Iran goes for the bomb

All the Iranians (or anyone else) needs to make a nuclear bomb, is enough fissionable material, either 90% uranium 235 or plutonium.  U235 occurs in nature. 0.7% of natural uranium is the fissionable U235, the rest is stable U238 which won't make a bomb.  Plutonium does not occur in nature, it has to be made in a nuclear reactor. 
   The Iranians have built up a huge battery of 19,000 centrifuges to separate the fissionable U235 from the inert U238.  They have been running the centrifuges long enough to create tons of uranium enriched to 20%.  Concentrating from 20% to 90% is easier than what they have already done, concentrating from 0.7% to 20%.  Iran is withing spitting distance of the bomb.
   The last thing the world needs is nuclear weapons in the hands of Iranian crazies. 
   So, as the Iranians moved closer to the bomb, we set up an economic blockade on Iran. The US Senate made it law.  They can't import anything technical, not even auto parts, they can't sell their oil.  Surprisingly,  this is working.  Iran is hurting enough to start bargaining. 
   Only the deal the Iranians are offering is "We promise not to make a bomb, and you lift the blockade."
Such a deal.  And Obama wanted to accept it. 
   Fortunately the French were wise enough to reject this "deal".  And probably the US Senate won't fall for it either.
   The deal we want is "You Iranians turn all your uranium and all your centrifuges over to us, and permit no notice inspections of every place in your country.  And you don't get to have reactors.  After that is accomplished to our satisfaction, then we will lift the blockade." 
   If we let the Iranians get the bomb, their neighbors, Saudi and Iraq will build their own bombs.  The Pakis and the Israelis already have the bomb. 

Death Spiral

For taxpayers that is. 
TV talking heads worry about Obama care going into a death spiral.  By which they mean only older and sicker patients sign up for Obamacare and the young and healthy won't.  Which means the insurance companies have to raise premiums to pay the bills, which means fewer and fewer healthy patients would sign up, 'cause it costs too much.  As the TV newsies tell it, the entire Obamacare plan would emit black smoke, burst into flames and make a big hole in the ground where it hits.
  Don't you wish. 
  In real life, the insurance companies will cry a lot, and head to the White House for a taxpayer funded bailout. 

Nuking the opposition.

Harry Reid decided to do it, he pulled some kinda magic and now the Senate Dems can approve Obama appointments by a simple majority, instead of the supermajority that has been required since Thomas Jefferson's time.  Needless to say, the Republicans are pissed.
   They been talking about doing this for a decade.  I'm wondering why Harry decided to do it now.  Is it cause he figures the Dems are gonna loose the Senate in 2014, so he might as well stack the courts with as many liberal judges as he can?  Is it to give the TV newsies something besides the Obamacare disaster to talk about? 
   Harry must not care much about bipartisan anything.  The Republicans are now mad enough to give the Dems trouble just for spite.  And, when the Republicans do take the Senate, they have a whole list of crusty conservative judges to appoint. 
   On a longer term viewpoint, Harry has thrown the classic Senate mission into the trash.  The Senate rules on filibusters/super majorities have been there since the beginning, to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority.  Used to be,  the majority had to have a lotta votes to jam anything thru that the minority hated.  Not any more.  Granted, yesterday's nuclear option only covered presidential appointments, but next week, we can go for legislation and Supreme Court appointments. 

Broadband is back.

I've been off the air since yesterday.  Today I called the Time Warner service number.  They tried a few things and we decided the modem might have died.  So I went into Littleton, to the Time Warner shop on Union Ave, our a little past Lahout's.  They gave me a new modem.  I took it back and plugged it in and no joy.  I'm still off the air.  So, call the Time Warner trouble number again, and they say they can have a service man out today.  Groovy. 
   And, the service guy gets here. Swaps out the splitter, replaces some tired looking J connectors, still no joy.  He has a clever box the can  plug into the coax and make like a modem.  They track back to the pole, and decide to change out my coax drop.  That does it,. I'm back. 

