Spend or not

Some well intended republican congressman was on TV talking about cutting government spending. Most of the spending is mandatory so he is talking about discretionary spending. Mandatory spending are things like social security, Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare so he is left with cutting veterans benefits, health care, education, housing, transportation, environment, science, and school lunches. President Biden wants to increase social programs and this congressman wants to cut social programs. Which side of this argument do you want to be on. His argument is that you can't keep spending money you don't have but that argument has been around for 50 years and the spending has only increased. The congressman doesn't understand that the Fed can just keep printing money. His argument falls on deaf ears. Someday in the future the whole thing may collapse and all of those people who voted for deficit spending will step forward and say I told you this would happen and any idiot should have known that. Many of those free spenders will be retired or dead so those who happened to be in office on the day reckoning will pay the piper.

Tanks

There are some people who are so blinded by the concept of wind and solar that they seem to have lost their common sense. Secretary Granholm has said it is her goal to have the military be all electric by 2030. When asked specifically about tanks she said yes. She apparently thinks that there is a power grid on the battle field and even there were can a tank in battle take the time to charge. To bad someone didn't ask her about planes. And just for good measure throw in air craft carriers.

Electric power

The New York Governor has banned gas stoves in future developments and this makes some sense since NY State gets all its electric power from non carbon sources, 43% from hydroelectric, 27% from wind and solar and the rest from nuclear. This would also be a good state for EV's. Contrast that with Texas that gets 61% of its energy from coal and natural gas. Texas has two nuclear plants and 40 coal plants. 60% of the time in Texas that you charge your EV you are using power generated from fossil fuels. The point is that EV's make more sense in some areas than others.

Greenpeace

Sometimes people with the best of intentions cause more problems than they fix. One good example is Greenpeace. Here is a statement from Greenpeace. Greenpeace has always fought - and will continue to fight - vigorously against nuclear power because it is an unacceptable risk to the environment and to humanity. The only solution is to halt the expansion of all nuclear power, and for the shutdown of existing plants. Greenpeace used fear and misinformation to limit the use of nuclear power. Every year, nuclear-generated electricity saves our atmosphere from more than 470 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions that would otherwise come from fossil fuels. Nuclear only generates 20% of the worlds energy. If groups like Greenpeace had not interfered the United States would have led the world into carbon free power. Of the 253 nuclear power reactors originally ordered in the US from 1953 to 2008 only 92 were completed because of misinformation. Today it is the Greenies, once again with the best of intentions, that are leading the world down the primrose path of wind and solar.

Trans in sports

On the first day of his administration, President Biden issued and executive order saying student-athletes should compete under the sex they identify as. Here is a letter from women's groups. We, the undersigned organizations committed to women's rights and gender justice, support the full inclusion of transgender people in athletics. National Women's Political Caucus Public Justice Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law Southwest Women's Law Center Surge Reproductive Justice Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport Women Leaders in College Sports Women's Sports Foundation

Harassment

The latest accusation of mistreatment of women in the news business is against Tucker Carlson who was recently fired from Fox News. This is only the latest in a long list of different news associations who have dealt with this problem. About 41% of women in media and entertainment say they’ve been sexually harassed by a colleague or boss at some point in their careers, according to a new report — the highest rate among white-collar industries. The results of studies confirm that the problem is unusually rampant in the midia biz as names like Bill O'Reilly, Matt Lauer and Charlie Rose come to mind. These are well educated men who find it necessary to degrade women and these are the same men the country depends on for news. Are they so insecure that they find it necessary to put down women to make themselves feel good. What's going on?

Ocean safety

One of the reasons that globalization was possible is because since the end of WW 2 the US Navy guaranteed the safety of the oceans and therefor all countries could trade free without fear of high jacking. The US moved away from destroyer based Navy to a carrier base and can no longer protect the shipping lanes. Big news. Yesterday the Iranians seized a Turkish oil tanker with 800,000 barrels of crude. If this thing starts to happen China will be in big trouble because all of their oil comes from far away by ship.

Debates

Where are the democrats. Why is no one stepping up to challenge Biden. 37% of democrats don't want Biden to run for a second term. 71% of the people say the country is on the wrong direction and Biden's approval is at 43%. Crime is up, inflation is up and the border is overrun so the door is wide open but no takers. RFK jr says everyone is afraid of the DNC. He says they will ruin your career. Some say no one wants to face Trump on the debate stage because he will talk about policy and not the end of democracy. The statement is made that democracy is at risk but the DNC refuses to have debates which are the essence of democracy.

New migrant rule

In the past few weeks the Biden administration has turned its focus to the problems at the southern border. For the past two years Fox News has had people down on the border reporting several times per day on the situation. In addition they have drones showing live video throughout the day. The situation has been a mess for these past two years but most of the press and apparently the administration has ignored the problem. It only started to catch their attention a few months ago when border towns along the Rio Grand started busing migrants to some northern sanctuary cities. At that point the press started to report and this led to government action. During these two years over five million illegals crossed the border not counting 1.2 million got aways. Add to that the 240,000 unaccompanied minors of which 80,000 are reported missing. Biden's new rule is designed to push migrant to seek asylum at official border crossing or through other legal channels rather than crossing the border illegally. As they say, better late than never.

Germany

Germany is a case study in today's dilemma regarding climate change. They lost the Russian natural gas and survived the winter avoiding a catastrophe by taking several steps which they would rather have not taken. First of all, Mother Nature blessed them with the warmest winter on record. Second they chose not to close down their last three remaining nuclear power plants. Third they started buying natural gas from anywhere around the world it was available. Fourth they reopened five lignite burning coal plants. Germany was not alone with coal as the worlds use of coal reached record highs in 2022. Now as if to slap fate in the face Germany has decided since they made it through the winter they will go ahead with their plans to close down the nuclear plants. Their backup plan to use when wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine is green hydrogen. They will produce hydrogen by electrolysis of water using electricity generated by wind and solar. The idea is to use the excess electricity produced when the wind blows and the sun shine to produce hydrogen and store it for when wind and solar cannot meet demand. This is a plan that will likely work but it would be much simpler if they would just build more nuclear plants and that way they wouldn't have to destroy the ground water in China and Africa in mining, processing and burying the materials needed to build wind and solar and then buy all of their windmills and solar panels from people who use slave and child labor.

Gender dysphoria

Up until a few years ago most people had never heard of transgenderism. There is a medical condition known as gender dysphoria where a person has a sense of unease that there is a mismatch between their biological sex and their gender identity. This first occurs at ages 2 to 4 and more often in males. According to Black's Medical Dictionary, gender dysphoria occurs in one in 30,000 male births and one in 100,000 female births. If left alone 70% will out grow this but the rest either are gay or transsexual. In 2007 the first gender clinic was founded and today there are 300 and growing. In 2017 15,000 were diagnosed with gender dysphoria and in 2021 the number was 42,000. One of the reasons for the increase is that many teen girls exhibit problems like bulimia, cutting, depression and attempted suicide are diagnosed with gender dysphoria. There is a serious problem with data on transgender. As stated about gender dysphoria occurs one in 65,000 births and there 3.5 million births which means 53 babies born each year with gender dysphoria. However another report from Mt Sinai hospital says an estimated 1.4 million people in the U.S. are transgender, which comes at a heavy price. The cost of medical treatments can add up to more than $100,000. One of these reports is wrong or there are many more people falsely diagnosed. An argument against these early diagnoses is that a young girl may just be going through a stage and someone steps in and tells her the solution to her problem is to change genders. This is all so new that caution should be used before making irreversible life altering changes.

Coal power

The replacement of coal fired power plants should have been underway for 60 years but it has stalled because of the unfounded fears of nuclear. If you compare a 1000 MW nuclear plant with a 1000 MW coal plant you will see why. A nuclear plant produces 35 cubic feet of waste per year. That is five 55 gallon drums. This material is safely stored either on site or off site. A coal plant of similar size produces 300,000 tons of ash and 6 million tons of CO2 and kills up to seven million people per year from air pollution. The new small nuclear reactors are designed to use up spent fuel so the storage problem can be eliminated. Although nuclear power plants have been operating in the US for 60 years there has never been anyone injured or killed. The fossil fuel industry has portrayed nuclear power as dangerous and lately the wind and solar people have been doing the same. They both see nuclear as a competitor. The people are slowly waking up to the fact that the solution to climate change is nuclear.

Asian students

The goal of many parts of today's society is something called equity which means equal results but the origin of this idea is something called disparate impact. This means using actual data around a situation and adjusting the results to meet a certain goal. For example. In a given city too many Blacks are being arrested so the decisions is made to remove some of the officers in the Black part of town. Or if the data shows that Blacks commit a disproportionate number of felonies then the district attorney's will not prosecute certain crimes in order to bring down the number of arrest. Some feel that the arrest are made based on race but data does not show that. In fact data shows that many cities have quit using red light cameras to catch people going through red lights because too many of them were Black. Years ago test scores for police and firemen applicants were adjusted based on race and more recently the MCAT test scores for medical school were race adjusted. The country is continuing down the path of replacing meritocracy with mediocrity while China and India keep pushing students to achieve more based solely on merit. Achievement is actually punished in some ways. Asian students are treated differently because they are such over achievers. Stuyvesant high school is the premier school in NY City and since 70% of their students are Asian Americans they are going to reduce their entrance requirements in the name of diversity.

