My apologies to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for using a variation of the title of one of his major speeches.
My dream early this morning was about a similar nemesis: those whose only interest is ruling with a false idea of conservatism and a misuse of religion.
The false idea of conservatism is holding on to power, irregardless of how it affects the vast majority of the citizens. This conservatism puts the interests of some large corporations over the interests of large segments of the population. The misuse of religion is to claim to have the truth even as it acts contrary to the teachings of its greatest prophet.
My dream was that teams of journalists met all over the country to unite against the attacks by false conservatives on the journalists integrity and professionalism. Interestingly, many of these journalists being attacked are real conservatives, like George Will and Jennifer Rubin.
What is a real conservative? We can start by naming a few: Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Dwight Eisenhower. All of these have given warning about the order of men that is not to be trusted.
Adam Smith warned about those who live by profit. Edmund Burke warned about the folly of not allowing the colonies to govern themselves. George Washington warned about factions and about foreign entanglements (letting both friends and enemies control our judgment). Abraham Lincoln stated that we had to think anew with new circumstances. Dwight Eisenhower warned about the military-industrial complex.
The best way to counter these false conservatives is to vote in each and every election. These false conservatives do all they can to dissuade people from voting from gerrymandering to false statements about their opponents.
Until such time as real conservatives appear on the scene, I’ll just have to keep voting for Democrats. I don’t support many of the issues of the Democrats, but these issues are not so destructive of our country as the issues proclaimed by false conservatives.
Showing posts with label Adam Smith. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Adam Smith. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 21, 2018
Sunday, December 10, 2017
Counter to “Republicans” and facts
Comment to Paul Krugman’s “Facts Have a Well-Known Liberal Bias”, New York Times, 201-12-08
I think a counter-attack to these distorters of facts should be repeating over and over again their misinterpretation and misrepresentation of so many ideas.
To them, a free market means corporations are free to do what they please. But a true free market is:
Many buyers and sellers.
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter or leave the market.
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need.
There are no externalities (all costs are paid for in the transactions
They cherry-pick “sacred” texts to suit themselves.
Adam Smith in “On the Wealth of Nations” observed the England had laws the prevent the workers from organizing to raise wages but none to prevent the masters from organizing to keep wages down.
Adam Smith warned that those who live by profit are not to be trusted.
“Originalist” judges have changed the Constitution to mean that corporations are people.
I think a counter-attack to these distorters of facts should be repeating over and over again their misinterpretation and misrepresentation of so many ideas.
To them, a free market means corporations are free to do what they please. But a true free market is:
Many buyers and sellers.
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter or leave the market.
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need.
There are no externalities (all costs are paid for in the transactions
They cherry-pick “sacred” texts to suit themselves.
Adam Smith in “On the Wealth of Nations” observed the England had laws the prevent the workers from organizing to raise wages but none to prevent the masters from organizing to keep wages down.
Adam Smith warned that those who live by profit are not to be trusted.
“Originalist” judges have changed the Constitution to mean that corporations are people.
Wednesday, August 23, 2017
Exxon-Mobil and Adam Smith
The New York Times (2017-08-22) had a long article on how Exxon scientists had predicted climate change but advertised that the science was unsettled. See "What Exxon Mobil Didn't Say", https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/22/opinion/exxon-climate-change-.html.
Many employees and other shareholders are suing Exxon-Mobil for hiding the potential loss of assets as less fossil fuels are used.
I submitted the following quote from Adam Smith:
"The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order [those who live by profit], ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it."
- Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, 1776
I was surprised that it was approved almost immediately after I posted it. Often my postings of this quote are ignored. See http://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/22/opinion/exxon-climate-change-.html?comments#permid=23840021.
Many employees and other shareholders are suing Exxon-Mobil for hiding the potential loss of assets as less fossil fuels are used.
I submitted the following quote from Adam Smith:
"The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order [those who live by profit], ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it."
- Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, 1776
I was surprised that it was approved almost immediately after I posted it. Often my postings of this quote are ignored. See http://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/22/opinion/exxon-climate-change-.html?comments#permid=23840021.
Monday, July 31, 2017
Foxconn’s foxy con
Foxconn want’s to build a factory in Wisconsin that will employ three thousand workers possibly becoming 13,000 workers. Foxconn plans to invest up to $13 billion in the plant. Gov. Scott Walker said that the Wisconsin will supply up to $3 billion dollars in incentives. See http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/business/technology/4303440-foxconn-announces-major-new-manufacturing-plant-wisconsin.
Oops! Aren’t Republicans the ones who believe in standing on your own two feet and not accepting government handouts.
If it makes business sense to build such a project, then shouldn’t business be the one investing its own money.
See “Foxconn’s long con”, John Biggs, TechCrunch, 2017-07-28. Politicians around the world have been out-foxed by Foxconn. Don’t these politicians read Adam Smith: “This order of men is not to be trusted.”
Oops! Aren’t Republicans the ones who believe in standing on your own two feet and not accepting government handouts.
If it makes business sense to build such a project, then shouldn’t business be the one investing its own money.
See “Foxconn’s long con”, John Biggs, TechCrunch, 2017-07-28. Politicians around the world have been out-foxed by Foxconn. Don’t these politicians read Adam Smith: “This order of men is not to be trusted.”
Friday, December 23, 2016
Adam Smith warned "Don’t trust Donald Trump’s appointees!”
"The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order, ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it." - pages 142-143, Adam Smith, PDF version of "Wealth of Nations" transcribed by the Gutenberg Project. You can download a text copy from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/3300.
Who are this "order of men”? Those who live by profit.
Who has Donald Trump appointed to be in his administration? Billionaires who have lived by profit many times over. Is this a populist government? Do pigs fly?
Given my small readership, I doubt you can make much influence. But who knows how much influence you might have by passing this on to your Senators and Representatives?
The above quote originally appeared in “The Invisible Adam Smith”, 2012-10-25 Only 146 have viewed this page to date. I feel like I’m just blowing in the wind. But, Bob Dylan wrote, “The answer is blowin’ in the wind, my friend.”
Who are this "order of men”? Those who live by profit.
Who has Donald Trump appointed to be in his administration? Billionaires who have lived by profit many times over. Is this a populist government? Do pigs fly?
Given my small readership, I doubt you can make much influence. But who knows how much influence you might have by passing this on to your Senators and Representatives?
The above quote originally appeared in “The Invisible Adam Smith”, 2012-10-25 Only 146 have viewed this page to date. I feel like I’m just blowing in the wind. But, Bob Dylan wrote, “The answer is blowin’ in the wind, my friend.”
Sunday, November 20, 2016
Misuse of "conservative" and "free market”
Letter to New York Times public editor
I wish writers would more carefully use the terms “conservative” and “free market”.
Those labeled with these terms, by self or others, are too often neither.
Are “conservatives” thoughtful and cautious about change, or are they rigid in whatever their views? For example, “conservative” religious sects are more often throwing the first stone rather than feeding the poor. Do “conservatives" really follow the Constitution as it currently exists, or are they “activists” interpreting it to suit their own views? “Persons” are corporations? “People” in the Second Amendment are now persons. “Regulate Commerce” is totally ignored.
As to “free market”, it is too often meant to mean corporations should be free to do what they please without government interference. Adam Smith must be spinning in his grave as those who live by profit (not to be trusted) buy so many politicians with money or a barrage of misleading statements.
A true free market
Has many buyers and sellers
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter or leave the market
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need to make a decision
All costs are paid for in the transaction, that is, there are no externalities.
Too many “free marketers” want as few sellers as possible, do their best to lock buyers into the market, find out as much as possible about buyers but hide or provide false information to the buyers, and ignore all the externalities like pollution and bad diets.
See “The Invisible Adam Smith”, http://magree.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-invisible-adam-smith.html
I wish writers would more carefully use the terms “conservative” and “free market”.
Those labeled with these terms, by self or others, are too often neither.
