StarTribune: We didn't see men throwing rocks at those women. Honest.

Headline: 300 Afghan women find their voice. If you read this story it sounds like a fairly peaceful protest march. No mention of bearded men lining the streets and pelting the women with rocks. Interesting...

A taxpayer voting for Obama is like...

On vacation but had to post this from a sign at a teaparty.

A Taxpayer Voting for Obama is like a Chicken Voting for Colonel Sanders.

Joe Biden's Daughter & Cocaine

Reports are circulating about a video supposedly showing Vice President Joe Biden's daughter doing a line of coke. This IS and SHOULD BE a non issue. The people her age who do coke is vast. It's extremely stupid to do it, but then there are a lot of stupid people in this world. This is not a partisan issue. This happens to the kids of Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and Greens. This happens to the kids of prominent Christians, Jews, and Atheists. It is extremely tough being a parent and raising good kids. It's that much tougher when they do stupid stuff like this. To then have it garner widespread media attention doesn't help.

Joe Biden repulses me in many many ways. I disagree with him on virtually every position he takes (assuming it's possible to know what his real position is at any given time.) That he is a heartbeat away from being president gives me indigestion. Nevertheless, this issue with his daughter and cocaine needs to be dropped from national attention.

Obama's new tax on charitable contributions

The Obama administration is planning, for the first time ever, to reduce the tax deduction for charitable contributions. Today those contributions are fully deductible. I don't pay any tax on money that I give to charities. Under Obama's new plan I will have to pay anywhere from 7% to 16% on contributions to charity. That's a chunk of change and will negatively impact how much we give. We budget how much we give each year and will have to lower our contributions to cover the tax. In some cases we may choose to simply not give to several organizations that have been borderline for us in the past. I want to give them a $, not give them 80 cents and the government 20 cents.

One thing I question is why Obama is doing this? Why hurt charities in this way? Could it be that he really doesn't care about the impact to charities? That he'd prefer if the charities didn't get the money at all so the government will have an excuse to step in and do things it's way instead of the way charities do things? Um...

Electric Vehicles Update

Today we have Tesla (250th roadster delivered, building 20-30/week, $49k S Model Sedan coming in 2011) with Fisker, Miles, and EV Innovations on the near (or semi near?) horizon. We should also see the Smart ED (smarte or smarty?) 100% electric very soon and now Think have announced plans for bringing their City to the US and are looking at a US based factory to follow soon thereafter. Rumors from VW and BMW continue to swirl. Toyota's all electric IQ is rumored for 2011 and an all electric 'Celica' for 2012. Rumors are also eminating from Mitsubishi and Subaru.

Mike Huckabee: Truthfulness and Accuracy?

Tonight on his Foxnews show Mike Huckabee told a wonderful story about Sir Winston Churchill and Sir Alexander Fleming (discoverer of Penicillin). And that's just what it is, a story. But Huckabee told it as if it were as true as the sun coming up in the morning.

Now this isn't that major of a deal. I don't think this story had any bearing on anything, just a fun story. At most is just indicates that Huckabee is rather sloppy in his pursuit of truthfulness and accuracy.

Several weeks ago he devoted a fair amount of his program to a discussion of 'a church in Ocean Grove, NJ that had been ordered by a NJ Court to allow a gay couple to use it's pavilion to marry.' This was, best case, a huge stretch of the truth and a big load of hyperbole. Most reasonable people would deem it simply misleading and lying. The pavilion in question was actually a public facility, not privately owned and maintained by the church. This was NOT a case of government interference with a private church as Huckabee led his audience to believe.

Huckabee claims to be a Christian. As Christians it is absolutely critical that we strive to be completely truthful and accurate in everything that we say - especially when we're saying it to an audience the size of Huckabee's. It's one thing when we spout off without thinking to a few friends, something I've been guilty of far too often, it's another when we do it in a planned way to mislead people as Huckabee did.

Need to get in touch with your inner dude?

Too many frustrations from cell phone drivers? Next time you're near Kassel, Germany stop in at Männerspielplatz, a 'playground for men'. And we're not talking naked women here. This place is full of horsepower from ATV's to D12 Bulldozers. They even have a tank. Thanks to Chuck Shepherd for the tip on this one.

Frustrated with people driving on cell phones?

Are Union Members Just Dumb Idiots?

What’s wrong with allowing employees to choose with secret ballots if they want to unionize or not?

According to a number of folks fighting for Card-Check legislation (otherwise known by the misnomer of the Employee Free Choice Act or EFCA) it’s not the secret ballot that’s the biggest problem, but that when an employer calls for a secret ballot they also get a chance to tell employees their side of things. Supporters of Card-Check don’t want their union members to hear the employers side. And we thought this kind of thing only happened in Cuba or Venezuela.

