Derivatives

Banks make money by making loans so the more loans they make the more money they make. The government requires that banks retain 10% in reserve so if a bank has $100 they can loan $90 but must keep $10. Say a bank loans a large oil company $100 million dollars. They must retain $10 million in reserve. They can put the money in the federal reserve bank and earn the going interest rate. Between 2008 and 2016 the fed rate was less than one percent. So the bank is sitting on $10 million dollars earning less than one percent. The bank looked for way to get around the reserve requirement and came up with what are called credit default swaps(CDS). The bank went to another financial entity such as an insurance company and said we would like you to cover any loss we may have on our $10 million in reserves and we will pay you 2% of the principal amount for your service. The bank could then loan out the $10 million at 4% and share the profits. The first such arrangement was with Exon who after the Exon Valdez accident took out a letter of credit with JP Morgan to deal with the cost of any future accidents. This letter guaranteed that Morgan would pay for damages caused by accidents. It was worth hundreds of millions and Morgan would charge a fee. They used their newly released reserves to back up the letter. This demonstrated the risk could be off loaded and capital freed up for more loans. The next step was to bundle many loans together and use CDS for the bundle as opposed to just one loan like the Exon. On the first one they put together loans on 300 companies in Morgans portfolio. The bank then offered investors an opportunity to invest in this portfolio of CDS's. They further refined the investment by dividing up the companies based on risk and the higher the risk the higher the return. These divisions were called tranches. These then became known as synthetic collateralized debt obligations and they were in fact derivatives of derivatives. This was a private market out of the view of regulators and that was in the end its downfall.

Loan forgiveness

Inflation effects different people in different ways. If the inflation rate over the next ten years is 5% then a person with a $10,000 loan will pay it back with deflated dollars which today would be worth $6,100. If you are retired and have $10,000 in your bank in ten years that will be worth $6,100. In the case of forgiving loans, like what is propose for students who are getting a good education and thus able earn higher wages, are passing the cost of those loans onto retired people. Some person who skips college and uses $10,000 to buy equipment to start a business will also pay for those student loans but there is no loan forgiveness plan for them. It is the old adage of rob Peter to pay Paul and the government decides who is Peter and who is Paul. According to a new report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce (CEW), adults with a bachelor’s degree earn an average of $2.8 million during their careers, $1.2 million more than the median for workers with a high school diploma.

ESG

Doing well while doing good was a phase from Ben Franklin that businesses adopted many years ago. It is something that grew slowly. After the war Japanese products were cheaply made and American consumers were not happy. In the 60's that began to change and by the 70's Japanese autos were top of the line quality. Some US car manufactures sent representative to Japan to find out how they were doing. They came home and to make a long story short they found out that when you treat your employees with dignity and respect they respond favorably. The plant employees wanted to have top quality cars because they were treated well. You might say they were doing well while doing good. Many other examples can used to demonstrate the effectiveness of this idea. In the past few years this concept has been expanded to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG). While this is a path to success for companies it is being used to punish companies for their real or perceived political views. Certain groups suggest pension funds use ESG scores to determine their investment strategy. An oil company whose products increase CO2 would be down graded but a company making solar panels would be upgraded. This is using the philosophy of doing good to determine what manufactures should be making. This would encourage investment advisers to move funds away from oil to solar. The fact that the demand for oil may be greater than the demand or solar is left out of the equation. The basic concept of supply and demand is being replaced with what some see as the moral high ground. This idea is promoted by the same people who want to determine what is true from what is disinformation. The question then arises who are these people, how many are they and what are their business qualifications.

Protest

Apple computer has stopped advertising on Twitter since Musk took over and they are demanding content moderation which means Twitter must not allow anything that Apple says is disinformation or misinformation. Apple feels they know truth. They threaten to block Twitter from the Apple store. Apple policies in China are not so altruistic. Human rights groups have found evidence suggesting that seven Apple suppliers in China are using forced labor through state-run “poverty alleviation programs” targeting the Uyghur population. The same double standard can be seen where women's groups in the US are silent as women protest in the streets in Iran and civil rights groups here are silent as the Chinese people protest for freedom.

Drilling

When the administration was asked why the US is okay with drilling in Venezuela but not in the US the answer was that there are 9,000 oil permits issued on government land that are not being used. This is the same problem that the infrastructure bill is encountering. Federal leases are subject to environmental studies. They're also subject to lawsuits filed by neighbors, by municipalities, by counties and state government. There are also regulatory processes and court decisions. For example. In 2006 Twin Metals company started the process to mine copper and nickle in Northern Minnesota On January 26,2022, the US Department of the Interior canceled two leases required to build and operate the mine. This is the kind of thing that most of the infrastructure projects will encounter.

CBS

CBS was in the news this week for two reasons. First when they heard that Trump may be coming back to Twitter they closed their Twitter account for two days saying: “In light of the uncertainty around Twitter and out of an abundance of caution, CBS News is pausing its activity on the social media site as it continues to monitor the platform,” Second they came to the conclusion that the Hunter Biden laptop was legitimate. CBS News said Monday that it confirmed the authenticity of data from Hunter Biden’s former laptop.

New Apple

After the war both Germany and Japan had their infrastructures destroyed and they rebuilt. This meant that while the US was still making steel in outdated plants these other countries had all new and more modern steel plants using the latest technology. Apple computer could do the same thing today. They have the cash on hand to build new I phone plants here in the US with the latest technology and the rapidity with which technology increases these days the new plant could easily out produce the existing plants in China. Add to that the fact that transportation cost have triple in the past few years building here at home looks pretty good. They could even begin to build the parts for the phone that they currently purchase from suppliers. This would also add safety to their supply chain.

Busing

A typical response from government when faced with a problem is to spend money as a solution. Often times the amount spent is used to show the importance of the problem. The government might say that the schools are not educating the students in the manner needed so we will increase the school budget and this will show our commitment to solving the problem. Some people even believe that this is the only recourse for government. This occurs not only in local, state and federal government but also on the international stage. The recent climate meeting decided to meet the challenge by sending money to the UN. The United States has faced a series of problems and over the past 20 months has spent $10 trillion in an attempt to solve these problems. Some then ask just what else can government do. Using the example of schools the local governments can agree to not only allow students to pick their schools but allow the money to go with the student and offer busing service to take the students. Busing was offered in the 60's and 70's for racial reasons it can be offered today for fairness reasons. There are many inner city students who would rather go to the schools in the suburbs.

Dictator

Venezuela has more oil reserves than any country at over 300 billion barrels. Like most countries the oil business was developed by US companies. In 1960 Venezuela joined OPEC and established its first state oil company and increased taxes on oil companies to 65% of profits. In the 1970's Venezuela had the highest per capita income in Latin America.   In 1998 Chavez was elected president on the promise that he would nationalize the oil industry and share the profits with the people. This would include seizure of property and redistribution of wealth. Over the next 20 years oil production fell from 3 million barrels per day to less than 500,000. Chavez died in January of 2021 and the current dictator Maduro took control. The country has descended further into chaos with hyper inflation and shortages of necessities like food. Millions have left the country in the past couple of years and many are headed for the US. Many times throughout history the promise of sharing the wealth has led to the election of a leader who over time becomes a dictator and the economy is destroyed. Many experts expected this to happen to China but the government is still holding on to power and the lives of people have improved. The question has always been how long will people with a taste of economic freedom put up with political dictatorship. The answer is until the military refuses to carry out the orders of the dictator. Recall Tiananmen Square, the riots in Hong Kong and the unrest do to Covid today.

Agenda

Polls show that the three most important things on the minds of voters are inflation, crime and the border. Now that the republicans have control of the house they can set the agenda to address these problems but that is all they can do. They can propose to increase production of fossil fuels to combat inflation, the can go back to enforcing the laws and putting criminals in jail and they can bring back remain in Mexico and building the wall to slow down the influx of illegals at the border. The problems will remain because any laws they pass will die in the senate. The campaign should center around those three issues and they will get the power to make changes. The democrats will want to campaign on things other than those issues. The press will cover the other. Trump has everything set up for him. He can say that he will return to the way things were when he was president. Low inflation, low crime and a secure border. He can say I did it before and I can do it again. Will he stay on script or drift into arguments about personalities. The democrats will try to bate him into arguments about anything but policy. 70% of the people say the country is headed in the wrong direction and President Biden says he is not changing. The door is open.