Are “conservatives” thoughtful and cautious about change, or are they rigid in whatever their views? For example, “conservative” religious sects are more often throwing the first stone rather than feeding the poor. Do “conservatives" really follow the Constitution as it currently exists, or are they “activists” interpreting it to suit their own views? “Persons” are corporations? “People” in the Second Amendment are now persons. “Regulate Commerce” is totally ignored.
As to “free market”, it is too often meant to mean corporations should be free to do what they please without government interference. Adam Smith must be spinning in his grave as those who live by profit (not to be trusted) buy so many politicians with money or a barrage of misleading statements.
A true free market
Has many buyers and sellers
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter or leave the market
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need to make a decision
All costs are paid for in the transaction, that is, there are no externalities.
Too many “free marketers” want as few sellers as possible, do their best to lock buyers into the market, find out as much as possible about buyers but hide or provide false information to the buyers, and ignore all the externalities like pollution and bad diets.
See “The Invisible Adam Smith”, http://magree.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-invisible-adam-smith.html
Mining and Adam Smith
If you think mining is good for northern Minnesota or anywhere else, read
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/19/opinion/appalachias-sacrifice.html.
Also consider what Adam Smith wrote about those who live for profit. And consider that a true free market has no externalities, like pollution that is not in the cost of a transaction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/19/opinion/appalachias-sacrifice.html.
Also consider what Adam Smith wrote about those who live for profit. And consider that a true free market has no externalities, like pollution that is not in the cost of a transaction.
Tuesday, June 28, 2016
Corporations are inefficient too
Many so-called conservatives claim that governments are inefficient and corporations are efficient. There is overwhelming evidence that both forms can be efficient and both forms can be inefficient.
As a prime example of how corporations can be life-threatening see “When You Dial 911 and Wall Street Answers”, New York Times, 2016-06-25, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/business/dealbook/when-you-dial-911-and-wall-street-answers.html.
Some corporations are run for the long term; some are run for the short term. And both can make big mistakes.
Many of us love and rely on our Apple products. But Apple can screw up big time and take a long time to correct the problem. My wife’s iPhone 5C stopped charging and we still have six payments left. When I checked Apple Support for “iPhone not charging", there were 28,136 results!
Two solutions were offered. One was to hold the home button and the sleep button at the same time. This did not work for any of the posters. The other was to take the phone to an Apple Store. For us, that is a two-and-a-half hour drive away.
We could mail it back to Consumer Cellular. We do have AppleCare+ on the phone, but I don’t know how long that is good for. We don’t know if we will have a new phone in a couple of days or a couple of weeks.
Considering how much smart phones become of people’s live, it is not very efficient or customer-friendly that Apple has not found a permanent solution yet.
But a non-functioning phone is generally a nuisance, not life threatening. Think of the fatal failures of automobiles. Takata is constantly in the news because of faulty air bags. On a less life-threatening level, Volkswagen has been called to task because its emissions are far higher than they claimed.
Also think of all the food recalls there have been over the last few months. Some are caught by the company and consumers are warned. Others have to be warned by governments.
Ironically, those who use Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” as a justification for “free enterprise” ignore his “This order of men is not to be trusted…” This order of men is those who live by profit.
The “bottom line” is really what are the ethics and dedication of the people in government or corporations. Angels and devils are in both.
As a prime example of how corporations can be life-threatening see “When You Dial 911 and Wall Street Answers”, New York Times, 2016-06-25, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/business/dealbook/when-you-dial-911-and-wall-street-answers.html.
Some corporations are run for the long term; some are run for the short term. And both can make big mistakes.
Many of us love and rely on our Apple products. But Apple can screw up big time and take a long time to correct the problem. My wife’s iPhone 5C stopped charging and we still have six payments left. When I checked Apple Support for “iPhone not charging", there were 28,136 results!
Two solutions were offered. One was to hold the home button and the sleep button at the same time. This did not work for any of the posters. The other was to take the phone to an Apple Store. For us, that is a two-and-a-half hour drive away.
We could mail it back to Consumer Cellular. We do have AppleCare+ on the phone, but I don’t know how long that is good for. We don’t know if we will have a new phone in a couple of days or a couple of weeks.
Considering how much smart phones become of people’s live, it is not very efficient or customer-friendly that Apple has not found a permanent solution yet.
But a non-functioning phone is generally a nuisance, not life threatening. Think of the fatal failures of automobiles. Takata is constantly in the news because of faulty air bags. On a less life-threatening level, Volkswagen has been called to task because its emissions are far higher than they claimed.
Also think of all the food recalls there have been over the last few months. Some are caught by the company and consumers are warned. Others have to be warned by governments.
Ironically, those who use Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” as a justification for “free enterprise” ignore his “This order of men is not to be trusted…” This order of men is those who live by profit.
The “bottom line” is really what are the ethics and dedication of the people in government or corporations. Angels and devils are in both.
Friday, April 29, 2016
Advice to Bernie Sanders
I sent $25 to the Bernie Sanders campaign a few weeks ago, and now I am bombarded with requests for money and volunteer calling. I decided that the campaign could use my "advice" more. So, I sent the following to info@BernieSanders.com in response to the message: "I will be with Bernie as long as he is willing to fight". I wonder if any of it will percolate up to the great man.
Bernie has a whole arsenal to use: the actual contents of documents that the billionaires and their lackeys misrepresent.
Adam Smith only used "free market" once, and that was the wool merchants kept the price of wool down by legislative means.
Adam Smith said that "This order of men is not to be trusted..." These were those who lived by profit.
Adam Smith's invisible hand really is a variation of the law of unintended consequences. He did not state that either man succeeded, only that the outcomes did not necessarily match their intentions.
The billionaires ignore much of the constitution. What part of Congress having the power to "regulate commerce" among the states don't they understand? Isn't sending pollution to another state commerce among the states?
What part of "no religious test" don't they understand?
In his "Farewell Address" George Washington warned about foreign entanglements and admonished his reader to pay their taxes.
If you can find an expert on the Federalist Papers, he or she can give you lots of ideas to counter the selfish who have no sense of community.
I can't find my reference, but a true free market is
Many buyers and sellers,
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter and leave the market,
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need to make a decision,
There are no externalities.
Finally, avoid any questioning of the personal integrity. Providing honest definitions of their pronouncements should do quite well for "hoisting them on their own petards."
For other ideas, see mdmagree.blogspot.com.
I didn’t mention that he should also remind the Republicans of the warning given by the last great Republican President: Dwight David Eisenhower; the military-industrial complex. Now Ike’s party as been taken over by the military-industrial complex.
Bernie has a whole arsenal to use: the actual contents of documents that the billionaires and their lackeys misrepresent.
Adam Smith only used "free market" once, and that was the wool merchants kept the price of wool down by legislative means.
Adam Smith said that "This order of men is not to be trusted..." These were those who lived by profit.
Adam Smith's invisible hand really is a variation of the law of unintended consequences. He did not state that either man succeeded, only that the outcomes did not necessarily match their intentions.
The billionaires ignore much of the constitution. What part of Congress having the power to "regulate commerce" among the states don't they understand? Isn't sending pollution to another state commerce among the states?
What part of "no religious test" don't they understand?
In his "Farewell Address" George Washington warned about foreign entanglements and admonished his reader to pay their taxes.
If you can find an expert on the Federalist Papers, he or she can give you lots of ideas to counter the selfish who have no sense of community.
I can't find my reference, but a true free market is
Many buyers and sellers,
Both buyers and sellers are free to enter and leave the market,
Both buyers and sellers have all the information they need to make a decision,
There are no externalities.
Finally, avoid any questioning of the personal integrity. Providing honest definitions of their pronouncements should do quite well for "hoisting them on their own petards."
For other ideas, see mdmagree.blogspot.com.
I didn’t mention that he should also remind the Republicans of the warning given by the last great Republican President: Dwight David Eisenhower; the military-industrial complex. Now Ike’s party as been taken over by the military-industrial complex.
Friday, February 05, 2016
TRUTH or truth?
TRUTH is what some assert with certainty but with no coherent justification. TRUTH cannot be challenged.
Truth is what people strive for with questions and tests; truth may never be fully achieved but enough has been discovered to offer a guide to life or improvement of lives.
