Science & Technology

Bush’s tax cuts are FAKE

“You know, if you let me write $200 billion worth of hot checks every year, I could give you an illusion of prosperity, too.”
- Lloyd Bentsen, 1988

The universal diss against Democrats is that they “Tax and spend”.  Thank goodness for the Republicans who cut taxes!  And if any Democrat opposes them, they can plant their feet resolutely and demand; “Are you willing to make Bush’s tax cuts permanent, or NOT?”

Only trouble is, Bush’s tax cuts are fake.  As long as we keep spending vastly more than we are taking in, we’re heading for disaster.  So says America’s ‘Accountant In Chief’, the head of the GAO, David M. Walker.

We. Are. Headed. For. Disaster.  Deficit spending will destroy our economy.  Thanks for the big favor, mister president.

At least with “Tax and spend” the transaction is done.  You taxed, you spent, that’s it.  Well, not really ‘it’.  The money didn’t disappear from existence; it went back into the economy.  Some government programs actually do some good, too.  OK not many, but some.

Not so with “Borrow and spend”.  When you borrow money, you have to pay it back someday under conditions of compound interest.  This is just as true for governments as it is for individuals.  Bush’s tax cuts just push off the taxes to our children.  By then, interest will be the bulk of the federal budget.

It’s no use whining about Democrats - it’s been a Republican shop for six years now.  House, Senate, President - it’s all yours.  Our president never vetoes any spending.  But “borrow and spend” is a bigger threat to our country than Al Queda could ever think of being.  So when i talk about Bush being a threat to our country, I mean it; absolutely, literally, in the most direct sense.  He and his band of borrow-and-spend so-called “conservatives” are on-track to destroy our country. 

Only thing I can’t figure out is how the Democrats were too dumb to come up with the phrase “borrow and spend” a long time ago.  It’s been obvious to me for years.  And now it’s official.

Posted by George on 10/30/06 at 07:53 PM
Science & Technology • Economics • (11) Comments • Link

Toyota’s new 3-cylinder car

I bet the new Toyota AvGo is a perfectly ordinary car that they already sell in other countries, and they were just waiting for Americans to wake up and realize how cool it would be to have a 51-mpg urban car.

Don’t let the 3-cylinder engine fool you; it’ll get around just fine.  I once had a Geo Metro XFI with a 3-cyl engine, and it had plenty of zoom (just not insane amounts of zoom).  It also got 50 mpg in town, which was a nice feature. 

But I didn’t like its flimsy construction, (stuff was always breaking) and it lacked air conditioning which made it unpopular with MrsDoF.  The new Toyota comes with a 5-star collision rating and being a Toyota, will probably beat the Suzuki-made Geo on durability as well.

Probably won’t be able to drive it down a creek bed like my Beetle, though.

Posted by George on 09/19/06 at 08:56 PM
Science & Technology • Transportation • (5) Comments • Link

One projector, or two?

Once economies of scale kick in, smaller often means ludicrously cheaper.  And totally new applications…
BBC News: Projector size of sugar cube made

Posted by George on 09/19/06 at 03:13 PM
Science & Technology • (2) Comments • Link

Pluto couldn’t give a rat’s ass what we call it

For centuries we sort of toddled along without a real definition of a “planet”, but we finally got one at the recent meeting of the International Astronomer’s Union in Prague:

  • it must be in orbit around the Sun
  • it must be large enough that it takes on a nearly round shape
  • it has cleared its orbit of other objects

Really a pretty good definition.  Planets don’t orbit other planets; those are moons.  Planets are big enough to pull into hydrostatic equilibrium, so they’ll be pretty much round - thus excluding every irregular chunk of rock from being called a planet.  And a planet’s orbit will be cleared of other stuff, either by the planet pulling it in, or winging it off with its gravitational field.  This alone excludes Pluto from being called a planet, since its orbit transects the plane of Neptune’s orbit.  Only the obliquity of their respective orbits has kept Neptune from clearing Pluto…

Continued...

Posted by George on 08/27/06 at 09:13 AM
Science & Technology • (3) Comments • Link

Geysers on mars

Think of a field of 200-foot geysers, blowing carbon dioxide.  I suppose future Martian tourists will pay big bucks to see them.

Remnants of an ancient carbon sequestration program, perhaps?  It would be a pretty cool science fiction story (hopefully without a memory-tampered Arnold Schwarzenegger).

Posted by George on 08/20/06 at 07:55 PM
Science & Technology • (0) Comments • Link

Oh crap, what did I say?

I got an email yesterday from an editor at the Chicago Tribune:

I plan on using your letter to the editor on Saturday (tomorrow). Thanks for writing.
Sincerely, Dodie Hofstetter Editor, Voice of the people, Chicago Tribune

Thanks, Dodie.  Except… I can’t remember what the hell I wrote! I write lots of cranky letters to newspapers.  Let’s see… the Trib?  It could have been energy conservation, gay rights, the invalidity of comparing Molly Ivins to Ann Coulter, or “bicycles and cars sharing the road”.  At least I think I sent some of those to the Trib - I read a lot of newspapers online.

