Tempus Fugit

I have to apologize for missing yesterday's blog entry, but the weather was absolutely beautiful- about 60 degrees , no wind, lots of sun and no humidity. I haven't seen a day like that in 2 years it seems like. So I went outside and did lots of stuff, and then last night I celebrated  my son's 21st birthday. I took a day off; so sue me.

But I already had a blog planned out. I just didn't write it. It went something like this:

I have a tall case clock in my living room. I have to wind it by resetting  the weights, and usually I need to reset the time. I have been trying to get it regulated by adjusting the pendulum. About the time I seem to get it regulated the weather changes and I have to start all over again. That's the nature of a mechanical beast; temperature and humidity cause things to swell or shrink, and even if a gear only swells a small fraction of an inch, when you have a hundred gears the amount of change adds up; it is a cumulative effect.

This clock also chimes the quarter hour- 4 chimes; the half hour- 8 chimes; the three-quarter hour- 12 chimes, and on the hour 16 chimes plus it bongs out the hour. I'm not bragging about my clock; I'm explaining how we used to tell time. Back in the day a house would have one clock in it, and you would know the time without looking, as long as you remembered the last chime. Everyday the town clock would strike at noon (at least), and you would reset your clock to match the town clock, so everybody in the village would be on the same time.

Time was a flexible thing; Church on Sunday was just about the only thing you had a specific time for. otherwise, a few minutes one way or the other was not just common, it was almost expected. Time keeping was not an exact science.

Now think about today. What room doesn't have at least one clock? A clock that is accurate to within a minute a decade? How many rooms have three or more? How clocks do you carry with you? One on your wrist, and one on each phone. And then one on your computer. It is impossible to escape time. The modern world doesn't have the same flexibility on time older ones did. There is no being 5 minutes late for a meeting, or for work. Or Heaven forbid, lunch.

We are not just creatures of time, but slaves to it. We have marks to hit many times a day, and those marks are solid. Not all are work related; TV Shows, movies at the theater; basketball games and tee times are all hard points we need to hit or miss an opportunity. Our day is broken in to 30 minute, 60 minute or 120 minute blocks; each segment ending just as fast as the next one begins. Some segments are marked by alarms- like the end of the night, others by internal markers; knowing that if we aren't in the shower by 7:00 we will not make work by 8:00.

And we also know that there is nothing we can do about it. Even vacations are ruled by the clock, to a certain extent. Flights; checkout times; dinner reservations.

When was the last time you were able to spend two days without a clock?

Probably like me; the summer between 5th and 6th grades.

Same Old Pattern

I have spent the last two days examining the titles on 10 properties in a part of town I know reasonably well. It is also an area that I go to as seldom as possible. It has the reputation as a 'Bad' part of town.

But that reputation is fairly new. A few years ago it was considered declining, and a few years before that it was considered nice.

What happened?

I saw the exact same course of events in each of these ten exams. The timing varied a little, but each had the same chain. And all 10 are currently owned by the same couple.

I can't go into too many details, but I can share a few. All 10 properties are in the Western Cincinnati neighborhood of Price Hill; most are in Lower Price Hill.

All of these properties were purchased in the late 1950's/early 1960's by a couple who lived there 30 years or more, and raised a family there.

How can I tell that from a title exam? Because Mom and Dad both had that address when they died and when the kids inherited the property. And then sold it.

This is where the decline of the property, and, by extension, the neighborhood starts. None of the kids wanted the house in 9 cases and it was sold outright. They were all still owner occupied; I could tell by the address the court used during the foreclosure case. It was the purchase after the foreclosure where things went down hill. Usually purchased by a Trust, or LLC or even a husband and wife, sometimes years after the foreclosure, the first sign is when the tax bill is sent not to a lender or the house, but to the owners at a different address, usually in a much better part of town.

Price Hill was known for years as a working class haven. Mostly blue collar, mostly smaller, older homes (All of my 10 were built between 1900 and 1915), but a clean, well kept community. It has/had several well attended churches. Not a rich neighborhood by any means, but respectable.

I saw one house sell for over $150,000 one year, and for $75,000 at sheriff's sale 5 years later. Then $6000 to an absentee landlord 2 years after that. Do you seriously think that chain of events doesn't affect the rest of the housing values in the neighborhood?

But once the property become a rental things can go downhill fast; especially in a 90 or 100 year old house. And it only takes one house to start a slide. Two houses will accelerate it, and three on a street will guarantee it, especially in an older, less expensive neighborhood.

Because you will have two types of neighbors: elderly, been there forever and renters. The renters don't care and the elderly can't make their voices heard. And their kids won't do anything; moving Mom and/or Dad to a nursing home and selling- or renting- the house is much easier than dealing with the lousy absentee property owners and lousier neighbors.

And things decline anther notch.

Why is this important? because it may soon be coming to a neighborhood near you. Look around your block; how many old couples do you see? The ones who have lived there 20 years or more? How much sales activity do you see? For Sale signs sprout and then age, only to be replaced by another sign, from a different broker.

Or maybe it is the legal notices, and the couple up the street with the three kids have packed up and moved away, 2 steps ahead of the sheriff. It doesn't take much sometimes; a divorce and the wife can't afford the house on one income and child support. Or a layoff, and his salary can't make ends meet. Or a long term-illness; Wife; Husband, or God forbid one of the kids. Between doctors and medicines and hospitals and what insurance doesn't cover it doesn't take long.

Shortly nobody is cutting the yard. Then some punk breaks a window. Next thing you know its two houses on the block; then three-four-10. Each empty property is not an opportunity, but a sign; or a signpost to the families that are now buying in the suburbs.

Don't say it can't happen to your neighborhood; they once said that about Price Hill.

Were They Irish, I Wonder?

Have you ever thought about the concept of "LUCK"?

First a definition is in order. According to one of Wikipedia's definitions, "Luck is "a purposeless, unpredictable and uncontrollable force that shapes events favorably or unfavorably for an individual, group or cause"".

