tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-203727242024-03-13T22:39:39.983-04:00Dumb Looks Still FreeThis will be a site to record my thoughts and musings as they occur. A 'vanity' blog or website. Postings will be sporadic as the nature of this site is not a conversation with others, but a monolog to help me in troubled times.
To Those who find good ideas, they are free for theft so long as attribution is given. They are to be *built upon* not used to demean and tear down. Ideas I present I do not declare to be *good* or *perfect* merely *better* or *different*.A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.comBlogger987125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-61859155280278967252014-09-24T13:29:00.001-04:002014-09-24T13:29:59.702-04:00Full Spectrum War<p>What is Full Spectrum War?</p> <p>First off it is not Total War.  Total War is that form of war done between Nation States that sees the productive capacity of a combatant Nation as the source of its military power and is a valid target for waging war.  This form of war is one that has seen Sherman's March as part of a Grand Strategy to remove the South's productive capacity to support war as one of its modern forms.  In Ancient time's Hannibal's attack on Rome to remove its capacity to wage war was an earlier form of this.  Similarly by the accounts we have from Homer it is clear that during the Trojan War the Achaean Greeks set upon the trading partners and allies of Troy to denude it of protection and economic support – thus the siege was not one meant to take place in a single year (as soldiers did tend to go home during parts of the siege making it an annual affair at Troy) but to slowly wage a war of attrition on Troy.  Economic attrition is at the heart of Total War and the faster it is done the faster the conflict ends.</p> <p>Full Spectrum War is not Total War.</p> <p>Full Spectrum War is not done in the Public War venue alone and is not waged, necessarily, against Public Enemies.  It can be utilized against Public Enemies (ie. Nation States) and has been utilized in multiple conflicts via the use of Privateers.  Privateers are not Mercenaries as they do not work for cash paid for by a Nation State.  Privateers are granted Letters of Marque and Reprisal against enemies named on such letters, and those enemies are targeted to have their goods taken or destroyed by the Letters.  Privateers live by Takings under such Letters and they seek to take the goods of a named enemy (and the conveyance of it is usually included in that, although that can be exempted by the Nation handing out such Letters) and then have them certified via an Admiralty Court so that such Taken goods can then be utilized or reduced to monetary value via the means of auction.  The US has deployed Privateers up to the US Civil War and the US generally announces if it will be seeking to use them during conflicts.  Of course such announcements can be overturned by Congress as it is the holder of the Private War Powers.</p> <p>Full Spectrum War is thus a form of War done in the Public and/or Private venues.  It is particularly useful against Private Enemies which are non-Nation State in nature, as they live a form of hand to mouth savage existence based on preying upon others via the use of Private War.</p> <p>What is Private War?</p> <p>Private War is that form of war conducted by individuals or groups of individuals without the sanction of any Nation State.  Those waging such Private War are a threat to all mankind and the entire Nation State system as they are not accountable to any law but that of Nature by their own actions.  By stepping out from the Nation State system they revert to Natural Law as their means to survive and that makes them predatory and waging opportunistic war as part of their savage nature.  Those waging Private War no longer agree to Civil Law nor Military Law (which is part and parcel of Civil Law as it is administered by Governments), they set their own goals by their own standards which are not amenable to Moral Law as they make that up as they go along.  Thus the only form of law they are accountable to is that of Nature which is common to all Natural Beings.  Private War is waged by such people who have stepped from civilization and those waging it are no longer considered civilized humans.  This was an active decision on their part, forced upon them by no one, and once that step is taken there are very few ways to get back into civilized life.</p> <p>Full Spectrum War is that form of war that is suitable to such savages who wage war for their own sakes and do not seek the trappings of civilization to do so.  They fight without uniforms, without a civil code that they are accountable to, they do not fly a recognized flag and those that are under their power are not there voluntarily.  Without a government, without a command structure, without a civil code, without a military code, without uniforms and by holding individuals captive under their power and giving them no civil choice or input into what is done, those that wage Private War are savages by their own intent and actions.  As they are not a Nation State, no matter what they call themselves, they are not amenable to international law between Nations as they have stepped from the system of Nation States as well.  Via the Law of Nations as known at the Founding and Framing of the US, these individuals are known to have many names but fall under the general category of Pirates.</p> <p>What are Pirates?</p> <p>Pirates are those individuals who wage Private War to their own ends and have stepped away from Civil Law and the Law of Nations to take on humanity for their own purposes.  Pirates are not limited to any geographic region, to any single place and are defined solely by being individuals who wage war on their own.  Pirates are not limited to the sea and have been noted since the beginning of history as being on land as well as at sea.  The sea is a form of transportation for those waging Piracy against mankind, and Pirates have attacked on land, at sea, and in hijacking aircraft they also attack from the skies.  Wherever humans walk away from the restrictions of Civil Law and the Law of Nations to declare themselves independent of all mankind and against the order of Nations is where you will find Pirates.  Anyone has the possibility to revert to being a savage and when done by a civilized human it is conscious act.  There are no trappings to Piracy, no requirement for ships, parrots, peg legs, hooks for hands, rum, eye patches, or even a black flag with some terrifying image on it.  When such savages form into bands they will often take on trappings and Take conveyances, and then Take whatever they want including lives.  Pirates have lived by many means: raiding ships, raiding ports, raiding villages and farms, and raiding Nations which contain all those civilized forms of life.</p> <p>Terrorists wage Private War and are thusly Pirates.  As has been noted terror is just a tactic in warfare, and it can be used in either the Public or Private venues of War.  Those who take on the tactic but are under no Nation State sanction then fall into the category of Pirate.  Calling them by the tactics they use is trying to sugar coat what those tactics are part of when not done by Nation State sanction, and is a means to try and streamline base savagery into our lives so as to bring down the order of Nations via corrupting our understanding of what is and is not civilized in the realm of War.  Public War has restrictions upon it, and those waging it are to declare it, name their enemies, go through the proper civil means for their Nation to wage it, and then to be accountable to other Nations in their waging of war via the Treaties that Nation has signed for fighting Public War.  When anyone tries to put Pirates into the categories reserved for those fighting Public War, they are seeking to corrupt our civilized understandings of the differences between Public War and Private War: between civilized war and savage war.</p> <p>Full Spectrum War takes place in multiple venues, not just of War but of Law as well.</p> <p>The Piracy Codes set up a system of announcing who Pirates are.  That puts other Nations on notice that any individuals or groups considered as Pirates by one Nation are a threat to them, as well.  There are only two sides to Piracy: civilization and savagery.  There is no 'but they want the right thing' with those who are Pirates, as doing the right thing in warfare requires Nation State sanction.  Imagine what the world would look like if anyone could wage war for any reason they wanted without any restriction upon them.  What you get is not a civilized world, but one gone to the red of tooth and claw.  We set aside our Negative Liberties to wage war and utilize the Law of Nations to create means to restrict Negative External War via Civil Law.  The Positive Liberty of War, that of self-defense against those waging War is primal to all living things and cannot be separated from them.  Any mother or father defending their children have the Positive Liberty of War on their side.  If you are confronted by those utilizing aggressive, attacking means against your life, that of your family, your property or against your neighbors, you have the Positive Liberty of War available to you.  Any felon who has served their time may take up arms in defense of themselves and then hold themselves accountable for doing so and no court in any land will convict them for that taking up of arms in purely defensive posture.  Those who step from the fold of civilized life have reclaimed their Negative Liberty of War to themselves, as is their right via Natural Law.  That puts them outside of Civil Law and the Law of Nations, however, and there is nothing good nor admirable about waging war to your own ends as that is savage and uncivilized, both.</p> <p>Thus the Civil Law has Piracy Codes so that those aiding and abetting Piracy can be brought to heel as well as those committing it be brought to civil justice.  Those acquitted are considered to be civilized in nature and the surest way of clearing yourself of any charge of waging Private War, which is to say Piracy and its sub-species of 'terrorist' is to voluntarily give yourself up to civil prosecution under law.  Indeed, to clear one's name you voluntarily step back into the fold and DEMAND that you be prosecuted.  Sadly that is not available to you if you have been caught actually committing Piracy which is to say 'terrorism'.  Then the codes of Military Justice are the recourse, via the Courts Martial, and those have specific items for those who do not wage regular war under such International Agreements as the Hague and Geneva Conventions.  Indeed, waging Private War puts one afoul of multiple parts of both Conventions on how and when to wage war, how to treat Private Property, and how to conduct oneself when at war.  In point of fact the general activities of 'terrorists' or Pirates falls under the 'Spies and Saboteurs' part of the Geneva Convention, which has summary execution as its outcome.  Under the Hague Conventions there are escalating penalties for the abuse and wanton killing of civilians with no National sanctions, taking or destroying private property without due orders of a Nation, and in general conducting war outside of the Nation State sanctioned system runs one afoul of the entire set of Hague Conventions  which can give one a terminal end via a Court Martial.</p> <p>Another means via the Civil Law and Military Codes is the sanctioned takings from Enemies via those designated via a Nation State with Letters of Marque and Reprisal.  This is the sanctioned means that all Nations have available to them, even if they signed a treaty saying they would not do such things a Nation needing such activities can then indicate via the means within the Treaty that they will no longer be following such parts of those agreements governing such actions.  Treaties are VOLUNTARY in Nature between Nations and can, thus, be stepped away from as well.  Even those forced upon a loser in a war are considered voluntary so that the conflict may end in agreeable manner, but those can be stepped away from as well.  The Occupation of the Rhineland was a sure step that indicated that Germany was no longer bound by the Treaty of Versailles.  The ABM Treaty is considered defunct as well.  So is the Washington Naval Treaty governing the number and types of ships and what armaments they can carry.  All sorts of treaties are stepped away from or just abandoned or considered defunct because all the signatories are violating it and no one wishes to enforce it.  In fact no Nation wishing to enforce a Treaty it signed is a sure indicator that a Treaty is dead.</p> <p>From this Full Spectrum War can be seen as having multiple components:</p> <p>1) Public War via Nation State Military means.</p> <p>2) Civil Law prosecution via the Piracy Codes.</p> <p>3) International Law prosecution via agreed-upon Treaty language.</p> <p>4) Civil Law based Military Codes for the granting of individuals or groups with Letters of Marque and Reprisal and granting of Takings and reduction of same so that such individuals and groups can find a means to operate.  This is an economic aspect of war against those waging Private War that has not been deployed.</p> <p>5) Proactive support of the Positive Liberties of War which is to say the Civil Right of Self-Defense for all civilized humans.</p> <p>6) Treaty enforcement of wartime obligations upon combatants in war.</p> <p>7) Utilizing the understood threat of Pirates to all Nations and to seek the extinguishing of those individuals and groups wherever they arise by all civilized means necessary in all venues.</p> <p>To consider oneself civilized that is what one must support.</p> <p>There are no favorites to play with savage man seeking to enforce their will upon all mankind.  If they cannot demonstrate that they are seeking to be part of the civil order of Nations, then those who fight on their own for their own reasons to their own ends are a threat to everyone without exception.</p> <p>Being civilized is more than just leading one's life under civil law.  It has duties, obligations and requirements for individuals to fulfill so that civilization does not get liquidated by our savage nature.   We agree to the limits that come with being civilized, and those limits are a great strength, not a weakness, as they requires us to be creative in our means of addressing savagery and yet remain civilized.  Those who have gone savage are under no such compulsion and their wanton killing, destruction and enslavement of their fellow man is clear to see, but only if one opens one's eyes to actually perceive what is going on.</p> <p>Being civilized isn't about being nice.  There is a time and place for that, and there is no place for it with those who wantonly wage savage, predatory Private War.  Those who do so must be opposed in all venues, simultaneously.</p> <p>That is Full Spectrum War.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-30198200932154824722014-07-02T13:01:00.001-04:002014-07-02T13:01:03.549-04:00State of events<p>I've been pretty swamped getting a miter saw stand/cart designed and putting it together, plus a large number of items are happening otherwise.  This is the year the deck has to be replaced, along with getting the yard put into shape, and getting all of that figured out, planned out and looking to put a shed in for doing my woodworking finishing.</p> <p>If I'm not working myself to exhaustion in the shop, then I'm recovering from doing that the prior day.</p> <p>Basically while the world appears Stuck On Stupid, I'm just doing the basics of learning skills and applying them as I go, with all the fun that entails.  </p> <p>With that said I do have a couple of new firearms that will be heading in for a check-out, and I will hope to post on those later this summer.  With ammo a bit less scarce I will try to get to the range a few times, and work out some things with my existing equipment.  </p> <p>As I have warned over the years when my health gets incrementally better my posting rate will plummet and that is the case as of now.  And that is not just here but everywhere.  Such is life.</p> <p>A bit more fiction to put up this month, completing one story that I left partially up and putting another finished one up, plus one that is in work.  </p> <p>Research for any other work falls by the wayside, but my past work serves as the basis for what I see currently.  Systemic overload is not an unusual venue for an elite class to take via politics, and that is where we are at now.  No good will come of it unless we, as individuals, improve ourselves.  Prepare for the worst, hope for the best, and make sure that you are prepared.  That is what I am doing now.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-9804760805474411842014-05-03T12:01:00.001-04:002014-05-03T12:01:08.999-04:00Shop changes<p>This last winter I struggled through the end of my router table build and then started in on building up some of my manual hand planing skills while deciding what to do next.  In the way of in-shop builds I decided that a miter saw table/cabinet was on the agenda so as to get it off the ersatz secondary workbench and onto a mobile platform.  To me that also meant that the cabinet it was on would also have to contain the thing, so that I could put a secondary surface on it and use it for other things, like supporting long work pieces that I hand plane.</p> <p>But that really couldn't get started in earnest until I had a place to roll it to, and the shop was in desperate need of freeing up some workspace.  A dead upright freezer was taking up valuable space and since it was no longer in service that meant it could go.  Yet in that tree of decision making came the concept that a roll around miter cabinet really wouldn't be all that useful sitting in the same place and what I really needed was some shelving there.  As I was working on getting stamina back by planing down 5/4 and 6/4 stock lumber, mostly Sassafras but also some Mahogany and 8/4 Acacia to make the frame for the roll around cabinet, I really couldn't devote much time to simple storage shelving.</p> <p>Before that, however, I also talked to an electrician for doing some of the around the house stuff (front and rear porch lights, mostly) and talked about the can lights in the basement.  He said those were probably made for attic use and as they have insulation around them, have a heat sensitive switch that makes them cut out.  Thus the blinking light effect which is killer on lights of any sort, and even CFLs did this in a few of the cans, so they were not a solution.  I could get up there, take down each light and remove that cut-off or have him do that, which would mean a major tear-down of the ersatz secondary workbench... or I could re-examine the issue. </p> <p>If the problem is heat generation from 60 watt incandescent bulbs (or equivalent in CFL which run at a lower power consumption) then the problem was too much energy wasted in making the actual light.  Too much heat per watt consumed, in other words a ratio.  I took a look at some of the standard charts for light output (you know, the visible and not IR stuff) and saw that LEDs used up about 10 watts of which 1 was wasted in heat and the rest went to equivalent light output.  LEDs have come down drastically in price over the last 5 years and are now cost competitive with CFLs.  So now the idea began to percolate that instead of new fixtures or re-wiring the old ones, what I really needed were just better bulbs (or point source LEDs with diffusers).  I purchased one to try in the one can that blinked on everything, almost immediately and put that in the can receptacle.  After 10 hours, the light was not blinking and that is longer than I usually spend in the shop.  Five more of those and my problem was solved.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-xJMYx6gwMoc/U2USlCBguII/AAAAAAAAB0o/BPxY37Vb-Ew/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_001%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_001" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_001" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-XQt7IZrAo8k/U2USl-7Am5I/AAAAAAAAB0w/tsqF--1u6P8/Shop_MAY_2014_001_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Plus I get a Color Rendition Index above 75% for these daylight LEDs.  An old CFL with titanium dioxide coating on the outside is still used in its workshop clamp on receptacle as it helps to get rid of some of the stuff that lingers in the shop from the chemistry there.  It is minor but over time it does do some good and I can notice changes in the shop air over time with it.</p> <p>The router table is on the left and becomes, as I knew it would, a flat surface catch-all while not in active use.  Still things are looking up and I'm hoping to get it into active use later this year as the roll around miter saw cabinet gets up and running.  Since it is a cabinet and not really a chest, I'm making a frame for it and then will slat in sassafras on the outside.  The frame base will be acacia at the base, walnut for uprights and long cross-pieces, and mahogany for short cross pieces.  Major dimensions are determined, but interior arrangement is TBD.</p> <p>With better lights I can see what I'm doing, a big, big plus.  And I will say this about daylight equivalent lights: they actually do have a positive effect on my mental attitude the moment they get turned on. </p> <p>Over the workbench is a <a href="http://www.dazor.com/">Dazor</a> two tube fluorescent task light I got off of someone at Ebay.  They still make those things, too!  And with the buzzing magnetic ballast, to boot.  I do want to hit them up for an electronic one if they have a retrofit kit: the buzzing isn't that bad at first, but as it warms up you hear it more.  With that said they packed a lot into the base including counter-weights and such, and if they don't have a retro-fit kit then finding something to fit in that space may be impossible.  The reason for the task light is that when I'm at the drill press or doing other work nearby the workbench, even with better overhead lighting I could use something a bit more directional, and that does the job perfectly.</p> <p>So, where was I?</p> <p>Oh, shelving!  Yes had to move the freezer out (hand truck necessary for that) and then once it was out of the way I got the measurements, realized I wanted some space behind the shelves for stuff like saw horses and out-feed supports, and ordered it from <a href="http://www.globalindustrial.com/">Global Industrial</a>.  Archive boltless shelving but good for workshop use.</p> <p>The one thing that boltless shelving lacks are components to upgrade them with.  I learned, to my disbelief, that the makers of the stuff utilize slightly differing spans (the cross pieces) so that one manufacturer's boltless shelving doesn't necessarily fit another's system.  You get a bit of lock-in that way and stuck with an original supplier.  Unless you aren't doing a systemic approach and going piecemeal, like me.  With that all said I would really have liked panels in prior projects or at least stuff that easily adapts to boltless shelving in general but is manufacturer agnostic.  In this case the panels I wanted to put up on the end was pegboard to start getting all my smaller stuff organized.  I ended up buying some Alligator Board (meant to be put up on studs or drywall in front of studs at 16" intervals) in 36" wide by 16" high, and then drilled mounting holes for the half-inch difference between the distance for boltless uprights and the board (with a bit of overhang on the rear side).</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-4-wyiuhmXqs/U2USmu6H9wI/AAAAAAAAB04/KeqASpKpZM8/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_005%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_005" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_005" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-xdfH9jJ5dQo/U2USnn_jgfI/AAAAAAAAB1A/yHbehF3ZXPE/Shop_MAY_2014_005_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Here is as you turn to your left as you walk in.  Note the shelf over the sink that I just put in, to get rid of some of the stuff sitting on there that is getting crowded out by the old Sharp microwave.  The microwave still works, heats up water just fine and that makes it available to reheat my coffee, tea or mix up some oxalic acid for bleaching wood.  </p> <p>In the foreground is an outdoor halogen task light serving as the vacuum hose rest.  It is really hand for that... but I don't have any place else to put it at the moment... so necessity and all that.  The bench grinder with <a href="http://oneway.ca/">Oneway</a> Wolverine system is obscured just behind it.   A bit better organization should get those stowed away and out of the way in the future.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-zPEUnpp9P7k/U2USoaG9SKI/AAAAAAAAB1I/WAlQGKlc0Io/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_004%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_004" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_004" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-dUSSjONqsTY/U2USpImAm6I/AAAAAAAAB1Q/ifIK-MVwT6o/Shop_MAY_2014_004_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>This is the heart of the affair and the light canister above it is the problematic one with anything but an LED.  Pegboard on the end with the shop hand tools that fit.</p> <p>The contractor table was sits on the bottom part of the shelving, and the rest of that level is used up for a few things that don't really fit anywhere else at the moment.  At the top of all of this is a <a href="http://www.jettools.com/us/en/home/">Jet</a> fine particulate air system which should really be suspended from the ceiling, but as I had nothing scheduled for that high up and fine particulates are a concern, that is the best I could do.  I does not suck nor blow from the vent from the utility room and does set up a general circulation pattern in the room when its on.  Also it is made for 16" rafter spacing and the basement has 24" spacing... but the floorboards of the main floor are at 16"! Not perfect but it works.</p> <p>All the cased tools (electric hand planer, circular saw, drill/driver, etc.) plus some anonymous jigs, fixtures and miscellaneous tools now sit on the upper shelves.  The long searches to find them and get them out from behind other stuff is now over.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6LDCU8wM6Zw/U2USp1tmKbI/AAAAAAAAB1Y/oX3PoMfsT04/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_006%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_006" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_006" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-dA8ZAtjEva8/U2USqvMfbpI/AAAAAAAAB1g/s1-vt7LGJKI/Shop_MAY_2014_006_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Let me just say that getting all the Japanese hand saws out and available is a huge plus on its own.  Getting the heavier hammers away from the workbench but nearby it frees up valuable space they were taking up.  Of the two jigsaws I have, the one on the outside is the cheap knockabout one, used for rough work, and the other remains in its case on the shelving.  The belt sander is a freebie with a Triton router, and I'll have to make more use of it and possibly see if I can rig up some sort of jig for it as well.  The random orbital sander is just a cheap workhorse that does the job, nothing fancy.</p> <p>The blue shelf on the upper left is cleaning and lubrication supplies and the stuff I tend to use the most when maintaining power tools.  By the waterfall rack is the camellia oil with a microfiber rag, and it is used for the light coating on most of the hand tools.</p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-kTqJ9WPOX48/U2USre0-zSI/AAAAAAAAB1o/R_gMkxL7w0E/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_007%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_007" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_007" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-1mNu9AcF5io/U2USsIMqxpI/AAAAAAAAB1w/o0HUfk63Ujs/Shop_MAY_2014_007_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>The lower half is hammer, mallet, wrench and other saw land, plus the Swedish axe picked up as milsurp.  I finally broke down and got a hammer set suitable for more than driving nails as I've already had to do some bashing of sheet metal and wanted something a bit more appropriate to that on an as-needed basis.  The wrench and socket sets are <a href="http://harborfreight.com/">Harbor Freight</a> and the racks and holders are after-market.</p> <p>Along the side are my measuring stuff like yardstick and center finding rule, plus architect's square.  The central portion of the racks are where the screwdrivers, pliers, power drill and baskets for other stuff are.  Craftsman for the screwdriver set as they are both reliable and cheap.  Plus they all fit on that 24" magnetic strip which I bolted on to the pegboard.  Getting my drill bit sets (jobber and brad point) means I don't have to go on the Quest for the Missing Drill Bit Set any more.  Two DeWalt sets and one cheap store deal with driver bits that I don't mind if they die for a good cause.</p> <p>Getting all this done took awhile because it is just me doing the work.  I hate eating up time with this stuff, but if it saves me time later, then it is well worth it.  The amount of ingenuity that has been put into making the various parts of this are a testament to the engineers involved and the workforce that made them.  My hat is off to you folks!</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/--vkECEVBpUE/U2USs9LXnzI/AAAAAAAAB14/1DZamcPw4EA/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_003%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_003" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_003" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-HkfvyoIqvJo/U2USttGT-1I/AAAAAAAAB2A/bVQk26WMWvU/Shop_MAY_2014_003_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Look, its clutter!</p> <p>More organized, though, and the top shelf for the ESW is now just down to some of the better cleaning supplies and lubricants, plus gun cleaning case on the side.  The miter saw is nearly alone on its level, now.  Under that some storage space has been opened up with re-arranging things and more of that needs to go on.  By the side, leaning up against stuff on the left, are the Sassafras boards I've been planing smooth.  When I'm doing that work the place smells like a rootbeer factory and is rather pleasant.  </p> <p>That shelving system in back may appear very cluttered, and that is because it is.  Yet it is organized clutter of the bulky stuff that needs to be somewhere and I can find it easily.  Foam sheets and stuff like foam rolls go up top.  Rarely used but no other good place to put them.  When I need them they need to be at hand.  When I don't they need to be out of the way.  Long piece jig storage is under that along with raw stock stuff like t-track and miter track.  Below that is excess and back-up storage, stuff used rarely or kept on hand just in case, plus broken down equipment that won't be used in the near future.  Then comes bulk storage for wood and finishes where the sun can't get to them.  Drill press roll around cabinet in front of all that stuff, plus smaller air circulator with HEPA filter: it gets air up out of the dead space and into circulation.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-bE4rcamQq98/U2USudftr8I/AAAAAAAAB2I/Q81a7bc1AKw/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_010%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_010" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_010" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-zDaEg2nMn6U/U2USvGnVDLI/AAAAAAAAB2M/I1TiSpvCqjc/Shop_MAY_2014_010_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>From the drill press, reverse angle looking back at the workbench.  