Fed war on cigarrettes

The Feds are increasing regulatory control over nicotine levels in cigarettes. Now is a good time to sell your GM stock and invest in criminal organizations trafficking high nicotine no tax smokes. And for you terrorist organizations hard hit by the economic downturn, here is an excellent opportunity to raise some operating capital. I'm sure any number of gangs would also be interested in developing new revenue streams.

A blog neglected

Forgive me for it has been many months since I blogged. I kind of got away from it. I think the main reason was an effort on my part to focus my energies on pumping life into my day job which could loosely be called software development. I don't really develop software anymore, my activities consist of long spans spent shuffling paperwork interspersed with brief moments writing programming code, that is, when you can invent a reason for doing so instead of handing it off to the offshore contractors. But hey, who's complaining, I am still employed at any rate.

I have been following the story of the 13 year old boy with cancer and I must say I have mixed emotions. On the one hand I feel the parents and the boy are being extremely foolish but on the other hand, in this climate of government intrusion, is this an opening for more government oversight in the health care of our children. Many nanny statists view childhood obesity as an immediate health threat. It is not a great leap to imagine government going after parents who fail to adhere to proper dietary restrictions with their children. From what I have read it was implied that there may be some religious beliefs involved in the decision to seek alternative treatments. Not being a religious person my self, this seems to be one of the times where blind faith has serious consequences.

Atlas Shrugged

After 6 months I finally finished "Atlas Shrugged". I know that I'm about 51 years late in joining the party. I liked it. Probably most people have strong feelings toward this book, either positive or negative. I am not 15 anymore so I like to think that I don't blindly embrace anyone who spouts ideas I find appealing. As far as literature goes, I would not say it is the greatest book I ever read. The dialog does not exactly flow. The speeches and the characters inner thoughts are filled with one superlative after another. The best this, the highest ideal that etc.
I wanted to read the book with an open mind so I decided to wait until after finishing the book to read the Whitaker Chambers review on National Review online. After reading Chamber's review, I was surprised that the review did not do much to argue against Rand's themes. The main objection seems to be that the novel is written in an operatic fashion with simplified characters that are either completely good or completely evil. I would agree with this, but I think Ayn Rands objective in writing the novel was to promote her philosophy of "Objectivism". Creating a good story and well developed characters was secondary to this. Just for fun, this should teak some people, but the Bible does the same thing in the parables that Jesus told. The characters were stereotypes to illustrate a lesson, not created for their literary value.
Whitaker Chamber's chief criticism was with Rand's notion that Capitalism was an end in and of itself and that mans pursuit of happiness his only morality. Chambers argued that happiness without religion could degenerate into a pursuit of pleasure. He seems to be arguing for the desirability of religion. As an agnostic, I don't believe in a God as the bible describes that is highly involved in our everyday lives. I also don't believe in a God who would give us an intellect and then expect us to find our way to him without using it. The God who created us would not expect us to base our knowledge of him on faith, in my opinion. He gave us the ability to reason I think he would expect us to use it. I don't know if it is better for humanity to believe in God than not to. If God does not exist and we chose to believe in him because we think that faith is the better choice for humanity then what path are we taking for humanity's future? Can deluding ourselves into believing something that is false for the betterment of humanity really make humanity better. I think this is what appeals to me the most about Rand, her point that you cannot escape reality. Now I could be wrong about God or the nature of God but my reasoning and logic leads me to believe that I am not and those are the only tools I have to figure out the universe or understand the nature or lack of nature of God.

Death of the Hummer

Last week GM announced that it would consider selling its Hummer brand. Immediately shrieks of joy could be heard from Hummer haters everywhere. Amazingly there are people out there who think this will have a positive impact on their life. From what I can tell, GM has produced less than 200,000 of these things since they started selling them. This is compared to some mass marketed vehicles that might sell a hundred thousand a year. Sure they get crappy gas mileage and I don't see them as very useful or practical but they don't make up a very large percentage of the vehicles on the road. Where I work there are probably 150 cars in the parking lot each day. There are probably a dozen Camry's, 10 or 20 minivans, a few Ford Escapes, various other compact cars and 1 Hummer. Thats it. Yet, there seems to be an undercurrent of anti-hummer sentiment by people who view them as obnoxious and ostentatious. I don't really care as long as they aren't tailgating me. As a side note though, if you want an example of an obnoxious vehicle, look at Harley Davidson's. When there were not so many of them a person could be seen as an individualist. Now, with everybody and his brother buying one and customizing it to make as much noise as possible, they are just part of a group of loud obnoxious people. Try enjoying a peaceful day at the park without a herd of orthodontists and accountants thundering buy on these things. But I digress.