Subpoena

The incoming Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy says that he will investigate democrats using the power of the purse and subpoenas. The power of the purse is severely limited as long as congress is using continuing resolutions in place of a budget. In the regular budget process each item is looked at individually but in a CR all the spending is lumped together in one package. Congress has failed to pass a budget by October1 almost every year for 45 years. The only way McCarthy can stop funding for a particular request is to get rid of the continuing resolution. Other wise he must shut down the government and he is not going to do that over some investigation. As far as subpoenas go he can issue them but only the Justice Department can enforce them and the Biden Justice will not do that if there is anything of significance involved. The congress has no teeth. The presidency is where the power lies.

Energy

President Obama was concerned about climate change and promoted green energy which included nuclear but the real attention was on wind and solar. He was up front with people when he said your electric bill will necessarily sky rocket. All of this was interrupted by Trump who pushed for fossil fuels and made the country energy independent. When Biden arrived he went back to the Obama policy without the nuclear. He set in play policies that would reduce fossil fuels and oil production declined from 13 million barrels per day to 11 million. This caused the price of gas, diesels and oil to rise rapidly. Diesel at over $5 is raising the cost of transportation which effects the price of all goods.

Racism

Over the years and more so in recent years the democrats have used race as a wedge issue. Throughout the day MSNBC has people on claiming that Trump voters are white supremacist. This strategy does two things. First is divides the country and second it moves the discussion away from policy issues, things like the border, crime and inflation. In dividing the country it solidifies the Black vote. The talk is always about discrimination both past and present and not about Black students getting further behind and Black neighborhoods being the center of crime and about the breakdown of Black families. These would be their concerns if they were really trying to help minorities. The words ethnic cleansing are often used to describe racial instances around the world. This is a process where those in power try to eliminate certain racial part of their people. Black women in the US have 40% of the abortions and this has been the case for many years. Using these facts a good argument could be made that abortion is racist.

Energy

How many kw hrs of energy can you get from one pound of various substances Oil .25 kw Coal 1.25 kw Uranium 20,000 kw Thorium 700,000 kw Estimated reserves of thorium are 6.4 million tons and current reserves of uranium is 5.3 million tons. Is thorium mining safer than uranium? Compared to mining of uranium , mining thorium is considered safer and more efficient

Border

  The Biden Administration granted a license to Chevron to resume oil production in Venezuela—easing sanctions imposed on the country in 2019 over corruption and human rights concerns. This oil is thick and high in sulfur meaning it is bad for the environment. White House press secretary Jean-Pierre said President Biden is securing the border against fentanyl Homeland security chief Mayorkas says the border is secure.

Covid

While the claim by the news media that the Hunter Biden tapes were Russian disinformation was going on in 2020 and into 2021 another misinformation story was going on and that was the claim that the Covid came from animals and not from a lab experiment. Scientist led by Dr Fauci were covering up evidence that suggested the virus came from their labs and promoting the story that it came from a meat market in China. Each day that passes more information is uncovered using the freedom of information act and it is becoming more evident that there was a cover up. The new congress has promised to investigate the origin of Covid and if a cover up is revealed it will add science to the many agencies the public can no longer trust.

Germany

In Germany the Green movement was much stronger than in the US. The result was a contradiction. They wanted carbon free energy but chose to shut down nuclear power. A contradictory approach? Germany wants to curb greenhouse gas emissions but at the same time will shut down all of its nuclear power stations, which in the year 2000 had a 29.5 per cent share of the power generation mix. In 2020 the share was down to 11.4 percent, and by 2022 all nuclear plants are going to be shut down. The transition away from fossil fuels cannot be accomplished in time without a severe economic problem so they had to rely on natural gas during the interim and this left them dependent on Russia. They are now trying to replace Russian natural gas with American gas but they do not have enough unloading facilities since US gas comes by sea using liquefied gas vs pipeline gas from Russian. Political pressure from the Greens here in the US is sending the country down the same path. One difference is that the US had enough sense not to start shutting down nuclear plants although many Green groups were pushing that.

Career choice

Nearly 40% of college graduates regret their majors, a Washington Post analysis found earlier this year. Among arts and humanities majors, nearly half wished they’d studied something else, while STEM graduates tended to feel they made the right choice. One lady expressed what I see as the real problem. "I got a bachelor of fine arts in musical theater and I don’t regret it because that’s my job," one woman said. "I live here in New York. I’m a Broadway actor." Data shows that fewer than 2% get a job acting and most of those are low paying. What to tell a young person who wants to study music. If that is their dream you cannot tell them not to pursue it but you also know that they will probably not be able to make living and may have second thoughts about their career choice. Some times these grads will ask why didn't someone tell me.

Coal miners

I was born and raised in Springfield, IL. It was a small city for being the state capital. For most of the year it was much like a over sized farm community but when the state legislature came to town things changed. All those big city types from Chicago brought with them a kind of sophistication which allowed us to see the other side of town. I lived in a working class neighborhood where a lot of Italian coal miners lived and worked. These were shaft mines going down over 200 feet and the only light was from the carbide lamps on their helmets. The tunnels were less than five feet high so most of the day the minors were bent over using picks and shovels all the while breathing in the coal dust which later turned into the black lung disease. They worked long hours and when they came up they headed to the local bar to drink and try to regain their sense of being alive. The mothers ran the family and all dad had to do was bring home the bacon. Most of the moms went to six o'clock mass and spend the rest of the day doing the things that moms do. Once in while there would be dad who didn't drink and he was a great father. I remember to brothers who gave up playing ball with the rest of the boys on Saturday because their dad said he would spend the day with them. On Saturday afternoon the dads would congregate at the bar and play bocce ball and if it rained they were inside playing pinochle. These were big strong guys and they threw down the Ace of trump the floor shook. I vividly recall one Saturday night when John L Lewis the head of the coal minors union came to the local bar and gave a rousing speech. Friday nights were set aside for the Gillette fights. The fight I remember most was the night that Rocky Marciano knocked out Jersey Joe Walcott. Rocky, being Italian, was of course cheered on by everyone. It was a time when all the neighbors knew one another and they all watched out for each other.

Musk

The saga of the Musk takeover of Twitter continues as he reduces staff by half. He has brought over 45 engineers from Tesla to organize the technical side of the business. Twitter has lost money 8 of the last 10 years so it is time for change and Musk is known for innovation. Will he wield his magic wand and turn things around or will he file bankruptcy and start over from scratch. It is hard to bet against Musk. When someone thinks outside the box they are general ridiculed but that doesn't seem to bother Musk.

Thorium

Environmentalist are often concerned about land usage and many projects have been derailed because of danger to some species. Different forms of energy production need different amounts of land. To produce one megawatt of power with wind uses 64 acres of land. One megawatt with solar takes 10 acres and one megawatt with nuclear takes 0.6 acres. Thorium nuke plants use even less space. Wind and solar plants are placed far from the use point because of these land requirements whereas thorium nuke plants can be built close to the use site and thus minimize the transmission lines. Wind and solar need a back up for when the wind doesn't blow and sun doesn't shine but nuke power is on 24/7. The materials needed for wind and solar damage the environment both when mined and later when recycled. Thorium creates little damage to mine and creates little waste. To power the United States with wind would need 1.26 million wind mills occupying 24 million acres which is about half the size of North Dakota. To use thorium nuke plants would require 600,000 acres

Crypto

The case of Sam Bankman Fried is opening the eyes of many including my own. He created an exchange called FTX where people could buy and sell cryptocurrency. He then created a marketing company called Alameda to create a demand for his crypto. They got a few investors to buy the crypto and pushed the value up. Other investors saw the value increasing and wanted to get on the band wagon so they started buying which pushed the stock higher. Sam Fried is quoted as saying it is not the intrinsic value that matters but the perception. Now this may sound strange but take a close look at Tesla. This company has $24 billion dollars of assets in all of its facilities but its stock is worth over $900 billion dollars. By comparison Ford, GM and Toyota combined are worth $250 billion. People are buying Tesla for the same reason the buy crypto. They think it is going to go up in value. At least with Tesla there is some tangible assets but with crypto there is nothing but thin air.

