Radioactive Communist Zombies

The Problem with Liberalism

Yes, I didn't blog yesterday, it was a very busy day and when it was over I was tired.  I did tweet the State of the Union and the excellent GOP response, however.

But today we're going to discuss the problem with liberalism.  I had an epiphany after writing this post about education.

This is how the left, from Marx to Obama, thinks: something is not perfect.  Capitalism is not perfect because there are poor people.  Our education system is not perfect because not everyone gets educated.  Health care is not perfect because some people don't have insurance.  The world is not perfect because there is pollution and the theart of war.  And so on and so forth. 

Now a conservative would say "Capitalism, like any human system, is not perfect, but it is the best way to generate wealth known to man and because of it we have the richest poor people ever so lets do what maximizes the good and minimizes the bad."  But to a liberal that's just not good enough.

So the liberal tries an experiment.  They come up with some clever idea (like Communism) that has never been tried before or has been tried and failed but the liberal has no sense of history so it's all new to him.  And they apply it to the real world.  And it fails.  So does the liberal say "hmmm, that didn't work, let's go back to the way things were."  No, they experiment more, they add layers of experimentation on top of previous layers to fix what failed.  So you get multi-layers of bureaucracy and regulation and government spending to keep trying to fix what is not and never will be perfect.

Like the banking situation.  Instead of fixing what caused the housing collapse (government-sponsored enterprises running amok and forcing banks to give bad loans) they first bail out the banks with government money then take on Dodd-Frank to make it perfect.  (And to protect those silly dumb consumers from mean old bankers.)

You'll notice the U.S. Constitution says "a more perfect union" not a "perfect union."  But to a liberal anything short of perfection needs their wisdom and guidance to perfect.  And when their wonderful new idea fails, they know it is because enough money wasn't spent or enough regulations weren't in place (or both).

And that's the problem with liberalism.

The Up Side of Global Warming

As I was driving through a blizzard today here in central Washington State (and Seattle is having a bad snow day but any day it snows in Seattle is a snowcopolypse), I had thoughts about the upside of a warmer world thanks to global warming climate change. Jurisdictions spend billions of dollars on snow abatement and removal.  Businesses also spend huge sums clearing parking lots and sidewalks for their customers' and employees' safety.

Fewer car accidents.  The damage from winter-driving related accidents probably also runs into the billions of not trillions, from fender benders to fatalities.

People wouldn't have to waste precious resources on snow tires (I know, a lot don't now, anyway), tire chains, snow shovels, snow blowers, and snow plows for their pickups (That name again is Mr. Plow).  That probably runs in the trillions of dollars that could be saved.  And no one ever had a heart attack shoveling global warming off their sidewalk.

Children wouldn't miss school so test scores might go up.  Adults wouldn't miss work at a cost of probably trillions in lost productivity.  I bet those environmental economists never consider that in their cost-benefit calculations.

And I wouldn't have to drvy through a blizzard to get to my community meetings with the heater running full blast to keep the windshield ice-free!

So bring on global warming.  Sounds like there's a great up-side to it!

LIberal Men Hate Strong Women

I tell ya, Twitter has been an eye-opener for me.  I follow some conservative women and the tweets they get from liberal men (and sometimes women) are just amazing. Both Michelle Malkine and Dana Loesch will retweet some of the hate-tweets they get.  The language alone will raise your hair.  The c-word is very common, along with other derogatory names for women.  Also racists terms since Michelle Malkin is Filipino.  There's talk of rape, forcible sodomy, and in at least one instance skinning alive (I'm trying to keep this clean here).

Now these are from liberal men.  These men are supposedly "liberated" from the male patriarchy and support women's liberation.  And what is women's liberation about other than letting women be who they want to be?  Well, apparently to these liberal men (and sometimes women) women can't be conservative or they are not really women deserving respect.  Any conservative women (or minority) is immediately attacked by the left as un-genuine (someone called Sarah Palin a female impersonator).  They are fair game for the most vile, vicious attacks because they dare challenge liberal orthodoxy.  They hate them because they are strong enough to think for themselves.

To a liberal, women deserve respect unless they are conservative.  Do you really think if these people came to absolute power, they wouldn't follow through on their threats?

