National Disaster Relief

Trudy on WRIF's Drew and Mike was just commenting about the national disaster relief fund that's nearly bankrupt and asked what money would be available for people in the wake of a disaster if they need money to make repairs.

If people "need money to make repairs" in light of a natural disaster then they need to buy insurance. I am sick of these idiots who live in areas they cannot afford to live in, make up the difference by not purchasing insurance, and then expect the taxpayers to bail them out. The people in New Orleans choose not to buy flood insurance; it is not the responsibility of the taxpayer to make up for their stupidity. The people in southern California live right on a fault line. If they choose not to buy earthquake insurance, the taxpayer should not be responsible for covering their costs. If people want to live in these ridiculously dangerous areas then they need to either pay for insurance premiums or realize that when the inevitable natural disaster comes they will be on their own.

The moral of this story - if you live in a flood zone, buy flood insurance. If you live in an earthquake zone, buy earthquake insurance. If you live in a high-wind zone, buy windstorm insurance. If you cannot afford the insurance, don't live there. The cost of insurance is a part of the economic system that discourages stupid behavior. If society continues to bail people out or subsidizes their insurance when they build a mansion on a fault line or a house in a high flood zone, then we only encourage loss of life and property damage. If the cost of living there, including the cost of insurance, is high then these people won't live there and will move somewhere they can afford, thus saving lives and property.

Quote of the Day

From slate.com's kausfiles:

Great Moments in Public Employee Unionism:

Two L.A. traffic engineers have been charged with 'sabotaging intersection signal lights' on 'the eve of a two-day job action by members of the Engineers and Architects Assn., which represents 7,500 city workers,' according to the LAT. The Times says the two allegedly rigged computers to disconnect signal lights at 'four busy intersections.'

Union officials were unavailable for comment Friday. Robert Aquino, executive director of the Engineers and Architects Assn., did not return repeated calls. But in an Aug. 21 interview with The Times about the pending two-day strike, Aquino noted: 'Los Angeles is not going to be a fun place to drive.'

A new era

The Democratic "100 hour" list:

• They vow to pass legislation implementing the September 11 panel recommendations: That's a whole lot of stuff to push through. Are they going to implement EVERY recommendation? Even the ones they have political differences with? I can't imagine that happening. Either way, this is just for show. They know that (1) they don't have time to read the entire report in 100 hours and (2) President Bush will veto this, as there are recommendations that just aren't good recommendations. The idea is a nice, get-us-elected sound-bite, but there's no way the Democrats are going to just rubber-stamp an appointed panel's recommendations. That's not how democracy is supposed to work. No one elected this panel - why should their recommendations be anything other than recommendations? We elect Congress so that the members of Congress analyze the merits of the recommendations and turn them into law where applicable - not to just rubber-stamp every idea an unelected body happens to put forth.

• Increasing minimum wage: I'm against increasing minimum wage. If the Democrats want to help the working poor, they can do it better by improving inner-city and rural education, fighting the drug problem, and ending the drop in wages due to the work done by illegal immigrants. Either way, this is bad for three reasons: (1) Artificially increasing wages leads to inflation. This will hurt all of those already making more than minimum wage and will mitigate the benefits that those making the minimum wage will see from the raise, (2) Higher minimum wages always yield greater unemployment. (3) The vast majority of people make over minimum wage. This is another show issue, and nothing more. The only people making minimum wage are those working at small businesses, many of which will be put out of business by this law.

• Expanding stem-cell reasearch: I'm all in favor of expanded stem-cell research, but I'm not generally one for governmental sponsorship for research to begin with. I'd rather see all government sponsorship of research ended in favor of private sector funding, but as long as that doesn't happen, I'd be in favor of the expansion of stem-cell research. Doesn't matter, though, as Bush will veto this.

• Allowing the government to negotiate prices for prescription drugs: Another show issue, nothing more. at best, this is a short-term fix to the problem. Long-term, it could cripple domestic development of drugs. At worst, it's the Democrats showing their arrogance by pandering to people with the expectation that if they slam on "Big, Bad Business" then it will help them get reelected. Either way, this is getting hit up with a veto.