The lower shelves behind it are for wood storage, up and off the ground, a pain to get to so that means I have to have a good reason to drag it out.  Some scrap storage at the end of the shelving behind the fastener drawers, then some more wood and bulky clamps, plus <a href="http://microjig.com/">Grippers</a>.  Upper shelf starts with some air handling stuff for future use, then migrates through jigs then sharpening supplies, then back to air handling stuff.  Top shelf holds my surface vise and then all the board scrap storage.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-mxhbCxMmEI8/U2USvy6LwFI/AAAAAAAAB2U/IDDIQ-fw9u8/s1600-h/Shop_MAY_2014_002%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Shop_MAY_2014_002" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Shop_MAY_2014_002" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-kRN6C9oC3sk/U2USwvTgH_I/AAAAAAAAB2g/Tf3aebAG3HI/Shop_MAY_2014_002_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>At the very end, on the far wall and tucked out of the way, is my clamp storage on normal pegboard.  That includes all the clamp using straightedges, as well.  My aluminum bar clamps aren't easy to see and that is for the good since I only use those when I have a large piece to assemble.  I used them a lot on the router table, that's for sure.  Some lighter stuff is on one of the two shelves on it, like the ersatz panavise and magnifying fine work holder.  Seen on the shelving to the left are some hand planes in their sacks which are out to remind me to give them a good sharpening before I start in on the major part of the cabinet, then my various takedown guides from the NRA and Browning, and above that miscellaneous plastic stripping and papers to put down for messy work.</p> <p>Work does go on, albeit slowly.  I have an <a href="http://www.incrementaltools.com/">Incra</a> I-box jig to start using with the table saw, and that looks to be fun.  Some general moving of other stuff in the house means an old set of metal shelving is out with the freezer and I need to get a round table out from a room where it is just taking up space.  Once those are out and removed, then comes looking for a deck contractor who also does some fencing and possibly something like a storage shed.  </p> <p>The deck is the prime concern for this year, but the fencing for the yard is falling apart and held on with a few nails and strong ties.  I would like all of that done in something like Ipe or Port Orford Cedar (aka Lawson's Cypress), but only if it fits in with the awful looking pressure treated wood that is the norm for the development.  Basically anything that can be put up and ignored for a few decades is what I'm after, along with finding the contractor that can deal with the slope the place is built on which has a sudden rise nearby, which means frost heave shifts all the fencing and warps the stuff until you can't open the gate.  Then it falls apart.  Perhaps some concrete supports for the uprights, buried under the surface will do the trick.  That slope is not the friend of our yard of the postage stamp sizing.</p> <p>So there is where the shop is at right now.  Spring takes its toll, doing all this takes time and effort.  I don't mind the organizing part that much, but would prefer to be on the learning and building part... but one step at a time.</p> <p>Still doing some writing and has a story that has to play through, and that will be posted soon as well as finishing up Earthfall.  Starting in on the next M-5 alt story history, and it's a tough one as it's a character study more than a story.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-60124019419514635662014-04-06T13:12:00.001-04:002014-04-06T13:12:31.800-04:00Two cases<p>There are two interesting corporate issues currently under discussion.</p> <p>First is the Hobby Lobby case, in which the owners of a corporation hold religious views that prevent them from supporting parts of what are required under Obamacare:  abortion and contraceptives.</p> <p>The other is at Mozilla and the leaving of Brendan Eich due to pressure for his political donation to Proposition 8, which would define marriage as between a man and a woman.</p> <p>In both cases the corporation refers to standards: The Holy Bible in the case of Hobby Lobby, and a standard of conduct at Mozilla.</p> <p>I would say, up front that corporations, when held by private individuals or families, or even those held by stockholders numbering in the millions, are free to have a corporate code of standards, morals and ethics for their company.  These are voluntary associations and represent a freedom of association amongst the people: no one forces an individual to work for a company.  I would say that it would help employees, greatly, if the actual codes are published with specificity, not with generic terminology referring to 'community' or some such, but to the details of what the corporation will actually hold you to.  That can include things for the corporation, itself, that it will not do as a corporation so as to uphold the standards set down for the company by those who own it.  I don't care if it is a sole proprietorship or a huge corporation: majority rights to set standards would function scale-free.</p> <p>In the case of Hobby Lobby, they made it perfectly clear that the company would be more than willing to purchase health insurance that did not contain those items that they morally cannot support.  Supporting those elements are an anathema to them and they would prefer to close the company or not provide health insurance due to it.  Thus as this involves the federal government, it is a freedom of expression, freedom of association and freedom of conscience from religion that is being cited, and all of those are specifically protected in the 1st Amendment.</p> <p>With Mozilla there is a case of punishing Brendan Eich for his 2008 contribution to Proposition 8 in CA, where his views were no different than Barack Obama's, Hillary Clinton's or a large number of other Democratic politicians.  Eich's speech is public speech, as much as a monetary contribution is 'speech', and there are specific laws prohibiting the use of political speech to punish employees, at least at the State level in CA there are.  Thus there is an extended 1st Amendment protection to political speech.</p> <p>In both cases the founders of the company have set standards that the company is to live by, and in the case of Mozilla, Brendan Eich is a co-founder of Mozilla, so he should know what it was he constructed.  The job qualifications for Eich match up closely with what nearly any high tech company would want for a CEO, and he has never discriminated against gays, lesbians or tried to prevent couples from getting health insurance.  Thus he has held in his public job, to his commitment to the company.  When not on the job he is a private citizens who is entitled to public speech as a citizen, not as a member of a company.  Thus there is a distinction between public speech as member of a corporation, and public speech as a private citizen.</p> <p>Hobby Lobby does not face the same sort of public speech problem, but is facing penalty of law for holding religious views as part of how they intend to run a company.  For the owners there is a requirement that in their lives that there be continuity between their publicly expressed morality in private and the company they formed to serve the public.  I have not heard of Hobby Lobby discriminating against its employees, and the employees perfectly understand the formulation of corporation they are joining when they request to be hired by it.  As a company, Hobby Lobby does not require its employees to profess their religious beliefs, nor does it perform any coercive acts to make them conform in their private lives to the standards made by the company. </p> <p>Thus in Hobby Lobby they would be fine if people still did the things they did not pay for directly: there is no coercion of its employees to toe the company line in their life outside of work.  Its employees are free individuals away from work.</p> <p>Mozilla feels free to intrude on the non-company life and speech of its members, at least it does for Brendan Eich, and use protected political speech as a reason to coerce individuals under its employment.  Its employees are not free individuals away from work and may have perfectly legal and constitutionally protected activities used against them in employment.</p> <p>It is strange that the one corporation, not requiring people to adhere to company standards away from work is vilified, while the other, which punishes individuals for their private expression of protected speech, is lauded.</p> <p>Often the same individuals deploring Hobby Lobby for maintaining its standards and lauding Mozilla for violating its work contract based on an individual's protected speech are the same people.</p> <p>And yet the issues are just the same.  </p> <p>Even worse is that the 'openness' is in the case of Hobby Lobby which does not discriminate based on religion or your private activities when they employ individuals.  The one claiming to have 'openness' is the one that discriminates against mere private opinion and represents a closing of mind to opinions or even a toleration of a separate life outside of work.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-62275187045349509292014-03-28T13:34:00.001-04:002014-03-28T13:34:31.333-04:00Methodology applied to strange case<p>Malaysian Flight 370 has given rise to a lot of speculation and, with the sighting of debris off the cost of Perth Australia,  hopefully the final hours of the flight will become known.  Sadly, yes, but known.  The recovery of the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder will bring the case to rest.</p> <p>Over the days since its disappearance the speculation of what happened to it has had to cope will large amounts of new material, like Boeing revealing that the flight last hours longer after the disappearance of the aircraft from radar.  That was not directional data, however, and left a wide radius from the last known position of the aircraft to the point its fuel runs out (Source: <a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303546204579435172975983630">WSJ</a>).  That last point, over the South China Sea, was after one course change that was not scheduled that happened during the hand-off of Air Traffic Control zones, and Flight 370 did not properly communicate with the new ATC zone.  At that point all verbal communication was lost with the flight, as well as its transponder information, but information from the engines continued to be sent.</p> <p>That was the jumping off point for speculation which immediately went to terrorism.  If it was terrorism, no group is claiming it, so that leaves an empty hole in the situation.  That was filled by the report of Lithium Ion batteries being transported on the flight, and even when stowed properly, they can cause problems in very rare instances, which includes bringing flights down with on-board fires in the cargo hold.  That defaults to the situation for Flight 370 by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor">Occam's razor</a> which is that the simplest explanation with the fewest assumptions is the best.</p> <p>Pilots get trained in a set of skills that start from the beginning, and they are summed up by the process of actually flying an aircraft: Aviate, Navigate, Communicate.</p> <p>Thus flying the aircraft and keeping it aloft takes precedence, not just during normal flight but during emergency situations.  The terse 'All right, good night' response from the pilot at the last communication point for the ATC zone he was leaving may be an indicator of something going wrong on-board that had not been properly identified.  Just after that the first course change to the South China Sea took place, deviating from the prior flight path heading into China.  The protocol of Aviate, which is fly the aircraft, comes first.  And the loss of verbal and transponder information may be an indication of either a system manual reset or the power supply to those systems going out for other causes.  The engine transmission system has its own power supply separate from those systems, and could remain intact and functional.  It would keep on doing so until the aircraft shut down or the engines ran out of fuel.</p> <p>If a pilot has a bad situation and is keeping the plane flying as a priority, then that pilot is determining if the plane can continue flying.  With an in-flight emergency being handled a pilot can then change the course, again.  That follows Occam's razor.  What does not follow is the pilot then succumbing to the situation right after that.  The question of it being reasonable that a pilot could misjudge his own capability to the point of not realizing how bad the situation had become after, perhaps, 5 to 10 minutes of dealing with it, is startling.  Human error does occur, yes, and cannot be discounted and may even be the case for Flight 370.  If so that is unfortunate.  That last flight change, to wind up in the Indian Ocean means that there was some capacity to not only Aviate but Navigate.</p> <p>The South China Sea is a region of shipping that is heavily trafficked, what with Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia nearby, and destinations of Japan and China to the east and India and the Middle East to the west.  A pilot having any doubt about his viability as a pilot has a perfectly satisfactory option of ditching in the South China Sea.  It may seem heroic to try and not to succumb to fumes from a smoldering fire, but to Navigate and think you can do that and not know for a certainty means you have had time to address the situation.  While ditching may be a bad option, it is less worse than calculating your ability to Navigate while having a heavily trafficked area to ditch in.  It is not just the pilot's life, but that of everyone on board that is at stake.</p> <p>There are circumstance where, perhaps, the ability to control engine speed has been taken out by a fire, leaving the jets to continue on without changes.  A crash into the sea is not a good way to ditch an aircraft, true, and if you cannot have that under your control then you have few options left as a pilot as you no longer control the airspeed of the plane.  That is a serious problem when it comes to Aviate.  There are options of what to do next, but they start to fall in the realm of changing angle of attack, changing elevation and trying to stall the engines out.  A bad situation but better than crashing into terrain or water at speed.</p> <p>Thus, by Occam's razor, we get in-flight emergency and then gross misjudgment of the situation.</p> <p>Is there another way to explain this scenario?</p> <p>Of course: The Joker scenario.</p> <p>Someone on-board planned to use the aircraft to give a wild suicide ride, and then crash the aircraft.  Some people do just want to see the world burn.  This is a viable option and requires little else beyond madness, which is just as likely as an emergency, a veteran pilot making gross misjudgments  and then succumbing to a situation he thought he could handle.  Even though a viable option, it is one that requires the intent of a man or woman gone mad to do it.  Thus it is less likely than the one by Occam's razor.</p> <p>At this point it is possible to say that Occam's razor has resulted in a non-simple explanation that requires some types of problems coming together in a single instance that is unlikely.  If this razor is not cutting to a solution, is there another?</p> <p>Yes, there is, and anyone examining military history will know it pretty well.  A main attribute for this goes to Napoleon, but it has shown up in various forms from various individuals over time. It is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor">Hanlon's razor</a>:  Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.</p> <p>For this instance is stupidity indicated?</p> <p>Piloting an aircraft and making navigational changes indicates some level of gross competence and skill in these tasks.  These are not stupid acts, but ones with intent behind them.  Their results may be stupid and dumbfounding, yes, but they are done with competence, reason and foresight: they are not acts of a stupid individual.  Deranged, maybe, but not stupid.</p> <p>When you cross of stupidity with Hanlon's razor you are left with: malice.</p> <p>With malice you now have a crime of intent.  There is a methodology to examining criminal cases, and while the well known Method, Motive and Opportunity tend to come to mind first, they assume you know who is doing it.  Without who you do not get to MMO.  From that you step back to the 5 W's and 1 H:</p> <p>Who</p> <p>What</p> <p>Where</p> <p>Why</p> <p>When</p> <p>How</p> <p>For Flight 370 we can definitively say What, Where and When up to the point of the second course change.  In fact that goes all the way back to the first course change, as they are the same thing: the aircraft losing contact and changing course between ATCs.</p> <p>That leaves us with Who, Why and How.</p> <p>A smoldering fire from cargo may not be by malice, but fills in each of those: the shipper, the cargo and a rare instance of fire.  Mind you the shipping container was rated for fire containment, but that could have failed.  The flight crew is just trying to deal with the situation in this instance, and are not active participants in the problem save for being unable to deal with it.</p> <p>Going Joker answers these, also: an experienced or even novice pilot with some ability to fly the aircraft, they were deranged and took it over by some means.  Not pleasant to think about, but can't be discounted.</p> <p>Terrorism?  This is two pronged as it may or may not involve active flight crew participation.  This broadly includes large scale criminal organizations, terror organizations or hostile governments doing something covertly.</p> <p>Without participation you get a hostile take-over of the aircraft.  This would mean the debris in the Indian Ocean is from something else if the take-over was successful and the plane went on to a destination unknown.  Now isn't that a frightening prospect?  A large cargo vessel goes down and no one notices it.</p> <p>Still remaining on the hostile takeover fork, it is possible that the take-over went seriously awry.  That can get the flight to the Indian Ocean.  It can also get it crashing into a mountainside or under triple canopy jungle or in some other waterway.  That could leave the debris from Flight 370 in the Indian Ocean or, again with the horror of finding a ship went down without notice.</p> <p>On this fork the How is a terror take-over.  The Who would be unknown as would the Why.</p> <p>With the crew or even just a single member of it, taking the aircraft over, you get the same bifurcation as with the hostile take-over and with the same results, save that How is the member of the crew, Who is the organization behind him/her, and Why is unknown.</p> <p>There are, perhaps, only a couple of organizations and maybe one government that might try this.  None of them are China since they are the destination of the flight and it would be most easy to redirect a flight to a secure airfield and seize it, and it might be days or even weeks until someone noticed as this is China, after all, a big place with a tight lipped government.  With that said, with so many passengers being Chinese Nationals, any organization attempting to seize the flight would also know that they would get the wrath of China.  Possibly a nuclear tipped wrath, at that.</p> <p>Who would tempt that?</p> <p>Criminal organizations can get what they need much more cheaply, and there is little indication of individuals worth kidnapping for any reason.  It is cheaper and easier to kidnap the poor, those remotely located or the unwary for nefarious reasons than it is to take a plane full of people and do... well... what, anyway?  No good reason comes to mind, so while Method and Opportunity can be filled in, Motive or Why gets these types of organizations scratched off the list.</p> <p>Of the Nations that might try this, possibly only the Magic Kingdom of Mr. Kim might be insane enough to do something like this.  However power hungry and egotistical the ruler is, however, he isn't crazy and not a Joker type.  At least so far as we can puzzle out.  Besides the Motive or Why leaves a gaping hole in the idea of NoKo being behind this.</p> <p>Terrorists usually don't take an aircraft and do nothing with it, claim no responsibility and generally remain silent about it.  They might buy an aircraft, as bin Laden did in the early '90s in Africa, but hijack one and claim nothing and do nothing with it?  Unless there was something like new bioweapons in with the people or cargo, the rationale even behind the most fantasy based of organizations remains out of the realm of possibility.  The Why part remains unanswered.</p> <p>Anything left?</p> <p>A death cult.  AUM once operated in the USSR/Russia and was able to brainwash some KGB/FSB agents before the group dispersed.  Note most went back to Japan, but not all of them did.  AUM had this wonderful idea of liberating people's souls to a better life by killing them now.  In fact that was such a good act in their line of reasoning at the time, that mass-murder was a really great idea.  After being brainwashed with drug, sex and rock'n'roll, the followers had to be convinced that as enlightened individuals they had to save themselves to continue on with the good work.  They might not leave any notes, any causation and generally not want to attract attention to themselves carrying on the good works.  Tends to get people put in jail and deprogrammed, and then put on trial.  So a death cult could fill in Who, Why and How is via the terrorism paths.  Do note that AUM had many competent individuals within its organization and the entire operation ran a chain of computer repair stores in Japan which was their main money-maker for the founder of the cult.  The founder has reformed, of course, but the individuals who were once with it and disappeared when it dispersed, are probably not reformed.</p> <p>In general the simplest explanation remains the best, and I'm expecting that the debris is from Flight 370.</p> <p>If it isn't, and its not just something dropped off by a dead circulation spot in the Indian Ocean like the large debris field in the northern Pacific, then things turn nasty.  Perhaps incompetent and nasty.  Or competent and nasty.  And do note that debris is yielded from multiple possible paths, as well.  Only the in-flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder can finally dispel the speculative paths and leave us with what is left.</p> <p>Evidence is needed to sort this out and remove the suppositional and to fill in the blanks.  </p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-62783968115469586862014-02-26T17:47:00.001-05:002014-02-26T17:47:44.594-05:00Disruptive technology<p>What is disruptive technology?  It is technology that brings in a change to our understanding of what is fundamental to a system.  Computers changed how businesses processed information which meant that whole categories of workers were put out of jobs.  Rooms that used to be filled with accountants were downsized.  Similarly rooms full of draftsmen and architects got pared down, as did rooms of engineers to design everything from squeeze bottles to jet aircraft.  Computers disrupted business in ways large and small, and that intruded on our lives and our lives slowly began to change, as well.  Connecting computers to a network and having them internetworked was meant, way back when, to be a way to have computers split processes amongst them as they were few and expensive and idle time was money lost.  Instead the internetworked systems allowed people to contact each other across all the networks in a way that enabled human intelligence to be shared and increased.  E-mail was the first real disruptive technology of networks, and then, later, would come the ability to browse from site to site with information put up in a flat network system with agreed-upon means to display information.  The Internet with World Wide Web came into being and the compelling way it changed lives was through interaction of people to do many things that they could have never done before.  People who would never dream of publishing anything soon had blogs and realized that there was readership available with people desperate for something interesting to read.  Videos also were shared when bandwidth increased, and that also changed our view of each other and the world.  And commerce moved onto a global stage accessible by anyone with a computer connected to a network, and competition became global at a retail level.</p> <p>Our world changed.</p> <p>Yet the seasons still come and go, the Earth orbits the sun and the Moon orbits the Earth.  That world did not change as it is Nature and beyond our reach to change, as its laws are required to allow us to be here.</p> <p>Today we see the last gasp of governments trying to regain control of people in ways large and small, from the Transnational Left and Right we see the disruption of societies as governments and companies try to liquidate what it means to be a citizen of a Nation.  Across much of Europe the attempt to socialize health care has resulted in the horrors of the British system and people left to die of thirst, to the lax attitude of physicians all taking their holiday on the hottest days of the year so that hospitals cannot treat those with heat stroke, to the much admired German system that can't seem to ask its own people if they actually like having to wander from doctor to doctor to get seen on a timely basis and never have continuity of care from a physician that knows them.  These systems have tremendous overhead and lacks big, small and always at the cost of actual health provisioning in a way people prefer.  Bureaucrats run these systems and they are run for the interest of the governments involved, not the people.  Control over personal health is one of the fastest ways a tyrannical system can find and eliminate opposition as it finds out just who has what, and then figure out how to deny opponents actual health services.  With such a whip the political class finds ways to dole out a bit here and there to get re-elected, all in the knowledge that the people are afraid of government as it has taken over the health care system.</p> <p>This is an antiquated way of doing things, with large lab systems taking lots of time running costly tests at high overhead with may companies and levels of bureaucracy which now must be sustained by the individuals actually using the system.  Put in a few levels of bureaucracy and the actual cost of provisioning health care goes up, timeliness and quality of care goes down.  Computers have not made inroads to anything but forms processing so that forms get ignored on a more timely basis by bureaucrats playing solitaire on their systems instead of just hanging out at the water cooler instead of doing their jobs.  They do that, too.  Computers increase inefficiency as well as efficiency and provide many ways to goof off that could not have been conceived of just 30 years ago.  Health care has resisted disruption from the inside as the insiders have a vested interest in keeping a high overhead, high cost system going: it provides control and makes money for them, and grants those running it much power over others.</p> <p>Yet automation and miniaturization are coming to the health care system, but this isn't coming from the decaying inside-out.  No this is coming from the outside, from people who don't much care for the inefficient, high overhead and centralized control realms that are the tyrannical features of government controlled health care.  Disruptive technology threatens the apple cart by putting power back in the hands of individuals who are able to walk away from aspects of the system to save money and empower those doing the liberation.  The place to start isn't with the 3D printing of organs... well, that is a pretty good place, actually, but to disrupt the entire system requires hitting at its underpinnings and that is with blood tests.  The things you have to get done to yield some information about what is going on with your body.  I've had so many of them it isn't funny, and if you have ever seen a nurse walk into a room with a full rack of vials to test your blood then you have some understanding of just how important the tests are.  Due to my health I've had up to 35 taken at a single draw, and there are people who have many more than that taken just to try and identify what is going on in their bodies.</p> <p>From <a href="http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/184573/#respond">Instapundit</a> I read, today, about a woman who, at age 19, started a company after dropping out of Stanford University and used her tuition money to put into the company (Article at <a href="http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2014/02/elizabeth-holmes-theranos/">Wired</a>).  She is afraid of needles and thought that there must be a better way to do blood testing.  Now at 30, Elizabeth Holmes' company, Theranos, is featuring a 30 test service at Walgreens in Palo Alto, CA.  The blood sample is a miniscule amount that fits into a half inch collection vial.  Results for their tests are in 4 hours.  The company posts the costs of its tests on its website and they are a fraction of the cost of going to a traditional lab.  Their goal is to run thousands of tests via a single sample, and to have that sample available so that if a doctor wants secondary tests done on it they can be performed without the need for a re-draw.</p> <p>Do they test for bacteria and viruses? Yes.  Instead of culturing blood, and risking contamination, they do a DNA screening to see if known viruses or bacteria are present and at what levels.  That is days of specialized culturing thrown out the door and the most definitive way to find a pathogen, via its DNA, put in its place. At some point my guess is that they will be able to give you your entire genome so that physicians can quickly see what medical conditions you might be susceptible to via your genetic profile.  The cost of a full genomic work up has been dropping drastically, and making it an everyday test done in hours, not days, would begin to change the course of medicine as diseases can be cross-referenced with genetic background and statistical results derived from it.</p> <p>Even with Moore's Law slowing due to the fact that physics at the atomic level limits the size of processors, the ability to multiply what a processor does increases computing power per die for production.  Once some of this technology goes off patent, or once competition with alternative and faster ways gets into play, the cost of the tests will go down, the rate to get results will speed up and the size of the sample will decrease.  Give it two cycles of Moore's Law and the microengineering to get a 'lab on a chip' and you will begin to see the first generation of full spectrum blood sampling devices as something that becomes available in nearly every store.  Put in a few more cycles of Moore's Law and that then becomes a device you buy to add to your cellphone.  Cross that with the X-Prize for a non-invasive tricorder and you have Dr. McCoy's minimal test tricorder.</p> <p>Time for something like this to get off the drawing board?  Less than a decade.</p> <p>What is the basis for Larry Niven's device in the Known Space stories called an Autodoc (a capsule you rest in that does full medical procedures from a simple blood test and manicure to setting bones and treating cancer, or replacing organs or limbs)?  A full spectrum blood test.  As results are processed faster and cross-indexed with diseases, pathogens, and genetic background plus having a 360 degree body scan to see what is wrong with you, then the basis for the Autodoc appears.  The blood test is key as it is the basis of so much of modern medicine that it isn't funny.  