President Obama’s Spill

Peggy Noonan, right here (click on the ‘article’ link), takes a different tack on The Spill than Donna Brazile did.  I suppose she’s more correct than Donna was, in that she’s not recommending an approach that is already sinking the Nation.  The reality is that President Obama’s error up to yesterday, in dealing with the spill in the Gulf, was to have no technical or cultural background to guide him in how to react.

If a person were to have spent 40 years going to sea, and more than 20 of those years as captain of an oil tanker, that person would have known (technically and culturally) that he had a really big problem on his hands.  When things hit the fan, people look to Captains (and Presidents) to solve the problem.  As in this case, right here.  A person with that kind of background would have been expected to solve all kinds of insolvable problems during the course of his career, so would have developed two skills.  First, figuring out whether the problem had a solution that was within his grasp.  Second, how to manage the unsolvable.

In this case, there is no solution within President Obama’s grasp to solve the gulf oil spill.  As I’ve said before, the citizens and voters and taxpayers of this Nation should not want the government to have that capability.  Attempting that would only further crush our children’s future.  Where he erred was in lacking the two skills of an experienced captain.

He should have known from day one that the solution was going to be up to either BP or a contractor (or group of contractors) hired by the United States Government to solve this problem.  He lacked the experience, and his advisors sent him out like a sacrificial lamb to slaughter to protect themselves, so he started off on the wrong foot.  Someone fired the head of the Mineral Management Service, but that’s small fry.  Everyone above her, up through the Secretary of the Interior, should go.  Plus selected folks from Homeland Security, most especially including Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, who should have given the President much, much better advice and never should have let the President go out in public and say “the buck stops here”.

As you can probably tell, I’m sort of worked up about this.  Because, as Ms. Noonan points out, nobody benefits from the American President being diminished.  In this case, the entire inner circle of Presidential advisors is guilty of stupidity, carelessness, and (a word I love) cupidity.

President Obama needs to bring in the best team of contractors with expertise in this field that he can find.  Then he needs to put one of them in charge of mitigating the leak, another in charge of oil recovery, and a third in charge of shoreline cleanup.  Include very handsome bonus clauses based on specific, concrete accomplishments.  Give them the resources and provide the authority (“top cover”) they need to do the job.  Then go out and do what he does best, communicate the situation to the American people.

That is the only effective course for the President and the government of this Nation, at this point.  There will be time later for firing lazy, incompetent government regulators.  And plenty of time for analysis and finger-pointing.  Right now, there’s an oil spill to take care of.  And anyone with 20 years experience as an oil tanker captain knows what that means.

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

Big Government and/or Big Business

Donna Brazile makes the case for Big Government right here.  She gets it wrong, but first I need to address some groundwork.  The “Big Government” issue has aspects that are similar to the famous “never waste a crisis” quote for growing government control.  There is a major role in this Nation for the federal government that needs to be protected.  The federal government absolutely is the Big Dog when it comes to issues like civil rights, consumer protection, regulation of specific industries like banks, and some other areas.

Those who see the need to defend that role clearly see the Constitutional and practical arguments for limited federal government intervention as a threat to the above, specific, role of the federal government.  Is there anything to this?  Should those who cherish civil rights and consumer protections feel threatened by “Small Government” business-and-prosperity-oriented positions, opinions, and arguments?  Perhaps not, but I can see their point.  Some of the rhetoric that comes out of the extreme right wing has an unfortunate, if not outright, worrisome component.  It isn’t a threat to those who don’t feel their civil rights or consumer protections threatened, but the art of dialog is being able to see how the other guy sees things.

This is something for Conservatives to take onboard and act on, if they wish to make their case to all the moderates, particularly us Militant Moderates, who will decide future elections.

