California Fleein'

There's nothing I can (or need to) add.

Thoughts On A Sunday

It seems the winter weather is catching up here at the lake, with two more storm systems paying a visit this coming week. While the Weather Guys^TM haven’t yet predicted how much snow we can expect from the two storm systems, they have said it will be plowable amounts. I figure I can work from home on those snowy days. It isn’t that I wouldn’t make the trip into our engineering lab since anything less than a foot of snow is a nuisance. But if I don’t have to drive into work that means I don’t have to burn any gasoline since the trusty RAM 1500 won’t be used.

We’ve seen above average temps here at the lake in January, but February saw both some of our coldest and warmest temps of the winter. Our precipitation total is slightly above normal, but mostly due to rain, not snow. It looks like we’ll be making up for the lack of snowfall over the next week or so.

Oh, and sugaring – maple syrup production – has started in earnest. Quite a few producers started tapping trees a week or so ago. I am not aware of anyone who has started their evaporators yet, but they should any day now.

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I keep wondering how long it’s going to take before the clueless among us realize that “equity” has absolutely nothing to do with “equality”? While the words sound similar they do not mean the same thing, something which we must point out again and again as we fight the increasing push for DEI ‘requirements’ in schools, colleges, and businesses.

The clueless do not understand what equity entails - due either to ignorance or indoctrination – that being reducing everyone to the lowest common denominator. Well, everyone except the elite.

History shows that is a particularly abysmal idea as in the end societies that do that die, usually in fire and blood. (The elite will ignore that fact that it is usually their blood will be spilled by the people they reduced to that lowest common denominator, i.e. abject poverty and virtual slavery.)

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Why would a Virginia teachers union and Democrats in Virginia’s legislature oppose teaching children about the victims of Communism?

Although House Bill 1816, the “Standards of Learning; instruction on dangers and victims of communism,” passed the House of Delegates with some Democrat support, it ultimately met its demise in the Democrat-controlled Senate of Virginia, Fox News reports.

The bill was “passed by indefinitely” by the Committee on Education and Health, which means it could be reconsidered at a later date. If it isn’t, the bill essentially will be dead.

--snip--

The bill calls on the governor to “annually issue a proclamation setting the seventh day of November as Victims of Communism Day,” and that the day “be suitably observed” by all public primary and secondary schools.

It also directs the state board of education to update Virginia’s history and social science learning standards to include the “dangers of communism.”

Could it be that they want to hide Communism’s genocidal history, the death toll being somewhere north of 100 million (and counting)? Could it be they want to hide Communism’s/Socialism’s dismal 400+ year record of one economic failure after another? Why would they want to hide any of that...unless they want to make it easier to fool people into embracing Communism and Socialism as a cure-all for the ‘evils’ of Capitalism even though Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other system?

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Is the real reason Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) was hospitalized is because he can no longer take care of himself?

Fetterman was sworn in as Senator on January 3 and kept a low profile until his office reported he had checked himself into George Washington University Hospital, in Washington, D.C. on February 8 after feeling lightheaded. His spokesman released statements that all tests on Fetterman came back negative and he was released after two days.

What the spokesman did not disclose was that Fetterman was diagnosed with depression and was advised to see the Capitol physician, which he did the following Monday. The doctor recommended Fetterman check himself into the hospital for clinical depression.

It turns out Fetterman’s lightheadedness was the result of him not being able to take care of himself: He was not eating or drinking enough fluids to sustain himself.

Fetterman is on his own in D.C. His family did not move to Washington with him, opting to remain in their hometown Braddock. This meant that Fetterman, still recuperating from a debilitating stroke while starting a new high pressure job, had no one to look after him. His staff obviously wasn’t. They knew he was suffering from depression and that between the stroke and depression he was difficult to deal with.

Fetterman shouldn’t have run for office in the first place as he wasn’t physically up to the task. WRBA couldn’t lend a hand because they were so busy keeping Biden functional. They have even less resources available today since Biden requires a lot more ‘maintenance’ now.

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Is the flawed Equal Rights Amendment coming back from the dead?

