| Monday
February 7, 2011 UK Health Care
Dr Pournelle,
Recently on View you stated "The goal of Obama and
Pelosi is a national health care system like Britain or Canada, which means
eventually that it will have to outlaw private practice, competitors like
Kaiser, and everything else.".
While I gather the Canadian system does only allow
public practice, the UK system's allowed private practice ever since its
formation in the late 1940s. It's quite common to see private healthcare
policies advertised in broadcast and print media here, and employers will
often offer associated health plans to attract staff (with the obvious
implication that at least some aspects of the private cover _are_ superior
to the free public service).
Whatever the goals of politicians in the States, the
UK experience suggests that introducing a national health care system
needn't automatically lead to the outlawing of private practice.
Regards,
Ian Kirk
Oxford, England
My error. I should pay closer attention.
I think that a national health care system can be
made to work, but allocation of resources will be problematic; I note that
Canada uses the US as an overflow. How well national health care works can
be discussed. I am told that the French system seems to work well. Others
say there are hidden disadvantages.
Were we to be able to clone the Kaiser Permanente
System many times without destroying it I would find that a very reasonable
thing to do; but I am pessimistic about doing that without ruining what we
have.
What I do not believe is that you can required
insurance companies to insure people with pre-existing conditions for the
same price as they insure healthy people and expect them to stay in
business. If we wish to debate socialized medicine we ought to debate
socialized medicine, and include the options of free medical and nursing
schools as part of the package; but calling it insurance is madness.
==================
"If this is the way publishers are going to try to
hold onto the business, then I think they are doomed."
<http://quixoticprod.blogspot.com/2011/02/
maybe-mayans-were-rightbut-they-were.html>
--- Roland Dobbins
Newspaper publishers hate their readers, whom
they see as an inconvenience. The make the print smaller, hide the Sunday
comics inside advertising wrappers, wrap the front page to make it
unreadable, and generally treat the reader with utter contempt. Book
publishers seem to be taking much the same attitude. And Kindle now
outsells paperbacks on Amazon.
====================
Letter from England
UK Government finally backs away
from multiculturalism: <http://tinyurl.com/6ccvv84>
<http://tinyurl.com/4uqjkra>
<http://tinyurl.com/6dbk3yz>
Chinese spying in the UK <http://tinyurl.com/5r963j3>
Scrapping of child safety vetting
scheme <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12372097>
Wide opposition to the NHS
reforms: <http://tinyurl.com/5rw3s54>
<http://tinyurl.com/67yn9ag>
More wikileaks detailing growing
differences between the UK and America <http://tinyurl.com/5rzs3cb>
UK universities finally began
sharing their entry requirements this week with the publication of a guide
by the Russell Group.
BBC coverage of the guidance: <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-12365050>
Other coverage: <http://tinyurl.com/6z3aovc>
Background: Students in the UK
are allowed to leave education at age 16. Those planning on entering
university go through a two-year programme leading to A-level exams in
(usually) two or three subjects. It had been suspected that not all A-levels
were equal for university entrance, at least for the more selective
universities, and this is now confirmed. Students wanting to enter the most
competitive universities need at least two of the following: mathematics,
English, geography, history, biology, chemistry, physics, or a foreign
language (live or dead). Math and science are the most important, even for
non-math/non-science programmes.
The guide mentions that outside
the UK, most students are required to take math, science, their native
language, and a foreign language up to age 17, and that UK students should
have comparable skills.
‘Soft’ A-level subjects that
don’t lead to a university degree include media studies, art and design,
photography, business studies, law, psychology, archaeology, astronomy,
classics, computer science, divinity, economics, electronics, political
science, oceanography (marine science), geology, human biology, religious
studies, sociology, statistics, critical thinking, and general studies.
