Fool Me Twice

 I am not a youngster.  My corporeal form has circled the Sun 70+ times.  Depending on when exactly during those rotations you approached me, there is a solidly high probability that you could well have found me being somewhat less than serious.

Yea, I like to joke around.  Practical jokes, funny memes, satire, or whatever else I thought someone would laugh at are all things you might have to suffer through interacting with me.  This year though, this year is different.  Well, technically this month is different.  I might even suggest that it is just today that is different.  I mean, I said "today" but really, I should say "this date".

Today is 4/1, April the first.  the 91st day of the year.  Today is April Fools Day.  Traditionally, this is a day for practical jokes, outrageous lies and in general a good natured exploration into the gullibility of humans. 

I have been on both sides of the April Fools silliness.  There have been years when I was working enough that I did not notice the date and as a result, fell prey to those paying more attention.  Other years, I was the asshole enjoying the mild discomfort of those trying to give their sense of humor a break.

Today was different though.  For the first April Fools in my memory, I neither saw nor proposed one single date related effort at humor.  Like others on social media, I saw some posts suggesting that what the misadministration is doing is more outrageous than anything I might come up with.  Still, I am not possessed of sufficient ego to believe that the nation would follow my humor lead so, I was prepared to observe and ideally, enjoy the efforts of others.  That didn't happen.  

Regardless of what you actually think of Felon47 and crew of incompetents, that he has reduced the level of humor in the nation (probably world).  We are more polarized and more bitter than at any point in my memory.  We have the biggest April Fool ever.

It ain't funny.

Half The Battle

 If you happen to be a news junkie, as several of those who opine on things political and cultural are, you might have noticed some of the same things I noticed.  Among those things, I have read reports of individuals who served honorably in the USA military but who were not citizens of this nation being deported.  Some of them had combat included in that honorable service.  They were deported anyway.

I have seen reports of folks who have lived in this nation for decades - raised children here, held jobs, paid taxes, and generally obeyed every law that had nothing to do with immigration.  When identified and apprehended they were unceremoniously deported.  

The federal (mis)administration currently in power has undertaken an effort to eliminate birthright citizenship.  They want citizenship to not be automatic upon being born here.  Now this is going to shock no one but, I do not agree with them.  The reason we have lawyers and judges is that the law is neither perfect nor absolute.  Extenuating circumstances exists.  I am not saying to ignore the law.  I am saying that each case should be looked at individually.  

But never mind my issues with the system as is.  I am used to having political disagreements and I understand the art of compromise.  This ain't about that.

What I want to know is the other half of the battle.  If neither military service, abiding by the laws, or being born here is enough to guarantee one citizenship, what will determine eligibility for citizenship?  Will it be wealth?  Skin tone?  Whether or not Felon47 finds you fuckable?  Seriously, what will the qualifications be?

This crew has a consistent habit of claiming something is a problem and in need of immediate banning.  Then they absolutely avoid presenting a fix or a preventative or process going forward that will not result in the same problem in a few weeks/months/years.  They do that because you let them.  I strongly suggest you stop letting them.  Whether you agree with them or not, demand a plan.  Demand that the plan be Constitutional.  Demand that the plan be feasible.  Demand that the plan be something you would be happy to put your name on.

Real Values

 Due to the lamentable lack of any surprising great things AND the lack of unforeseen horrible things, I did indeed attend the No Kings protest in Knoxville, TN.

Historically, East Tennesseans are notoriously publicly apathetic.  Even if we do love something or hate it, we would keep quiet about it.  Getting us to show up to protest something was hard.  Yesterday we showed up pretty good.

Felon47 is for reasons I will never understand, an incredibly polarizing figure.  (I fully and easily understand any hatred expressed towards him.  It is my inability to see anything in him worthy of support by an actual human that escapes my understanding.)  If there is one positive thing about him, accidental though it may be, it is that he is causing my communities to reflect and decide what our values really are.  While I remain dismayed by the number of my neighbors who appear to value greed, immorality, misogyny, dishonesty, and racism, I am also impressed by the number who have decided to publicly reject those things. 

 As I have gotten involved with Indivisible Knoxville, the local organizer of the protests, I had an assigned duty.  I was an observer/counter.  I walked the entire length of the protest with a clicker counter and attempted to get a rough count of attendees.  The snapshots and videos will have to tell the story as the crowd was quite fluid.  Folks crossed the streets and in that manner could have been counted twice or not counted at all.  I did not observe any untoward events.  No LEOs were attacked - physically or verbally.  I observed one well-behaved counter protester who was treated with respect or ignored. 