Now back to Brazile’s case for Big Government to protect us from Big Business.  She’s just plain wrong.  Government in general and the federal government in particular have been actively getting out of the job of “doing things” in favor of their appropriate regulatory role.  The reason for this is that government employees are hideously expensive, inflexible, and inefficient.  Say that you’re having your house painted.  Who would you hire to do the job, a private company or a government agency?  I can only imagine you would choose the government agency if you’re accustomed to getting things for free from the government…

So the idea that the federal government would establish and maintain a capability to deal with a situation like the ongoing oil spill in the Gulf is fiscally ludicrous.  Brazile quoted that President Obama has deployed 1,105 vessels, etc, etc.  Guess what?  No more than a handful of those are government vessels, the rest are owned/operated by private industry or contractors.  Let me say this clearly, no way on the face of the Earth should the federal government even contemplate acquiring their own oil spill response capability.  If you think that the current steep descent toward national insolvency is frightening, then you better start looking for the escape hatch now.  Because Brazile’s position will double the rate of debt accumulation, and deliver no benefit over what we have now.

What did go wrong here?  I dunno, but I worked in the industry for long enough to have opinions.  Number one, the federal agency charged with regulation and oversight simply fell asleep at the wheel.  And nobody thought to check on them.  They issued a permit to proceed ten days before the accident.  I saw this repeatedly when under Coast Guard regulation.  The Coast Guard was ready in a second to hang a licensed operator for any infraction, or even accusation.  But let “the home office” get on the phone, and the Coast Guard turned docile and cooperative.  I never saw the Coast Guard pursue a management or executive person ashore.  Now, I realize that the Mineral Management Service is the agency at question, but government operations share many characteristics, and the above is one of them.

Instead of chasing after Brazile’s proposed solution, the federal government should clean house, all right.  They should clean their own house, get competent regulators in place, and shake those regulatory operations (whether financial, airline, oil companies, nuclear, what-ever!) into shape.  The reason for our recent problems is the failure of the federal government to perform their function of providing effective regulation and oversight.  We have not had these problems because the federal government is too small, but rather because the federal government has been out chasing after butterflies instead of keeping their noses to the unglamorous grindstone and shoulder to the tiresome wheel.

Ms. Brazile: Big Government is a bully no less than Big Business.  The difference is that with Big Business, I can opt out and simply not buy their product.  Once the federal government sets out bully, there is no escape.  We need a smaller, smarter, more focused, more effective federal government.  The federal government never bulks up with muscle, it only ever puts on fat.

Circling back around to the beginning of this post, I hope that Conservatives will come to realize this important fact.  The liberal Left needs to know that federal enforcement of civil rights, consumer protections, financial regulation, etc face no threat from the idea of “Small Government”.  The conservative Right, including the Tea Party, needs to affirmatively state that federal protections of civil rights, consumer safety, regulation of the financial industry, etc are just and proper.  A hypothetical proposal to, say, cut the budget of the Justice Department’s civil rights division understandably and predictably would generate defensive proposals to grow the federal government.

In the meantime, Brazile simply could not be more wrong in the solution she proposes.

G’day all, an dmay God continue to bless America!

Please do this for yourself

Please … please, go here: http://www.deepwaterhorizoncondolences.com/condolences.asp and post a message for the families of the 11 men who lost their lives in the fire and explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon drill rig in the Gulf of Mexico.  It doesn’t matter what your political beliefs are, these were all simple working men who went out to earn a living to support their families.  And their families waited at home with prayers for their safe return.  Yet this time they didn’t come back, and if you can find the human kindness in your heart to post a message of condolence for those families, well, that will be something you can do as much for yourself as for the families.

One can only imagine the desperate, mortal struggle in that last half hour to contain disaster.  These men were heroic.  Their families are heroes.  Please take the time to leave a few words of comfort for them.

G’night all, and may God continue to bless America.

A fresh look at the New Deal

Confession: this is going to be a fiscally conservative rant.  Ignore if you wish, but rememeber that we never learn by ignoring what we disagree with.  There will be a link to facts and figures that prove the falsehood of the legend.

This isn’t really “fresh”, it’s only fresh to me.  I know that the efficacy of Roosevelt’s legislative package in recovery from the Great Depression has been generally honored and only peripherally doubted.  This falls into the “reading the lessons of history correctly” class of acts:

http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net/History/New_Deal/new_deal.html

Salient quote: “Most embarrassing however, was an open letter to FDR by Britain’s John Maynard Keynes to the New York Times in December 1933. In the letter, Keynes said the Roosevelt Administration had erred in giving priority to reform over recovery and had confused the symptoms of recovery with recovery itself.”