Here’s an incomplete list of current A-levels. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Advanced_Level_subjects>
--
Harry Erwin, PhD, Senior Lecturer
of Computing, University of Sunderland. Computational neuroethologist:
http://crowan-scat.sunderland.ac.uk/~harryerw/mediawiki/index.php
===============
Rosenberg on Beck
Jerry
http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/
index.html#/v/4525743/beck-a-
new-caliphate/?playlist_id=86917
<http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/index.html>
A New Caliphate?
Jim
==
Caliphate
Hi Jerry!
Mail 660 : Friday : Caliphate
Jim Crawford is the perfect example why the US today
is living in a perfect storm of blowback.
A storm that just blows over the dictators and
potentates that By the US' "Bringer of Democracy" Grace governed against the
best interest of the indigenious population.
Nothing understood, nothing learned.
G! uwe
=
The question is who is the
best judge of other people's interests? JEP
He. people ( as in the collective of persons in a
nation ) hate it to be forced to work towards their own detriment.
Hiding selfservice behind a facade of altruistic
motive is a truth accessible to the acting person.
So, you don't have to judge other peoples interests
but your own motives.
IMHO intervention is an elastic application of force.
( I think there even is some factor of amplification ;-)
Applied force is resilient and will "come back".
Whereever you look: Treaty of Versaille, The Schah,
oldtime Apartheid SA and newly invented Apartheid Israel
applied negative Karma comes back ... as negative
Karma.
G! uwe
PS: I only recently realised that Carly Simons "Do it
them before they do it to you" is a core property of american thinking.
However tenuous or nonexistant the "before" is the "do it to them" is a
certainty.
You have a far different view of the US than I do.
I see incompetent empire, mostly with good intentions from intellectuals who
believe their theories are social laws.
I hold with Adams: each man is the best judge of
his own interest. Countries do have national interests, but those are fairly
narrow. As to US policy, I prefer to be the best United States we can be,
the City on a Hill as a shining example, and leave others to their own
devices so long as that is possible. Sometimes that is not possible, We need
Middle East oil, although had we invested the blood and treasure poured into
the desert sands into developing energy independence we would not. But do
not ascribe to malice that which is easily explained by incompetence and
egregiously incorrect premises.
As to the Shah, I think you do not know the entire
story; but few do, and it is probably not worth the time that a rational
discussion would require. We are where we are, and while understanding
how we got here is important, more important is what shall we do now.
Regarding Egypt, we would do best to shut up and
watch.
We are the friends of liberty everywhere but we are
the guardians only of our own. Our interventions in the two World Wars were
partly exceptions to that principle, and partly (in the case of II) forced
on us. Our intervention in I had ambiguous effectgs for both sides.
=============
Harvard Study
Jerry,
I enjoyed this article that Mike Flynn posted:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/
yblog_thelookout/20110202/us_yblog_thelookout
/study-says-college-isnt-for-everyone
<snip>
A new Harvard study (PDF) says American students need
to begin to decide in middle school whether they want to prepare for
four-year college and then a career. The alternative approach, the study
says, is to begin vocational training for a job earlier.
</snip>
This is what they do in Asia. Most Asian countries
have tests at each level of the school system. You get tracked into college
or vocational training based on your scores and performance. I remember
soldiers used to comment about how horrible it was to have your life decided
for you at such a young age. Well, its much more horrible to have your
growth stunted so certain sections of society can say they have a college
education too.
I know, I'm preaching to the Pope and the Cardinals.
--------
BDAB, Joshua Jordan, KSC Percussa Resurgo
I always enjoy Mike Flynn's thoughts. Thomists are
generally very rational.
============
Jerry,
Found on Google Books:
Bolometric data about the sun in chapter 1 of this
tome. 0.15% variation over solar cycle (based on two cycles of observation
in the satellite observation period). (see data in earlier paper at this
page).
Notionally, 0.15% variation should result in a 0.5
degree variation in global temperatures between solar min and solar max.