I started my counting at the official start time of the protest and was done with an hour still to go.  I attempted to count the cars honking their horns or otherwise indicating their support of the protest.  I counted the south side of the protest first and by the time I had gotten through about half of the north side, the south side appeared to have approximately doubled in number.  Again, a rough count was the best I could do.  I got about 2800 with my clicker and I estimated the final number to be better than double that.  5k - 8k is my guesstimate.

BONUS:  As an apparent accident of scheduling, the Washington D.C. Gay Men's Chorus was in town and performed a few songs enjoyed by those close enough to hear them. Click on this link for a sample.

Horses and Hardware

 When Ford Motor Company released their first automobile for sale, there was an issue.  The Model T ran on a refined petroleum product.

I get that  the fact that fuel was needed fuel is not news to you.  That also was not actually the issue.  The issue lay in the acquisition of said petroleum products.  There was no such thing as a gas station or a convenience store with gas pumps.  When an automobile operator needed fuel, a trip to the hardware store to purchase a container or two of fuel.

Now, if the need for fuel was absolute and immediate, say you ran out during a drive (fuel gauges and such did not yet exist), then you would probably need to find alternative transportation to the hardware store or wherever else the source was.  A one horsepower vehicle was a very likely choice.  Although TBF a carriage or wagon could be pulled by more than one horse.  While I was certainly not around in those days, I assume that some folks ended up taking an unplanned walk.

That scenario is what I think about whenever some short-sighted moron suggests that electric cars can't go mainstream because there is insufficient infrastructure to conveniently refuel them.  Then I think about a television commercial from a few years ago.  A rugged individualist type driving a pickup truck that is pulling a horse trailer. The truck and trailer somehow magically (certainly through no fault of the aforementioned rugged individualist) gets stuck in mud/soft ground. Rugged individualist (RI) does not get frustrated or angry. Instead he harnessed up the horses he was hauling and uses the horses to pull the truck out of the mire thus demonstrating his something something tough guy RI.

The morons laugh about out-of-power EVs having to be charged up on road by an internal combustion vehicle carrying a generator. Apparently actually thinking about stuff and Gawd forbid, studying history is just too damn difficult.

Infrastructure has not historically appeared fully formed all at once. Building the interstate highway system, electrifying rural America, or even simple sewer systems, all of that took time and planning and effort to come to fruition. The same will be true of the infrastructure for EVs. Whether we are talking battery swaps or solar powered parking lots or straight grid connections, eventually there will be enough of it that people will act and speak as though it had always been that way.

Look, I get that some folk really like gas/diesel vehicles. I have owned sports cars and currently own a couple of motorcycles. I enjoy my gas powered pickup truck. That does not stop me from seeing that EVs and autonomous vehicles are coming and they are coming in a hurry. Making a stupid argument is not gonna stop it.

 

The Big Lie

 This piece was originally written and published in 2016.  I referenced it in a previous post so, here it is in total.

Any number of my friends have described themselves as “Fiscal Conservatives”.  One did so a while back in a Facebook comment.  I answered with the following response.

“I am going to have to take exception to your description of yourself as fiscally                conservative. The problem is that some people are not as smart or given to indepth thinking as are you. As such, they will jump to the conclusion that if someone does not describe themselves as a fiscal conservative, they must be a fiscal liberal. Of course, there is no such thing. Oh sure, there are plenty of folk who indulge in profligate fiscal policies for their personal or business finances but there is no significant group with any power base that could be described as fiscal liberals. That makes the term "fiscal conservative" a variation on Robert Heinlein's best way to lie. He said the best way to lie was to tell the truth so unconvincingly that no one believes you. While you really are fiscally conservative, saying so implies an opposite that simply does not exist.

Now there are plenty of folks who prioritize things over fiscal policy. The Greens prioritize environmental policy and it does make sense that if you can't breathe or if you have no clean water, saving money will not be anywhere near as impressive. Other groups prioritize other things but none of them are proponents of profligate spending for frivolous reasons. The icon of the majority religion of this nation, as told in the sacred book the alleged adherents allegedly revere(the bible), prioritized caring for the poor, sick, children, and helpless over saving or making money. According to said allegedly revered book, the icon went so far as to violently remove those engaged in fiscal operations from the temple. But as I said, an awful lot of people lack the depth of thought necessary to extrapolate and adjust their actions accordingly.”

