Monthly Archives: August 2023

Thoughts from the GOP “Debate”

Politics,
Trump

I followed, as closely as I could stand which was not much, the first of the GOP debate and I heard nothing to make be think about voting for any Republican next year. Frankly this is quite sad for me. While I am a life long Democrat I have, from time to time, voted for Republicans. In fact my first Representative in the House was a Republican and I voted every time he ran for reelection. I was what was known as a Reagan Republican in the 1980’s

So what did I hear in the Debate that I didn’t like? First the response to the idea of ending Social Security and Medicare. I admit that this is very personal for me as all I have to live on now that I’m retired is Social Security. An before you say it, yes it is my own fault that I’m in this position. Back in 2006 Lin and I decided to start our own business. 2009 was our break-even year and we got hit by the Great Recession. In an effort to save the business we put everything we had into to it. To no effect. I lost everything. But I would still be totally apposed to ending Social Security. As to Medicare/Medicaid just try and get medical insurance if you are over 35 on the open market and have any kind of medical issues, like higher than “normal” blood pressure. Go ahead, I’ll wait.

What got me in the debate was not that a candidate proposed the idea, no. What got me was the enthusiasm the proposal got. The audience loved it. I also noticed the lack of any defense of Social Security and Medicare by any of the other candidates. I heard nothing. Did Fox just ignore any response or was there just none? I don’t know.

The second major take away for me was the idea that Climate Change (Global Warming) is a myth. Once again it is personal, I am a scientist. Yes it is a Social Science but it still is a Science. I still use the scientific method and math. Get over it. The very idea that millions of individuals have colluded to pull a great hoax on the American people for the sole purpose of destroying the ‘Carbon Industry’ (an just what is the ‘Carbon Industry’ anyway?) just blows my mind. That the GOP would give this idea even the time of day worries me. Not because the party leadership believes it but that they are so clinical that the are willing to use it for a few more votes. What else are they willing to do to get and keep power? I don’t want to find out.

In their effort to scare the mass of GOP voters I think the ten candidates last night have accomplished something else. The are scaring the great mass of the Middle voters. Not right nor left but the middle. The very voters you need to win in the general election. Last night I heard nothing to attract that voter. Now we can wait and see.

A change in view and Tactics

Climate Change, Politics, Science, , ,
Weather Control
Coming Soon: Weather Control

A little while ago a friend of mine suggested a new way of talking about the Climate Change Crisis. She recommend I use the phase “You can pay me now, or you can pay me later.” I tried it and it worked. We got away from arguing about if it exists or not and started discussing just how we will pay for either just letting things happen or trying to do something preemptively. I was even able to change the wording. No longer are we trying to reverse the effects of “Global Warming (AKA Climate Change) we were now talking about controlling the Climate aka Weather.

Controlling Weather has be a staple of Science Fiction since forever. It is right up there with sailing under the sea and flying to the Moon. Both of which we now have done and take for granted. One big advantage is we can take off the table how we get other countries to cooperate. We can just assume they will joint in just so they have some say in what kind of weather. This also gets the Climate Change Deniers off of defending their denial, very non-productive, and onto thinking about what we can do that benefits us.

Another thing is we can get them to look at just how much the recovery from ‘Natural’ disasters cost and looking at how much preventive action would have cost. One example is the cost of improving the levy system of the lower Mississippi vs building all new sea ways when the river changes its path it has now away from the Port of New Orleans. The river has tried to do this a couple of time already and preventing it has been both costly and difficult. We even have a great ‘Bad Example’ in the wild fire in Hawaii, recovery costs of over $5 billion or greater are being talked about. What would it cost in recovery cost be for Miami when it is hit head on by a mega Hurricane?

Finally we can point out, with hard examples, that the money we put into the research on Climate Control will, 1) be mostly spent in the USA and 2) even pure research has always pay itself back many times over. A when the research is targeted, like in the space program, the return on investments is even greater. An as an added bonus we can go looking for the hidden examples of where research in one area has given great benefits in totally unrelated areas.

You can pay for it now, or you can pay for it later.