I think the real thing that gets people is the way Hummer owners seem to defy gravity. Most of us have a hard time paying for a normal car and the costs associated with it. Then they see this huge monster of a vehicle that cost close to 50k and takes 3x the fuel of most cars to fill up and they wonder how are they able to do this. It does not make sense. It upsets their perception of the world. We all get this, especially those of us who live conservatively below our means. When we see someone living so far above our means it gets to us. It makes us wonder what are they doing that we are not. Are we idiots? Then the average person not wanting to believe himself an idiot says no, I am not an idiot, that guy driving the Hummer is and I don't like him. Now many people driving Hummers are living above their means. Not all of them but some are. The free market society that we live in has a way of dealing with people who live above their means so the rest of us should just chill out. By the same token when the market inflicts consequences on people who buy houses they cannot afford either, the government should chill out and not get in the way.

In the past couple months, the free market has demonstrated itself to be far more affective at modifying human behavior than a democratic government could ever hope to be. The number of miles driven is down 4% this year. With the huge plunge in truck and other full size vehicle sales I have to believe gasoline consumption for transportation is down more as many vehicles are being replaced with smaller ones. The free market will never let us run out of oil. It will gradually shift the price to a level that will force it to be used only for applications where it is economical to do so. Too often people expect immediate change by government decree. They ignore the real power of the free market that can do what governments cannot.

$200 Oil

I should be working on my house and finishing the job of laying laminate wood flooring but I'm kinda tired after working all day. I've found that when I am tired, it is a good time to stay away from doing things that require accurate measuring and cutting. So I started thinking about the price of oil and how some are saying it might go to $200 a barrel. I don't know if it will. Who knows, it might. I just think it is interesting that a government that wants us to believe it can cure all our problems won't be able to do much about this one. Not like the "mortgage crisis" bailouts that are ongoing. This is not a problem that government is going to be able to make disappear with smoke and mirrors. With the mortgage problems the government can and has been doing things like assuming a lot of the risk from lenders, something that does not have an immediate downside. Sure you are removing the consequences from bad decisions resulting in more of the same behavior that will one day cause a much bigger problem. That, however, will occur down the road a bit, and no one will remember then what happened now. Some of us will bring it up and say "Remember in 2008 when they..."If anyone actually listens to the end of that sentence, they will remember what was said for about 30 seconds or until their next rant about how the government is not doing enough.

$200 oil is another thing though. Not much that smoke and mirrors can do there. The government could allow more drilling and maybe the political climate will change to allow that but I wouldn't bet on it. Even if they did open up drilling, it would be years before that oil was available, definitely not soon enough for our ADD electorate. The strategic oil reserve could be tapped for a while. I am sure no one would horde the temporarily cheaper oil. Price caps are a quick fix. The gas price would be cheaper and if you are lucky enough during the resulting shortage you might be able to get some. Gasoline rations would be popular. If oil goes to $200 a barrel things will change and the government won't be able to do much about the consequences we will all experience. Maybe people will build neighborhoods with corner stores and butcher shops like existed prior to the 1960's when it became easy and cheaper to drive to the local mega mart. Just idle speculation. I know people who are already downsizing their cars. Funny that the government wants to keep people living in houses they can't afford. Maybe $200 oil will remove the illusion that these snake oil salesmen politicians can fix all the wrongs and give you everything you want.

First cigarettes and alcohol

New Jersey wants to tax fast food. First it was alcohol and cigarettes. Then it was a bunch of other things to numerous to mention. Now it is fast food. What is considered fast food. Seems to me it will be difficult to nail this down and some restaurants will change their format just enough not to meet the definition of "fast food" under the law. Every Friday I walk in to our local pizza place and get two large pizzas and jojo potatoes for 11.97. Is that fast food? In the food court in the mall, there is a McDonald's and a Chinese place where I like to go. Are they both fast food, is it only McDonald's that is fast food, why? Sadly enough I now some people who will think this is a good idea.

Gangsta Rap Invented by Rich White People

When you thought you have heard everything. Apparently "Gansta Rap" was invented by the governemnt according to Alicia Keys. I have not researched this much beyond the news clip I saw on Drudge but I guess that Keys is suggesting a bunch of rich, white, probably republican men sat around writing "Gangsta Rap" songs. Then, I guess they got some unsuspecting young black men to record them. I wonder which songs Dick Cheney wrote? It explains a lot though. I never understood the tendency of black rappers to refer to themselves using the "N" word and call black women "ho's". Now I can see that this was actually a plan by the rich white power structure in this country to undermine the black race. Maybe Obama can comment further on this as soon as he parks the bus that he has been driving back and forth over his white grandma.