Colorado

The attack at the gay club in Colorado has taken an unexpected turn as the attacker has been identified as nonbinary. This means not male or female and wants to be referred to as they or them as opposed to he or she. This led to the following AP report. The attack was halted by two club patrons including Richard Fierro, who told reporters that he took a handgun from Aldrich, hit them with it and pinned them down with help from another person until police arrived. The use of the pronoun them instead of him makes this a difficult read. The English language is being turn up side down in order to accommodate people who consider themselves as nonbinary.

Nuke power

When people have been indoctrinated, exposing them to facts in order to enlighten them can be a difficult if not impossible task. In the case of nuclear energy the world has been told that it is dangerous and creates too much waste. Taking these one at a time. The danger is reinforced by two major accidents, one at Chernobyl in 1986 and and the second at Fukushima n 2011. In the United States no one has ever been hurt by nuclear power plants. Even including the 46 deaths from Chernobyl the safety of nuclear is equal to the safety of wind and solar. As far as waste accumulation it is quit small. U.S. commercial reactors have generated about 90,000 metric tons of spent fuel since the 1950s. If all of it were able to be stacked together, it could fit on a single football field at a depth of less than 10 yards. Using the new thorium nuclear reactors which are smaller and less expensive the waste material can be used to produce more energy while reducing the stock pile. In a excruciatingly slow process the world is coming around to nuclear but the politics of wind and solar is getting in the way. The very people who propose to be the most concern about climate change are the ones holding back the progress of nuclear. Some of this is because of ignorance but much of it is political. Politicians see a way to get campaign funds from wind and solar as they did with Solyndra. A 2015 report from the Department of Energy found major flaws in Solyndra's business practices and claimed the company made"inaccurate and misleading" statements to obtain the loan guarantees, and also found fault with Department of Energy oversight.

Sam crypto

For people who are not interested in finance the word arbitrage is an unknown. The way it is commonly used in the United States is trading between the east coast and west coast stock exchanges. Because of the time delay there is a slight difference in the price of the same stock so arbitragers buy and sell and thus keep the prices very close. Sam Bankman Fried a young trader is in the news because of arbitrage. In 2013 he started right out of MIT working for trading firm Jane Street Capital. While there he discovered a difference in the price of crypto between the US and Japan. He started buying as much as $25 million dollars per day and soon amassed a sizable fund which he used to start his own crypto trading company. He entice rich people to invest with him and was soon in control of billions. He appealed to the altruism of others by giving money to charities and also developed political friends through campaign donations. The question is how did so called sophisticated investment managers get fooled by this guy. The answer is the same thing that happened in 2008 with the mortgage crises. There people were investing in home mortgages bundled in groups of 5,000 or more and no one knew what was in these bundles. They were buying a pig in a poke. The chance to make a fortune blinded their common sense. This sort of thing happens on a regular basis....remember Enron.

Meritocracy

The goal of America along with other free market democracies is meritocracy. (A society in which people are chosen and moved into positions of success, power, and influence on the basis of their demonstrated abilities and merit). This is an admirable goal and one to strive for but it will never be completely achieved. On the other side of the coin is a popular movement called equity (Where government interviens to promote equality based on things like race and past discrimination.) One extreme example of equity is reparations. Another is adjusting test scores to create a proper outcome. One early example was affirmative action and that is still practiced today. If not handled properly this results in phases like token Black or token woman. It can also replace one unfair situation with another. A certain amount of government regulation can help move toward equity but too much can create animosity amoung groups. Immigration is one area where equity conflicts with equality. If legal immigrants are judged on their merits we would have most of them coming from Asia. The opposie of this is the old lottery system where so many were accepted from certain countries based on population. If the boss tries to hire new people with the intent to give preferential treatment to minorities this would be considered okey by most but if the boss lays off a White person and replaces that person with a Black this would not be okey. It gets a little tricky when promotions come up since a lot may depend on subjective means of merit. In trying to right past wrongs care must be taken not to add to the discontent.

Standards

Some years ago it became common place for cities to make the written test for fire fighters and police officers easier so they could include more minorities and to some degree that made sense. When a fire fighter is going into a burning building to pull someone out his the test scores are not that important. But now the ideas has moved up to law school. Harvard and Yale law schools are removing the LSAT in order to bring in more diversity. If they do this and don't make the course work easier it will result in many students who scored low on the test score low in classroom work. Will they flunk out. Will this idea spread to pilots and physicians. Is this what Bush pointed out when he said the soft bigotry of low expectations. As the world becomes more complicated should standards be lowered while other countries like China are raising their standards. Is the recent example of the organic chemistry teacher who was fired because he was to tough going to be the new standard. Did this all have its start years ago when in forth grade every body got a trophy.

IMF

Beginning with the industrial revolution and continuing today the West built up its economy using fossil fuels and now the United Nations wants to ban the developing countries of Africa from fossil fuels. They seem unaware that the West cannot move away from fossil fuels and yet they expect Africa to do so. Natural gas and coal provides 70% of Africa's energy and some feel that all of this can be replaced by wind and solar to meet some 2030 goal. This type of planning will keep these developing nations from growing their economy so they can feed their people. The solution that these UN experts see is sending money to these countries as if they will use that to manufacture wind and solar. Most people see this as just a way to increase the power of the UN by allowing them to distribute the money and then it is anybodies guess as to where these funds will end up and will some go to the distributors. Last year the United States sent $117 billion to the IMF which has $700 billion to hand out to countries they deem deserving.

Satire

One of the more important parts of free speech is satire ( the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues). The Onion is a liberal satirical site on the Internet and The Babylon Bee is a conservative site. The Babylon Bee was banned from Twitter and recently allowed to return. For many people banning satire is like banning books. Satire causes people to think about things in an entirely different way and that is its strength. It causes people to think and this scares some people.

Climate

The US gets its rare earth metals from China and cobalt from the Congo. The environment in both of these countries is being contaminated. The water is poisoned and those working in the mines are suffering from different illnesses caused by the mining process. Meanwhile environmentalist here in the United States do not want to mine here as they feel it will contaminate our water. Once again shades of the "Ugly American" from the 1950's. They could stop this whole process by concentrating on thorium nuke reactors and switching away from wind and solar but they choose not to do so. The proponents of wind and solar never talk about the mining and disposition of the materials used but they frequently say that nuclear is dangerous. In the 60 years that nuclear power has been used in the US not one person has ever been injured. One wonders what is their motivation. Has the ideology of their politics blinded them to other options. Is the promise of pay back from solar controlling their actions. The government scientist understand the importance of nuclear but environmental groups are controlling these scientist.

Special counsel

The appointment of a special counsel is appropriate when there is a conflict of interest within the regular government protocol. This would be the case if the Justice Department decided to look into the activities of Hunter Biden. It now appears that the newly elected congress plans to investigate Hunter so this would be a reason for the Attorney General to appoint a special counsel. Once appointed all of the witnesses called by congress could refuse to testify saying the could not while the special counsel is investigating. That would take two or more years and by that time Biden will be out of office and no one will care. This would also eliminate the apparent bias of having a special counsel for Trump and not for Hunter so look for another special counsel soon.

Bank bail outs

When the 2008 mortgage crisis hit the government decided to bail out the big banks instead of the home owners. Many questioned this at the time saying that the money should go to the homeowner who are underwater on their loan. There were 6 million homes in this category and the average debt was $200,000. The proponents of the bail out main street approach pointed out that the cost would be close to the same whether the banks or the home owners got the bail out. Their theory was that when the home owners paid off their loans the banks would then have the money to balance their accounts and keep from going under. This simplistic approach was pooh poohed but the experts but they never really gave a reason why this wouldn't work. The best explanation given is that it is simpler to deal with 1,000 banks than with 4 million homeowners. The experts accepted that but recently the government found it easy to send out checks to many millions. Would it have been that difficult to find out from the bank how much the outstanding mortgage was and pay that off. They are planning on doing something similar with student loan debt where there are 40 million borrowers not 4 million. Just as each mortgage was different so each student loan debt is different. Questions remain.

