Some things I don't understand. It's perfectly reasonable for Trump's national security advisor to talk to some Russians. Flynn is an old intelligence guy, knows some Russians, and contacting our biggest international problem is a good idea. Let 'em know that we won't nuke 'em, that we could make a deal, pass on a bit of sweetness and light, is always a good idea. We aren't at war with the Russians, reaching out and schmoozing them is a good thing. Far better than calling them names.
How did Flynn manage to get himself cross threaded with Mike Pence? Just what was it that he failed to say, or "misspoke" ? And why would a senior retired Army general officer not live up to the code of the services and tell the truth?
And, who in the intelligence world leaked the phone taps on Flynn? And leaked them to the press, not just Congressional Democrats? You tap a senior guy's phone and that's serious business. When the senior guy finds out, he will retaliate. Clearly Trump has a heavy duty leaker on the loose. He needs to call a plumber ASAP.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Words of the Weasel Part 45
"Border Tax". A euphemism for tariff. I listened to some talking head on Fox News spend five minutes explaining why Trump's proposed "border tax" was not a tariff. Tariffs have been a hot subject thru out American history. And the history books all use the word tariff. We are doing our children a disservice to introduce a new buzz phrase for an old old concept.
Could it be that a century of free trade agitation has made people think that tariff's are bad for them?
In real life, tariffs are good for domestic makers of stuff, for obvious reasons. Tariffs are bad for everyone else because they have to pay more for stuff. Everyone else is more people than the makers (both labor and company) of any one kind of stuff. Since this is a democracy, it is reasonable to support free trade since more people benefit from a free trade regime.
Could it be that a century of free trade agitation has made people think that tariff's are bad for them?
In real life, tariffs are good for domestic makers of stuff, for obvious reasons. Tariffs are bad for everyone else because they have to pay more for stuff. Everyone else is more people than the makers (both labor and company) of any one kind of stuff. Since this is a democracy, it is reasonable to support free trade since more people benefit from a free trade regime.
Father of Dodge Viper says it died because it ran out of reasons to live
Bob Lutz, product champion of the Viper, back some years ago, said the idea of the Viper was to have more power and go faster than anything else. When Chevy put out some Corvettes that were even faster than Viper the car lost its reason for being.
Piffle I say. When the competition comes out with a product hotter than yours, it's time to soup up your product. Chrysler just didn't want to spend the money. Or didn't have the money.
If some car maker was looking for a new product, how about a sporty car that can handle driving in snow? I've driven Camaros and Mustangs, a lotta fun on a dry road but totally worthless after the first flake hits the road. Up here in NH, people laugh at you if they see you driving a sporty car in winter. Which cuts into the market for sporty cars.
What someone ought to make is a sporty car that works in winter. Fifty fifty front rear weight distribution is a good starting place. Then it needs four wheel drive, with limit slip differentials fore and aft. Maybe a built in ski rack that doesn't whistle at 65 mph. Decent tires with rubber that sticks in snow. They make 'em. Plenty of defroster heat. Good strong windshield washer to cope with the salt spray. Bleed some engine heat to the washer bottle to keep it from freezing. Outside thermometer so you can tell if that glittery black stuff up ahead is ice or just wet asphalt. Give it some decent styling and I'd buy one.
Piffle I say. When the competition comes out with a product hotter than yours, it's time to soup up your product. Chrysler just didn't want to spend the money. Or didn't have the money.
If some car maker was looking for a new product, how about a sporty car that can handle driving in snow? I've driven Camaros and Mustangs, a lotta fun on a dry road but totally worthless after the first flake hits the road. Up here in NH, people laugh at you if they see you driving a sporty car in winter. Which cuts into the market for sporty cars.