Race 1960

I grew up in Springfield, IL a typical mid west town with a population of about 75,000. Our town, like all of the towns in those days was segregated by race. The Blacks, which represented about 10% of the population, lived in one part of town. For that reason they all went to one high school. I lived in a all white working class neighborhood where most people worked in factories or coal mines. Each neighborhood had its own grocery stores, theaters, drug stores and hardware stores. There was a down town area in the city but people rarely went down town so we never had the opportunity to mix with people from other parts of town. I went to an all boys high school which drew students from across town but in our school of 400 students there was only one Black student or more precisely brown student and we never considered him as different. This was because it cost $90 per year tuition. There was very little understanding of how people in different parts of town related to one another which meant we knew next to nothing about the Blacks. I was the exception to the rule because my Dad was a milkman and his route was in the Black area. On Saturdays and during summer I would go on his route with him and so I did get a little knowledge about the Black people. I am ten years older than the oldest baby boomers so I was able to watch as they came on the scene. They were appalled at their parents view of race. In my day we got our news from the radio and the local news paper but all that changed when the baby boomers got into high school because of TV. This brought news from around the world and soon pictures of Blacks being mistreated were a daily affair. The young people assumed their parents knew of this mistreatment and did nothing about it when in fact they didn't know. Instead of seeing their parents as they became known, the Greatest Generation, they saw them as racist. This led to the anti establishment liberalism of the 1960's which led to the civil rights movement and to the Great Society.

Schools districts

As President Biden gears up for his campaign he doesn't say much about crime, inflation and the border but his main concern is protecting freedom. It is not that easy to discern what that means but best guess is protecting the freedom of abortion, of being transgender, of being gay and gay marriage. Most Americans agree with those choices but prefer that they remain private decisions and not be taught in schools. Most Americans oppose book burning but do oppose certain books that promote certain sexual preferences in schools. Most Americans are protective of what is taught in schools and prefer the subject matter be limited to the three R's, the areas where the teachers have their expertise. If the schools feel it necessary to teach sexual preference they should bring in teachers who specialize in those areas and the courses should be electives. Most feel this is the responsibility of parents and the teachers also feel that way. Controversial issues like sharing bathrooms and showers with transgender students should be determined locally by parents in those districts. This will be added to the responsibilities that school districts already have. School districts determine how their students will meet the standards and benchmarks by developing courses and curriculum. School districts also decide which evidence based instructional techniques are to be used and take on the responsibility to train and support educators in using those instructional techniques.

Biden 24

Biden announced his run for a second term this AM and he said very little about what he would do but talked at length about how he will stop the republicans. His theme was lets finish the job but he failed to mention what the job was. Normally an incumbent runs on his record but Biden chose to ignore that and talk about how republicans want to cut social programs, limiting voting access, taking away abortion rights, voting rights, LGBT rights and banning books. This is the strategy since he would rather avoid the issues that polls say are important to people, things like inflation, crime and the border. This now lets the press know what to do and they will put the issues of inflation, crime and the border on the back burner. The press will continue their constant tirade against all things Trump and Biden can stay on the side lines preforming the duties of president and let the press campaign for him. Unless Biden's health deteriorates he should win re-election. The only thing standing in the way is how well the republican ground game can harvest ballots.

Adams

Mayor Adams of NY City recently had an Epiphany when it comes to migrants. He championed New York's sanctuary city status until the migrant started coming to town. Then he asked Biden for help. He says the 56,000 migrants have cost the city $4.3 billion dollars and the city needs federal aid. If his figures are correct just do a little math and discover that is $76,000 per migrant. Extrapolating that number to the 5.5 million who have crossed the border since Biden took office the total cost balloons to $418 billion dollars. The point is that Adams was not concerned when thousands of migrants were over running border towns in Texas but as soon as they sent a few his way he changed his thinking. It's the old story about walk in my shoes.

Do as I say

The average home size in the US was going up from 2000 to 2015 and then started down but the last two years begin going up again. The average home size today is 2,400 sq ft more than double since 1950. 80% of all new car sales are SUV's and small trucks. This just 15 years ago was 50%. Since 1970 meat consumption has increased by 50%. The average commute time has been going up for many years and continues to go up. People are taking longer road trips than ever before. All of these things show what Americans think about climate change. They say it is a problem but their actions belie their words.

Allyship

There is a new word in use that most people are not familiar with and the word is allyship. Allyship describes reaching out, helping, and empowering. For example, allyship could be a white manger who helps his black female coworker achieve a promotion. This sounds different from a manager who reaches out to help subordinates to achieve success based on their performance. This could mean bypassing a more qualified person based on skin color. This is an attempt to equalize the playing field by replacing ability with other qualities. It happens when the boss promotes someone that he likes over a more qualified person. While this occurs is it something to be encouraged. Even nepotism is not considered good business practice. This is another example of equity. Equity smacks of mediocrity instead of meritocracy. It means bringing someone up while bringing someone else down. The recent move by the administration to place an extra charge on home buyers who have good credit and lower the requirements for buyers with poor credit. Is this an acceptable way to make up for past real or perceived mistreatment. Is this good for America. These are questions worth asking.

Made in China

About 20 years ago China had the insight to recognize that materials needed for EV's would see a large increase in demand so they looked around the world and discovered that one of these materials, cobalt, could be found in Central Africa. They went to Africa and with the permission of the local government began to mine cobalt. These mines contain 70% of the worlds cobalt. Now China, the country that uses the slave labor of the Uyghurs, had no problem using child labor to mine this cobalt. They then ship the cobalt ore to China where they process the ore adding additional contaminants such as hydrochloric, sulfuric and nitric acid to the environment. So far the US press has been willing to overlook these problems under the assumption that China will export the cobalt to the US to make EV's here but some see a different outcome. They see China restricting the cobalt for their own use and exporting EV's. Once again Elon Musk was alert and makes more than half of his Tesla's in China. As the world moves toward wind and solar it should be noted that most of the wind turbines, solar panels and EV's are made in China and all the while it uses coal generated power to make this products. Are we to believe that the US leadership is unaware of all this. Once again the evidence shows the new green deal to be about social change not climate change.

Abortions by state

It is very difficult to get accurate information by states on abortions. One site shows a map where all abortions are banned and Idaho is on the list but reading further the ban is limited. Abortion has been banned at all stages of pregnancy in Idaho since August — a result of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Terminating a pregnancy is illegal in the state unless it saves the life of the mother or in cases of rape and incest Seven states have no restrictions on abortions. It is estimated that 400 to 500 live births are aborted and many feel this number is low because the tendency is to not report. These extremes are what the press thrives on but they distort the normal distribution of abortions. 90% of all abortions occur before 13 weeks. The normal gestation period is 40 weeks. While this is small conciliation to those who believe a babies life begins at conception it does show the problem in a different light. Only one percent of abortions happen after 21 weeks. About 93% of reported abortions in 2019 were performed at or before 13 weeks of pregnancy, 6% were conducted between 14 and 20 weeks and 1% were performed at or after 21 weeks, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In time the laws will be determined by the people in each state and they will change as time passes. The current trend indicates that most will settle on 15 weeks.

Election 24

A NY Times article says the Dems have unified around Biden. The Dems yearn for a fresh new face but they don't have one. The campaign will not be about the border, crime or inflation but as one Dem congressman says, the fight against fascism, racism and sexism, the old standbys of the party. This will divide the country based on these isms with little concern about policy. It will be a repeat of the 2020 campaign with the emphasis on Trumps personality. Biden will have limited back and forth with the press and they will carry out is complaints about isms. The only way there will be debates is if Biden can get some pick me up help from his doctor. Cholinesterase inhibitors are prescribed to treat symptoms related to memory, thinking, language, judgment and other thought processes. These can slow down dementia. Many are concerned that out of 339 million people Trump and Biden are the best we have. If Biden wins the country will continue down the wind and solar path which leads further away from nuclear.

Rebuild

The modern version of globalization began after WW 2 when the United States owned the oceans and kept shipping safe. This allowed countries around the globe to begin trading on a large scale. The open trade was promoted by the US in order to contain communism. One of the results was that over one billion people were lifted out of poverty. In winning WW 2 the US saved the world from Fascism and Nazism and followed that up with rebuilding Europe and Japan and followed that up with rebuilding the far East. Today countries like China, Vietnam and South Korea have thriving economies because of globalization but that is all coming to an end and each country will now have to fend for itself. The countries with large working age populations like the US will do well but those with aging populations like Europe, Japan and China will be the losers. The US will continue to shorten its supply chains by building plants in Mexico and using Mexican workers. New manufacturing facilities will be built in the US and this will bring rising wages for middle income groups. This will be an opportunity for a rebirth of the union movement in the US.

Carbon capture

The reason the US has lowered its CO2 emissions is because the country changed coal fired power plants over to natural gas. The Biden administration is planning to roll out aggressive new rules to regulate planet-warming pollution from natural gas power plants The rules have not yet been released but insiders say it will be about carbon capture. That means adding scrubbers to the exhaust to clean and sequester the CO2. This will add about five cents per KW hr. The current cost in MN is 13 cents which averages out to $154 per month. This means the new cost will be $213. This $59 per month will not effect wealthy people but it will hurt the poor especially retired poor living on social security. Add this to the new tail pipe rules for gasoline powered cars and the push is on for more wind and solar. The US will clean up its carbon while China will be building more coal plants so they can have the power to mine rare earths, build EV batteries and build wind mills and solar panels. All of this is just one more reason to go nuclear.

