Saturday, June 3, 2017

Sunday, June 4, 2017

Electricity has become a luxury good in Germany.

Der Spiegel

The world is “laughing (and) crying at the President of the United States, who clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

Former US Secretary of State John Kerry

President Trump formally withdrew from the Paris Accords. Reaction everywhere was highly emotional, but the effects of the withdrawal on US policy are minimal, and there are few scientific claims that US membership in the non-binding accords would have any measurable effect on global temperatures. The accords are a statement of goals, not binding policies.

For a longer and more passionate analysis of the withdrawal, see Newt Gingrich’s comments: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/06/02/gingrich-trump-and-paris-let-negotiations-begin.html

The fact is that the US is not actually committed to anything: the accords are voluntary, and if one assumes the validity of the man-made global warming hypothesis as usually put forward, the US contribution to rising CO2 is quite small compared to India and China, which, as developing countries, are more concerned with economic growth than CO2 reduction, and don’t pledge to reduce CO2 producing energy production until they have built their economies. As I said in A Step Farther Out, the developing nations aren’t worried about the future: they want in on modern wealth, which takes energy; when they’re rich they can worry about the far future. Until then, they’ll burn coal.

Economic needs generally govern investment. Government subsidies – “we know better than the market place, so do it our way, you idiots” – can change that, but gets expensive. Southern California, which uses significant amounts of energy in cooling in summer time under a bright sun, has a different economic situation regarding ground based solar energy from New York where it doesn’t cool off much just because the sun has gone down. When the sun’s not up, ground based solar panels don’t produce electricity, yet air conditioning is still demanded. That means something other than sun and wind needs to produce the base power at night. But this is all obvious and need not be said again.

On that score, note that the Paris Accord was never approved by the Senate, and thus under the Constitution cannot bind a future President no matter what President Obama agreed to. Presidents cannot make treaties the law of the land without the advice and consent of the Senate, and President Obama never got that for the Paris Accords. (The Kyoto agreement failed in the Senate by an overwhelming margin.)

Indeed, most of the “science” has long since vanished from the discussions, and we end with proof by repeated assertion which few other than true believers pay any attention to.

I would be overjoyed to see some serious scientific research into CO2 reduction; we are at present running a long term open ended experiment to see just how high we can let CO2 levels get. There is some evidence that more CO2 might be still be beneficial – plants love the stuff, and that generally means larger agricultural yields; but can we all agree that after we double the amount (we haven’t yet) that will surely be enough, at least for a pause during reassessment? What I would like to see is research into how we can reduce CO2.

That will take energy, and some ingenuity, but we know it can be done. It’s the details that need study. Of course no international agreement is needed for this: we already spend much of the money we would need to pay for the R&D, and in the old days the NSF had ways of allocating research funds that generally paid off. That could be revived.

The main beneficiaries of these large multi-national conferences are the attending staffs, mid-level civil servants who get to stay in interesting cities – they never seem to hold these long conferences in dull places – and stay In first class hotels. Nice work if you can get it.

Sunday, June 4, 2017

Too little CO2?

Hi Dr. Pournelle,

I just ran across this article, When Too Little CO2 Nearly Doomed Humanity,  by Dennis Avery on Townhall. While I have not fact-checked every CO2 concentration number in the article, many of those he mentions are well-known values.

The executive summary is that there is a much greater danger to humanity and the eco-sphere from a modest (e.g., 20%) decrease in atmospheric CO2 than from a doubling or tripling of CO2 concentrations.

My personal take-away on this is that I’m not at all concerned by the current rate of increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations and that I’m right to oppose any mandatory CO2 emission control laws, regulations, etc. Your mileage may vary, of course.

Bill Hembree

We need not get into that argument, and there is far too little data; we’ve not studied the “optimum” CO2 levels, and there’s not much reason to believe there would be consensus on what would be optimum.

I think there is, or should be, nearly universal agreement that we don’t want an uncontrolled experiment to find out what the maximum CO2 level we can endure would be; we want to be able to reverse that at need. I do not think we are anywhere near that limit, but the way to reduce CO2 levels is not to impoverish the west (or concede productivity advantage to China and India which will continue to burn coal no matter what we insist on), or to have a nuclear war to impoverish everyone; poverty is not the answer to global CO2, and greater poverty is more likely to lead to more frantic energy production.

Economics will force us to nuclear or space based solar (most likely both) anyway, but may take a while. I’d like to have some investment in developing the means to reverse CO2 trends at need, just in case. The climate change people have not very good models, but their computing ability and thus model accuracies will inevitably improve, and I like to have technology ready at need.

Climate change insurance —

Someone posted this idea on Scott Adams’ blog:

I propose the following system.

Build a big open insurance market like Lloyds of London but specifically for climate change.

Have a global CO2 tax about $20-$40/ton have governments collect the tax via their existing tax systems and have governments use the proceeds to buy climate change insurance on the exchange.

If you think climate change is bullshit then you can sell the insurance and just keep collecting those cheques.

All the alarmist can buy insurance and all the sceptics can sell insurance. The price of the premiums will soon tell us if climate change is real or bullshit or if it’s not a worry today it will tell us when we need to worry about it.

If people want more done to prevent climate change then they can vote to put the CO2 tax rate up and governments can use the extra money to buy more insurance (send money to the sceptics).

If coal/power/cement/oil companies don’t like paying the tax, they can get their money back by selling the insurance. This transfers all of the risk from society onto the emitters.

This is how to solve climate change using capitalism. Rather than the communist model of mandating wind farms and solar panels.

Richard White
Del Valle, Texas

Legislators and regulators will understand the need for raising taxes; after that there wont be much consensus.

another career op lost to AI

Dr. Pournelle,
Don’t know if this qualifies as cheap replacement of a worker by automation, but there are two companies making robots to fold laundry: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/schmich/ct-laundry-robot-mary-schmich-0526-20170525-column.html
Now, I think I probably work cheaper (but not faster) than the $800 robot, but I daren’t ask my wife her opinion, at least until I get my union card…
Of course, Bill Gates would have her pay a tax to somehow protect me (or society, Bill, or someone) from my job loss, but somehow, I still think I’m gonna be sacked.
-d

The robot won’t need a pension or maternity/paternity leave…

Hillary Spreads The Blame… Some More

Jerry,
I just came across this article on the BBC news site — “Hillary Clinton told to ‘move on’ from her loss” (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40135541). She has apparently started blaming the Democratic National Committee (DNC) for her loss last November. They now join the ranks of the Russians, the FBI, and the media as a responsible party for her loss. She does not place any blame on herself, though, saying, “I take responsibility for every decision I make – but that’s not why I lost.”
I started thinking of the term “megalomaniac”, but she is so far beyond megalomania. That is when it occurred to me that megalomania is a personality disorder SPECTRUM, running from your basic over confidence issues which classify as simple “lomania”, through various degrees of big-headedness (decalomania, hectolomania, kilolomania), on past the familiar “megalomania” on to Hillary’s level, which has to qualify minimally as “gigalomania” or even “petalomania”.
I write the above, tongue only slightly in cheek, because, in all seriousness, Hillary cannot conceive of NOT being the President of the United States. She honestly thinks that there is no one else out there who could possibly BE POTUS. She, who was the First Lady to a two term President who never won more than 50% of the popular vote — a President who the majority of voters rejected — cannot accept that SHE lost the election. She who questioned Trump’s loyalty to the election laws of this land cannot even say that Trump won. She is claiming that the election was somehow stolen from her, implicitly saying that the results of the election are not legitimate.
Trump may not be the best President who has ever served, but it is quite evident that we could have done a lot worse.