What someone ought to make is a sporty car that works in winter. Fifty fifty front rear weight distribution is a good starting place. Then it needs four wheel drive, with limit slip differentials fore and aft. Maybe a built in ski rack that doesn't whistle at 65 mph. Decent tires with rubber that sticks in snow. They make 'em. Plenty of defroster heat. Good strong windshield washer to cope with the salt spray. Bleed some engine heat to the washer bottle to keep it from freezing. Outside thermometer so you can tell if that glittery black stuff up ahead is ice or just wet asphalt. Give it some decent styling and I'd buy one.
Monday, February 13, 2017
Ivanka Trump and her clothing line.
All I know about Ivanka Trump is what I see on TV. She sure looks like a nice, good looking, pleasant, mother of three. The sort of young woman any father would be proud to call his daughter. And so, when Nordstroms and some other retailers drop her clothing line, her doting father says a few words. What does anyone expect him to say? And Kellyanne Conway says a few more words, good for her.
The newsies are making a federal case out of this. Which is one reason why polls show president Trump has more credibility than the newsies do.
The newsies are making a federal case out of this. Which is one reason why polls show president Trump has more credibility than the newsies do.
Sunday, February 12, 2017
Can I trust US courts anymore?
Good question. Seattle district court judge James Robart certainly doesn't believe in following the written law. The 1952 law says the president has total authority to ban any immigrant or class of immigrants from entry to the United States. Judge Robart ignored this and forbade the president from barring immigration from seven Middle East countries. In short, the judge ruled in accordance with his personal political ideology and not in accordance with the law on the books. Plus the two plaintiff states clearly lacked standing to sue the federal government.
What's worse, the 9th Circuit court of appeals backed him up. So, we have the federal courts in the western part of the country making judgements based on personal prejudice rather than written law. I wonder what they were teaching in law school back when these so called judges were doing law school. Scary.
So much for the procedural argument. The substance of the issue is of only medium importance. We don't get all that many immigrants from the seven middle east countries in Trump's executive order. On the other hand, these seven countries are so screwed up from civil war or just plain collapse into failed states, that we cannot believe anything they tell us. We ought to be vetting immigrants to weed out criminals and select for people who will become loyal and productive members of American society. Vetting means contacting the authorities in the immigrant's home country to verify his name and home address, see how much schooling he has, see his police record, and so forth. This only works if the home country has authorities in charge. The seven countries on Trump's executive order are all so war torn that we cannot find the authorities, and even if we find someone who claims to be an authority in an enemy country like Iran or Syria, we suspect that they would lie to us. Surely an Iranian mullah who wanted to infiltrate an agent into the US would have no problem telling US authorities that "Yes Omar is a good boy, never been in trouble, good marks in school. Yada-Yada."
So, it's a twofer, the so called judges are wrong on the issues as well as procedures. Very scary.
What's worse, the 9th Circuit court of appeals backed him up. So, we have the federal courts in the western part of the country making judgements based on personal prejudice rather than written law. I wonder what they were teaching in law school back when these so called judges were doing law school. Scary.
So much for the procedural argument. The substance of the issue is of only medium importance. We don't get all that many immigrants from the seven middle east countries in Trump's executive order. On the other hand, these seven countries are so screwed up from civil war or just plain collapse into failed states, that we cannot believe anything they tell us. We ought to be vetting immigrants to weed out criminals and select for people who will become loyal and productive members of American society. Vetting means contacting the authorities in the immigrant's home country to verify his name and home address, see how much schooling he has, see his police record, and so forth. This only works if the home country has authorities in charge. The seven countries on Trump's executive order are all so war torn that we cannot find the authorities, and even if we find someone who claims to be an authority in an enemy country like Iran or Syria, we suspect that they would lie to us. Surely an Iranian mullah who wanted to infiltrate an agent into the US would have no problem telling US authorities that "Yes Omar is a good boy, never been in trouble, good marks in school. Yada-Yada."
So, it's a twofer, the so called judges are wrong on the issues as well as procedures. Very scary.
Saturday, February 11, 2017
How much should that wall cost?
I'm not a great wall fan myself. New Hampshire is about as far away from the Mexican border as you can get. But ABC was just claiming that the border wall would cost $25 billion. Which is rediculous.