Thorium

There are 96 nuclear reactors in the US and they produce 19% of the power so in order to produce all the power we would need 505 reactors. On average each reactor produces one gigawatt or 1,000 megawatts. The typical small thorium reactor (sized to fit on a semi truck) produces 300 megawatts so it would take 1,530 thorium reactors. The estimated cost is $780 million dollars each so the total cost to supply the United States with power from thorium reactors would be $1.2 trillion dollars which is less than half the cost of the Afghan War. These units can be installed near the point of use and eliminate the need for long transmission lines. That would be the end of CO2 and solve the climate change problem. These reactors also use up the stored nuclear waste. They also produce excess heat which could be used to make hydrogen which could fuel transportation. There would also be enough heat to desalt sea water and start growing food in the deserts. These plants operate at normal atmospheric pressure and use no water. A water line could run from the Pacific Ocean to Central California and the whole valley would have a source of fresh water. This is only one area and there are many more dry places where sea water could solve the problem. Thorium could feed the world. The world is heading in this direction and China is leading the way.

Victims

Five people were murdered in a gay night club in Colorado and it is all over the news today. There were four college students murdered in Idaho and that is also big news. On an average weekend in Chicago 10 are murdered. This is not worth reporting because murders of mostly Blacks in big cities is so common place it is not news. Most people seem to be immune to the pain the families of the big city victims are going through. This same thing has happened to crimes against Jews where there were 2,700 crimes reported in 2021. Different victims get different attention.

Free speech

Here is what polls show about free speech. More than nine in 10 Americans (91%) agree that “protecting free speech is an important part of American democracy.” Similarly, 90% of Americans agree that “people should be allowed to express unpopular opinions.” Significant majorities believe “free speech rights help marginalized groups be heard” (86%) and that “having different points of view, including those that are ‘bad’ or offensive to some, promotes healthy debate in society” (77%). Twitter had a poll asking if Trump should be allowed to return and 15 million people voted and 51% said yes he should return. The question is did the other 49% not believe in free speech or only in free speech that they agree with. If the idea of free speech has any significance it means speech you don't agree with. If what is said is not illegal it should be allowed. If you ban some speech because you think it is not true you open the door to banning all speech.

Truth or not

Politicians in general say things that are self serving but often times untrue. Trump was famous for this and his supporters brushed it off as just the salesman in him. This is from the NY Times. Biden, Storyteller in Chief, spins yarns that often unravel Biden has been unable to break himself of the habit of embellishing narratives to weave a political identity. This is from Politifact listing 30 significant lies Biden has spun since taking office. https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/list/?category=&ruling=false&speaker=joe-biden His supporters like Trumps slough this off as just being Joe. Whether being exaggerations or storytelling they are not the whole truth. Trumps language in public is more forthcoming or some would say rude but Biden keeps his secret like when he leaned over to Obama and whispered, this is a big fuckin deal or when he called a reported off mike a stupid son of a bitch. When it comes to politicians it best to pay more attention to what they do instead of what they say.

Attorney General

When Attorney General Bill Barr testified before congress two congressmen accused him of The two men continued to speak over each other, at times in raised voices, with Johnson accusing Barr of “carrying out Trump’s will.” Here is a quote from Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder. "I’m still enjoying what I’m doing, there’s still work to be done.  I’m still the President’s wing-man, so I’m there with my boy. The democrats said that the Attorney General was the lawyer for America not the president but his job description belies that fact. He serves at the pleasure of the president.

Speical prosecutor

Today the Attorney General appointed a special prosecutor to investigate the January 6 riots and the Mar A Lago secret papers. This past summer the congress spent three months investigating January 6 and decided not to refer anything to the Justice Department for prosecution so why the new investigation. Perhaps they will find some illegal activity in the Mar A Lago paper and then can dismiss the January 6 showing a balanced report. Many felt the raid at Mar A Lago was not because of top secret papers but a fishing trip to find whatever. Maybe the special prosecutor will find some smoking gun. Trump has been under investigation by different government agencies for 6 years and nothing has been found but this may be the time.

Taylor

Today I was introduced to Taylor Swift. I looked her up and found that she earns $150 million per year. I thought it was outlandish when quarterbacks were getting $50 million per year but this beats that. She plans 50 concerts next year and when tickets went on sale the web site crashed because 2 million people signed on the first day. Its hard to believe that this young lady still wet behind the ears could have that many fans. I could understand if this were Sarah Vaughn, Nancy Wilson or Ella but not this little upstart. Sometimes people just don't know what real talent is. This younger generation!

Oversight

As republicans take control of congress they are planning to investigate and they have the power to subpoena people to testify under oath but it is the Justice Department that must enforce subpoenas. Eric Holder was held in contempt of congress for failure to turnover documents “Congress can’t enforce their own contempt charges; all they can do is give notice to the attorney general that they would like it enforced, and Eric Holder never enforced it against himself,” When the congress and the president are of different parties there can be no enforcement so the famed congressional oversight is just words. They can investigate all they want but if the president doesn't want to help them they will get nowhere. Anyone that has something to hide will just refuse to testify and that will be the end of it. Or they could testify and lie under oath but nothing would be done about it if the Justice Department refused to enforce the law. There is a way around this but it has not been used since 1934. Congress has the rarely exercised power to act on a contempt resolution by instructing its sergeant at arms to arrest witnesses and bring them before the chamber’s presiding officer, with a conviction—presumably following some congressional “trial”—resulting in imprisonment in a cell in the Capitol. This is not effective because this power ends with the new congress and delays can be used to drag it out for a couple of years.

Topsy

These are remarks from Senator Schumer in 2010. "Until the American people are convinced that we will stop future flows of illegal immigration, we will make no progress on dealing with the millions of illegal immigrants who are here now and on rationalizing our system of legal immigration." Schumer’s remarks come a day before President Barack Obama holds a closed-door meeting with lawmakers to discuss how to follow through on his campaign pledge to address illegal immigration and improve border security. Schumer said legislation should secure control of the nation's borders within a year and require that an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants register with the government and "submit to a rigorous process to convert to legal status" or face immediate deportation. Rejecting the euphemism "undocumented workers," he said: "Illegal immigration is wrong—plain and simple."

Negotiate

The cost of the war in Ukraine keeps going up and a negotiated peace should be the goal but there is a conflict between the generals and the administration. This is from an article in the NY Times in May of 2022. The more than $40 billion in additional aid to Ukraine approved by Congress on Thursday brings the total U.S. commitment during the Russian invasion to roughly $54 billion, when combined with the aid package passed in March. Biden is now asking for $13.7 billion more. When General Milley even suggested a negotiation the White House objected. Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff Mark Milley urged Kyiv and Moscow to find a "political solution" as the winter months loom, warning that the chances of a total military victory was "unlikely." The Biden administration is working to reassure the Ukrainian government, outside experts, and former US officials that it will not push Ukraine to imminently seek a diplomatic outcome to the war with Russia after the most senior US general publicly pushed for a more urgent diplomatic effort this winter. As estimated 200,000 have been killed and this number will continue to rise. The infrastructure of Ukraine is slowly being destroyed. It is looking more like Afghanistan every day and still no pressure to negotiate.

Trump speech

Did the Trump announcement show a new Trump. He stuck to policy and avoided any personal attacks and he did not discuss the 2020 election. This approach is considered the best by many of his supporters. The question is can he keep it up. Will he respond with insults the first time he is insulted. Those who oppose him will not be able to win by attacking his policy successes so they will use a more personal approach. They will try to bate him into some kind of name calling game. Will he have the self discipline to ignore their personal insults and stick to policy. If he is able to do that those who choose to name call will be the losers. If he is unable to change that will open the door to De Santis who agrees with Trump policies but does not have the history of mean Tweets.

Crypto scam

In 1989 Michael Milken was convicted of insider trading and fined $600 million dollars and sentenced to ten years but that was reduced to two years for cooperating with authorities. He earned his fortune selling junk bonds. These are high risk bonds that pay a high return. He got out of prison and had $4 billion in the bank. He then started to give away his money to various charities and in 2020 Trump pardoned him. The today's version of Milken is Sam Bankman Fried the young man who just bankrupted the crypto firm FTX and he may not go to jail since his business is offshore. If he hid billions in off shore accounts he may live the rest of his life as a wealthy former business man. He may even start giving some away like Milken and maybe earn a pardon from some future president especially if he gives a lot of money to campaigns as he has done in the past. Only in America.