The Equal Rights Amendment is once again up for debate in the Senate next week, and Democrats and weak Republicans want you to believe that the only “debate” this time around is a procedural one. The original proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to include a clause to guarantee identical legal treatment of both sexes passed in 1972 with a seven-year ratification deadline. Despite extending the deadline to 1982, the ERA never received the requisite approval from 38 of the 50 state legislatures.

Seeking to win some political points by resurrecting the dead amendment, Sen. Ben Cardin, the Maryland Democrat, has proposed a resolution, concurrent with a House resolution passed in 2021, to strike the ratification deadline from the text of the ERA, thus, presumably, reopening the amendment for passage by state legislatures. The Senate will debate the resolution Tuesday, an event that Democrats hope to keep at the bumper sticker level: Who doesn’t value men and women equally?

The amendment, however, does not pose the question of the equal inherent worth of men and women, as Cardin and his colleagues on the right and the left would have you believe. The question, instead, as most political ones, is one of prudence. Is it prudent to treat men and women identically—or, reframing it, to treat women as men? History, and most of the women in it, issue a resounding “no.”

I can think of a number of negative effects the ERA will have, particularly for women. Here are just a few of them I can think of right off the top of my head:

1. Women will have to register for the draft. (It’s not much of an issue now as it was back in 1972 because the draft isn’t active like it was back then...but it could be.)

2. The dynamics of divorce will change, particularly when it comes to child custody. (This is something I can support as in general men get the short end of the stick, being awarded custody under 20% of the time.)

3. Women convicted of crimes will have to receive the same sentences as men for the same crime. Right now women receive lesser sentences for identical crimes.

4.It will mean an end to all sex-segregated spaces – locker rooms, restrooms...and prisons.

5. There will also be repercussions for men: “When you treat women identically to men, it turns out, society merely adapts standards to favor more feminine characteristics, enabling women to succeed but feminizing men in the process. With the ERA in place, it’s worth asking if any part of society would be permitted to exhibit the masculine virtues.” The answer to that is “No”.

The Law of Unintended Consequences will come into play and the downsides are likely to outweigh the upsides, just as Phyllis Schlafly understood back in 1972, which is why she fought so hard against its ratification.

Maybe Congress should take a closer look at the ERA to determine if it will cause more harm than good in its original form.

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And that’s the news from a snowy Lake Winnipesaukee, where February vacation is in progress, the ski resorts are busy, and more snow is on the way.

Social Media Is Hurting Our Kids

The claim has been made for a while that social media is something that children should be banned from using. I will admit that at first I thought that might be going too far, but after seeing its effect on children, and particularly teens, I have to wonder if banning it might not be enough.

The effects of social media on kids has been seriously underestimated since in most cases they do not have the defense mechanisms maturity brings. (OK, defense mechanisms that maturity might bring as there plenty of adults out there who have major problems dealing with social media.)

Social media present people with multitudes of false impressions about how wonderful other people’s lives are as well as being used to torment and bully others, particularly teens. There have been times when social media has driven people to suicide, usually by way of cyberbullying. This is particularly true of teens.

Clearly, kids are in terrible pain. In trying to understand why, many conservatives have embraced ideas about the damaging effects of social media championed by Haidt and Twenge. The Republican senator Josh Hawley cited Twenge’s work in calling for a ban on social media use by kids under 16. “Depression and social media use go hand in hand,” he wrote in The Washington Post.

--snip--

Social media has not connected or united the world. It’s tearing people apart. And young people are suffering the most. Researcher Jean Twenge, who has spent her career chronicling social media’s effects on kids, has observed that the longer children use social media, the more likely they are to harm themselves. This finding held true for both boys and girls — but especially girls. Depression and social media use go hand in hand.

As I have written elsewhere, social media tends to twist people’s perceptions of reality because social media is really cyberspace, and cyberspace isn’t reality. However, people treat it as if it is. Too often they don’t understand that most people try to paint a picture of their lives that is better than reality. People looking at those “My life is great” posts start to feel their own lives don’t measure up. This is particularly true of teens because too often they have little life experience to use as a comparison. It makes them vulnerable...but it’s something we can do something about by distancing our kids from social media. The question is, will we be brave enough to actually do so? We don’t need legislation to do so. We just need to be parents and tell our children “no” when they insist they absolutely must have a smart phone.