The US Mexican border is 2000 miles long. At 5280 feet to the mile, that comes out to 10 million feet in round numbers. Chain link fence material, the chain link, fence posts, ties, and everything is about $5 a foot. I looked it up on the internet. Let's assume installation is about the same as the cost of materials, so make it $10 a foot, or $100 million to do the whole border. That's a far cry from ABC's $25 billion.
Actually, there is a bit more to doing it right. To prevent people from digging under it, we ought to put a solid concrete footing under the fence, all the way across. That might cost another $100 million. Then we need an access road on our side of the fence to allow the border patrol to get men to the site of an illegal crossing in a hurry. It can be a dirt road, just good enough for a jeep. And we ought to fly air patrols in Cessnas (not $1 millon UAVs) daily. The real purpose of the fence is to stop vehicles from crossing, or at least to leave an unmistakable hole where someone crashes thru. You need air patrols to spot the big holes in time to get the border patrol in pursuit of the fence crasher before he gets away.
Even with all this stuff I'm thinking we could do the wall for less than $1 billion.
The US Mexican border is 2000 miles long. At 5280 feet to the mile, that comes out to 10 million feet in round numbers. Chain link fence material, the chain link, fence posts, ties, and everything is about $5 a foot. I looked it up on the internet. Let's assume installation is about the same as the cost of materials, so make it $10 a foot, or $100 million to do the whole border. That's a far cry from ABC's $25 billion.
Actually, there is a bit more to doing it right. To prevent people from digging under it, we ought to put a solid concrete footing under the fence, all the way across. That might cost another $100 million. Then we need an access road on our side of the fence to allow the border patrol to get men to the site of an illegal crossing in a hurry. It can be a dirt road, just good enough for a jeep. And we ought to fly air patrols in Cessnas (not $1 millon UAVs) daily. The real purpose of the fence is to stop vehicles from crossing, or at least to leave an unmistakable hole where someone crashes thru. You need air patrols to spot the big holes in time to get the border patrol in pursuit of the fence crasher before he gets away.
Even with all this stuff I'm thinking we could do the wall for less than $1 billion.
Friday, February 10, 2017
Adventures in Router Land
The virii and trojans and ransomware are getting aggressive this year. I decided to upgrade the firmware in my router. Router is a $40 plastic box that plugs into the cable modem and offers WIFI and four internet connectors. The router faces the raw internet, and needs to reject incoming messages that would take over the router and do evil. The router acts as a firewall, and if it should be penetrated, the hacker has direct access to the Windows machines plugged into the router. And Windows is like Swiss cheese, fully of holes. If the tougher software in the router is compromised, the Windows machines are toast.
My router is a NetGear N300 purchased a couple of years ago. I Googled the router maker name, model number and "firmware". This gave me an offer to download new firmware. On this particular router you can talk to it using your web browser. You put in a special URL and the router picks up and displays a groovy little user interface. From this I learned that my current firmware was v18 while the new downloaded firmware was v42. Hmm, been a lot of patching of router code over the last couple of years. The router offered an "upload firmware" function, which was sorta flaky. I had to run it two or three times before the upload "took".
So, me router firmware is all up to date, which is the best I can do against the swarm of malware running around the internet. Upgrading the firmware did not mess up any of my computer connections to the router.
My router is a NetGear N300 purchased a couple of years ago. I Googled the router maker name, model number and "firmware". This gave me an offer to download new firmware. On this particular router you can talk to it using your web browser. You put in a special URL and the router picks up and displays a groovy little user interface. From this I learned that my current firmware was v18 while the new downloaded firmware was v42. Hmm, been a lot of patching of router code over the last couple of years. The router offered an "upload firmware" function, which was sorta flaky. I had to run it two or three times before the upload "took".
So, me router firmware is all up to date, which is the best I can do against the swarm of malware running around the internet. Upgrading the firmware did not mess up any of my computer connections to the router.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)