Irony Can Be Pretty Ironic

The only thing the U.S. Constitution guarantees you may own is "arms" meaning guns, firearms, knifes, nuclear weapons, etc. There is no right to own cars, computers, houses, cell phones and pretty much anything else you own except "arms."  That means that California can ban you from owning cars or, what it is doing, is ban you from owning cars the state doesn't approve of.  I know, it sucks.  So this makes Congress' ban on incandescent light bulbs fully constitutional (well, sort of, because they are using the Commerce Clause to say they can control intrastate commerce, i.e., you buying a light bulb from Home Depot in your town).

Now the Supreme Court in Griswold vs. Conneticute extended that right to own something to birth control and Roe vs. Wade said some medical proccedures that kill children are a "right."  Now some would like to extend rights to free health care, a living-wage job, and education through their post-doctorate in Hispanic Studies.

What is ironic is that the thing states, cities, and other jurisdictions want to ban you from owning (or keep you from owning ones they don't approve of) are guns.  In a world where nude dancing is a Constitutional right as free speech, owning a handgun in some places is nearly impossible.  And as I've said before, exercising a civil right you have to jump through flaming bureaucratic hoops to exercise means you pretty much don't have that right.  Can you imagine if government put the restrictions on speech that they put on guns (don't tempt them, there were calls for speech restrictions a year ago in the wake of the Gabby Giffords shooting).

Frankly, I think it's ridiculous that your Constitutional rights are repressed in some places.  It's like you drive into Boston and suddenly you can't publish bad things about the President because Massachusetts has "speech control" laws.  That's how it is with your civil right to own and bear arms.  While I'm all for states rights they have to stay within the Constitution, too, including the 2nd Amendment.  That is why we need one, single gun control law for the entire country and it needs to be a law that allows law-abiding competent citizens to "keep and bear" almost any small arm.  Do we need howitzer control?  Maybe.  Do we want laws that prevent Bill Gates from owning a nuclear device?  Probably.  No Constitutional right is absolute.  You may not scream "Fire" in a crowded theater or protest in the middle of an interstate highway.  There is no absolute right to keep and bear arms.  But just as we try to error on the side of liberty in free speech, we should error on the side of liberty on guns.  And knifes.  And maybe howitzers.  Probably not nukes.

The irony is, the one thing the Consitution says you may possess, the government is most likely to ban.

It's Tough Out Here for a Conservatarian

I guess Congress starts today so hold on to your wallet.  But other than that (and some ruckus in Iowa) not much going on, it seems.  (I wonder what time the results are going to roll in.)

George Carlin had a funny routine on driving and other drivers.  I can only paraphrase (could probably find it on YouTube but I'm feeling lazy)(okay, I found it) but it was something like this.  You drive the perfect speed.  Anyone else that drives faster than you is a maniac and anyone who drives slower than you is an idiot.  But you're perfect.

And that's how I feel about my politics.  I'm perfect, anyone to the right or left of me is an idiot or a maniac (depending on how far away from me they are).  I like Reason magazine, Reason.tv, etc.  But they are sometimes just too dang libertarian for my tastes.  They make Ron Paul look reasonable on foreign policy, for instance.  And they are very socially liberal and anti-cop, it seems.  So sometimes I agree with them (domestic issues) and sometimes they're idiots or maniacs.

Now I read and subscribe to National Review.  And I usually agree with them.  But sometimes they are so socially conservative.  They are against any form of gay marriage, for instance where I'd like to see some system where gay folks could have some of the privileges and responsibilities of marriage, but not call it marriage.  So sometimes they strike me as idiots.

I've already discussed this conundrum before.  The problem is, now it's an election year and as a "conservatarian" (which is what I call myself) none of the Republicans look good to me.  They are almost all too socially conservative.  But you know what?  Right now, I just want to beat Obama.  No matter who comes out of the sausage maker of the primary system, I will be voting for them.  I feel voting libertarian (or any third party) is a wasted vote and I do lean more conservative in most issues than libertarian (I am, for example, very pro-life and I can't understand how anyone who has had children could be otherwise).

I'll even vote for Romney.  Don't want to but I will.

A 2011 Recap

Since I tend not to blog on weekends and holidays, this will probably be the last post of 2011.

So, what did we do in 2011? We covered a lot of ground for both my readers.  I've just been looking at January and I talked about the Gabby Gifford shooting aftermath (and the stupid calls for speech restrictions), the fact that Canada banned the song "Money for Nothing" and that nuclear power is a better use of concrete than wind power.

