Category Archives: Economics

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Keep Cars, But Don’t Make People Drive Them

6 Comments

An alternate, and more realistic version of the Green Leap Forward.

Two points: I fear the day that we won’t be allowed to drive, except in special circumstances (like amusement parks).

Point Two: I suspect that a lot of current auto traffic will move to the air, with the advent of Urban Air Mobility, particularly if the vehicles can be powered from the ground (e.g., Jeff Greason’s and Dan DeLong’s Electric Sky is working on such a concept). Airbus has an interesting concept of moving passengers via passenger modules that are moved from one vehicle type to another, like cargo containers, in which you’d share a pod with people from your door to an aircraft, to a long-range aircraft, to another aircraft, to the other door. That’s a lot more interesting and flexible concept than high-speed rail.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

The Real Pucker Factor

20 Comments

For Dragon, it will be early tomorrow morning, when it enters and is recovered.

[Friday-morning update]

Mission success.

[Noon update]

What SpaceX’s success means for America.

Business, Culinary, Economics, Health, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Eating Healthy

1 Comment

Yes, it’s possible to do it on a budget. The problem with this is that the USDA guidelines are terrible:

The menus offered a variety of food, didn’t have processed foods, were affordable and didn’t require always require cooking to prepare. Each menu also had manageable portions of food without high fat or salt content.

There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with high fat or salt content, as long as the fat isn’t seed oils.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society, War Commentary

Roscosmos

4 Comments

…is acting left behind.

It’s not really acting. They have been left behind.

But, while I like Sandy, this kind of thing continues to drive me crazy.

Business, Economics, Education, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, War Commentary

Trump’s CPAC Speech

46 Comments

I listened to some of it, but I really, viscerally hate listening to Trump for long. But Nick Gillespie (!) was impressed:

All in all, it was, in the words of Daniel Dale, the Washington correspondent for the Toronto Star, “one of the least-hinged speeches Trump has given in a long time.” It was indeed all over the place but like the weirdly wide-ranging and digressive speech in which he declared a national emergency, it was also an absolute tour de force, laying out every major point of disagreement between Republicans and Democrats (abortion, the Second Amendment, and taxes, among other things) while tagging the latter aggressively as socialists who will not only end the private provision of health care but take over the energy sector too. Those charges take on new life in the wake of the announcement of the GND and comments, however short-lived, by Democrats such as Kamala Harris, who at one point recently called for an end to private health care. And over 100 House Democrats have signed on to a plan that would end private health insurance in two years. For all the biting criticism and dark humor in today’s speech, Trump has mostly ditched the “American Carnage” rhetoric that marked his first Inaugural Address, pushing onto liberals and Democrats all the negativity and anger that used to surround him like the dust cloud surrounds Pigpen in the old Peanuts cartoons. “We have people in Congress right now who hate our country,” he said. “We can name every one of them. Sad, very, very sad.”

At moments, he seemed to be workshopping his themes and slogans for 2020. “We believe in the American Dream, not the socialist nightmare,” he averred at one point. “Now you have a president who finally standing up for America.” The future, he said “does not belong to those who believe in socialism. The future belongs to those who believe in freedom. I’ve said it before and will say it again: America will never be a socialist country.” That’s a line that may not work forever, but it will almost certainly get the job done in 2020.

As previously noted, the media is going to re-elect Trump. Because they still don’t understand how they got Trump.