Of course, the idea continued to percolate in the back of my mind.  It occurs to me that there is always a cost associated with regulations.  Typically for a code or regulation to mean anything at all there has to be some level of inspection and/or enforcement.  In theory, the goal of the codes or regulations should be to ensure that the cost of an action, product, or process is borne by those who profit from it.  So we have a situation wherein the public, in the form of the government, pays to enforce regulations that prevent the public from being unfairly burdened with the detritus left over from the action, product, or process that profits or benefits an individual or small group.  Now, I am happy to go on at length about risk socialization and profits privatization but that is for a different essay.  For this one, the takeaway is that codes and regulations have a fiscal impact.  

Generally the fiscal impact is negative - it costs money.  I acknowledge there could be situations where that cost is offset but generally, enforcement of regulations involves paying someone to do inspections and making provisions for accurate records keeping or, to put it another way, establishing a bureaucracy.

The leap that realization sponsored is probably not an obvious one for most folks.  It occurred to me that in the political realm, one could not honestly be both fiscally and socially conservative.  The terms are of necessity mutually exclusive, considered from the aspect of codifying behavior into law.  There is no way to ban abortion or control the sexual activities of consenting adults or even to regulate the use of organic recreational substances(psilocybin mushrooms or cannabis etc) without funding those who would enforce the rules made about those behaviors.  In other words, to be willing to regulate social behavior is to be willing to spend common funds in that effort.  (Yes, you could push for turning enforcement over to private entities and allowing them to collect fines or confiscate assets but surely that can’t sound like a good idea to anyone.  If it does, please go elsewhere to discuss it.)

The only way to force compliance or verify compliance is to allocate tax dollars.

Even the tax dollars from those who vehemently disagree with the necessity of those rules, even the tax dollars from those engaged in the very behaviors being regulated, even the tax dollars from those who refuse to follow the teachings of the Christ because it would cost too much in their opinion, those tax dollars will have to be spent on enforcement or, the regulations mean nothing at all.

I do not doubt or argue the existence of people who find both the wasteful expenditure of public funds and certain individual behaviors distasteful.  Politics however, is about setting priorities, about choosing what gets attention first.  That doesn’t mean you don’t think other things are deserving of attention, just that you believe that YOUR THING has to be considered first.  If a person prioritizes restraint in public spending, they could make the claim of being fiscally conservative.  Something HAS to be the primary concern.  However, simply saying it is the primary concern doesn’t make it so.  Actions have to support the words.

Now, the individual “you” can believe anything you like.  You can tell yourself and others that you want to minimize tax dollar spending and that you want to ban abortions and you want to ban Gay sex and you want to ban minorities walking around in public as though they had rights.  It cannot however, be a movement or political organization.  At the governmental or societal level, you cannot want to create new regulations and oppose spending.  You can twist your words and torture your justifications all you like but the basic truth of it will not change.  If you want to regulate what I can smoke or who I can screw, you are simply not even a little bit fiscally conservative.  

If you want the government to spend wantonly on the things you deem deserving of wanton spending, the takeaway is that you want the government to spend wantonly.  A social conservative cannot be a fiscal conservative.  Lying to me, lying to yourself will not make it so.  If you want the government to spend wantonly to save fetuses or to prevent adult citizens from addressing their mental, physical or social issues with a plant that grows wild or to continue the effective subjugation of humans you feel are inferior, the takeaway is that you want the government to spend wantonly.  Regardless of what you call yourself, you are no fiscal conservative.

Your actions and the results of your actions will determine how you are known.  The aforementioned allegedly revered book quotes the allegedly revered religious icon as saying that you will know a tree by the fruit it bears.  It isn’t what you say, it is what you produce or cause to be produced that will identify you.  

So, what is it going to be?

Not One Thing. Also Not The Other

 Several years ago, the Pentagon correlated energy independence with national security.  "Then-General James Mattis famously called on the DoD to "unleash us from the tether of fuel" because the logistical need for gas was costing lives and limiting troop movement." (according to Gemini)

Among those who identify as political conservatives, there is a significant percentage, perhaps even a majority, who would call themselves "fiscal conservatives".  It has been 10 years or more since I first called bullshit on that claim (see my essay, "The Big Lie" which I will post to this blog next) but, for the sake of discussion I will ignore what I think of it.  I will simply point out that if such a thing actually existed, one would expect them to choose the least costly path whenever there was a viable option.

So what might we think about a politician who considered it reasonable to spend an exorbitant amount of money to make the nation less secure?  What if that politician called themselves something else, would that matter?  