One TRUTH is that the Bible is the inerrant word of God. The truth is that the Bible offers many moral teachings even though it contains descriptions of many impossible events or even justifies bad deeds.
Did God on the sixth day create “man in his own image, … male and female created he them”? Or did he create only Adam and then when Adam grew lonely, he created Eve from Adam’s rib. I would think it would take more than a few days for Adam to grow lonely for a companion.
Is the “Great Flood” a recounting of some catastrophic flood in the Tigris-Euphrates valley in which some few had the foresight to build boats for their family and cattle, or was it a great flood to destroy all the “wickedness”, including babies? Considering that the depth of the waters was 15 cubits (22-1/2 feet), it was probably the former. Flood stages of over 20 feet are all too common even now. The truth is that it is important to be just and that it is important to prepare for disaster.
Is it TRUTH that God let Satan bring many calamities upon Job, or is it truth that bad things happen to good people? Certainly a just God would not let so many innocent people be killed to test one man, especially if God knows everything?
Is it TRUTH that heretics should be burned at the stake? It is truth that the Bible only mentions “heretic” once. “A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject” (Epistle to Titus, 3:10). I don’t think “reject” meant to kill, but rather it meant to shun.
Is it TRUTH that Islam is a militant religion set on converting all to Islam? It is truth that Mohammed and his followers had to defend themselves against the polytheists of Mecca who considered the Muslims a threat. It is also truth that many Muslim-dominant cultures had a mix of Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
“Those who believe, and those who are Jewish, and the Christians, and the Sabeans - any who believe in God and the Last Day, and act righteously will have their reward with their Lord; they have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve.” - Talal Itani. “Quran In English. Modern English Translation. Clear and Easy to Understand”.
The Sabeans were a culture in South Arabia; this is supposedly where the Queen of Sheba came from, she who visited King Solomon.
You can get many versions of the Qur’an from the iBook store and other sources. However, like the Bible, it takes much reading to understand what is meant.
Consider “simple” documents like the “Declaration of Independence” and the “Constitution”.
Is it TRUTH that they are clear and unambiguous? It is truth that people are still arguing over them over two hundred years later. It is truth that what one Supreme Court decides may be overturned by another Supreme Court? For example, “Separate but Equal” was overturned by “Brown vs. Board of Education”.
Is it TRUTH that the United States is a Christian nation blessed by God? It is truth that many of the signers of the “Declaration of Independence” or the “Constitution of the United States” attended Christian Churches. It is truth that the “Declaration of Independence” mentions “Nature’s God” and the “Protection of Divine Providence”. But it is also truth that the “Constitution” uses no words or phrases involving any deity. It is truth that the United States took land from Christian Cherokees and others because white men wanted the gold that was found in Georgia. So much for the “Protection of Divine Providence” for these Christians.
Is it TRUTH that Adam Smith advocated totally free markets? It is truth that he used “free market” once and only once in “Wealth of Nations”. But it is also truth that the heavily regulated market was brought about by the woolen manufacturers. They asked for and received from Parliament many regulations that would keep the price of wool down so that their costs would be down and their profits up. It is also truth that even today “Free Marketers” lobby for laws that are beneficial to them and detrimental to others.
Is it TRUTH that voters “decided”? By the time you read this, the Iowa caucuses will have been held. It is truth that many voters cast their votes for whoever “won”, but many other voters chose somebody else. It is truth that better headlines would be that “a plurality of voters” or “a majority of voters” supported the “winner”.
It is also truth that no matter who is doing the reporting, they have a limited amount of time or space.
It is also truth that this column should end before you fall asleep.
Also published in Reader Weekly of Duluth, 2016-02-04 at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2016/02/04/6677_truth_or_truth.
Truth is what people strive for with questions and tests; truth may never be fully achieved but enough has been discovered to offer a guide to life or improvement of lives.
One TRUTH is that the Bible is the inerrant word of God. The truth is that the Bible offers many moral teachings even though it contains descriptions of many impossible events or even justifies bad deeds.
Did God on the sixth day create “man in his own image, … male and female created he them”? Or did he create only Adam and then when Adam grew lonely, he created Eve from Adam’s rib. I would think it would take more than a few days for Adam to grow lonely for a companion.
Is the “Great Flood” a recounting of some catastrophic flood in the Tigris-Euphrates valley in which some few had the foresight to build boats for their family and cattle, or was it a great flood to destroy all the “wickedness”, including babies? Considering that the depth of the waters was 15 cubits (22-1/2 feet), it was probably the former. Flood stages of over 20 feet are all too common even now. The truth is that it is important to be just and that it is important to prepare for disaster.
Is it TRUTH that God let Satan bring many calamities upon Job, or is it truth that bad things happen to good people? Certainly a just God would not let so many innocent people be killed to test one man, especially if God knows everything?
Is it TRUTH that heretics should be burned at the stake? It is truth that the Bible only mentions “heretic” once. “A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject” (Epistle to Titus, 3:10). I don’t think “reject” meant to kill, but rather it meant to shun.
Is it TRUTH that Islam is a militant religion set on converting all to Islam? It is truth that Mohammed and his followers had to defend themselves against the polytheists of Mecca who considered the Muslims a threat. It is also truth that many Muslim-dominant cultures had a mix of Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
“Those who believe, and those who are Jewish, and the Christians, and the Sabeans - any who believe in God and the Last Day, and act righteously will have their reward with their Lord; they have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve.” - Talal Itani. “Quran In English. Modern English Translation. Clear and Easy to Understand”.
The Sabeans were a culture in South Arabia; this is supposedly where the Queen of Sheba came from, she who visited King Solomon.
You can get many versions of the Qur’an from the iBook store and other sources. However, like the Bible, it takes much reading to understand what is meant.
Consider “simple” documents like the “Declaration of Independence” and the “Constitution”.
Is it TRUTH that they are clear and unambiguous? It is truth that people are still arguing over them over two hundred years later. It is truth that what one Supreme Court decides may be overturned by another Supreme Court? For example, “Separate but Equal” was overturned by “Brown vs. Board of Education”.
Is it TRUTH that the United States is a Christian nation blessed by God? It is truth that many of the signers of the “Declaration of Independence” or the “Constitution of the United States” attended Christian Churches. It is truth that the “Declaration of Independence” mentions “Nature’s God” and the “Protection of Divine Providence”. But it is also truth that the “Constitution” uses no words or phrases involving any deity. It is truth that the United States took land from Christian Cherokees and others because white men wanted the gold that was found in Georgia. So much for the “Protection of Divine Providence” for these Christians.
Is it TRUTH that Adam Smith advocated totally free markets? It is truth that he used “free market” once and only once in “Wealth of Nations”. But it is also truth that the heavily regulated market was brought about by the woolen manufacturers. They asked for and received from Parliament many regulations that would keep the price of wool down so that their costs would be down and their profits up. It is also truth that even today “Free Marketers” lobby for laws that are beneficial to them and detrimental to others.
Is it TRUTH that voters “decided”? By the time you read this, the Iowa caucuses will have been held. It is truth that many voters cast their votes for whoever “won”, but many other voters chose somebody else. It is truth that better headlines would be that “a plurality of voters” or “a majority of voters” supported the “winner”.
It is also truth that no matter who is doing the reporting, they have a limited amount of time or space.
It is also truth that this column should end before you fall asleep.
Also published in Reader Weekly of Duluth, 2016-02-04 at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2016/02/04/6677_truth_or_truth.
Thursday, August 06, 2015
Quote of the day: Coal vs. Solar
"There are now more than twice as many workers in the fast-growing solar power industry than there are coal miners."
- "Coal Industry Wobbles as Market Forces Slug Away", James B. Stewart, New York Times, 2015-08-06
Are the likes of Sen. Mitch McConnell preventing jobs in solar while protecting jobs in coal? Also, does he think of the lives destroyed by lax safety standards and the contaminated air and water around towns near coal mines.
Of course not! Adam Smith warned about those who live by profit over 200 years ago. They deceive and oppress the public. See "The Invisible Adam Smith".