: Kevin

Possibly. After all, many of us were surprised by her loss. We have had government by the established experts who understand things; now we have a different approach. At least the deplorables aren’t in charge. And thanks to Hillary, we can try a non politician President.  We’re unlikely to have that chance again.

Maybe this is the job of the future for young people on UBI…

Like most plot points on HBO’s Silicon Valley, a recent episode in which tech oligarch Gavin Belson receives blood transfusions from a “blood boy” to help keep him young is actually rooted in reality—just ask Peter Thiel. “I’m looking into parabiosis stuff, which I think is really interesting. This is where they did the young blood into older mice and they found that had a massive rejuvenating effect,” the tech billionaire and Trump adviser told Inc. magazine. “I think there are a lot of these things that have been strangely under-explored.”
Jesse Karmazin agrees. His start-up, Ambrosia, is charging about $8,000 a pop for blood transfusions from people under 25, Karmazin said at Code Conference on Wednesday. Ambrosia, which buys its blood from blood banks, now has about 100 paying customers

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/06/this-anti-aging-start-up-is-paying-thousands-of-dollars-for-teen-blood

John Harlow

There is a long tradition of science fiction stories along the theme of using the financially insecure young to medically support the rich elders. You could even argue that this is the theme of vampire stories. Of course egalitarianism complicates the matter.

You are not allowed to sell your own organs, but apparently aborted children’s parts can be sold, at least by the abortion clinic.

China and Space

http://www.space.com/30337-chinese-experiment-international-space-station.html

Mr. Heinlein used to remind us that there was no law making English the language of mankind in space…

I would not rate this as proof of a miracle, and I haven’t anything more at the moment; but I am not astonished.

https://unitedwithisrael.org/watch-israeli-scientists-verify-miraculous-biblical-event/

Vilikovsky had a different explanation, but not one easily accepted. This seems more likely.

The Definition of Covfefe

Jerry,

Covfefe def. The equivalent of dangling a shiny toy in front of the Media to divert their attention from potentially important stories.

It certainly works!

Bob Holmes

I wondered what that meant. Thanks.

I understand a Fox news anchor found a Macedonian under his bed…

The States on Climate Change

Jerry,
I thought you might like this article on climate change from Scientific American — “Governors Pledge Climate Action in Face of Possible Paris Withdrawal” (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/governors-pledge-climate-action-in-face-of-possible-paris-withdrawal/). Whether or not you think climate change is a real thing, this at least shows that the American federal system is working to some degree, with states taking action or not as their constituencies support, regardless or even in spite of the federal direction from Washington DC.

Kevin

Just as the States retained their Established Churches under the Constitution, they retain the right to make what they believe is scientific policy. The federal government was our national government and was given limited powers; all residual powers were reserved to the States.

Renewable is luxury

Dr. Pournelle,

You quoted Der Spiegel as stating electricity is now a luxury in Germany. Isn’t it interesting that Germany has also been cited as having the largest investment in solar electric, so-called renewable energy in the Western world? Germany is simultaneously dismantling its nuclear and coal energy production infrastructure while increasing investment in other allegedly renewable sources. Also interesting is that Germany at least sees itself as the largest financial investor in the EU. Some of the loudest cries of anguish over Brexit have come from Germany, and Frau Merkel is this week the anti-Trump heroine of the U.S.

democrat and republican party extremists.

I wonder if this is all connected.

Hoping for a continuing and smoother recovery for both you and Roberta,

an adamant de-Nye-er,

-d

Ground based solar, like wind, makes economic sense in some places and markets; Southern California uses electricity in the daytime for air conditioning; it makes sense to use daylight solar power for that need whenever possible; the expense comes with trying to store that power for times when the Sun is not shining. In most of California, one needs very little air conditioning when the Sun is not shining.

Military Suicide

Dr. Pournelle,
Since you linked the unz.com article as an implied prompt for discussion, personally I don’t buy it. It seemed to me like a lot of the other alt-right-seeming rants on the internet (Breitbart being another): clickbait that is long on invective, short on information, lacking in useful insight. Perhaps the author has come close to my own opinions on waste and the need for military acquisition reform, but he even admits that it was a position fed to him by a third party.
For example, the quote “the US military was never a very impressive one, certainly not when compared to the British, Russian or German ones.” Really? What standard is used? Can’t be the multiple victories over the the three listed or their proxies, and can’t be world history since Napoleon.
Yes, I agree that GWOT and the (uppercase) Bush wars represented an almost endless supply of un-regulated cash to civilian (and uniformed) war profiteers, but these have been just more recent than a couple other boondoggles that come to mind. Yes, military acquisition is out-of-control. Yes, the intelligence agencies (“community” my aching anatomical expletive) and diplomatic corps are extremely overly-politicized. After around 30 years of spineless non-leadership from the executive and the legislative branches, what should we expect?
Trump’s style is nothing if not entertaining, as it has been apparently effective. I do hope that it is not all show. I don’t think we’ll have another chance for a beltway outsider in that office for a long time, and it remains to be seen whether he can actually govern (could be he’s just a really fat ‘gator, I can’t tell).
Meanwhile, I lately shy away from reading endless invective as it has never been really effective and is no longer emotionally satisfying. I may now have a lot of time to waste, but I surely have something better to do.
With hopes for yours and Roberta’s continuing recover,
-d

 

Dear Doctor Pournelle,

While I agree that it is always a good idea to be skeptical of our own military’s claims as to their level of technological, tactical and material quality, I also am skeptical of such “The Sky Is Falling”

screeds as the “Suicide of the military” piece you posted a link to.

My first reaction is that anyone who can with a straight face claim that the Russian military, historically and/or currently, is superior to the United States armed forces, and worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as the British military quality-wise is someone who doesn’t know squat about military history.

The Russian claim to quality historically rests upon their defeat of Napoleon and Hitler. In both cases they had a huge amount of allied assistance, and in both cases they suffered staggering defeats that any other nation would have collapsed from, but the sheer mass of Russia, both in territory and human resources, allowed them to survive and claim a sort of victory.

The British do have the best military man for man, no doubt. However, we beat them once, and managed a draw the second time. Maybe the best comparison is that the British entered World War One with an army about the size of the US Army when we entered.

They quickly built up a multimillion man army, shipped it to France and

23 months after the war began they attacked on the Somme in July of 1916. They accomplished almost nothing while suffering the largest number of casualties of any one day in their long military history. The United states entered the war in April, 1917 and over the next nineteen months, four months less than the British, built up a two million man army, shipped it not across the English Channel but the North Atlantic, and in the St. Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne attacks destroyed two German field armies and effectively ended the four years of slaughter.

As for the German military, well yes they are good. Frederick The Great wrought something new in military affairs, and his work still casts a long shadow. But the United States Army defeated his heirs twice in thirty years, and in each case we did it in less than a year after coming to grips on the European continent with the main strength of the Germans. A West Point graduate has written a doctoral dissertation, published as “When The Odds Were Even” analyzing just how well the US Army matched up against the German in World War Two, picking a little known campaign in the Vosges mountains of northeastern France in the late fall and early winter of 1944-45.