DEI

Last year US companies paid experts $3.4 billion dollars to come in and train employees on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). It has its roots in the 1960's civil rights movement and has grown to include gender, sexual orientation, religion and country of origin. Virtually all Fortune 500 companies offer diversity training to their employees. Yet surprisingly few of them have measured its impact. That's unfortunate, considering evidence has shown the diversity training can backfire, eliciting defensiveness from the very people who might benefit most. And even when the training is beneficial, the effects may not last after the program ends. An extensive study of 10,000 employees revealed the following. We found very little evidence that diversity training affected the behavior of men or white employees overall—the two groups who typically hold the most power in organizations and are often the primary targets of these interventions. Even though companies realize that this training is not effective, they do it for the appearance of doing something. This is what is called in today's vernacular, virtue signaling.

Nukes

Governments around the world are waking up to the fact that nuclear power is the answer and they are investing large sums of money into the planning and building of nuclear reactors. The new deal in nuclear is small modular reactors (SMR's). Small because they are less than 300 megawatts (MW) and the average nuclear plant currently operating is 1000 megawatts. Modular because they are produced on an assembly line and hauled to the use site on a semi truck. The most popular types are molted salt reactors (MSR's). As the need for more power develops additional modular units are added. The fuel is either uranium or thorium and the fuel is mixed in with liquid salt where the reaction takes place. There is no need for high pressure water which eliminates the concern about pressure and they do not need to be placed near any water supply since they use no water. Most use a heated gas like helium to drive the generators. They operate at higher temperatures which means more efficient heat transfer to the generators. New fuel is constantly added as the old is used up which means if the power is lost the fuel feed stops and the plant shuts down. This is called walk away safe because no action is needed if the power is lost. In addition if the salt gets too hot the reactions stops until the salt cools down. These modular units are placed near the use site which eliminates the need for long transmission lines. They take up a much smaller place than the existing plants. They can use up store nuclear waste and produce much less waste than existing plants. Both uranium and thorium can be mined without damaging the environment. The only thing standing in the way of an all out push is the green deal dream of social change and people are slowly waking up to the fact that they have been misled by the greenies.

Sex Ed

Many parents dread "the talk" when their children begin to ask questions and they must cover the birds and bees. Responsible parents just add that to the many things that parenting entails. This brings up the question why any teacher would want to get involved in these types of conversations with their students. It seems the best approach is to refer such inquires to the parents. Going a step further why would teachers get involved in more complicated issues like gender changing or sexual preference. Teachers are not trained to answer such questions and would much prefer to stick to their particular academic subjects. When students ask for information about religion or politics they should defer to parents. It can be very confusing if teachers say one thing about an issue and parents say another. The teacher can say that their job is to sick to their subject matter and refer other topics to parents. Teachers are not trained to answer questions outside of their field of expertise but there is a class called Health for third year high school student discuss many of the these issues. In addition some schools teach sex education and here are the teacher requirements. What credentials are needed to teach sex education. BA degree plus four years of professional experience as a sexuality educator. A minimum of one thousand hours of professional experience as sexuality educator, in not under two years and not over five years prior to certification, will be documented by the applicant.

France

France like the US runs a budget deficit and they are taking steps to correct the situation. France spends 15% of its budget on social security and wants to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. The people are protesting. As a comparison the US spends 52% of its budget on social security and several years ago raised the retirement age from 65 to 67. In France social security includes healthcare so if we add in Medicare to the US social security that brings the total to 72% which is almost five times more than what France spends. The problem in France is the same throughout Europe in that they have to many older people and too few workers. In 1960 they had 4 people contributing to social security for each retiree but today that figure is 1.7. Add to that the fact that it is the young working people who are also the consumers and less consumption means a slow down in economic growth. It takes 20 years for population growth to catch up but France has a birthrate of 1.8 births per woman and it takes 2.1 to stay even so France will not catch up and in fact they will get further behind. There are two ways out of this dilemma, innovation or immigration. Unlike the United States the large Muslim immigrant population is not assimilating making immigration a problem.

Mines

While China has most of the rare earth metals used in modern electronics they not only mine the ore they process the ore into usable metals. Countries, including the United States, sends ore to China for processing. China also mines materials needed for EV batteries but they receive some ore from Australia and Africa and then they process the ore into materials needed for the batteries. In the final step they manufacture the batteries. The administration has stated that 50% of all cars must be electric by 2030. There are currently 2 million EV's in the US among the 280 million cars. Not counting any new growth over the next eight years it means that the number of electric cars must increase from 2 million to 140 million. That represents a 70 fold increase. Just looking at cobalt as one of the metals needed the problem is brought into focus. 70% of the worlds supply of cobalt comes from the Congo in Africa. As of 2022 there are 255,000 Congolese mining for cobalt, 40,000 are children, some as young as six years old. A 70 fold increase means 2.8 million children working in the mines. This job entails having children pick up rocks and put them in bags and then placing the bags on a truck. Are people who are driving EV's and promoting EV's aware of these cobalt mines.

Speech

Many conservatives remain fearful of expressing their thoughts on various issues. To disagree with the accepted opinion on many issues shows a lack of compassion or may mean facing charges of some type of bigotry. What is not often talked about are liberals who fear expressing their opinions on various issues. For example many liberals are upset with the border or crime or with the Ukraine war but they remain quiet. Many more think that teaching gender changing to children and having men dressed as women dancing in grade schools is inappropriate but they remain quiet. Free speech is under attack against both liberals and conservatives.

Mexico trade

Japanese, South Korean and Chinese companies are building manufacturing facilities in Mexico to get closer to the US market something called nearshoring. Chinese also escape the US import tax on Chinese goods by claiming made in Mexico. This practice has made Mexico the US largest trade partner. There are more goods coming across the border at Laredo than at Long Beach and LA combined. This is also encouraged by the new NAFTA deal. China's economy is heavily on US consumers and businesses.

Taxes

The words fair share are tossed around loosely when it comes to income tax. Most people are OK with raising taxes on someone else which makes it difficult to determine what is fair. Here are some facts. The top one percent of taxpayers pay 42.3% of all the taxes but they only earn 26.3% of the income. The bottom 90% of taxpayers pay 26% of the taxes but they earn 50% of the income. In 1980 the top 1% earned 9% of the income and paid 17% of the taxes. The bottom 90% earned 68% of the income and paid 52% of the taxes. The biggest reasons for this turn around are the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit.

National debt

Republicans, led by Speaker McCarthy, are proposing spending cuts before lifting the debt ceiling. Why are they doing such a foolish thing when the alternative is just to keep spending. Does McCarthy think that given the choice the American people would prefer cuts in benefits vs adding new benefits. Polls show that the people are concerned about the rising debt but no one wants to give up any of their benefits to help solve the problem. Everyone wants someone else to give up their benefits. If he wants to cut benefits here are the only places he is allowed to cut. Government employee (bureaucrats), medical care for veterans, grant programs for education and research and low income assistance. It is a ploy to show rich people who are not dependent on government help that he wants to reduce the national debt. He is going nowhere with this. People got their Covid checks and now they are looking for more not less.

Computers

Some people are concerned that computers may be getting ahead of their creators and this has a lot to do with the speed in which the new computers operate. The rate of development of these new computers is mind boggling. On January 1, 2018 when the first version of Chat GPT came out it operated at a speed of 17,000 petaflops. A petaflop is one thousand million million operations per second. On March 15 of this years version four of Chat GPT came out with a speed of 22 billion petaflops. The speed increased from 17,000 to 22 billion in four years. What does the future hold and that is what scares some people. The word mind boggling is not hyperbole when you try to understand what one thousand million million times 22 billion is.

Climate stuff

In case people were not convinced that the new green deal was about social change under the guise of climate change here is the new new green deal introduced yesterday by Senator Ed Markey and Rep Cortez. "We have demonstrated that our movement is a potent political force, and in the run-up to the 2024 elections, we will direct this power to demanding solutions to the intersectional crises Congress has yet to address: in health care, child care, schools, housing, transit, labor, and economic and racial justice," the Massachusetts lawmaker continued. The estimated cost for this plan is $94 trillion. It does not say where the money will come from but past reports tell us that Cortez is a believer in Modern Monetary Theory so this suggest the Fed will just create the money. In case you are not familiar with the term intersectional here is the Oxford Dictionary definition. the interconnected nature of social categorisations such as race, class and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantaged. That gobbledygook doesn't sound much like climate change.

Law and order

I saw a tee shirt on a young basketball player that said, "it takes more than talent". We live in a competitive world and those who are willing to develop their skills will benefit. This is sometimes called a meritocracy and that is exemplified by the American Dream of home ownership. This whole concept is being challenged by a new idea called equity. Based on the constitutional concept that all men are created equal, equality meant equal opportunity. The country has fallen short of this promise but the new idea has given up on trying to achieve equal opportunity and is now pushing the new idea of equity. A good example of this new way of looking at things can be seen in the NY City DA Alvin Bragg. He campaigned on the promise of equity in law enforcement and he is now implementing that promise. He has declared that he will not prosecute cases of theft because he feels these are people who are left out of society and are just trying to catch up. He says if you are hungry you will steal food. While Bragg's empathy and compassion are to be admired, it is an injustice to the victims of theft and if each DA starts to enforce the laws based on his personal feelings the idea of law and order will cease to exist. Not surprising all to many of these thieves who are prosecuted become repeat offenders.