So union bosses and their supporters are saying one of two things;

- Union members are not intelligent enough to make decisions for themselves and to decide if they are better off with or without a union representing them. Or,

- Union members are intelligent and if they hear both sides they will vote against unions.

This doesn’t make sense no matter how you look at it. Are union members too dumb to decide for themselves? Union bosses and legislators must think so because they're treating them like immature little children. The average 15-year-old has the intelligence to make a decision like this, are union members dumber than average 15-year-olds?

Some, maybe so. Any union member who supports this legislation, who is supporting union bosses taking away his own free choice to vote, truly is an idiot. Why would anyone do that?

If you believe that union members are immature little children who can’t decide for themselves what is best for their own employment – by all means vote for the EFCA. But if you do, have the maturity yourself to openly state that you are doing so because you do not believe union members have the intelligence to decide for themselves.

Elsewhere: We Need Unions (and $50 billion to bail them out)

Abstinence Ignorance in North Carolina

In this article on Foxnews about states moving away from abstinence-only sex education to more comprehensive education John Rustin, director of government relations for the North Carolina Family Policy Council, had this to say:

But Rustin said teaching contraception and disease prevention is similar to teaching kids how to be safe when they engage in other risky behaviors like smoking, drinking and taking drugs.

"North Carolina public schools have a no-tolerance policy when it comes to tobacco, alcohol and drug use. Our question is, why in the world would we take a different position when it comes to sex?"

The first question I would have for Rustin is how many problems do they have with alcohol among teens in North Carolina vs teens in Italy where parents DO teach their children responsible behavior with regard to alcohol?

My second question is how he expects to achieve zero tolerance with regard to sex? Will he require that every girl over 12 wear a chastity belt locked on by the school district? Will the North Carolina Family Policy Council lock chastity belts on every guy over 14?

I’m a proponent of waiting on sex until marriage, but I’m also a realist that knows that some folks do not believe this and that even of those who do many do not poses the self-discipline to make it until marriage.

Obesity, drugs, and self-control

Companies such as Entero-Medics and Leptos Biomedical are striving to develop devices that will curb people's appetites so they'll eat less. Eat less, fewer calories, and your weight goes down. It's really rather simple. What ever happened to basic self-control? With products like these all we're doing is reinforcing a belief that we don't need self-control. This is a dangerous thing to teach. We do need self-control and controlling our gastronomical system is a great way to develop self-control that will then benefit us in other areas. And we wonder why we're so quickly falling behind other countries.

Next question: How long will it be before, thanks to a government program, we're paying for these devices for those poor obese souls who lack the self control to eat normally?

Government Intrusion

You own a commercial building. The city 'suggests' that you add some off-street parking. You purchase an abandoned house next door in a area that is appropriately zoned for razing the house and using the land for the off-street parking. Oops, the city decides, after your purchase, that the house is of historic significance so you can't raze it. It's crumbling and falling apart and will cost you far more to repair than it will ever be worth. You can't sell it because nobody wants it. City: "Tough."

More here.

I have a thing for historic architecture. I wish we had a lot more of it. I wish we hadn't destroyed the thousands of historic buildings we did in the 60's and 70's (and many of the buildings that replaced them have now be destroyed as ugly and poorly designed and built mistakes). BUT, this burden cannot be put on individuals. If we want to preserve a building then we (or those who want to preserve it) need to purchase it for a fair price.

The biggest unreported event at CPAC

The line, often 3 people wide, snaked down the hallway, around a corner, dodged a glass table, and mooned the hotel lobby. Groups here and there made up of the 8,000 attendees of CPAC saw some of their cohorts in this thing and wondered what they were missing. By the time they found out, it was too late. There were already over 700 people in line for an event that expected 200 and was only able to fit the first 500 in the room. According to many at the end of the line or who never even got in line, they turned away more than had originally even been expected.

CPAC had the opportunity to host this as an official event. They turned it down. Too controversial I suppose. It ended up in a far off side room a ways from the main event. Not announced or advertised. Not Rush Limbaugh. Not Glenn Beck or Shaun Hannity. But a Dutch politician with a dangerous weapon - a mirror. Geert Wilders holds the mirror up and people don't like what they see. But then, he's the offender holding it up.

More at Atlas Shrugs.

Update: Thus far Fox News has not mentioned one peep about Geert Wilders visit to the US last week. On the other hand, during the month of February they featured 5 articles about his difficulties entering the UK.