Sometimes New Isn't Better

When I saw this post in Instapundit my first thought was “Let me guess: The decision to do this was made by either a bean counter to save a few bucks or some mid-level suit without any understanding of ‘How Things Work’.” What is it I’m talking about?

User interfaces, in this case the user interfaces inside of cars and trucks. (The linked post slams the user interface of the Chevy Colorado.) More specifically, when it comes to controlling various functions like the radio station tuning/volume, interior lights, exterior lights, the heat/AC/temp/fan speed/vent selection, and a whole host of other functions usually handled by knobs, switches/buttons, and sliders.

The move away from the traditional controls and towards using a touchscreen on the vehicle’s infotainment center has some serious downsides, the biggest being the driver is required to take their eyes off the road in order to use those controls.

As Glenn writes, “Touchscreens are cheaper than buttons and knobs, which is why they’re pushing them. But they’re inferior.”

There’s one comment to the post that lays it out succinctly:

The biggest problem with the interface is that everything uses the same control. By that, I mean that unlike 'traditional' controls in automobiles (even if they all go through some kind of on-board computer) is that there's no muscle memory involved with controlling various systems.

With traditional controls - buttons, switches, and sliders - one quickly learns which button, switch, or slider does what. That in turn leads to a driver not needing to look at the controls in order to change anything from the the fan speed, temperature (heat/AC), the vent outputs (defrost, floor, side/center vents), headlights, internal lights, radio station/volume, and so on. All require different actions and the body quickly remembers how do these various functions without thinking about it. The driver doesn't have to look away from the road in order to do any of these things.

The touch screen interface destroys that because the same action will have different functions depending upon which screen is active. The driver has to look at the screen in order to perform routine functions. That means taking their eyes off the road. That is what is called "A Bad Thing" in the engineering biz.

While some may try to use the "Then why don't you use voice command?" argument, I have found that can be as distracting as having to look at the screen, particularly if you have to perform some function you do only now and then as compared to every day.

User interfaces are supposed to be designed to make things easier for the user, not the manufacturer or engineering staff.

It isn’t just in automobiles that I’ve seen user interfaces that were awful and not very easy to use.

Does anyone remember the debacle that was Windows 8?

The programmers decided that a user interface that looked just like the ones seen on smart phones and tablets was a great idea...and it might have been if laptops and desktops had touchscreen monitors. But back then only a few monitors had that capability. People were still using a mouse or touchpad to navigate and the tablet style user interface was a painful experience with those devices. This drove Microsoft to come out with Windows 8.1 which returned to a version of the Windows 7 interface. (By then the damage was done and most people stayed with Windows 7 rather than switch to Windows 8.)

I have seen other poorly designed user interfaces for things like test equipment which made it more difficult for service personnel to use the equipment for its intended purposes. The engineers who designed it may have had no problems navigating the interface, but the average users hated it.

With that it mind, GM needs to go back to the drawing board for the Chevy Colorado’s user interface and return to using actual knobs, switches, and buttons...before it gets someone killed.

Thoughts On A Sunday

I was out making a quick trip to our local Walmart to pick up a couple of things I needed to help my friend I mentioned in yesterday’s post when I ran across Skip of GraniteGrok fame. He was doing some grocery shopping with his grandson when he spotted me and wondered what I was doing there on a Saturday afternoon. (As I have mentioned more than once in TOAS, I tend to do my Walmart shopping Sunday mornings prior to church. So me being there on a day other the Sunday was unusual.)

As I was driving to and from my usual Sunday Walmart shopping run, I saw that much of the ice that had formed on the lake during the sub-zero temperatures a couple of weekend ago was gone. There were still sections here and there that had a thin skin of ice, but there were large swaths of open water. This is going to be one of those few winters where the lake never freezes over entirely. I can think of three occasions over the past 20+ years when Lake Winnipesaukee did not freeze over entirely, so it is not an unprecedented event. Of course the Climate Change Faithful will point to it as yet more proof the Earth’s climate is warming. If the failure of the lake to freeze over had occurred only over the period of the past 20-some years, I might agree. But history shows numerous winters where the lake didn’t freeze over entirely over the past 150 years or so.