Due to the terrain, weather and relatively minor strategic importance of the region, US forces had little of the artillery, air power and logistic superiority they enjoyed on other fronts, yet they drove the German army out of the Vosge, inflicting major losses in men and materiel, while suffering relatively low losses in comparison. I recommend the book to anyone who thinks the US Army was anything other than a world class force in World War Two.

As for technological superiority, I agree with something you have been beating the drum about for decades: that it is vital. However, it is not necessarily decisive. I offer two examples of second-class equipment used by American fighting men, and in each case they not only survived, but managed to win. The first is the Wildcat fighter in early World War Two. It was slower than the Japanese Zero, had only machine guns while the Zero was equipped with a 20mm cannon firing high explosive shells.

The Zero could turn inside of a Wildcats turn radius, so any attempt to dogfight quickly led to the Zero getting on the Wildcat’s tail and ending the matter there.

So American pilots learned not to get into a turning fight, but instead to take a high altitude position, dive on the Zero using the Wildcats greater mass than the Zero to catch up to it as they fell out of the sky together, get in close, use a tactic called the “Thatch Weave” to concentrate the fire of two Wildcats on the enemy plane, and with twelve

50 caliber machine guns, the unarmored Zero, with its non-self-sealing fuel tanks, would be quickly shredded and torched.

The other example is the Sherman tank, which was the worst tank of the European theatre in World War Two. Even the British Comet, not exactly a world beater, was superior. German tankers referred to the Sherman by the same morbid nickname as their American crews::”The Ronson” from the famous ad campaign of the time for the Ronson cigarette lighter “Lights up first time, every time!”, for the way they exploded in an inferno every time a German tank hit one with an AP round. So American tankers learned to use the superior manoeuvrability and speed of the Sherman to get in close, on the flanks and rear of German tanks, and swarm them.

There were always three to four times as many Sherman’s as there were German tanks overwhelming German quality with tactics and numbers.

There are other examples of American turkeys that turned into world beaters due to ingenuity and resourcefulness. The Phantom II of Vietnam fame, the M-16 rifle, even the Bradley AFV.

So I say “”Baloney!” to anyone who thinks the US military is anything other than one of the top three, and often better. It’s the human material that makes it so, and that is still top shelf, despite the best efforts of our schools and universities to destroy it.

Petronius

 

The US military has historically risen to acquire the competence required by the task. Possibly the best example is the problem of German Panther tanks. The German tanks were said to be ten times as good as the ones we deployed; the answer to that was to face each Panther with 11 Sherman tanks. The story is probably apocryphal but the essence is true; just as Grant knew he could not “out general” Lee as his predecessor hoped; but he could always win a war of attrition.

The US has developed Rangers and their elite successors as the need for elite units rose. Of course in the past we could always count on converting our industrial base to war production; expensive and thus not lightly to be undertaken, but pretty well guaranteed to be decisive. Faced with the nuclear challenge, we developed the elite SAC. And in Viet Nam the North sent 150,000 men south with as much armor as the Wehrmacht had in many WW II engagements. That was in 1973, and of that 150,000 fewer than 50,000 men and no armor returned to the North, at a cost of under 1,000 American casualties. Most would count that an outstanding victory. (Alas, in 1975 North Viet Nam had another army of over 100,000 and sent it South; the Democratic Congress voted our South Vietnamese 20 cartridges and 2 hand grenades per man, but refused naval and air support; Saigon predictably became Ho Chi Minh city as we pushed helicopters off the decks of out carriers in our frantic evacuation; but that is hardly the fault of the US military).

Our problem is not military capability, but commitment: no troops can accomplish a mission they are not given. And as von Moltke the Elder observed, it is difficult to win campaigns with a telegraph wire from the Capital stuck up you

Sunday, June 4, 2017

We seem to have had a cooler May in California, and I’ve heard nothing predicting a warmer June (which in Southern California is often referred to as Wummer, winter in summer, or June Gloom).

I have not seen more details, but as of last arch the global cooling trend and low sunspot activity continued; I’ve seen not much on this since. It’s warming up outside today, but cool inside the house. Apologies: I usually try to keep track of this.

Note that this dialog is old, from a time before my pneumonia and subsequent problems. It may not still be relevant:

In a message dated 3/21/2017 5:51:52 P.M. Central Daylight Time, VValkyrie@hotmail.com writes:

…other people are sitting up and taking notice.

https://www.vencoreweather.com/blog/2017/3/20/1130-am-the-longest-stretch-of-a-blank-sun-since-2010

I’ve been keeping a spreadsheet since late last summer, and here are the results, as of today. (First column, year; second, month; third, the percentage of days having no more than 1 sunspot visible; fourth, the percentage of days having NO sunspots visible.)

Year     Month     %dys     %dys

                        0-1spt     0spt

2016	Aug	16.1	9.7
	Sep	23.3	3.3
	Oct	38.7	3.2
	Nov	36.7	13.3
	Dec	67.7	16.1
2017	Jan	41.9	25.8
	Feb	60.7	3.5
	Mar	85.7	76.2

~Stephanie Osborn, “The Interstellar Woman of Mystery”

http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com

 

: Re: And…

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/12/21/solar-cycle-25-amplitude-prediction/

—

This all fits in with what I’ve been seeing.

I suspect we may enter an extended minimum earlier than even the double-dynamo model forecast. Especially since, arguably, we are already nearly to Dalton Minimum numbers.

~Stephanie Osborn, “The Interstellar Woman of Mystery”

http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com

Award-winning author of the Division One, Gentleman Aegis, and Displaced Detective series

I suspect it’s going to be a cooler summer.

Jerry Pournelle

On Mar 21, 2017, at 7:49 PM, Stephanie <VValkyrie@hotmail.com> wrote:

That’s a distinct possibility, though not a foregone conclusion. We still have to factor in the effects of cosmic rays, which flux is on the increase, as would be expected with a decline in solar activity. And there is a link to cloud formation there, though it is not at all well understood.

~Stephanie Osborn, “The Interstellar Woman of Mystery”

http://www.Stephanie-Osborn.com

Award-winning author of the Division One, Gentleman Aegis, and Displaced Detective series

We shall all have to hope fervently for a serious increase in cow flatulence to boost those ol’ greenhouse gasses.

May save us from a mini ice age don’t you know.

Jerry Pournelle

[

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

The map is not the territory.

Alfred Korzybski

Electricity has become a luxury good in Germany.

Der Spiegel

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

George Santayana

I view with profound relief my documents in Word on my main machine: they look as usual, nothing fancy, unlike the horrible formats I was confined to on Word in my back bedroom machine. That system, Swan, is on the advanced Microsoft update schedule, getting Windows and Office updates on the experimental advanced schedule, and apparently the combination was too much to bear: they’re updating Word to the point of unusability. The opening default format is several pages to the screen, all in tiny print. I can see how that might have been useful back when my eyes were better, but now it just makes things impossible. Doubtless others will complain as I have, and it will all be fixed before most users ever see it; a good argument for the early release test program, and a better argument for not allowing main production machines to be on the early release installation program.