The winner is:

Sharing the street
Motorists seem to be most torqued off about bicyclists who run stop signs. The few who dart through heavy traffic deserve criticism, but cruising through when traffic is light posts no hazard to anyone.

When you are your vehicle’s engine, you learn a lot about energy conservation. If I could, I would make every stop sign in the world into a yield sign for motorists and bicyclists alike.

Traffic is a fabric of forgiveness; let’s all try to cut each other some slack. Think of it as one thing you can do today to make the world a little nicer place for everyone.

George Wiman, Normal, Ill.

It must have been in response to the recent spate of letters from motorists and cyclists who each want the other drawn and quartered on national TV.  I should have used the word “poses” instead of “posts”.  And I do think it’s silly to bring any vehicle to a complete and full stop on a deserted street. 

By the way, I just read that 2/3 of the energy in oil is wasted before it ever makes it to your tank.  It triples the significance of every gallon of gas I don’t burn while riding my bike.  I’m helping keep the price of gas down!  (And so is everyone who makes the decision to buy a car that gets good mileage).

Posted by George on 08/12/06 at 01:33 PM
Science & Technology • Environment • (0) Comments • Link

James Van Allen dies at 91

James Van Allen, one of the pioneers of America’s space program who gave his name to the belts of radiation that encircle the Earth, died Wednesday. He was 91. Van Allen died of heart failure at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City, said university spokesman Stephen Pradarelli.

My oldest son, when in grade school, did a presentation on the Van Allen belts.  He lost one letter grade on the presentation because the assignment “was about space” and the Van Allen belts “had nothing to do with space”.  It resulted in another of our frequent little impromptu parent-teacher conferences where I tried and failed not to sound condescending to a complete idiot entrusted with the education of children.

Despite being on the ground floor of America’s space program, Van Allen was critical of the decision to use manned flights. He believed that robotic instruments could do everything that human astronauts could while avoiding the danger of exposing fragile living beings to the harsh environment of space.

“Man is a fabulous nuisance in space,” Van Allen said in 1959, shortly after the successful launch of Explorer 1, with which he was intimately involved. “He’s not worth all the costs of putting him up there and keeping him comfortable.”
- LA Times: James Van Allen

I’ve been sayin’! For what we’re wasting on the Shuttle and the ISS, we could send out a fleet of robotic space probes and do some real science.

Posted by George on 08/10/06 at 07:14 AM
Science & Technology • (2) Comments • Link

BP heads off major oil spill

In a move that will reduce US oil production by up to 8 percent, British Petrolium (BP) is shutting down a huge Purdhoe Bay pipeline was found to be severely corroded.

“We regret that it is necessary to take this action and we apologize to the nation and the State of Alaska for the adverse impacts it will cause,” BP America Chairman and President Bob Malone said in a statement.

A 400,000-barrel per day reduction in output would have a major impact on oil prices, said Tetsu Emori, chief commodities strategist at Mitsui Bussan Futures in Tokyo.

“Oil prices could increase by as much as $10 per barrel given the current environment,” Emori said. “But we can’t really say for sure how big an effect this is going to have until we have more exact figures about how much production is going to be reduced.”

It’s bad news for everyone but it’s a good thing BP found the problem before it resulted in an enormous spill.  It will be interesting to see how it translates at the pump.  I had no idea one pipeline could amount to so much of our country’s oil production.

Update -

Posted by George on 08/07/06 at 11:55 AM
Science & Technology • Environment • (5) Comments • Link

I ain’t mowin’ the lawn in no ‘hundred-degree heat…


...and that’s just the way Oscar likes it!

Posted by George on 08/01/06 at 04:54 PM
Science & Technology • Weather • (6) Comments • Link

Tony Blair knows a good deal when he sees one

In the wake of George Bush’s veto of federal stem cell research funding, England’s Tony Blair…

...is on a four-day visit to California to try to boost co-operation between the state and the UK.  The UK may benefit from an influx of cash as US stem-cell firms face vocal and politically powerful opposition.
- BBC News: Blair to lure US stem cell firms

Crippled children and alzheimer’s patients aside, biotech is huge business, with correspondingly strong support from Singapore, Korea, China, and now England.  Thanks a lot, religious fundiecrats.  Just another area where other countries can gain an insurmountable lead.

Posted by George on 07/30/06 at 06:57 PM
Science & Technology • Economics • (0) Comments • Link

Open thread 1 on poverty: Socialism vs Capitalism

Much of the slugfest centered on the contest between socialism and capitalism, with GUYK and WEBS05 arguing about the definition and relative merits of each.  Although I am capitalist I think the distilled version of either ignores some important realities…

Continued...

Posted by George on 07/27/06 at 07:34 PM
Science & Technology • Economics • (5) Comments • Link

Open thread 4 on poverty: Social Programs

First, I agree with the critics of welfare that it is bone-headed to give money to the poor.  If they had good money-management skills, they wouldn’t BE poor so that money will basically be wasted.  Those programs should end now, in favor of attacking root causes…

Continued...