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Skip at GraniteGrok (mentioned above) has posted about the logic we use up here in New England to decide whether or not it’s time to turn on the heat in our homes. Considering the cost of heating oil, propane, and natural gas, the decision can seriously affect our bank balances, so it’s something we take seriously. If the house is heated with wood, the decision is more about when it’s time to put more wood in the stove.

As I think I’ve written before, back when I was working for Digital Equipment Corp (“DEC”), I was transferred to Honolulu for a 3 month stint. I remember a couple of days after arriving that the morning was around 65 degrees F when I got up for work. Coming from a few weeks of 10-28 degrees, this was SPRING TIME! Just a polo shirt and khaki pants.

The locals were walking about in puffy down jackets. Quite the contrast.

The above also ties in with my post from yesterday.

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Richard Fernandez reminds us (and the Progressives and their ‘followers’) what Communism is all about and how it’s been a dismal failure everywhere it’s been tried.

It’s really amazing how Communism, even after killing hundreds of millions of people on the past 100 years and ruining every country it ever ruled – without exception – can routinely take the moral high ground and unfailingly strike the pose of the movement of tomorrow.

That some of our young people think communism, or it’s slightly less destructive sibling – socialism – will solve ‘problems’ that aren’t really problems shows they have never cracked open a history book and have absolutely no understanding of human nature. If they had, they would be running away from those related genocidal ideologies as fast as they could.

Communism and socialism go after the ignorant young because they have no basis to make any judgments about whether or not what they’re being told is BS or not, makes any sense or not, will work or not. They’re gullible, inexperienced, and have little knowledge of the real world. That makes them the perfect target for indoctrination, exploitation, and use as cannon fodder.

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It turns out the ignorant young aren’t the only ones supporting Progressive ideology. The willfully ignorant white liberals aren’t much different than the indoctrinated youth, particularly since they don’t have to deal with the fallout of destructive Progressive legislation, regulations, and programs.

My good friend Harrison Finberg — OK, OK, I’ve never actually met him, but we can be good friends on Twitter these days — noted this tweet from Philly First Ward, the Democratic Executive Committee in Philadelphia’s First Ward. We have previously noted the mayoral candidacy of Helen Gym Flaherty,[1] one of the furthest left of the ever-growing list of hopefuls, whom The Philadelphia Inquirer described as a “longtime activist who is typically aligned with the Democratic Party’s left wing”. Mrs Flaherty’s campaign website is full of the usual ‘progressive’ bromides, but, at least as of this writing, there’s no actual issues page, telling the city’s voters — of which I am not one — what she would actually do, other than those bromides, in office if elected.

While she says that she will fight “gun violence,” what she doesn’t want to do is fight the criminals who use guns. I guess that’s not much of a surprise, since ‘progressives’ seem to think that guns simply levitate and shoot people all by themselves.

As long as none of the laws and policies put forward negatively affect them they don’t care what their Progressive politicians do to others that are not “them”.

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First, it’s Elizabeth Warren. Then it’s Rachel Dolezal. Now it’s Raquel Evita Saraswati.

What do they all have in common?

They are all liberal white women who claimed ethnicity they don’t have.

Elizabeth ‘Fauxcahontas’ Warren claimed Native American heritage. She doesn’t have a single drop of blood that allows here to make that claim.

Rachel Dolezal claimed to be of African American heritage. But like Warren, she has no such genetic heritage.

The latest is Raquel Evita Saraswati who claimed to be a “queer, Muslim, multiethnic woman.” However she, like Warren and Dolezal, is not what she said she is.

But now it has come to light that contrary to her claims, she is infected with the Left’s original sin: Raquel Evita Saraswati was born Rachel Elizabeth Seidel, and is as white as the native population of Switzerland.

And so it continues.

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the ice is receding, the skiers are still coming to hit the slopes on this holiday weekend, and where I do not have the holiday off.

Dependence

I was recently reminded of just how dependent we’ve become on the Internet when friend called me in a panic, asking if I could help her configure her new cable modem and wireless network.

Apparently her old wireless router decided to end itself and died. She ended up deciding to both update her Internet service speed and replace her now defunct wireless network. Herein lies the problem.

Her ‘tech’ guy couldn’t seem to get the new setup up and running before the weekend.

I headed over there last night and attempted to get her network up and running.

I failed.