And that was just January.

I blog because I have something to say.  Sometimes it's a little forced as I try to blog every weekday.  Sometimes it's inspired as I run across something I really feel the need to say something about.  I've occasionally turned Toastmaster speeches into posts (see here and here).  I bashed ethanol (not as much as in the past), doubted anthropogenic global warming, and tweaked political correctness and liberals whenever I could.  And occasionally, I simply rambled.

Also celebrated this blog's five year anniversary.

Well, look for more in the future.  You never know what might pique my interest.

It's Christmas Eve Eve

It's the Friday before a three-day weekend (Monday the 26th is a day off if not a holiday) and Christmas is coming soon. So it's a slow news day. I haven't found this anywhere but from my Twitter timeline it seems Ron Paul is trying to "disavow" is old racist newsletters, saying he didn't write them. Yeah, but they came out under your name, Bucky.

According to a Reason-Rupp poll there are still 29% of voters who will "definitely" vote for Barack Obama.  This is pretty much down to the hard-core leftists in America.  And 44% say they definitely will not vote for the Leader-from-behind.  That figure must include a fair amount of so-called "independents" that elections hinge on.

Now I can kind of understand voting for Obama in 2008.  He said he was going to cut the budget (lied) and he said he would do all sorts of wonderful things.  And he was the first black man to be nominated by one of the two major parties and you wouldn't want to be racist and not vote for him.  But now that he has down little that he said he would, and pretty much flushed the economy down the toilet, why would you vote for him unless you are a hard-core leftist who actually believes Keynesian economics works?

As I saw somewhere (Twitter?  Facebook?) "If you voted for Obama in 2008 to prove you weren't a racist, vote against him in 2012 to prove you aren't an idiot."

Probably won't post again until Monday so Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah, everyone.

The Future is Coming!

The future is coming and it's closer than you think! According to IBM there are five emergent technologies that will very soon change your life (but not, to me it seems, always for the better).  So what are these wonders of science that IBM says we'll have in five years (2016)?

The first is (cue dramatic music) energy from humans.  Wait, wasnt that the whole premise of The Matrix?  According to the geeks at Big Blue (do they still call IBM that?):

Anything that moves or produces heat has the potential to create energy that can be captured . . . Walking, jogging, bicycling. The heat from your computer or the water flowing through plumbing.

Was it the red pill or the blue pill you're supposed to take?

On a personal level, while you're riding your bicycle to work, devices on the spokes of your wheels could be recharging batteries you could later use to power some of the lights in your home.

Wait, first of all, I don't ride my bike to work, like 99% of Americans, I drive (I know, wait until the Transportation Access Act of Obama's second term).  Secondly, If my bicycle is generating electricity, doesn't his make it harder to pedal (nothing's free) and thus I'll burn more calories and thus I'll need to eat more food and the growing and transportation of that food will require . . . energy?  I'm just saying.

Okay, so what else does IBM have in store for us in our wonderful future (where apparently we all ride bikes to work):

Each person has a unique biological identity. Your biometric data—facial definitions, retina scans and voice files—will be composited through software to build an individual's unique online password, IBM researchers said.

Referred to as multi-factor biometrics, smarter systems will be able to use this information in real-time to safeguard your identity. You will no longer need to create, track or remember multiple passwords.

In the future, IBM scientists said, you will be able to walk up to an ATM and securely withdraw money by simply speaking your name or looking into a tiny sensor that can recognize the unique patterns in the retina of your eye.

So instead of stealing your credit card they steal  your eye? It wasn't a very good movie but in Minority Report there was a system a lot like this and it was used by advertisers and the government to track what you did.  Now advertisers will just be annoying.  But the government tracking you through biometrics can be a threat to freedom.  Cop pulls you over, scans your eye, and says, "Oh, Mr. Townsend, this is your day to ride a bike to work."

Well, what's next?  Can you read my mind?

Mind reading may make the leap from science fiction to real life sooner than expected, the researchers in Armonk, N.Y., said. IBM scientists are among those researching how to link your brain to devices such as a computer or smartphone and be able to control inanimate objects by just thinking about it. If you think about calling someone, for example, the smartphone would then dial that number.