What was true then (New Deal policies didn’t work) is true today and will be true in the future (New Deal policies don’t, and won’t, work).  The Obama Administration and the Progresssives in Congress are going to perform a valuable service: they will finally disillusion America of the idea that the government can “spend our way” out of economic distress.  Only the federal government is big enough to cripple the Nation.

What all this means is, as long as the federal government pursues government spending as way out of our economic woes, we are doomed.  You can thank the Progressives, most notably Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi, and Lynn Woolsey for giving the President the votes he needs to pursue this folly.  There is only one solution (in three parts) to putting an end to our suicidal program of ‘reform over recovery’:

Fire Lynn Woolsey
Fire Barbara Boxer
Fire Nancy Pelosi

Thank you very much, g’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

Back to Arizona

And of course, Arizona SB 1070 … “the immigration bill”.  I’ve written this up on the Press Democrat forums here, but I’d like to use this space to further develop the ideas.  First, we are a Nation of laws.

What that means is that our laws describe what the federal government, the states, and the citizens shall do and may not do.  If it isn’t in the law, it isn’t regulated and it is left to each individual state and citizen to decide for themselves.  However, the 10th Amendment to the Constitution specifically forbids the federal government from exercising that discretionary power.  The federal government is explicitly limited to those powers enumerated in the Constitution.

Being a Nation of laws (rather than an Nation of rulers, or groups, or ideas, or religion, or military junta, or any other mechanism) is our protection against the hazards and penalties that occur when governments malfunction.  There are two things for certain.  One, no matter how much anyone may identify with the current ruling group, that will eventually change.  And two, the government will do its best to malfunction, and then the protection of being a nation of laws (so readily attacked and undermined) will be treasured.

Where we substitute what we “believe” or what we “like” or “want” for the law, we move away from being American and we place all of our futures in peril.  Where we invent new “rights” not contained in the Constitution, we place our Constitutionally guaranteed rights in peril through dilution and debasement.

Where we blatantly and publicly fail to enforce important laws, we undermine the legitimacy of the government.  A government that fails, or refuses, to enforce the law becomes, literally, “outlaw”.  The failure of government under one regime to enforce the law is no excuse for successive regimes to likewise fail through act or omission to perform its most basic duty (when the “But Johnny did it!” defense works, you know you’re dealing with children, not adults).  No government may pick and choose which laws to enforce without expecting dire consequences.

We’re having a real big problem with citizens who misunderstand the nature of and relationship with law enforcement.  Governments are formed with the consent of the governed with a major goal of insuring public behavior that is acceptable to society and conducive to prosperity and safety.  We do this specifically so each private citizens does NOT take up arms in his/her own defense.  When the government fails to perform this duty, citizens are left to decide for themselves how to proceed.  And that situation never turns out well.

To facilitate the civilized and orderly enforcement of laws, we the people select and appoint people, then invest them with a specific civil status that (while in the performance of their duties) separates them from the public at large.  The police, prosecutors, and judges are not “just like us”.  They serve under the authority of the people at large, to enforce laws, maintain order, and protect public safety.  Because of this additional power, they are held to a high standard, and severely punished when found in violation of the public trust.

Anyone who expects perfection from police, prosecutors, and judges need only examine their own lives to see how unrealistic that is.

The alternative to accepting (while always striving to improve) human imperfections in law enforcement is to accept the collapse of civilized society, vigilantism, and mob rule.  President Obama was guilty of a rush to judgment when he accused Sergeant Crowley of the New Haven Police Department of “acting stupidly” in the arrest of Professor Gates.  Progressives in general are guilty of this anti-government (to complement their anti-corporation and anti-capitalism positions) prejudice in assuming that “the authorities” have evil intent.  This becomes most visible when they, the Progressives, are in fact “the authorities” as with Lynn Woolsey, Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, and President Obama.

So Chris Rock explained this all most brilliantly right here and should be required viewing for anyone who wishes to get a college degree.  It’s one thing to have uneducated people living in ignorance of how encounters with authorities play out.  It’s plainly unacceptable if the most pampered, privileged, and educated among us have no idea how this relationship between citizen and government works.