The Problem with Electric Boats

As I've noted in several posts on this blog, the day of the all electric recreational boat is coming. It's actually a more technically and economically feasible deal than electric cars. The drawback? As electric boats become readily available we'll start to see pressure for lakes and sections of rivers to be classified as electric only. No gas engines allowed. No more air and noise pollution. And this won't wait until all or even most of the current users of the waterway have electric boats, it will happen very early in the electric boat epoch. Those who own gas powered boats will start to find fewer and fewer places to use them and with fewer places to use them comes huge devaluation of gas powered boats making it difficult for these folks to afford to purchase a new electric boat (or get their gas guzzler converted?)

How much you want to bet we'll see a government program to help people cover the difference in their devalued gas boat and a new electric boat? It can be modeled on the similar government program to help people who had devalued horses purchase new gas powered cars. (Is this the government program that was a model for the government program that gave everyone $40 to help buy a new digital TV tuner?)

Brits confuse me.

They bar Dutch MP Geert Wilders from entering the country because he's too controversial and now, just a few days later, they say this is OK. Confused? I am.

Tesla S Model Saloon

Thanks to the folks at WIRED magazine for coming up with this pic of what the new Tesla S Model may look like.

In other Tesla news. I was very disappointed to hear a rumored reason for Darryl Siry's departure was his having angst over Tesla taking $40k deposits on the S Model before they even have a factory to build them in. Does the guy simply have a conscious?

Drug War: Innocent Victims

I don't know how accurate this site is, but from quick checking it's fairly solid. Some of the stories of innocent people killed by police and DEA agents in pursuit of people doing drugs is heart-wrenching.

In true government parlance I guess they're just necessary collateral damage.

Do you want to pay your neighbors mortgage?

Rick Santelli:

RIA: Critical Thinking

In talking with kids and adults today it becomes apparent that we are no longer teaching critical thinking. It’s a foreign concept. Kids in school are indoctrinated with a variety of things and are never given the other side, told to research the other side, or asked to evaluate all of the potential negative consequences of a decision. They’re now growing in to adults who choose who they like and want to listen to and then swallow everything that person or group says. To the blind and often ignorant exclusion of others. No questions asked.

We are ALL, whether Democrat or Republican, Black, White, Red, or Grey, becoming simpletons. We’re nothing but lemmings. We follow without question, even if that’s right over a cliff. We make decisions with little to no thought about the consequences – for us, those around us, and society. Most of us have no idea why we believe what we believe, even on a very rudimentary level.

It would do us some good to task ourselves with writing a paper arguing for the position opposed to our own and evaluating all consequences.

In school our kids should routinely be tasked with doing this so that they learn to evaluate the pros and cons of decisions. Perhaps first argue for their own position along with the negative consequences of the opposing view, then some time later argue for the opposing position with all of the negative consequences our their own view, then some time after that present a solid pros and cons evaluation.

RIA? Rest In Anquish. Critical thinking won’t rest in peace.

DAYCARES TAKE A HIT

This was the headline for at least one major newspaper late last week. Many parents who’ve lost their jobs or have had their hours cut back are apparently keeping their kids at home instead of bringing them in to daycare. Interesting impact of our new economy.

Would this have been a headline anytime in history prior to perhaps 1990?

Buyer Beware

I was looking for a Blu-Ray player and came across this on a Sony BDP-S550

http://www.techcyberstore.com/sobdbl.html

$239 is a pretty good deal. Too good to be true when most others are selling this player for $275 - $300?

Their address as listed on their website is
TECH CYBER STORE, INC.
10400 Southwest 98th Street
Suite 400
Miami FL 33176

Click Here to see their 'office' on Streetview, It's the one on the right.

If you order from them let me know how it goes.

Tesla: Racing improves the breed?

Some would think that the last thing people in the oil funded Middle East would want is to do anything that would benefit electric cars. Well, some folks in the United Arab Emirates want to put some of that money they've earned from all of our gas engines in to a racing series for Tesla electrics. More here.

Whatever You Do, Just Don’t Get Married.

I was really struck by this article on Fox News. Before Continuing, read the article.

Now, think for a bit about Hugh Hefner’s numerous relationships, often multiple at a time. Think about the environment his children are growing up in. Of course he’s only legally married to one of these woman, Kimberly Conrad.

Now, think about FLDS families for a minute. They’re certainly far from perfect.

Which environment do you believe is healthier? For the women? The children? Society?

It’s rather fascinating to me how differently our government, society, and the news media treat these two. Sometime, compare how Fox News treats Hugh Hefner and Playboy versus the FLDS. What do you think?

It's 46 degrees warmer, but still cold!