Swan is in the back bedroom where I’m pretty well stuck late at night. It’s not really a main production machine, and thus a reasonable place for previewing early release stuff. Apparently the release I have is messed up in discriminating between “Read” and “Print Layout” views (lower right hand part of screen) neither of which is explained well; and there is no “edit” or “create” or “ordinary normal vanilla” mode or view. Possibly an interaction with a new version of Office 365 and a new release of Windows. Of no real matter, except it was frustrating last night to be stuck; possibly a restart of the machine will help; I’ll go back and test that later.

Health improves daily, but energy levels still lag. Not much I can do about that but rest; but too much rest turns me into a vegetable and one I’m not fond of, so it’s time to get on a new daily schedule. I have a dermatology appointment tomorrow – the biopsy showed the thing on my forehead has to go – and an internist appointment next week; by then I hope to be well into daily Five Tibetan Rites, which is my solution to the vegetation menace.

The news continues to be depressing. The main stream media continues to report every single thing President Trump does as a major disaster; the media has pretty well joined “The Resistance” which is indistinguishable from the Never Trump movement. Google “Kushner” and look at the results as an example. And predictably, Senator McCain is joining the resistance, going out of his way to tell us he doesn’t like whatever it is Mr. Kushner did even though he doesn’t really know what it was; but it was being nice to Russia, and that’s all we really need to know isn’t it?

The Paris Accords on Climate have reduced Germany to a state in which electricity is a luxury good according to Der Spiegel; so naturally President Trump is exhorted to agree to this nonsense. After all, the Europeans have; why should we be spared the economic pain? Surely Europe’s misery from self inflicted wounds is a more pressing problem for the US than the agenda Mr. Trump was elected for? Perhaps Senator McCain will tell us what the Paris Accords will do for the Earth, Europe, South America, various other places, and, perhaps even how they would affect the United States. We have natural gas; making it more expensive will certainly help Russia. Perhaps that’s it.

But I ramble.

We’ve mentioned this before, but it’s worth repeating:

http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2017/05/rocket-startup-s-about-eat-elon-musks-lunch/138153/?oref=d-nextpost

The use of new materials and technology that now allow batteries to power rocket fuel pumps is fascinating. Werner von Braun used a kerosene turbine to power the fuel delivery pumps in V2. Then we started Expanders, Staged Combustion, and all kinds of ways, many of which blew up rockets. Now it’s lithium batteries, which are much safer; are they rechargeable also? They will be…

 

Rocket Lab

the issue with launches isn’t cost-per-launch, it’s cost-per-pound
prices to LEO
Rocket Lab pans to launch 500 pounds for $5m or $10k/pound
space-x Falcon launches 50,000 pounds for $55m or $1.1k/pound
the Falcon Heavy will launch 140,000 pounds for $90m or $650/pound
ULA Atlas V launches ~40,000 pounds for ~$160m or ~$4k/pound
ULA Delata IV launches ~62,000 pounds for (indirectly calculated) >$300m or ~5k/pound
and this is not including savings Space-X will see from ‘flight tested’ boosters (including the eventual savings for the initial user), but the expectation is that it will cut costs by at least half.
Yes, there will be a market for ‘I need it right now and it’s small’ satellites, but far more of them can wait, and could piggy-back on another launch and include maneuvering capacity to get them into their own orbits at less cost than an individual launch (The Iridium launches launch 10 satellites/launch and they include enough maneuvering capacity to get them into their individual orbits)
It’s good to see someone else get into the market, but to describe this as “About to Eat Elon Musk’s Lunch” is overstating things by a lot.
I also think you may be interested in https://copenhagensuborbitals.com/ an amateur group working towards a manned sub-orbital flight. They routinely post videos to YouTube showing their progress.

David

 

It is trivially true that cost/pound-in-orbit is the long term determiner; but the new techniques keep expendables in the business, and that means it’s easier (takes less capital) to get into the rocket business. Obviously over the long run reusables will drive out most expendables.

 

As I’ve often said, I’m not a “Climate Change Denier”, but I am definitely a model denier: the current models can’t predict the past. (Start with 1930 initial conditions and run to 1999; the results vary but are nowhere near reality.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerical_weather_prediction

Mathematical models based on the same physical principles can be used to generate either short-term weather forecasts or longer-term climate predictions; the latter are widely applied for understanding and projecting climate change. … Manipulating the vast datasets and performing the complex calculations necessary to modern numerical weather prediction requires some of the most powerful supercomputers in the world. Even with the increasing power of supercomputers, the forecast skill of numerical weather models extends to only about six days….A more fundamental problem lies in the chaotic nature of the partial differential equations that govern the atmosphere. It is impossible to solve these equations exactly, and small errors grow with time (doubling about every five days). Present understanding is that this chaotic behavior limits accurate forecasts to about 14 days even with perfectly accurate input data and a flawless model.

_____

So, once again: the climate modelers take a weather model good for a week (or less), dumb it down by a factor of at least 300,000 (simplified physics, longer time steps, and coarser geographic cell sizes), and claim they can forecast half a degree (Celsius; 1 degree Fahrenheit) accuracy of the average global temperature after 100 years.

J

Precisely. We need to fund some new models, selected for ability to predict the past; when they can do that, we might look to the future. Incidentally, for next year’s weather, you would do better to rely on The Farmer’s Almanac rather than our most sophisticated (and expensive) models; at least past performance would indicate that.

Dropping the Hammer on Comey… Brilliant!

For what it’s worth, I’ve just run across the following link which appears to be one of the earliest postings of this article:

http://stateofthenation2012.com/?p=72788

This article states it as coming from an uncredited Facebook post.

The Expert Disease

Dear Doctor Pournelle,

In a history class at university we were assigned a book that detailed the rise of the Expert Class in the late 19the century in America.

Between about 1875 and 1900 there emerged a new type of professional, and associations devoted to their professional advancement, all in service of Progress. Everything from Accounting to Zoo Management suddenly had a career path, a degree or certificate, and a professional Society to advance the New Way Of Doing Things.

Of course, this was all presented in the book as a Good Thing, reinforced by the lectures based on the book. There was progress, but at what cost?

Here is an example: I know a fellow whose father was a federal meat inspector. His dad’s job involved visiting stockyards and processing plants in his Midwestern state, ensuring everything was up to federal standards for health and safety of the product. One night, quite late, he was called out of bed to visit the scene of a highway wreck. He took along his son, from whom I have the tale. A truck full of frozen beef had jackknifed on the highway, and spilled most of its’ load. Thee highway patrol could not fully secure the scene, and people were scooping up the meat and loading it into their vehicles. The meat inspector was beside himself at this violation of all protocol, the utter disregard for potential contamination and subsequent health problems for anyone consuming the presumably tainted product, and did all he could to explain to the looters that they must cease this at once. I gather eventually, probably with highway patrol help, he succeeded. The son, when relating this story, explained how his father had taught him a valuable lesson that night: that people need to be protected from themselves, that experts are there to do that, and that we had better always listen to the experts.

Would you be surprised to hear that the son is also a far left advocate of socialism, believes in the hard version of human caused Global Warming and all that goes with being a leftist?

It is a disease. Those people on the highway may have been wrong to take the meat, but if it was spoiled or rotten, would they have really eaten it? Seems unlikely. But of course the idea of allowing people to exercise personal judgment is anathema to experts.

Not to mention that a common highway mishap literally became a Federal Case. Ah, sweet reason and Progress!