Voters

The secret ballot is a part of the US voting system. You go into the booth, draw the curtain and no one can see how you vote. The mail in ballot is different. There is an over envelop that maintains the privacy of your vote but there may not be privacy when you are filling out your ballot. There may be family members or other friends in the room watching you or more to the point there may a campaign worker there to help you with your vote. In big cities where a large number of minorities live in a small area, campaign workers can canvas these areas and help people to fill out the ballot. 16 states allow anyone you designate to deliver your ballot. Many low information voters can be encourage to vote a certain way by a campaign worker. States offer early voting two to six weeks ahead of election day. Instead of spending money on TV ads it may be better spent by hiring election workers to visit registered voters and offer assistance. This will be much like the good old days in Chicago where precinct workers scoured the neighborhood with walk around money and then drove the voter to the poll.

Raising children

Responsible parents understand that children must learn to accept the consequences of their behavior. When a child makes an error in judgment the parent does not make excuses for the action but they offer love as they help the child work through the problem. This allows the child to grow into an adult who will become a productive citizen. Too often these same parents do not show the same concerns for others. When a young Black man makes a mistake instead of encouraging him to accept the consequences they offer him a way out. They say it was poverty, broken families, racism or some other excuse and this allows the young man to feel what happened wasn't really his fault. These people who offer excuses do so with the best of intentions as sometimes happen with people and their own children. They act with compassion and a desire to help but their actions are counter productive. There are many stories about the father who always came to the rescue of his son by using influence and money to get the son out of trouble. The result is all too often a son who cannot stay out of trouble.

Border

One of the most puzzling things is the situation at the border. Fox News has a crew down there and they use drone cameras to record what is going on and they show it several times everyday but no other news sources seem to be interested. In October of this years 69,000 got aways crossed. These are people who come into the country with something to hide. Record amounts of illegal drugs including fentanyl were seized. Last year over 100,000 died from these drugs including 70,000 from fentanyl. Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security and Vice President Harris both have said that the border is secure and the press says okay with no follow up questions. This is why many think that the press is just the arm of the democratic party. This is a major story worthy of a Pulitzer but no takers.

FTX

I am not sure what Bitcoin is but it can be purchased through a company called FTX, a company which this week filed for bankruptcy. FTX was a company where you could buy and sell crypto currency like Bitcon. The news said that $32 billion dollars just disappeared overnight. What they mean is that those who put the money in no longer have that money but somebody has it. It appears that the money came in the front door and out the back to another company. The man who founded the company, Sam Bankman Fried earlier founded a company called Alameda Research a company that evaluated crypto and gave recommendations as to what kind to purchase. Later he founded FTX a company to buy and sell crypto. Several experienced invested suggested that this was a conflict of interest since Alameda could recommend buying from FTX. Before FTX was founded the largest crypto trader was Binance and when FTX started Binance was a major investor. Later when FTX was in trouble Binance put the final nail in the coffin buy selling off all of its investment in FTX. It was then learned that FTX had been using its money to fund risky investments by Alameda. They would use customer money as collateral for loans and then invest that money. When these investments went south the company began to unwind. It was like all Ponzi schemes in that those who went in first won and those who came in later lost. In other words that $32 billion didn't disappear it just changed hands.

Gender

One of the more controversial books that is read in high school English class is Harper Lee's, "To Kill A Mockingbird". The uproar is because "nigger" is used even though it was a part of the vernacular at the time. What may turn out to be even more controversial is the little girl Scout who is one of the main characters. She is a regular tom boy. She gets in fights in school and beats up other boys. She wants to hang around with her older brother and refuses to wear a dress. Think about that. In today's world would she be a candidate for a gender change. Maybe if they had started to change her over to a boy when she was little she might have had a happier life. Of course this is during the depression and if her dad Atticus had even heard of such nonsense he would have had a fit.

Negotiator

An open seat on the school board here in Hastings was filled by a retired teacher and some feel that borders on conflict of interest. That may or not be true depending on the individual. When I lived in Grand Forks, I had a friend who was the head of the union that represented country employees. He negotiated to get benefits for these employees and used county money to pay for these benefits. When he retired he was elected country commissioner and the shoe was on the other foot but his was just as tough in his negotiations as he was when head of the union. Point is that the right person can shift gears based on the job responsibilities.

Investigations

For the most part congressional investigations are just opportunities for politicians to go on national TV and make speeches. Since the government is now divided nothing much will be accomplished over the next two years. Anything the democrats want the house won't pay for and anything the republicans want the senate will not go for and if they did Biden would veto. What does that leave for them to do. Investigate. They will have subpoena power but the Department of Justice will not enforce so if there is a smoking gun the public will never know. The president will use executive decrees to push certain things but they will end up in court so once again the elected officials will not be determining policy but that will fall back on the courts. The bureaucracies will maintain their power because the continuing resolutions used instead of a budget will not allow the house to cut funding without shutting down the government. Bottom line is that the bureaucrats and the courts are running the country while the elected officials in the house, who are the representatives of the people, sit on the side lines and watch. All of the new members of congress elected this time are promising to make changes in Washington but they will find their hands are tied.

China thorium

More scientist are realizing that thorium nuke power is the answer to climate change but they have political obstacles to over come and pressure not to move forward. The fossil fuel industry understands that thorium could be the end of their business and these private companies and not in favor. The wind and solar people pushed primarily by government see thorium as an end to their power so they are opposed so it is left up to scientist to push thorium. The scientist must fight both big business and big government. So while the US wastes time with this in fighting the Chinese are moving ahead with thorium and now have working power plant. The next step is to produce these reactors on an assembly line and sell them to the world. Instead of the US buying wind and solar from China we will be buying thorium plants. A small thorium reactor can be made assembly style and each unit will produce 300 MW of power and can fit on a semi truck. Three of these units hooked together are the size of a current nuclear plant.

Schools

Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. This quote is from the New Testament indicating the separation between church and state. It can also be applied to schools. Render the three "R's" to teachers and the rest to parents. Teachers can reinforce the parents by treating students with dignity and respect. Teachers can be kind and considerate in the way they teach academics. Teachers will be happy when they can spend their time on subject matter. They can alert parents when students require extra help in their academic skills and their social skills and parents can alert teachers when students are struggling. It is not productive for a parent to teach math in a different way than the teacher and it is not productive for the teacher to offer cultural values that may differ from what the student learns at home.

CO2 levels

I have pointed out many times that the CO2 levels have been increasing at an accelerated rate in recent years and this coincides with the industrial revolution and that leads one to belief that there is a correlation. This has been challenged by Covid. Core ice samples going back 2.7 million years show CO2 levels stayed below 300 ppm. In 1900 the level crossed the 300 ppm line and reached 400 ppm in 2015. The problem is that the levels continued to rise during the pandemic. This occurred in spite of the fact that man made emission decreased by 7% but the CO 2 continued to rise. This is a challenge to the aforementioned correlation. This is disturbing to me because I assumed that burning fossil fuels was the cause of the rise over the past 120 years. I now must reconsider this hypothesis. A predicted drop did occur during the 1973 oil embargo but not this time.

Student loans

The first student loan payment of $400 billion was announced today and this is only about one forth of what is expected to be needed to offset student debt. That is enough money to build a $400,000 house for one million vets on this Veterans Day or to give every K-12 teacher in the country a $100,000 bonus. It could pay for 4 million full four year college scholarships or my favorite $8,000 to every one receiving social security retirement benefits. To make everyone feel better a poll taken shows how the students plan to spend their savings 73% of anticipated recipients say they expect to spend their debt forgiveness on non-essential items, including travel, dining out and new tech, according to a recent survey from Intelligent.com.

Nuclear energy

Looking back on nuclear power over the past 40 years. Reagan.... develop new generating capacity that will permit them to supply their customers at the lowest cost, be it coal, nuclear, hydro, or new technologies such as fuel cells. Clinton....There is no talk of a nuclear phase-out in the United States. On the other hand, contrary to past administrations, there will not be a promotion of nuclear power, George Bush "It is time for this country to start building nuclear power plants again," As detailed in the Climate Action Plan, President Obama is committed to using every appropriate tool to combat climate change. The Trump Administration declared last week "Energy Week," and used the opportunity to lay out its energy priorities, which included nuclear. Nuclear power is back in vogue, buoyed by the demand for a significant source of emissions-free energy. Unfortunately, the Biden administration continues to stifle the US nuclear energy industry with outmoded policies.

