Category Archives: Politics

General, Politics, Preparing for the worst

Rebuilding N’awlins

What a waste. Spend your $10 billion now or your $200 billion later. We can’t tell you how much later, maybe next week, maybe next year, maybe next decade, but it will be spent, in your lifetime.

I think they ought fill in the below sea-level part of the city with the rubble of the world trade center and any other rubbish that can be gathered and bring the entire city up to sea level, at least. Then cover the rubble with a layer of good silt and, voila, instant city. I don’t know how long you have to wait for everything to settle to provide a stable foundation. I think a decade or two should suffice. Basically, if you owned the land at the bottom of the rubble, you would own what is directly above it.

I heard someone suggest that the New New Orleans should build houses on stilts, like the beach front houses. Then you don’t have to fill anything in. Of course, the house would be a bit more expensive.

I would also suggest that every house be built with a trap door in the roof to provide easy egress from the attic.

I imagine that if all the houses were built on stilts, that the builders wouldn’t make sure the stilts were properly anchored and that all the houses would fall down after the ground got soaked by a heavy rain. I wonder if that counts as flood damage?

I also heard that some states are planning to go to court against the insurance companies, saying that the companies need to pay for damaged houses even if the damage was all flood and the homeowners didn’t have flood insurance. What a crock. If you want ensure that all your citizens have flood insurance then mandate it. Make it part of the property tax.

Don’t go crying that you didn’t think you needed flood insurance but now your house is gone and you want another one, but you aren’t willing to put up any money to buy the insurance. That’s what insurance is all about, everyone pays to cover against the possibility that a natural disaster will happen to some of them. It’s like a collective helping individual members. It’s socialism.

Personally, I wouldn’t let people build within a 100 year flood plain without their paying a hefty amount of insurance, annually. But it is up to them. IF they build, or buy, where history says floods will come, and they don’t want to contribute to a disaster contingency fund, then they can live with the results.

I remember when we bought a place in Texas, our lot had a creek at one end and the part of the property bordering the creek was in the 100-year flood plain, (it’s marked on the plat). Our mortgage company wanted us to get flood insurance before they would give us the mortgage. We were able to convince them that the actual structure, (house), was 100 yards from the flood plain marking and on a slight rise so we were 2-3 feet higher. (Plano Texas is very, very flat) We looked over the situation and decided not to go for the insurance. We took a chance. I don’t think that house will be flooded until the 1,000 year flood comes along, and that will wipe out most of Dallas-Fort Worth and our house would be the least of our worries.

I also don’t think anyone should be allowed to build within a mile of sea level. (Horizontally, on the map, not vertically. It would get too crowded in Colorado.) Although I realize that that isn’t too realistic. Fisherman, and others who live off the sea, will want to be nearby. But that’s it. No ocean-front beach houses for people working inland. No sea-breeze tourist traps. Let them walk a mile to the beach.

General, Politics

Government Saw Flood Risk but Not Levee Failure

Government Saw Flood Risk but Not Levee Failure – New York Times

One line jumped out at me here: Under the circumstances, Mr. Becker said, the government response “has been nothing short of heroic.” I think they need to find a new definition of ‘heroic’. Mr. Becker is with the Red Cross.

It looks like there was enough incompetence all around in this fiasco. The local and state officials need to take the brunt of the blame since it was their city under siege. They shouldn’t be counting on the Feds to do all, or any, of the immediate relief work. If they can’t even take care of their own citizens then they shouldn’t be in office.

The Feds should help support the aftermath, the clean-up, not the immediate crisis. But, it is New Orleans, The Big Easy.

General, Politics

Teaching of Creationism Is Endorsed in New Survey

Teaching of Creationism Is Endorsed in New Survey – New York Times

And we should be teaching Astrology in school because so many Americans read their daily horoscopes in the paper (or online).

What are these people thinking? Science is not based on a belief system. You don’t teach some scientific theory because you believe it to be true. You teach it because you are able to construct a logical thesis based on empirical evidence that has been tested and re-tested and reviewed by the community to reach the conclusions that are reached.