Petronius

I don’t think the Philadelphia Constitution intended that to be a federal matter, but it is not unreasonable to say that the Interstate Commerce clause permits it to become one. Of course there’s no possible way you can grant a government a power that won’t be used.

Size matters in libraries now…

https://qz.com/802744/the-legendary-new-york-public-library-shelves-books-in-its-underground-stacks-by-size-not-subject/

“Compared to the old system, where a small volume about geography might be shelved next to a large book of maps, the size-based approach eliminates the wasted space above each book. “This just maximizes the number of books you can put into the area,” Oliva says, noting that Princeton University and Columbia University’s libraries have adopted similar systems. The new book sorting system has increased the library’s storage capacity by 40%.”

Charles Brumbelow

I suppose there needs to be compromise between saving space and making things easier to find.

Special Operations in Africa

This doesn’t interest most people but it should. The tone and pace of special operations increased, globally, but increased even more in Africa. The reasons and the highlights are spread throughout this article, which I think is worth your time.

It seems that Africa will become more a threat than the Middle East for terrorism. Also, it seems that affairs are on a downward trajectory. I’ve been following the interest in Africa for over a decade but the committal of more resources is comparatively recent and “too little too late” in my opinion.

To his credit, Bush II foresaw this malaise and created Africom — much to the annoyance of the antiwar crowd. But, it’s taken time to shift resources to this entity. Why this didn’t happen after Mogadishu is beyond me, but our firefighters are there, doing their

jobs:

<.>

In 2006, just 1 percent of all U.S. commandos deployed overseas were in Africa. In 2010, it was 3 percent. By 2016, that number had jumped to more than 17 percent. In fact, according to data supplied by U.S.

Special Operations Command, there are now more special operations personnel devoted to Africa than anywhere except the Middle East —

1,700 people spread out across 20 countries dedicated to assisting the U.S. military’s African partners in their fight against terrorism and extremism.

</>

https://news.vice.com/story/the-u-s-is-waging-a-massive-shadow-war-in-africa-exclusive-documents-reveal

That snip tells nothing, really; the article is worth reading if you’re interested in geopolitics generally or special operations specifically. It’s also of interest to anyone who wants to know what’s happening in Africa today. Even though I’m not certain if these are core interests of yours, I think you’ll find this worth looking at because this is about to catch many by surprise.

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

What You Need to Know About Climate, In One Chart

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/05/what-you-need-to-know-about-climate-in-one-chart.php

From Andy May at Watts Up With That, a chart that contains an enormous amount of information relevant to the climate debate. It shows global temperature as inferred from proxies (tree rings and the like), carbon dioxide and methane concentrations, and temperatures as predicted by the alarmists’ models for the Holocene epoch, the time since the end of the last Ice Age.

May comments:

In the figure below (source Javier, here) proxy global average temperatures for the whole Holocene (last 11,500 years) are shown in black. Computer model temperatures calculated by Liu, et al. (2014) are shown in green, carbon dioxide and methane concentrations from ice cores are also shown. For the Neoglacial Period, temperatures go down, but the computer model temperatures go up, so does the carbon dioxide level. Quite obviously, for the Holocene, neither CO2 nor the computer models are predictive of temperature.

 

As the chart reflects, we are currently living in a relatively cool period. Global temperatures change over time, and while there are various theories, no one really knows why. If the alarmists were real scientists they would go back to the drawing board.

 

Analysis: It’s not just droughts, but nearly all extreme weather is declining or at or near record lows

http://www.climatedepot.com/2017/04/27/analysis-its-not-just-droughts-but-nearly-all-extreme-weather-is-either-declining-or-at-or-near-record-lows/

On Eve of DC climate march, drought drops to record lows in U.S. as nearly all extreme weather is either declining or at or near record lows (See: Climate Bullies Take to the Streets for ‘People’s Climate March’ in DC on April 29th’)

“It is not just droughts that are at or near record levels. On almost every measure of extreme weather, the data is not cooperating with the claims of the climate change campaigners. Tornadoes, floods, droughts, and hurricanes are failing to fit in with the global warming narrative.”

Brennan Says Nothing New

This is just an update; it’s nothing we don’t already know but it’s interesting to see former DIRCIA Brennan twisting in the wind, nearly a year later, repeating the same mantra:

<.>

Former CIA director John Brennan testified before the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday that he was not sure if there was any evidence of collusion between the Russian government and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

Yet Democrats are thrilled by his testimony, because he said there were contacts between Russian officials and some “U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign,” and hence an FBI investigation was warranted.

Note that there is nothing new in what Brennan said. The New York Times reported on January 19 — in a story timed to appear on Inauguration Day — that the intelligence services had “intercepted communications” between several Trump “associates” and Russian officials. (The same story said there was “no conclusive evidence of

wrongdoing.”) And last week, Reuters reported that there were 18 such contacts — over seven months, less than three per month.

All that Brennan presented was his opinion. And it is not clear what prompted his opinion. He said he convened a group, including the FBI and NSA, to investigate possible Russian attempts to affect the election in late July 2016.

</>

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/05/23/brennan-russia-house-intelligence-late-july-liberal-media/

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

There hasn’t been anything new since Podesta invented the Russia myth as a distraction from the leaks about Mrs. Clinton’s unauthorized server. The investigations continue. Witch hunts usually find at least a hint of a witch.

Robots, books, and anger 

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

I’m sorry to hear you had a bout with pneumonia, I hope you shape up soon!

Here is an interesting article on robot farmers who are in the process of transforming the way we do agriculture:

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/robots-are-now-working-down-on-the-farm-2016-07-07

And, giving hope to people like my family, 3d printed ovaries which can be used to make kids, replacing those destroyed by endometriosis:

https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2017/may/3-d-printed-ovaries-offspring/

Alas, the modern world is still crazy in many ways . Make sure you don’t have a black character in your next book, as editors seem to take offense at white people writing in black characters.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/447867/white-author-editor-told-me-my-fictional-book-shouldnt-have-black-protagonist-because

So I expect in five years the same people complaining about

‘appropriation’ will be complaining about ‘erasure’ instead. I fear

for the field of SF, as the insistence of Americans on these rigid standards contributes to a narrow mindset which will greatly hamper our imaginations.

Perhaps we should just use fantasy creatures and cultures only, since they don’t have any real-world people to complain about their appropriation.

Oh, and I thought this article in Spiked on the late events in Manchester was spot on. In brief: Stop the weeping, stop the mourning, get angry and solve the problem.

http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/after-manchester-its-time-for-anger/19849#.WSSXGeuLT3j

Cordially yours,

Brian P.

 

I have often said that by 2024 – actually I suspect a bit sooner than that – at least half the jobs in the United States can be performed by a robot costing no more than 10% of the annual wage paid to the person now performing that job.  The implications of this are not all obvious.

 

 

Nye’s Quadrant

Posted on May 2, 2017

https://judithcurry.com/2017/05/02/nyes-quadrant/#more-23029

by Judith Curry

The scary emergence of Nye’s Quadrant in dominating the public discourse on climate change.

If you are unfamiliar with Pasteur’s Quadrant, read my previous post [link].  The focus of my previous post was on use-inspired basic research.  I struggled with the 4th quadrant (lower left), which is sometimes referred to as ‘taxonomy’.  In the context of climate science, I interpreted this as climate model taxonomy, which analyzed the results of climate model simulations to identify alarming future possibilities.