As of today the first piece of the Autodoc is being worked on, although not as an Autodoc but as a way to get small blood samples to yield up information that used to take racks of vials to get.</p> <p>This sort of technology is no longer a question of 'if' but of 'when' and 'how soon will it get here'.</p> <p>Our health care system is on the verge of disappearing as we know it, with its high overhead bureaucracy, within 20 years.  Possibly within 10.</p> <p>What will you do when you are given the freedom of having all of that medical knowledge on the cheap about yourself and then able to have a doctor step you through the beginning of understanding just what is in your body and how you can deal with it effectively?  Why would you want 'insurance' when you are in control of your medical life in an absolute way that is at once low cost and easy to do?  The power to control you begins to evaporate with low cost, effective blood testing that breaks the old system at its foundations.  How long will it take to do simple genomic cross-indexing of inherited conditions?  I'm guessing less than a decade, but certainly in that 20 year time horizon.</p> <p>And what happens when governments try to take this away from stores, doctors and you?</p> <p>That is an obvious power grab directly against you, the individual, to put a bureaucrat in control of your life and death.  Yet it will be cheap and easy to snub these control monsters.  Will you dare to be free of them?</p> <p>This is just one disruptive technology.  Others are here and just being perfected.  Still more are coming from the horizon at a high rate of speed.  If you want to know why those wishing to dissolve your personality, your bonds to your country and your fellow citizens, are so desperate it is this: the future is arriving far faster than it can ever be controlled.  Governments are ill suited to coping and understanding what this means.  Individuals, however, are very able to do so as they do not have the burdens of collective stupidity and bureaucracy to hamper them.  And those who will benefit most are the poor, who do not need this controlled for them to get a good price as it already comes with a low price tag.  What happens when the poor are set free of the clutches of those wishing to control them?  Will they quake in fear of freedom or just shake their head at those who seek control and let them know that their day is over?</p> <p>Change is here, but it isn't the one that the controllers hoped for.  Quite the opposite as this kind of change is their deadly enemy.</p> <p>Welcome to the future.</p> <p>I embrace it with open arms while those who seek control yell in fear of it.</p> <p>Oh, happy day.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-20345466835955866822014-02-03T18:49:00.001-05:002014-02-03T18:49:16.505-05:00One interesting stat from early modern England<p>This is one of those times where a single statistic can open up a wealth of insight, and yet it does not come from our present but our past.  This one is coming from the <a href="http://oyc.yale.edu/courses">Open Yale courses</a>, which are freely available for viewing and have some of the most interesting professors that can have a wealth of information.  The stat comes from the <a href="http://oyc.yale.edu/history/hist-251">HIST 251: Early Modern England</a> which covers the time period of the late 16th century to the early 18th century and is presented by Professor Keith E. Wrightson.  To understand the transformation of England during this period it is necessary to see where it started from circa Henry VII, just before all the major changes in England took place.  I've been watching these with my lady and our side conversations tend to make the simple presentation quite long as it is necessary to pause the presentation so we can discuss material.  Thus the insight comes from that discussion.</p> <p>In the mid- to late-16th century there was a relatively stable social stratification that has the Nobility at the top, the Gentry of landed estates and 'gentle birth' next, then the Yeomen class who were not of 'gentle birth' and tended to be well considered in towns and cities running trades and businesses (as well as some farms which was necessary for the era, the Craftsmen and those earning a living via craft work, and then gradations through the poor end of the spectrum which ends in Unskilled Labor.  The Clergy are considered separate (remember pre-Henry VIII) and while they can have power, it is not by lineage (as in the Nobility and Gentry) but by appointment to position (such as Bishop or Arch Bishop) by the Pope.  Literacy was low outside of those who could afford such education or that required it for daily operation (like the Clergy).  Schooling was done at home and as soon as children could contribute in any way to a household, they did so via work, first at home and then, if coming from a poorer family, by paying a Master Craftsman to take on a boy as an apprentice or by going to a household to work in any of a variety of tasks for a one year term.</p> <p>This society can be characterized as stratified and one in which survival at all but the upper ranks of society is a constant pre-occupation.  Mercantile capitalism tends to fall in to the Yeomanry and Craftsman realms of society, and while the Yeomanry were socially limited they could earn quite a lot of money and purchase land from plying business trades.  Across all strata of the non-Clergy is one particularly interesting phenomena and the statistic of interest: marriage tended to be put off until the early- to mid- 20's.  This was done because establishing a new household is a costly affair (even for the rich) and must be done with much due consideration.  At the upper ranks of society choices in one's class were limited, and matches between young men and women could take time but also required agreement between families.  Sliding down into the Gentry, Yeomanry and Craftsman realms of society, men and women had a bit more in the way of choices and leeway, but parental and family consent made marriage a multi-lateral agreement in which any single party could hold a veto.  This sort of concern lessened going down to the lowest levels of society, where there was a lot more freedom for couples, agreement tended to be limited to parents, but start-up costs of a new household was high in proportion to the income of the poor.</p> <p>From that this society can be said to have a high overhead cost of maintenance to it: it costs a lot of time as well as funds to get a household going.  Child birth, statistically, would happen within 18 months of marriage and then be a cyclic affair every 2 or 3 years of the woman's childbearing years.  Added to this was the high rate of infant mortality, endemic diseases, pandemics of plague, plus the normal assort of death by accidents, and life expectancy, while better than in Neolithic times, tended to be in the mid-30's with rare individuals surviving past 60.</p> <p>Why is this interesting?</p> <p>My lady was startled because of the American experience with families up to the early 20th century: large families with marriage happening in the late Teens.  Many marriage laws for what society would consider 'children' today included age of consent down to 12 in some States.</p> <p>There are important changes by the start of the 19th century for Americans, but the life expectancy had not increased much over the 16th century, and while the Industrial Revolution would begin to transform America after the 1820's, American family size continued to be large even with advances in medicine, public sanitation and better diet.  Taking these factors into consideration, there is one other major factor that is encountered in the US that sets it apart from its Early Modern English forbearers in the 16th century: it is a society of not much in the way of 'classes' and it is one with a low overhead for maintenance.</p> <p>The first is relatively self-explanatory, and while there were major land and slave holders in the Southern States (an equivalent of the Gentry class circa 16th century England)  and huge differences between those living in cities and those in rural areas, these are not largely different from the share-cropper system and differences between city and rural folk of the 16th century.  Without the rest of the class structure to burden the system and plenty of wilderness to settle in what happened is that the Americans of the early 19th century gained a definition that stuck until the early 20th century: a Frontier Culture.</p> <p>By now, of course, this has interrupted all viewing of the course as this is a vital topic but approached in an oblique way.  There are large differences between a 'Settled' culture and a 'Frontier' culture, most of which revolve around the cost of maintenance of the infrastructure necessary to sustain the culture.  It is difficult to think of Early Modern England as a 'settled culture' but it has natural geographic limits to it, even when you consider Great Britain or the UK as a whole: these are islands and have definite boundaries and no frontiers.  Once an island has undergone initial exploration and settling, that is it for new resources and to get claimed land one must purchase it, which requires capital.  If you live in a town or city you can rent space, of course, but in the villages and household settings to have a new household requires land either by purchase or lease, and then a home on it.  There are many records in England from the late 16th century onwards, which allows us to glimpse a bit of everyday life via the records of deaths and coroner's inquests.  Prof. Wrightson recounts the death of one young woman who was working as a servant in a household who, at her death, had a total of 3 Pounds, 3 cows, and a chest containing items of clothing, bedding, bowl, spoon and the like.  Indeed an average of all deaths can actually yield that individuals owned perhaps as many as 25 to 35 items, total upon death.  The savings of a young woman was that of hoping to find a husband, marry, and establish a household amongst the poorer ranks of society.  She was already bringing something to the table for a marriage: she was gathering necessary overhead capital and goods for the start of a future household.</p> <p>This is a stark contrast to the American Frontier experience that included clearing land, marrying early, and settling that cleared land for little to no overhead cost beyond sweat equity.  Raw materials were readily available, land was anywhere from free to cheap (compared to Early Modern England, at least), and the idea of 'go forth and multiply' was something that was held near and dear to the heart in reverence to God.</p> <p>What is the condition of America today?</p> <p>Settled.</p> <p>It has a high overhead cost of maintenance to start a household.  Even with politicians distorting lending markets no end, the cost of starting a household is high.  Those that learn the Trades in America, today, actually have a low overhead cost from education: there is less burden on them and a trade craft repays the cost of education in it quickly.  A distorted market in 'Higher Education' arising from the 'good deed'  in the GI Bill post-WWII flooded colleges and universities with people which then changed the requirements in the marketplace for what is a 'minimum necessary education'.  That 'Higher Education' no longer repays itself and is a debt burden to those who go through such education and have no useful job skills at the end of it.  It is a high cost that must be paid down before starting a family.  The result?  The age of marriage has increased, couples expect both parties to bring something to the new household, children are put off for a period of time after marriage, on average and yes there are exceptions to this just as there were in Early Modern England of the 16th century.</p> <p>At the lowest end of the economic spectrum there is a payment of funds from tax receipts (or in added debt) to the poor to 'care for women and children' who happen to have children out of wedlock.  Women get payments based on number of children and husbands are no longer required to get support: government has taken on that role.  The result is a liquidation of the once solid poor family structure that was purposefully uprooted during the 'Urban Renewal' that started with the Truman Administration and the movement of poor families from homes they owned to tenements they rented from under the 'Great Society' programs.  Add in payments based on childbirth to women who are not required to be married and have a stable family situation, and you liquidate the foundations of the stable culture that was once a part of the urban landscape prior to the 1950's.  Although a Nation in which by any objective standard pre-1940 there is no poverty, at all, we still have the strange belief that the poor are a condition of poverty.  And yet the poor are always with us, as being poor is part of the condition of individuals within mankind.  </p> <p>Poverty, as such, was transitional in America where anyone could aspire to be a 'rags to riches' story and maybe end up in the Middle Class or at least better off than one's parents in material goods and security.  What there also used to be was no support system for the rich who failed: you could go from rags to riches to rags and cycle back and forth between them.  The establishment of regulatory regimes to allow failing concerns to remain open (and even get direct government help via taxpayer funds) means that those who make poor decisions under those regulatory regimes no longer fail and they no longer succeed, either.  They become zombie concerns depending on the lifeblood of taxpayer funds and supported regulatory regimes to survive and exist.  Any comparisons between this and later English companies supported by the Crown and later found to be bankrupt is purely coincidental with the Modern England.  In the Early Modern England there was too much upheaval to allow for such things.</p> <p>Thus there are similarities of type between the US of 2014 and mid- to late-16th century England, but not of kind.  There are entirely different sets of overhead concerns for starting a household, and yet they arise for the same reason of being in a settled and geographically limited society.  The Old West in America is just that: the historical Old West.  And while there are still unsettled lands in the US, no one can rightly call them a Frontier in the expansive way of the early 19th century.  Yes Alaska is still nasty, has a low population level and if you can gather the overhead costs to establish yourself there, it has a frontier-like feel to it.  Social stratification becomes more apparent in the modern US but not due to the gentleness of birth but the connectedness to corrupt government and those that serve and service its corruption.  Just as in Early Modern England this is not a stable situation.</p> <p>The result in Early Modern England was the Industrial Revolution and the great colonization effort that spanned the globe.</p> <p>America, today, is at the cusp of a similar sort of transformation, as well.  It is not a dour and bleak totalitarian one, that is if we don't work to counter it.  No, it is one that also had an antecedent in Early Modern England: a New Frontier.</p> <p>America has tested its endless expanse and now is home to many private concerns that dream big dreams of endless expanses of territory and wealth to be made.  It can't be made just by the rich or even with robotic systems, as those are fragile to this new and hostile wilderness.  And in this wilderness children will learn from the earliest of ages how to survive, what to do and not to do, and the rest of 'education' as we know it will be geared to those concerns first and foremost.</p> <p>What happened when the English had access to new territories?  Some people were banished to them.  Others fled to them because of the freedom they offered for a new life at great risk.  They were Frontiers.  No social stratification.  Relatively low cost of overhead compared to what was left behind. Great and terrible risk to eke out a new life together with those who also decided that this was better than being settled.  Vast populations from Scotland, Ireland, Germany, Poland, Scandinavia, Spain, Italy... they followed when the cost of transportation to the Frontier was cheap enough to escape the settled lands of their old homes.</p> <p>As I've said before and say again: there isn't anything so wrong with America that a New Frontier will not cure.</p> <p>Freedom and Independence will beckon to us, to all mankind.</p> <p>No one from the time of Henry VII could have seen the rapid changes that would follow his death.</p> <p>And we can compress those massive changes of centuries down to decades, and no totalitarian power will be able to stop it once the flood gates open.</p> <p>All we must do is curtail the grasp of tyranny in the present, hold it off by all means possible, and a New Frontier will open to us.  Like Early Modern England seemed a strange place to look for such transformation in its stratified ways and settled lands, so, too, does America look like a strange place to expect the push for a New Frontier.  Yet Early Modern England was pre-adapted to such things by its history and America, along with a few other Nations, is pre-adapted to Frontier culture by its cultural heritage.  </p> <p>It is easy to fight tyranny in space: open an airlock.  Nature plays no favorites, but you can.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-38311052887920956762014-01-08T08:20:00.000-05:002014-01-08T08:20:22.407-05:00Why modern education isn't<p>Now open your books, class...</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Laurentius_de_Voltolina_001.jpg" target="_blank"><img title="Laurentius_de_Voltolina_001" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Laurentius_de_Voltolina_001" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-wzE7Hyags10/UssoCZLNh5I/AAAAAAAABzI/dTDKXxuomv0/Laurentius_de_Voltolina_001%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="194" /></a>Image Courtesy: Wikipedia</p> <p>That is a picture of a late 14th century classroom at the University of Bologna.</p> <p><a href="http://www.medievalists.net/2011/08/27/medieval-university/"><img title="353px-Meeting_of_doctors_at_the_university_of_Paris" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="353px-Meeting_of_doctors_at_the_university_of_Paris" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-dU2aHejdkgI/UssoDIbv99I/AAAAAAAABzQ/ri_RTA5zr7Q/353px-Meeting_of_doctors_at_the_university_of_Paris%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="142" height="240" /></a></p> <p align="center">Image Courtesy: medievalists.net</p> <p>That is a meeting at the University of Paris in the Middle Ages.</p> <p><a href="http://www.binghamton.edu/cbasm/"><img title="University of Binghamton_newlanding" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="University of Binghamton_newlanding" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-wAjuD3O6lOs/UssoDnf1IVI/AAAAAAAABzY/CaGRLTLCuW4/University%252520of%252520Binghamton_newlanding%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="129" /></a></p> <p align="center">Image Courtesy: SUNY at Binghamton</p> <p>And here is a modern counter-part, circa early 21st century, Binghamton, NY.</p> <p>What made the University in its modern form?</p> <p>Books.</p> <p>Lack, thereof.</p> <p>The modern university of having a teacher or professor or doctor or priest sitting in a central position of power and students looking to that individual for wisdom was necessary back in 1350 as moveable type hadn't been invented yet.  Books were scarce, rarely printed, and quite often hand copied.  Thus the best way to disseminate knowledge was to have someone who had time to read lots of books on a subject teach students from a curriculum that was dutifully, or not so dutifully, copied down in the form of notes.  If you had to really know what was in the book you could go to the library and, if you were lucky, they actually had a copy of it available.  Getting to read it was a matter of bureaucracy.</p> <p>Even with moveable type books were still expensive but at least somewhat available... in the library... to read.</p> <p>The availability of books for private libraries and at home did take a while to get into gear, and was mostly something for the rich and well off up to the late 19th century to early 20th century, where books were still cherished in poor families.  By the post-WWII era, books were readily available as forms of modern printing and the cost/benefit ratio of long press runs took over, and soon you had salesmen hawking the Encyclopedia Britannica in the new suburban neighborhoods.  It wasn't alone, of course, and the book store, once something that only those with a scholarly or Bohemian lifestyle went to, were soon in strip malls.</p> <p>Yet the entire educational system still depended on 'experts' to present pre-digested 'material' for students to copy down.  Mind you mass-media was now available and out in semi-rural Western NY, out in pine tree and cow country, our black and white TV got Sunrise Semester where, in the early, pre-dawn hours, one could tune in to a course being presented on TV for that semester and do course-work by mail.</p> <p>Amazing!</p> <p>Revolutionary!</p> <p>It went nowhere, of course, as those big palaces of learning had political clout, alumni, professors and buildings, all of which needed grease of the monetary variety to function.  And if you didn't like the public schools, well, you just weren't 'modern'.</p> <p>For that you have to go back to late 15th and early 16th century and Martin Luther who wanted everyone to learn to read so they could read the Bible on their own.  In their own language.  This concept was expanded upon by Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827) and <a href="http://jhpestalozzi.org/">the web site dedicated to his contribution</a> gives a list of the things he wanted put in place for what we would call 'Primary Education':</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">Pestalozzi’s approach has had massive influence on education, for example, his influence, as well as his relevance to education today, is clear in the importance now put on:</font></p> <ul> <li><font color="#0000ff">The interests and needs of the child</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">A child-centred rather than teacher-centred approach to teaching</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Active rather than passive participation in the learning experience <br />The freedom of the child based on his or her natural development balanced with the self-discipline to function well as an individual and in society</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">The child having direct experience of the world and the use of natural objects in teaching</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">The use of the senses in training pupils in observation and judgement</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Cooperation between the school and the home and between parents and teachers <br />The importance of an all-round education – an education of the head, the heart and the hands, but which is led by the heart</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">The use of systemised subjects of instruction, which are also carefully graduated and illustrated</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Learning which is cross-curricular and includes a varied school life</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Education which puts emphasis on how things are taught as well as what is taught</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Authority based on love, not fear</font> </li> <li><font color="#0000ff">Teacher training</font> </li> </ul> <p><font color="#0000ff">Pestalozzi’s influence over the spirit, the methods and the theory of education has continued into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and most of his principles have been assimilated into the modern system of education.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>And by 1900 you got schools that look like this...</p> <p><a href="http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/sub_image.cfm?image_id=1600"><img title="bpk 20.012.125" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="bpk 20.012.125" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-7uKvdslGLXQ/Uss8oysOPOI/AAAAAAAABzo/wfohptlfNf0/20012125-copy%25255B5%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="173" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo Courtesy: GHDI</p> <p>Oh, wait, that is a factory at AEG in Germany at the turn of last century!  So sorry!</p> <p><a href="http://www.1900s.org.uk/1900s-schools-classrooms.htm"><img title="tiered-classroom" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="tiered-classroom" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-yla5YPPel9k/Uss8pQVwKSI/AAAAAAAABzs/A-r3sk2Na9w/tiered-classroom%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="177" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo Courtesy: 1900s.uk.org</p> <p>There you go!  Rank upon rank of students at desks all doing the same tasks... I mean that is so different from an industrial facility, isn't it?  And that is so very different than the University!  I mean, you have... individual desks, no wait, that was there in Bologna... students writing notes on the topic, no wait, they were doing that in Bologna, too.  Hmmm...are we <em>sure</em> the production line wasn't invented in Bologna?</p> <p>At least today is so different!</p> <p><a href="http://www.examiner.com/article/5-things-parents-should-know-about-kindergarten"><img title="5277d3ad6e79a98d3a2b1a1b7ecffca4" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="5277d3ad6e79a98d3a2b1a1b7ecffca4" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-UZ1xLvHd7vU/Uss8p2cQSvI/AAAAAAAABz0/Ocbk74qEbfA/5277d3ad6e79a98d3a2b1a1b7ecffca4%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="160" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo Courtesy: LA Childhood Education Examiner</p> <p>I mean here the students can also push their desks together!  And learn the same thing... at their desks... at the same time...</p> <p>Growing up with this sort of system, I never realized just how antiquated it was, even while I was just auditing college courses on Sunrise Semester.  When I was 6? 7 perhaps?  Definitely less than 10 years old.  The New Media of that era of the late 1960's to early 1970's was television, a one to many media that should function very well as an immediate replacement for that 14th century institution known as the 'Educational System', with bells and whistles like Kindergarten added in by the Germans.</p> <p>And yet the US came into the late 19th and early 2oth century with a different sort of teaching environment.</p> <p><a href="http://willcountynews.blogspot.com/2010/10/will-county-history.html"><img title="oldsch" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="oldsch" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6tWOXc6uIpc/Uss8qNJHRfI/AAAAAAAAB0A/J_r9-ZWUEaE/oldsch%25255B4%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="173" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo Courtesy: Will County News blog</p> <p>That is a one room schoolhouse, a place where children of both genders and different ages all learn in the same environment.  By the time of that image in 1938 there was some segregation by age.</p> <p><a href="http://education14.blogspot.com/2008/11/xv-political-influences.html"><img title="One-Room Schoolhouse" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="One-Room Schoolhouse" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-N7T8I68TMHM/Uss8qtEHgPI/AAAAAAAAB0E/sb6mlYO95D4/One-Room%252520Schoolhouse%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="193" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo Courtesy: education14 blog</p> <p>Yet a generation prior to that, this was not the case.  That idea of systematized learning also meant segregation not just by subject, but by age, and the requirement for specialized teachers not only by subject but by age range.  The education profession was turning into a reflection of the work environment, to some degree, but was also becoming a sort of guild system which had decided that further employment of its system required further specialization.  And yet the topics involved for reading, writing, math and even basic history, are ones that are amenable to distinction within a heterogeneous but delimited age range, say 6 to 18 years old.  </p> <p>In a one room schoolhouse such instruction was mandatory due to the variety of ages coming to the school and the limited time to teach a subject.  Thus a subject was taught as a multi-level form of instruction in which basic facts could be provided and expanded upon in a fashion to suit the learning capacities not just by age but by individual.  This gave children a wider exposure to a given subject and a chance to pick up advanced learning at a young age.  Older students get a refresher and some new material, while younger students get more than they can handle so they have to learn just what it is that they will have to handle.  Simultaneously and in different subjects all by one individual leading the students.</p> <p>That is teaching.</p> <p>Talking on a single subject and having student writing down notes, that is instruction, and a largely passive affair.  This has been the case since the start of the modern University as seen in places like Bologna and what we have to day is an relic form of institution trapped in the old system that was driven by a lack of ready material in the form of ink printed on paper and bound into codices.</p> <p>Today the world does not have a problem of ready material availability and, in the advanced post-industrial revolution Nations, a lack of access to them.  Quite the contrary the classical works are now available, by and large, for free via digital means which should be a great boon to education across all of mankind.  Yet the classification by subject and learning level for a cohort of homogeneous age students is not compatible with this ready availability.  Indeed no instructor in any subject, save for a few of the actual hard sciences, can be said to have any idea of the extent of their subject or be so well versed in it as to encompass its modern size.  </p> <p>It is true that subjects that start in the Ancient Classical period and going through the Reformation, Peace of Westphalia, Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment era of the 19th century are relatively staid historical subjects.  These subjects serve as the basis for all later education in ALL FIELDS from views on religion and morality through what Nations are through economics through the hard sciences and into the requirement of personal ethics that upholds a given moral code and structure for the basis of individual freedom.  And here is the solution to basic education in these areas: record them at multiple current schools, digitize the lectures, hyperlink ideas together via topic, and formulate a program of self-instruction on them by individuals with actual written tests without access to anything but written source materials in hard copy format to demonstrate individual knowledge and fluency on topics.  This would be a self-paced, age independent system so that individuals could learn at the pace they wished to learn at and only if they see a requirement for demonstration of such knowledge need they ever be tested on it.</p> <p>Getting to 20th century topics would also require such fluency and background, but the educational materials for them would not be limited by any means.  Demonstration of knowledge of the basis for these ideas and how they came to be is a touchstone demonstration of knowledge.  