The UN resolution that OK'ed the US invasion will expire end of this year. "Status of Forces" is the usual agreement between our government and foreign governments that allows armed US troops into said foreign country. Such agreements usually spell out legal jurisdictions, does a US soldier have to face the local justice when crimes are alleged? We try hard to put in a clause that give the US Army jurisdiction, but that doesn't always fly with the locals. Interesting point, Crocker said the status of forces agreement would be handled by executive order without the advice and consent of the US senate. Most of the existing status of forces agreements were handled as real treaties needing Senate OK. This might give rise to more Senate grandstanding before the election.
Petraeus and Crocker feel that the recent shootouts in Basra and other places represents the Maliki government getting strong enough to take out the militias, which is a good thing even if taking them out leads to a bit of mortar fire into the Green Zone.

Defeat the Granite State Fair Tax Coalition

They want to strip away the powers of cities and towns and give them to Concord. Behind seductive talk of lowering property taxes they call for rejection of “The Pledge”. Translation, give Concord a sales tax and state income tax like they have in Massachusetts, and Concord will stop skimming our property taxes.

Concord started skimming to pay for the State Supreme Court mandated equal school funding. Before that bit of judge made law came down, Concord managed to struggle by on the Liquor Commission profits.

New Hampshire could put things to rights very simply. Amend the state constitution to put schools back under the control of the cities and towns, where it was before the court changed the rules.

Cities and towns will get more education done for less money than Concord could. Local school boards, facing skeptical tax paying citizens, many of whom they know personally, will strike a better balance between expenditures and revenues. Questions about the proper place of athletics, shop classes, music, art, a ski team, and the whole host of other issues, are best handled at the local level.