Nye’s Quadrant

In response to my previous post on the Science March, which mentioned Pasteur’s Quadrant, David Deeble tweeted this version of the Quadrant diagram:

 

 

Besides being hysterically funny, the more I thought about it, I realized how profound this is.

Enemies of the People

Hi Jerry
Do hope you are getting better and everything well.

With all the political noise in the US thought you might find this Canadian perspective refreshing. Conrad Black again seems to capture salient historical moments as touchstones to the present. Take care of yourself.
http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/conrad-black-the-malicious-and-dishonest-media-really-are-as-trump-says-enemies-of-the-people

: Sam

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.

Monday, May 29, 2017

Memorial Day

The map is not the territory.

Alfred Korzybski

If a foreign government had imposed this system of education on the United States, we would rightfully consider it an act of war.

Glenn T. Seaborg, National Commission on Education, 1983

Happy Memorial Day, and my thanks to all who served.

I can barely read this. WORD on this machine seems invulnerable to changes in text size, so my big monitor is useless and I have to use a magnifying glass to read I had intended to post something, but on my bedroom machine with the latest Office 365 I have two columns of tiny text and no way I know of changing that. The text expansion thing at the bottom of the screen doesn’t respond. Control scroll wheel can make it smaller but not larger.

I have managed to make the text larger but only by increasing font size, so I’ll be able to post something, but not much. My office machine works fine, so I’ll just have to make do for tonight, but Microsoft has improved Word once again to the point of unusability for anyone actually trying to USE it. It sure has a lot of features, though. I’ll do an actual essay tomorrow.

I try to scroll and it moves everything sideways. I don’t seem to be able to change that either. This is weird.

The news media have gone insane. Now the President’s son in law is “vulnerable” because he discussed communication channels with the Russian Ambassador. As I recall, Eisenhower had direct back channel communications (teletype I think) with the Kremlin. Why not?

As to sharing secrets with the Russians, President Obama shared every secret we have in electronic counter intelligence after the election but before he left office by directing that all 17 agencies including the leakiest ones be given all the intercept information we get, no need to know involved; thus insuring that the Washington Post and other Press would have access to it all, as indeed they did.

This was in his power, although it was possibly unwise. But Trump, as President, shared combat information with Russia about Syrian operations, and of course this must be investigated.

As was observed, those experts who took over our government don’t mean to give it back to the amateurs.

The trials of Lois Lerner

Hello Jerry,

In your prequel to the story about suppressing Lerner’s testimony because releasing it would be hazardous to her health:

“Apparently as a government worker you can be so outrageous as to put yourself in danger of tar and feathers… and the government must protect you from that public outrage by keeping it secret. Deep government indeed. I’m sure it’s all Trump’s fault, through Russian operations.”

it is apparently assumed that the hazard would be posed by the outraged victims of her actions.

I’m not sure that the assumption is justified.  

The conservative populace at large, subject to years of progressive administrations weaponizing the government bureaucracy and using it against their actual and potential opponents, has never (yet) taken up pitchforks and gone after their tormenters.

On the other hand, the long and growing list of fatalities among those who opposed the Clintons/generic progressive agenda or were close to the Clintons, had reason to be familiar with some of their more nefarious schemes, and who were reportedly preparing to provide testimony regarding same suggests that the hazard to Lerner may not be posed by her victims, but from those who provided her marching orders and who put her into position to carry them out.  The term ‘Arkancide’ was not coined out of a vacuum.

Bob Ludwick

Perhaps I did not make my own views very clear.

A10 and U2

Dr. Pournelle,
U2 and A10 retirement postponed in next year’s budget: http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/05/28/warthog-attack-plane-finds-new-life-trump-administration.html
-d
That is very good to hear.

This doesn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has thought about the problem.

There are combat jobs women can do. And there are women who can do any job demanded. But these need to be assessed realistically on a case by case basis, without regard for quotas – just as with men, when attempting to qualify for the same jobs.

The reductio ad absurdum: can you imagine Obama having done this if he thought it was good for the combat effectiveness of the US military?

Subj: NOT PC, but accurate

You might want to read this twice.
http://usdefensewatch.com/2017/05/female-fighters/

It takes a special kind of “stupid” to believe anything in the MSM these days, including the current weather report.

Something to take seriously if you are a first responder:

: Opioid risk to investigating police

http://www.waff.com/story/35531441/in-opioid-crisis-a-new-risk-for-police-accidental-overdose

 

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.

Memorial Day Weekend

Saturday, May 27, 2017

The map is not the territory.

Alfred Korzybski

Recovery continues and I’m almost caught up with mail. I have a large accumulation of items that ought to be posted – some anonymous, which I don’t like much, but the content speaks for itself, and I understand why some of my correspondents prefer not to be publicly identified. I suppose that’s a form of leaking, but I prefer that to silence.

I’m not up to full energy yet, I sleep more than I used to, and I get less done; but I’m beginning to be back in business.

If there is anything interesting in this week’s Weekly Standard, I won’t see it. I gave up reading the standard neo-con editorials several months ago, but I usually enjoy the opening humor in the Scrapbook; but it too has now become a Trump bash along with everything else. I started — attempted to start – the article on the “special investigation” but it opened with sufficient Trump bashing that I simply threw the whole thing in the trash. I don’t know how long my subscription runs, but I won’t be renewing. One fewer thing to read, so it will save time. There’s nothing in it I can’t get almost any random “news” source. I use the word “source” but I don’t really mean that: the New York Times used to say that citing anonymous sources was a last resort; but that was long ago and in another country. Now it’s using actual sources that’s rare.

I don’t usually recommend video editorials, but this one is short and very well worth the couple of minutes that it takes; I think you will appreciate it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F0Hv9TUrfs

This is from the Daily Signal, a Heritage publication. The complete story (along with a fund raiser plea) is at http://dailysignal.com/2017/05/23/what-a-tea-party-leader-thinks-of-lois-lerners-latest-move-in-the-court-case/?utm_source=TDS_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Top5&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWlRsa1pUWXdPVEl3TVRoaSIsInQiOiJmektWVm02TUU4NFU1TEc1YzNLb2JDaVVXcUY0d2VJcVIwREJxbXBaZENSRXltMlZNUDI3R1FQU1JKMjdubW1kVDVUclU0dWN4WFV1dGxvUXNcL1BiV1NFbUFFZjlydzJCbGRVTTdUQXlNdlBsTmRmSm1XWndXQk9lTlc1cUFwOE4ifQ%3D%3D and is interesting. Apparently as a government worker you can be so outrageous as to put yourself in danger of tar and feathers… and the government must protect you from that public outrage by keeping it secret. Deep government indeed. I’m sure it’s all Trump’s fault, through Russian operations.

Lerner and Paz said in the court papers that making public details about how IRS workers in Cincinnati and Washington, D.C., “handled applications for tax-exempt status from tea party groups” could endanger their lives, USA Today reported.

Engelbrecht’s organization, which filed for tax-exempt status in 2010, was asked hundreds of questions by the IRS that she said “had nothing to do with nonprofit status.”

After the IRS requested copies of speeches she had given and groups she had interacted with, Engelbrecht said in the interview, she had had enough.

“We finally sued them and are still in court with the IRS over viewpoint discrimination,” Engelbrecht said.

“The only way you can ever heal a problem is if you understand the root source.