- "Coal Industry Wobbles as Market Forces Slug Away", James B. Stewart, New York Times, 2015-08-06
Are the likes of Sen. Mitch McConnell preventing jobs in solar while protecting jobs in coal? Also, does he think of the lives destroyed by lax safety standards and the contaminated air and water around towns near coal mines.
Of course not! Adam Smith warned about those who live by profit over 200 years ago. They deceive and oppress the public. See "The Invisible Adam Smith".
Thursday, July 16, 2015
Capitalists vs. Scientists
First, just what is a capitalist. Most are definitely not the little top-hatted guy in Monopoly or big-hair Donald Trump. Surprisingly, if you look in the mirror you might see a capitalist. A capitalist is a person who provides money, directly or indirectly, to the funds of a company, be it Behemoth Industries or Tiny’s Corner Store.
If you are contributing or have contributed to a company pension plan, you are a capitalist. Most pension funds invest in stocks or bonds. If you invest in an IRA or 401K, you are likely a capitalist. We could quibble whether an investor in government bonds is a capitalist.
Government “bureaucrats” are often capitalists. CALPERS is the pension fund for many California public employees, whether they are school teachers, snow plow operators, or motor vehicle clerks.
Union members are capitalists. Teamsters employed by UPS can have 401K accounts managed by Fidelity Investments.
Who we think of as capitalists sometimes really aren’t capitalists in the sense of putting their own money into a company. These “capitalists” are executive hirees who are given humongous stock benefits to run a company. These hirees or those who inherit a company from a parent can be, but not always, focused on short-term profit without consideration to the environment, employees, or customers.
Fortunately, there are many capitalists, both stock owners and corporate hierarchy that think of the long term effects of their businesses. Unfortunately, it is the short-term profiteers who too often have the ears of politicians to serve their short-term interests. These are the people that Adam Smith had in mind when he wrote, “This order of men is not to be trusted…”
These short-term thinkers are the ones who do everything they can to discredit those who get in the way of their profits, be it in food, medicine, or climate.
Many CEOs don’t care about the long-term consequences of their actions. Scientists do.
Scientists are the ones who seek out answers to life’s persistent questions: what causes this disease and how do we best cure it, what is the safety of our air and water and can we make it better, and what is happening to our climate and can we mitigate any adverse effects?
All of these scientists have had their detractors who use all the tools they can find to discredit the scientists: “junk science”, “just a theory”, “doctored data”, and lists of “scientists” who disagree with the scientists doing the actual work. Everything except do some actual scientific work to evaluate the evidence on its merits.
Newspapers have been filled with letters denying global warming, aka “climate change”. They almost seem orchestrated with far-fetched “proofs” that there is no climate change. One is tempted to put these deniers on an Arctic ice floe in the winter and see how soon they call for help in the summer.
I was inspired to write this column after having had on my to-read list for a very long time Michael E. Mann’s “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines”. I finally read it. I knew that many distortions had been made about climate research, but Mann provided many of the details.
“The Hockey Stick” relates to the graphs showing global warming. The graphs aren’t nice straight lines with a sudden rise up, but they are lots of squiggles as temperatures vary from year to year but in a band that doesn’t drift very far. Then in the middle of the Nineteenth Century the band angles steeply up. Mann has been attacked for manipulating data, for leading a cabal of renegade scientists, and for much more, but his results have been replicated independently by others many times over.
You probably read about the falsifying of data by climate researchers at the University of East Anglia. But, did you read that the email was hacked and phrases cherry-picked from them? One example of the deceit of the hackers was to rewrite a sentence using “trick” as a clever way to do something to imply that the “trick” was deceit.
Time and time again, the deceit is on the part of the deniers, and very few reporters follow up with the truth. Very few of these follow-ups make it to the front pages or opening news bites. Unfortunately, there are too many news outlets that will never admit they are wrong, especially if the truth doesn’t match the owners’ view of the world.
One weapon that deniers have is a Congress which is now heavily weighted with Senators and Representatives heavily subsidized by certain old-style energy interests. This weapon is a double-barreled shotgun. One barrel shoots out thousands of misleading statements about global warming. The other barrel shoots out subpoenas to climate researchers to appear before Congress. Often researchers have to appear because many of their funds come from Federal grants. These subpoenas have the effect of taking the researchers from their work and providing a grandstand for the deniers in Congress.
After I finished Professor Mann’s book, I had an exchange of emails with him. One paragraph I wrote was a parody of Galileo being put under house arrest for asserting that the Earth moved around the Sun (Eppur si muove):
If you are contributing or have contributed to a company pension plan, you are a capitalist. Most pension funds invest in stocks or bonds. If you invest in an IRA or 401K, you are likely a capitalist. We could quibble whether an investor in government bonds is a capitalist.
Government “bureaucrats” are often capitalists. CALPERS is the pension fund for many California public employees, whether they are school teachers, snow plow operators, or motor vehicle clerks.
Union members are capitalists. Teamsters employed by UPS can have 401K accounts managed by Fidelity Investments.
Who we think of as capitalists sometimes really aren’t capitalists in the sense of putting their own money into a company. These “capitalists” are executive hirees who are given humongous stock benefits to run a company. These hirees or those who inherit a company from a parent can be, but not always, focused on short-term profit without consideration to the environment, employees, or customers.
Fortunately, there are many capitalists, both stock owners and corporate hierarchy that think of the long term effects of their businesses. Unfortunately, it is the short-term profiteers who too often have the ears of politicians to serve their short-term interests. These are the people that Adam Smith had in mind when he wrote, “This order of men is not to be trusted…”
These short-term thinkers are the ones who do everything they can to discredit those who get in the way of their profits, be it in food, medicine, or climate.
Many CEOs don’t care about the long-term consequences of their actions. Scientists do.
Scientists are the ones who seek out answers to life’s persistent questions: what causes this disease and how do we best cure it, what is the safety of our air and water and can we make it better, and what is happening to our climate and can we mitigate any adverse effects?
All of these scientists have had their detractors who use all the tools they can find to discredit the scientists: “junk science”, “just a theory”, “doctored data”, and lists of “scientists” who disagree with the scientists doing the actual work. Everything except do some actual scientific work to evaluate the evidence on its merits.
Newspapers have been filled with letters denying global warming, aka “climate change”. They almost seem orchestrated with far-fetched “proofs” that there is no climate change. One is tempted to put these deniers on an Arctic ice floe in the winter and see how soon they call for help in the summer.
I was inspired to write this column after having had on my to-read list for a very long time Michael E. Mann’s “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines”. I finally read it. I knew that many distortions had been made about climate research, but Mann provided many of the details.
“The Hockey Stick” relates to the graphs showing global warming. The graphs aren’t nice straight lines with a sudden rise up, but they are lots of squiggles as temperatures vary from year to year but in a band that doesn’t drift very far. Then in the middle of the Nineteenth Century the band angles steeply up. Mann has been attacked for manipulating data, for leading a cabal of renegade scientists, and for much more, but his results have been replicated independently by others many times over.
You probably read about the falsifying of data by climate researchers at the University of East Anglia. But, did you read that the email was hacked and phrases cherry-picked from them? One example of the deceit of the hackers was to rewrite a sentence using “trick” as a clever way to do something to imply that the “trick” was deceit.
Time and time again, the deceit is on the part of the deniers, and very few reporters follow up with the truth. Very few of these follow-ups make it to the front pages or opening news bites. Unfortunately, there are too many news outlets that will never admit they are wrong, especially if the truth doesn’t match the owners’ view of the world.
One weapon that deniers have is a Congress which is now heavily weighted with Senators and Representatives heavily subsidized by certain old-style energy interests. This weapon is a double-barreled shotgun. One barrel shoots out thousands of misleading statements about global warming. The other barrel shoots out subpoenas to climate researchers to appear before Congress. Often researchers have to appear because many of their funds come from Federal grants. These subpoenas have the effect of taking the researchers from their work and providing a grandstand for the deniers in Congress.