Veterans

Today is Veterans Day our most important holiday and the only reason we have other holidays. Many people honor Vets on Memorial Day which is good but that day also includes all who have died. Vets Day is set aside solely for veterans. Call or visit a Vet you know and say thanks. 600,000 died in the Civil War, 100,000 in the first world war, 400,000 in the second world war, 40,000 in Korea, 58,000 in Vietnam and 7,000 in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Retire

More and more republicans are suggesting that Trump go the way of Hillary and they both retire. Biden was 78 when elected and he is fading fast. Trump will be 78 in 2024 and Hillary will be 77. It's time to bring in some younger blood in both parties. While the pro Trump people will be disappointed their disappointment will pale when compared to the dismay in the press. Trump is like a blood transfusion to the press and they will have to come up with news about policies and this means work. They will no longer just get to use the latest Trump tweet for their stories. That is much easier than explaining fiscal policy.

Student loans

Biden’s student loan plan has debt cancellation in the pipeline for most borrowers and is already delivering targeted debt relief. More than 20 million borrowers applied for $10,000-$20,000 of federal student debt cancellation less than a week after the Department of Education released the application in October — roughly half of those eligible for the relief. There is a court challenge to this executive order but it is weak. When it comes to court challenges there is something called standing. The person suing must prove they have been harmed. '” Standing limits participation in lawsuits and asks whether the person(s) bringing a lawsuit, or defending one, has enough cause to “stand” before the court and advocate, since not anyone can go to court for any reason. To have standing, a party must show an “injury in fact” to their own legal interests. The lawsuit’s plaintiff is Frank Garrison, a Pacific Legal Foundation attorney in Indiana who received a Pell Grant to attend college and qualifies for $20,000 in debt forgiveness under Biden’s plan because he makes less than $125,000 per year, according to the complaint. He says he is being harmed because he must pay state income tax on the forgiven debt. Experts say this will be thrown out because he does not have to accept the debt repayment plan. Others say that if for some reason or another any student who has received debt repayment money will not be required to give it back so all eligible students are encouraged to sign up immediately.

Living cost

About 50 years ago when I live in Grand Forks my neighbor who was a professor at UND came to me one day all excited. He had just accepted a better job at Stanford. I told that I hope he got a substantial raise as the cost of living would be much higher and did he look at jobs in Texas or Florida. Not much has changed over the years and the contrast between San Jose and Austin still exist. If you are a computer wiz graduating today you have job offers across the country. If you move to California you have 13% state income tax vs no tax in Texas. In San Jose the average home price is just over one million dollars while in Austin the cost is $600,000. The average apartment in San Jose is $3,000 and in Austin it is $1,800. Many of the 100,000 millionaires that live in California are connected to the high tech business in Silicon Valley. They represent .5% of the population and they pay 40% of the taxes. Many of these people are looking to move and some big tech companies like Oracle, Tesla and Hewlett Packard have already moved. As the wealthy drive up cost of things like housing the lower income groups are moving out of the state. The population that had been growing by 240,000 per year before 2010 is now declining at the rate of 180,000 per year. Something similar is happening in New York where the state income tax rate is 10.9% and the average house cost $700,000 and the average apartment cost $2,100. People are leaving New York State at 300,000 per year and many are moving to Florida where there is no state income tax. The average home in Florida cost $400,000 and the average apartment cost $1,000. Many of these people don't want to move but they cannot afford to stay.

Carbon credits

Tesla Motors got their start using money from carbon credits. The law says that if your company produces carbon above a given limit you must pay a fine or purchase excess credits from another company. Tesla has a large excess of credits since they only produce electric cars. Ford can then purchase credits from Tesla to avoid paying penalties. Tesla has receive over $5 billion in credits over the past five years and expects over $2 billion more this year. There are $260 billion in credits currently on the market. The White House on Tuesday released its "Roadmap for Nature-Based Solutions to Fight Climate Change," which the White House says will "put America on a path that will unlock the full potential of nature-based solutions to address climate change, nature loss, and inequity." The Biden administration said it will direct billions of taxpayer dollars toward "nature-based" climate change solutions, which includes carbon credits.

ID

Asking for an ID to vote is considered racist by some saying it is too difficult for minorities to get an ID. Some even suggest it is too complicated or they just don't know how to do it. Here is what you do in Minnesota. How to get a Minnesota State ID card. Two forms of ID are needed. For people who don't have a drivers license they can use Utility bill Bank statement Employment pay stub Go to any drivers vehicle services (DVS) and pay the $20 fee.

Abortion

A good example of how democracy works will be show cased over the next couple of elections in Missouri. The current law in Missouri says no abortions at any time unless the life of the mother is at risk. Polls show that 58% of respondents in Missouri approve abortions in the first eight weeks. In time the will of the voters will take over and the laws will be changed. This is how it is supposed to work. National polls show that most people feel that abortions in the first 12 weeks should be legal and this is how it will shake out now that each state has a say. 90% of abortions occur in the first 12 weeks.

Election

After this week the dust around the mid terms will settle and everyone will start on the 2024 election. If Trump runs the whole thing will revolve around him. Trump will come on strong saying he will get the country back on the track to where it was when he left office. This means energy independent, tough on crime and control of the border. He will increase import taxes on China to force more goods produced here in the USA. He will close out any hope of agreement with Iran and push for a negotiated settlement in Ukraine. He will make the Trump tax cuts permanent. He will push the schools to concentrate on academics. The democrats will not talk issues as they will be concentrating on Trumps personality. Trump will be talking policy and the press and the democrats will try to get him into argument over anything but policy and he will fall for it. They will push the idea that Trump is not a decent person and this will reflect on the country. Trump will give them lots of fodder and will dominate the news like he did in 2016. The country will likely be in a recession and inflation will slowly come down but that will be balanced by price and wage increases as more products are made in American. When the democrats select a candidate it will be a Miss congeniality contest to find the nicest person to contrast Trump. Policy will take a back seat to personality. Those who feel that policy is more important than personality would like to see Trump retire and let younger people take over. Rising star Florida Governor Ron DeSantis agrees with Trump policies and doesn't have the negatives. He is Harvard law grad with ten years of political experience and a Iraq War vet. He just won a landslide reelection.

Climate

This week there will be a climate change meeting in Egypt and the UN secretary says the rich countries should give money to the poor countries. And it is why I am asking that all governments tax the windfall profits of fossil fuel companies.  Some of the big emissions countries will not be there, countries like China, India and Japan. These three countries account for 70% of new coal plants and they will be building 3 new plants every week. Nearly 360 U.S. coal plants have shut or plan to shut in recent years, compared with about 170 plants that remain active, according to the organization.Aug 10, 2022 UNITED NATIONS —  The U.N. Secretary-General appealed Monday to developed nations to make good on their promise of $100 billion a year to support climate action in developing countries, ahead of a November climate review conference in Egypt.

Students

Someone asked the other day if you could come up with one idea or concept that best explained what is happening to our country what would you say. The answer was watching students in school sit down during the pledge. More than a million have died defending the flag to protect our freedom. While the constitution gives the student the right to sit, many wonder why they choose to do so. There is no question that there are things wrong within our country and that will always be the case but there are not many places in the world where things overall are better. If those students sitting had the opportunity to go anywhere in the world would they go or would they stay here and work to make things better. Would they start with their own lives by working harder in school and looking for ways to reach out and help others. Would they offer kind words and smiles to others. Would they come to understand that this is America the land where dreams come true. There are countless stories of people who started with little to nothing and became productive citizens.

Natural gas

I have spent considerable time and effort in the study of solutions to the problem of climate change. First, all means of producing energy should be considered but some more than others. There are two major misunderstandings. First wind and solar cannot replace fossil fuels an second nuclear can. President Biden believes in the first and a few days ago said that coal plants must be shut down and yesterday said no drilling. There is no need to shut down coal plants because they are rapidly being replace by natural gas. Nearly 360 US coal plants have shut or plan to shut in recent years, compared with about 170 plants that remain active. US CO2 emissions are now down below the 1995 levels even though the population has increased from 266 million to 333 million. The improvements made by switching power plants to natural gas can be duplicated by going to natural gas for transportation but all the emphasis is on electric cars.