Which brings us to President Obama’s second gross faux pas regarding law enforcement.  He said that Arizona SB 1070 “may lead to racial profiling”, and that’s just uninformed.  I’ve read the law, and it provides more protections than the federal statute to safeguard the civil rights of citizens, the most basic of which is the right to be left alone by authorities.  What seems to be bugging the President, and other opponents of Arizona SB 1070, is the idea of “probable cause”, which they seem to see an opportunity for abuse.

This is old news, “probable cause” is fundamental to enforcement of any law.  Without probable cause, civil culture fails and with it goes prosperity and safety.  We end up like Nations where the culture has never supported legitimate government (including peaceful succession).  Police, prosecutors, and judges deal with probable cause every day, and in the staggeringly overwhelming  the majority of cases get it right.  If certain citizens don’t like this concept, that if okay.  When our elected government leaders don’t like this concept, or want to apply it selectively, that is most definitely not okay.

Well, Johnny did it too!  Yes, the Bush Administration showed no great interest in this particular aspect of national security.  The people we elect to govern and represent, though, are supposed to act like grownups, not third graders.  The truth is that both “sides” have failed on this issue of immigration.  Republicans have no interest in cutting off the flow of cheap labor, and Democrats have no interest in cutting off the flow of future block voters.  Both sides have placed partisan politics above the good of the Nation.

We have Arizona, and perhaps the Tea Party, to thank for forcing this issue.  I would be thrilled if the citizenry and politicians learned broader lessons from this, as well.  There are many lessons here, and the future of our Nation depends on all of us basing our decisions, whatever they may be, on adequate knowledge of the facts of government.

Thanks for your time and patience on this, I know it’s been a long hard pull.  I hope it’s been worth your time.  G’day, all, and may God continue to bless America!

The Militant Moderate

I’ve been gone for a while, and I’ll tell you what.  It’s been a tumultuous time over at www.watchsonomacounty.com.  Before, during, and after our brief vacation to Southern California, I’ve been plenty busy there, calling things the way I see then.  Which leads to today’s topics.  What follows are my personal thoughts, take ‘em or leave ‘em (and I offer this with no intention to offend anyone).

1.  Labels are useful, if they are accurate
There seems to be a real aversion to being labeled, in fact to the whole concept of labels.  As a Militant Moderate I insist on the utility of accurate labels as a means to avoid “socio-cultural Alzheimers” (waking up every morning and not knowing whether something will fall up or fall down if dropped).  I also abhor inaccurate labels, especially if the intention is to marginalize a valid concept or school of thought.  Heck, a good part of science and academia in general is the development of accurate and useful labeling systems.

2.  The world is not binary
There also seems to be a strong belief system at work that if you’re not ‘A’ then you must be ‘Z’.  This disregards the 24 other letters in between.  Not to mention that a person might be an ‘M’ on one topic, but a ‘T’ on another topic.  I’ve stated this before, and I’ll say it again (because I sort of like the sound of it): I’m not a Conservative, I’m not a Liberal, I’m a Responsible.  And now I’m declaring myself a Militant Moderate.  What the extreme Left and Right don’t seem to understand is that each is the creation of the other.  When extreme Liberals push as hard as they can in the public square, in self-defense and equity and righteous outrage, the Right will become more extreme in its efforts to push back.  And vice-versa.  This is exactly how high school fistfights start, only now it’s being played out by adults using words, or worse.

The Nation is past the point where we can afford ideological extremism.  The roof is leaking, the foundation is settling, and there are termites in the walls of the Union.  We must lay aside ideological extremism in favor of rebuilding our Nation, because otherwise nothing else will matter.  I recommend this as a starting point:

http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/st162.pdf

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

Coming late to the Arizona debate

The Arizona Immigration Act, SB1070, has been in the public forum for a couple of weeks now.  There has been intemperate language from those who should know better.  I would have thought that President Obama would have learned from New Haven police officer incident to not jump in with an unflattering opinion of the performance of public employees, or in this case elected officials.  He didn’t, and for that he sacrifices yet another small chunk of credibility.

AG Holder should never have let himself get caught out, expressing strong negative opinions about a piece of legislation he was forced to admit he hadn’t read.