Immigration bill

There are a lot of angles to immigration.  There is a "comprehensive" (something for everyone) bill floating around.  Democrats would love to get some press and maybe a vote on it, anything to deflect the obmacare flak heading their way.  So what's in it for real people?
  Well, it could let in more low end workers for picking crops, construction, retail.  Planters, growers, farmers, and business are in favor of more low price workers.  For the same reasons, unions are against it.
  It ought to do something about the estimated 11 million illegal  immigrants already in the country.  These poor people have no legal standing anywhere and live in terror of a routine traffic stop that gets them deported.  Anyone, employers, the mob, petty criminals, cops, the Border Patrol can abuse them at will. This is unfair, unjust un American, and we ought to fix it.  
   Hispanics and Democrats want to turn all 11 million of 'em into instant citizens.  Hispanics like this 'cause a lot the illegals are friends, relatives and neighbors.  Democrats like this 'cause they think Hispanics will vote a straight Democratic ticket.  11 million voters for your party is not to be sneezed at.  A whole lot of other people see no reason why illegals in the country should get better treatment than the millions of legals who are waiting in line to enter the country. 
   Maybe we could compromise and issue work permits to illegals who have been here for a while, have jobs, look stable, and have stayed out of trouble with the law.  The work permit doesn't let 'em vote, or let them draw welfare, unemployment, medicaid, food stamps, or social security benefits.  But it does let them hold a job, get a driver's license, buy a car, buy car insurance, and send their kids to public school. 
   Or, we could deport them all.  I don't approve of that, most of 'em have jobs, contribute to the community, pay taxes and stay out of trouble.  We need citizens like that. Arresting them and packing them onto buses for shipment back to Mexico is the sort of thing the Nazis used to do.   American is what it is because we have a large and loyal population, both immigrant and native borne.  In fact, immigrants are as loyal, and often more loyal than the native borne.  
   And then honorable service in the US armed forces ought to earn US citizenship.  And illegals who were brought to this country as minor children deserve a break.  It isn't the kid's fault that their parents decided to slip into the US without doing the required paperwork. 
   We ought to have an immigrant quota of 1% of the current population, per year.  America can easily assimilate that many immigrants.  1% would be about 3 million immigrants a year.  We ought to favor the young, the healthy,  the educated, the skilled, the married.  Current policy favors relatives of American citizens, which gets us a lot of grandparents just about ready to retire and draw US social security. 
   If we cannot do enough log rolling and horse trading to pass a "comprehensive" immigration bill, then we ought to pass things that every one agrees on.  Getting something is better than nothing. 

Was JFK a Conservative?

With the 50th anniversary of JFK's assassination coming up,  TV news is full of chit chat about JFK.  Some of the chitchat  cites JFK policies, his tax cut, his strong anti-communism, and calls JFK a conservative.  I suppose, but fifty years ago, JFK was a liberal.  Sides have changed, the left has moved way left compared to where they were 50 years ago.  By today's standards, JFK is conservative, but by 1960 standards he was liberal.  Standards have changed. 
   It's one thing for modern talking heads to claim a popular 20th century president supports their 21st century political programs.  But if you want to understand want was going down in the 1960's, you need to understand what the words liberal and conservative meant in the 1960's. 

Gaza Strip Misery?

The Gaza strip is very small,heavily populated, and miserable.  A nearly full page article in the Economist details how bad things are.  The Israeli's won't let anything but food in, the Egyptians are closing the tunnels that used to smuggle in arms and luxury goods, electric power is mostly off.  Then they printed a picture, two small boys, probably seven or eight, playing on a sand pile in front of a crumbling poured concrete building.  The background is pretty miserable, but the two boys are dressed in brand new clean jerseys and patterned shorts.  The clothes look fresh off the rack at  Walmart.  My kids never looked that spandy clean playing out of doors back here in suburban US of A.  Methinks the photo was carefully posed, presumable by Hamas which runs the Gaza strip.
   One wonders why they didn't dress the boys in rags for the photo.