Biden

The democratic establishment is continuing its move to get rid of Biden. The New York Times on Friday, Times reporters Alan Rappeport and Jim Tankersley published a piece on Friday titled, "As Elections Approach, Biden Spins His Economic Record," which claimed that the president's boasts about his economic achievements were not true The report also claimed, "The president, who has long been seen as embellishing the truth, has recently overstated his influence on the economy, or omitted key facts." Further skewering Biden, the Times stated, "It is common for presidents to spin economic numbers to improve their pitch to voters," yet "the president’s cheerleading has increasingly grown to include exaggerations or misstatements about the economy and his policy record."

Threat

72% of democrats and 70% of republicans fear that democracy is being challenged but for different reasons. Democrats see voter registration and Trump as the threat but republicans see the deep state as a threat. Extremist always represent a threat and they are on both sides. Some issues have many more people on the extremes and abortion is one of those. Only 8 percent of adults say abortion should be against the law in all cases, without exception, while just 19 percent say abortion should be legal in all cases, without exception, according to data from Pew Research Center. In this example 27% are on the extremes and this is an alarmingly large number. Another area with large numbers is that 20% of the people want to repeal the second amendment. 20% support polygamy. 42% support legalizes prostitution. 61% want to abolish the electoral college. 66% support legalized drugs. 80% support legalized sports gambling.

Trump

News people are reporting that Trump will announce his candidacy next Sunday. Morning Joe is on his knees praying that this is true. It will be a ratings bonanza for Joe who has seen his ratings decline since Trump left office. When Trump announced his candidacy for president in 2015 ratings for Joe started up and increased until Trump left and then quickly declined. The same thing happened on all cable including CNN and Fox. There will be little discussion of issues and every thing will center around Trump's personality just like it was during the last election. It has even been that way during the mid term campaign. No talking about inflation, crime or immigration but January 6, Mar a Lago with an occasional blip about abortion and climate change. It will be about personal attacks on Trump. The only question is can the keep it up for 2 years without the public getting fed up. The never Trumpers will thrive but others may get just a little tired of it all. If the republicans take power they will get nothing done because the White House can veto. It will just be two years of bad mouthing Trump and he will respond in kind. Maybe he will even go back to Twitter so people can read everyday what he is thinking and the news people will love it.

Felony

When you want to make a case for a particular position on an issue you find the one case that most represents your side. In Pennsylvania they have a charge of felony murder also known as second degree murder. Conviction brings a mandatory life in prison without parole. This can be repealed by reopening the case and presenting new arguments. In recent years the PA legislators have tried to eliminate the felony murder murder rule to get a chance for re sentencing but each time the bill failed. A candidate for US Senate, Fetterman, is proposing changing the law and the example he uses is 18 year old Tyreen Rivers. Tyreen followed an elderly woman home from the bank and tried to grab her purse as she climbed the steps to her front door. He did not shove or hit her but the 85 year old woman fell down the steps and died. There are 1,200 people in prison in PA charged with felony murder and Fetterman wants to change the law and feels that about one-third of these should be released. To do this each case would be reviewed and those deemed eligible would be released. Unless they change the law more people like Tyreen will be sent to prison for life. It would make sense to change the law and then release those eligible. Fetterman has the cart before the horse. His way is to circumvent the legislature and just begin releasing prisoners. It would be another case of a bureaucrat overruling the legislature.

Time flies

Time flies is an old adage that takes on more meaning as we get older. The most amazing thing about it is how fast things change. My father was born in 1900 when there were no cars and he died in 1969 when man was on the moon. My wife was born in a farm house in North Dakota one of 16 children. They had no running water, no indoor plumbing and no electricity. On cold winter nights you had to follow the rope line out to the outhouse so you wouldn't get lost in a blizzard. Toilet paper was the Sears catalog. On Saturday night dad would fill a large tub with hot water and each would take their weekly bath. They had to get ready to go to church on Sunday which represented their social life. Sometimes after church a neighbor would come over and that would be a special treat. There were no birthday presents but mom would bake a cake and it would be shared by all. There were many chores and each family member worked hard. The boys out in the field and the girls at the house milking cows and churning butter. Mom sewed all the clothes and there were no store bought clothes. No one went to college and a few didn't finish high school. Move forward one generation and look at my daughters life. She had her own room with many dolls and other toys. She had indoor plumbing and electricity. She had all store bought clothes. At Christmas she had so many presents and she couldn't open them fast enough. She had a life filled with school activities and private dance lessons, good teachers and lots of friends. She graduated from college and has a career a family and lives in a fine home. I often tell people that I took my daughter off to kindergarten and then she got married. Time flies.

Democrats

Many top democrats are saying the if the republicans take power that democracy as we know it is over. It is difficult to find a more precise meaning for what this means but yesterday a well respected democratic congressman James Clyburn offered his explanation. He said that if the republicans take control the US is "on track to repeat what happened in Germany". It is usually unwise to use the Nazi's to emphasis a point. Historian Michael Beschloss went over board when he said regarding a republican victory, "our children will be arrested and conceivably killed”. Hillary Clinton said republicans are just trying to scare people. One commentator on MSNBC complained that all Fox News talks about is inflation, crime and immigration and she is correct and those are what polls show that people are concerned about. Most people don't understand a phase like, the end of democracy as we know it but they do understand the cost of groceries. Some in the democratic party are concerned that they have lost touch with the people.

Rare earths

The side of the new green deal that no one talks about is the mining and disposal of rare earth metals the elements used to manufacture solar panels, wind mills, electric car batteries and many other modern conveniences like cell phones. There are two methods of mining and both produce mountains of toxic waste, with high risk of environmental and health hazards. For every ton of rare earth there are 2,000 tons of waste. China established dominance in the market because of laxed rules much like the West during the early years of the industrial revolution. The mines there allow seepage into the groundwater and it is heading toward the Yellow River a major source of water for millions of people. Currently the sludge is moving at 25 meters per year, a dangerously rapid rate. At one mine there is a holding pond that contains 70,000 tons of radioactive thorium. By comparison the total of all the nuclear waste stored in the US since nuclear power plants started some 60 years ago is 90,000 tons. The same people who regale against nuclear power because of the waste storage have no concept of what rare earth mining does. All of this is just the first half of the story and the disposal is the other half. Currently the most popular method is to bury it in Africa.

War

The far right and the far left are coming together in their opposition to sending money to Ukraine. Both say the money could be used to help Americans here at home. Polls show that 70% of Americans want to keep sending money. If this is like past wars that number will decline as time passes and it will decline rapidly if US troops get involved. There seems to be very little interest in a negotiated settlement. According to the New York Times article on May 22, 2022 the US has sent $54 billion to Ukraine. Russia invaded in Feb of 2022 to that comes to $18 billion per month or $216 billion per year. The US spent $2.3 trillion on the war in Afghanistan over a 20 year period and that is half the current spending on Ukraine. So far no American soldiers have died compared to the 2,400 who died in Afghanistan. Every day Generals appear on TV explaining how we must defeat the Russians but no one seems to be interested in hearing about a settlement. Should there be a balanced discussion over such a serious matter. Maybe a national debate.

Climate

Here is some positive news about climate change This is from a Feb, 2022 article. European regulators recently proposed to include nuclear power and natural gas in a select group of energy sources, alongside renewables such as wind and solar power, to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This is from a July, 2022 article. BRUSSELS, July 6 (Reuters) - The European Parliament on Wednesday backed EU rules labelling investments in gas and nuclear power plants as climate-friendly, throwing out an attempt to block the law that has exposed deep rifts between countries over how to fight climate change. This is from a June, 2022 article. In many of the states with the nation’s most aggressive climate goals, officials are investing millions of dollars to save the power source that was long the No. 1 target of many environmental activists: nuclear plants.

Inflation

All the polls show that the economy is the number one issue on the minds of voters. Biden gave a last ditch speech last night but didn't discuss this issue. He could have said that the voters are better off now than they were two years ago. He could have said they passed the new green deal, passed the infrastructure bill, the American Rescue Act, bills to avoid the government shutdown, the inflation reduction act and new gun regulations. Instead he said that democracy is in danger if republicans win but he didn't say how so people were left up in the air. It was a missed opportunity to explain how the democrats plan to bring down inflation.