Comparing to the current figure at drroyspencer.com, the Cycle 23 warming is
clearly visible. Cycle 22 was perturbed by the Mt. Pinatubo cooling. The El
Nino spikes are clearly more significant though of shorter duration. The
chart on the page that should load when you click on the link clearly
predicts a weak solar maximum for this and the next couple of periods.
Current posts at wattsupwiththat.com are also showing that we seem to be
headed to a direct repeat of the Dalton Minimum.
For some reason, I am having a hard time finding
current data on the subject. Always have.
====
http://books.google.com/books?id=45HGQ
BD79WwC&pg=PA42&lpg=PA42&dq=
bolometric+solar+constant+measurement&source
=bl&ots=drEMyJHnXU&sig=3CqbtFeHAuykcL
az3UL0ww-Vq5Y&hl=en&ei=Up5NTcjaF8j0gAeB
lLjXDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=
2&ved=0CBoQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false
Note that the Google has an extensive preview but not
a complete compilation. The book is the 1997 Fermi School, volume 133, and
is available on Amazon for $177.
Incidentally, I put a trend line through the Jan
2010-Jan 2011 data at drroyspencer.com. A quadratic fit yields 1.5 degrees C
in cooling this year. That's probably not realistic, but... all of those
societal memes that revolve around the early days of the Republic in the
Dalton Meme ("dashing through the snow...") are probably about to have a
revisit.
J
I do not think that we have accurate enough data
over a long enough period of time to establish trends closer than a few
degrees accuracy. There were dairy farms in Greenland, vines in Scotland and
Nove Scotia, and longer growing seasons in Europe and Chine in Viking times.
It began to get cold about 1300 and there was ice on the Hudson, Thames, and
Zuyder Zee in the early 19th Century. Closer than that I am not sure we can
establish. Over time we ought to be able to do better.
=========
Washington, DC design for defense
"If government have to fall because 100,000 people
turn out to barricade the capital, we are in the kind of world envisioned by
the Framers, who built Washington DC with the Capitol in the center, and
broad open streets and malls radiating from it -- designed so that one
regiment of Federal soldiers could defend it with a battery of cannon. The
crowds would have been smaller in those times, of course, but rule by a
capital city mob was one of the options rejected by those who designed DC.
The Convention was held two years before the French Revolution, but the
evolution of the Federal government came simultaneously with the turmoil
that followed 1789."
I recall that there had been a letter to the editor in
the Washington Post once that mentioned that certain building designs within
the city were also subject to Army approval -- bay windows and such things
that would project outward from the building and thus affect fields of fire.
Supposedly this dated back at least to the Civil War. I've never been able
to confirm this, but it certainly ties in with the general concept of a city
designed for defensibility.
Karl
==
Mr. Pournelle,
I love your writings on your website, but I was
confused about the following:
“I note that the crowd is now described as "tens of
thousands." If government have to fall because 100,000 people turn out to
barricade the capital, we are in the kind of world envisioned by the
Framers, who built Washington DC with the Capitol in the center, and broad
open streets and malls radiating from it -- designed so that one regiment of
Federal soldiers could defend it with a battery of cannon. The crowds would
have been smaller in those times, of course, but rule by a capital city mob
was one of the options rejected by those who designed DC. The Convention was
held two years before the French Revolution, but the evolution of the
Federal government came simultaneously with the turmoil that followed 1789.”
http://www.jerrypournelle.com/view/2011/Q1/view660.html
Can you please tell me where you found this
information? I’ve read a lot of history and have never heard that the design
of the capital was done for defensive purposes. THANKS!
-Justin
I believe I first learned that in eighth grade.
Certainly George Mosse discussed it in his Western Civilization classes at
the University of Iowa. I believe it was at one time common knowledge.
Napoleon III was impressed by Washington's design (Paris before his
rebuilding was a city of easy barricades).
==========
Chavez's Jessica Mitford.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/05/world/americas/05venezuela.html>
---- Roland Dobbins
============
Incompetent Empire III Redux
Jerry,
This not only takes the cake, it takes the table the
cake is on and the chairs surrounding the table.