The question is not academic.  Unfortunately for humanity, the USA has allowed Felon47, Donald J.Trump to be in a position to betray several groups at once.    By limiting the nation's access to renewable energy, he demonstrates that he is not now, nor has he ever been a patriot.  He is taking intentional, overt steps to weaken the nation.  He is doing that by unnecessarily spending tax revenue.  In doing that he establishes that he is decidedly NOT a fiscal conservatives and that he is willing to screw over those who claim the mantle of fiscal conservatism.

So we have installed into the presidency an individual who is not concerned with the security of the nation nor does he care about the condition of the nation or the world's economy.  He is not one thing and he is also not the other.  I will never understand how anyone finds this appealing enough to vote for.

Grudging Admiration

 If you were trying to stop a car from running you down, throwing a gallon of a boiling hot sticky substance would probably be laughed at.  I do not know of one single human that would keep coming if you hit them with a gallon of boiling hot sticky liquid but, I also do not know of a single car that would be slowed down or stopped by it.

If you find yourself in a fight, regardless of whether you are an instigator or a reluctant participant or something in between, you need to use tactics, tools and methodologies that will harm the opponent in front of you.  No matter how effective a given tactic was against a different opponent, it is not guaranteed to have the same effect on anything else.  If you want to win the fight, you have to understand your opponent well enough to know what specifically hurts them.

This is not a revelation from a military genius.  Hell, it ain't even original.  Sun Tzu and other tacticians throughout history have harped on the necessity of knowing your enemy.  It is a core, if not THE core, teaching of any serious military academy.  The only thing that might be more important is knowing yourself.

Right now might be a bit of a dangerous time to be rich.  I'm sure you're fine if you're upper-middle class.  Even if you have 5-20 million dollars you need not worry.  But if you are truly investor class, now would be a good time to be careful and pay close attention to the world.

As near as I can figure, Iran wants to win the fight they are in.  They apparently decided very early on that they were not technically in a fight with the USA.  Instead, they decided they were in a fight with the obese orange felon himself, Donald John Trump with the quiet acquiescence of the rest of the world.  So, they studied him.  They looked at what sort of person he is and then chose a plan of action that would be effective against him, even if it appears unfair to a bunch others, even if it doesn't look like any plan they have used against different opponents.

Iran is isolating Felon47.  They looked and saw how he constantly struggles to be seen as a peer of the uber-wealthy.  They analyzed his words and actions to understand that money is the most important thing to him. (I mean, if it weren't for Ivanka and golf, it would be the only thing important to him but, I digress.)  After getting to know their enemy, they have chosen a course of action that is as brilliant as it is brutal as it is brutally effective.  They are seriously fucking with the global economy.

If you are investor class, you are almost guaranteed to have an investment position that includes energy, specifically petroleum.  Iran has taken steps to slow or halt the production of petroleum products in several of their neighbor nations.  Oil is globally priced and traded.  A reduction in the volume most any given nation produces can affect the entirety of the market.  It will inflate the costs of anything that involves the use of petroleum products in the manufacturing process or the transportation of the product.  That inflation means the middle-class folk that invest their "extra" money will have less of it to invest.  That will result in less profits for the investor class.  The production facilities are typically built with investment funds.  A lot of them will need significant repair.  That will result in either a lower dividend payout or even additional investment to pay for the repairs.  The investor class will probably not be patient.  They will demand a cessation if they believe they are likely to lose more income.

I don't mean to imply that as a poor person I will not be hurt by this crap.  I and all of my similarly economically challenged brethren will absolutely be hurt by inflation.  But we are just collateral damage.  The target is those who are in Trump's Rolodex or that have him in theirs.  The goal is to have those whose approval he so desperately seeks to pressure him in to stopping doing stupid shit.

I will admit that despite the pain I am likely in for, I do have a grudging admiration for just how well it appears they understand him.  They knew he would pay no attention to facts or history or even our various intel agencies.  They knew that he wants MBS to think favorably of him.  They knew about the shady investments various "oiligarchs" (see what I did there?) around the Middle-East have made in various Trump properties.  They looked at all of that and then punched him right in the money.  I doubt they considered the effect the war would have on his relationship with MTG and the rest of MAGAts.  That is likely just icing on the cake.  The stock market is in a negative trend.  Without drastic action, recession is a near guarantee and it will probably be a global recession.  No one will be confused about why it is happening.  His hubris and incompetence will be remembered even after all of his assault victims are gone.  

I do not enjoy war or inflation but, you have to appreciate a well fought fight.