Yeah; I'll buy that. In general.

To some folks luck is finding a twenty dollar bill in a Cracker Barrel parking lot. To others, its finding $28,000 in their backyard.

Must. Be. Nice. I don't even have the $20 kind of luck.

And then, the $28k is only face value; in total they maybe worth Ten Million Dollars. Now that is luck with a capital L.

These coins may have been buried as much as 100 years ago. Who ever buried them either forgot about them or died before he could reclaim them. No matter when they were buried they were a fortune. A large fortune at some points; somewhat smaller at others.

And talk about luck; how would you like to be related to the folks who buried- and then lost- this fortune?

There has been a lot of speculation about by whom and why these coins were buried. Personally, it think they were buried in 1933; when FDR was in the gold confiscation business. I can see someone burying their life savings instead of turning it over to the government. I guess they figured it would only be a couple of years before the country came to its senses. No such luck; it took until 1974 before a US Citizen could legally own gold not in his teeth or wedding band.

By 1974 our alleged hoarder was probably long dead, or at the least senile, and the location of the gold was forgotten.

Until some folks stumbling around their backyard hit a jackpot.

All I ever stumble over in my backyard is sports ball of one sort or another and bikes.

It seems I have been forced into a different definition of Luck than some other folks.

The Ukraine

A topic I have been trying to avoid for the last two days has finally surfaced in an unavoidable way.

The Ukraine.

I have been trying to avoid the topic for several reasons; None of them good ones.

First; What the Hell do I know about the Ukraine? Of it's history, past and recent? Of its past; its people; its customs?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing but what I have herd on the radio the last few days and what a quick skim of Wikipedia could tell me.

So them the question is, what is the best future for the Ukraine and its people?

First off, I would be fairly sure that any future with armed foreign troops on their soil would not be the most optimal. If those troops are form the same country that had a boot on their neck for 70 years even less so.

The fall of the Soviet Union freed a lot of people; the Poles and the Ukrainians among them. The Georgians too.

But where are the Georgians now? Looks to me like they are (at least partially) back under Russian control.

But what is best for the Ukrainians? I know part of the reason the whole country has been in turmoil that last few months is because they have been pulled two ways; part of the county wants to return to an alliance with Mother Russia, while another portion (The Majority?) want a more Western alliance. This difference of opinion has lead to a months long Civil War and very recently a new government.

Next question is why do I care?

Two Words:

Pax Americanus

The American Peace. For 70 years it has been American military power that has stopped most conflicts in the world. The United Nations would cease to exist without our support, and it isn't the pronouncements of the nattering nabobs that work; it the knowledge that those words are backed up by American might  that give pause in the world.

Until recently. We now have not a President who speaks softly, and carries a big stick, but one who bellows constantly, and carries a stick he keeps whittling down, both in actual dimension, and in respect.

Twice in recent months he has drawn a 'line in the sand', and twice those lines have been crossed, and twice the consequences have been 'Line? what Line? I didn't draw any line".

And each time America's standing has taken a hit. We are no longer the county that is able to respond in a few weeks to an attack from abroad, like we did after 9-11. Without that fear of reprisal we are leaving ourselves open to a new attack.

Bluntly, I really don't care what happens to the Ukrainians. I don't mean that in a heartless way, but in a practical way. The situation will work itself out, one way or the other, and, to the best of my knowledge, we do not have any treaty or alliance with the Ukraine.

But we do with the Ukraine's neighbor, Poland. what if Russia swallows not only Crimea but all of the Ukraine? And then turns it greedy eyes toward another lost Soviet satellite, right next door?

Then what happens when the line is drawn and crossed?

Its not a situation I want to be in. Poland is a member of NATO; we do have mutual defense treaties with them.

Do you really want President Bluster in charge of NATO's response to Russian aggression in Poland?

And now you know why I avoided this topic as long as I could.

Hallelujah!

It looks like Blogger is back!

Now; Where was I?

Oh Yeah!

Sunday night I watched a show on Netflix called Wagner and Me. The star/narrator was an Englishman named Stephen Fry. It was an interesting hour and some.

Basically, Richard Wagner was an 19th Century German composer who wrote, among many other things, The Flight of the Valkyries; brought into popular culture in the movie Apocalypse Now as the music the helicopter squadron would play as they were attacking the North Vietnamese. Wagner also had the misfortune to be the favorite composer of Adolph Hitler. At least, that's the way the relationship was always portrayed.

This show got a little deeper. Fry, who is Jewish (and lost relatives to the Holocaust), has always loved Wagner's music; something he felt guilty about. This show was his journey into that guilt.

Now; how to describe the show and not have to pronounce a SPOILER ALERT?

We usually don't have to 'navel gaze' over our likes and dislikes. I love the movie 9-5 but hate Jane Fonda being in it. I watch it very seldom for that reason. Or, closer to point, you may have a musician who's music you like, but who's politics you hate. But even that is only close, not on, point.

Imagine that you had a visceral connection with the music of Louis Armstrong, and then found out that Bonnie and Clyde were his biggest fans (not true, as far as I know). And then remember that Bonnie and Clyde had killed your Grandfather, a Louisiana Deputy Sheriff. That gives you a better feel, I think. Except that in this case, Hitler killed millions.

And it wasn't just that Hitler was a fan; Wagner's descendants were supporters of Hitler in the late 1920's, before he was powerful. And Wagner himself was anti-Semitic.

Now you may begin to understand Mr. Fry's guilt.

As I said; it is a fascinating journey.

There is a theater in Germany dedicated solely to the music of Richard Wagner, built by King Leopold specifically for Richard Wagner, and every year they perform Wagner's Ring Opera series; a show that lasts over 8 hours. EIGHT HOURS OF OPERA!!! And tickets are sold out for this year. If you wish to attend you will need to buy tickets for the 2021 show. Yes; they are sold out for the NEXT SEVEN YEARS.