• Cutting interest rates on student loans: The only item which has a chance of passing. Personally, I'm concerned that making college more affordable is only increasing the cost of college. Harvard, for instance, has an endowment which pays out about $75,000 a year per student (undergraduate, graduate, doctorial candidate) in education expenses. On top of that, they charge about $48,000 a year in tuition to those whose families who make at least $50,000 a year (because a family can afford to spend more than its entire income sending a child to college, of course). They can charge the tuition, so they do, although there's no reason why the school needs to spend $110,000 a year per student on education (the difference is due to those who receive need-based and academic scholarships). Decreasing student loan interest rates makes college more affordable, so students can borrow more, so the schools charge more. In the end, the students will be making the same payments for the same amount and most of them will be graduating with degrees which won't help them get jobs. The government would be better off giving grants/scholarships to students studying degree-programs which will end up helping the economy - engineering, medicine, nursing, law, business, education, computers, applied sciences, foreign languages, etc. - and less money on 'personal development' degrees.

• Ending subsidies for oil companies while expanding renewable energy exploration: Gonna get a veto, wo why even bother? I'm against all corporate subsidies, but the Democrats hate oil companies so they may as well nail on them. Of course, if this passes it will only increase the price of gas. Not sure if that's their goal, but I'd be hard pressed in our local economy to do anything to decrease supply and increase the production price of gas.

Quote of the Day

From Gregg Easterbrook's Tuesday Morning Quarterback column:

My Name is Bunk - James Bunk:

TMQ got around to seeing the new Bond flick, which left me longing for supervillians with master control rooms built inside an entire hollowed-out mountain without anyone noticing. Supposedly for the latest iteration of the Bond franchise, the new producers wanted something akin to realism. OK. But if the new premise is realism, why are Bond and M discussing state secrets over a cell phone? And how can the United Kingdom still exist if MI6 is so incredibly incompetent it assigns just two agents to assist Bond on a big mission and both of them are actually working for the other side?

AP loves John Edwards

Translations from politispeak:

"Providing universal health care for all Americans": Instituting a single-payer insurance compensation system which will decrease health care for the upper and middle classes in order to provide equal medical care for all while eliminating incentives to create new medical techniques and medicines.

"Rebuilding America's middle class and eliminating poverty": Expanding entitlement programs, including into middle class, which is the most wealthy, most prosperous, and most inclusive it has been in any country at any point in history. (I have no idea how this is "rebuilding" America's middle class.)

"Creating tax fairness by rewarding work, not just wealth." Increasing taxes on the 27% through 35% brackets and increasing taxes on capital gains. (I'm sure he can explain how it's fair that if my wife and I were making $30,000 a year we'd be paying about 5% of our income in Federal taxes but if we're making $100,000 a year we'd be paying about 15% of our income in Federal taxes and if we're making about $10,000,000 then we'd be paying about 1/3 of our income in taxes).

As an aside - only 1% of the Federal budget comes from people who make less than $30,000 a year, the nation's median income. Frankly, I'd be inclined to eliminate taxes on the first $30,000 of income if only to make people stop bitching about the taxes on the rich. Then again, I'm in favor of a simple tax structure. eliminate all of the stupid tax breaks/credits/etc. and go with the flat rate where all income, regardless of source, is taxed equally, something like:

0 to 30K 0 %
30K to 45K 10%
45K to 100K 25%
100K to 1mm 33%
over 1mm 37%

Quote of the Day

From Greg Easterbrook -

Capitalism Will Make a Movie About the Hanging of Capitalism:

The new movie 'Fast Food Nation,' which ridicules fast food as a corporate conspiracy, is produced by the cinema division of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, a multinational. 'An Inconvenient Truth,' which tells us big corporations are destroying the world, is distributed by Paramount Classics, owned by Viacom, a multinational. Many recent thrillers and action movies depict big corporations as evil, and the movies are produced and distributed by big corporations. Presumably this happens because the evil corporation is a hackneyed cliche of screenwriting, and in recent years Hollywood has produced little beyond hackneyed cliches. But consider: Perhaps sinister corporations have some secret reason for wanting us to think big corporations are sinister.

Insurance = bailouts?

I'm sick of idiots who think that an insurance company's job is to bail you out of whatever problem you're in. It's bad enough when people think that's the government's job, but it's the idiots that think an insurance company is screwing them over because they didn't take out a policy to cover the loss they're claiming.