But lawyers for Paz and Lerner said their testimony in out-of-court depositions should be kept private.

“This documentation, as the court will see, makes very personal references and contains graphic, profane, and disturbing language that would lead to unnecessary intrusion and embarrassment if made public,” the lawyers said in a court brief.

The lawyers added that “public dissemination of their deposition testimony would put their lives in serious jeopardy.”

“That is a stunning admission, that what they did is so egregiously wrong and so criminal that people might be very angry with them over it,” John Eastman, professor of law at Chapman University, told The Daily Signal in an interview. “That’s exactly why it’s important that this see that light of day.”

The Real Reason Zuckerberg Supports A Universal Basic Income.

<http://www.thedailybell.com/news-analysis/the-real-reason-zuckerberg-supports-a-universal-basic-income/>

—————————————

Roland Dobbins

This was on Fox News among other places; Mr. Zuckerberg wants the government to fund a minimum annual wage, paid by taxes 9eventually; there isn’t much detail about that part). If a Harvard dropout thinks this way, imagine what he might come up with as a graduate.

I doubt whether Larry and I working hard for a month could have made this up. It illustrates why your $28,000 student loan debt might not have bought you as much as you thought it would.

Academia

http://www.pagepulp.com/wp-content/academia.jpg

When Bill Waterson published this Calvin and Hobbes comic literally decades ago it was funny. Real funny. Then, in 1996, Alan Sokal got a nonsensical paper published in a peer-reviewed journal. Now this:

http://www.skeptic.com/reading_room/conceptual-penis-social-contruct-sokal-style-hoax-on-gender-studies/

It’s absolutely hilarious, and it makes me wonder what the reviewers who liked the paper talk about when they’re not being academics.

And yes, Cogent Social Sciences has removed the paper from their web site. But I’ll bet the reviewers are still employed there.

Takeaway quotes:

“If you’re having trouble understanding what any of that means, there are two important points to consider. First, we don’t understand it either. Nobody does.”

“It gets worse. Not only is the text ridiculous, so are the references. Most of our references are quotations from papers and figures in the field that barely make sense in the context of the text. Others were obtained by searching keywords and grabbing papers that sounded plausibly connected to words we cited. We read exactly zero of the sources we cited, by intention, as part of the hoax.”

What do you want to bet that Cogent Social Sciences is flooded with bogus papers? If I had $625 to burn, I might want to do it just so I could brag that I had been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Richard White

Del Valle, Texas

And yes, there really is such a respected peer reviewed journal, still being published.

Capleville education ca 1945

Dr. Pournelle,
I think that there may be a few details of your primary education that are also pertinent to any comparison with the present:
1. Probably your Tennessee rural school was segregated, indicating that there was another primary school with different standards in the same district.
2. Your teacher may have had a two-year degree in education. The black student’s school teacher(s) may not have had even as much. The current school district probably requires its teachers hold a Masters of Education degree, or that teachers be a candidate for MS, and have earned multiple specialist certificates.
3. No one in the federal government even kept statistics on attendance, competence, nutrition, diversity, or other attributes ad nauseum on the Capleville schools. This may have been implied in your description, but should be stated explicitly.
4. The principals, and likely the teachers, of the two respective Capleville schools probably knew at least one of all the student’s parents socially.
5. No one outside of Capleville cared or regulated the quality of Capleville schools education. (Again, implied, but deserving of explicit statement).
If there is a present-day Capleville school, it likely serves many, many more students of many different backgrounds, is required by State and Federal regulation to meet a variety of standards (often without commensurate funding) and bureaucratic oversight, liability insurance or bonding, expensively diploma’d and certified teachers and administrators, the immediate availability of social, medical, and psychological health services, and must meet an arbitrary level of educational standards for most subjects for the majority of students. The eductional standard is notionally oriented to the successful graduate going on to attend just enough college or university to be indebted for 10 to 20 years of loan payments of a substantial part of their annual earnings. The class of ’45 graduate was expected to operate a tractor or a grain elevator with little or no further education.
More likely, the small town school system has been absorbed by a system that has all these features.
20 years later, my own education took place under systems (some in Tennessee) that had begun to change, but were not really substantially different.
My takeaway from the comparison is that (1) the ’45 – ’65 system doesn’t scale up to a larger student population. (2) No matter how integrated, the current system hasn’t become color-blind, but is probably more culturally-dependent. (3) Teacher education is not a determinating characteristic of educational competence. (4) Neither legislative nor judicial regulation can instill educational competence. (5) Higher costs don’t drive educational quality.
Did I miss anything?
Hoping that you and Roberta continue in your recovery,
-d

So I should shoot dope or otherwise handicap myself? How is this relevant to the topic of discussion, namely the upward spiraling cost and lowering standards of the public schools? I put it to you that I received a better education at lower costs than public schools deliver to essentially anyone today; the fact that there was a segregated school, Hickory Hill, about half a mile from where I lived is irrelevant. It so happens that Shelby County boss Ed Crump insisted of “equal” in segregates schools (in teacher qualification, etc.), is also irrelevant.

They paid less for Capleville than the worst schools just about anywhere, segregated or diversified.

Or are you saying that if we must educate blacks it will necessarily cost more? I doubt you meant that.

I don’t purport to know how to fix 75 year old problems, and generally do not discuss that subject. My topic was today’s schools, which I contend cost more and deliver less than the “primitive” schools I attended.

Jerry Pournelle

Not at all. Nor was I trying to give offense.  I was trying to, at a minimum, sing what I thought was the refrain: government is incapable of providing universal goodness no matter how pure the motive.  Perhaps I am still missing your point?

I didn’t understand you to be merely reminiscing, or that you thought we could return to 1945 in order to fix education.  But it is interesting that you should lead your response with self harm through drugs or handicapping.  I’m going to have to think about that. 
Two factors changed the student population of school systems since your Capleville: a huge increase in population and integration.  When the baby boom flagged, the population continued to increase through immigration.  None of these are bad things, but they changed the dynamic.  It is a frequent kind of mistake to believe that small successes can be scaled up to be bigger successes simply by making them bigger. 

Not given in evidence is a teacher salary chart for the same period as the staffing chart you included.  It is another kind of mistake to believe that spending more money on a failed program will make it better.  Yet the people running the public school lobby (and those running every local school district that I have seen) seem to keep going back to that approach.  One way they do that is to claim that there aren’t enough qualified teachers; qualification often being an MS in instruction with a specialization (but not demonstrated competence) in a field of study, plus sundry other expensive training certifications.  I assert that a teacher pay scale plotted over the years of 1945-2015 would show an even greater increase than the staff chart, and corrected for inflation would show a greater increase in compensation than that of the general public.

At some point since 1964 we thought we could wag the dog by changing our perceived social shortcomings through the schools.  That move pretty much ruined education for efficiency, and otherwise the experiment has failed on multiple levels.