Stephen wants to attend, but is still having Guilt Issues. The power of the music versus the power of the guilt.

He travels all over Europe, including a visit to the Wagner Theater in Bayrueth, Germany during rehearsals and a visit to the massive outdoor venue Hitler had built in Nuremberg, site of his most well known speeches, trying to decide which is more powerful.

He has one more visit to make; to see a Holocaust survivor, and it is talking to her that he decides which has the greater power.

What? you thought I was going to tell you which choice he made?

I thought about doing so, but then I thought this: some of you will be interested; interested enough to watch the video. Others of you will just not care; the information on his final choice isn't of any importance.

So by telling, I will have ruined the show for those who care, and not affect those who don't.

See? I think I have chosen wisely.

On the Butcher Block

Well; they are at it again.

Carter did it; Clinton did it and now Obama is doing it.

Read the US Constitution. It is written in pretty plain English, unlike some modern laws that seem to be written in Sanskrit. There is a direct charge to the Federal Government to pay for an Army and Navy. Defense of our borders is, in some respects, the ONLY charge to the Federal government.

Yet when money gets "tight" (yes I am using that word sarcastically) the first cuts are in Defense. There are so many things wrong with this announcement  i don't know where to start.

How about here: The cuts assume the United States no longer becomes involved in large, prolonged stability operations overseas on the scale of Iraq and Afghanistan. 

Really? And what happens if that assumption is wrong? NO problem; call up more of the National Guard and Reserves. Except, damn the bad luck; they are getting cut too. So with less regular Army and less Guard and Reserve Units, what happens when the manure hits the fan? What happens when Iran and North Korea conspire to attack Israel and South Korea at the same time, plunging two areas of the globe into chaos at the same time?

I'll tell you what happens. Have you ever locked two feuding boys into a room without parental supervision? Then come back a hour later to the utter devastation? Without the US as a stabilizing force a Korean conflict will drag in Japan and China at least. An Iran- Israel war will drag in Iraq and Syria and probably Egypt as well. And maybe Russia, as a 'silent' partner. Which side of the world would we respond to? Where would the limited resources get allocated?

Which ally will we throw to the dogs? and don't mention the United Nations as a solution; without US firepower (both figurative and literal) they are a laughing stock.

Don't misinterpret me; I don't want the United States military to be used the world's policeman. I don't want out best young men dying between the fighting factions in a backwater Civil War. But like it or not, our country has international interests; both treaty and trade related.

Those interests need to be protected. We can no more abandon South Korea than we can, should she require our help, England.

But these cuts may force just such a decision. There is a reason we have not had a Army smaller than it now for the last 70 years; its because we need to be prepared to not just fight a war on two continents; we need to WIN both wars.

Have you ever watched a show on the nature channel? Have you ever watched a pride of lions chase after a herd of wildebeests? Have you ever seen them take on the biggest meanest one they could find? No, they are chasing the old, the sick, the weak. The vulnerable.

Have you ever watched a how on a wolf pack, or a wild horse hear or a any other group of wild animals? They all have A leader. When is that leader challenged? when he is at the height of his power? Or during his decline?

Like it or not it has been both the United States' power- and willingness to use that power- that has kept the world largely at peace since 1945. What happens when that power is no longer there?

Its not just our way of life we need to worry about (although I do see an increasing testing of US resolve in the last 4 years; and there will be more and more incidents to test 'President Bluster' in the coming year; watch carefully the response to his 'line' in the Ukraine), but also that of our allies. Yes Israel is a potent force, but it is the looming US Club that has helped keep the rest of the Middle East at bay. And yes; we have interests other than Israel in the Middle East; a conflict in that area would be disastrous to energy prices, not to mention the possibility of Moslem uprisings in any country in Europe that joined in on Israel's side. Yes; quite a few countries have sizable Moslem populations, like France, Belgium and England; enough that could swing a balance of power in a 2015 Mideast War.

The thing the Obama Regime doesn't think about when doing their figuring: Cutting Defense is easy.

Dealing with the results of those cuts will be hard. Hopefully not harder than we can cope with.

But I have my doubts. And the history of this Administration does nothing to ease those doubts.

Back to the Past, and Back to the Future

This article, Time Travelers: Please Don't Kill Hitler, caught my attention this morning, for obvious reasons. What better way to catch the eye of a history buff than to mention time travel and killing Hitler?

The specific of not killing Hitler is just a general prohibition about not changing the past, as it will change the future. Well, duh.

Doesn't everyone know that? Aren't we all aware of an event in our past that has lead us to where we are?

Personally, I can point to several events, seared... seared into my memory that have made me who I am, and how, Robert Frost-like, a different path would have made all the difference.

Yeah; so?

20-20 Hindsight is not the most optimal method for re-examining our past. Very specific events put us in a position to make a specific decision, and changing that decision would require changing the circumstances; it would not be logical to think we would change our decision without a change in the circumstances.

Years ago I read Ray Bradbury's, "A Sound of Thunder", and the concept fascinated me. The idea that the life or death of one individual creature millions of years ago would change the world we live in. This idea was also dealt with in a Star Trek, the Next Generation  episode, Paralells, where a character gets caught in a time fracture, and all of the various possible histories form that time fracture become not just possible, but active. In the final scene, all of the possible futures are gathered together, hundreds of thousands of variations, just before the fracture is corrected, and the original, I don't think anybody says correct, time line is restored.

One of the questions asked in the article, and answered in some of the comments, is what would you do with a time machine?

Can you imagine being able to revisit yourself at one of those decision points, shades of 2015 Biff visiting 1955 Biff and changing his future, and having a decision that effected your life changed? Would the one visit do it? Or would that single change open up a broad range of new decisions that would need guidance from the future as well? That decision you made at 18 about college or a job is changed, and now your future self is worse off than you are now. Or were then. Or were before you started messing with things,

Or that decision to buy a new car at 25, a decision that you thought didn't turn out so well, is changed; so you continue to drive the beater, until that accident that you walked away from in the new car, leaves you paralyzed in the old one?