After I finished Professor Mann’s book, I had an exchange of emails with him. One paragraph I wrote was a parody of Galileo being put under house arrest for asserting that the Earth moved around the Sun (Eppur si muove):
“Sen. James Imhofe, Pope of the Wholly Wrong Church, condemned Michael Mann to house arrest for the heresy of questioning a static climate. As Mann was condemned, he muttered, ‘It’s still getting warmer!’”Mann replied that in many of the hearings he was tempted to mutter: “Eppur si riscalda”.
Sunday, May 03, 2015
The Magical Marketplace Can Be Malevolent
Once again, one who lives by profits justifies wages by the magic of the market. See “Work like you mean it, and let the market set the best wage” by Scott Sayer, Star Tribune, 2015-04-20. He writes, “Market forces should determine what an hour of work is worth.”
Once upon a very bad time, market forces determined that a slave should work as many hours as the master required. These masters were so determined that they were right, they were willing to wage a bloody war to protect their interests.
Once upon a bad time, market forces determined that children should work as many hours as the masters of the factories required. These masters didn’t fight a military war to protect their interests, but they bought a lot of politicians to defeat child labor laws.
Once upon another bad time, market forces determined that young women should work long hours in unsafe working conditions as the masters of the factories required. Even fires and other disasters did not stop the corruption from letting these conditions continue. Then the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911, killing 145 people, mostly immigrant teen-age girls, made a bit of progress in reducing these conditions.
Even in these supposedly more benign times, market forces determine that masters’ employees should work long hours, well past their ability to function safely. How many people other than these employees have been killed by truck or bus drivers working longer hours than the drivers could stay alert? Despite these deaths, there are still masters who decry government interference with too many regulations.
Now as many call for a minimum wage of $15/hour, Sayer states “Market forces should determine what an hour of work is worth.” He complains that these figures are coming “from bureaucrats who never had to sign a paycheck in their lives.” But these “bureaucrats” are officials, elected by the People, who try to follow the Constitution and promote the “General Welfare”.
And just what are these “market forces” that Sayer mentions so often? Are they many buyers and many sellers free to enter and leave the market? Do these “market forces” provide buyers and sellers with all the information they need to make an informed decision? Are all the costs of the transaction covered, or are there costs that others must bear?
There are far fewer buyers of labor than sellers of labor. The buyers of labor are free to contract or expand their work force. The sellers of labor must find buyers or be hungry and without shelter.
Both buyers and sellers of labor might not provide all the information for informed decisions. Buyers might not provide all the details of the job, including how safe it is, how many onerous rules there are, and how reliably checks are issued. Sellers might overstate their credentials, hide unsuccessful performance, or hide illness that limits their abilities.
Both buyers and sellers of labor might push off costs to others. Buyers might not have insurance to cover work injuries. Sellers might engage in theft that needs to be investigated by public law enforcement officials. Buyers might pay less than “a living wage” passing off to others the concern that sellers have sufficient food, shelter, and clothing. Sometimes these costs are borne by relatives, sometimes by governments.
These are only a few of the ways that other than “market forces” can influence labor decisions.
Sayer decries that a living wage is based on 40 hours a week, and he wonders why such a limit. He ignores that many people fought and even died to get a standard work week set at 40 hours. This push came not from bureaucrats but workers who wanted long, healthy, and enjoyable lives. They defied Adam Smith’s observation that it was legal for the masters to unite to keep wages down but illegal for the workers to unite to raise wages.
Consider that a work day is eight hours plus a half hour for lunch. Assume that a worker has a half-hour commute each way and that the other two meals also take about a half hour each. The worker has now accounted for ten-and-half hours of the day. Add eight hours for sleep and fifteen minutes each preparing for bed or getting dressed. The worker has now accounted for nineteen hours of his or her day, leaving five hours for other activities. It seems Sayer believes that the work day should use these extra hours up to give him a thirteen-hour day from his employees.
Even when I was enjoying my job, I was quite willing to go home at the official quitting time. Sure, there were times when some pressing problem needed more work or when I was so involved in what I was doing that I didn’t want to stop. In fact, I don’t think that there was an hour of the day at which I didn’t work sometime or another. Sometimes that was when the work was to be done; sometimes that was when the work just kept going. But I was always glad when work returned to a normal day-time pace.
It was not bureaucrats who decided the work week should be 40 hours, but We the People. It was We the People who decided that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
Once upon a very bad time, market forces determined that a slave should work as many hours as the master required. These masters were so determined that they were right, they were willing to wage a bloody war to protect their interests.
Once upon a bad time, market forces determined that children should work as many hours as the masters of the factories required. These masters didn’t fight a military war to protect their interests, but they bought a lot of politicians to defeat child labor laws.
Once upon another bad time, market forces determined that young women should work long hours in unsafe working conditions as the masters of the factories required. Even fires and other disasters did not stop the corruption from letting these conditions continue. Then the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911, killing 145 people, mostly immigrant teen-age girls, made a bit of progress in reducing these conditions.
Even in these supposedly more benign times, market forces determine that masters’ employees should work long hours, well past their ability to function safely. How many people other than these employees have been killed by truck or bus drivers working longer hours than the drivers could stay alert? Despite these deaths, there are still masters who decry government interference with too many regulations.
Now as many call for a minimum wage of $15/hour, Sayer states “Market forces should determine what an hour of work is worth.” He complains that these figures are coming “from bureaucrats who never had to sign a paycheck in their lives.” But these “bureaucrats” are officials, elected by the People, who try to follow the Constitution and promote the “General Welfare”.
And just what are these “market forces” that Sayer mentions so often? Are they many buyers and many sellers free to enter and leave the market? Do these “market forces” provide buyers and sellers with all the information they need to make an informed decision? Are all the costs of the transaction covered, or are there costs that others must bear?
There are far fewer buyers of labor than sellers of labor. The buyers of labor are free to contract or expand their work force. The sellers of labor must find buyers or be hungry and without shelter.
Both buyers and sellers of labor might not provide all the information for informed decisions. Buyers might not provide all the details of the job, including how safe it is, how many onerous rules there are, and how reliably checks are issued. Sellers might overstate their credentials, hide unsuccessful performance, or hide illness that limits their abilities.
Both buyers and sellers of labor might push off costs to others. Buyers might not have insurance to cover work injuries. Sellers might engage in theft that needs to be investigated by public law enforcement officials. Buyers might pay less than “a living wage” passing off to others the concern that sellers have sufficient food, shelter, and clothing. Sometimes these costs are borne by relatives, sometimes by governments.
These are only a few of the ways that other than “market forces” can influence labor decisions.
Sayer decries that a living wage is based on 40 hours a week, and he wonders why such a limit. He ignores that many people fought and even died to get a standard work week set at 40 hours. This push came not from bureaucrats but workers who wanted long, healthy, and enjoyable lives. They defied Adam Smith’s observation that it was legal for the masters to unite to keep wages down but illegal for the workers to unite to raise wages.
Consider that a work day is eight hours plus a half hour for lunch. Assume that a worker has a half-hour commute each way and that the other two meals also take about a half hour each. The worker has now accounted for ten-and-half hours of the day. Add eight hours for sleep and fifteen minutes each preparing for bed or getting dressed. The worker has now accounted for nineteen hours of his or her day, leaving five hours for other activities. It seems Sayer believes that the work day should use these extra hours up to give him a thirteen-hour day from his employees.
Even when I was enjoying my job, I was quite willing to go home at the official quitting time. Sure, there were times when some pressing problem needed more work or when I was so involved in what I was doing that I didn’t want to stop. In fact, I don’t think that there was an hour of the day at which I didn’t work sometime or another. Sometimes that was when the work was to be done; sometimes that was when the work just kept going. But I was always glad when work returned to a normal day-time pace.
It was not bureaucrats who decided the work week should be 40 hours, but We the People. It was We the People who decided that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
Monday, April 20, 2015
No harm to humans: where have we heard this before?
I just watched “The Clean Room” in “Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey” with Neil DeGrasse Tyson.