Posted by George on 07/27/06 at 07:31 AM
Science & Technology • Economics • (9) Comments • Link

A private part of the common good

When I was a kid my dad would often stop his ‘53 Mercury, get out, and clear an obstruction in the road.  It might be a branch, some rocks, even a bale of hay that had fallen off a truck.  Then he’d get back in the car and we’d drive off.  I thought it was normal for people to do that. 

In later years, I came to understand that it is not normal.  Most people, if they see a branch in the road, would drive around them, muttering “somebody should do something about that.” Today, people seem to feel that any harm to the public good can only be addressed by a public agency - the highway department, the schools, the police, someone ‘official’.

On the better side of the ledger, check out MrsDoF’s latest post, Making walking worthwhile in which she combines the common good with her private good.  Go check it out and give her some props grin

What if everybody did something? 

Posted by George on 07/18/06 at 03:48 PM
Science & Technology • Environment • (2) Comments • Link

Stuff adds up

Two unrelated quantities that caught my eye in a couple of news articles:

  • Tobacco consumption in S. Korea increased from 68,000 tons in 1980 to 101,000 tons in 1999, most of it imported from the US
  • Steel mills recycling shredded automobiles in Illinois release about 400 lbs of mercury a year into the air, roughly the same as a large coal-fired power plant.

I enjoy quantities like this because of the scale of activity they suggest around them.  They help us understand why certain human activities have influence.

How many acres of land would it take to grow 101 thousand tons of tobacco?  How many families does it take to tend those acres?  What is the collective political clout of those (mostly American) families?  And - that’s just South Korea.  What’s the tobacco clout worldwide?

At just a couple drops of mercury (in electrical switches) per car, how many cars does it take to equal 400 lbs (about three gallons) of mercury?  What other pollutants are in those cars?  How much lead?  What happens to the gasoline in the tanks?  (It can’t be reused in other cars unless it is carefully filtered) How about the motor oil?  How many of the tires are reused?  How many people make their livings handling those cars? 

What is the composition of the scrap metal?  Cars have a lot more aluminum and various alloys in them nowadays - the quality of the steel would be degraded unless that is separated out before smelting. 

And that’s just Illinois: nationwide, there are still 35 million mercury switches in cars, though manufacturers switched in 2002 to nontoxic alternatives.  Just about all those cars will be off the road in ten years - hence the need for removing the switches.  But that mercury had to come from somewhere. How much cinnabar is mined each year?  Cinnabar is mercury sulfide; what are the sulpher emissions of mercury smelting plants, to say nothing of the mercury?  Where are the plants located?  How are the mine tailings handled?

Hold almost any commercial product in your hand; the connections associated with it dazzle the mind.  Economies closely resemble ecologies and are interrelated to them.  It’s just fun to think about that stuff… (sources New Scientist magazine and Chicago Tribune)

Posted by George on 03/09/06 at 10:22 PM
Science & Technology • Economics • (3) Comments • Link

Paleocene-Eocene tanning salon

One of the frequent criticisms leveled at scientific inquiry by the chronically over-religious alleges that science is an ‘orthodoxy’ from which dissidents are excommunicated.  But a single paragraph from a modest report on paleoclimatology in The Economist illustrates a concept for which that view fails to account.

At the AAAS meeting in St. Louis in February, paleoclimatologists presented evidence from the temperature spike known as the ‘paleocene-eocene thermal maximum,’ or PETM, that current greenhouse models may be too conservative by a wide margin.  In other words, it may get even hotter than we thought. 

But the paleoclimatologists weren’t all arm-in-arm singing ‘kum-by-ya’; they were trying to prove each other wrong.  This is the crucial difference from orthodoxy; scientists love to find holes in the current theory or in each others’ work.  The fact that they found the same hole while looking from different angles is how one field of science validates (or invalidates) another.  Some were using oxygen isotopic analysis, others patterns of animal migration based on the fossil record. 

That does not necessarily mean it is time to panic.  The models could be right after all, if the paleo-temperature estimates turn out to be wrong, (though the fact that multiple approaches undertaken by rival paleo-climatologists at different sites generally agree suggests they are not far off).

The key word is rival.  Ruthless competition in the marketplace of ideas has an effect similar to competition in our monetary economy - what remains may not be perfect, but it’s stood up to assaults that certify its strength.  Ideas which are sheltered under a conceptual monopoly like ‘revealed truth’ can’t be weeded out unless their challengers want to risk eternal damnation.

Oh, and that climate thingie?  The news from the PETM isn’t good:

On balance, it is probably too early to tell.  But that is hardly reassuring.  As Dr. Wing puts it: “This is probably the single scariest result of deep-time paleo-climate work.  The models we use to predict the future have been shown to be conservative, and we don’t know why.”
>>The Economist, 2/25/06, pg 82 A blast from the past

Posted by George on 03/09/06 at 01:06 PM
Science & Technology • Environment • (5) Comments • Link
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