This morning when I went out to get the paper and restock firewood it was 46 degrees warmer than yesterday morning. But today's 19º F was still pretty cold.

Cold is also how I feel about bailouts. Chrysler is getting another $1.5b from our Treasury Dept (IE, you and me) to be used, according to Chrysler and with the Treasury Dept's blessing, specifically to provide 0 interest loans to people with poor credit to purchase Chrysler cars. Wasn't providing credit to people with poor credit one of the things that got us in to this mess?

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

UK Drinking Problems

Some chunk of my time gets devoted to researching and writing about traffic safety. One major element in increasing safety is utilizing roundabouts instead of sign or light controlled intersections. When this is done fatalities drop by about 90% and crashes overall by about 40%. Alcohol is another critical element. Alcohol and driving do not mix very well.


Well, alcohol and traffic engineering may not mix very well either. Getting drunk is a popular pastime among many throughout the UK and one which many are beginning to realize has become very problematic. Magic Roundabouts are one apparent result of this abundant drunkenness. If one roundabout is good then a few pints apparently makes 5 seem better and maybe just one more pint makes putting those 5 in the middle of a giant traffic circle the epitome of traffic engineering. Click here for a Google satellite image.

Chrysler not good enough for it's owner.

Sen. Tom Coburn pointed out a very important issue this morning. Cerberus Capital Mgmt owns a bit over 80% of Chrysler. If there is any way to save that company, they will figure out a way to do it. They have billions on the line if Chrysler goes down. They'll sell other of their assets in stronger companies in order to get the money to protect their investment in Chrysler. They can do that. That is their option. It's a simple business decision.

If Cerberus chooses not to save it's own car company, why should we. If they do not believe it is salvageable and are willing to loose their billions of investment, what makes us think the government can do better? On this one issue alone Chrysler should be completely out of consideration.

Iowa: Gay OK, just don't let in any Polygamists

In hearings before the Iowa Supreme Court on Tuesday (in Varnum v Brien), Justices spent some time fixated on fears that allowing gay marriage in the state would open the door to something far worse - polygamy. I assume the Justices aren't Christians since if they were following the Bible they'd allow polygamy long before gay marriage.

Bill O'Reilly's Prostitutes

“Amsterdam is a disaster.” Bill O’Reilly said on his show last night, “And they’ve finally realized it.” O’ Reilly pontificated about Amsterdam finally realizing what a failure their city policies are and are finally doing something about it.

O’Reilly promoted an impression that crime and social problems are soaring in Amsterdam, that the city now realizes it, and is closing all of it’s prostitution and coffeeshops. He also made mention of the apparent failure of their safe sex programs for teens.

Well, that’s not exactly accurate. Not even remotely close. Bill must be learning journalism and honesty from his friend Geraldo.

Let’s make sure we all understand exactly what Amsterdam is doing. They plan to close approximately 30% of the prostitute windows in the city center area and 22% of the over 200 coffeeshops. The bulk of these are in the relatively unknown areas of The Singel and Pijp. While they are closing some windows along the perimeters of the more famous Walletjes RLD the city said that they plan to leave at least 200 windows and very specifically said that they do not want to close any more as they believe that a legal industry is better for everyone than an illegal underground industry under prohibition. In total the plan represents about a 4% overall reduction of prostitution locales in the Amsterdam area (windows make up less than 15% of legal prostitution in Amsterdam) though likely no reduction in activity as many of the displaced prostitutes are expected to move elsewhere and continue working. This move by the city is aimed more at simply reducing visibility.

Now, back to Amsterdam realizing how screwed up they are.

As we’ve already discussed, Amsterdam appears, from every report published, to have significantly less human trafficking and underage prostitution than the US. The Netherlands has 1/5 the teen pregnancy rate of the US (34/100k in NL vs. 176/100k in the US) and also has about 1/3 the per capita abortion rate. The US has about 2 to 3 times the incidences of AID’s as The Netherlands and over twice the incidences of other STD’s. (I believe in abstinence until marriage, but the results of safe sex programs in The Netherlands and elsewhere cannot be ignored.)

We also know that about 50% more kids smoke pot in the US than in The Netherlands. Adult use of pot in the US is higher by an even greater margin.

As O’Reilly pointed out the government says that one reason for taking these measures is to cut down on crime. Let’s get some perspective on this. ALL of the following is based on per capita rates per 100k population as per the World Bank and US Justice Dept. The Netherlands has less than half the theft rate of the US and 15% less fraud. The US has 12 times (yes, twelve) the arrest rate for drug offenses as The Netherlands. The US has 3 times as many murders and 4 times as many assaults, most of these related to our war on drugs that doesn’t exist in The Netherlands. (And these don't include numerous deaths and assaults such as Tarika Wilson.) The Netherlands has 20% fewer robberies. The US prison population is 9 times that of The Netherlands. And The Netherlands has 32% fewer law enforcement personnel than the US. If the FBI, border patrol, state SBI’s are included they have 69% less and if military personnel used for drug interdiction are included they have 82% fewer.