Just as being able to master the tools and concepts of welding, machining, and creation of materials via additive processes, there is a requirement that someone who actually knows how to do these things certifies that a student also knows them so, too, would the requirement for understanding economics, morality, the moral basis for ethics, physics, chemistry, biology, or any other subject useful for a career require the demonstration of being able to think independently without aid of any device save hard copy source material and marginal notes.  </p> <p>These are mental tools that have direct applicability and requirements of mastery to them which can be tested in an age heterogeneous environment where there is no limit to re-taking such tests (albeit a small fee might be involved) and that could be sent to any three individuals with certified mastery of such knowledge up to that level,  and graded separately.  This would give the person seeking education feedback from three individuals with varying background and insights, and while passing an exam faults and flaws in everything from syntax to logic structure, along with historical accuracy would be given.  For the topical sciences the divorce of the hard sciences from the rest of post-Enlightenment topics would only come at the specialization level after demonstrating a knowledge of the basis for a given topical science and ability to do lab work in them, both held in equal proportion as science is as much about understanding a topic as testing it via lab experimentation.  Thus the basis for the sciences and their connections to the each other and to the world they worked in, historically, would be a major factor in understanding the place of the sciences in everyday life and have a requirement that anyone wishing to understand that place must also understand the method of experimentation and the moral and ethical basis for it.</p> <p>Such testing isn't just written on many topics, but is also conversational: being able to demonstrate an immediate ability to reason through new topics on the spur of the moment is something we only do at the Graduate School level for individual topics, but are something that form each of us as individuals in our lives.  Being able to hold a discussion on, say, the basis for the Nation and what the function of a State is will vary across periods from Ancient Classical all the way to the modern age, but the groundwork for that reasoning is one that is historical and requires historical knowledge to make an informed decision.  Just as modern understanding of quantum theory rests on electromagnetic theory, and that, in turn, has links forward to relativity and backwards to Newtonian physics, the ability to discuss that as a topic in its modern realm requires a basis of understanding of its history and why the questions we ask today come about.  In attempting to divorce history from our modern lives, to seek to disconnect the modern State from our historical and cultural understanding of it, is a disservice to all men just as trying to disconnect biology and human experimentation from morality and the duty of citizens to practice their ethics on a known moral code in service to their fellow man both lead to ruin of not just Nations and societies, but mass slaughter of individuals.  Without a historical understanding of the present, the future is one of horror.  A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but none is fatal.</p> <p>If we are to take <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Burke_%28science_historian%29">James Burke</a> of <em><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connections_%28TV_series%29">Connections</a></em> fame to heart then the basis for understanding our role as individuals in a complex world is to understand the basis for how our complex world came about.  Education, then, is no longer something limited by age, by class, by gender or by any other category we impose on humanity: it is for everyone at all ages at all times of their lives from the moment that cognitive thought first starts to the last thoughts of those at the end of their lives.  Fluency in the range of topics to address the modern world should have, however, no requirement that people learn them via an enforced educational system that relied on a lack of source material availability to require such things as Universities and, later, schools.  Jobs have requirements to them, and learning the basics of reading, writing, logic, basic four function mathematics, reasoning, syntax, spelling at a fluency and daily use level may have some age determinants in them, but even those can be highly automated via pre-recorded instruction that would serve as the basis for entry to taking further examinations to demonstrate skill and mastery of a topic later.  Many jobs, however, have only the need for basic mastery of material to them and while some might class these jobs as 'low' they are only low in their demonstrated skill requirement: people hauling trash make a good living doing so and those paid a pittance for doing manual labor for farming can still get a good life from doing so.</p> <p>The entrance to higher capability in any field is a demonstrated ability to master topics and expand mental capacity so as to properly understand how a given area of knowledge fits in with all other areas of knowledge to create a complex web of knowledge that goes back and forth in history.  A concentration in a given topic can go far with just a little auxiliary knowledge in broader topic ranges, right up to the point where you question the morality of research and the ethics of doing certain kinds of research, at which point all those minor entrances into the other topics that allowed for a concentration in a given field must come into play and an individual put in the time and effort to learn what the moral basis for society and freedom are, and what their ethical obligation is to such a society actually is.  </p> <p>All bureaucrats should have this as part of their essential 'must know' category of knowledge as it is the functionaries of the State that perform acts upon their fellow man and that can, indeed in our era must, contain a full and broad understanding of what society is, where our source of freedom and rights come from and the obligation of the individual in service to the State to not perform acts of immorality upon others as an ethical obligation to themselves, their society, their fellow man and the State they have created.</p> <p>There is no Royal Road to education.</p> <p>Our current formulation has run into the 21st century which is now set to sweep away all systems based on limitation of access to materials be they mental or durable goods, and bring a new age of humankind into being based on what we know of ourselves to be as individuals in Nature who are obligated to its laws and as individuals granted access to a moral code that seeks to engender liberty for each man without coercion upon him to think like anyone else.  You cannot get that through the University system, the current education system, or the current systems supporting them which are now failing in this modern era and have been failing ever since the first one-to-many forms of broadcast became available.  Our society upgraded the tools it has to learn but has not applied them for the utility of each individual.  That era is now ending not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up.  </p> <p>I have already seen schools built in the post-WWII era turned into office space after being sold by their districts.  And I've seen entire cities crumbling because a way of life that was thought to be perpetual was so rooted in place that it required vast amounts of revenue to keep a dead way of life going as a veneer on the physical plant of the city itself.  The answer is not to throw more money into these institutions which have failed in critical ways to adapt and adopt to the 20th century, not to speak of the 19th and 18th century.  They were not even appropriate to the 20th century to say nothing of the 21st.  It is time we change our view of education from the warehousing of pre-teen and teenagers to the development of knowledge and skills that can be demonstrated by each and every individual if that is their desire.  Education must no longer be enclosed by brick walls and attempted to be walled off within our minds to institutions, but opened up as a conception that is held by each of us who are eternally students and, in our turn, practitioners of those things we sought to embed in mere material structures.  That, of course, will shake us all up as to what it means to have a job, when it is appropriate to have a job and how betterment of oneself is in one's own hands and not enforced by a bureaucracy that, in seeking to do 'good', walls us off from the eternal good of self-education and reasoning.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-86638956448738965882014-01-01T00:01:00.000-05:002014-01-01T00:01:01.958-05:00Recovery<p>A personal retrospective on my physical well-being.</p> <p>I hope to get some more normal posts up, but such is life.</p> <p>Late in 2004 I began a trip into a land of darkness where my mind was slowly losing track of work and I was beginning to feel exhausted beyond anything I had experienced in my life before that.  With that also came a lack of awareness of these things and the simple and all too human attempt to rationalize these sensations.  Being made senseless and having one's mind dimmed when aided and abetted by rationalization meant that things that should have alerted me to my dire straights were passed off... until my body forced the issue by giving me a cataleptic attack while driving.  No accident resulted, but that warned me that something truly serious was going on, even through the mists of my befuddled state of mind and being, which was turning into a strange place where being awake and being asleep meant little difference at all.</p> <p>By 2005 I just wanted to know what was causing these attacks and if they could be dealt with, and the list of tests I went through was long and deep.  The only change had been in a standard medication, one of the statins, and when my endocrinologist heard the symptoms he took me off them, but the damage had been done and worse was to come after that until the full extent of it was finally reached.  My brain had the normal attributes of someone a good 20 years older than my physical age, and yet that was not a natural thing.  Narcoleptic conditions run in the male side of my family and I had thought I had escaped them as they have two general periods of onset: up to teenage years and then again in one's 60's.  Well, my brain had reached that magic age, I guess, just decades ahead of schedule.</p> <p>Climbing out of that pit meant trying to get my thought structure back together as it had been shattered and eroded by this condition.  I had become a creature of willpower alone, determined not to let this be the end of my life.  The hardest work in my life would not be physical, would not be trying to write great pieces of fiction or histories to last the ages, but to merely scrape back a formulation of my thoughts out of a land between waking and dreaming and back, fully, into the land of the waking and living.  We take the fact that we think for granted, at least most people do, but somewhere within my psycho-dynamic toolkit there is a repair kit that allowed me to begin the hard work of reconstructing my mental capabilities to get some thinking capacity up and running again.</p> <p>Those dark days are dealt with in my early blogging, which take place after the internal collapse of my mental structure, diagnosis and the first medications to deal with the actual phenomena.  There is no magic pill to rejuvenate the mind, as yet, to repair damage and to regain lost capacity.  Maybe we shall have that in some future, but until that point one is stuck with the old fashioned way of hard work.  I set myself some tasks to exercise my mind: learn some rudiments of Javascript, find out just what terrorism is (not the talking around it to attempt to call it something else, but its actual being as an activity) and then to learn connectivity structures based on Person-to-Person systems which are the basis for so much of human life that it pervades the far reaches of the horrific and the criminal realms.  For, as my Uncle Joe used to say disparagingly of so many corporate and government affairs, 'it isn't what you know, its who you know'.</p> <p>Thus diagnosis was done by others, but I was willing to go through just about any test they cared to put me through, and I would hazard a good couple of hundred of vials of blood were taken to that end.  I have a long, long, long list of things I don't have and for that I am very thankful, indeed!  I will give the Sherlock Holmes method of scratching off stuff from a list and whatever you are left with is what it is a hat tip: it works.  Unfortunately it is the brute force method of logic, and I prefer inductive reasoning of 'this is the only thing that fits to make the entire thing work' sort of approach to the list scratching business.  As I have learned, that is a bent of mind that one must have by some means other than education as no one can teach you how to take a look at a whole thing and then see where something is missing and say what it is.</p> <p>Countering the effects of the problem, although not the problem itself, came next.  I was a Type 1 diabetic before this happened and can tell you that dealing with a problem is not the same as curing it.  For all the advances in genetics, biology, biochemistry, and 3D structural analysis of molecules and how they interact, plus the human genome, a simple auto-immune disease dating back into the far reaches of human ancestry is still beyond modern medicine to cure.  Somehow every promising approach is thwarted by it.  Yet one gains a toolkit of mental requirements to deal with such a problem on a daily basis and that means I had one available for yet another problem that has no cure.  We know that there are cases of spontaneous remission of Type 1 diabetes after about 20 years of having it: the poor immune system just gets tired of fighting that part of the body and natural regeneration takes place for islet cells.  That I still have the condition points to an immune system that is still misdoing its job!  Now I also get to take medications that modern medical science can say what its structure is, but has no real idea of how it works.</p> <p>There are times when I suspect the strain of being known as Witch Doctor is still with us to this day. 'What is it, what does it do?' you ask and the response is 'Dunno, it just works, take it.'</p> <p>I am not nor ever have been impressed by degrees sitting up on a wall.</p> <p>Doctors are still practicing medicine.  They need more practice, less overhead, please, as the practice still is not perfected.</p> <p>Now all of this research, fiddling with code, playing with stuff got me to firearms as there was a warning bell going off in my head circa 2007.  A good year before the elections, hell before there were candidates, some part of me was saying: Prepare For No Good Shall Come Of This.  I took NRA training to ensure that I properly understood function and safety of firearms, plus only rudimentary cleaning... there needs to be a real course on that, not just gunsmithing but just 'how the hell do you clean this piece of Swiss watchmaking called a gun?' sort of course.  And I like older firearms, so drift punches, springs, and scouring around for parts became a ready past-time.  All of this is DIY in the firearms community, and the modern arms are much, much simpler to work with than much of the older stuff until you get back to the bolt action rifle: those are, at least, pretty simple to understand.</p> <p>My goal was to next find out what sort of useful skills I had or could gain, and I'm still on that path today.  Firearms leads to stocks made of wood and that means wood finishing.  In my family lineage is woodworking going back at least a couple of generations, and I had not only shop class but a father who did cabinetry in his spare time.  That means I had some of the old 'young shop assistant' sort of deal going on, although not a lot of it, enough to get me familiar with the tools of the trade.</p> <p>Building back stamina became the major goal as of 2009-10 and woodworking, well once you start using the manual tools you now have a major way to utilize physical capacity and measure endurance, now, don't you?  Even on the power tool side, the lifting and toting of boards, planks, and other less savory bits of trees can get you all sorts of exercise, especially if you have a small shop and need to set up and break down the power tools so that you can have access to the rest of the shop when you aren't using them.</p> <p>Up until the past few weeks here has been the deal: 1 day of a few hours of work, 2 days of recovery.  Doesn't matter if the day is woodworking, shopping, or whatever, either.  On rare times I could string a couple of days together and then need additional down time to recover.  That was getting me to an even keel, but the boat still had water up to the gunwales and I was bailing as fast as I could.  Stamina was not returning but I at least could keep what I had.</p> <p>About a month ago I talked with my neurologist who told me that there are some preliminary longitudinal studies that indicate that for diabetics in Japan and Germany (two populations with a major concern over the disorder by genetic causation) that the use of a CPAP helps to lower the HbA1c (a basal blood glucose reading that you strive to get to 7% as a diabetic) by a full 1%.  That is an eye-opener, to be sure.  A real eye-opener as a CPAP improves flow of air to the lungs while sleeping.  I had tried a CPAP before as there were indications of some marginal sleep problems, and they continue to be marginal and the neurologist doesn't know what to make of the actual readings as they aren't showing a disorder but something else going on... but that a CPAP might help that and the the cause to actually get one.</p> <p>Done!</p> <p>The prior CPAP device made my sleep worse, not better.</p> <p>There have been improvements over the last 6-7 years, not grand ones but gradual ones, to the point where I can actually tolerate the device, more or less.</p> <p>It will take some months of use to see what it does for that long term basal blood glucose reading.</p> <p>A more immediate effect is to get lots of oxygen into my system at night and well distributed through my body.  I do wake up logy, no two ways about it: it is the sleep of someone who has worked themselves to exhaustion.  I knew what that felt like, back before 2004.  It is the sleep that when you wake up you just had no idea of how tired you actually were.  Apparently I need that sort of sleep.</p> <p>From that sleep I now have better and larger amounts of physical energy and mental awareness longer into the day and even into the evening.  I can accomplish a lot more with the energy once I get the logy feeling out of the system.  Learning to hand plane maple that has just been skip planed is really hard work, let me tell you.  Yet I haven't been tempted to power tools (although I have a planing jig for a router) because it just feels good to be able to put some actual physical capacity into the work.  For a few hours at a stretch.  So now I can have sore muscles when I wake up!  This is a good thing.</p> <p>The next step of the recovery is actually reversing not just the effects of one of my major conditions, but the thing, itself.  Those require an actual, functioning medical system in which trying to redistribute wealth and making everyone sicker in the name of 'health insurance' is not the goal.  That is an enemy to actual scientific advancement.  Strange that the most backward looking people are now on the political Left: they are starting to sound like the old fogies who just want to do things the same, tired old way that doesn't work well because that is all they know and will tell you about how righteous it is to do things the broken, tired, old way.  Yet the 21st century isn't going to wait for them to catch up, and no matter how much kicking, screaming, and theft under the guise of 'doing good' goes on, this century is set to steamroller the prior 3,000 years of advancement with changes that seemed impossible just a decade ago.  Be it the first formulation for a warp drive or getting to the bounds of computer capacity and then leapfrogging that with quantum computing or finding out that the ways to deal with disorders and diseases isn't to just ameliorate the effects but treat the damned things with some skill ('what does this drug actually do?' 'I dunno, it just works') and get the idea of practice out of the way or education that is self-performed via online systems of study that can't be categorized but can be tested as to skill, knowledge and capacity to utilize it... everything, and I do mean everything, that has been the foundation for the modern world is about to undergo a sea change that will make the Industrial Revolution seem like something for children.</p> <p>Thus my goal is to survive the current bout of MegaStupidity via Centralized Insanity of Government and get to this new age of Individual Freedom and Liberty writ large.</p> <p>As has been my threat: the more I recover, the less I will be posting.</p> <p>I hate repeating myself and that is mostly what I would be doing to no good effect.</p> <p>I need to recover so I can join this up and coming age of wonder.</p> <p>The age of Back to Basics, DIY and reaching for the stars and getting off this damned starter home of a planet.</p> <p>And I hope you will join me.</p> <p>For we are better than the old 20th century has led us to think.</p> <p>And governing is the problem, and government is not the solution.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-49522980376045377092013-12-09T11:38:00.001-05:002013-12-09T11:38:57.226-05:00In the workshop–router table<p>My main project for the past year has been working on a router table for my workshop.  I don't have much time to do such work and things that take me well nigh forever would take someone who was relatively healthy a much, much shorter period of time.  Also my general lack of skills also has something to do with this, and I took up making a router table as a skill teaching project for myself, and for that it was worthwhile even if the result was failure.  Yes failure is always an option, and to combat it the idea with limited time is to set minor goals one can achieve in a short period of time.  Bit by bit you move forward and at the end, if you played your cards right, you get something half-way useful.</p> <p>Works, too!</p> <p>So with no further fanfare, I'll start in on the thing, itself.  No images are color corrected, btw, and the overhead lights don't give a visible yellow cast to things, but that is the way stuff in the distance gets without color correction.  As an example the Incra tracks are an orange-gold color, not that weird yellow green.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-NvZS6Fq7HDs/UqXx7RBHZPI/AAAAAAAABws/FzEk48kwIWU/s1600-h/Router_Table-001%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-001" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-001" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-nc0fxHEDyqY/UqXx8BHZCBI/AAAAAAAABw0/VeZ-5qHv0kc/Router_Table-001_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-1688JUR1g3A/UqXx88bDg1I/AAAAAAAABw8/30H0c3EZyHs/s1600-h/Router_Table-008%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-008" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-008" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-l73w2YzTWWI/UqXx9hr0snI/AAAAAAAABxE/pVtvQgCt39w/Router_Table-008_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>This is the front end view, or the business end of things.  My first decision a few years ago was to get a <a href="http://veritastools.com/Home.aspx">Veritas</a> router table plate from <a href="http://www.leevalley.com/US/Home.aspx">Lee Valley Tools</a>.  I did that because I needed more work surface than your standard router table plate inset into a basic benchtop router table.  My main point of dissatisfaction with a benchtop system is that it couldn't easily handle long  pieces of material: they are great for smaller pieces, but the moment you get to 2x the width and active work portion of it, then you have a problem of actually getting a piece to stay flat to the table.  What I wanted was a system that could deal with that problem by having a larger work surface, and a couple of inches here and there get doubled and the pieces get slightly bigger.  Still the Veritas surface, even with a couple of inches extra, and lovely steel plate with which to use rare earth magnets to hold pieces down, needed some more space.  To get more space means a longer dimension and then pick up the outfeed of longer pieces on something else.</p> <p>That set up the parameters of being 34" high to use my workbench for outfeed, or manipulating larger pieces, and having a long dimension in which I could shift the fence system around and use that long dimension.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-00S7hnn8tEQ/UqXx-ZcJeQI/AAAAAAAABxM/tpwqBBF5o9E/s1600-h/Router_Table-003%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-003" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-003" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-3FGQMzBmB_I/UqXx_brP5gI/AAAAAAAABxU/n8y0HUD4yc8/Router_Table-003_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-EIfb8_Xby9A/UqXyACOUIoI/AAAAAAAABxc/QPaJ0FxFN9U/s1600-h/Router_Table-002%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-002" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-002" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-RO2ej9vkqDk/UqXyA7YnyEI/AAAAAAAABxk/l7kCoXz72JM/Router_Table-002_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-sv6QaIFvsPE/UqXyB8wstGI/AAAAAAAABxs/21fQFghlT10/s1600-h/Router_Table-009%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-009" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-009" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-1KyBZ5JZUdc/UqXyCudxsLI/AAAAAAAABx0/bt7uW-I7Tzw/Router_Table-009_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>With the trim and such I have 48" of space for active use, and nearly 50" overall long.  Two <a href="http://www.incrementaltools.com/">Incra</a> T-Tracks with measuring tape pieces are on the major sides starting up at the miter slot and going to the end of the table.  Internally there are some regular old aluminum T-Tracks that I got from <a href="http://www.orangealuminum.com/">Orange Aluminum</a>.  </p> <p>Just under the top on the right side is a large drawer, which I'm using to hold all my 10" saw blades, and on each side is a small circular saw till for the 7 1/2" blades and one of my dado sets.  Saw tills are tilt out, not pull out drawers.</p> <p>The side exteriors have a 4" dust collection blast gate which is currently serviced by a Ridgid shop vac.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-IH-xhQFw7d0/UqXyDe4UyuI/AAAAAAAABx8/2NVPnzn3lko/s1600-h/Router_Table-006%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-006" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-006" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-EC_YPt6c92k/UqXyD4Mc8JI/AAAAAAAAByA/E4xc4pMgMbw/Router_Table-006_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-rwTX-co_W2I/UqXyEuz72fI/AAAAAAAAByM/OOEficTMwA0/s1600-h/Router_Table-005%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-005" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-005" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-UOniWoWjLfM/UqXyFDadpdI/AAAAAAAAByU/Nm-YG3Satuo/Router_Table-005_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>Now I have finally gotten the shop vac out of the way of the rest of the shop and centralized it.  It is still easy to get out and use on its own when that is necessary, like for outdoor cleanout tasks.  This met the requirement for having the shop vac stowed away to where it would have some standardized fittings to it, so that it would be easy to set up between multiple pieces of equipment.  Any future machining pieces will have a 4" blast gate at the same height so that it can be easily attached to an ad hoc collection arrangement.  I don't have the space necessary for a dedicated system, and this will do nicely until then.  Also I can fit a portable dust collector I have to this system and take the vac out and put in a blast gate on its side, so that an actual 4" system can run through all of this.  That portable system is loud and really needs to be run outdoors or with something between it and the shop environment.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-fmU7nbP5Cuw/UqXyF7y6VcI/AAAAAAAAByc/42w7Ds8LYcc/s1600-h/Router_Table-004%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-004" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-004" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-_vLwfaUEpL0/UqXyGe_wAvI/AAAAAAAAByk/S3XYV5k1hjw/Router_Table-004_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>All of this gets powered up from the rear with two inlets for 120v AC.  Internally it is wired with 14 ga. Romex or equivalent and I ran it all through the 'can I power it all up and have no shorts?' phase of things while the top was still off.</p> <p>Note that the entire affair is on casters with brakes on the corners and one in the center to support the bottom of the table so that it doesn't sag. This is a 'must have' necessity of any pieces of shop machine equipment from this point out until such time as living environment allows for a real shop to be put in place.  With that said it is damn handy to be able to wheel heavy equipment around, and anything made out of nearly 5 sheets of 3/4" Baltic Birch plywood is to be considered a bit on the heavy side.</p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-vfFyAbfr4zY/UqXyHeZiUZI/AAAAAAAABys/oOXNbvHDVIs/s1600-h/Router_Table-007%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Router_Table-007" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Router_Table-007" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-PyJfDDn5yHo/UqXyHyQRFSI/AAAAAAAABy0/-M2MwlWCAR8/Router_Table-007_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>At the front again, the controls on the left are for one of the internal outlets (it is a duplex with the connector between outlets removed) and I have some LED strip lights to put in yet which will be run off the left side switch panel.  Also on the left is the shop vac outlet switch.  On the right is a standard 15A machine switch to run the Hitachi M12V2 router I picked up reconditioned from <a href="http://bigskytool.com/">Big Sky Tool</a> and they did a great job of getting the missing couple of pieces from my router that were supposed to be with it, and are one of the few places I could find that had such a router available at a price I could afford.</p> <p>On the left and right are drawers running approx. 17" and 3" across, which is handy for putting small parts into.  I have to see if tins from mints can fit in them as handy organizers.  Right now they have my miscellaneous jig pieces, router bits and whatever else belongs with a router or jig work.  The bottom drawer contains all the other router stuff and over-size bits, plus any of the excess stuff necessary for the table or making jigs.  One of the great positives of having that huge expanse in the rear of the table is being able to put Incra jigs on it, and I'll be starting out with a very basic positioner type and seeing how well it can integrate with the Veritas fence.</p> <p>One thing I've noticed is that the T-slot nuts I get from Lee Valley will work in either the Veritas or Incra equipment, but the Incra nuts only work with their own equipment.  In theory each of these is using standardized slots, but in practice they are not using standardized fittings.  Go figure.</p> <p>One additional piece to add to this will be a car jack with one of those circular cups made of plastic.  