Clair Patterson, a graduate student then a professor, spent years trying to determine the age of the earth by the amount of lead, a product of uranium decay. He kept running into far more lead in the environment than should occur naturally. He concluded that the lead was coming from tetra-ethyl lead added to gasoline to improve anti-knock qualities.
However, lead is a known neuro-toxin, known even in Roman times. Chemical industry representatives kept trying to show that leaded gasoline was not a problem.
We still have many people having neuro-toxin problems from leaded paint in older buildings. But we try to show that their problems are caused by lack of initiative rather than environment.
Now we have the same scenario all over again with vested interests working overtime to “prove” that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is not a problem.
When will we ever learn? Those who live by profit are not to be trusted: Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations.
Clair Patterson, a graduate student then a professor, spent years trying to determine the age of the earth by the amount of lead, a product of uranium decay. He kept running into far more lead in the environment than should occur naturally. He concluded that the lead was coming from tetra-ethyl lead added to gasoline to improve anti-knock qualities.
However, lead is a known neuro-toxin, known even in Roman times. Chemical industry representatives kept trying to show that leaded gasoline was not a problem.
We still have many people having neuro-toxin problems from leaded paint in older buildings. But we try to show that their problems are caused by lack of initiative rather than environment.
Now we have the same scenario all over again with vested interests working overtime to “prove” that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is not a problem.
When will we ever learn? Those who live by profit are not to be trusted: Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations.
Thursday, March 12, 2015
Hubris is ruinous
Hubris is overreaching pride and arrogance. Many Greek tragedies have the gods punishing those like Oedipus. Shakespeare tragedies have circumstances punishing those like MacBeth and Othello. It seems that rarely do the electorates punish those with overreaching pride and arrogance. They do it by not voting and those with hubris never count the non-voters.
Scott Walker is one who is showing overreaching pride and arrogance in his abilities.
He touts his electoral success but ignores that he won with a low turn-out. Many other newly-elected Republican governors won with higher vote counts (of those who bother to vote). Those who signed the petition to recall Walker but then didn’t show up to vote were also arrogant.
He talks about the “invisible hand of the free market”, but ignores Adam Smith’s admonition of trusting those who live by profit.
He is proud to have passed a “right to fire” law, but ignores Smith noting that the masters could organize to keep wages down but it was illegal for the workers to organize to raise wages. If workers can refuse to pay union dues, is there a complimentary law that businesses can be part of Chambers of Commerce without paying dues?
He thinks that facing down demonstrators qualifies him to take on the likes of ISIS. Facing demonstrators armed with pizzas is not same as facing a few thousand jihadists armed with AK-47s, rocket launchers and more. Also, he ignores the history of meddling in the Middle East; it has always backfired, maybe not right away, but within a few years.
I only have my keyboard against Scott Walker’s many microphones. If you are a Wisconsin voter who didn’t show up in one of more of Walker’s election “landslides”, please show up the next time.
Many politicians other than Walker cite their belief in American exceptionalism. Sorry, but many people in other countries, well-governed or not, believe their countries are exceptional. The difference is that many of these people don’t think their exceptionalism gives them the right to tell other countries how to conduct their own affairs. Those who believe in American “exceptionalism” refuse to see how often the “gods” have punished this hubris: Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and more. The proponents of the “domino theory” seemed to have ignored that a game of dominos can go off in unexpected directions.
The hubris of the jihadists of ISIS and other terror groups make the hubris of American politicians look like a parlor game. The jihadists claim they are doing Allah’s will, but how do they know this other than repeating it to each other? Where is their forgiveness to others that Allah gives them? And if they believe “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”), can’t Allah right these “wrongs”.
If God could flood the entire world, killing thousands of pregnant women and their unborn children, couldn't God send a lightning bolt to strike “blasphemers” dead? If God could destroy the tower of Babel, built out of bricks, couldn’t God bring down the skyscrapers of steel in all the cities of the non-believers? If God could destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because the residents were sinful, couldn’t God destroy all the much larger cities of today where there is much “sin” according to purists who believe in an Almighty God?
The greatest hubris of all is that of countries with nuclear weapons. They want to prevent other countries from having any capacity to build nuclear weapons, but they seem very disinclined to reduce the number of their own nuclear weapons. These nuclear countries are ready at a moment’s notice to cause more death and destruction than the God of the Old Testament did from the beginning of the world.
Mel wishes the pen were mightier than the sword far more often than it has been.
Scott Walker is one who is showing overreaching pride and arrogance in his abilities.
He touts his electoral success but ignores that he won with a low turn-out. Many other newly-elected Republican governors won with higher vote counts (of those who bother to vote). Those who signed the petition to recall Walker but then didn’t show up to vote were also arrogant.
He talks about the “invisible hand of the free market”, but ignores Adam Smith’s admonition of trusting those who live by profit.
He is proud to have passed a “right to fire” law, but ignores Smith noting that the masters could organize to keep wages down but it was illegal for the workers to organize to raise wages. If workers can refuse to pay union dues, is there a complimentary law that businesses can be part of Chambers of Commerce without paying dues?
He thinks that facing down demonstrators qualifies him to take on the likes of ISIS. Facing demonstrators armed with pizzas is not same as facing a few thousand jihadists armed with AK-47s, rocket launchers and more. Also, he ignores the history of meddling in the Middle East; it has always backfired, maybe not right away, but within a few years.
I only have my keyboard against Scott Walker’s many microphones. If you are a Wisconsin voter who didn’t show up in one of more of Walker’s election “landslides”, please show up the next time.
Many politicians other than Walker cite their belief in American exceptionalism. Sorry, but many people in other countries, well-governed or not, believe their countries are exceptional. The difference is that many of these people don’t think their exceptionalism gives them the right to tell other countries how to conduct their own affairs. Those who believe in American “exceptionalism” refuse to see how often the “gods” have punished this hubris: Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and more. The proponents of the “domino theory” seemed to have ignored that a game of dominos can go off in unexpected directions.
The hubris of the jihadists of ISIS and other terror groups make the hubris of American politicians look like a parlor game. The jihadists claim they are doing Allah’s will, but how do they know this other than repeating it to each other? Where is their forgiveness to others that Allah gives them? And if they believe “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”), can’t Allah right these “wrongs”.
If God could flood the entire world, killing thousands of pregnant women and their unborn children, couldn't God send a lightning bolt to strike “blasphemers” dead? If God could destroy the tower of Babel, built out of bricks, couldn’t God bring down the skyscrapers of steel in all the cities of the non-believers? If God could destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because the residents were sinful, couldn’t God destroy all the much larger cities of today where there is much “sin” according to purists who believe in an Almighty God?
The greatest hubris of all is that of countries with nuclear weapons. They want to prevent other countries from having any capacity to build nuclear weapons, but they seem very disinclined to reduce the number of their own nuclear weapons. These nuclear countries are ready at a moment’s notice to cause more death and destruction than the God of the Old Testament did from the beginning of the world.
Mel wishes the pen were mightier than the sword far more often than it has been.
Thursday, January 29, 2015
Let’s Stop It with Global Warming Denial
The blogosphere is filled with nitpicking about NASA’s supposedly only 38 percent certainty about 2014 being the warmest year for recorded data. Does it really matter if 2014 was the warmest year in recent history or the third warmest year? The trend is still up even though there may be slightly cooler years or there may be cooler spots that had been warmer.
Think of your house in winter. Assume it is a five-room house with a basement. Assume you have no central heating and your only heat is from electric space heaters.
If you turn on one space heater in one room, you will feel warmer by the heater and colder as you move away from it. Suppose you turn on a space heater in every room. Each room will warm up near the space heater and be cooler away from the space heater. If you are on the opposite side of the room, there is no room-heating! And if you go to the basement, you have proven that there is no household warming!
What happens if you put a space heater in every corner of each room and in every corner of the basement? You will have a very warm house, maybe an unbearably hot house.
So what happens if you have a few steam-powered factories? Not much. What happens if you add hundreds and thousands of steam-powered factories. Well, the areas around these factories may be a bit warmer, but few will notice until they go into the factories.
What happens if you have a few steam-powered trains? Not much, just like with the factories.