Organized crime is very difficult to measure but according to what I’ve been able to quickly pull together it appears that the US has about 2 - 3 times as much organized crime as The Netherlands. More research is needed on this one though.

What O’Reilly also didn’t mention is that this past summer when Conservatives in the national government were looking at a law to close all prostitution and coffeeshops throughout the country that over 85% of the mayors, including Amsterdam, Maastricht, and all other major cities, very strongly protested this effort saying that this would increase crime and other problems. And many of these mayors are Conservatives. Nor did he mention that they also hope to close over 50% of the mini-marts and souvenir shops.

The ignorance of O’Reilly and his guests on this issue is a new level for him.

An accurate statement is that Amsterdam is very slightly tweaking their already successful prostitution and drug policy in hopes that they can further reduce crime (that overall is already about 1/6 that of the US crime rate) without increasing social problems (that are overall about 1/3 that of the US).

Amsterdam: Messing up a good thing?

Recent news of Amsterdam’s plans to close a number of brothels and coffeeshops (that sell pot) in the central district raise some interesting questions. Their purpose according to the plan is to clean up the unappealing aspects of their city center to make it more appealing to tourists and clamp down on organized crime.

The Netherlands, and Amsterdam in particular, have for decades been known for their very open tolerance towards personal vices that many other countries have, over the past 90 to 100 years, tried various prohibitions against. Many people, particularly religious groups, have been very vocal in criticizing these policies and have for years put pressure on The Netherlands to repeal these policies and institute prohibitions.

The standard critiques have been that The Netherlands policies promote human trafficking and drug use among teens and others.

As far as drug use The Netherlands is actually below average. According to a UNICEF study of OECD countries conducted in 2007 about 21% of 11 – 15 year olds in the Netherlands had smoked pot in the past year while 31% of these kids in the US have. 35% of this age group in the UK have and 40% in Canada. The Netherlands scores equally well or better in other studies. It would appear that the coffeeshops may actually have a bit of a deterrent effect. This sometimes attributed to Dutch teens seeing people stoned in coffeeshops and finding it unappealing or the knowledge that they can always try it later if they want so there’s no need to rush to do it ‘while I have the opportunity’.

On the prostitution front the city’s plans to close down some brothels is even more interesting. Every study I have read on the harmful impacts of prostitution in The Netherlands indicates that The Netherlands has far fewer problems than other countries. Numerous studies by DSP- Groep, WODC, Regioplan Beleidsonderzoek, and Intraval have found extremely low incidences of human trafficking and underage prostitution. Across a broad spectrum of other issues these reports say that continuing the current policy of legal and open prostitution is far superior to the problems caused by prohibition.

Some, including Saint Augustin and Saint Thomas Aquinas, believe that legal prostitution is necessary to reduce problems of rape. Per capita The Netherlands has about 9 rapes per 100,000 people while the US has 33 per 100,000 (all OECD countries with legal prostitution average 11.3). Since Sweden criminalized prostitution in 1999 their incidences of rape have increased twofold. Will this clamping down also ratchet up rapes in The Netherlands?

The authorities in The Netherlands want to trade in a real society that has very few social problems for a veneer that they think will be more appealing to tourists. They want their city center to look better and cleaner and they’re willing to risk their very successful and strong social fabric to do it.

One of the more perplexing aspects of this plan is that Amsterdam is already one of the top tourists spots in the world, particularly relative to its size. People come not just because of the coffeeshops and prostitution, which is for better or worse a popular draw, and not just because of other equally or more popular attractions such as Amsterdam’s architecture and museums or the Anne Frank House. People come to see a society that has so very successfully integrated all of these things. As one travel agent pointed out to me this morning, take away the intriguing Red Light Districts and Coffeeshops and Amsterdam will become second fiddle to a number of other popular tourist cities.

Will a 22% reduction in coffeeshops, which is the plan, reduce or eliminate the apparently positive impact on illicit drug use among Dutch teens? Will clamping down on legal prostitution drive more of the industry underground and increase human trafficking and underage prostitution?

I'm in no way a supporter of prostitution or illicit drug use, but I do believe in a certain level of pragmatism, especially when the harms of policies such as social prohibitions are so detrimental to societies.

Stay Tuned…