This has nothing to do with whether Arizona SB1070 is good or bad, legal or unconstitutional.  These are merely observations about how this issue seems to extract less than the best from otherwise honorable people.  Having read the bill, and coming from a family that had to carry real frickin’ papers in an attempt to survive, on the face of it I don’t see anything heinous in the AZ law.

Every person in the United States is obliged by law to provide proof of their identity, on demand, to law enforcement officials.  US citizens when travelling overseas will be required to establish their citizenship by the government of every country through which they pass.  When I was recently in Mexico, I had to prove to Mexican authorities 3 or 4 times who/what I was.  I absolutely oppose a National Identity Card because I don’t trust the federal government with a central repository of citizen’s identities all tied up on one place.  But read the Arizona law, it offers a menu of possible documents by which to prove status.  Including the same ones that would be required at any “lawful contact” (eg; traffic stop).

But the really positive thing I see about Arizona SB1070 is that it finally opens this dialog.  Now, a dialog is not one side lecturing the other.  It is one side talking while the other side listens.  Then the two sides swap places.  If the dialog is working, positions on both sides gradually change until there is consensus, a working solution.  If positions on one side don’t change, it proves one of two things.

1) The incredibly, astronomically, phenomenally unlikely situation where one side is 100% right and the other side is 100% wrong, or;

2) One side (or perhaps both) is not working in good faith.

Right now, the question for opponents of AZ SB1070 that is   hanging in the air is, “OK, if you oppose enforcement of the federal and states laws, then how do you propose to control illegal immigration?”.  I believe that a good faith answer to that, one that respects the fact that it is the natural right and duty of the United States of America to protect its borders and enforce its immigration policy, will answer the question of who’s in the game, and who’s standing on the sidelines, betting on the outcome.

Lastly on this issue, it is shameful that that our bloated Federal government has so utterly failed in this most basic of functions.  I’m not well educated, but I’m trying to think of a more basic function of the Federal government than securing the borders and enforcing immigration law.  I once read that a Nation that cannot enforce its borders no longer exists as a sovereign nation-state.  How was the Federal government allowed to dabble as dilettantes in matters they are forbidden by the 10th Amendment, while failing to enforce the most basic of Federal law?

This has created the Alice in Wonderland situation where a state, overwhelmed beyond its resources with the outcome of gross violation of Federal law, has had to take on enforcement of Federal law.  While the Federal government, failing to perform the basic duties they are Constituted to perform, instead fritters away at issues like education and health care which in fact belong to the States.  The situation in Arizona promises to bring this issue to public debate, hopefully for the good of all, and the Union.

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

A rare restaurant recommendation

Cathie and I went to dinner last night at a well-known local place that I’d ridden by many times, but we’d never been to.  Folks, if you are north of the Golden Gate Bridge, you absolutely owe it to yourself to dine at Nick’s Cove.  This place is on Highway 1 between Marshall and Tomales.  In addition to the dining room, they have a dozen cottages, which is what we are going to do next time (go for dinner, spend the night).

There just isn’t anything wrong with Nick’s Cove, it is magical.  There’s a wood burning fireplace in the dining room, two tables located right in front of it.  The view from the waterfront tables is spectacular, the pier and boathouse adding visual interest.  The designer here either stumbled on something special, or knew exactly what he or she was doing: the pier draws your eye toward the horizon, while the boathouse is perfectly situated to terminate that sightline just as your eye reaches the far shore.  The people working the dining room are absolutely top notch (in a casual but proper, California sort of way).

Food and wine:  The food is “just right”, good enough to engage and enchant without being fussy and demanding.  I had the local Preston Bay oysters and they were the best oysters I’ve ever had in my life, perfectly prepared and presented.  Cathie’s iceberg wedge was fantastic.  I had the halibut for dinner, Cathie chose the seafood linguine, both great.  Very few places (at last count, exactly one, that being Nick’s) can cook halibut properly, the cook at Nick’s hit it out of the park.

The beer, wine, and liquor list hits the same perfect medium as the food.  For example, they offer brandy, Cognac, Armagnac, and Calvados … not a huge selection of each, but if you get to the end of your meal and crave a glass of Calvados, there it is.  Try that in most pretentious fine dining restaurants.