That I will put under the router and use for gross positioning of it, because trying to get the elevation right by lifting it by hand is a PITA.  Time to repurpose one of the jacks I got for squaring up the refrigerator and freezer and pray I never need it for that again.</p> <p>Also to be done are light door catches for the side doors, and for those small rare earth magnets should fit the bill.  That front door was made out of ripped trim pieces... am I the only one to have thin ripped hardwood tend to warp?  In any event, all of that was given a temporary glue-up, then glued to plexiglass and the thing warped to the slight warping of the trim pieces.  I had always thought I would use a hasp or small cylinder lock on the door, but it would be unsightly if the top and bottom were pulling away.  The answer is to 1/2" cylinder x 1/2" long rare earth magnets (with something like 35 lb. pull apiece) on the interior frame corners and then two 3/4" nominal square pieces of 28 ga. galvanized sheet steel glued to where they can't be seen from the front.  Works like a charm!</p> <p>Other than that the basics are 5 sheets of 24"x48" Baltic Birch ply from <a href="http://www.rockler.com/">Rockler</a>, plus a couple of sheets of 1/4" ply from them, and then Padauk cut to size, ripped and mitered at the corner (and the fit is not so hot, but the benefit of not gluing the in is that I can always replace them), plus some 3/4" square nominal Padauk for the corners (dowel top and bottom), and 1/4" thin rip 15/16" Padauk for the lower trim.  Mostly that was done for looks, but also it hands me a clamping surface on the top which is needed for jigs. </p> <p>Originally I had ideas of making the entire thing knockdown and if I sacrifice the lower trim, it still can be.  The top, however, is totally removable and separate from the router plate support system which has all the drawers in the front in it.  This means that if the top gets totally ruined, it can be replaced completely as nothing is attached to it.  At one point I had ideas of putting a set of heavy duty chest hinges in the back which would allow the entire top to swivel up like a car hood... but the thing was already complex enough that I didn't want to do that once I realized that the tills would have to go or be seriously downsized or a major tray put in on the top which would replace the drawer and tills.</p> <p>Hardware I got from all over with a lot coming from <a href="http://www.dlawlesshardware.com/">D. Lawless Hardware</a>, but other pieces are coming from Lee Valley and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/">Amazon</a>.  And about a zillion other places I've scrounged parts from... I have a long list of hardware suppliers from the absolutely modern to the 'if it has to be stock period Victorian, we got the knob for you!' sort of place.  Mostly I went cheap on the knobs and handles, but the concealed Soss hinges are a nice touch for the doors even if they are a PITA to install.  </p> <p>I make no money, get no benefit and no perks from any place I link to – I am just a customer. YMMV.</p> <p>Basically the table is in the 98 to 99% stage, lacking the LEDs (which I need to splice some wires together to let them fit) and magnet catches.</p> <p>I finished it with walnut oil (1:4 limonene for a couple of coats, then progressive 1:3, 1:2 and 1:1) and have used an equal portion by volume of beeswax and carnauba wax (90/10), linseed oil (not boiled) with just a bit of leftover walnut and tung, plus limonene.  If you don't need the wax finish all that quickly, just put the limonene (or turpentine if you use that) together with the beeswax in a sealed glass jar (like a mason jar) and set it on shelf that gets sunlight for a week, and it should be dissolved.  I used wax flakes and did a basic 'shake the hell out of it' dissolving, left it sealed in a jar in a warm room for a few weeks and then finally had to use a double boiler, and to do the final dissolving and add the oils.  A fun note is that by basic volume you get a soft wax suitable for rubbing on surfaces, if you do it by weight, you get a hard wax suitable for your tools.  Too much air in wax flakes to do it properly by volume, but it makes for a great wax to rub on, like I did with the surface of the router table.  I have one batch of wax with just linseed oil and a bit of lavender oil (like a quarter teaspoon to a cup of linseed oil), and need to find someone who has lost their sense of smell to pawn it off on as a furniture wax.</p> <p>The limonene I got as 'technical grade' from someplace on Ebay, and it is derived from oranges.  My prior stuff was from limes.  When I use the waxes as a finish it smells like I've just made some tea... and when I applied the walnut with limonene, it smells like a salad dressing.    Limonene is your turpentine replacement and it is used in shampoos, cosmetics, and as a sort of universal solvent for all things sticky.  Use just as turpentine, and while it is nice you still need heavy ventilation...non-toxic doesn't mean it won't give you a headache.</p> <p>The trim is done in super blonde shellac that I got from <a href="http://www.shellacshack.com/">Shellac Shack</a> and with just one 2# cut coating using a French padding technique, and it came out just fine.  Padauk has a lot of natural oil in it and I really can't see wanting to try and mess up the character of the wood by an oil finish.  Only two coats and then a bit of final rubbing out to cut the luster of the shellac and I have zero complaints on that.  A router table finished that you can eat off of if you had to, but I wouldn't recommend it.</p> <p>Currently doing some of the minor tasks that got put aside for this.</p> <p>Nearly done with a <a href="http://oneway.ca/">Oneway</a> grinding/sharpening/honing jig for my 6" DeWalt bench grinder.  Simple compared to a router table.</p> <p>Next up will probably be a toolchest/workstation/shelving unit for all the major tools that need a real home (like my bench planes and hand saws) and it must conform to the 34" height requirement.</p> <p>A real benchtop for a set of rivet shelves/workstation has to be done, as well, and that will probably be a rip and glue up sort of deal, with lots of planing and sanding at the end of it.  I got in a couple of small 8/4 Maple slabs to cut the ends for such a thing, but the ripping of other woods will be the major chore.</p> <p>General tool storage is a big headache and that really should be in boxes, so that is on the agenda at some point.  Custom boxes.</p> <p>A miter saw station (mobile) to conform to 34" standard and dust collection standard.</p> <p>I would love to get the contractor table saw down to 34", but see no way to do that with its current stand.  Although I tend to use that outdoors, if it had a proper dust collection system for all the stuff that doesn't go down its exhaust, that would be splendid... no way to cut the noise, though.</p> <p>Then on the household end a Queen size loft bed would be great to get floor space back in an upper room, but that is looking to be a 'purchase' option rather than hand-made custom option, save for creating a lower interior sewing and computer space under the bed.</p> <p>A gun display case, not that I have that much to display, but it's the principle of the thing.</p> <p>All of this should go so much faster with a router table.</p> <p>In theory, at least.</p> <p>Practice is something else, again.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-58382731011914695752013-12-01T07:08:00.001-05:002013-12-01T07:08:23.878-05:00The play's the thing<p>Normally I don't do much in the way of examining plays, opera or the like, which is not to say that I haven't been to same and enjoyed them, but my ability to actually find a production that I might like and one that  I could physically attend are limited.  Generally my television watching has tended away from the norm and went to science fiction and some fantasy series, and since my troubles I've shifted from those to the so-called 'reality ' programs all of which center around small businesses.  My viewing habits have changed radically due to those programs and a subscription to Amazon Prime and owning a Roku box.  At some point I can see a massive paradigm shift in television programming where what you watch will be directly supported by you for programs that you want to see.  The concept of ala carte television, that is picking and choosing just channels you want and ditching the rest, is something that should have happened with the advent of cable television.  Unfortunately those local monopolies acted like monopolies and gave you 500 channels of which you maybe watch something from 3 or 4.  Today I have no idea how many channels are offered by the semi-competitive subscriber based system I'm on, probably a couple of thousand when you include HD channels, and out of all of those I watch stuff from maybe 5 or 6 channels.  More specifically I watch just a few series on those channels and ignore most everything else.  With Amazon Prime I can now find programs that are offered for no charge with the Prime subscription and that has meant finding presentations from television and films that I would normally not run across.  Needless to say about 98% of that is stuff I'm not interested in.  This is, of course, just a variation on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_Law">Sturgeon's Law</a>, and that is a handy thing to keep in mind when you approach any information, program, film, novel, short story... if you see a vast warehouse of material in front of you 90% of it is crud.</p> <p>Of the non-crud based stuff I've run across is a set of specials from PBS, which I don't watch, looking at the historical roots of Shakespeare's plays.  Knowing a bit of history of England and being able to see what changes were made for the information to be presented as plays is fascinating.  So is the work by the actors who have just come off a particular play or are heading towards one, or who have a background in the works in part or in whole.  In particular looking at <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00B9S3OA0/ref=dv_dp_ep3">Richard II</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00B9S37PC/ref=dv_dp_ep4">Henry IV/Henry V</a> was most interesting as there are so many different aspects of history that have a vital role to play in the background of that entire set of transitions between Kings.  For all the liberties taken by Shakespeare in presentation, what we get is a view of the history that was known in that period and can examine some of what was known then that may not be that interesting to the modern viewer of the works.  Yet it is not those works that are the most intriguing, but possibly the most famous play by Shakespeare which is <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BDLR882/ref=dv_dp_ep5">Hamlet</a>.</p> <p>Knowing science fiction and fantasy and seeing the strong parallels drawn by authors on historical material and then presenting new material within a future or fantasy framework means that as a reader and viewer there are different ways to present material that may not be all that obvious to the average viewer.  With that said I have no strong background in all the historical productions of Shakespeare's works, so I may just be treading on an old idea, but it is new to me and a lot of fun to play with.  For me the main aspect of the play, that of the psychological development of Hamlet, is one that has been done so well, so many times, that it is hard to see how one could improve on it for an actor or director: what we have are flourishes, some modern interpretations, and a few changes in scenes that are modern in circumstance to fit what we know or think we know about human psychology.  The fantastical element of the play is limited to just those four appearances by the late King who is known in the play as 'Ghost'.</p> <p>Here is one of the key elements that really struck me: the pact with the Ghost.  It is a simple one, actually, given what goes on in the play, and I'll take it from Act I, Scene V (and I'll use <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1524">this copy</a> from the Gutenberg Project):</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Ghost. <br />Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ham. <br />Murder!</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ghost. <br />Murder most foul, as in the best it is; <br />But this most foul, strange, and unnatural.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Ham. <br />Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift <br />As meditation or the thoughts of love, <br />May sweep to my revenge.</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Ghost. <br />I find thee apt; <br /></strong>And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed <br />That rots itself in ease on Lethe wharf, <br />Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear. <br />'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard, <br />A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark <br />Is by a forged process of my death <br />Rankly abus'd; but know, thou noble youth, <br />The serpent that did sting thy father's life <br />Now wears his crown.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>A simple enough proposition, really, and it is the driving force behind the entire play.  Yet do consider that Hamlet has made a pact with his father's ghost, and the ghost has also told us just prior to this of its limitations:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ghost. <br />I am thy father's spirit; <br /><strong>Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night, <br />And for the day confin'd to wastein fires</strong>, <br />Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature <br />Are burnt and purg'd away. <strong>But that I am forbid <br />To tell the secrets of my prison-house</strong>,</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Strange that he is forbidden to tell of his after-life prison while just having told us of essential information of it.  Still the logic holds that at night it may roam and during day it is confined to wasting fires.  So those are the basic rules of it and on that hinges a view of the play based on the soliloquies of Hamlet which are internal monologues spoken out loud so that the audience can know what a character is thinking.  Thus a retelling centered on the pact and the soliloquies becomes a vital part of a review of the play, itself.  By putting the center on the pact, and what is the normal outcomes of such pacts in other works, we can come to a different telling in which the Ghost may make its presence felt beyond just the four scenes.</p> <p>As was mentioned in the episode there have been productions in which there is no actor playing the Ghost, presumably with someone out of sight giving the lines to which Hamlet responds.  The audience is then left to decide if Hamlet is going slowly insane or if he can just see the Ghost and the audience can't.  Either way it is an effective staging for the play and allows for a view of Hamlet the Prince that you don't get with the physical presence of the Ghost.  My thought was that the best way to stage the play was to take advantage of some of those soliloquies that seem to have an internal structure in which Hamlet is speaking and then answers himself.  Thus to properly set the stage for a modern production with the Ghost as absent is to have the actor playing Hamlet record the lines of the Ghost with a somewhat lower pitch to them, as his father is usually depicted as not a frail old man but a sturdy man in his middle age.</p> <p>With that established in opening scenes the actor who is playing Hamlet the Prince can now utilize the voice of his father in those spoken internal monologues and even in some of the directly spoken dialogue.  In fact it is the latter when speaking with the Players in Act II, Scene II when speaking in the AEneas' tale to Dido:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">  'The rugged Pyrrhus,—he whose sable arms, <br />   Black as his purpose, did the night resemble <br />   When he lay couched in the ominous horse,— <br />   Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd <br />   With heraldry more dismal; head to foot <br />   Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd <br />   With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, <br />   Bak'd and impasted with the parching streets, <br />   That lend a tyrannous and a damned light <br />   To their vile murders: roasted in wrath and fire, <br />   And thus o'ersized with coagulate gore, <br />   With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus <br />   Old grandsire Priam seeks.'</font></p> </blockquote> <p>That all done in the somewhat lower voice of his father which would be scene appropriate for Hamlet to speak in a voice of a character in a play.  It would be somewhat unnerving to Polonius, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, perhaps, but would they truly recognize the voice of the late King transfigured through Hamlet?</p> <p>Then the soliloquy just after and I will use bold to indicate the shift in voice from Hamlet to his father:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ham. <br />Ay, so, God b' wi' ye! <br />Now I am alone. <br />O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I! <br />Is it not monstrous that this player here, <br />But in a fiction, in a dream of passion, <br />Could force his soul so to his own conceit <br />That from her working all his visage wan'd; <br />Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect, <br />A broken voice, and his whole function suiting <br />With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing! <br />For Hecuba? <br /><strong>What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba, <br />That he should weep for her? What would he do, <br />Had he the motive and the cue for passion <br />That I have? He would drown the stage with tears <br />And cleave the general ear with horrid speech; <br />Make mad the guilty, and appal the free; <br />Confound the ignorant, and amaze, indeed, <br />The very faculties of eyes and ears. <br /></strong>Yet I, <br />A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak, <br />Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause, <br />And can say nothing; no, not for a king <br />Upon whose property and most dear life <br />A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward? <br />Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across? <br />Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face? <br />Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat <br />As deep as to the lungs? who does me this, ha? <br />'Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot be <br />But I am pigeon-liver'd, and lack gall <br />To make oppression bitter; or ere this <br />I should have fatted all the region kites <br />With this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain! <br />Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain! <br />O, vengeance! <br />Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave, <br />That I, the son of a dear father murder'd, <br />Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell, <br />Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words <br />And fall a-cursing like a very drab, <br />A scullion! <br /><strong>Fie upon't! foh!—</strong>About, my brain! <strong>I have heard <br />That guilty creatures, sitting at a play, <br />Have by the very cunning of the scene <br />Been struck so to the soul that presently <br />They have proclaim'd their malefactions; <br />For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak <br />With most miraculous organ, </strong>I'll have these players <br />Play something like the murder of my father <br />Before mine uncle: I'll observe his looks; <br />I'll tent him to the quick: if he but blench, <br />I know my course. The spirit that I have seen <br />May be the devil: and the devil hath power <br />To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps <br />Out of my weakness and my melancholy,— <br />As he is very potent with such spirits,— <br />Abuses me to damn me: I'll have grounds <br />More relative than this.—<strong>the play's the thing <br />Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.</strong></font></p> </blockquote> <p>With Hamlet there is internal structure to his thoughts that are both question and response, and even he realizes that the thoughts in his own head now settle within him to begin the process of answering to him.  With his father now an active voice there is an active role for him in the play beyond mere Ghost as he speaks to his son within his own thoughts.  Indeed for what is Hamlet but the man who would be King if all had taken its natural course?  This is something that Claudius knows and fears, and takes active steps to counter in the play, itself.  Yet Hamlet's father existed in a court where there was intrigue and Hamlet is no stranger to it, but how does one deal with such intrigue when it is pointed at oneself and has already taken his skilled father?  It would not be surprising to hear Hamlet begin to grow into the role of not just a revenging son, not just a Prince revenging his King, but as the Prince who is heir to the throne of Denmark beginning to grow out of the shell of being the young Prince.  Yet this is not Henry IV, where the son has support from a somewhat errant older fellow, but a young man who is possessed of revenge and who has revenge possessing him.  Staged like this we not only get the tormented problems of Hamlet, but also his father being in the torment with him: being there with his son is to be in the wasting fires.</p> <p>The Ghost has powers not granted to the living and has already warned Hamlet about certain things, the main one is not to confront his mother.  What the Ghost can see is a future for Hamlet and is trying to find that path which will lead to the fruition of the plan and save his son, both at the same time.  Yet he can not be the one to exact the actual revenge and must have his son do it for him.  This is torment to him, the warrior king reduced to spirit in torment that must have revenge upon his slayer by the only one who would do so.  Would he not exercise any of that to be with his son as much as able to try and help him through this deed which is a revenge murder, not something done in the heat of battle?  It is the necessity of being a King to have unpleasant tasks that must be done by the King and King alone, not one that you can hand off to an underling so sensitive is its nature.  His son steps into the den where knives aplenty are turned against him and where even small pieces of advice could mean the difference between success and failure if his son but has the wits and reason to listen to the inner responses to his inner questions.  In most normal 20th century staging this is something that Hamlet must grope towards, but in such a staging as this Hamlet is guided to be that one that will exact revenge not only for his father but with some help from him, as well.  Thus this requires that the scenes be played as true to original as possible, and to strip out the 20th century Freudian conception and to turn Hamlet into someone who will start the process of revenge in a cold and calculating manner.</p> <p>And yet he gets the singular opportunity to end this all after the staged play with King Claudius in prayers.  Yet, in the witching hour at night, is the prime time for the Ghost and this is when the internal monologue allows this viewpoint to come forward:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ham. <br />Now might I do it pat, now he is praying; <br />And now I'll do't;—<strong>and so he goes to heaven; <br />And so am I reveng'd.—that would be scann'd</strong>: <br />A villain kills my father; and for that, <br />I, his sole son, do this same villain send <br /><strong>To heaven. <br /></strong>O, this is hire and salary, not revenge. <br />He took my father grossly, full of bread; <br />With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May; <br />And how his audit stands, who knows save heaven? <br />But in our circumstance and course of thought, <br />'Tis heavy with him: and am I, then, reveng'd, <br />To take him in the purging of his soul, <br />When he is fit and season'd for his passage? <br /><strong>No. <br /></strong>Up, sword, and know thou a more horrid hent: <br /><strong>When he is drunk asleep; or in his rage; <br />Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed; <br />At gaming, swearing; or about some act <br />That has no relish of salvation in't;— <br />Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven; <br />And that his soul may be as damn'd and black <br />As hell, whereto it goes</strong>. My mother stays: <br />This physic but prolongs thy sickly days.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>This is the heart of the Ghost guidance staging: the one who points out that this is not success but grossest failure is Hamlet's father.  Revenge, you see, is a dish best served cold when one of treachery is not prepared to meet his maker but, instead, finds his death at the hands of his un-maker to bring justice to one who can place himself above normal justice.  And, really, are not these parts highlighted those of someone else speaking within Hamlet as part of the question and response that makes up Hamlet's thoughts?  Revenge can only served hot if it means justice in disposition, when there is reward to the one who has betrayed and wronged, then there is no justice at all.</p> <p>At this point when Hamlet confronts his mother the idea of it happening in a space off the bedroom where personal business is transacted, letters written and talking with close friends done, one where he is coming into being as a person of revenge.  Instead of the heated bedroom romp that it was changed into during the 1920's, it becomes a focal point of coldness and Hamlet has gotten a bit too far in the role of avenging son.  A Queen has maidservants, ladies in waiting and others of the Chambers who would normally assist her and be there, but in the private Closet there is supposed to be no one who shouldn't be there.  Mind you in the heat of the moment he has forgotten his own father's warning about doing this: thus not only trying on the role of avenging son but the heat of lost opportunity drive him.  </p> <p>Killing Polonius is, however, something that would be true to form for a Prince who is seeking privacy with his mother in the one place in a castle that should be private to them both.  Save for the King, of course.  For Hamlet this is not just the heat of missed opportunity but operational security and removing a listener who is a spy.  Actually that is relatively chilling and the King takes it that way as Hamlet wanted to be private with his mother and that meant no one else was to be there: not even him.  Still that gets a bit ahead of the story and what Hamlet does next, with his mother having to sit still on her chair, is listen to her son... with a corpse and, as we see later, the Ghost of Hamlet's father:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Queen. <br />What have I done, that thou dar'st wag thy tongue <br />In noise so rude against me?</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ham. <br />Such an act <br />That blurs the grace and blush of modesty; <br />Calls virtue hypocrite; takes off the rose <br />From the fair forehead of an innocent love, <br />And sets a blister there; makes marriage-vows <br />As false as dicers' oaths: O, such a deed <br />As from the body of contraction plucks <br />The very soul, and sweet religion makes <br />A rhapsody of words: heaven's face doth glow; <br />Yea, this solidity and compound mass, <br />With tristful visage, as against the doom, <br />Is thought-sick at the act.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>One can picture Hamlet ticking off on his fingers: an act that blurs, calls virtue hypocrite, takes the rose of innocent love and sets a blister there, makes false marriage vows, such a deed rips the soul from the body against all religion.  Point by point he tells his mother of the case against her.  This is not the stuff of running around a bedroom, but of a judge speaking a verdict and going through the particulars in a cold, matter of fact manner that chills one to their bones.</p> <p>This makes the visitation when Hamlet is disobeying his father to see his mother to be all the more important, not less, as he utilizes the deep power of the witching hour to try and set Hamlet's course straight by a direct appearance:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ham. <br />Do you not come your tardy son to chide, <br />That, laps'd in time and passion, lets go by <br />The important acting of your dread command? <br />O, say!</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Ghost. <br />Do not forget. <strong>This visitation <br />Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose. <br /></strong>But, look, amazement on thy mother sits: <br />O, step between her and her fighting soul,— <br />Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works,— <br />Speak to her, Hamlet.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Of course this can be staged as all the prior visitations of the Ghost in this staging so that it is the recorded voice of the actor played off-stage.  The added bonus is that the one who has blunted the purpose is not Hamlet, directly, but Hamlet following the internal voice of his father.  It becomes a long list of particulars this accessory to regicide business, and Hamlet gets into it pretty deeply. But raging against the Queen is revenge and hatred somewhat misplaced as she did not do the dirty deed of killing King.  </p> <p>This is why the Ghost warned Hamlet against such a meeting as it was sure to get emotional in some way, although not by the form we have come to expect in a modern staging of the play, to be sure, the confrontation is still there and extreme in its character.  The Ghost knew what it meant to kill in cold blood, it was a pretty nasty era to live in, after all, and you didn't get to the top without some large amount of bloodshed going along with it.  To do the necessary work Hamlet must now be pulled back from the brink of talking himself into killing his mother and, perhaps, starting a murderous rampage that would not properly get the King as he has too many guards.  That is the wisdom the Ghost brings in the play as it is, but in this sort of telling it becomes something quite other.</p> <p>Throughout the rest of the play when there is an internal monologue or the time where Hamlet appears to reached a decision, the voice of his father would be used.  In time, as we no longer see the Ghost, the actor might, by the end, be speaking in his father's voice entirely and be the Prince prepared for the tasks of a King, even recognizing that if his own life is forfeit to the task, it must be done well or not at all.</p> <p>This gives rise to a very subtle and yet potent variation of this staging, and one that plays into the heart of revenging the spirit of the dead.  It hinges on exactly what has gone on in all the regular presentations of the play in the form of the Ghost.  The Ghost is seen by others, or can be seen by others, but that is selective by the Ghost as witness in Act III, Scene V which up to the 20th century has traditionally taken place in the Queen's Closet which was a personal office.  Now if that is the case then the Ghost can also appear only to the audience and not to any of the other actors as a silent and on-stage  presence.  </p> <p>That, in itself, would be a bit creepy.</p> <p>What would be even more disturbing would be that at those points as I've previously outlined, instead of having the actor change his intonation of voice without his father present, would be for his father to lay a hand on his shoulder for each of those parts and for the actor to come to resolve in his own voice.  