Students

There are reports coming almost daily about how climate change is traumatizing children. This is the result of what they learn in school but they are not told the whole story. The Greenies push wind and solar as the solution but they rarely tell the part about how the mining and processing of rare earth metals harms the planet. They never talk about the ecological problems associated with disposing of all those same metals. Here is a way to get the kids involved with a test to determine how important they believe climate change is. One of the rare earth metals is indium. This is used to create touch screens. How many students would give up this convenience and go back to pushing up and down arrows. This is a small price to pay to protect the drinking water for 150 million Chinese. Would these same children forgo the batteries needed for windmills if they knew that there were 40,000 children much like them working in the cobalt mines in Africa. Were they informed about these children in the schools. When you as a teacher only tell half the story you are following the CRT method of teaching. You tell the students how terrible the Native Americans without teaching about how the lives of these people have improved over the past 100 years. One of the most common ways to mislead people is not lying but by leaving out part of the story.

MN nukes

There are 449 nuclear reactors operating in the the world today with 96 in the United States and 60 new plants are under construction. For each terewatt-hour of energy generated there are 32 deaths due to accidents and air pollution but the figure for nuclear energy is .07 and that includes the deaths in Fukushima and Chernobyl. The new small nuclear reactors shut down safely when power is lost. In additions they produce smaller amounts of waste and can use up existing stored waste. Nuclear takes up much less space and uses much shorter transmission lines. Nuclear is as safe as wind and solar but needs no back up power source. Nuclear does not destroy the earth because it needs no rare earth metals. Nuclear is making a come back but the national press hasn't figured that out yet. Here is an example of where MN stands. Some state lawmakers and clean energy advocates think it's time to reconsider whether modern nuclear technology should be part of Minnesota's future. It has finally occurred to them that wind and solar need backup and since fossil fuel cannot be considered they are left with only one alternative. It was Minnesota lawmakers who decided in 1994 to ban the construction of nuclear power plants.

Whistle

An interesting case has come to the attention of the public regarding the investigation of Hunter Biden's tax complaint. An IRS supervisory special agent has come forth asking for whistle blower protection. He has alleged mishandling and political interference in the ongoing Hunter investigation. The interesting part is the allegation that a senior political appointee gave false information to congress. The speculation is that this person is non other than Attorney General Merrick Garland. This means that the Justice Department will have to investigate the head of the Justice Department. Even if this whistle blower has smoking gun evidence any investigation will be delayed during which time this whistle blower will be totally destroyed by allegations of all sorts of misdeeds some of which may be true. The case will then shift to investigating the whistle blower and will drag on for months and in time the country will move on to bigger and better things. It will end up like the list of visitors to Epstein's sex island. If Biden is re-elected the whole case will be forgotten as a new Attorney General will be appointed. If these allegations concerning Hunter are true it will force Biden to run again.

Drones

It was revealed yesterday that 2,500 US drones were sent to Ukraine and some of them were flown into Russia. 700 of those were Switchblade drones which are suicide drones that just crash into the target. While some US supplied weapons have been used to retake Ukrainian territory captured by the Russians this is the first time such weapons have been sent into Russia proper. Is this a test incursion or an escalation.

Afghan

White House spokesman John Kirby said he saw no chaos when the US pulled out of Afghan. There were hundreds of people chasing an airplane down the runway some even hanging on to the plane. There were people handing babies over a barrier into the arms of American soldiers, there was suicide bomber exploding his bomb in a large crowd of people at the airport trying to leave the country. The bomb killed many Afghans and 13 US troops. Hundreds of American citizens were left behind along with 78,000 Afghan allies many were interpreters whose lives were in danger. Now we find out that much of the $8 billion in aid to the Afghan people may be going to the Taliban. Perhaps chaos is not the right word but what is.

Lithium

The government is pushing the use of EV's as a way to fight climate change. This means a large increase in the number of lithium batteries. Lithium is processed in China where most EV batteries are made. This means that China will be using their coal fired power plants to process and manufacture lithium batteries to send to the US where they will be used in EV cars. This pretty much tells the story of the green new deal.

China policy

There are three distinct groups of chips. Some are high end and produced mostly in Taiwan and less so in the US. Middle chips are produced in South Korea, Japan and the US. The low end chips are mostly made in China. Just as important, are the machines that make the chips and these are mostly manufactured in the Netherlands by a company called ASML and these are already prohibited from sales to China. The new Chips Act restricts foreign chip manufacturers from selling chips to China or providing them with the technology to make them. This is a severe blow to China's ability to develop advanced electronic products. In addition the US currently imposes a 25% tax on $250 billion of imports from China and a 7.5% tax on another $112 billion of imports. But most troubling of all to China is the fact that the US is moving away from globalization and bringing manufacturing back home. Meanwhile China is stuck with its own economic problems. The vast real estate developments of the last 20 years have over built and are many buildings sit empty. On top of that China has an extreme shortage of workers. The one thing that can save China is the production of wind mills, solar panels and EV's. China has a lock on the mining of the materials needed and controls most of the processing these materials. If the west moved toward nuclear power this would be the final nail in the coffin for China.

Minors

Nearly 130,000 unaccompanied migrant children entered the US in 2022 and the government has lost track of many thousands. Where are they? Some are working. Recent investigations by the NY Times have found migrant children as young as 12 working in chicken plants and slaughterhouses, making car parts, packaging snacks, operating hazardous machinery and construction roof, all in violation of child labor laws. This may be the least problem. The US Department of State estimates between 14,500 and 17,500 victims are trafficked within the United States each year. An estimated 72% of these victims are immigrants. This is on top of the problems these children face while making the 1,000 mile trip across Mexico.

FBI

When the FBI went to the FISA court to get permission to surveil Carter Page they were refused. Later they went back with the additional information in the Steel dossier and received the warrant. It was later discovered that the dossier contained un-varifyable information which made it unacceptable for a warrant. The dossier was the product of a Democratic operation from April 2016 to December 2016 and was focused on getting dirt on Trump. This sort of thing is common and called operational research. Christopher Steel, a former spy, was hired to prepare the dossier and thus the name. It contained allegations of misconduct, conspiracy and cooperation between Trump and the Russian government. The dossier's 17 reports allege that Trump campaign members and Russian operatives had conspired to cooperate in Russian election interference to benefit Trump. The US intelligence community took the allegations seriously and the FBI investigated every line of the dossier and identified and spoke with at least two of Steele's sources. The DNC and the Clinton campaign, working through their attorney Marc Elias. In April 2016, Elias hired Fusion GPS to perform research on Trump and they paid Fusion one million dollars. The FBI relied on the Steele debunked dossier inserting key parts from it into their application to the FISA court. Agents did this without telling the court that wording was taken directly from a political rumor sheet paid for by the Clinton campaign.

AI

Through out history writings of various forms like speeches, pamphlets and books have influenced public behavior. The pen is mightier than the sword. Lincoln's Gettysburg address, Common Sense by Thomas Paine or Books like Silent Spring, Mein Kamph, The Communist Manifesto by Marx or the Bible are all examples of how words can change the world. Sometimes the change is for the good and sometime not. With the onset of AI a computer may one day have access to every thing that was ever written. It can also have everything that was ever written about how the world reacted to what was written. It can then be directed to write something that will influence human behavior in a particular direction. This is just one of the dangers of AI run amok. It is necessary that some controls be installed to avoid misuse. In a small way some of this is already happening. Algorithms in use on social media promote disharmony, divide people into groups and promote racism and hatred.

Nukes

Nuclear reactors only use a small amount of the fuel that is introduced to the system but thorium reactors use 40 times more of its fuel compared to uranium reactors meaning more fuel efficiency, less fuel to mine and far less spent fuel to store. In addition thorium reactors can use up stored fuel from old uranium reactors.

Audits

The IRS has received $80 billion dollars and some of this money will be used to hire new auditors but most of it will be used to hire new employees and upgrade computer systems. The big accounting firms are having a difficult time finding auditors so it will not be an easy task for the IRS. In addition training an auditor to handle low and middle income returns is relatively easy but handling the returns of wealthy people takes a lot more training. The most likely group to be audited are the 25 million people who claim the EITC. These are easy audits mostly on people who earn less than $20,000 per year and many times can be done by mail. Most people collecting EITC do not earn enough to owe taxes but they get an average credit of $2,000. The cheating happens when people claim children they do not have. They use false social security numbers. Most wealthy people have trained accountants to do their taxes and to audit these accounts takes special training and a lot of time. If you are a millionaire your chance of being audited is 2.3 out of a thousand but if you are a low wage earner claiming the EITC your chances of being audited are 13 out of a thousand.

Murders

Following the George Floyd murder in May of 2020 there was a large increase in the number of murders in the Black community. In 2019 7,484 Blacks were murdered and in 2020 that number rose to 9,941. In 2020 7,043 Whites were murdered. This is 2,898 fewer than Blacks even though the population is of Blacks is 13% and Whites 68%. 95% of Blacks were murdered by other Blacks. During 2020, 177 Blacks were killed by police. This should be a civil rights issue but it is rarely covered in the press. Most of these Blacks were young men and no one seems to care.