Truth

As Elon Musk moves into Twitter the conversation shifts to what is truth and who determines what is truth. Most people gravitate to sources that they believe best represents their version of the truth. Some take the easy road of just watching some cable news channel but others dig deeper. They search various news outlet in both printed, major radio and TV outlets along with social media until they find their home. Some will check sources that they don't agree with and then try to get a more balanced view. People who recognize their own bias will search areas they don't agree with in order to see the other side.

Black crime

Today on Morning Joe the complaint was that when ever people talk about crime it is racist. One of the reasons is that Blacks commit a disproportionate share of the crimes. For example while Blacks represent 13% of the population they commit 51% of murders, 50% of robberies, 53% of aggravated assaults, 27% of burglaries and 27% of rapes. These stats are even more damaging when it is reported that most Black crime is committed by Black males who represent only 6% of the population. If police are sent into high crime areas they will find more crime and if they send in fewer police there will be more crime. Young Black people have trouble with authority figures and it starts in schools and continues after they leave school. Within the Black community there are problems with respect for one another and dissing a person is cause for a violent response. Here is what experts say. "People often feel respect, awe, and admiration toward legitimate authorities, and many cultures have constructed virtues related to good leadership, which is often thought to involve magnanimity, fatherliness, and wisdom…[Societies may also] value virtues related to subordination: respect, duty, and obedience. Perhaps Blacks do not see authority figures as legitimate. For most people authority figures are parents, teachers, coaches, elected officials, bosses and police. In schools Black students represent 16% of enrollment but account for 40% of suspensions. This figure is diluted because most of the Blacks are males which account for only 8% of the enrollment. In additions most teacher go the extra mile when dealing with Black students.

Damned lies

The teenage defense (mom, everybody is doing it) has been around for a while but it has come into its own recently with President Biden's tendency to lie. He does so with impunity because the press doesn't call him out on it. The first defense is that Trump also lied and then that is expanded to Obama lied about keep your own plan and Bush lied about WMD in Iraq so since all president lie this is no big deal. So now we are all satisfied with presidents who lie. This is the result of each party making excuses for their side. One big difference with Trump was that the press exposed every lie something they are hesitant to do with Biden. Many lies result in no important consequences. When Biden says gas was $5 when he took office everyone knows that is not the case and so pretty much ignores it. The same is true of Trump when he exaggerates the size of crowds. Sometimes the lie can be significant. When Obama said you can keep your doctor or you can keep your plan that caused a great deal of headache for many people. Like Mark Twain said, there are lies, damned lies an statistics.

Voters

President Biden spoke tonight and suggested that our democracy is in jeopardy because of voter repression. He then said that we are currently experience record early voting. The last four presidential elections showed the following turnout. 2008 57.1% 2012 53.8% 2016 54.8% 2020 62.0% The average over the past 100 years is 55%. If there is voter repression it is not a new thing.

Action

The court is investigating affirmative action. I was closely involved when this program was introduce to industry. Plant managers were told to take steps to insure diversity(hire Blacks). The wise managers did this over time in order to cause as little disruption as possible. Properly instituted meant that no one had to be fired to open a job. It was done through attrition. The courts attention this time is on colleges. One extreme case is MIT where 20% of students are Asian Americans when this group represents 6% of the population. While more Blacks are being admitted to college their graduation rate is only half of Whites and Asians. This is the result of K-12 education which is failing Blacks at an unacceptable rate. This has been known for decades and many attempts have been made to correct the problem but nothing seems to work. Affirmative action spread quickly across the country in schools and work but one area was left to merit and that was and is sports. Up to a certain grade everyone gets to play but at some age only the best make the team. It is now creeping into sports in the management and ownership positions. If professional sports teams were told to include more Whites to the detriment of the team the fans would object. There is certainly no systemic racism in pro basketball and football.

Nuclear power

An environmental site called OneEarth list seven reasons why nuclear power is not the answer. All seven can be debunked by small modular thorium plants. The first is the long time between planning and operation. Thorium power plants are build on an assembly line and transferred by semi truck to the site. Building time for one unit is 3 to 5 years but once underway production time would be much shorter as is the case with any assembly line. Cost of a new power plant using natural gas is $1,000 per kW, $2,000 for wind, $4,000 for solar and $4,000 for thorium nuclear. Once again the price per unit of thorium comes down drastically when produced assembly line style. Weapons proliferation. No weapons grade materials are produced from thorium plants. This is the reason why this type of plant was turned down in the 1950's. The government only wanted nuclear power plants so they would have a source of U 235 for bombs. Meltdown risk. Thorium plants cannot meltdown. They shut down automatically when power is lost. This feature is called walk away safety. The plant employees could all go home and the plant would shut down. Lung cancer risk from mining uranium. No such risk from mining thorium. There is considerable environmental damage from mining the rare earths needed for wind and solar. Carbon equivalent emissions from building plants. Once again damage to the environment is much greater mining and disposing of the rare earths needed for wind and solar vs the mining of thorium for a thorium nuke plant. Waste risk. Thorium plants produce far less nuclear waste then uranium plants and they even use up stored radioactive materials. In addition a 1000 MW thorium plants takes up one acre. The same power from solar uses 75 acres and wind needs 300 acres. Thorium plants are small and can be built near the use point eliminating the need for long power lines. Thorium plants produce power 24/7 whereas wind and solar only run when the wind blows and the sun shines so they need backup. Thorium is inexpensive to mine and is found all around the earth It would take 2000 tons of thorium to power the globe. Currently there are 6 million tons of known thorium reserves which is enough for 3000 years based on current usage.

Vietnam

With regard to Vietnam, Truman’s government refused to recognise Ho Chi Minh’s 1945 declaration of Vietnamese independence. Instead, in February 1950 Truman recognised a self-governing Vietnam still under French sovereignty. In May 1950, he committed $US10 million in military aid and established the Defence Attaché Office in Saigon, with the purpose of supporting anti-communist forces in Vietnam. More US military assistance and advisors were sent to Vietnam in 1951-52. Here is an article from the news yesterday. WASHINGTON — A small number of U.S. military forces inside Ukraine have recently begun doing onsite inspections to ensure that Ukrainian troops are properly accounting for the Western-provided weapons they receive, a senior U.S. defense official told Pentagon reporters Monday. It started small but ten years later there were 500,000 US troops in Vietnam. 58,000 died before the US got out of there. Will history repeat itself. Be careful.

Rallies

When you google Trump rallies you get on the first page the Times and the Post. The major press has not let up on their bias against Trump. Recent article from the Washington Post, Former president Donald Trump isn't expected to return to some key battleground as other surrogates abound and his rallies don't draw the crowd he used to From the NY Times. Whether he is invited or not, the former president keeps holding rallies in battleground states. If you want to check this out you have to go to pages three and four to find data Trumps save America rally in Nebraska draws thousands Former President Trump returns to Michigan, 20k attendees expected in Warren on Saturday Large crowd lining up for Trump rally in Casper, WY on Saturday Why are Trump rallies so packed with overflow crowds if he is as unpopular as some say

Murders

There were 21,500 murders in the US in 2020 an increase of 30% over 2019. The reason was that incarceration rates fell, manpower shank and anti police protest spread across the nation. Gun Violence Disproportionately and Overwhelmingly Hurts Communities of Color. African Americans as a whole were at least four times more likely to be killed by a gun than the overall population. In 2020, 12,179 Black Americans were killed with guns. While Blacks are 13% of the population they represent 56% of murder victims.

Affirmative

Affirmative action is on the Court docket and like most issues it is not the same in all cases. Some cities simplified the written test for firemen in order to allow more minorities to qualify. This made some sense since the true test is can you haul out a person through a small basement window with all your equipment on. This of course would eliminate most female candidates. On the other hand should a person be allowed into medical school if they can't pass chemistry. Here the written tests take on more significance. Certain skills are required for many jobs and some skills are more important than others. You cannot be an air force pilot if you are 6 foot 6 inches tall. How tall you are is no more under your control than your skin color. Many jobs require written test and results are not effected by the race of the test taker. Should they be? Should a person who fails the math part of an accounting test be hired because of their race. Some common sense must be applied when answering these questions.