I can’t comment on the cottages, as soon as we spend the night there I’ll let you know.  They sure do look homey and comfortable from the outside.  Parking on the east side of Hwy 1 is plentiful and easy in/out.  The management team at Nick’s Cove has created a small village atmosphere around the whole compound.  It’s crafted, but authentic (it’s not Disneyland, it is a restoration).  You can make reservations online, and now that I check, the cottages go for $275-$425 a night, with modern amenities.

FWIW, our dinner, which began with cocktails and appetizers, then our entrees (with a glass of wine each), then desert and cheese plate (with Madeira), was $130 plus gratuity.  Like the perfectly cooked halibut, try that anywhere else of comparable quality.  And the view from our table was far beyond priceless.

There are so many places to go in the San Francisco Bay Area, whether for resident or visitor, it’s just crazy.  No, we’re not New York here with multiple three star restaurants and imperial hotels.  But by the time you run around The City, north Bay, east Bay, Napa and Sonoma valleys, you can get worn out looking for a nice place to eat and stay.  If you’re within a couple of hours of San Francisco, a trip to Nick’s will be worth your while.  I grew up in Marin County in the 50’s.  Nick’s Cove is reminiscent of that time, and illustrates why Marin came to be known as the most distinctive of Bay Area counties.

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

PS: I just read the New York Post review of April 15th and simply disagree with them completely regarding the cost.  Maybe New York City is a lot cheaper than rural Marin?  I’m far from wealthy, but in terms of Bay Area dining, Nick’s Cove is extremely reasonable.

Played hooky today

It was too beautiful, I gave up on doing anything productive and just went for a ride today.  I rode into central Marin, then through Fairfax to 101 and back home again.  With a bit of Claritin, it would have been a meticulously perfect day.

Tomorrow I’ll go back to work, but since I’m working most weekends, anyway, I figured a day off during the week wouldn’t hurt anything.

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!

Is the Obama administration in distress?

President Obama has never shown any great capacity for handling criticism, or even lack of adoration.  He has frequently, in word and gesture, demonstrated his expectation that he is above criticism and worthy of great admiration.  His off-prompter remarks have also shown a surprising lack of that sense of balance so prized by gymnasts, always knowing which way is up.

In his remarks at Hampton University the other day, President Obama excoriated the New Media and called information “a distraction”.  This is purely Alice in Wonderland, through the looking glass stuff from a politician who got elected using Facebook, Twitter, email, the Web, and every other information outlet and inlet available.  Not only is it w-r-o-n-g, not only is it destructive to the one industry where this Nation leads the world (attacking freakin’ Apple and Microsoft by name!?!?), it is also simply nutty and unbalanced in a mental sort of way.  Here’s a guy, the first President to  carry a Blackberry, telling us little people that we’re getting too much information (as though we’re not competent to discern the difference between propaganda and insight).

Taken together with AG Holder’s proposal to curtail Miranda rights for U.S. citizens.  They insisted on civilian trials for terrorists, and I defended them (much to my own chagrin) right here in this blog.  Now they’ve panicked in realizing what they’ve gotten themselves into.  And their proposed solution is something that even Richard M. Nixon would never have considered.  Anyone in the Administration, anyone in the country, who thinks this is OK because the Liberals and Progressives are trustworthy and on “our”side, think again.  If this Administration is successful in curtailing this right and protection from government abuse, how is everyone going to like it when President Cheney takes office?

And what about Secretary of State Clinton chiding Great Britain to open negotiations with Argentina over the Falkland Island?  That idea is historically and culturally ludicrous, as well as astonishingly impolite and insulting to one of our three staunchest allies in the world.  Just one more nutty outburst from an increasingly nutty Administration.

I think that the Obama Administration, if not the President himself is struggling mightily to keep its head above water.  To appearances, it looks like this is starting at the top, with Obama himself.  To the President’s absolutely Clintonian hubris and microscopically thin skin, add his own personal brand of lawerly pedantry and unalloyed ideology.  This Administration does not appear to be growing in office, so much as coming unravelled.

G’day all, and may God continue to bless America!