It wasn’t until my second trip there today I was able to figure out that her new cable modem was the problem. After being activated by the cable company I found out that even though it would be recognized by the cable system and link in, there wasn’t any Internet access. It was necessary to perform the necessary rituals to gain access to the Internet. But the modem would lose connection to the Internet when the power was cycled, a necessary step in setting up the wireless router. That necessitated performing the rituals...again.

In the end I could not get her network up and running which upset my friend to no end. Without access to the Internet there were many things she was going to be unable to do, and the inability to do those things had her upset.

It showed me just how dependent she was on the ‘Net, how much she could no longer do without it. How much so many of us could no longer do without it.

I know I would have to change how I pay most of my bills as with only a couple of exceptions I pay all my bills online. A couple require me to pay either with cash or check since the establishments in question do not have online payment capabilities. I also do quite a bit of shopping online as do most of us.

In my friend’s case, most of her TV viewing is via streaming on the ‘Net, so she’s also been TV-less for some time, too. That’s the case with a lot of us as well.

At least my friend did manage to get a new cable modem and it appears to be working. That means I’ll be back over to her home tomorrow to set up her wireless network.

So True

I can attest to the veracity of this, having seen proof first hand.

Maybe Time To Ban Assault Box Trucks?

After seeing reports of this incident in Brooklyn – a man in a U-haul truck running down pedestrians – one has to wonder if there will now be calls for U-Haul Control measures in the Big Apple.

It appears the driver of the U-Haul was someone who had rented the truck down in Florida, meaning the deadly “assault box truck” was brought in from out of state. His violent rampage injured 8 people and killed 1, bringing into question whether “Assault Box Truck Free Zones” will be declared across the Metro New York area.

Thoughts On A Sunday

Seeing the difference in temperature between last Saturday and yesterday shows an almost 70ºF swing from the low temp last week and the high temp this week. While a bit of weird winter weather-wise, I am not complaining that the temps this past week have been above normal. That’s meant the furnace here in The Gulch hasn’t been running all that much, at least during the day.

The sub-zero temperatures helped more ice form on the Big Lake, though there is still plenty of open water in a section of the lake called The Broads. While Ice In was declared last week, it being defined as all five ports of call for the MS Mount Washington being iced over. That it was declared so late is unusual, but I have seen late Ice In’s before in the 40+ years I have resided in New Hampshire.

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When I heard the governor of my state is considering a run for president in 2024, my first thought was “Oh no!”

My second thought was “Oh HELL no!!”

Mind you, I have no dislike for Chris Sununu. He’s been a decent governor, but there are a lot of things he should have been addressing in New Hampshire that he’s been wishy-washy about, particularly things like CRT/DEI ‘indoctrination’, or refusing to tell the “Abortion No Matter What” pro-choice extremists to step off (though he did sign legislation banning on-demand third trimester abortions despite being pro-choice himself).

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To add to the embarrassment for my home state of New Hampshire, we now have one of our school districts – Milford - deciding that urinals in the boys’ lavatories in the middle and high school be blocked off and made unusable by anyone, all in the name of “compromise” when it comes to bathrooms and gender identity. I kid you not.

Dozens of students walked out of their New Hampshire school after the district banned urinals in a compromise to a proposal that would have blocked children from using facilities based on their gender identity.

The school board decided a few days before the Friday walkout to prohibit students at Milford Middle School and Milford High School from using urinals or shared spaces in locker rooms.

The ban in a town of about 15,000 people roughly 35 miles (56 kilometers) from Concord, New Hampshire’s capital, was the culmination of a long debate about district rules about bathroom use and gender identity.

People need to be fired. The school board needs to be voted out because they have caved to the woke busybodies who are doing this not to actually help anyone, but to make themselves feel better about themselves for having done something, even if it’s the wrong something.

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Yeah, I can agree with this wholeheartedly:

I think what I respect most about Pres. Joe Biden is how every day, in every way, he shows how empty and hypocritical all the Trump hating was.

Also, big shout out for inflation-fueling porkfests, ruinous energy policy and foreign policy humiliations.

‘Nuff said.

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It looks like the actual science is in and it’s telling us that the claims about masks preventing the spread of Covid is just a bunch of hooey.

The landmark Cochrane study shows that the mask skeptics were right.