Did they pay less for Capleville schools than the best or worst schools of the time or the schools in the present day?  My guess is that you meant to compare your primary school to present day.  I think your experience was probably typical of the time, and not very much different from the experience of the student from about 1890 through about 1960.   It would be incorrect to do failure analysis on education without at least acknowledging that in about 1964 we began to throw out all the things we knew how to do in schools so that we could try to do things we would like to do in our society.  
The increase in school personnel appears to me to be a byproduct of your own Iron Law, and we have decided that a government bureaucracy can solve all our problems.  Perhaps a corollary is that the number of bureaucrats will modulate in inverse proportion to the efficiency of the services provided?    
Maybe I was reading the wrong music? 
-d

My point, really, was that if local taxpayers had to pay for the nonsense we buy in the name of education, we would not put up with it; but we are in the hands of deep government, and some have known since 1980 that it would always get worse, not better. We pay a great deal more and get far worse results, and in general that statement is universally true year after year; and nothing is done or will be done. Perhaps I am merely depressed. I do know that every one of our black sharecroppers and farmhands in segregated Tennessee could read.

They paid whatever it cost to get teachers in that district. Each school district took care of paying its staff; they didn’t get State or Federal support. Only taxpayers voted in school elections.

Please excuse me if I am not as clear as usual.

In case you’ve not seen this:

The Rocket Startup That’s About to Eat Elon Musk’s Lunch

The Rocket Startup That’s About to Eat Elon Musk’s Lunch

The Rocket Startup That’s About to Eat Elon Musk’s Lunch

Rocket Lab is aiming to put small satellites in low Earth orbit at a fraction of the cost of even SpaceX.

Rod McFadden

This is an encouraging development in commercial space. International competition is useful. Use of newly developed materials for special purposes is important.

Sorry, Breaking News

I’m sorry; I know you don’t like breaking news but this is too good not to pass on:

<.>

FBI source tells me Comey dropped the Susan Rice unmasking investigation bc it would have implicated himself. Developing

— Jack

https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/863112363578462212

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

I’ve seen no more on this. The list of Comey entanglements grows. But he did manage to send Martha Stewart to jail, and I am sure that made us all safer.

This is not a new happening; I’ve watched crap like this go on for some time at various universities across the nation. I’ve declined to write to you about this because you’re generally not interested in topical news. But, these affairs continued for so long that it’s time to share some of this:

<.>

Over the last 72 hours, students have taken over a small liberal arts college in Washington state, and only one adult has tried to stop them.

Students at Evergreen State College in Olympia, who filmed their exploits and posted the videos on social media, have occupied and barricaded the library, shouting down anyone who disagrees with them or shows insufficient passion for racial justice.

Biology professor Bret Weinstein was berated by dozens of students outside of his classroom Tuesday morning for refusing to participate in an event in which white people were invited to leave campus for a day. Now he says police have told him to hold his classes off campus due to safety concerns.

</>

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/may/25/evergreen-state-students-demand-professor-resign-f/

Don’t you love how the “journalist” says whites were “invited to leave”? You mean someone tried to kick them out? And now these kids created a climate where classes cannot occur? First they make it unsafe for speakers they don’t like to come express their ideas and now they force teachers who do not agree with their criminal activities to hold classes off campus for their personal safety? Why

would anyone pay to go to school in one of these circuses? Were I a

student, I would sue to get my tuition back.

And it gets worse! This is just like in Berkley when the police were forced to stand down by the mayor and the university police were forced to stand down by the administration during one of the comparatively recent riots this year:

<.>

Things are “out of control at Evergreen,” he said.

“Police told me protesters stopped cars yesterday, demanding information about occupants,” Mr. Weinstein told The Washington Times.

“They believe I was being sought. It appears that the campus has been under the effective control of protesters since 9:30 a.m. Tuesday.

Police are on lockdown, hamstrung by the college administration.

Students, staff and faculty are not safe.”

</>

So the administration won’t allow the police to enforce the law? Who the hell gave them the right to tell police when, where, and how to enforce the law in the first place? What is going on in this country?

Are we now run by unelected bureaucrats like the EU?

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

This was on Fox last night, and is another example of what you get for your student loan debts. And they never catch wise… As to your final question, deep government is everywhere, and after all it’s our fault for electing Trump. Someone must provide continuity.

Niemeier:  ‘Thanks almost entirely to Amazon, more books are being published each year than ever before, and more authors are making a living with their writing than at any time in human history.’

<http://www.brianniemeier.com/2017/05/amazon-terrifies-big-5.html>

—————————————

Roland Dobbins

 

Incorrect statement regarding Lynch’s recusal

“Attorney General Lynch recused herself from deciding whether to prosecute Mrs. Clinton and left the decision to the FBI; this is not normal practice for an investigative agency, but then it is not normal to call in a Corporate Counsel from private practice to head the FBI.”
Lynch did not formally recuse herself from the investigation. She stated she would “leave the decision [to prosecute] up to the FBI”, but never recused herself. And the FBI (recommending whether or not to prosecute isn’t their job to begin with) conveniently came up with a decision not to prosecute…coincidence, surely.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/no-don-lemon-loretta-lynch-didnt-recuse-herself-from-the-clinton-email-scandal/article/2616265
Enjoyed the read, some very interesting things you’ve compiled.

A

Comey

Dear Sir,
First, I wish you a speedy return to health.
Now, on your correspondent’s fairly lengthy communique wrt Comey, I would like to add one detail that he leaves out: Comey’s involvement with the Clintons goes back to the Senate Whitewater probe in 1996, even before the Marc Rich thing. In that case Comey was, among other things, lead prosecutor, and he pressed no charges while explicitly finding that Hillary Clinton destroyed documents that she was legally obligated to preserve (and “mishandled” others that she was obligated to divulge).
It was sort of a rehearsal for the email investigation: Comey found criminal conduct, described that conduct accurately, and then declared that it did not warrant prosecution. In 1996 Comey accused Hillary of “a highly improper pattern of deliberate misconduct.” In 2016 Hillary was “extremely careless”, i.e. grossly negligent. In both cases Comey spelled out the elements of a criminal offense and then declared that there was nothing more to see or do.

K

Lying to Federal Employees

I just wanted to let you know that this statement below it way off and you may want to correct it.
“But then Martha Stewart was jailed by then Assistant US Attorney (for Southern New York) Comey for denying that she said something that was not a crime if she said it. She was not under oath at the time, thus providing a new code of conduct in dealing with Federal Authorities even in unsworn statements: Say Nothing About Anything. Cooperation Could Get You Jailed.”
If you look at this federal code provision you will see that lying to a federal employee is a criminal offense (I am simplifying it here) that has nothing to do with being under oath and had been on the books for quite some time. This is what Martha Stewart was charged with.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1001
This statute may be unfair and give way to much power to the feds but it was not uniquely applied to Martha Stewart. I advise all my clients before the speak to the FBI or the SEC that lying can be worse that the underlying conduct.

J

Martha Stewart said, in conversation, that she never said something (a denial of an action that was itself not illegal). That was wrong – lying, forgetfulness, wandering of mind, deliberate intent to mislead? It was not in a formal statement or under penalty of perjury. I suppose Congress could make failing to bow to federal investigator, or failure to say Good Morning to a federal janitor a crime. In general this “lying” is not applied universally; this is the problem with giving “investigators” such discretion. Submitting a signed document is one thing; notes of a conversation is quite another. You may advise your clients as you will. I would advise – I am of course no attorney – my readers to say nothing, and withhold all observations including their opinion of the weather, from anyone identifying themselves as a Federal Employee. That probably hampers their “investigation” but it’s safer. Communicate only in writing, if you have the time and inclination.

I know it’s the law; but then every one of us breaks at least one Federal Law every week. That was not the purpose of this nation’s founding, and particularly not the purpose of the Philadelphia Constitution.

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.