"I can't believe that damn Mr. Quimby is making me work late on a Friday.  No no no!  Don't call . . . Oh, Hi Mr. Quimby, was just going over those figures you sent me."  I'll be impressed with this system when it brings me a beer when I'm thirsty.

So what else?

In five years, IBM said, the gap between information haves and have-nots will narrow considerably due to advances in mobile technology; by then 80 percent of the current global population will have a mobile device.

You'll be issued them at birth.  We're going to quickly run out of IP addresses at this rate.  And how slow will the internet be if 5.6 billion people have iPhones (buy that Apple stock now!).

[S]pam filters will be so precise that you'll never be bothered by unwanted sales pitches again.

Great!  Until the spammers use your biometic data and your mindreading device to send it right to your brain.

So there's the future.  No teleportation, however.  I'm still waiting for that!

Slow News Day

Seems to be a slow news day (Mitt Romney was whining about his "tough" interview at Fox News, apparently while Newt has declared himself the nominee).  Even Twitter's not giving me anything to blog about.  So some random thoughts:

I have some really liberal Facebook "friends."  (I put that in quotation marks 'cause some of these people I don't know from Adam, I just friend a lot of people in hopes they might by a book or two.)  One even has Karl Marx (!) as an inspiration.  I try very hard not to argue with them when they post something blatantly stupid.  For example, the Marx guy is a writer (like me) and he posted (and I paraphrase): "I can not believe one man's labor is worth 100 times more than another man's."  This is typical Marxist crap.  I was so very tempted to post "if you sell 100 books and I sell one, your labor is worth 100 times mine."  So the free market has determined that his labor is worth 100 times mine.  Are CEOs worth 100 times a janitor?  If you pay a CEO $1 million and he brings up the stock price by $10 million, then he is worth every last penny.  The price of CEOs has increased lately due to market forces (not enough good ones to go around).  Are they over-paid?  I think that's up to the stockholders.

The Occupy Wall Street crowd is calling for two diametrically opposed things: More democracy, less freedom.  They don't think they are calling for less freedom, but if you are going to take the money from the so-called 1%, you will have to do it with force and that's less freedom.  They want government to make more decisions about everyone's life (less freedom) while giving everyone more democracy.  (Of course, democracy has many many flaws which is why this country is not a democracy . . . yet.)  But what they assume is, the people, given a choice, would vote for confiscating the wealth of the 1%.  Problem is, most Americans still cling to the idea that they could become the 1% and don't want income equality.  Income equality has been tried, it was called the Soviet Union.

Let's see, what else?  Just remember, this once was a constitutionally limited representiative republic.  And it can be again.

Electronic Devices on Airplanes Not Dangerous

If you haven't flown lately (dang, I haven't for almost a year!) you may not be aware that you have to turn off all your electronic devices until the plane has reached an altitude of 10,000 feet, then you may turn them on except cell phones (unless they are in airplane mode) or anything that sends/receives a signal (except WiFi if the plane is so equipped).  Confused yet?

Now it looks as if that policy is rather . . . dumb (for lack of a better word).  Why?  According to Nick Bolton writing in the "Bits" blog at the New Yuck Times:

The government might be causing more unnecessary interference on planes by asking people to shut their devices down for take-off and landing and then giving them permission to restart all at the same time. According to electrical engineers, when the electronic device starts, electric current passes through every part of the gadget, including GPS, Wi-Fi, cellular radio and microprocessor.

It’s the equivalent of waking someone up with a dozen people yelling into bullhorns.

So it might be better just to leave the devices on.

As Bolton points out, if just 1% of folks forget or can't be bothered to turn off their devices, that's about 2 people in a 737 and more on a bigger plane.  Yet there is not one recorded incidence of a plane crashing due to an on-board electronic device. What's more:

Michael Altschul, senior vice president and legal counsel for CTIA, the wireless industry association, said a study that it conducted more than a decade ago found no interference from mobile devices.

“The fact is, the radio frequencies that are assigned for aviation use are separate from commercial use,” Mr. Altschul said. “Plus, the wiring and instruments for aircraft are shielded to protect them from interference from commercial wireless devices.”

I frankly think the whole scam is to get you to pay attention to the safety briefing.

But with government over-caution, don't expect this rule to change soon if at all.  Maybe as electronics become more ubiquitous, the FAA will have to bend to reality.  But don't count on it.