I believe in the scientific method: make an observation. Ask a question. Form a hypothesis. Test the hypothesis. Listen to the answer. Insisting on the answer before pursuing this methodological approach is not science, it is propaganda.

And “masks work” was never more than propaganda — rooted in mechanical plausibility, not actual science — furthered by public health officials, left-leaning government leaders, the press and the party faithful starting in 2020 and continuing to the present day.

--snip--

Those who claim to be on the side of “the Science” will continue to push unscientific policies in order to prove that they were right all along. This is the sunk cost fallacy writ large. Don’t admit mistakes. Ignore the actual science in favor of “the Science.” And continue to punish those who challenge. As well as those most vulnerable who simply aren’t in a position to challenge at all.

“Science” has apparently been rebranded by the left. It is now a slogan — a tagline — shouted at heretics to signify one’s moral superiority and loyalty to the party. What we have now is “science” that ignores the scientific method, which means “the science” is a cult. And a dangerous one at that.

It’s Lysenkoism brought forward to the 21st century by the Progressives in order to back up their power plays.

The aforementioned Cochrane study is here, and says this:

One of the largest and most comprehensive studies on the effectiveness of masks found they do almost nothing to reduce the spread of respiratory viruses.

The study reviewed 78 randomized control trials—experiments that have long been considered “the gold standard” for medicine—which assessed the effectiveness of face masks against flu, COVID-19, and similar illnesses. It found that wearing masks “probably makes little or no difference” for the general public, no matter what kind of mask is used. Even N95 masks, considered the most effective at filtering airborne particles, showed no clear benefit for health care workers.

The study was published on January 30 by the Cochrane Library, a world-renowned medical database that is famous for its high-quality evidence reviews. It comes as a battering ram to the recommendations of the U.S. public health establishment, which urged children as young as two to wear masks throughout the pandemic.

“This amounts to the scientific nail in the coffin for mask mandates,” said Kristen Walsh, a clinical professor of pediatrics in Morristown, New Jersey. “I just can’t wrap my mind around the fact that some schools are still actively forcing children to wear masks, much less children who need to see faces to learn.”

This will, of course, be devoutly ignored and the mask mandates will continue despite the evidence to the contrary.

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where it feels more like spring, the snow is melting, and the furnace isn’t running nearly as much as it might.

The Law Of Unintended Consequences Reigns Supreme

I think I can safely say pretty much everyone has heard of the Law of Unintended Consequences. It’s also safe to assume that that a good portion of those folks have experienced the effects of that law.

Throughout history we have seen actions taken, either be individuals, corporations/businesses, and governments that have generated unanticipated, and quite often, undesired results. Depending upon who took those actions, where, and the magnitude of those actions, the unintended consequences can range from trivial to profound.

Sometimes unintended consequences are the result of willful ignorance as there are plenty of examples of others pointing out flaws in plans and warning about likely side effects of the planned actions, yet those warnings are poo-pooed, dismissed out of hand, or ignored as if they never existed.

A recent example of this?

The #FightFor15 movement.

One of the consequences that many warned the proponents of a $15 minimum wage about was the loss of jobs, particularly jobs that could be better and more cheaply handled by machines. States and cities which implemented a $15 minimum wage saw job losses, particularly at some of the chain fast food restaurants. Workers taking orders at the front counter were replaced by ordering kiosks, allowing walk-in customers to place orders without the need for a worker to do so.

As I have mentioned in other posts here and there, our local McDonald’s has done that during a recent remodel. If memory serves, Wendy’s had announced they would be installing ordering kiosks in their franchises. We have a Wendy’s in our town, but I can’t say whether or not it has has such kiosks installed. (I haven’t been in a Wendy’s since the start of the Covid Pandemonium.)

Another reason for machines replacing human workers?

Businesses can’t seem to hire the people they need, even at $15 or $25 an hour.

Where are all of the workers who demanded $15 per hour, who now have access to much higher wages for entry-level, mindless jobs? They’re sitting at home playing video games, smoking the devil’s lettuce, and living off the handout-heavy U.S. government under President Joe Biden. That’s where they are.

--snip--

The answer? Automate. Just look at your local McDonald’s owners or any other fast-food chain businesses. They’re no longer sitting around and begging for slackers to show up and click buttons on a screen.

