Thoughts On A Sunday

I will admit some disappointment that there wasn’t more new snow on the ground when I got up this morning. I expected to see somewhere between 4 and 6 inches. However, it was closer to 3 inches, hence my disappointment. But Mother Nature follows her own rules and by the time I was imbibing in my second cup of coffee a couple of hours later there was another 2 inches on the ground. It appears that when I got up there was a lull in the snowfall so I thought it was pretty much over and the only thing we had to look forward to was some sleet that was forecast to follow later in the morning and through the afternoon.

Like many others up here in New Hampshire, we had thought the below normal snowfall and warmer than normal temperatures in late December and into mid-January were what we would be seeing throughout the rest of the winter. We were wrong. Not that we’re upset now that we’re experiencing a more ‘normal’ winter with cold temps and regular snow. Quite the contrary.

While we haven’t experienced any big storms to this point, we have seen snow about every 3 or 4 days in amounts running between 2 and 5 inches. We did have one storm that dropped about 8 inches about a week ago, but that’s been the exception. Not that I’m looking for a big storm. They can be ‘exciting’ but they are also more difficult to dig out from afterwards. The smaller storms every few days make it easy to get everything shoveled out, usually taking time but a lot less effort to take care of the snow.

There’s still a month to go before the Spring Equinox and we can see big storms well into April up here. In fact, we had one of out biggest storms of last winter in April, a big Nor’easter that dropped a lot of heavy snow and caused widespread power outages. The Gulch was without power for almost 2 days, but at least we had the Official Weekend Pundit Generator to rely on to keep the lights on and the heat running. I’m hoping we won’t need to do so this winter, but it is ready just in case.

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I covered the electric school bus debacle in Maine two weeks ago, but it seems there are more repercussions to this major fail.

As one commenter so aptly put it:

A lot of comments on electric vehicles and winter performance, but that's really not the point. If the $365k buses worked just as well as a conventional $150k school bus it's still not the point. The point is they made the buying decision based on the fact that they were electric instead of on performance requirements (with safety margins), reliability, and lifecycle costs.

If the bus couldn't handle the worst route on the worst day at the end of its 10 or 15 year service life, with plenty to spare, and at a lower cost than other options, it should have never been considered.

A bus failure in the middle of winter is something that does happen now and then. But if your entire bus fleet - electric bus fleet – can leave students stranded in sub-zero weather or during a snowfall, you are endangering those kids due to a decision made based on ‘feelz’ and not facts. I have to echo the sentiment of other commenters that the folks who made the decision to buy these buses should be fired or removed from office.

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I have a feeling this topic is going to have long legs, the topic being DOGE and what it has been exposing. I have a feeling we’ve seen only the tip of the proverbial financial iceberg and that, in the end, a lot of people are going to be investigated and in some cases imprisoned for their misappropriation of funds.

When Americans learn that their tax dollars are going to fund egregious projects around the world, it lays a foundation for the public relations framework needed by the Trump administration to bring American public opinion along on the necessary journey of restructuring the government. It makes people’s blood boil. And it sets the tone for the effectiveness, and need for, the entire Trump efficiency program, even though the spending in absolute monetary terms on these insane USAID projects is fairly minor compared to the overall $6.9 trillion federal budget.

--snip--

Trump recognizes, as Ronald Reagan did, the importance of galvanizing American public opinion as an integral part of carrying out his agenda. By inflaming the public, he puts pressure on the craven Congress to go along with his efforts to enact sweeping changes that would otherwise be difficult or impossible to achieve.

No doubt when Musk sets his genius young elves to work applying their AI algorithms on the Department of Health and Human Services and the Defense Department’s budget data, they will find waste so massive that it dwarfs that of USAID’s $40 billion annual outlay. But it’s a bit harder for the public to grasp the wastefulness of the government paying many times the price that it should be paying for anti-aircraft missiles, say, or ineffective vaccines. From a public relations standpoint, it’s much easier to see the lunacy of the US taxpayer shelling out $2.5 million for an electric vehicle project in Vietnam or $1.5 million to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in Serbian workplaces.

Cleaning the Augean Stables of government spending is truly a Herculean task, but I think DOGE as it is constituted now is up to the task. It is something that is long overdue as we can’t keep running multi-trillion dollar budget deficits every year. (Thanks Joe/WRBA!)

That some of the first federal employees being let go are those who are newer employees, with many of them still within their probationary periods, is something that makes sense. They can be laid off for any reason with little or no recourse. Will there be some disruptions because of these layoffs? Sure there will, but that’s no reason to not shed employees from bloated agencies, bureaus, and departments. If we hand it over to Congress as many Democrats had suggested, any workforce reductions will be token amounts so the Democrats can claim they’ve gotten something done. But we don’t need a 5% or 10% reduction in the federal workforce. We need to see 30%, 40%, or even 50%, even if it means shuttering some of those federal agencies, bureaus, and departments which serve no purpose other than spending money the government doesn’t have on things that aren’t needed.

Some people think it it can’t possibly be done, but Javier Milei, President of Argentina, has done just that, cutting the size or Argentina’s government by 50% and seeing a revitalization of his country’s economy as the government deficit spending has been cut to zero. Even if we can’t reach that level of cuts, every dollar saved counts.

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Hmm, I have to wonder if this has anything to do with Trump and his “DOGEs of War” going over the books in every government office?

It seems the housing market in the DC area is seeing a “massive sell-off”.

The most expensive housing markets in the US, the burbs of DC, is suddenly taking a beating. The moochers, the looters, the criminals are fleeing in a major housing sell off.

“Of the top seven wealthiest counties in America, 4 of them are suburbs of Washington DC. These counties have no major industries of note other than the federal government, lobbying the federal government and selling things to the federal government.”

--snip--

“This is a major reason why the vast majority of Americans have zero sympathy for defunded NGOs, terminated federal employees, cut-off journalists and suddenly irrelevant lobbyists.”

They are running scared...

Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.

Take a look at the postings and listings for properties in the Washington DC area. It’s the rats deserting a sinking ship.

Good riddance.

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the sleet is slowing increasing, there’s still plenty of snow to move, and where folks from Massachusetts will be spending this coming week since it’s the February vacation down in the Pay State.