So many decisions; so many futures. And imagine the effect on the 25 year old you. First you have to accept that the geezer in front of you is actually the future you, and then you have to accept that his advice to not purchase a new car is valid, and then you act upon it, only to be revisited by the same geezer, this time in a wheelchair, telling you to forget the previous advice he gave you, and now he wants you to buy the new car? Do you believe him this time? How many more trips will be required to get your future to turn out the way you want it to?

Isn't that kind of what we have tried with our children? We see how our future has turned out; we see where the bad decisions were made, and try to force our children to make different choices than we did, so their future will turn out better than ours. We are that old geezer, hawking different options than what the geezer made in his youth, and having just as much faith that the decisions made will be correct for their future.

So; do we try? Do we attempt to steer our children down a different course than we took, not knowing for certain that future events will play out to detriment or benefit, based on that decision?

Besides, we may remember as a pivot point some choice we made, but it may have been a completely different decision, one we see as a good choice, that may have actually have not been so. Or it may be a choice we made, long since forgotten, that has had more effect of our current selves than we may know.

Kind of like stepping on a butterfly, 80 million years ago. You never know how it will affect the future, if at all. 

UAW Loses Another One

I think I have mentioned several times that Unions have a glorious past, but a rather ignoble present, and a doubtful future. Face it; if we outlawed government worker unionization, the Unionized rate for the workforce as a whole would drop to 5 or 6 percent or less.

The union vote in Volkswagen's Chattanooga Plant is particularly telling. Volkswagen was not only neutral on the vote, but was encouraging the unionization. The lack of a Union in the plant is preventing them from forming company/employee product improvement groups, something they see as a necessary part of plant management.

Why can't they form the improvement groups? It is AGAINST Federal Labor law. Forming the groups without a Union is illegal, and they can't form an in-house union; that is also illegal.

Gee; I wonder which lobby got THAT fine idea made into law?

But; I digress. Again.

My real point today is this post over at The Truth About Cars by a member of the workforce that voted the representation down.

This isn't some outsider talking, or an anti-union activist; this is a person on the ground explaining what the UAW does to you, and why their presence poisons the workplace.

I'll tell you as well, having worked in a union shop years ago; every word is true. In particular the Us versus Them attitude that Union leadership engenders. There is no We when it comes to the workplace; They are evil; They want to steal from you; they want to kill you; nothing They say is true; on and on and on.

Apparently some folks are wising up.

Old Technology

I found this article in Popular Mechanics through Instapundit.

Some is interesting; some a bit of a stretch. The idea of 'still in use' especially.

But there are some points that are inadvertently made. Points only I would probably notice, and point out.

Slide One of Nine talks about Philadelphia's 100 year old cast-iron water mains; yet shows the workmen building a Brick Conduit, probably from even earlier. Not the 1910 t0 `920 period, but 1885-1895. Are these even older brick conduits still in use?

Slide Two of Nine is the New York City Subway. it opened in 1904 with 24.7 miles of track. Subway track. Cincinnati is making a big deal about 2 miles of track on the surface 110 years later. The article mentions that the tunnel under the East River is over a hundred years old. Think about that the next time you are riding the subway between Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Slide Three of Nine is an even bigger stretch. Yes, the technology of the railroad is still in use, but the rails can't be more than 10 years old; the ties even less. And even the B&O is gone. Nice spot for an old picture, but a stretch for old infrastructure.

Slide Four of Nine is a true survivor; a one hundred and twenty year old piece of concrete street. Yep; they are still using it for cars. Maybe we need to revive that recipe for our modern Expressways.

Slide Five of Nine is a stone bridge in Pennsylvania,  one just a bit over 300 years old. No wonder it is still here. Being solid stone, it is less trouble to keep using it than it is to tear it down.

Slide Six of Nine is a beast. Or at least the men who built it were. in 1825 they blasted a 729 foot tunnel through slate and limestone. IN TWO YEARS. The feds have been working on a bridge replacement for I-75 for 10 years now, and don't even have a route. And you wonder why this country is going to Hell in a hand basket. A second interesting point; the tunnel isn't really in use as a canal tunnel, but as a tourist attraction. The County that owns it uses it for boat rides. Which is the third interesting point. These are small boats floating about a thousand feet in a 200 year-old canal. But the Coast Guard has shut the boats down for repairs. What?

Slide Seven of Nine (why does that have a familiar ring?) Another 200 year old waterway, and again, the term in use is a little suspect. Originally built as a canal with 8 locks, not it is a sluiceway for an electric power plant. Still in use, but not as originally intended.

Slide Eight of Nine is legit; a 120 year old hydro-electric power plant; still putting out electricity. Probably not with the original generators, but still; rather impressive. Probably a good initial design.

Slide Nine of Nine; another power plant; a 1969 vintage nuclear plant. Not quite as durable as the hydro-plant; it is scheduled to be shut down in 2019 after only 50 years of use.

Part of what this proves is that good engineering pays; do it right the first time and it will last. Something that needs to be  learned by our modern engineers. Maybe we can build a stadium that will last a hundred years, instead of forty.

D-Day; the Sixth of June

I had few minutes today and went to Ann Althouse's blog.

I found something I had to share.

I haven't heard this speech in almost 30 years. I surprised it is still available to view and listen do. I definately puts the lie to the notion that current president is a great orator.

Or even an orator.

Today is D-Day; 69 years on, not 40. President Reagan's words still ring true and should remind us that there is no such thing as a Peace Dividend. Yes, we can call this an Era of Peace and cut our military spending, just as every nation but Germany and Japan did between the two World Wars, and we will wind up in exactly the same place the world did in 1939.