What happens if you have a few thousand gasoline-powered cars? Not much. But if you take lots of measurements, you will find that the temperatures are rising slightly around the areas where these factories, trains, and cars operate.
What happens when there are hundreds of thousands of factories and trains and millions of cars? Where is all the heat from these going to go? Magically back into the ground where the fuel came from?
Add to this that these factories, trains, and cars generate carbon dioxide. Since the Earth takes in energy as ultra-violet radiation and sends out energy as infra-red radiation, you would think there would be some stability in energy. But carbon dioxide (and other gasses) block infra-red radiation. The more carbon dioxide we dump into the atmosphere, the more heat will be retained on earth. The more generators of carbon dioxide we have, the more carbon dioxide we will have dumped into the atmosphere.
Let’s go back to our household heaters. Nowadays, we use electric heaters. Any carbon dioxide that results from our use is generated outside the house. But what if our heaters are fireplaces and wood stoves? The carbon dioxide is being generated inside our house. If we are not careful, we could suffocate ourselves. To make sure we have enough oxygen, we have to have leaky windows and doors or some controlled source of oxygen.
A simple thought experiment shows that we are definitely putting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. For millennia, people cooked their food and warmed themselves with wood fires. The wood provided the carbon for fuel and the trees absorbed the carbon dioxide to grow more wood. This is a virtual cycle: what gets used for one purpose is recycled to produce more of the original substance.
Then people discovered coal in the ground. This burned better than wood and was never rotten or damp. For millennia, the techniques for extracting coal were too inefficient to provide world-wide use.
As the world population grew and agriculture spread, more trees were cleared for buildings and farms. This meant less wood was available for fuel and alternatives were needed. Extracting coal became more efficient.
However, its use wasn’t always efficient. Many fireplaces and factories didn’t burn coal efficiently and much soot was dumped into the air. This resulted in dirty laundry and more cases of pulmonary diseases. As late as the 1940s, steam locomotives would spew cinders and other pollutants as they rumbled by. At the time, we lived right next to the tracks in an otherwise nice neighborhood. We would have to brush our hair after a train passed.
Coal and other fossil fuels are inefficient for another reason. They ain’t making them anymore! We have drained the swamps where critters large and small drowned and slowly broke down into coal and oil. We have also “drained” the easy access to oil and coal. Now we blow up mountains to get coal and pound the heck out of the underlying rock formations to get oil and gas. The first has ruined towns and rivers. The second is causing minor earthquakes.
Both of these operations remove thousands of trees and other vegetation that would absorb carbon dioxide. Add to that we want larger and larger parking lots, wider and wider highways, and larger and larger buildings. We will need more oil for these and will take away more of the carbon sink vegetation. This is a vicious cycle; things only get worse.
Meanwhile we have more and more carbon being burned and many people making lots and lots of money producing carbon fuels. To understand the denial of global warming, follow the money. As Adam Smith wrote in his “Wealth of Nations”, those who live by profit are not to be trusted.
You can find more thoughts like this at my blog: http://magree.blogspot.com.
Think of your house in winter. Assume it is a five-room house with a basement. Assume you have no central heating and your only heat is from electric space heaters.
If you turn on one space heater in one room, you will feel warmer by the heater and colder as you move away from it. Suppose you turn on a space heater in every room. Each room will warm up near the space heater and be cooler away from the space heater. If you are on the opposite side of the room, there is no room-heating! And if you go to the basement, you have proven that there is no household warming!
What happens if you put a space heater in every corner of each room and in every corner of the basement? You will have a very warm house, maybe an unbearably hot house.
So what happens if you have a few steam-powered factories? Not much. What happens if you add hundreds and thousands of steam-powered factories. Well, the areas around these factories may be a bit warmer, but few will notice until they go into the factories.
What happens if you have a few steam-powered trains? Not much, just like with the factories.
What happens if you have a few thousand gasoline-powered cars? Not much. But if you take lots of measurements, you will find that the temperatures are rising slightly around the areas where these factories, trains, and cars operate.
What happens when there are hundreds of thousands of factories and trains and millions of cars? Where is all the heat from these going to go? Magically back into the ground where the fuel came from?
Add to this that these factories, trains, and cars generate carbon dioxide. Since the Earth takes in energy as ultra-violet radiation and sends out energy as infra-red radiation, you would think there would be some stability in energy. But carbon dioxide (and other gasses) block infra-red radiation. The more carbon dioxide we dump into the atmosphere, the more heat will be retained on earth. The more generators of carbon dioxide we have, the more carbon dioxide we will have dumped into the atmosphere.
Let’s go back to our household heaters. Nowadays, we use electric heaters. Any carbon dioxide that results from our use is generated outside the house. But what if our heaters are fireplaces and wood stoves? The carbon dioxide is being generated inside our house. If we are not careful, we could suffocate ourselves. To make sure we have enough oxygen, we have to have leaky windows and doors or some controlled source of oxygen.
A simple thought experiment shows that we are definitely putting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. For millennia, people cooked their food and warmed themselves with wood fires. The wood provided the carbon for fuel and the trees absorbed the carbon dioxide to grow more wood. This is a virtual cycle: what gets used for one purpose is recycled to produce more of the original substance.
Then people discovered coal in the ground. This burned better than wood and was never rotten or damp. For millennia, the techniques for extracting coal were too inefficient to provide world-wide use.
As the world population grew and agriculture spread, more trees were cleared for buildings and farms. This meant less wood was available for fuel and alternatives were needed. Extracting coal became more efficient.
However, its use wasn’t always efficient. Many fireplaces and factories didn’t burn coal efficiently and much soot was dumped into the air. This resulted in dirty laundry and more cases of pulmonary diseases. As late as the 1940s, steam locomotives would spew cinders and other pollutants as they rumbled by. At the time, we lived right next to the tracks in an otherwise nice neighborhood. We would have to brush our hair after a train passed.
Coal and other fossil fuels are inefficient for another reason. They ain’t making them anymore! We have drained the swamps where critters large and small drowned and slowly broke down into coal and oil. We have also “drained” the easy access to oil and coal. Now we blow up mountains to get coal and pound the heck out of the underlying rock formations to get oil and gas. The first has ruined towns and rivers. The second is causing minor earthquakes.
Both of these operations remove thousands of trees and other vegetation that would absorb carbon dioxide. Add to that we want larger and larger parking lots, wider and wider highways, and larger and larger buildings. We will need more oil for these and will take away more of the carbon sink vegetation. This is a vicious cycle; things only get worse.
Meanwhile we have more and more carbon being burned and many people making lots and lots of money producing carbon fuels. To understand the denial of global warming, follow the money. As Adam Smith wrote in his “Wealth of Nations”, those who live by profit are not to be trusted.
You can find more thoughts like this at my blog: http://magree.blogspot.com.
Monday, September 01, 2014
A thought for Labor Day
"The masters, being fewer in number, can combine much more easily: and the law, besides, authorises, or at least does not prohibit, their combinations, while it prohibits those of the workmen. We have no acts of parliament against combining to lower the price of work, but many against combining to raise it. In all such disputes, the masters can hold out much longer. A landlord, a farmer, a master manufacturer, or merchant, though they did not employ a single workman, could generally live a year or two upon the stocks, which they have already acquired. Many workmen could not subsist a week, few could subsist a month, and scarce any a year, without employment."
- Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations
For more selections from Wealth of Nations, see “The Invisible Adam Smith”.
- Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations
For more selections from Wealth of Nations, see “The Invisible Adam Smith”.
Friday, August 08, 2014
Is business experience a qualification for government office?
Some Republican candidates are running for statewide office in Minnesota. See
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/270538031.html and http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/270412441.html. They claim that their business experience makes them better qualified for government service.
Adam Smith seems to have thought differently. He said that those who live by profit are not to be trusted because they have often “deceived and oppressed” the public.
See “The Invisible Adam Smith” for more about this.
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/270538031.html and http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/270412441.html. They claim that their business experience makes them better qualified for government service.
Adam Smith seems to have thought differently. He said that those who live by profit are not to be trusted because they have often “deceived and oppressed” the public.