Defund

After Black Lives Matter protesters demanded that cities “Defund the police,” San Francisco Mayor London Breed held a press conference to announce that her city would be one of the first to do exactly that. Breed cut $120 million from the budgets of both San Francisco’s police and sheriff’s departments. This resulted in an increase in crime and the people revolted and ejected the district attorney along with three school board members. Hundreds of officers left and the worst is yet to come. SFPD will be short 825 officers by the end of 2022. Mayor is now refunding the police and asking Washington for help. This same thing happened to many cities across the country including right here in Minneapolis. Here not only did they defund the police but there was a vote to replace the police with some type of social program. Fortunately that was defeated at the ballot box. President Biden is fond of saying he never said defund the police but he did agree to reallocate funds away from the police department. Sounds like a matter of semantics. Did these people take the time to think ahead as to what would happen if they defunded the police.

Leaks

The news is covering the leak of sensitive materials and talking about what was leaked but not about the governments misleading remarks. The leaked information revealed that NATO has 97 troops including 14 US troops in Ukraine. Here are the top people telling the public that there are no US troops on the ground. Kirby: There are no plans to put US troops in Ukraine at this time. There are no discussions or conversations or plans or speculations for troops. Biden has been very clear on the point: US troops will not be sent to Ukraine to take part in conflict. This is government speak. Kirby said no plans at the time he made that statement Biden said they would not take part in conflict. What is conflict is sort of like what the definition of is is. This kind of double speak is what happens when you talk war.

Climate

People in the western hemisphere are very concerned about global warming or so they say. Germany has been leading the way in conversion to wind and solar and the people praise the government for the transfer away from fossil fuels. Suddenly when the cost to heat the home goes up the people have a change of heart. They demand that the government do something so the government is helping home owners with their heating bills. In addition Germany is reopening 6 coal fired power plants and these plants use lignite which is the dirties coal available. They have accepted the idea that global warming is destroying the planet but that is not quite as important as keeping the house warm. The government has requested that people set their thermostats at 19 degree C which is 66 degrees F, hardly a temperature that you could freeze. Global warming like many problems looks different when it directly effects you.

Press

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was famous for saying, it's not what you don't know that will hurt you but what you don't know you don't know and that is the situation the country is facing in regards to the war in Ukraine. The country has homeless people sleeping on the streets in major cities because they are addicts and/or mentally ill but we can send $115 billion dollars off to Ukraine with no questions asked. That is only possible because the military industrial complex in partnership with the press and the backing of Wall Street have deemed it so and the people all follow along because they are kept in the dark about what is going on. The recent leaks have put a small dent in this master plan but will soon be covered up and forgotten. Little by little the world is being drawn into a major conflict and the voters are kept out of the loop. Get ready for more misleading information from the press, "the guardians of liberty".

Leaker

The story about the 21 year old who leaked secret information has people wondering what ever happened to the free press, the media that functions as a watchdog and investigates and reports on government wrongdoing. The press uncovered this guy and instead of hiding his identity and trying to get more information from him they turned him over to the pentagon. Then their questions were all about how did this happen and what is being done to make sure it doesn't happen again. Why didn't they question the government about the misinformation that has been disseminated to the public about the war. What about the contradictions that are revealed in the leaks. It appears that the Washington Post has additional information they have not released and that they are releasing info on a selective basis. What else is going. In recent years the press has been accused by some as partnering with the administration and this just adds fuel to that argument. The White House responded by asking people not to read about this. The White House has responded to a cache of leaked US intelligence documents on the Ukraine prosy war by discouraging the public from reading them.

Green Washing

As if there aren't enough problems with green energy, California has a separate problem and it is called Green Washing. When you have a source of green energy say like solar panels, you do not get energy when you need it and later you get more than you can use. For example the sun rises and you start to produce energy and by mid afternoon you are producing more than you need. For each megawatt of green energy you receive a green energy certificate. The certificate is uncoupled from the energy so you can sell your excess green energy and keep the certificate. You sell to an out of state producer of brown energy. Later you buy back energy from them that is brown but you have the certificates that say it is green. You sell to local energy companies as green and they charge an extra fee for green. The customers feel they are doing the right thing going green so they don't mind paying a higher price. The same thing happens with wind because sometimes wind farms produce more than you can use and other times less. It even happens to hydro because certain times of the year the water levels are high and more energy is produced and later when water levels are low there is less energy produced. This is going on but it is kept out of the public domain. As of now it is the only way California can prevent brown outs or black outs so no one wants to bring it up. Ignorance is bliss.

Leakers

People who release classified info later become known as whistle-blowers as opposed to traitors. Here is what CNN said about Daniel Ellsberg in 1971. "Speaking truth to power: Ellsberg's legacy of courage and conscience. Here is the consensus about Edward Snowden. 55% of the people believe Snowden did the right thing and the ACLU petitioned Obama to pardon him. The latest to release classified info is a 21 year old who showed that once again the government is misleading the public. Will he later be judged a hero or a villain. Government always justify lying as national security but people are not satisfied with that explanation.

America

The world should be thankful that the United States military belongs to the US. Think for a minute how other countries might use such power. Start with the little dictator in North Korea and move on to the Ayatollah's in Iran and today even China and Russia. Would other countries show the restraint that the US has shown. Since 1990 the US has been the single super power and the US has not expanded its territory. Even at the end of WW 2 where the Soviets took all of Eastern Europe the US took nothing. The US instead sent money, equipment and engineers to rebuild Europe. In spite of this there are many in America who see this country as some kind of evil empire. This is the country that has the largest immigrant population in the world. Currently 50 million people living here are foreign born. This is more than the next ten countries combined. In addition these immigrants come from all parts of the globe. The US is truly a melting pot. Recent polls show that there are 160 million people who want to come to America.

China US

President Biden has been accused of being in bed with China based on reports that his son Hunter received money from Chinese firms but the facts do not bear that out. First off, Biden kept the import taxes that Trump imposed on China. Next he signed the Chips Act to provide high tech innovation for the chips of the future. China manufactures low tech chips and they need high tech chips for innovation. Innovation is particularly important to a country like China where they have a fast disappearing work force because of demographics and therefor need innovation to increase productivity. The four leading countries producing high tech chips are Taiwan, South Korea, Japan and the United States. These countries are all aligned with the west and viewed as competitors to China. As the west continues the policy of decoupling from China, care should be taken that China is not forced into a military solution as a solution to their economic problems.

Decoupling

When President Trump placed import taxes on Chinese goods, he started what has become known as decoupling. It is a move by the west to move away from dependence on Chinese manufacturing and to begin the process of bring things back home called onshoring. China for many years used the unfair practice of subsidizing industry to run the competition out of business. The one area that is currently causing the most concern is what are called API's (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients). China produces more than 2,000 API molecules and has more than 1,000 manufacturing facilities. China is the source of 40% of the Global API's. Another area where the US has thwarted China is in 5G. China's company Huawei was going to install their version of 5G across the world but Trump intervened and convinced the west to stay away from Huawei based on security reasons. Adding pressure to decoupling is China's recent moves toward Russia and their threats to Taiwan. This movement will be slow but as concern for fragile supply chains and possible shortages of critical materials rise the move will quicken. The current US policy toward China is called containment but they avoid using that word as it is used by China to indicate that the US has an aggressive plan to undermine the Chinese economy whereas the truth is that the US merely wants to reduced its dependence on Chines imports which will in fact hurt the Chinese economy. It is the difference in motivation that causes the misunderstanding of what containment means. For 40 years the US relationship with China was economic but today it is a national security issue.

Secrets

When you are given secret information and asked to keep it secret it may be difficult for some and impossible for others. If you tell anyone tell them not to tell is the old give away. The more important the information the more the pressure is on to share it. When Mary's friends know that her husband Jim is fooling around it is tough for her friends to keep quiet. If Joe knows his good friend Bob will be losing his job in a month it is tough for him not to tell Bob. That is why it is amazing that there are over one million Americans who have top secret clearances and yet we have so few occasions when information is made public. My guess is that many people are sharing top secret information but it only becomes public on rare occasions.

India

The US is India's biggest trading partner with $102 billion imported from India last year. There are more than 1,000 American companies in India employing over one million Indians. China is India's greatest military threat and the US is India's best friend as India is a democracy. There are 200,000 Indians current enrolled in US universities where they receive the best tech education in the world. There are 2.7 million Indian Americans most of whom have higher education and are self supporting. In spite of all this India is joining forces with China, Brazil, Russia and South America to replace the US dollar as the worlds currency. The point is that all countries will do what they believe is best for their self interest. The US is beginning to understand this as the move to bring jobs home is heating up.

Zero carbon

It is often said that innovation is the key to increased productivity and that is true. Here is an idea that will solve the problem of climate change at low cost and in quick time. There are 290 coal fired power plants that have been shut down in the United States and scattered around the country. These plants have the steam powered generators intact and are connected to the grid. The old coal boilers are removed and replaced with small modular nuclear power units. These small units are made on an assembly line and brought by truck to the location. They do not need water and are walk away safe. In addition they use up old stored nuclear waste. There are 224 coal plants still in operation and scheduled to be closed in the coming years and these too could be refitted with small nuclear powered units. The next step is to replace the 1,800 natural gas power plants with small nuclear units. The entire power system in the country would then be running on nuclear energy. Zero carbon.