An article in Esquire discusses two individuals, husband and wife, who ran a nursing home in New Orleans. They chose not to evacuate when the mandatory evacuation order was given. An official from the government called them and offered them the use of two buses to evacuate their patients. The couple declined. They figured they knew better than the state officials who gave the mandatory evacuation order. The hurricane came, the two of them left the nursing home, and the residents were left to die - some of them physically restrained to their beds. The couple was charged (and convicted) of negligent homicide. Esquire wrote up a long article which was little more than a 'these were such great people' piece, never contradicting the facts at hand - that they chose to ignore the evacuation order and then left the residents to die while they saved themselves. When they got around to going back for them, after the storm had let up, everyone was already dead.

That's not the part that pisses me off at the moment (though it doubtlessly does). The nursing home owners' defense attorney (who, I might add, blames the deaths of the residents on the Army Corps of Engineers and every government official from Mayor Naggin to President Bush but feels that those who actually ran the nursing home aren't to blame in the slightest) started out the conversation with the reporter doing the piece with a long rant about how the government and every insurance company completely screwed over everyone who suffered losses. He's ticked that his insurance company isn't paying for the damage to his house. Later they visit his house - it was destroyed by the flood. Like the vast majority of people, he didn't buy flood insurance. However, despite the fact that he didn't buy flood insurance he expects his insurance company to pay for flood damage. That's like going out to a high-end restaurant, buying an appetizer, and then getting ticked that you didn't get the fillet and lobster tossed in for free. It's not the insurance company's place to pay for his fillet and lobster. If he can't afford to eat at the restaurant, he should go to a frickin' Big Boy instead. Why is that so hard to understand? Why do people think the insurance company or the government should pay for his fillet and lobster when so many of us have to eat at Big Boy?

Maybe I took that example a little too far...

Special Bonus: Granholm's plan for "improving" the economy

Governor Granholm released her tax plan yesterday. Basically, she's in favor of slashing taxes for the manufacturing industry and imposing taxes on service companies, particularly on financial service companies. Mainly, this is because people are worried about outsourcing and hate insurance companies and banks.

Here, I thought Granholm was trying to diversify the economy. If this is her intent, why would she be attacking the consulting and financial service companies which are growing at a great pace and are one of the few shining points in the economy? Sure, we need to do something to help manufacturing. However, is cutting their taxes by 1 percentage point (albeit, an 85% reduction) going to offset the harm to the economy by imposing a new tax on the service industries? Nearly all new jobs in this state are service industry jobs. Service industry jobs are things that Americans can do better and more cheaply than foreign competitors and thus are where we're strongest. Why make it tougher for these companies to succeed while trying to bolster a manufacturing sector in which we simply can't compete? We should be focusing on things we're doing well, not tearing them down. Only by focusing on what we do well can we hope to turn around Michigan's economy.

However, Democratic strategies are more concerned about making things 'even' then about sound economic policy. It's still amazing how these people think they're capable of running the economy.

Quote of the Day

From Slate's science roundup:

A new robot can recognize when it's injured and change its behavior to compensate. Animals do this all the time, but previous robots have shown little or no adaptability. This robot was designed to observe the consequences of its movements, infer how its limbs work, and adjust when the consequences change. Key test: When its creators shortened one of it's legs, it changed the way it walked. Sci-fi spin: It's an early model for explorer robots that must handle surprises on other planets without human aid. Nightmare scenario: 1) Adaptive, self-modifying robots will treat human interference as just another challenge to overcome. Scientists' rejoinder: "We just pull the plug out of the robot." Nightmare scenario 2: Your plug-pulling habit is just another challenge.

First accusation of voter fraud

The Democrats filed their first accusation of voter fraud this morning at 7:36 am. Why? A poll in Ann Arbor opened late this morning and they felt that this may have deprived individuals of their ability to vote. It opened at 7:06 am. One individual was in line and voted without incident.

I just love when people cast doubts on our political system in order to score political points. I'm surprised I haven't heard that Republicans in Detroit are intimidating voters by making sure that they're actually registered to vote. Yep, one of the complaints about the 2004 election was that a "young, white man" looked over the shoulder of an election worker to make sure that a voter's name was on the registered voter list. Clearly intimidating.