See “The Invisible Adam Smith” for more about this.
Sunday, June 22, 2014
Corporations, persons, tools, and fools
Corporations are persons? Someone said that you know a corporation is a person when Texas executes one.
How did we get to this situation that corporations have “freedom of speech” and many other freedoms granted to actual living individual persons?
Corporations were originally created to give monarchs and other nobility a piece of the economic action. As the merchant class rose in the cities, the monarch couldn’t tax them because they had no land. By creating a corporation of a given business, the monarch could insist on a few shares of a corporation and rake in more in profits than he would have in taxes. Also, by giving a monopoly to a corporation, he protected it from competition.
These monopolies soon expanded far outside the monarch’s country with colonization of other parts of the world. An example is how British law forbade the American colonies from producing a long list of items or importing goods through any other organization than the British East India Company. Was the British East India Company composed of Adam Smith’s “order of men” who “were not to be trusted” with proposing legislation? The Boston Tea Party was an act of defiance against the corporate monopoly enjoyed by the British East India Company.
Is today’s Tea Party a tool of corporations who want to extract minerals without paying the full cost of such extraction? These corporations are waging legislative, administrative, and public relations campaigns to allow them to operate on corporate terms. Are these corporations composed of Adam Smith’s “order of men” who “were not to be trusted” with proposing legislation? Also as the British East India Company was a “foreign” entity, many of the extractors of today are entities from out of state or even out of the country.
Does “Open for Business” or “Business-friendly” apply to locally-owned companies or to large corporations that will move elsewhere whenever they think an area is not bending to their wishes? Does it mean that large corporations will be given subsidies, including reduced taxes, that aren’t given to locally-owned businesses? If we want truth in government, maybe we should insist that states and localities that claim to be “Business-friendly” should admit being “Corporation-friendly”.
Can you find “corporation” in the U.S. Constitution? That was deliberate. Many of the delegates to the Constitutional Convention remembered well the dominance of a corporation over Colonial affairs and did not want a repeat of that stranglehold. Many of the national politicians of the time had a vision of craftsman and farmers plying their goods in local markets.
But with advances in transportation, the economic situation changed drastically. To build canals required capital. To gather capital, groups of people had to organize to buy shares and/or borrow money. If the enterprise failed, the shareholders didn’t want to be held individually responsible for the losses of the company beyond their own financial contribution. Wouldn’t you? Thus, the limited liability corporation came to the United States.
With the coming of the railroads came ever larger corporations. The Illinois Central Railroad hired a lawyer to get special privileges for it like breaking unions, hiring foreign workers, and gaining privileges not held by people. Yep, that lawyer was the “of the people, by the people, and for the people” guy. Apparently, the Civil War opened his eyes to many things. This excerpt from one of his letters shows this rather strongly:
“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
My, how political parties morph over the generations! I think only two Republican Presidents have had similar misgivings.
Many decades later another war-time leader worried about the “military-industrial” complex. But one of his predecessors pulled a corporate branding trick on the American people. The Department of War was now to be called the Department of Defense. Now corporations weren’t in the business of selling war machines but were fulfilling “defense contracts”.
One of the political ironies is the political party the claims the federal government can’t do anything right bends over backward to lavish more money on the military-industrial complex. Do they not know that snafu and fubar are terms coined by the guys in the foxholes?
So, are corporations the tools of the people or are the people the tools of corporations? If we let the latter happen then we are the fools.
For a lot more about the abuse of and by corporations, see “Life, Inc., How the World Became a Corporation and How to Take It Back” by Douglas Rushkoff.
Mel owns shares in a few corporations and almost always votes against their overpaid executives and boards.
How did we get to this situation that corporations have “freedom of speech” and many other freedoms granted to actual living individual persons?
Corporations were originally created to give monarchs and other nobility a piece of the economic action. As the merchant class rose in the cities, the monarch couldn’t tax them because they had no land. By creating a corporation of a given business, the monarch could insist on a few shares of a corporation and rake in more in profits than he would have in taxes. Also, by giving a monopoly to a corporation, he protected it from competition.
These monopolies soon expanded far outside the monarch’s country with colonization of other parts of the world. An example is how British law forbade the American colonies from producing a long list of items or importing goods through any other organization than the British East India Company. Was the British East India Company composed of Adam Smith’s “order of men” who “were not to be trusted” with proposing legislation? The Boston Tea Party was an act of defiance against the corporate monopoly enjoyed by the British East India Company.
Is today’s Tea Party a tool of corporations who want to extract minerals without paying the full cost of such extraction? These corporations are waging legislative, administrative, and public relations campaigns to allow them to operate on corporate terms. Are these corporations composed of Adam Smith’s “order of men” who “were not to be trusted” with proposing legislation? Also as the British East India Company was a “foreign” entity, many of the extractors of today are entities from out of state or even out of the country.
Does “Open for Business” or “Business-friendly” apply to locally-owned companies or to large corporations that will move elsewhere whenever they think an area is not bending to their wishes? Does it mean that large corporations will be given subsidies, including reduced taxes, that aren’t given to locally-owned businesses? If we want truth in government, maybe we should insist that states and localities that claim to be “Business-friendly” should admit being “Corporation-friendly”.
Can you find “corporation” in the U.S. Constitution? That was deliberate. Many of the delegates to the Constitutional Convention remembered well the dominance of a corporation over Colonial affairs and did not want a repeat of that stranglehold. Many of the national politicians of the time had a vision of craftsman and farmers plying their goods in local markets.
But with advances in transportation, the economic situation changed drastically. To build canals required capital. To gather capital, groups of people had to organize to buy shares and/or borrow money. If the enterprise failed, the shareholders didn’t want to be held individually responsible for the losses of the company beyond their own financial contribution. Wouldn’t you? Thus, the limited liability corporation came to the United States.
With the coming of the railroads came ever larger corporations. The Illinois Central Railroad hired a lawyer to get special privileges for it like breaking unions, hiring foreign workers, and gaining privileges not held by people. Yep, that lawyer was the “of the people, by the people, and for the people” guy. Apparently, the Civil War opened his eyes to many things. This excerpt from one of his letters shows this rather strongly:
“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
My, how political parties morph over the generations! I think only two Republican Presidents have had similar misgivings.
Many decades later another war-time leader worried about the “military-industrial” complex. But one of his predecessors pulled a corporate branding trick on the American people. The Department of War was now to be called the Department of Defense. Now corporations weren’t in the business of selling war machines but were fulfilling “defense contracts”.
One of the political ironies is the political party the claims the federal government can’t do anything right bends over backward to lavish more money on the military-industrial complex. Do they not know that snafu and fubar are terms coined by the guys in the foxholes?
So, are corporations the tools of the people or are the people the tools of corporations? If we let the latter happen then we are the fools.
For a lot more about the abuse of and by corporations, see “Life, Inc., How the World Became a Corporation and How to Take It Back” by Douglas Rushkoff.
Mel owns shares in a few corporations and almost always votes against their overpaid executives and boards.
Saturday, March 29, 2014
Oso, Washington mudslide: sometimes I don’t like to be proven right
I have been wondering if the disastrous mudslide in Oso, Washington was caused by excessive logging. Could it have been only that there was far more rain than normal? My concern was affirmed by Timothy Egan, “A Mudslide, Foretold”, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/30/opinion/sunday/egan-at-home-when-the-earth-moves.html”, New York Times, 2014-03-29.
Twenty-five years ago, in the same valley, he witnessed a mudslide from over-logging. The hill above Oso had possibly been logged beyond the legal limit.
I just can’t write anything more at the moment about this predictable catastrophe. I’ve written before about short-term profit and few are taking up Pete Seeger’s chorus, “When will they ever learn?”.
Twenty-five years ago, in the same valley, he witnessed a mudslide from over-logging. The hill above Oso had possibly been logged beyond the legal limit.
I just can’t write anything more at the moment about this predictable catastrophe. I’ve written before about short-term profit and few are taking up Pete Seeger’s chorus, “When will they ever learn?”.
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