Mexico

As the US moves toward onshoring the southwest will be the first area to see increased economic activity since they are close to Mexico and the vast farming of California. Wages in Mexico at $5 per hour are now less than similar jobs in China. The big problem will be water. Israel uses reverse osmosis to desalt sea water and this is one solution. Another is a small thorium reactor to desalt. Trade with Mexico has been increasing for many years and last year was a record high of $780 billion. Mexico has a working age population of 90 million and growing.

Unipower

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990 there was for the first time in history a unipower world. The United States was the super power. The US then felt obligated to turn the rest of the world into a liberal democracy. Recall when the people of Iraq were going around showing off their purple thumbs proving they voted. The point is that these people weren't ready for a liberal democracy. They were still bound by the old tribal ways much like Afghanistan. After these severe blunders the US learned an important lesson, that not all countries are ready for democracy. During the super power years the US brought China out of poverty by forcing the Chinese government to allow for free markets and these markets quickly performed their magic and China is today a world power. The US is now in the process of retrenching and moving away from globalism. As China loses the US consumer market and they face their own demographic problems (too few workers) they will slip into decline. Other countries in the region, like Vietnam and South Korea will compete with China for the European market. The US with the help of Mexico will grow stronger and keep its good trade relations with Europe most importantly England. Historians call the 20th century the US century and it is shaping up that the US will also be the leader in the 21st century.

War

In 1990 when the Soviet Union collapsed there were 16 members in NATO and today there are 31 countries in NATO. Each time a new member joined it represented a closing in on Russia. At the 2008 Bucharest summit NATO said that Ukraine would eventually become a member. At the 2012 Brussels summit, NATO leaders reiterated the decision taken at the 2008 summit that Ukraine would become a member. Putin immediately announce that Ukrainian membership in NATO would be a "red line" that Moscow would not permit. In 2014 Moscow opposed any eastward expansion of NATO and Putin warned that membership would force Russia to take action. At the June 2021 Brussels summit, NATO leaders reiterated the decision taken at the 2008 Bucharest summit that Ukraine would eventually become a NATO member with the MAP as an integral part of the process, and Ukraine's right to determine its future and foreign policy without outside interference. NATO had for years set a path for Ukraine to join. Many experts now concede that if NATO had agreed that Ukraine would not be invited to join that the war could have been avoided.

Leaks

On a weekly basis the news reports confidential sources say, blah blah blah. Nothing comes of this because these are authorized leaks by the government or in other words propaganda. When the 21 year old released secret information he was arrested. That is because his leaks were not authorized. When the press gets access to confidential reports they never bother to look into why they received the information and they print it as fact.

NYC Police

Will wonders never cease? Al Sharpton says we should get tough on crime. Al Sharpton took a shot at progressive at a conference hosted by his National Action Network on Thursday, saying he's now in lockstep with Mayor Eric Adams on fighting big city crime. Anybody that tells you they're progressive but don't care about dealing with violent crimes are not , Sharpton said at the Sheraton New York hotel in Times Square. Progressive for who? As a first step New York City could add back the money they cut from the police and change the attitude of city officials toward police. In 2022, about 3,700 police left which was a 32% increase over last year. Only 2,000 new officers were hired.

Rebuild

At the end of WW 2 Europe was mostly destroyed and this was especially true in Germany. The US came to the rescue sending money and engineers to rebuild. Within 5 years Europe was back to the pre war times but with all new buildings and equipment. The post–World War II economic expansion, also known as the postwar economic boom or the Golden Age of Capitalism, was a broad period of worldwide economic expansion beginning after World War II and ending with the 1973–1975 recession If the Ukraine war ended today within five years the country could be rebuilt with all new homes and manufacturing facilities. The world would once again have the huge quantities of food and minerals which it desperately needs.

War news

While the news about the 21 year old who leaked classified information is headline stuff, it is wise to wait a few weeks to digest all that has been reported. We can use our past experience to draw some similarities. The leaked info says, contrary to what the government tells us, that Ukraine is losing the war. Harken back to the Vietnam days when the press reported on a regular basis that the we were winning. Move forward to Afghanistan where similar reports were issued. The government can lie at will and cover up by saying it evolves national security. Years later when the lies are exposed it is too late to do anything about it. Danial Ellsberg, the man who released the now famous Pentagon Papers, which showed how the government was lying about the war was charged charged with espionage. No government officials were charged for lying to the public because something as important as war is not a crime but covered by national security. The same thing will likely happen in the current case.

EV's

The whole story of EV's is rarely told. When you buy an EV the first four years you drive you are saving the carbon that was used to mine and process the materials needed to build the car especially the battery. This would be a longer time if the mines that use child labor to pick rocks by hand used machines. It doesn't include the fact that 70% of the time you charge the car you will be using power generated from fossil fuels. It also doesn't include the cost to dispose of the old battery and the harm to the environment. The $7,500 tax credit is non-refundable which means you don't get it unless you owe $7,500 in taxes which means the lower 50% of taxpayers will not qualify. Add to that most people don't like the fact that you have to wait around while charging. This paints a whole different picture about EV's than most people are familiar.

Infrastructure

Update on the infrastructure bill. The law, enacted about 100 days ago, will provide $550 billion for new federal infrastructure investments over the next five years. Roughly a fifth of the pot will be available in 2022 for a variety of projects, including roads, bridges, rail, water systems, airports, broadband and public transit. A fifth of the pot would be $110 billion. In 2022 only 6.3 billion was spent and a good guess as to why would be environmental concerns. It all goes back to Obama when he found out there were no shovel ready jobs. Here's the fear. Infrastructure projects can have significant impacts on the environment, such as deforestation, soil erosion, loss of biodiversity, and increased air and water pollution.Feb 6, 2023

War

This is from last November. President Joe Biden has repeatedly ruled out American troops fighting in Ukraine, though the U.S. and its allies provide equipment and training to Kyiv's forces. The recently released classified documents show US troops are on the ground in Ukraine The question then arises,  If there are U.S. boots on the ground in Ukraine, as these leaked documents indicate, are we closer to war with Russia than we thought? We learned the hard way during the Vietnam War that the government cannot be trusted. What's worse is when they goof and get caught they shift the blame and the cover up. They best get going on a plan to settle this war and it is up to the president to put pressure on the state department to ignore the generals and find a peaceful solution.

24

After two years of Trump the economy was growing, medium household real incomes were rising, poverty rate hit an all time low, more Americans were employed than any time in history(160 million), the unemployment rate fell to a 50 year low including Blacks, Hispanics, women and Americans without a high school diploma. The number of people seeking unemployment was the lowest ever while the average family income rose by $6,000. 7 million people were lifted off food stamps and Black home ownership from 41% to 46%. The poverty fell to a 17 year low of 11.6% and for Blacks and Hispanics the lowest level ever. The Dow increased 50%. Crime continued the downward tread started in the 90's. The illegals crossing the border were at a record low of 40,000 per month. The Abraham Accords brought 4 Arab countries together with Israel. Oil production was at record level and country was energy independent. The US dropped out of the Iran deal and put import taxes on China. Trump shifted the military emphasis toward confronting the rising power of Russia and China. He fast tracked the Covid vaccine and he lowered taxes for everyone including doubling the child tax credit from $1,000 to $2,000. He appointed three to the Supreme Court. Signed three bills to benefit Native Americans and created the Space Force. He re negotiated NAFTA. He signed into law 12 weeks of paid parental leave for federal employees. Signed the First Step Act which helped criminals rejoin society. In the upcoming election all of these facts will mean nothing to the people who dislike Trump. They are not interested in policy and are totally consumed by his personal characteristics. They are guided by their feelings and they feel he is dishonest, racist, hateful and an all around disgusting person. They are more inclined to vote for Biden whom they see as a likable person. It is not unusual for voters to be influenced by what is commonly called charisma and that leads to likability but Biden is not that charismatic. It is the overwhelming dislike for Trump that motivates the anti Trumpers.

Wire tap

Carter Page was a foreign policy adviser for Trump. On September 23, 2016 two months before the election. The FBI was investigating Page for alleged contacts with Russian officials. Page promptly left the Trump campaign. In October the FBI got a FISA warrant to surveil Page and read his emails. The FBI convinced the judge that Page was a foreign agent. As it turns out he was working for the CIA and the FBI knew nothing about it. Four years later the DOJ concluded that the sureillance was not valid because misstatements in obtaining the warrants. When the FBI was given permission to wiretap Page this opened the door to listen to everyone he talk to and in addition to those whom they talked to, These documents also tell us the FISC routinely includes authorization in their warrants for the government to surveil people in contact with their target, and people in contact with the contact; in a scheme referred to as “chaining,” these authorizations will include 2 or 3 “hops.” While the text of the Carter Page warrant application, and court approval, remain a secret, one shudders to think this authority was used to spy upon other members of the Trump campaign team who were in contact with Page. (The memo of the House intelligence committee’s Democrats about the warrant suggests that some unknown number of Trump campaign advisors were the subject of FBI “sub-inquiries.”) Three hops means that if Page is talking to Smith the FBI can then tap Smith's phone and when Smith talks to Jones the FBI can then tap Jones's phone and when Jones's talks to Abrams then the FBI can tap Abram's phone. This allowed the FBI to listen in to all of the Trump people. They not only did this but they selectively leaked information that would be harmful. On January 27, 2017 just seven days after Trump was inaugurated his entire conversation with the Prime Minister of Australia was leaked to the Washington Post who immediately published the whole thing. This type of leaking continued throughout the Trump presidency. gn power, which was required to him.