Quote of the Day

From Slate's science roundup column:

Scientists claim to have built an 'invisibility cloak.' It uses metamaterials (metal patterns on a surface) to bend waves around an object so that the waves strike you as though they've passed through empty space. Researchers' hype: We can hide anything from anyone! We hid a copper cylinder, and now we're gonna hide a toaster! Sci-fi hype: Today, Harry Potter's cloak; tomorrow, Romulan space ships! Critiques: 1) The cloak didn't hide anything. It bends microwaves, not light. 2) It worked in two dimensions, not three. 3) Even with microwaves, it left a telltale reflection and shadow. 4) To bend light, which is much harder, you'd have to find new metamaterials. Naive answer: Just you wait, we'll figure out how to hide things, and you'll hear all about it. Cynical answer: The military, which is funding this work, will figure out how to use it to hide things, and you'll never hear about it.

Quote of the Day

Wally, from Dilbert -

I have an idea for boosting my performance. You wisely coached us to use all of our vacation days each year, because we come back recharged! Our renewed motivation is more than enough to compensate for the missed days. My plan is to leverage that competitive advantage. I'll take a fifteen year vacation and return ten minutes before retirement. Then I'll be so recharged that I'll pounce and do twenty years of work in minutes!!! Unless it's near a holiday, in which case, do you mind if I leave early?

Quote of the Day

Dogbert -

Remember that money can't buy happiness. But, it can buy expensive possessions that make other people envious, and that feels just as good. And, you can pay to have people whacked.

Quote of the Day

Kevin Lehde of Raleigh, N.C., a high school football official, notes the new National Federation of High Schools rulebook bans the "fumblerooski" in which a team deliberates places the ball on the ground, hoping the defense will lose track of where the ball is. The reason? Because this trick play often tricks the officials, leading to an inadvertent whistle - though coaches planning to call a trick play may describe the play to officials before the game. Lehde notes:

This means we now have a rule that was instituted as a direct result of the perceived incompetence of the officials calling the game! 'Our officials can't enforce the rules correctly, so let's alter the rules to reduce officiating mistakes," says the rules committee. Who do they think we are, U.S. - Mexico border guards?

Quote of the Day

Scott Adams -

Now, since I know from the comments that many of my readers are - inexplicably - also troglodytes, allow me to include a disclaimer here. I'm way more hawkish than you are. It just doesn't look that way because my thinking is that if a bully punches you, you should run away. Later, when he's asleep, put a bullet in his head and leave the gun in his little brother's crib so it looks like a sibling squabble. In other words (again, for the troglodytes) being tough doesn't require being stupid. It's totally optional.

Quote of the Day

Scott Adams -

I have a theory that only people who have never been rich would believe that the rich are routinely willing to kill enormous amounts of people to get richer. Personally, I've been poor and I've been rich. And I can speak from first hand experience about how it changes you. I'm far less bloodthirsty than before.

Quote of the Day

A. J. Liebling -

Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one.

Quote of the Day

Deminski and Doyle are talking about people who don't follow racial stereotypes, so you have the Japanese guy who can't do math, the black women who like rock, and the Mexican guy who doesn't like spicy food...the best exchange:

Caller: I'm a gay guy and I don't talk with a lisp, I enjoy hunting and fishing, I watch football, and I drink beer. In fact, my idea of a perfect day is one where I spend the day fishing.

Doyle: I just don't understand that.

Deminski: What, you've got issues with him being gay?

Doyle: No, the fishing. Where's the fun in that?

Deminski: You know it's 2006 when you can understand a guy being gay but you can't figure out why anyone would want to go fishing.

Quote of the Day

Matt Stone, co-writer of South Park, upon hearing that Muslims throughout the world were rioting over a cartoon depicting the prophet Muhammad:

Oh my god, what have we done? I better find a lawyer.

Quote of the Day

Scott Adams -

I should note that I'm a vegetarian, but only for selfish reason. Saving critters from pain is an excellent goal if it's practical. But I can't reconcile that goal with what would happen if humans stopped killing animals. The alternative is to wait until the bears - for example - are about to copulate and then swoop in and place the condom on the boy bear without him noticing. Otherwise it seems to me that we'd have too damned many bears. If that happened, you'd be all 'Where's the remote control for the TV?' and your spouse would be all 'A bear is sitting on it' and you'd be all 'Again?!!' And you know how much you hate it when people say 'I'm all' instead of 'I said.' That has to be at least as bad as killing animals. That's my only point.

Quote of the Day

Napoleon Bonaparte -

Never attribute to conspiracy that which can be explained by incompetence.

Quote of the Day

Mickey Kaus -

Do you have an expectation of privacy when you check out a book from...the government?