Here the guidance is direct and the audience is allowed to see the full activity of the Ghost throughout the entire play.  Castle Elsinore is the wasting fire and having to be there and during most times be unable to do much and only guide the thoughts of his son when there is opportunity would be further torment to him.  With such staging would come the actor playing Hamlet to have the voice of manhood as guided by his father, so that when conclusion comes to internal thoughts it is the learning of Hamlet of what to do in his position with so many hostile people around him.</p> <p>It seems such an obvious way to stage the play that it must have been done before.  But this is not the pre-Freudian nor post-Freudian way of doing it, of course, and staged like this it would have a deep impact on any audience of any era.  Once the mother fascination is removed and Hamlet becomes dedicated to the deed of revenge, he is no longer that young man who is seeking to get himself up to the task, but one who has help to work through these questions as they are ones which not only plagued that era but all eras.  Which is why I'm sure that this is not new to me as it could have been done at any time since the first staging of the play.</p> <p>Hamlet as the instrument of revenge is not done by a relatively unsettled spirit, but by one who has compassion and wisdom of experience: he was a King, after all, and the ways of being a King did not leave him.  He truly does want his son to succeed not just in the deed, but as a man and to take the throne as the rightful Heir.  His son needs seasoning, however, beyond just warfare and going after bandits and such, but to deal with the intrigue of the Court when it is running cold and villainous.  The Ghost was the man who failed at that, and he can see the many paths his son might take that lead to ruin of him as a kinslayer and Kingslayer will have few compunctions about removing the rest of the prior royal line.  While Hamlet is 'of age' and a true young man, he doesn't have that necessary depth of understanding to deal with all aspects of intrigue within the Palace walls.  He has experienced it, yes, but when a child largely protected from it and as a young man kept from it in many ways, but poor Yorick needs to be kept buried and Hamlet to deal with life and death, both after having his father slain.  And yet in the famous soliloquy there is this:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">...</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">But that the dread of something after death,— <br />The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn <br />No traveller returns,</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">...</font></p> </blockquote> <p>But that is not the case with Hamlet, now, is it?</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-73583386871396497532013-11-01T17:13:00.001-04:002013-11-01T17:13:09.905-04:00Evils of government<p>Examining the Declaration of Independence past the famous opening lines shows a type of society that is unique amongst mankind.  It is a society that is tolerant of much in the way of government abuse and over-reach and yet one that has its limits and will, in the end, push back against that government which has over-reached itself in regards to the individuals in society and society itself.</p> <p>The pertinent text is as follows and I'm using the site <a href="http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/freedom/doi/text.html">Early America</a> for this:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.<strong> Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.</strong> --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>One cannot find such ideas in, say, Italy or Spain, nor in Greece nor Germany, but only in the English tradition.  England is that place which has multiple roots and the name, itself, Angla-Land comes from the Angles who settled the Island along with the Saxons.  Together these Norse peoples, originally from Denmark, created a society that had fused with the local culture so as to form a new society, as I described in <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2012/10/roots-of-constitutional-government.html">Roots of Constitutional Government</a>.  With the formation of England under King Alfred the Great also came the recording of these people's history so that they could know the events of their own past and that was recorded in multiple versions of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Saxon_Chronicle"><em>The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle</em></a>.  Together the local versions of the Chronicle form the historical understanding of a people up to the Norman Conquest, which would be the third and last major Norse infusion of people and culture into England (original Anglo-Saxons, the victory of Canute and then of William the Conqueror).  The last brought French influence to England, but the local ruling system survived, with changes, even after that time and it was a durable system that left local nobles able to check the power of Kings who over-reached themselves.  Yet, as seen just prior to Canute's victory, it was a system in which years could go by in building pressure to bring a King's grasp under control.  That internal set of divisions did cause the loss at the Battle of Maldon, but the battle itself served as a unifying point for Anglo-Saxon culture.  By that point in time the basics of the society and how it reacted to its government were set.</p> <p>It is a society in which government over-reach is tolerated to an extent, but the more that government pushes for power over localities, the more that resistance will build.  A central conceit of Progressivism is to encroach so slowly on society with the power of government that the people are corrupted with their own funds. Just as the Declaration came out so, too, did Tom Paine's <em><a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/147">Common Sense</a></em>, in which he laid out the case for Independence.  He recorded the state of society in the colonies as follows:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">The present state of America is truly alarming to every man who is capable of reflexion. Without law, without government, without any other mode of power than what is founded on, and granted by courtesy. Held together by an unexampled concurrence of sentiment, which, is nevertheless subject to change, and which, every secret enemy is endeavouring to dissolve. <strong>Our present condition, is, Legislation without law; wisdom without a plan; a constitution without a name; and, what is strangely astonishing, perfect Independance contending for dependance.</strong> The instance is without a precedent; the case never existed before; and who can tell what may be the event? The property of no man is secure in the present unbraced system of things. <strong>The mind of the multitude is left at random, and seeing no fixed object before them, they pursue such as fancy or opinion starts. Nothing is criminal; there is no such thing as treason; wherefore, every one thinks himself at liberty to act as he pleases.</strong> The Tories dared not have assembled offensively, had they known that their lives, by that act, were forfeited to the laws of the state. A line of distinction should be drawn, between, English soldiers taken in battle, and inhabitants of America taken in arms. The first are prisoners, but the latter traitors. The one forfeits his liberty, the other his head. </font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Notwithstanding our wisdom, there is a visible feebleness in some of our proceedings which gives encouragement to dissensions. The Continental Belt is too loosely buckled. And if something is not done in time, it will be too late to do any thing, and we shall fall into a state, in which, neither RECONCILIATION nor INDEPENDANCE will be practicable.<strong> The king and his worthless adherents are got at their old game of dividing the Continent, and there are not wanting among us, Printers, who will be busy in spreading specious falsehoods.</strong> The artful and hypocritical letter which appeared a few months ago in two of the New York papers, and likewise in two others, is an evidence that there are men who want either judgment or honesty.</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>The media of old is reflected by the current media: it adheres to power, gives it succor and thinks only of itself in relation to power.  Look not for honest amongst them.</p> <p>The Declaration gives a long list of abuses and usurpations of power by the King, and that puts a final bit into place that describes the society that is forming the Declaration.  These had been going on for years, indeed well over a decade in building up to a breaking point.  It is not a society that takes umbrage quickly nor is it one that seeks to upset the applecart at the slightest excuse, but one that bides its time to judge its government and seek ways to bring it into line with society.</p> <p>To get a feel for this we can move ahead to the early part of the 20th century and to a piece by Rudyard Kipling called <em><a href="http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_beginnings.htm">The Beginnings</a></em>:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">It was not part of their blood, <br />It came to them very late <br />With long arrears to make good, <br />When the English began to hate. <br /></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">They were not easily moved, <br />They were icy-willing to wait <br />Till every count should be proved, <br />Ere the English began to hate. </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Their voices were even and low, <br />Their eyes were level and straight. <br />There was neither sign nor show, <br />When the English began to hate. </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">It was not preached to the crowd, <br />It was not taught by the State. <br />No man spoke it aloud, <br />When the English began to hate. <br /></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">It was not suddenly bred,  <br /> It will not swiftly abate, <br />Through the chill years ahead, <br />When Time shall count from the date <br />That the English began to hate.</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>Notice that those preaching hate to crowds, preaching divisiveness and utilizing government to try and stir hatred amongst the citizenry are the ones who become the target of the ire of society.  It does take a long series of abuses and usurpations leading towards despotism to cause such a culture as this to begin to hate... its government.</p> <p>And no amount of lies by the government or its media sycophants can forestall society when it finally does shift to secure its future once more.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-73106582520548599552013-10-18T14:07:00.001-04:002013-12-09T20:34:54.628-05:00Voting in the 21st century<p>The 20th century is over and it left a long, blood-stained path behind it.  Unfortunately our political class is married to it, still, and continue to campaign like the 20th century is still going on.  The politics of division such as 'The War on Women' or wanting to put a huge, government led system down for 'health care' ignore the realities of the 21st century.  These realities I've talked about before in <a href="http://Second, there are “process” moderates. These are Republicans of various ideological persuasions who understand that American institutions are designed to require compromise between three branches of government. In early October, 22 such House Republicans committed publicly to supporting a “clean resolution” – that is, to allowing an up-or-down vote on whether to reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling.">Dawn of a New Era</a>, and those drivers are the ones that are currently shifting the basis for what we know as our modern civilization.  Yet the 20th century, for all its problems, has also blessed us with an infrastructure that is vital for the immediate continuance of civilization in the 21st century: electricity, potable water, sewage systems, paved roads, airports, and a vast web of pipelines.  Without this infrastructure in all of its parts modern civilization quickly decays.  A major disruption of the pipeline system crossing the Mississippi River would cripple the entire Nation.  <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2006/06/geophysics-for-common-man-pt-2-fun.html">I outlined five major events</a> that are either cyclic (meaning they happen on a regular basis due to forces of nature) or a singular event that has its now understood predecessors so that it is not cyclic, as such, but part of an understood and ongoing process, and all will happen at some point in time to North America.</p> <p>I will add to those yet another: solar weather.  In testimony on <a href="http://www.dhs.gov/news/2012/09/12/written-testimony-nppd-house-homeland-security-subcommittee-cybersecurity">12 SEP 2012 to the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection and Security Technologies, the head of the National Protection and Programs Director</a> gave us this on the topic of solar weather:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Solar Weather is created as a result of massive explosions on the sun that may shoot radiation towards the Earth. These effects can reach the Earth in as little as eight minutes with Solar Flare X-rays or over 14 hours later with a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) plasma hurricane.<strong> An extreme CME is the Department’s biggest Solar Weather concern. It could create low-frequency EMP similar to a megaton-class nuclear HEMP detonation over the United States, which could disrupt or damage the power grid, undersea cables, and other critical infrastructures.</strong> The United States experiences many solar weather events each year, but <strong>major storms that could significantly impact today’s infrastructures are not common but have previously occurred in 1921 and 1859 and possibly in several other years prior to the establishment of the modern power grid</strong>. The U.S. Department of Energy and utility owners and operators have been focusing on potential threats and steps that utilities can take to reduce possible impacts.</font><a href="http://www.dhs.gov/news/2012/09/12/written-testimony-nppd-house-homeland-security-subcommittee-cybersecurity#fn1" name="fn6r"><sup><font color="#c0504d">6</font></sup></a><font color="#c0504d"> Work is underway in cooperation with a number of federal agencies including the: National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Nation Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), United States Geological Survey, Department of Energy, Department of Defense, and DHS with industry support and participation to <strong>ensure this threat is understood</strong>.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>The concept of 'ensuring the threat is understood' for a known threat that is understood is verbiage for 'we want to get a few bureaucrats to hold meetings and write reports that might have some conclusions in a decade'.  Just so you know what that means.</p> <p>The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1921_geomagnetic_storm">1921 storm</a> fed power into the nascent grid and took the telegraph service down with blown fuses and damaged equipment and lasted from 13-15 MAY 1921.  Over at <a href="http://www.solarstorms.org/SS1921.html">Space Weather</a> there is a somewhat longer look at the effects of the 1921 event:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">May 13, 1921 - The New York Railroad Storm - At 7:04 AM on May 15, the entire signal and switching system of the New York Central Railroad below 125th street was put out of operation, followed by a fire in the control tower at 57th Street and Park Avenue. Railroad officials formally assigned blame for a fire destroyed the Central New England Railroad station, to the aurora. <strong>Telegraph Operator Hatch said that he was actually driven away from his telegraph instrument by a flame that enveloped his switchboard and ignited the entire building</strong> at a loss of $6,000. Over seas, <strong>in Sweden a telephone station was 'burned out', and the storm interfered with telephone, telegraph and cable traffic over most of Europe</strong>. Aurora were visable in the Eastern United States, with additional reports from Pasadena California where the aurora reached zenith.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Such storms originate from a sunspot and can last for hours, days or even weeks.  They have two distinct parts to them when they happen on the orbital plane of Earth and intersect with the planet as the Sun rotates.  First is the initial wave of particles and lightweight radiation: gamma rays, x-rays, along with UV.  Transit time from the sunspot to Earth is just a bit over 8 minutes as they are going at the speed of light.  These interact with the Earth's magnetic field and are deflected by it to the north and south magnetic polar regions.  These particles give the first real taste of the storm and if it isn't much of storm that is all you will get and have some aurora effects a bit further from the poles than normal.  Larger storms send particles along that path and they also interact with the Earth's magnetic field, but due to their mass they also start to push it lower.  This brings the aurora effects to lower latitudes and can make them quite spectacular, and also bring down more in the way of heavier particles to cause secondary radiation effects when they interact with the atmosphere.</p> <p>This is the stuff that also starts to effect satellites, and if it isn't hardened against this sort of radiation that can be the end of the satellite.  The major problem with this part of the storm is first the pushing in of the magnetic field, which causes ripples that cause long wave ground currents which travel through anything conductive at or just below the Earth's surface, but then as the storm passes, the magnetic field springs back and oscillates, causing more of these currents.  How much current is induced is effected by the wavelength of the magnetic oscillation, which can induce a current down to half the wave length of the oscillation.  What this effectively does is puts a current into things like transmission wires (above and below ground) and into any pipe made of conductive material.  Thus a water system with metal pipes will have an electrical charge going through them.  </p> <p>Also power plants will have an electrical current fed into them via long-line transmission wires, usually taking out transformer stations, but those may not fail fast enough to protect the power station, itself.  Grounding out a plant does no good as the ground wire is most likely 'live' with current.  In your home if you are grounding out through water mains made of metal pipe, then you will also experience this effect, particularly if the ground wire is not going through the central fuse box or circuit breaker box.  Even killing the main switch to the grid from your home won't stop this unless the ground is centralized through there.  It is much better to have a local ground that is only a few feet long instead of one that is the equivalent of miles long.</p> <p>A solar storm like this is known as a Carrington Super Flare and one like that was responsible for the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_storm_of_1859">Solar storm of 1859</a>.  At <a href="http://www.solarstorms.org/SS1859.html">Space Weather</a> there is a collection of newspaper articles and I'll give a few excerpts to give an idea of what this sort of ground current means:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">Singular Effect of the Uarora Borealis on the Telegraph Wires. New York. August 29, The Superintendent of the Canadian Telegraph Company's line telegraphs as follows in relation to the effect of the Aurora Borealis last night: '…so completely were the wires under the influence of the Aurora Borealis, that it was found utterly impossible to communicate between the telegraph stations, and the line had to be closed.' The same difficulty prevailed as far South as Washington. [Chicago Tribune, p.4]</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">.…The French telegraph communications at Paris were greatly affected, and on interrupting the circuit of the conducting wire strong sparks were observed. The same thing occurred at the same time at all the telegraphic station in France…[The Illustrated London News, September 24, 1859].</font> </p> <p><font color="#0000ff">…Lousiville KY, August 31-The telegraph wires between this city and New York, as also throughout Canada, were interrupted by the unusual overcharge of electricity which always pervades the atmosphere during the continuance of this phenomenon…[The New Orleans Bee, September 1, 1859].</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">…During the auroral display on Thursday night in Boston some curious phenomena were witnessed in connection with the telegraph wires. The following conversation, says the Boston Traveler, between the Boston and Portland operators on the American telegraph line, will give an idea of the effect of the Aurora Borealis, on the working of the telegraph wires: Boston operator, (to Portland operator)--"Please cut off your battery entirely from the line for fifteen minutes." Portland operator-"Will do so. It is now disconnected." Boston-"Mine is disconnected, and we are working with the auroral current. How do you receive my writing?" Portland-Better than with our batteries on. -Current comes and goes gradually." Boston-"My current is very strong at times, and we can work better without the batteries, as the Aurora seems to neutralize and augment our batteries alternately, making current too strong at times for our relay magnets. Suppose we work without batteries while we are affected by this trouble." <br />Portland-"Very well. Shall I go ahead with business?" Boston-"Yes. Go ahead." <br />The wire was then worked for about two hours without the usual batteries, on the auroral current, working better than with the batteries connected. The current varied, increasing and decreasing alternately, but by graduating the adjustment to the current, a sufficiently steady effect was obtained to work the line very well. This is the first instance on record of more than a word or two having been transmitted with the auroral current. The usual effects of the electric storm were manifested, such as reversing the poles of the batteries, etc…[The Daily Chronicle and Sentinel, Augusta, Georgia, Thursday AM, September 8, 1859].</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">In addition to the technological issues posed by these 'earth currents' entering the telegraph lines, was the very real potential for direct human injury. The most spectacular, and now legendary, story is told by Frederick Royce: a telegraph operator working in Washington DC. at his station between 8 and 10 PM. " I did not know that the Aurora had made its appearance until 8 or 81/2 o'clock. I had been working 'combination' to Richmond, and had great difficulty from the changing of the current. It seemed as if there was a storm at 'Richmond'. Concluding that this was the case, I abandoned that wire and tried to work the Northern wire, but met with the same difficulty. For five or ten minutes I would have no trouble, then the current would change and become so weak that it could hardly be felt. It would then gradually change to a 'ground' so strong that I could not lift the magnet. While the Aurora lasted the same phenomena were observable. There was no rattling or cracking of the magnet, as is the case in a thunder storm. I looked at the paper between the arrestors, but found no holes. Philadelphia divided the circuit at the request of New York, and we succeeded in getting off what business we had. The Aurora disappeared a little after 10 o'clock - after which we had no difficulty, and we worked through to New York. During the display I was calling Richmond, and had one hand on the iron plate. Happening to lean towards the sounder, which is against the wall, my forehead grazed a ground-wire which runs down the wall near the sounder. Immediately, I received a very severe electric shock, which stunned me for an instant. An old man who was sitting facing me, and but a few feet distant, said that he saw a spark of fire jump from my forehead to the sounder. The Morse line experienced the same difficulty in working." [New York Times, Sept. 5, 1859]</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Do remember this is with the telegraph system at the period, and it tells us of the problems of induced ground currents under that pushing down of the magnetic field, during the event which lasted from 28 AUG – 2 SEP 1859.  This all with equipment made of simple coils of wire and batteries.  Now put that sort of electrical charge into the entire power grid of every Nation on Earth in this, the early part of the 21st century.</p> <p>Unlike a nuclear EMP you probably won't have much of your personal electronics effected by this sort of event unless you are far north of the aurora and getting a lot of that secondary radiation bouncing around: then you might get some of that sort of thing.  What most nuclear EMPs don't do all that well is induce ground currents across the surface of the planet like a CME.  No, the problems aren't from that, but that other part: the induced ground current.  The 1921 event saw transformers explode from a relatively minor solar storm without much of an electrical grid to do that.  Modern electrical grids have orders of magnitude more transformer stations than were on the entire planet in 1921.  Large Nations may utilize some very large transformers for their long-haul lines, and the US has about 6 of these which are vital in connecting up some of the major hydro-electric generation systems into the rest of the grid, and no one really makes those things any more.  Even worse there is at least one of them that took a special rail line to put in place and that has since been removed, and as geomorphology and geography dictate where these things go, it was and is in an ideally situated spot for its function.</p> <p>Now this effects my voting... I mean this is what the article is about, no?</p> <p>I've read a bit about what it would take to put in isolation systems for power plants, and it is about $1M per power plant, which comes out to $0.03/month for an individual customer for about 5-10 years to get the project done for existing plants of all sorts: coal, natural gas, nuclear, solar.  You name it and if it isn't built with this sort of protection to start with, it needs a retrofit if it is slated to stay online longer than the life of the retrofit project.</p> <p>This does not need to happen at the National level: individual States can do this on their lonesome and even coordinate efforts if they want.  No law against it and nothing in the Constitution prohibits it so long as it doesn't tread on federal power grants from the people.</p> <p>Now find a politician who even KNOWS this stuff.</p> <p>Go ahead, try and find one that puts SURVIVAL first.  Because if we get a CME from a Carrington Event, then modern civilization is toasty.</p> <p>'War on women'?  Without electrical power you don't get potable water.  You don't get a sewage system.  You don't get fuels transported via pipelines (and how the induced currents will hit them is anyone's guess).  A good part of the satellites will be dead, although you might still have GPS, but that depends on the size and strength of the event... and taking into account that the Earth's magnetic field has been declining for a few decades since it looks like it is time for a pole reversal in the next few thousand years.  So which is more important: birth control/abortion or survival?</p> <p>Your choice in the voting booth decides your fate in the future.</p> <p>More locally the regular geophysical disasters have some very grave implications, like the New Madrid Fault Zone letting slip for a few months.  That will most likely take out bridges, pipelines and a good number of long-haul electrical lines, plus damage or destroy some dams close to the event.  That St. Louis to Memphis region hasn't experienced anything like that since the quake events from 25 DEC 1811 to 7 FEB 1812, which was three major quakes and so many small quakes that it was hard to ensure one's footing during the time it happened.  As so much of the Nation's goods flow north and south along the Mississippi, a sudden onslaught of debris flows going through the river system will cause damage.  For some hours the Mississippi River ran backwards near New Madrid, and the river shifted its course in a few places, drained one lake and created another, as well as causing sand geysers... you tell me what this means for the flow of goods, services and power throughout North America.</p> <p>And being close to the East Coast means that the island of La Palma's Cumbre Vieja having an earthquake causing a massive landslide will have dire consequences for the entire Eastern Seaboard of the US, Canada, and the entire Caribbean, not to speak of the reflected and refracted tsunami events hitting Europe, Western Africa and Eastern South America.</p> <p>So how does the 'War on women' play out when National and probably international trade is effected by a large portion of the US going off-line?  Devastation from the NMFZ to the Mid-West and the lower Mississippi River will probably take out a few refineries and pipelines from the Gulf, too, so getting back up and running with those might take a few years.  And as for the Cumbre Vieja landslide event for the Eastern Seaboard, well, there are major population centers and the tsunami will travel across the ocean as a wave at about the speed of a jet liner so you get 6 hours of warning if it can be identified and detected.  A wave form coming in that tops the Empire State Building when it hits NYC isn't something to sneeze at, and similar will hit across the entire coast.</p> <p>Can we find a politician that puts basic survival first?</p> <p>Or at least encouraging citizens to prepare because our government is so woefully inadequate that it can't figure out if cheap disaster preparation is more important than birth control when the survival of civilized life is at stake?</p> <p>Or how about decentralization and disintermediation of government services from the federal to the State and local levels?  The federal government has proven incapable of keeping unguarded memorials open during a government furlough... I mean that is worse than lackluster, it is criminal to prevent the people from seeing public memorials due to a funding fight.  That is piss poor stewardship of sites entrusted to that government and the States really do need to step in and intervene by rescinding permission for the federal government to hold lands in their state for public use.  Eminent domain those babies to get rid of the awful steward in charge of them: we can get more accountable buffoons, cheaper than the federal government can.  On the State level strange functions like 'liquor control boards' are buggy-whip deals and need to go.  And for roads that aren't Interstates and don't really go beyond a couple of counties in a State, why aren't those handed over for purely local control?  Hardening the electrical grid takes State level initiative and waiting for the federal government to study it to death is a recipe for disaster.  And that disaster WILL effect you if the right event hits with NO preparation.</p> <p>You, at least, can prepare.</p> <p>A few days of food, potable water, and some method of dealing with physical waste products goes a long way towards dealing with the small problems.  At a month you are at least buying time to take good stock of a much larger disaster.  