France

With all the news stories about energy floating around, the situation in France is rarely mentioned. France gets 67% of its energy from some 56 nuclear reactors and they have been energy exporters for 30 years. France currently has plans to build 6 more nuclear reactors. Europe is currently facing an energy shortage because of the loss of Russian gas but France is better able to weather the storm because of its nuclear power. In other European countries the electricity cost is two or three times greater than in France. There is a lesson here if people want to see it.

Norway

Norway is a tale of two cities. They get 98% of their energy from carbon free hydro and they get accolades from around the world for being carbon free. The other side of the story which is rarely mentioned is that Norway has access to North Sea oil and exports 1.4 million barrels a day. This is like the people who say wind and solar are carbon free when in fact they just export their carbon to countries that mine the materials needed to build wind and solar. We only have on planet and shifting carbon from place to place does not reduce world CO2 emissions. The American people were conned into believing that wind and solar were carbon free and many still believe that to this day.

Green stuff

Inquiring minds want to know. Why are more people not aware of the downside to wind and solar. There are a number of reasons but the first is ignorance. I use this word in its semantic sense and not as a pejorative. The politicians have led the way and the press dutifully followed up telling only half the story. Wind and solar are always discussed as being carbon neutral but that leaves out the carbon produced in mining, manufacturing and disposing of the materials needed. This not only ignores the carbon produced but covers over the harm to the environment.

Mexico

After WW2 the United States led the world into what became known as globalization and now the US is leading the world away from globalization. As the US begins the process of bringing manufacturing home (on shoring) the need for Mexican labor will increase dramatically. The problems of drugs, trafficking and crime have alerted the US to the problems at the border but having the cartels interfere with manufacturing in Mexico will not be tolerated and for that reason the border will be secured. The US will provide engineering technology to build up the manufacturing in Mexico and this will result in a second industrial revolution. It will be the greatest economic growth period in US history. Mexicans will not only help make goods but they will become consumers of what they make similar to what happened in the US in the last century. It is the final defeat of Marxism as Marx never envisioned the worker bees being in a position to purchase what they produced. Mexico will be going through a time similar to what the US went through in the 50's and 60's. The supply chains will all be close to home and shipping cost will be minimal. These next few years while these changes are happening will cause some dislocation and inflation but after that the good times will roll.

Scott

Senator Tim Scott, republican from South Carolina, announced his run for president. He is an interesting candidate because he agrees with Trump on the issues but has a completely different background. He grew up in a single parent family and his mom worked long hours to put food on the table. Like most poor Black families they survived by placing their faith in God, family and church. His campaign will be based around the claim that America is the land of opportunity not the land of oppression and his life is the proof. He says we are victors not victims, that if we work hard and take responsibility for our actions we can achieve the American dream. He represents the next generation and knows that the stepping stone to success is education and understanding that separating people in groups is destructive. He will not be able to overtake Trump but he will cause the conversation to shift to the good side of American like the land of opportunity and get away from ideas like systemic racism and victimization.

War fever

In October of last year 23 democratic congress people wrote a letter to Biden suggesting that we should be looking at a settlement to the war while we are helping Ukraine. Even though polls show that 57% of Americans want a peaceful settlement, within days the congress members retracted the letter. In a statement issued yesterday congress made a dramatic U-turn, scrapping the letter implying it had all been a mistake. The pro war advocates have so much power they can shut up the congress. When Elon Musk said we should look for a settlement he was accused of being a Putin puppet even though he is spending $20 million dollars using his Starlink system to provide communication to Ukrainians. Connected via a Starlink satellite, it allows Ukrainian artillery teams to target Russian positions by dropping anti-tank munitions, often in silence and at night. Once the war fever starts and the military industrial complex gets control it is difficult to change couse. There is far too much money to be made.

Mining

As American consumers purchase more EV's the country is lowering the production of CO2 by exporting CO2. Most of the CO2 produced from EV's comes from the mining and disposition of the elements used in the manufacture of EV's. A typical EV battery has about 17 pounds of lithium. Mining for lithium is water intensive and harmful to the environment. Much of it is mined in dry areas like Australia, Chile and Navada. It takes 25,000 pound of ore to get the lithium needed for one battery. After the ore is mined, it is crushed and roasted at 2012°F (1100°C). It is then cooled to 140°F (65°C), milled and roasted again, this time with sulfuric acid, at 482°F (250°C), a process known as acid leaching. During this last step, the hydrogen in the sulfuric acid is replaced with lithium ions, to produce lithium sulfate and an insoluble residue. It is easy to understand why articles on EV's don't talk about the mining aspect. This is only one metal. Mining others like cobalt are equally destructive. Then there's the problem of disposing all the old batteries.

Border news

The problems at the southern border are child trafficking, abuse of women, drugs and crime. The drug problem is getting worse. The number of deaths from opioids stayed around 60,000 from 2015 until 2019 but in 2020 increased to 92,000, 2021 106,000 and 2022 110,000. This almost doubled in less than five years. That is more deaths in one year than all the wars since WW 2. This coincides with the number of illegals crossing which have increased from 40,000 per month to 200,000 per month. Last year 130,000 unaccompanied minors came across the border. Were any of these children abused along the way. Will they be trafficked here in the states. Why is there so little concern about this situation.

EV's

The EPA proposed legislation that will force people to buy EV's. The new limits would require as much as 67% of new vehicles sold in the US by 2032 to be all-electric cars. They started small with shower heads and light bulbs but have now moved up to big ticket items. Today about one percent of US cars are electric so this is a very ambitious plan. This means the number of EV's will have to increase from 2.7 million to 278 million in 9 years. Has anyone asked where will all the charging stations be. Where will all the lithium and cobalt come from. This is mindful of the people who pushed wind and solar without asking what happens when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine. If people do not want EV's and are forced to buy them they will not be happy. This is an example of un-elected bureaucrats determining how people live their lives.

Portland

A number of liberal led cities around the country are losing population. The problem is partly loss of population but more importantly is who is leaving. Most people today are not old enough to remember what happened to Detroit but something similar is happening in cities today. It was called White Flight. It was White business owners and White workers who moved to the suburbs. Taxes and racial problems caused them to leave. Thus began the downward spiral that led a thriving city of 2 million to decay into a bankrupt city of 800,000. The tax base declined to the point that the only way out was bankruptcy. In 2013 Detroit was $18 billion in debt and filed for bankruptcy. For the cities today it is high taxes, high crime, homelessness and drugs that are causing people to leave. Portland is an example. Rising crime and homeless camps that have spread from downtown and into the suburbs have pushed out countless businesses and residents. 'It's a hollowed out shell': Portland business owners say they're fleeing crime-ridden Dem-led city en masse after it turned from the 'crown jewel of the West Coast' into criminal-run city The City of Roses has been in peril since 2020, largely due to efforts to defund police and lax bail reform laws that leave little to no deterrent for increasingly brazen criminals.

Election 24

Happy days are here again. Cable-News Networks’ Ratings Soar Amid Trump Arraignment CoverageFox News sees 13% viewership spike in past week, while MSNBC and CNN were up 36% and 35% respectively. These stations are addicted to Trump. He is on everyday many times during the day. It's 2016 all over again. If it is Trump/Biden again don't expect to see Biden debate. He will just stay out of sight and coast to victory on the backs of the press. Shortly after that he will resign for health reasons and Harris will be the first woman president. Is the country truly picking the best and the brightest or is it the old choice of the lesser of two evils. To many, Trump is considered evil and incompetent is better than evil. How did we get to this point. To quote Yakov Smirnoff, "What a country".

Protest

There is a growing number of people within the country who are uncomfortable with the war in Ukraine but for the most part they are keeping quiet about their concern. This is especially true for Biden supporters as he is seen as the hawk in chief. This past week it appears that some dove with access to classified documents leaked some information that would be considered pro Russian. This is reminiscent of the Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam War. This is an inappropriate way to express displeasure with government policy. While it takes a certain amount of courage the best way is to speak out publicly and offer solutions. Vietnam protest which started small in 1965 came to a head in 1969 and this was with US troops on the ground. The protest about Ukraine will likely grow more slowly unless US troops get involved. Current US Troops in Ukraine is an open secret but they are small in number so the alarm has not been raised.

Investments

Brokers offer something called an FA short for friends and family account. It is a stand alone account that would execute orders in the same time for multiple clients. Once and order get executed, it will be distributed across existing accounts based on a specific allocation previously agreed upon. For example the broker may purchase $10 million of a certain stock and in ten months sell it for $11 million. It can then be set up that the first million in profits go to one particular client and the any money over that will go in equal shares to the other clients. Perhaps the first client is a disabled mother and rest are her children. It could be 10 friends who want to invest together and have one friend who is disabled. Some have suggested that this is how Hillary made a quick $100,000. It was reported in the news that Hillary turned a $1,000 investment into $100,000 in ten months but many feel that she had some help. An FA is one way this could be done and the other members of the group could remain anonymous.