I usually spend a few hours on this day to watch The Longest Day; the 1963 movie about the heroes of D-Day. That will be postponed until tomorrow night.

I also think I will start adding President Reagan's speech to my D-Day itinerary. Great words, honoring greater men.

Do Emission Standards Equal Horsepower?

Amazing how, at times, a simple article can start a massive discussion on several other, tangentially related, topics.

Take this post over at The Truth About Cars. Starts off with a rant from a used auto dealer about the deals he has missed because his county still has emission control checks.

Then it sways into the difficulty of diagnosing a glowing Check Engine Light, and the various ways to defeat, where it is legal to, the emissions systems.

And then swings off into the Constitutionality of Emissions checks as opposed to emissions systems, with a swing back to whether the checks and the systems themselves serve a public purpose, and should be a legitimate function of government.

Wow; that's a lot of territory.

Ya wanna know what I think?

Of course you do; you've read this far, haven't you?

Back in the day of the big block engine with points and a carb we re getting about 10% of the power of the gasoline to the road. The rest didn't burn, and washed into the oil or trickled out the exhaust pipe.

Yep; we was polluting. Part of the advances in emissions have lead to less gasoline being a pollutant, and more of it being turned into horsepower. That's how you can have a Ford Focus with 420 horsepower. These systems have also become more reliable. Fuel injection is not new. Automakers experimented with it in the 1930's. Chevrolet had a production FI unit in 1957.

But they were about as reliable as $3.00 watch. So the idea was shelved until it had to be revived.

Not that I think the current state of automotive technology is solely the result of emissions standards. Physically engines could only get so big in an automobile; 500 cubic inches was about all there was. New ideas had to be developed to squeeze more horsepower out of a drop of gasoline. The technology that was developed would have been developed where there were emissions standards or not. Maybe not as quickly, but it still would have been developed.

Things would have worked just like all the others advances had; high end manufacturers would experiment and develop; the mid-level would  produce thousands of units, and the consumers would do the road testing for a few years until the bugs were worked out.

Without emissions standards would we have street legal cars pushing 600 horsepower? Oh yeah.

The market would have demanded it, and the automakers would have made it happen.

January 20, 1973

A date that will live in infamy; at least in some circles.

A tortuous decision, Roe v. Wade, in which the decision was made, and then the law was found to enforce it. Or maybe found in certain 'emanations from penumbras'.

Ann Althouse, whose blog is a daily stop for me, has a post up on the decision. Ann is a law professor, so her opinion on Conlaw should carry some weight. But in this case she, and the court are wrong.

I won't fault their finding of a right to privacy, or their finding of a limitation on state action when it comes to the individual. Both correct.

But they incorrectly protect the wrong individual.

In his opinion Justice Blackmun seemed to have trouble determining when life actually begins. I don't have the same trouble.

Life begins at conception.

Unless you can prove to me that the product of human sperm and a human egg can somehow grow into a duck.

Why is that so hard? Why couldn't the esteemed Justices figure out that there is a second individual involved in every pregnancy, just as human as the mother, whose life has the same right to legal protection as the mothers?

Is that life worth as much as it's mother's? Absolutely. Once you start assigning comparative value to a human life you have started down a road toward lessening the value of every human life.

Certain things need a bright, white line; the protection of human life is absolutely THE prime one.

Once a society  has determined that a human life is worth less than a whim decision of another, where do you now draw the line?

Since a 20 week old fetus is not viable, based on its inability to live with out the support of another human, what about a 25 year-old comatose individual, also unable to survive without the care of another individual? Why is the 25 year-old 'worthy' of the care of another, and the 20 week old is not?

Or the 85 year-old grandmother with Alzheimer's;can we consider her viable? She needs constant care individual in order to survive. Can someone's whim decision end her life as well and the 20 week old's?

Ah; I know the response; ANY individual, with the proper training, can care for the comatose or the elderly; only ONE individual is capable of taking care of the fetus; its Mother.

When we say its her baby we don't mean its her possession, like an automobile; we mean its in her charge; her care. The child is a part of her.

Women have been given the most important job in the history of mankind; the production and nurturing of the next generation. Over 55 million mothers in the last 40 years have decided they don't want the job. which is fine.

As long as you haven't applied for the position and been granted the job. It's not one you can quit half way through the contract.

Next objection is always Rape/incest. I can understand why a woman would not want to carry the child of her rapist. The morning after pill exists, and I think this would be an excellent use of it. When a woman reports a rape, a part of the kit is a morning after pill. If the egg has been fertilized, it has not yet begun to grow, and has not become implanted on the uterine wall. It has not yet become life.

But the idea that 6 months later a woman suddenly decides to cry rape because of an inconvenient child... maybe I don't understand what it means to be raped. I can't imagine it would take a woman more than a few minutes to figure out she was, or had been raped.

Incest is another matter. Yes it happens, and yes, an unwanted child is the result. And yes, there should be an exception in the law for the victims of incest. Are they willing to put the father in jail?

As is pointed out in the Althouse comments, abortion was always legal, but not available on demand. Medical professionals needed to determine that the saving of the mother's life required the termination of the child's. As a father, that is a decision I would find impossible to make. Kill my wife or kill my child? A decision I pray I never face.

And yet, 55 million women have easily decided that the cost of having a child was more than they were willing to pay.

And they are free to decide not to have children. Its easy.

Just avoid the act that creates them.

But I suppose that would be too difficult, wouldn't it? Easier to have your fun and destroy the results than not enjoy the fun.

Maybe that is the part of the process I understand the least.

But apparently Justice Blackmun had no trouble.

The Issue is Basic

Who controls your life? You or the Government?

And when Government control becomes oppressive, what do you do about it?

You do your best to vote out the bums, and only the bums change, not the oppression.

Then we turn to the Second Amendment. Do we really plan on defeating the government with our little guns?

Uh, yes.

What were Lexington and Concord about? What was Paul Revere's ride about? Why were an ignorant bunch of Colonials taking on the most powerful military the world had ever known in 1776?