Robots are now the logical and increasingly affordable solution to the ongoing labor shortage problem.

Sure, it’s more expensive up front than hiring a 16-year-old kid, but robots never take off work, never come in late, and never whine about how hard the job is. And they never need a raise, benefits, unemployment insurance, or any of the other headaches that come along with traditional workers.

Oh, and robots aren’t interested in forming unions, which also happens to be quite attractive to both small and large companies attempting to stay alive in Biden’s inflation-ridden, supply-chain-disaster of an economy.

The #FightFor15 movement really shot itself in the foot years ago when defiant business owners who were merely trying to keep their businesses afloat turned to automation as waves of minimum wage strikes unfolded across the country.

It isn’t like none of this could be foreseen. Businesses in Europe, particularly fast-food restaurants like McDonald’s, have been using ordering kiosks for a number of years because of labor costs and more particularly some of the labor laws that made hiring human workers less attractive.

Call it another example of how the Law of Unintended Consequences reigns supreme over all of the ignorant economic nonsense put forth by the Give-Us-More-Money-Or-Else advocates.

I Gotta Get Some Of This Too

I thought this post would be enough to give the anti-gunners the vapors.

I figure this one will give them nightmares:

Thoughts On A Sunday

The sub-zero temperatures have departed, making today’s temps in the 20’s and 30’s feel absolutely balmy. My neighbors had issues with their heating system during this bout of arctic temps which made for a couple of interesting days of trying to keep their pipes from freezing.

For the most part it was business as usual for most folks. Some ski areas closed their lifts because of the high wind chills (-40ºF to -50ºF). Firefighters had to battle frozen hydrants, frostbite, and hypothermia.

I could hear the furnace here at The Gulch running almost continuously once the outside temps fell below -15ºF. I saw dollar signs in the form of water vapor exiting from the furnace flues here and at my neighbor’s homes.

At least the trusty RAM 1500 had no issues dealing with the cold. However, some friends found their vehicle batteries weren’t up to the task of starting the engine under such cold conditions. (This happens every time we experience sub-zero temps.)

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This isn’t something that surprises me in the least.

Wind power isn’t what was promised...but not necessarily for the reasons you think.

While wind power sounds like a great idea, the reality is that it hasn’t come close to meeting the promises made. Those who went all in one wind are finding wind cannot meet their needs, particularly when they need the power they generate the most. There were a lot of things ignored by proponents, or worse, were not informed or mis-informed about.

However, there’s a different problem affecting wind power: Wind turbine manufacturers are having problems while others have shut down.

Now the entire industry is hitting headwinds they hadn’t counted on and it could spell disaster.

The European wind industry has warned of continued difficulties in 2023 as high materials costs and slow approvals for new wind power projects drag back profitability, despite rising demand for renewable energy.

…The effects of the Russian war on Ukraine drove up prices for energy and important raw materials such as steel last year, creating a perfect storm for the European wind sector.

Despite escalating demand from governments and customers for renewable energy as a result of the energy crisis, the slow EU and UK approval processes have created a backlog of projects and delayed new turbine orders.

And then there are quality issues to deal with, with two companies, Vestas and Siemens, having a problem with quality which has eaten into earnings, turning profits into losses.

Don’t you find it odd that they are having demonstrably terrible problems with faulty products and hardly a peep about any of it in the mainstream cheering for wind? There seems to be a concerted effort to hide the reliability of these products from the get-go in the hype and renewable raptures.

You (say, Siemens, for example) get a reputation for overpriced junk – no matter how subsidized it is, your order sheets will start reflecting your reputation.

It isn’t just overseas manufacturers having problems.

Here in the U.S., General Electric was humming along in its financials except…*sad trombone*…when it got to their turbine business. Ooo, they took a hit, too. Really fugly numbers.

…The company’s renewable energy business has been facing challenges due to inflation and supply chain pressures. The unit reported a loss of $2.2 billion in 2022. GE is reducing global headcount at the onshore wind unit by about 20% as part of a plan to restructure and resize the business.

How is GE and Vestas and Siemens planning to deal with their problems?

Subsidies funded by taxpayers.

Any industry that is supposedly so beneficial and popular with ‘everyone’ shouldn’t require taxpayer money to survive. That should be telling us something right there.