Russia

Russia is caught in a demographic nightmare. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990 the birthrate has declined to the lowest in history. Many working age men are dying from alcoholism. The number of people over age 60 is growing while the younger population is declining. Now they are losing young men in the war. There is no short term solution to this.

Discipline

I was watching a sheriff from Florida and he was saying how most of the young people in trouble that he encounters share a background where they were not held responsible for their behavior. He says it happens in the homes and in the schools. The schools are between a rock and a hard place. In the past they did call out students for improper behavior but after a time some enterprising investigator calculated that too many minority students were being disciplined. Rather than assume that too many minorities were misbehaving he assumed it was a racial thing. When his statistics were published it made the school look racist so they had to back off the discipline thing. This same thing occurs in cities where the police chief sends his officers into the high crime areas which results in arresting a lot of minorities. Once the stats come out showing a disproportionate number of minorities the chief pulls his officers out of the high crime areas and crime increases in those areas.

Merit

A controversy arose over Jill Biden's suggestion that the top two teams from women's basketball be invited to the White House. This is how embedded the idea of equity is in her mind but people who are all in on equity are not so when it comes to sports. The history of our country is based on meritocracy which means we have winners and losers. It's the belief that if you work hard and smart you can achieve the American dream. It's called the work ethic. There are many who start with certain disadvantages and others who have a heads up but everyone can succeed. Examples abound of people who started with little or nothing and succeeded. One of the best starts is having parents who love you and instill in you the value of work but even here there are many examples of kids who come from dysfunctional homes and become winners and there are examples of kids who come from the best conditions and still go astray. Even kids raised in the same family can grow up and be winners and losers. We try to make the playing field more level and that helps, things like scholarships. We tried affirmative action and that helped some but it hurt others. There are many examples of more qualified candidates being passed over because they couldn't check the right boxes. These things swing back and forth. We spent years moving away from segregation and achieved a good standard of integration and now we are moving back toward segregation. One thing that can help is education but the country is not doing a very good job. Its not because the country is not trying but they just can't seem to find the answer.

Women's sports

More and more people are coming to the realization that trans women should not compete in women's sports. To illustrate the point take the extreme example of weight lifting. The record in the dead lift for a man is 1104 pounds and for a woman 636 pounds. In the pole vault the male record in 20 feet 7 inches and for women it is 16 feet 6 inches. In the mile run the male record is 3 min 39 sec and for the female it is 4 min 12 sec. Today it is not unusual for high school boys to break four minutes. This will overturn the good results created by Title 9 which has allowed women's sport to flourish.

End the war

Using the benefit of hindsight the war in Ukraine could have been prevented. Putin said in 2008 that allowing Ukraine into NATO was a threat to Russia's existence that he could not accept. The west ignored his comments and continued down the path to bring Ukraine into NATO. One possible way to negotiate a settlement and end the war is to reconsider Ukraine's entry into NATO. Russia would pull out of Ukraine with the promise not ever to invade again and the west would guarantee that Ukraine would not join NATO. This may be a day late and a dollar short but it would give Putin the security he wants and a the victory he needs to pull back. It would leave Ukraine with the territory they had before the war and would satisfy their demand that no territory be lost. There has to be someone with leadership skills to get in the middle of this and start promoting a peaceful settlement. Who or where is that leader.

No war

The United States has followed the Monroe Doctrine established in 1823 which states that other countries cannot establish any threat to the US in the western hemisphere. Since the end of the cold war in 1991 Russia has feared NATO expansion and has drawn a red line when it comes to Ukraine. It was their Monroe Doctrine as they see NATO expansion into Ukraine and a direct threat to their security and in fact such expansion as a declaration of war. In 2008, Burns, then the American ambassador to Moscow, wrote to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: “Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russian elite (not just Putin). In more than two and a half years of conversations with key Russian players, from knuckle-draggers in the dark recesses of the Kremlin to Putin’s sharpest liberal critics, I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine in NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russian interests.” After the Soviet Union fell in 1991 the former satellite countries started to join NATO and Russia watched as 19 countries moved closer to the west and joined NATO. Then in 2008 the NATO countries announced that they wanted Georgia and Ukraine to join and this is when Russia said no more. Their view of the Monroe Doctrine saw these countries right on their border as threat to their security. Georgia thinking that NATO would come to their rescue tried to pull away from Russia but that resulted in Russia taking military action to keep Georgia in line. In 2014 the Russian backed leader in Ukraine, Yanukovch is ousted in a coup and Russia reacts by taking over Crimea. To put this in perspective consider how the US would react if China put a military force in Mexico. Just prior to the start of the war Putin asked for a guarantee that Ukraine will not be asked to join NATO but his plea is rejected. If at that point the US would have agreed there would be no war.

Climate goofs

President Biden's energy policy seems to lack an understanding of how climate works. He wanted to curtail oil production in the US to appease the Greens but then wanted to buy oil from Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. The burning of oil causes carbon dioxide to form and this then circulates around the globe. The big difference is that US crude is cleaner than Venezuela's and US drilling and refining is more climate friendly. This shows that his policy is more about politics than about climate change. It also shows that the Greens are more politically motivated than interested in climate. These same groups are pushing wind and solar and seem unaware of the damage done to the earth by the mining and disposing of the materials needed for wind and solar and the same can be said for the batteries needed for electric cars not to mention that there are so few charging stations around the country and many of those use fossil fuels to generate the charge. This whole system is so contaminated with politics that they are delaying the solution to the problem by avoiding nuclear power. People will one day wake up to what is going on and that day cannot come too soon.

EITC

The taxpayer class with unbelievably high audit rates, five and a half times virtually everyone else, were low income wage earners taking the earned income tax credit (EITC). Of the 626,000 audits last year 298,000 were in this group. This brought in about $40 billion to the IRS. Years ago people on welfare would lose their benefits if they went to work so instead of changing that law the IRS instituted the EITC to compensate for the lost income. It is available for low income families but it can be substantial. The highest EITC is $6,800 for taxpayers with three children. Note the word children. People would make up children and get the credit. Prior to 1987 the IRS did not require social security numbers for the children and cheating was rampant. Since then people used fake SS numbers but many get caught thus the audits. The year this requirement took effect 7 million children disappeared overnight. Even so people still use this scam as witnessed by the $40 billion. No one knows how many got away with the scam. Maybe the 87,000 new agents will get the rest of those criminals.

Wind solar nuke

Nuclear power has been given a bad rap by those who push wind and solar and by the fossil fuel industry as both see it as a competitor. There are 92 nuke plants in the US and most have been operating for more than 50 years and no one has ever been injured or died from a nuke incident. All of the waste material from all of these plants can be store in an area the size of a football field ten feet deep. New small nuke plants can use up stored nuke waste and cannot melt down. These plants can be produced on an assembly line and transferred on a semi truck to where needed avoiding the long transmission line. Wind and solar plants must be where the sun shines and the wind blows and this is often hundreds of miles from the use point. They take far less space than either wind or solar. A 1,000 megawatt nuke plant takes one square mile. The same power from wind takes up 360 square miles and for solar it is 75 square miles. They do not require materials that must mined at the expense of the environment. Wind and solar need lithium, copper, cobalt along with rare earths most of which are mined in other countries and almost all are processed in China. They need no back up power source like wind and solar. Over the past 20 years more than one trillion dollars have been spent on wind and solar and those two sources now account for 5% of the energy production. Last fall China started up the first small nuke power plant and they plan to sell these to the rest of the world.

Tax cuts work

The Trump tax cuts went into effect starting in 2019. They reduced the corporate rate from 35% to 21%. In April of 2022 a report from the Congressional Budget Office shows the corporate tax revenue is set to hit a new record of $454 billion, 22% higher than last years record high. Corporate tax revenues. 2020 $212 billion, 2021 $372 billion, 2022 $395 billion and projected 2023 $456 billion. Individual income tax receipts reached an all-time high of $2.04 trillion in FY2021and $2.63 trillion in 2022. Allowing people and companies to retain more of their money causes the economy to grow. These tax cuts are do to sunset in 2025 and should be renewed. Any time tax cuts are across the board the rich get the biggest break because they pay the most taxes but the average worker also benefited. 12% savings for people earning between $15,000 and $20,000, 11% drop for those earning between $25,000 and $30,000, 14% drop for those earning between $40,000 to $50,000, 11% for those earning between $100,000 and $200,000, 14% for those earning between $250,000 and $500,000 and a 4% drop for those earning more than one million. Low income groups who pay no taxes got an increase in tax credits from the earn income tax credit and the child tax credit.

Chicago election

The Chicago vote is in but doesn't tell us much because only 35% of eligible voters voted and the win was by a small margin. The pro police candidate who wants to fill the 1,700 empty spots in the department promises to be tough on crime, much like the new mayor in New York City. The more interesting thing about the new Mayor Valles are the names of his backers. They include Illinois Senator Durbin, former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and former Illinois Governor Pat Quinn. His out state endorsements came from prominent democrats Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. He was also backed by the Chicago Teachers Union and civil rights leader Jesse Jackson. These party leaders recognize that helping police to protect the citizens against crime is an important issue and will be in the 2024 election as they watch Biden move to the middle on crime.