The men who had fought and won the Revolution then entrusted the newly formed government to be in charge, because as Jefferson said, government is a necessary evil. But the new Constitution failed to enshrine some of the basic rights the new country had just fought a 7 year long war for. One side in 1783 reminded us that these rights are God-given, and can't be infringed.

The other side we agree, but put it in writing. That's how we wound up with the first 10 Amendments, commonly called The Bill of Rights.

All of these Amendments are important, but let me call attention to 3 of them; the Second (of course); the Ninth and the Tenth. These rights were so important to the Founders that they were individually named; the same as our freedom of press and expression; freedom of worship, and freedom from illegal search and seizure.

The ability to own weapons is the Second Amendment. Not the last.

The Ninth and Tenth further limit the Federal Government to only the powers enumerated in the Constitution itself, further limiting the power of the government in our lives.

Reagan said it best; Government isn't the solution, Government is the problem.

Take Sandy Hook. It was a 'Gun Free Zone'. A place designated by the government to exclude guns. That sure stopped the shooter there, didn't it? So lets up the penalty for bringing a gun into the zone. The crazy bastard killed himself. What punishment can you craft into law worse than that?

Take a look at ALL of the mass shootings in the last 5 years. For arguments sake lets say there were 15; 3 a year. Say each one averaged 20 dead, and the shooter used 3 guns, each with a 30 round magazine. Damned evil guns.

So we have 45 guns used for evil in very attention grabbing incidents. In a county with over 300 million guns in it. and we have 300 dead; each death a tragedy, but again, in a country of over 310 million people; and these number are just off of the top of my head. The real numbers are considerably less.

But each incident makes headlines, and the folks who don't like guns in the hands of private citizens use each one to ram home there talking points. Never waste a good crisis, remember?

Instead, I maintain that incidents like Sandy Hook only serve to prove the old saying; When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.

Gun technology is a genii you can't stuff back into the bottle. Bans don't work, not just for guns but for anything. Prohibition worked real well back in the 1920's didn't it? The War on Drugs? How's that working out for you? Gun Free Zones?

Yeah, you see the point.

One way I use to make my point about self defense (it's easy for me, at 6-4 and around 300 pounds) is I invade personal space, and then ask what they intend to do about it. Call 911? Why? Because they have guns? Then why not have one yourself?

Me standing in front of you to make a point in an argument is one thing; What would it be like if I was truly hostile?

How long would you be willing to wait on a government response?

Who is in charge of your life?

You; or the government?

Ready for a Little Bang-Bang-Bang?

I want to show you a video. I found it a few minutes ago on the The Borderline Sociopathic Blog For Boys.

Great video. My goal is to make it to the shoot one day. Just as soon as I can justify the thousands of dollars it would cost.

But here's my point, especially tonight, right before Obama tries to outlaw 'Assault Weapons' by Presidential fiat.

During the video the report says something to the effect of "you could kill a lot of people with all this firepower.

Yep. Sure could. Even if one shot in a hundred killed somebody this shoot would have probably killed thousands.

But guess what? Nobody even suffered a wound from these fully automatic firearms. Why was that? because they are in the hands of responsible citizens, not criminals or spaced out victims of modern psychiatry. 

If the guns were evil; if the massive magazines were evil, then this would have been a complete blood bath.

I don't see any blood. All I see are a bunch of folks having a good time. A DAMN good time.

When some body asks why I need a 30 round magazine to shoot a deer I tell them I don't. I tell them I need a 30 round magazine because it's FUN to shoot 30 rounds in a row.

This video proves just how much fun it can be.

Say Cheese!

I did a post the other day on the changes in the last hundred years on the way music has changed in our lives.

At the same time I was thinking about the ways that photography has changed as well.

Photography was initially developed almost 200 years ago. The process of using light to cause a chemical reaction and create an image was a startling revelation. History could now be documented in real time. As long as history would stand still and had plenty of light thrown on it.

50 years later Matthew Brady would do just that, making hundreds of images of the carnage on Civil War battlefields.

The process has changed sometimes; the chemicals used or the base material. Tintypes are just that- an image created chemically on a metal plate, and glass plate negatives were just a chemical wash on a glass plate, subject to the hazards as any piece of glass is. The modern negative film was the development that put a camera in the hands of the common man. George Eastman was the Henry Ford of photography; Ford put the common man on the road with his Model-T, and Eastman allowed him to photograph the trip.

The images were still; very still. We are so used to micro-second exposure times, but images in the old days took minutes to expose, which is why most old pictures are stiffly posed portraits.

The Kodak Brownie had those same issues; slow film speeds, no adjustable aperture, no flash. Groups didn't gather on the front porch for their health; they needed the light to make sure the picture turned out.

And then once the roll was full, the whole camera was sent off to Kodak, returned a few weeks later with your pictures and a fresh roll of film inside, all set for 8 more shots. And that's when you found out that Aunt Martha had moved during the Easter family portrait.

Cameras became more complex, and those cameras eventually made their way into the hands of the amateurs. Although amateur in this case just meant took pictures for fun, not profit. Film speed had to be set, f-stop, depth of field and focus all had to be right, and heaven help you with color film!

And you had to wait a week to find out if that once-in-a-lifetime shot had turned out.

Unless you did your own developing; tubs of caustic chemicals and very specific timings. Old chemicals, to long or too short in one bath or the other and your negatives or your pictures were ruined.

And then came the Kodak Instamatic with it's Flash Cubes. Point and shoot, inside or out, a (fairly) perfect shot every time. But film and developing cost money; about 6 bucks all told for 24 shots. And you had to wait to see the picture.

Unless you had a Polaroid. Take the shot, catch the picture as it spit out the bottom of the camera, keep it warm in your armpit for a minute and voila! Pictures! Want two copies? Take two pictures. At about 50 cents each.