You can and should prepare beyond that, but when you are in that mode then the problem OF GOVERNMENT comes to the forefront.</p> <p>It isn't serious about anything.</p> <p>Politicians care more about dividing electorates than serving them.</p> <p>Politicians and their parties want political and polarizing fights, ignoring survival level problems that should be the domain of government: self-government, local government, State government and last and least is the federal government.  Yet all we get are top-down solutions for bottom-up problems.</p> <p>That is the 20th century mindset and it is a recipe for disaster.  It was in the 20th century and it is worse now because we have spent zero time preparing for anything larger than heavy wind storm... and even those don't get any preparation and days of power going out.  Super Storm Sandy gave us the time from civilized behavior to barbarism in the 21st century: 72 hours.  And the supplies to 'deal' with it were so far away that it took a week or more to get them to the disaster... that is a guarantee of a bad disaster going barbarous.  And yet simple decentralization of goods to local management would have alleviated the immediate problems long enough to allow a better regional response.</p> <p>Didn't happen.</p> <p>Now with that in mind, picture a Carrington Event in the 21st century.</p> <p>Not the destruction of Super Storm Sandy, yes, and even gets you a pretty light show for a few days.  The lack of all infrastructure, however, gets you the same decay rate, everywhere that is not prepared.  And we don't have Interstellar friends to bail us out of a global CME.  Yet with some basic preparation for the power plants, getting a decent set of replacement transformers in storage in a salt mine or other safe place, a basic grid can start to reappear in days.  With distributed food and water, plus some localized systems for processing same, you can keep civilization going and get it back on its feet.  Birth control and abortions will be in short supply, I'm afraid, but then having food to eat, water to drink and a safe place to bed down for the night will rise far above any 'War on women' sort of deal as we try to stave off barbarism and a war of Each For His Own.</p> <p>Thus I have a list of things that politicians must be willing to talk about or they do not get my vote at all.  Period.</p> <p>Decentralization of services along with an understanding of disaster preparation at all levels of government.  That means FEMA can go away and have its stores divided up by the States and distributed locally.  They suck at disaster response.</p> <p>This goes double for the State level.</p> <p>Prioritization of threats so that mere lifestyle 'threats' come long, long, long after basic survival threats.  Yes, nothing is going to save us from Yellowstone if it goes through one of its major eruptive events, unless we have a viable way to get off this planet.  Preparation right up TO that for ANYTHING ELSE should be a priority of all governments starting with self-government.  It isn't costly to be prepared.  A bit of extra canned food stored away after each shopping trip does wonders over a few months to a year.  Stored containers of water with basic additives to allow them to stay potable for up to 5 years is cheap, so is bleach or compounds for swimming pools to make bleach.  A bucket and plastic bags to deal with human waste, plus knowing where to dispose of it doesn't cost much at all.  Each locale has its own other requirements, but getting the basics in place means you won't be a victim of a disaster unless it directly takes you out with its direct damage. If you don't want to take care of yourself, then you have only yourself to blame for the consequences.</p> <p>If you have read this article: you have been warned.  Nature doesn't care much about you, about me, about our civilization and isn't all that nice, come right down to it.  Don't bother me with 'climate change' if you are unwilling to face realities of Carrington Events that seem to get to us about every century or so.  Oh, its heading on towards a century since the last one... aren't we lucky?  And New Madrid is hitting its readiness for an event in its cycle.  Ditto the Cascadia Thrust Fault.  And who knows when just the right quake will hit La Palma?</p> <p>I'm looking for a politician willing to address the realities of infrastructure repair (not just 'jobs bills' or that Interstate stuff but the REAL INFRASTRUCTURE) and hardening, along with disaster preparedness.  Because if we don't get serious about these things then civilized life as you and I know it will be cut off with a real disaster.  And the more we let politicians divide us and try to centralize power, the more certain that the first disaster we get will also be ending our civilization increases.</p> <p>So far, no luck.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-83505731593423527812013-10-01T13:06:00.001-04:002013-10-01T13:06:09.105-04:00Sub-pack for field target pistol<p>Part of going through inventory and cleaning out old junk, mostly boxes that had a single small item in it or things that should be consolidated like my cord and nylon web pieces, was moving stuff for camping/emergency use to a more prominent place.  I mean after cleaning out shelf space something has to go there to keep more small boxes from migrating to it, right?  And when I found my sub-pack for field use of a target pistol, my lady suggested that others might like to see what I used and possibly get an idea from it.</p> <p>I have no idea if anyone else uses this stuff in this way, and didn't look, either.  This just seemed blindingly obvious to me when I was getting equipment that I never much fastened onto it as a topic.  Yet having the ability to do a basic bit of field cleaning to a pistol is something that I've seen incorporated into a number of older holsters, stuff like some Lugers, Browning 1910/22 police rigs, and similar.  There isn't much room devoted to that sort of thing and, after the pistol and a couple of magazines, you quickly run out of space in the holster and you really don't want a small bag of cleaning swabs or bottle of oil to go flying out when you take your pistol from the holster.  But the cleaning rod can be incorporated into them, so that is always with the firearm so you can always do some expedient cleaning with whatever is at hand.  Most of the other stuff can migrate to a small pouch.</p> <p>That was what I had in mind, just something that would allow for a bit more kit with the kit, so to speak.  No one makes that sort of thing, at least at first glance... second and third glance as well... and that means adapting something else to fit the need.  There are tons of pouches out there, but you usually end up with something thin and rectangular and your grip riding out of it, or larger and square that requires modification to keep the pistol secure.  Neither is optimal, really, and only when going through a milsurp site did I actually see something that would work.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-Dt6vcRMzl4M/UksA5gLeL-I/AAAAAAAABo8/pJd3QeP7YwU/s1600-h/Field-R678-001%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-001" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-001" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/--XATunIGDro/UksA6LNxxXI/AAAAAAAABpA/-msgpzTRV20/Field-R678-001_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-gAu3E7gGP-Y/UksA6TmvayI/AAAAAAAABpI/re5Ipi0kbt0/s1600-h/Field-R678-003%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-003" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-003" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-Id93gJa3CyQ/UksA63JGpQI/AAAAAAAABpQ/wUcYG-3tVTA/Field-R678-003_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>As the tag shows: </p> <blockquote> <p>CARRYING CASE, AN/PRC-148(V)(C)</p> <p>23386 ASSY 1600495-1</p> <p>MADE IN USA</p> </blockquote> <p>Basically comms equipment carrying case.  Nicely made, too!  Belt/ALICE type, but you can change it over to MOLLE with adapters.</p> <p>Now how does it get used when you don't have the comms equipment?</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-R6LTYSEepaE/UksA7G5YKOI/AAAAAAAABpc/yitKsq4mIjw/s1600-h/Field-R678-004%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-004" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-004" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-V9n6KPg4zFQ/UksA7p-GhYI/AAAAAAAABpg/n5WI_HMtq5M/Field-R678-004_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>Pop the top and you get to see a lot of stuff it can hold.  That top is secured via four slide buckles, all nice and snug, as well as adjustable.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-X9f29nBAQRE/UksA76czYnI/AAAAAAAABps/6CbSN-NMaBA/s1600-h/Field-R678-005%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-005" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-005" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-1J9098t5KMA/UksA8mZJ1II/AAAAAAAABpw/xgVm7IfGs7w/Field-R678-005_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>In the front compartment goes a cased pull through, 4 magazines (you could probably get six in there), and a short 50 box and longer 100 box of ammo.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-QFPDShKt6ps/UksA9FUebKI/AAAAAAAABp8/A4ZTfmJS29I/s1600-h/Field-R678-006%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-006" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-006" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-kED5UizXay0/UksA9S2UdFI/AAAAAAAABqA/W90hqI1YhBc/Field-R678-006_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>That is a decent amount of storage when you come right down to it.  What did have to be done is an internal divider had its stitching undone and removed so that grip could slide into the case.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-5F06_Dqa-1Y/UksA9pLgfXI/AAAAAAAABqI/vytE6grxWOw/s1600-h/Field-R678-007%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-007" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-007" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-isaUXcN8hWk/UksA-eRBgFI/AAAAAAAABqQ/jyRFic0Irbk/Field-R678-007_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Like that.  Spare manual slid into the now open area at the top of the case.  There is also a place where you can store small 2oz. or squat 4oz. bottles.  Mine had walked over to my cleaning equipment area and need to walk back to the case.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-sQC3l7vy6lU/UksA-7y_6CI/AAAAAAAABqc/znpwoNEtThc/s1600-h/Field-R678-008%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-008" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-008" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-O1YXQt2iiLA/UksA_DHgUQI/AAAAAAAABqg/3w3TveO_iZ0/Field-R678-008_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Also a great place to store patches, swabs, brush heads... any of those nice things from home that you just never know if you are going to need in the field that is compact is perfect for that.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-eBCMw8ntkpQ/UksA_kQJ4qI/AAAAAAAABqs/TjD6tXWvsFE/s1600-h/Field-R678-009%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Field-R678-009" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Field-R678-009" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-_xZ1Ije222U/UksA_-iMKnI/AAAAAAAABqw/5lR0VjdL-iY/Field-R678-009_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>And that is your sizing reference, if the magazines didn't do it for you.  A 6 7/8" Bull Barrel Ruger Mk III.  And as you saw in prior pics, the gun sock fits well in there and keeps things from rattling around.  It can be improved upon, yes, but for... I think that was a $25 carrying case... its been a few years... you can't go too far wrong.</p> <p>A perfect piece to go on a 2" belt with a MOLLE thigh platform previously pictured.  Not an EDC pack, to be sure, but something that has everything you need for a short excursion that might run into a couple of days. With zip lock bags you could easily waterproof this stuff and yet still have it readily available in the field.</p> <p>Like I said this seemed blindingly obvious to me at the time.</p> <p>Now back to getting the router table finished.  Losing a month in the summer due to upper respiratory tract infection and stomach flu have made catching up a top priority so I can get the finish on before the cold weather arrives.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-19148804002133608082013-09-04T11:29:00.001-04:002013-09-05T10:51:46.501-04:00What are tactics and what is strategy?<p>From dictionary.reference.com:</p> <blockquote> <h4><font color="#0000ff">tac·tics</font></h4> <sup></sup> <p><font color="#0000ff">[tak-tiks]</font></p> <p><em><font color="#0000ff">noun</font></em></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">1.  ( <em>usually used with a singular verb</em> ) the </font><a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/art"><font color="#0000ff">art</font></a><font color="#0000ff"> or science of disposing military or naval forces for battle and maneuvering them in battle.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">2.  ( <em>used with a plural verb</em> ) the maneuvers themselves.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">3.  ( <em>used with a singular verb</em> ) any mode of procedure for gaining advantage or success.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">4.  ( <em>usually used with a singular verb</em> ) Linguistics . </font></p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">a.  the patterns in </font><font color="#0000ff">which</font><font color="#0000ff"> the elements of a given level or stratum in a </font><font color="#0000ff">language</font><font color="#0000ff"> may combine to form larger constructions.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">b.  the study and description of such patterns.</font></p> </blockquote> </blockquote> <p>And from the same source:</p> <blockquote> <h4><font color="#0000ff">strat·e·gy</font></h4> <sup></sup> <p><font color="#0000ff">[strat-i-jee]</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff"><em>noun, plural</em> strat·e·gies.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">1.  Also, strategics. the science or art of combining and employing the means of war in planning and directing large military movements and operations.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">2.  the use or an instance of using this science or art.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">3.  skillful use of a stratagem: <em>The salesperson's strategy was to seem always to agree with the customer</em>.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">4.  a plan, method, or series of maneuvers or stratagems for obtaining a specific goal or result: <em>a strategy for getting ahead in the world</em>.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Using just the dictionary style reference, I would disagree with strategy item #3 example as a salesman is employing a <em>tactic</em> in pursuit of the <em>strategy</em> of a sale.  I'll use die.net to show how a prior generation examined these two words:</p> <blockquote> <p><small><font color="#c0504d">Source: <i>Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)</i></font></small></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Tactics</strong> \Tac"tics\, n. [Gr. ?, pl., and ? (sc. ?, sing., fr. ? fit for ordering or arranging, fr. ?, ?, to put in order, to arrange: cf. F. tactique.] </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">1. The science and art of disposing military and naval forces in order for battle, and performing military and naval evolutions. It is divided into grand tactics, or the tactics of battles, and elementary tactics, or the tactics of instruction. </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">2. Hence, any system or method of procedure.</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>And strategy:</p> <blockquote> <p><small><font color="#c0504d">Source: <i>Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)</i></font></small></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Strategy</strong> \Strat"e*gy\, n. [Gr. ?: cf. F. strat['e]gie. See Stratagem.] </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">1. The science of military command, or the science of projecting campaigns and directing great military movements; generalship. </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">2. The use of stratagem or artifice.</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>Both of these items involve planning, but their scales are very different given the problem to be addressed.  Tactical decisions are typically battlefield decisions with goals set on the battlefield as guided by overall strategy.  Thus an operation to 'take a hill' to divert the enemy and feign an attack in one place so as to distract from the main thrust is a tactical decision of the best way to carry out the larger theater tactical or theater strategic goals.  A theater of war is one that encompasses a number of areas, so that there was a European Theater of Operations in WWII as well as a Pacific Theater of Operations in that same war.  Each Theater of Operations had its own set of goals set by the Theater of Operations Strategic Objective.  Individual battles were tactical instances of utilizing force to achieve the larger set of objectives set in the Theater of Operations.  In the European Theater of Operations there was an over-arching Grand Strategy above the Theater level that required that Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany be defeated.  </p> <p>At the Theater Level this required a series of operations starting in Africa, to dislodge the Afrikacorps and Italian forces from there so as to remove pressure on British shipping.  For a time that was the only part of the European Theater of War that was operable for the Allies, beyond a basic defense of the UK.  To achieve the end of the Theater Strategy required Theater Tactics on the deployment of troops, their numbers, types, amounts and logistical support without which the operation would have failed and the Theater and Grand Strategy set back.  All of the subsequent battlefield tactical decisions, the stuff you see so many programs about, are all in pursuit of the larger goals.  There are different skill sets and approaches required for these different areas of operation, and one must discriminate between them so as to ascertain just what the strategy is and which tactics are suitable.</p> <p>And <a href="http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/z/zhou_enlai.html">this quote</a> sums up the applicability of strategy and tactics as concepts to diplomacy:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">All diplomacy is a continuation of war by other means. <br />- Zhou Enlai</font></p> </blockquote> <p>That is why the US State Dept. has different areas of responsibility or Theaters of responsibility to it, and what diplomats seek to gain is the advantage for their Nation by finding agreement with other Nations.  It is much, much better if everyone agrees with each other's requirements and things can be done in a peaceful manner because you lose far fewer lives and have a lower cost (perhaps even a mutual cost reduction or net benefit!) via diplomatic agreements than you get via warfare.  In the early days of warfare, when produced items and agriculture were relatively primitive, one could gain great riches by going to war and plundering one's enemies.  Today that is much less the case and mechanized warfare has a high cost to it that goes higher the more sophisticated the equipment comes.  Diplomats, then, are the first wave of troops and commanders you send overseas to see if you can find some agreement amongst Nations: they are the shock troops that employ a set of tactics that do not, typically, involve killing others.  Diplomats are servants to the Grand Strategy of the Nation State, which is set by whoever is put in charge of that stuff, but it is usually an Executive function of a Nation State (although there are exceptions like the Republic of Venice and its Council of Doges).  It is that Grand Strategy that guides the Nation State and it is executed by diplomats and by the military of a Nation that takes into account when diplomacy fails.</p> <p>Diplomatic failure does not always lead to war as that is situation dependent, so that a minor faux pas with a friendly power is something to snicker at, while the same faux pas with an antagonist might lose you the diplomat, the Embassy and put the Nation State into a war without any preamble to it.  The back-up plan for the first wave of effecting a Grand Strategy is the military might of a Nation.  Failure of diplomacy is not always something a diplomat can do anything about, particularly if a belligerent Nation cuts off diplomatic ties and accepts no behind-the-scenes talks.  At that point, when diplomatic means are refused at all levels, it is the responsibility of the military to pick up the slack and begin preparing for a hostile Nation to go into an active state of hostilities.</p> <p>Diplomacy is part of a spectrum of warfare and George Washington underscored that point while as President by making all diplomatic efforts part of the War Dept.  Because any minor failure, with even a modest foreign power no matter how distant, might mean disaster for the trade and survival of the young United States, the diplomats all understood the gravity of their situation by going through a military command structure run by the military.</p> <p>Can mere tactics create strategy?</p> <p>Yes, it can.  The best case in point is the set of tactics described between WWI and WWII by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basil_Liddell_Hart">B.H. Liddel Hart</a> in his book <em><strong>Strategy</strong></em> in which he described how mechanized warfare would work and the necessary change in Strategic approach it required not just in warfare but in the logistics behind warfare.  A series of papers between the World Wars described just how armored and mechanized mobile troop units would create a new style of warfare and that Nation States would need to adjust not only their tactics but their strategies to accommodate this new warfare.  He was not alone in this review of how mechanized mobile armor platforms would change everything about how war was fought (just as the machine gun did for World War I, though very few pre-WWI strategists recognized the importance of this tactical innovation).  World War II and the post-WWII era saw the bulk of those insights come to pass and we now live in a world where the foundational understanding of warfare is mechanized and mobile warfare in all venues of all theaters of operations.</p> <p>From World War I also came a modernized reprise of chemical weapons attacks done on a large Grand Tactical scale on the Fronts during the war.  Grand Tactical is a set of arms or methodology for deployment of troops and arms that are employed across all Theaters of War.  Chemical and Biological Weapons pre-date the modern era and were used in the siege of castles and the subduing of cities going back to an era that predates riding horses into battle.  This class of weapons only gain the Weapons of Mass Destruction moniker when they can be produced on a scale large enough to turn the tide of war when an enemy has no defenses against it.  As such these tactical devices in the CW and BW areas can only meet the WMD tag when used against those without defenses, but are little different from other mass forms of arms utilizing conventional forms of attack.  Nuclear devices gain the WMD tag by destroying a mass in an instant, and that effect is a large scale one, hence weapon of mass destruction in both size, scope and effectiveness.  CW and BW arms do not meet those criteria of size, scope and effectiveness, even when all the stars are aligned for use of them.  Against the defenseless these sets of conditions are easier to meet, yes, but nature will have her way with them in the way of wind, humidity and a number of other factors that will limit or negate the use of them in a way that nuclear devices are not prone to.  Fallout is an effect of a nuclear device, not the reason you use one, thus how nature moves a cloud of radioactive fallout is secondary to the use of the device itself, while spreading chemical or bio components in a direction of the wind that is not wanted thwarts the primary intent of the weapon, itself.</p> <p>This now moves us to the present and what President Obama wants, or doesn't want, in regards to Syria.  I'll take a part of a piece by Miriam Elder in BuzzFeed on 01 SEP 2013 on the topic of Strategy and what President Obama wishes to do in Syria:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">“<strong>The results of this mystifying lack of preparedness have been abysmal</strong>,” he wrote, calling Obama’s decision to seek congressional approval for the strikes “<strong>constitutionally sound, but strategically appalling</strong>” and suggesting the White House find “<strong>an objectives-based strategy</strong>.”</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Hof struck at what, for those who spend their time thinking about <strong>grand strategy and not domestic politics, is the heart of the matter</strong>. The administration has consistently separated the goals it hopes to achieve with a military strike — <strong>punish Assad, send a warning to similar states, restore U.S. credibility</strong> — from <strong>the objectives it hopes to achieve politically: to reach a negotiated peace in Syria with Assad no longer at the country’s helm</strong>. In <strong>terms of strategic planning, the separation of the two is almost a rookie error</strong>.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>I do understand that Miriam Elder may not be up on the differences between strategy and tactics, as the middle ground of the two realms can be hazy even to those on the inside of the operational spheres in question.  However, with analysis, it is possible to separate what is strategic and what is tactical from her review.</p> <p>First is the lack of preparedness cited by Frederic Hof, and that is an easy thing to designate as a tactical error.  Being unprepared to enforce a policy decision, which is a part of the overall Strategy of the United States, is a tactical error by a President.  I do agree that seeking the approval of Congress is not just sound, but a necessity so as to gain the necessary funds to supply the military for doing anything with regard to Syria.  And when a President seeks to perform offensive operations that expend logistical supplies, equipment and possibly lives, that means that Congressional approval can show support for the policy decision.</p> <p>That policy decision is one that drives objectives, and here Mr. Hof states that the strategy is objectives-based.  Objectives are to be driven by strategy from policy, and when those get reversed it demonstrates that you have no policy and no strategy at work.  Thus an 'objectives-based strategy' is no strategy at all as objectives are driven out by strategy.</p> <p>As seen previously tactics can drive strategy and, perforce, change objectives, but that only comes from the understanding of the change in tactics.  An 'objectives-based strategy' that does not clearly and succinctly say what the larger strategy framework is to drive out those objectives actually is, then gives the appearance of having no larger based strategy at work. </p> <p>The goals as outlined are multi-fold and deserve some examination to determine if they are just goals or if they are tactical or strategic plans.</p> <p>First is to 'punish Assad', presumably through military strikes.  Yet this can be achieved through non-military means like has been seen in the case of Iran, Cuba and North Korea, through diplomatic sanctions, seeking to cut off aid in the form of banking to the regime, or through other non-military means.  Indeed, even though Syria is not a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention, a President can go to the other CWC signatories and point out that their lack of action with regards to Saddam Hussein has now led the world into a realm where terrorists are now getting their hands on CWs via the means of civil war.  The goals given in the CWC is to prevent such spread and proliferation from happening and the CWC signatory Nations should have it pointed out to them that they have an obligation to act to their stated Foreign Policy goals that they voluntarily signed up for via diplomatic means.  A much wider array of Nations could be asked to either put up and support what they signed up for, or to walk away from the CWC saying that they cannot support it any more.  If punishing Assad and the Syrian regime is a goal, it is questionable if it is best served by any military strikes by the US without gaining the backing of a treaty group that said they wanted to curb if not end such activities. By pointing out this venue there are also other treaty venues outside of the UN to go through to 'punish Assad' through diplomatic means, and they might actually be effective and save lives, and curb the spread of CWs.  All of this can start with a simple policy statement that the US has no interest in the outcome of the civil war in Syria, but that we deplore the use of WMDs and will seek agreement amongst all those Nations with similar foreign policy goals to start achieving those ends.</p> <p>When translated to a military level, then, 'punish Assad' is a tactical goal in service to a stated Strategy.  Yet, when it is a 'goal-based strategy' that is effectively saying that the goal is the only thing in the strategy and that there is no larger framework to the goal.  It is a goal in service of itself, which is not just irrational but can have long-term consequences when the aftermath of trying to reach the goal, or failing to do so, happens.  And it will happen once the goal is stated and achieved or not achieved because it has been stated as the goal of the Nation of the United States.</p> <p>Second is 'send a warning to similar States'.  This can be achieved through multiple means, as well which I outlined in the first goal area: cutting off banking, seizure of accounts, cutting off US trade with such regimes, working with the CWC treaty organization of Nations... all of that done without a single shot fired by the US.  In fact that would be a much clearer warning that the US is fed up with such things than a military attack, as it would be done quickly as part of a stated foreign policy with objectives to stop the proliferation of WMDs at the Nation State level.  Of course that would take actually having that as a policy.  That can only be done by the President as he is the one who creates much of the foreign policy execution and how it is done, without having to go to Congress.</p> <p>When translated into the military realm this concept of 'sending a warning to similar States' is nebulous.  There are many ways to achieve this when given a military set of conditions and not all of them deal with actually trying to destroy or eliminate the weapons themselves.  As a goal it must have a framework of what is to be achieved, and simply curbing the use of such weapons in Syria can be done by such things as destroying infrastructure, attacking shipping, or dropping lots of small arms to the civilian population with a note on each piece asking nicely if they would 'take care of this tyrant for their own safety' in a way similar to dropping Liberator pistols in occupied France during WWII to help the Underground Resistance there.  That is something that would be guided by conditions and by Congress, if there can be an actual foreign policy statement given to this 'goal' that puts it in service to some larger strategic framework.</p> <p>The third goal to 'restore US credibility' means that the US has already lost credibility in this case.  