<snip> The US secretly agreed to give the Russians
sensitive information on Britain’s nuclear deterrent to persuade them to
sign a key treaty, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.
</snip>
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/
wikileaks/8304654/WikiLeaks-cables-
US-agrees-to-tell-Russia-Britains-nuclear-secrets.html#
We can only hope the English are in on this and it's
all good. Else, we just betrayed the most powerful and most important ally
that we have or have ever had. Japan might hold that honor if not for the
late unpleasantness. We have such history with England, and I am sure we
will with Japan. But--if the UK is not in on this little gimmick--then this
was the dumbest piece of foreign policy I've ever read about in my life and
I can only hope that we can salvage the debacle.
I know that I should immediately be able to assume the
UK is in on this. But, this administration seems to have gone rouge a long
time ago and I am not so sure. What are your thoughts?
--------
BDAB, Joshua Jordan, KSC Percussa Resurgo
I would hope there is more to this story than we
know. I am making inquiries.
=========
Mini Todos Santos
Hi Jerry,
Just finished re-reading
Oath of Fealty on my Kindle. Next time you are in Tokyo you should check
out Tokyo Midtown (
http://www.tokyo-midtown.com/en/ ). It's a mini Todos Santos. It has
apartments, offices, shops, restaurants, doctors, dentists, a hotel,
supermarket and even a museum all integrated together. My wife and I were
joking about getting an apartment there but we were worried that we would
never leave the building during the winter. We were there for lunch on a
weekend a while back and we saw kids from the condos riding their bicycles
around inside near the food courts. Roppongi Hills nearby is a similar
complex but Tokyo Midtown really brings everything together under one roof.
Neither are close to being self-sufficient, of course,
and are really just upper class enclaves but still kind of fun.
Cheers, Dave Smith Tokyo
Niven and I toured several of the large malls built
in the 1970's and other such places as part of the research for writing that
novel. I also knew Paulo Soleri (we were both called to testify to a state
planning committee and became friends) and read his books. I am very fond of
Oath of Fealty.
=============
Global weirding
Jerry,
From that bastion of conservatism, the Boston Herald:
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion
/op_ed/view.bg?articleid=1314036
take-away: <snip>
Global warming — is there anything it can’t do?
Well, the one thing it apparently doesn’t do is help
predict the weather. The UK’s Met Office stopped giving seasonal forecasts
last year after mis-predicting warmer winters three years in a row.
Meteorologists without a warmist agenda like Piers Corbyn and AccuWeather’s
Joe Bastardi, on the other hand, continue to pay the bills by making
predictions directly contrary to the “weirdos.” Oddly, they don’t have
degrees in politics.
For a theory to be scientific, it must be fallible —
capable of being proven false. If every weather condition can be used to
“prove” global warming simply by being declared “weird,” then it’s not
science. It’s a joke.
Which is exactly what the environmental movement has
become.
Jim
==========
We're doomed, and it's getting worse
First they came for the cows <http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-
confidential/2011/02/start-crying-epa-now-regulating-spilled-milk>
, then everyone <http://cnsnews.com/news/
article/epa-administrator-claims-regulating-drin-0> else.
Dan Steele Ice Pilot
===========
Wind Generated Power and Reliability
Dr. Pournelle --
You may have heard that areas of Texas are
experiencing rolling blackouts during the current cold weather. Officially,
the outages aren't supposed to last more than fifteen minutes at a time but
I have been told that they have ranged from one to twelve hours in some
cases. In part this is due to high demand. However, supply has been
apparently further hampered by a lack of wind to push the turbines that the
system in Texas relies upon so heavily, Texas having the most turbines of
any state.
On the flip side, a large turbine in Wyoming was blown
down recently by 110 mph gusts.
Sometimes you can't win for losing.
Pieter
Sooprise!
==================d
TOP
CURRENT
VIEW Monday |