Kodak and Polaroid were getting quietly rich.

Then came the image sensor; developed by an employee at Kodak, of all places, in 1975. It took 20 years, but once the sensors became cheap everybody wanted one. No film; no developing; no wait pictures. Snap one? Hell no; snap 50. Things not worthy of documenting 10 years ago now became fodder for a battery of images.

And just when the digital cameras thought they had a monopoly on the market, BAM! The iPhone, and now every phone has become a pocket photo studio.

My grandfather took pictures of me and his other grandkids with an Argus 35mm; fully manual, it took some great pictures, once you knew how to operate it, a skill I had just about mastered when I got my first point and shoot digital 10 years ago.

Now my son sees his boys in a cute pose, pulls out his phone, snaps off a pic or two, and texts them to me on my phone.

I think his Great-grandpa would be proud. 

Music Makes The World Go Around

 Have you ever given much thought to music?

Today we don't have to; drag out the iPod; pull up a song. Don't like it? Dump it and pull up another. But that technology, through the iPod, is just over 10 years old. MP3? About 20.

Before that we had Tapes; Cassette; Reel to Reel and 8-Track. And of course before that albums and 45s. Or 78s. Or even further back, wax cylinders.

Before that? All music was live.

We have become accustomed to music being a constant soundtrack to our lives; our MP3 players; the radio or CD in the car; muzak piped in the stores and elevators; even coming through our TVs through the miracle of cable. Pandora coming through your flippin' cell phone!

Less than 100 years ago it wasn't so easy. You want a tune? Whistle it. Or Hum it. Or know somebody who who can play it on some instrument or the other. Sure; you could buy a Victrola in 1913; for $75.00. When the average year's salary was $1300. Two weeks pay; give or take a couple of hours. Plus records at a buck or so each. That one song would lose it's novelty real quick.

Dances in the rural areas were a godsend; a reason to get together and music to boot, provided all of the members of the band could get together.

You think a barbershop quartet sounds goofy? Compare it to no music at all. Sounds pretty good now, don't it? Ever wonder why you always see Uncle Ed with his guitar in old family photos? Because he brought the music.

Stop and think for a minute about how dependent we are on electrons for music today, and how few folks play an instrument. Every high school had at least one band back in the day. The official one that played at football games, and there were always 4 or 5 guys banging around in somebody's garage or basement, hoping to play the school dance some Saturday night.

There was also a community to be had when a band got together and a dance was in the offing.

Something that's hard to achieve with a pair of earbuds.

Making a Stand in Michigan

My dad was a member of the UAW (United Auto Workers) for more than 35 years, and at one point was Union Steward.

I was a member of the Ornamental and Structural Iron Workers Union for about 5 years myself. My Mom's Dad was a member of a Union, although I can't recall which one, but I do remember it was his Union picnic that took us all to Coney Island one Saturday a year when I was a kid. I believe My other Granddad was an Iron Worker as well, because of where he worker in the 1940's, but it wasn't something that was ever discussed. I've also had Uncles in the Steelworkers and the UAW and a son who is a Teamster.

I doubt any of them could explain what happened in Michigan today. I know I sure can't.

I am, as you probably know, a student of history. I am well aware of the bloody struggles it took to gain Union recognition back in the '30's. The UMW- United Mine Workers and their struggle in the Appalachians; the UAW and the sit-ins at GM. The Bloody Battle of the overpass at Ford. Union men fighting- and sometimes dying- in the physical battles against company thugs.

All for an ideal; a purpose. God knows they needed it. I can't imagine a situation desperate enough for me to climb into a mine shaft to earn a living in 1930, stand an assembly line or run steel on the Empire State Building. Jobs were short, Labor was begging for jobs and the companies were still in the early Industrial Age mode; Life was cheap. Use them up; spit them out move on to the next man- or woman; boy or child- in line and make another dollar.

Workers needed a voice; and the only way they got that voice was through Union representation. Life- All lives- have value, and it was only through Union activity that that value was recognized.

And then... something went wrong. Maybe it was the labor shortage of the '50's, or the Cold War days of the '60's. But Unions went from NEED to WANT. 6 weeks; 8 weeks; 10 weeks of vacation. 8-10-12 holidays a years. Add another dollar; add another buck-fifty; no, a buck seventy-five an hour. And sick days. Insurance; Medical, life, dental, long term care, short term/long term disability. 2 breaks, no 3 breaks a shift.

Absolute power corrupts; absolutely.

The UAW is probably the poster child for Union over reach. The center of automobile production in the world was Detroit, Michigan. Every automobile on the road in this country for 30 years had a UAW sticker on it somewhere.

And now? I'd have to guess that less than 10% of the cars on the road are Union made, and probably less than that have a Union hand in their production.

The number of private sector Union workers in this country is rapidly approaching single digits, and today didn't help that at all.

Yes; Michigan made it easier to have a job and not pay Union dues. Did that hurt the UAW; King of Michigan? Maybe; maybe not.

But video of 4 guys in Union jackets beating up a reporter and tearing down a tent with a woman inside most definitely did.

The UAW had control over one of those events; but not the other.

Guess which one will get the least attention in the Union halls?

And Union approval will drop another few points. The Unions will wonder why; why is membership shrinking? After the fine job we did not giving into the bastards at Hostess. After our spirited defense of Union rights in Wisconsin and Michigan. Why are people no longer supporting us?

And the four thugs who are criminals to us will be heros to them.

And they will never figure it out.

More Beer

This article really demonstrates part of what I have been saying for years; nobody really liked most of the corporate beers. They just didn't have any alternatives.

Now; we have alternatives. Like we talked about in this post about Beer, people have wanted better beer for years. Now we can get it.

The one interesting point is about Michelob. Back when getting a Guinness was a pipe dream, beer aficionados drank a lot of Michelob. It was a better beer than the normal brews.

And then we were able to get Guinness.