K-12 is not a proving ground for teaching hypotheses. Theories should be taught in K-12, not hypotheses. There is a difference between the two and if you don’t know what it is, look it up.

Why don’t we make π = 3? That will certainly simplify a lot of calculations.

Politics

Rover boy

All this commentary on Karl Rove makes me wonder.

Here Karl is, busy accusing the Democrats of being traitors for playing politics, while he is playing politics by being a traitor.

(Isn’t it about time that these idiots learned that their side lost, that the South shall not rise again.)

Politics

– 3rd rail – Liberty leads to liberalism leads to liberals

– 3rd rail – Liberty leads to liberalism leads to liberals

Thanks to Avedon for pointing out this link. I think Chris Cobb sums up, quite nicely, the need for liberals to reclaim their roots. And from a brand development/marketing guy. These comments also follow nicely on what I began to look at last week.

Freedom of Speech is a liberal idea. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” is a liberal Idea. Representative democracy is a Liberal Idea.

General, Politics

Liberalism

Driving home last night, I got behind a car with a ‘Liberalism causes Terrorism” bumper sticker. I admit I was a bit flabbergasted to this bit of inanity, but the car also had a “US Air Force Retired” decal so that explained a lot. I am surprised that anyone, even in Colorado Springs, considers George W. Bush a liberal, or, Cheney or Rumsfeld for that matter.

There are mujahaddin from all over the world going to Iraq to learn the skills of successful terrorism and to practice those skills against our troops. Would this terrorism school even be in session if we didn’t have a boatload of troops for them to practice on? I don’t think so.

Between the Bushites, the Taliban, and Osama bin Laden I think it is fair to say that “Conservatism causes Terrorism”, althought “causes” is a bit over the top. “Fosters” or “Enables” is more appropriate.

But the bumper sticker got me thinking again about exactly what “liberalism” or “a liberal” means. I think most pundits and people, today, with the Republicans in power, think a liberal is anyone who disagrees with them.

I did find an interesting feature in Google to answer my question. At the Google search line, enter define:liberalism and Google will bring back a number of definitions from a variety of web sources. The upshot is that “liberalism”, in political philosophy terms, is a belief in limited government, free markets and the supremecy of individual rights and freedoms. (Isn’t that the Republican Platform?)

Using the define:liberal search, we have results that cover the gamut from ‘favors progress’ to ‘advocates greater freedom’ to ‘denies some of the basic truths of Christianity’. Quite a wide range for these broad-minded people. Oh yeah, they also include the British Liberal Party, now part of the Liberal Democrats.

What I see as a dis-connect between the liberal philosophy and the liberal practice is that the philosophy calls for a limited government and the practice calls for an active centralized government to enable individuals to be less dependent on government. I can see where this would bring on a sort of psychosis to the body politic.

But, what does define:conservatism yield? Preserving the status quo and avoiding radical changes. Some support of tradition. About what I suspected. Then how do we characterize those people that want to radically change the status quo by regressing back two hundred years? That’s not really a conservative approach. In Colorado Springs, we seem to have a very vocal minority promoting that approach.

General, Politics

A man, a plan, a canal, Panama

In the beginning was the plan
and then came the assumptions
and the assumptions were without form
and the plan was completely without substance
and darkness was on the face of the workers
and they spoke amongst themselves, saying, “It is a crock of shit and it stinketh”

and the workers went to the supervisors
and said, “It is a pail of dung and none may abide the odor thereof”

and the supervisors went to the managers
and said unto them, “It is a container of excrement and it is very strong, such that none may abide it”

and the managers went to the senior managers
and said unto them, “It is a vessel of fertilizer, and none may abide its strength”

and the senior managers went to the directors
and said unto them, “It contains that which aids plant growth, and it is very strong”

and the directors went to the vice presidents
and said unto them, “It promotes growth and is very powerful”

and the vice presidents went to the president
and said unto him, “This new plan will actively promote the growth and efficiency of this company”

and the president looked upon the plan,
and saw that it was good,
and the plan became policy.

This is how shit happens.