==+++==

Biden finally ordered the Pentagon to shoot down the Chinese spy balloon. I’d say he waited too long.

That it carried such a huge instrumentation package - the size of three buses - makes me think it had nothing to do with studying weather. The package was large enough to carry high-resolution multi-spectral imaging systems, ELINT systems, and more.

If the Chinese had talked about these ‘research’ balloons well in advance, talked about the mission and the instrumentation being used for weather research, I would have been more inclined to believe them. But the fact that they hadn’t and was dismissive of questions about them after they were spotted makes the paranoid side of me doubt their explanation.

Having been involved in the defense industry for over 20 years, understanding reconnaissance systems and their requirements, the Chinese using high altitude balloons (60,000+ feet) for intelligence gathering makes sense. Satellites are expensive to build and launch, even to low earth orbit (62 miles minimum altitude). Balloons are cheap and the instrumentation packages can be much larger, heavier and carry more equipment than satellites. The also move a lot slower than satellites (1-200mph versus 17,500 mph) which can allow for much higher resolution imaging.

Weather research balloon versus ‘spy’ balloon? Of the two, I believe the one shot down was the latter.

==+++==

Karens can ruin just about anything. It’s even worse when NPR gets involved and backs the busybody Karens.

What are this batch of ‘woke’ Karens complaining about?

The Kansas City Chiefs.

Kansas City has been on an adrenaline high since the Chiefs won the AFC Championship last Sunday. Go anywhere in the metro and you’ll see Chiefs gear everywhere. Next stop: the Super Bowl in Arizona.

But of course there are the party poopers, the Debbie Downers, the Karens, who want to take the city’s pride down a notch or two. You can find them at KCUR, the National Public Radio affiliate in KC.

--snip--

On Friday morning, as the victory high in KC was beginning to taper off, the KCUR website published a story with this title:

“As Kansas City Chiefs head to the Super Bowl, their violent traditions alienate even some local fans”

It goes downhill from there...like it always does with these ignorant, intolerant, narcissistic wokerati.

==+++==

And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee where the lake still isn’t frozen over, the temps have returned to somewhat normal levels, and winter rolls on.

From The Comments (From Someone Else's Blog)

A little over a week ago I addressed California’s money grab by way of a wealth tax that could end up being the death knell for the once Golden State.

However, I didn’t give enough thought to the constitutional implications of such a tax, something that may prevent California (or heaven forbid, Congress) from being able to impose upon taxpayers. But someone else did.

From the comments to this GraniteGrok post comes this analysis of those constitutional implications:

Isn't this the same thing the Bottomless Pit of Sacramento wants to do with its subjects...er...citizens? California wants to tax "the rich" a portion of all of their assets, including unrealized gains. Worse, they want to continue to do so for ten years after "the rich" depart from the Pyrite State. After all, 'The State' has better use for their assets than those who own them, earned them, made them, right?

Too bad there will be constitutional restrictions - primarily under the Fifth Amendment's "Not be deprived of...property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." They aren't taxing income or sales. They want to confiscate private property for public use, but not compensate the owners for the property taken by the state.

This is something I think SCOTUS will find compelling should California do something this stupid. Then again, California has been doing increasingly stupid things that is driving out more people, businesses, and the money that goes with them.

Wicked Cold

It’s going to be a might chilly up this way. As I write this the temperature is -9ºF with a wind chill of -33ºF. The temperature will hit -17ºF by morning with the wind chill hitting close to -50ºF.

The summit of Mount Washington has already seen a record breaking wind chill of -106ºF -109ºF. (Update: Overnight the 'old' record which lasted all of a few hours was broken with an even bigger windchill record.)

I got home around 4:30pm after dealing with some town business and parked the trusty RAM 1500. I have no plans to use it again until late tomorrow afternoon at the earliest. I have no plans of stepping outside The Gulch until then, and even then only if it’s absolutely necessary.

At least the trusty RAM 1500 hasn’t balked at starting during these cold temps...so far.

Unfortunately one of my neighbors has been having problems with their furnace, something that has been difficult to handle because they live in another state as their place is their vacation home. The last thing they need is for their furnace to fail during the deep freeze we’re experiencing.

It’s wicked cold up here...