So what happened to Michelob? Was it the ability to get better beers that has caused its slide (Sales loss (2006-2011): 72.0%, according to the article), or was it the cheapening of the Michelob brand that caused it? Beers like Michelob Ultra.

But they also produced some better beers, like Amber Bock that I really enjoyed and a very drinkable Porter.

Could be one or the other or both. It wouldn't be the first time a good product was squeezed from both sides. It was more or less a niche beer that has had its niche disappear.

It was a good domestic large beer. Now if you want a good beer, you go microbrew; if you want a large beer you go (hold on while I pause for an involuntary shudder) Bud Light.

I find it interesting also that the  'cheap crap' beers have also lost sales. Old Milwaukee; Milwaukee's Best and Amstel have all lost between 35% and 58% of their sales. Is that a reflection of increased taste among beer drinkers for better beer, or a loss in sales to cheaper drunks, as cash strapped budgets looked for cheaper alternatives? Hard to say.

But this article from 2010 basically says that the loss in top shelf booze is more than made up for in the increased sales in lower priced stuff. Is there enough room in there for a few former beer drinkers?

My guess is yes.

Bud Light is sort of an anomaly in this report, with 39.15 million barrels sold last year it is the undisputed king of the hill in Beer sales.

Its not really hard to figure out why. Most sports stadiums and arenas sell it almost exclusively. If you want to drink beer, you (please allow a short break while I pause for another involuntary shudder) drink Bud Light.

I'm sorry; I just don't under stand how anyone with a single functioning taste bud can drink that swill. I seriously would rather drink dishwater than Bud Light. That's not a recent opinion; I have never liked Budweiser or Bud Light.

I guess it has something to do with having an edjamikated beer palate.

I was, you may recall, raised on Weidemann.

Stirring Up Some Old Memories

According to BING, today is the 50th birthday of the Petrified Forest National Park. Well; Happy Birthday.

Somewhere I have a picture of me, my sister and our Dad in the Petrified Forest. We're sitting on a log about 8 feet long and maybe 30 inches in diameter. I'm about 4; Sis is 3 or so. Dad is wearing a cowboy hat. That hat is still in the family. It is a white Stetson, and I don't think Dad ever wore after we left Texas a few days later. But he kept it for the next 40 years, hanging off of a basketball trophy on his chest of drawers.

Back in the 60's real Stetson cowboy hats were kinda rare in our part of Kentucky. So, when a local theater group did a production of Oklahoma!, Dad's hat did a star turn on the head of Curly. We got free tickets to the show.

But, I digress.

The visit to the petrified forest was on the return leg of our California trip. A real Vacation trip that took us through Denver to Los Angeles and Disneyland, then up the coast to Knott's Berry Farm and San Francisco, then home the southern route through Arizona, for the Grand Canyon, and Texas. One Day I am going to do a series of posts on that trip. I just have to figure out who has the movies.

My Mom's Dad was on the trip with us, and took hundreds of feet of film from Cincinnati to LA and back, some of it with the hood ornament of our '55 Oldsmobile figuring prominently. Dad had the super 8 footage converted to video tape years ago, and I think my brother had it converted to DVD a few years later. As soon as I figure out who has the movies, I'll rip 'em to my computer and post pieces in the blog.

Our trip wasn't as exciting as the trip the Griswolds took 20 years later, and Disneyland was open when we got there, but I can still remember bits and pieces almost 50 years later.

I have to confess; the primary memory I have of that trip is the smell of hotel rooms. A combination of cleaning fluids and air conditioning, that smell remains with me today for some reason. I associated that smell with air conditioning for years; that trip was the first time I remember spending a considerable amount of time in cooled air.

Amazing what will impress itself on the mind of a 4 year old, isn't it?

Friday Night at the Movies XII

Did you ever watch something and when you were done kinda thought....

What the Hell was that?

I was looking for something to watch last night and was doing an extensive scan of Netflix. I was down to perusing the Independent stuff. There I found a show called Confederate States of America. The basic premise is alternative history; what if the South had won the Civil War?

Then what you have is a BBC produced 'documentary' on the current- circa 2004- CSA, which now encompasses all 50 states, and the history of the world to this point. Interspersed in the show are the commercials broadcast on the CSA network.

Some parts are real history, some parts are almost history (like the 1960 Presidential race between Democrat Richard Nixon and Republican John F. Kennedy which includes original debate footage redubbed) and some parts are pure fiction. But without knowing the real events it would be easy to become confused on what is real and what is not.

Presented as satire, the commercials are..... indescribable. There is one for the Home Shopping Channel- for slaves. Another advertises a sort of invisible fence for your servants. Yet another advertises get insurance for your property- All of your property.

Interestingly enough some of the ads are for products that really existed and were commercially sold in the world in the past. The racism in the ads is apparent and, hopefully, transparent.

The show itself is at times funny. The phrase "Sexual Relations with that woman" comes up, and the situation causes a few quick laughs. If you know the history as it happened, then there are also some 'events' that will cause a more than a few quick grins.

Just shy of an hour and a half long, some parts show the film was done independently, but for the most part it is a very watchable 90 minutes. You can't let go of the premise, and I really think that is the purpose of the commercials. Without them, because of the PBS style and quality of the mockumentary you could very easily believe this is a factual presentation.

One inspired and presented by the KKK most likely.

The historic timelines are credible and the use of redubbed historic footage lends a certain authenticity. The Canadian exiled Abraham Lincoln even makes and appearance in some "recently discovered" old film footage.

But the commercials bring home that what you are watching is a fiction; and the film is meant to ridicule a possible Southern Christian based society, not admire it. In later years the country bans all non- Christian religions and homo-sexuality, again driving home the general intolerance of folks who would tolerate slavery.

Bottom line; I'm not sure what to think. Interesting concept, and presented well. Some fiction; some reality, blended together rather nicely.

Grab a few beers, and watch a few minutes.

If nothing else there will be food for thought.