That is due to the lack of having a foreign policy that can be stated as a Grand Strategy: there is no Grand Strategy at work to drive out policy and, from that, goals and instances of objectives in service to the Grand Strategy.  Without having a Grand Strategy that can be clearly and succinctly stated, this cannot be achieved.  It does not have to be a great foreign policy statement and the US has gotten away with rather short ones in its history:</p> <p>- Walk softly and carry a big stick.</p> <p>- Keeping the worlds worst weapons out of the hands of its worst people.</p> <p>- Confronting an Evil Empire and calling it to reform.</p> <p>- Carter Doctrine of Blood for Oil.</p> <p>- Monroe Doctrine to keep foreign powers from the Western Hemisphere.</p> <p>You don't need something fancy and convoluted to hang a foreign policy on and, in fact, the shorter and easier it is to remember the better off you are.  Each of these drove policy not only for the Administration that stated them but were an influence on future Administrations and the direction of the Nation as a whole.  The simplest way, then, to restore US credibility is to have a foreign policy that can be clearly stated as a Grand Strategy for the Administration.  That doesn't take ANY military maneuvers and can be accomplished by one man and one man only: the President of the United States.</p> <p>The political objective that all of this is supposed to tie together is to reach a negotiated peace in Syria and end up with Assad out of power.  That should actually be a foreign policy objective tied to a Grand Strategy.  By trying to make it a political objective, to score 'points' by showing you can 'get something done' which has as its goal bolstering the status of the occupant of the Office.  Without having any real planning on the foreign policy or military side, the result of even achieving this objective is put in doubt as, without any pre-planning for success, others can step in to define it for themselves and actually snatch success away and for themselves.  That would be contrary to the stated objective, and is a result of a lack of any foreign policy to drive out goals and objectives which then puts the entire State Dept. and Dept. of Defense into the picture to help understand what the aftermath of such an objective is before you even attempt to achieve it.  That then creates not just a foreign policy failure but a political failure, as well, plus damages the credibility of the US still more.</p> <p>In fact going through this entire procedure without a stated Grand Strategy for foreign policy damages the credibility of the US.  One way to not damage the credibility of the US is not to go through this procedure in the first place and have the President understand that some failures have a single father and that for the good of the Nation his personal credibility must be sacrificed.  </p> <p>Yet he could just figure out a foreign policy Grand Strategy and avoid all this, while using the non-military options to show how that Grand Strategy will play out.</p> <p>For as much as this President talks, he can't appear to say what his foreign policy Grand Strategy is.  Instead he gives us a few objectives that don't even require a military response, but that is the first thing he goes to.  And that loses him credibility far faster than choosing anything else he could choose.</p> <p>No good shall ever come of that.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-18691068160192432632013-08-18T11:01:00.001-04:002013-09-12T12:51:19.488-04:00Gun safe selection<p>On previous posts I went about the process of <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2013/03/selecting-gun-safe.html" target="_blank">Selecting a gun safe</a> and then <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2013/03/narrowing-gun-safe-selection.html" target="_blank">Narrowing gun safe selection</a>, which gave my criteria for what a safe must have, should have and be nice to have.  What I wound up with is from<a href="http://vaultprousa.com/"><img title="Vault-Pro-Logo-4" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="Vault-Pro-Logo-4" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-iNIFwh-oK6s/UhDhZFo_EKI/AAAAAAAABg4/llT6bvAkRhY/Vault-Pro-Logo-4%25255B4%25255D.gif?imgmax=800" width="240" height="61" /></a></p> <p>and is their Marksman II safe at 72" x 40" x 28" which I was able to get a few minor features added on to meet my minimum specs.  I didn't go for any of the major upgrade features for thicker steel on the exterior or interior since I knew that it would have to be on a non-concrete floor.  Home interior stair steps are rated at approx. 1200 lbs. per tread, which is not a minor consideration for safe procurement.  For the square footage the floor is rated for dead weight at 2500 lbs,</p> <p>Delivery I had done by a local firm that specializes in safe moving and it took a total of three crewman and their boss along with a stair climber to get the safe into the house.  It was larger than the standard gun safes they deliver from the well known, big box companies and much heavier as well.  There was no way that a less experienced crew could get it in.  As there is no way for me to know where the major support members are for the floor under carpeting without doing some major exploratory work in the basement, I had to go with the basic measurements and knowledge of where those members are in relationship to the basement ceiling and transpose those to the main level floor.</p> <p>As delivered, here it is:</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-MwB0arxoBgE/UhDhZ8RuuPI/AAAAAAAABhA/DlYNH4iLQ_c/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-001%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-001" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="Summer 2013 safe-001" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-WsngnRa12bA/UhDhaiL0d6I/AAAAAAAABhI/Z7Yem2fTOgk/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-001_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-_lzIE9jyyc8/UhDhbQvbCKI/AAAAAAAABhQ/BbSM-sYnEnw/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-002%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-002" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="Summer 2013 safe-002" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-ofLos0xMMVg/UhDhb1s56rI/AAAAAAAABhY/HWhZ3M6dKQM/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-002_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-0PVaWZzXY_w/UhDhciHfzjI/AAAAAAAABhg/nmDQJlKSsUk/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-003%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-003" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="Summer 2013 safe-003" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-M-bfzbKnjxw/UhDhdB94NUI/AAAAAAAABho/9lH-5YSOCYE/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-003_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-4Sa_n4thAEc/UhDheFAREfI/AAAAAAAABhw/d4jtZZmF7Iw/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-004%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-004" style="float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto" alt="Summer 2013 safe-004" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-Z9j12QzuTMA/UhDheqOM_qI/AAAAAAAABh4/H6lEUkVb5mI/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-004_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>This is the matte black color scheme and I asked for them to kill the gloss as much as possible for it as I don't need a spare mirror in which to comb my hair.  The exterior details are good, although the manufacturer's logo appears to be a decal, as does the pin striping.  That lock is a S&G type and it is one where you have to basically get the number dead-on with the lowest variance from it in either direction.  During delivery I, somehow, got it open the first time with ease, almost like I knew what I was doing.  Re-opening it after locking it... that was another thing, entirely.  If I had known that it would be a bit of a pain to operate I would have gone with one with a bit more slop for getting the numbers, as it is patience and concentration are necessary to get it right.  A lot of patience.  A whole lot. </p> <p>Now onto the interior:</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-2aCmkpMF560/UhDhfWBZp-I/AAAAAAAABiA/y8p-djn1OnY/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-006%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-006" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-006" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-PYGCmSfozCk/UhDhf4ze9CI/AAAAAAAABiI/paLyoun5ffc/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-006_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-skGLnMosNlI/UhDhgixb_tI/AAAAAAAABiQ/ElW-pNLSly0/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-007%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-007" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-007" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-dUtlCHydZNg/UhDhhEblYaI/AAAAAAAABiY/Km4FdiEyPiU/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-007_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6O075SwQmBE/UhDhh7rH-TI/AAAAAAAABig/fGcmFc8E_iE/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-008%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-008" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-008" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-alp4VidN-nQ/UhDhiozf63I/AAAAAAAABio/SFvGYzKCFBQ/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-008_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-d2TdfW8q2Kw/UhDhjHehstI/AAAAAAAABiw/AybY3GjRw3k/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-009%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-009" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-009" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-7WZHvJF_1Wk/UhDhjyzT7RI/AAAAAAAABi4/_l19jGN1VGw/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-009_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/--dxQ2s1eO9E/UhDhkq05mhI/AAAAAAAABjA/REWgdhJYkdE/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-010%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-010" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-010" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-vTVZL-woAcA/UhDhlPyIXgI/AAAAAAAABjI/TbcQr7wKGC0/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-010_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-QNoybt30nsQ/UhDhl38qO0I/AAAAAAAABjQ/A7c8zH7M8a4/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-011%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-011" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-011" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-bGBeulQE21U/UhDhmvFKD9I/AAAAAAAABjY/HYKVSE7CzXk/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-011_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-HYZWFaiRNWM/UhDhnQFwpkI/AAAAAAAABjg/FXnwExCCJUM/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-012%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-012" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-012" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Vp24ElBx-_k/UhDhnwieirI/AAAAAAAABjo/YbBXJm4VccA/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-012_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>This is one of three standard configurations with the other two being all long shelves (basically a huge handgun safe or standard safe for collectibles/valuables) and a tri-divided bottom.  I was very tempted with the triple arrangement, but decided on this for various reasons, with the primary one being that I have more long guns than would fit in 1/3 of the bottom.  Also a couple of those are Mosin-Nagants at 48 1/2 long.  As you can see this is a full carpet interior that is hook & loop (i.e. Velcro) compatible, so that if you have pouches or anything else that you can get hook material on (you know the stiff fibers that grab, not the soft loop side) then you can just stick them onto the carpeting.  VaultPro uses Fossshield which is added to the fibers to help prevent mold, mildew and other organic growth on them.  A handy feature, that.  The interior is adjustable using <a href="http://www.knapeandvogt.com/">Knape &Vogt</a> pilaster standards and <a href="http://www.knapeandvogt.com/256_Series_Pilaster_Supports.html?page=details.551">#256 supports</a>.  The carpeting is attached to the smaller shelves using an adhesive of some sort, to the larger boards with small staples and to the interior it appears to be mostly adhesive, save for the sides which must have wood backing to support the pilasters, which appears to be the staples again.</p> <p>A word on the adhesive used and this goes with any safe interior: if you are allergic to new car smell, or have any problems with the VOCs used to attach carpeting via adhesives then it would be wise to ask for a low VOC adhesive to be used.  In fact if you can get the safe manufacturer to air out the carpeting in sunlight for a week, that would be even better.  This has been the single major problem of purchasing a new safe and makes the refurb/used market very appealing as an older safe will have gone through all of that stuff within a few months after delivery when it was new.  For me the safe delivery came when I was already getting an upper respiratory tract infection and, a few days into that getting treated, I got food poisoning which has killed all of JUL 2013 and the first part of AUG 2013 for me.  Dealing with the off-gassing of the safe interior (the exterior is great, no fumes at all) has been a major hassle and has delayed getting it finally anchored and migrating equipment into it during this period.</p> <p>How I've dealt with the off-gassing... first airing out the interior boards on the back deck for a week.  Fresh air and sunshine help a lot, but do nothing for the safe interior as there is no way to move that sucker so as to vent fresh air into it nor to get sunlight into it.  Because of that it has been 'better living through <em><strong>chemistry</strong></em>' time.  Oh, joy.  Oh, rapture.</p> <p>After sunshine and fresh air here are products I've used to varying degrees of success:</p> <p>1) Baking soda!  Get a cheap, old fashioned dusting plant sprayer... you know the type that is part bicycle pump and part hvlp paint sprayer?  The kind with the bottle by the nozzle.  Get one new, that hasn't been used for anything else and fill the bottle portion about half full with baking soda.  It is hard to get an even, fine dusting out and I would end up with major amounts coming out now and again, but I was able to get every surface covered with fine to small heaps of baking soda.  Let stand one hour and sweep up with vacuum cleaner.  It works, to a degree, and was one of my last resorts.</p> <p>2) <a href="http://www.thebadairsponge.com/">The Bad Air Sponge</a>.  This is weird stuff but effective, at least for the stuff in the air.  Basically just open it in a room with bad odors floating around it, let stand until you start to get the smell of stuff from the container (not obnoxious and not a perfume, just chemistry) and let that react out in the air.  When its done you should have a decent smelling room again.  Repeat as necessary with longer openings for places that have really bad fumes... like my workshop.  This baby has done more to get rid of some of the old smells used in finishing woodworking than anything else I can name.  For the gun safe close it up on the inside overnight (8 hours or more) and then open the safe, close the canister and ventilate the room if possible as you now have a concentrate of that stuff in the air.  This has done wonders for the gun safe and is better than waiting a few months for the VOCs to react out, that's for sure.</p> <p>3) <a href="http://www.zeroodor.com/">Zero Odor</a> – In the 8 oz. trial size.  This was the first stuff I used to just be able to access the safe and it did a good job getting rid of the stuff in the immediate air, but less of a job with the continuing off-gassing.  For that brute-force, 'must get there within the hour' deal it can't be beat.</p> <p>4) <a href="http://orisonmarketing.com/expelon.html">Expel</a> – Another of the 8 oz. trial size bottles and this one did a basic job of allowing me to actually get the interior out to the sunlight.  A very good job on the immediate surface gasses coming from the carpeting/adhesive and without it who knows how long it would have taken me to get this far.</p> <p>Each of these products has its place in the removing VOC and other organic chemical smells from carpeting in a gun safe, and they are each role players in that effort.  The baking soda can't be completely removed from the carpeting although another go-around with the vacuum might get more of it out.  As it isn't a salt I'm less worried about it than about, say, some of the chemical moisture removers.</p> <p>At this point there safe is now far enough along to actually secure it to the floor and I was nearly dead-on with one of the support beams, hitting it square with one lag bolt and just a bit off-center with another, which as put that one in a direction that will resist motion along that long axis.  The other two are in the floorboards.  Lag bolts with washers and lock washers plus a ratchet with a deep socket did the trick after drilling a small pilot hole.  The safe itself is resting across two support beams but the holes can only line up for a single one, which is what I can get without having some major work done to floor and basement ceiling.</p> <p>Next comes lighting!  It is dark in that safe and you just can't imagine how bad it gets in there, even during daylight hours.  Thus I looked and looked for an all American Made lighting system or at least a lighting integrator from the US and came up with a solution at <a href="http://inspiredled.com/">Inspired LED</a>.  As I believe a safe should have as few holes in it as possible and should have no added features that do fun things like put live voltage inside a safe.  Yes, I do know about MTBF and equipment that shouldn't fail to a short...and those are just nice ways of saying that the odds are on your side for a few years and you guarantee you will swap out equipment that isn't fully up to snuff and before it hits MTBF... I reduced those odds to zero and got a DC battery solution.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-spfB9353D5s/UhDhoki7KSI/AAAAAAAABjw/KdIYqodG0kc/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-013%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-013" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-013" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-I_rTezzNzeM/UhDhpIsmhEI/AAAAAAAABj4/QSKuBxRKUic/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-013_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-XR0jvOATxOI/UhDhp3h-nEI/AAAAAAAABkA/TTaXGTcs86U/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-014%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-014" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-014" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-GkfcAg7ivro/UhDhqgFw3sI/AAAAAAAABkI/oApdvMaHUa4/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-014_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-DukrgdCfb5w/UhDhrAgEIcI/AAAAAAAABkQ/uXgHC_NPU8A/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-015%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-015" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-015" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-bhyh2jlRBIc/UhDhrioHB4I/AAAAAAAABkU/obSJ8wVkgEk/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-015_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-zW6QXkqR43Q/UhDhsQY4OVI/AAAAAAAABkg/R2FKN00-ztk/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-016%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-016" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-016" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-44oMyRS_ufM/UhDhs8TbzuI/AAAAAAAABko/nb7hN_N3_CE/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-016_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>For this I have a battery pack with two sets of 8xAA batteries in parallel along with a normally closed reed switch for the door, plus all the wires that utilize 1.3mm DC coaxial male ends between everything.  Working with Inspired LED I got a basic package together along with battery pack solution to get the safe lit up.  Now this is just a test situation to make sure everything works and to get the safe to where it could at least accept Mosin-Nagant rifles, which is that long rifle in its Browning sleeve on the right.  Because I removed one long shelf, that meant that I had down-lighting for the long gun area and a spare light that I put along the right hand interior to shine into that part of the safe.  This was about two weeks after delivery and in the midst of moving shelves to the outdoors for airing out.  I used the two spray products to allow me to work on the safe and get it this far.</p> <p>That is a really snazzy lighting system, don't mind the wires drooping all over the place as it is just a test configuration.</p> <p>That vast expanse of doors loop space cries out for something to make it serve as storage.  Here is where you'll find that on other safes that have things like gun racks on the door you lose some interior space to those racks.  This safe has a small amount of clearance between the door and the interior, which means you have to get creative and arrange door storage to suit the interior.  And if you ever think you might shift the interior around, a modular doors system would be ideal.</p> <p>Say, I did a few write-ups about this sort of thing for packs and equipment... wouldn't it be great if someone made a huge MOLLE panel for a gun safe?  I mean I could stitch one together, maybe, over 8 or 9 months... and have it look amateur made, and probably need a new sewing machine to boot... but if someone made them...</p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-vEVJ60oy5as/UhDhttCShzI/AAAAAAAABkw/DiTCqwJt-d4/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-017%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-017" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-017" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-AlJOTdnVXRs/UhDhuIzUy8I/AAAAAAAABk4/DHUmvI_Iw_I/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-017_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Why it's the MOLLE Safe Panel from <a href="http://www.wildebuilttactical.com/collections/molle-safe-panel">Wilde Built Tactical</a>!</p> <p>Geeze, isn't that handy?  And all it really needs is, say, something to hold a couple of long guns so that they would fit into the open space in the safe interior between the other guns...</p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-B6uP4fzVF5g/UhDhu5vFyjI/AAAAAAAABlA/ZPkFRgGQFvo/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-019%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-019" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-019" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-2MQxmGS2WGU/UhDhvXEJ-KI/AAAAAAAABlI/pi_S_vkDoIY/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-019_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>Why it's the <a href="http://www.eberlestock.com/miva/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=E1&Product_Code=A4SS&Category_Code=AC">Eberlestock A4SS Tactical Weapon Carrier</a> I picked up a couple of years ago!  Amazing!  I'm utilizing <a href="http://www.itwmilitaryproducts.com/content/grimloc">ITW GrimLoc</a> carabiners for this, not webbing stuff.</p> <p>Now on the interior is something that I rigged up out a MOLLE vehicular panel that has been sitting in the closet begging for use:</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-oW8_0Z4W1GU/UhDhwE5GAII/AAAAAAAABlQ/tWn3WvIJQDE/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-018%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-018" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-018" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-eQqpmU-z3j4/UhDhw1kQJeI/AAAAAAAABlU/_OEDnx1IBOs/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-018_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>It doesn't come with hook material strips on the back, I added those from some that I picked up online and used <a href="http://www.beaconadhesives.com/cgfab.html">Beacon Adhesives Fabri-Tac</a> to put on three strips of 2" black hook to the back of the panel.  Apply in thin beads and do it outdoors because the smell of that stuff will knock out a charging rhino.  Sets quickly and the smell disappears rapidly, and within a half-hour your piece is good to go.  I can think of 1,001 uses for that and it is in what would normally be 'dead space' behind barrels of long guns.  Just look at that big pocket begging for cleaning supplies!  And after the first two rows of MOLLE you get something to put documents into, a huge pocket for that sort of thing just sitting there.  Wouldn't it be nice to have a place to put those thin repair manuals?  Look for those in surplus stores... I found that one a few years ago at one for something like $30 and now it is worth all of that and much, much more.  Plus you can always take it out and put it on the back of a car seat, like it is supposed to be used.  Geeze wouldn't that be handy for a 3-Gun event?</p> <p>Mind you this is still in the interim 'see what fits before it all has to be stripped out again' phase.</p> <p>Today is the first phase of doing the final install and using foliage green hook (foliage green is a good match for the gray interior) to start hiding all those unsightly wires:</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-0mv9nMtfu7Q/UhDhxY5K3tI/AAAAAAAABlg/cpQLLK__AlA/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-020%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-020" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-020" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-FvCS8XLEUFc/UhDhyNa5yRI/AAAAAAAABlo/4zrYLdS6x4g/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-020_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-j1-A0K_1kcE/UhDhyqZns4I/AAAAAAAABlw/VeLsCAIALd0/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-021%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-021" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-021" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-OWWro6gKDyY/UhDhzZyxGvI/AAAAAAAABl4/epGL-qx7UrI/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-021_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-zlLPEmj5-jo/UhDhz5iZ3HI/AAAAAAAABmA/-VbSABBOAh0/s1600-h/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-022%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="Summer 2013 safe-022" style="float: none; margin: 0px auto; display: block" alt="Summer 2013 safe-022" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-oB0gy2rJgXw/UhDh0gF8EuI/AAAAAAAABmI/8sEvXttJjYM/Summer%2525202013%252520safe-022_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>This may or may not be the final arrangement.</p> <p>I added in two more LED panels to the under side of the rifle upright shelves and only have a bit of dead space over the top of the half-shelves.  I might get a document drawer or two for that, or just use it for storage of manuals.  VaultPro sent me some touch-up paint for the exterior and I asked them for a strip of interior cloth to finish the top of the half-shelf support (so that you can't see the particle board used for it) and then made a couple of quick placement round covers for the bolt holes and removed those shelves.  I'll probably take some spare foam padding and put it under the long gun side.</p> <p>And that is the gun safe excursion.</p> <p>A few more days with The Bad Air Sponge ought to clean up the last of the VOC problems and make it something I can actually keep open for longer periods so I can get the equipment into it.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-42927019307738172692013-08-01T07:52:00.001-04:002013-08-01T07:52:00.916-04:00Passively implicit<p>The following is a cross-post from The Jacksonian Party.</p> <p>When looking at the US Constitution I take a view of it as a structuralist, that is to say that the form of government is given as a structure that has a number of interlocking parts that are defined, limited and created to serve a purpose.  Structural analysis means that you take the words as they are presented in the context of the English language.  I laid this out in <a href="http://thejacksonianparty.blogspot.com/2013/03/structural-analysis-of-amendment-ii.html" target="_blank">Structural analysis of Amendment II</a>, and that rests on the work that I looked at earlier by Nicholas Rosencranz who laid out how the sentence structure of the English language creates the structure of government in the <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1611210" target="_blank">Subjects</a> and <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1844749" target="_blank">Objects</a> of the Constitution.  The lineage of the US Constitution starts with agreements outlined in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and King Alfred all the way through to Bill of Rights put in place with James II, which I went over in <a href="http://thejacksonianparty.blogspot.com/2012/12/roots-of-constitutional-government.html" target="_blank">Roots of constitutional government</a>.  For this article I'm going to be building off my article on <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2013/07/taxation-via-sales.html" target="_blank">Taxation via sales</a>.</p> <p>Taxation was part of the trigger for the US Revolution and it is understood that the Founders and Framers both had a view that taxation is a necessary evil to run the organ of society known as government.  As a necessary evil it must be limited so that it does not over stress the body which is society that requires the functioning of government to do the few and necessary things to allow for the individuals to be free.  With that said taxation takes many forms and the US Congress gets some particular types taxation in <a href="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_transcript.html" target="_blank">Art I, Sec 8</a>, in part:</p> <blockquote> <p><b><font color="#9b00d3">Section. 8.</font></b></p> <p><a name="1.8.1"></a><font color="#9b00d3">The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;</font></p> </blockquote> <p>If Congress was getting the complete taxation power with this clause then there would be no need to put in Duties, Imposts and Excises, now, would there?  In fact it took an Amendment for Congress to get the income tax, and even that Amendment has been misused as it nowhere indicates that Congress may levy different taxes on different income levels.  The Progressive Income Tax requires not just the Income Tax part, but a specific exemption of the Privileges and Immunities clause and Amendment V and Due Process of Law which is to be applied equally to all citizens.  Be that as it may, later in Sec 8 is a clause that indicates what the scope of the Taxation power actually is:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Duties, Imposts and Excises are generally taxes aimed at the National level and at international trade.  Thus the regulatory or regularizing power of Congress writing law in support of Treaties or, in cases where there are no trade treaties, setting the Nation's tax policy towards importation of goods to sustain trade, thus are complementary to the Duties, Imposts and Excises previously mentioned.  That is to say there is an explicit venue given for the Taxation power that is complete for Congress for international trade modified by Treaties.  Thus even where it is a complete power it is one that has limitations via Treaty.</p> <p>Next is Sec 9 where one tax power is restricted and then modified by Amendment:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, </font><a href="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_amendments_11-27.html#16"><font color="#9b00d3"><strike>unless in Proportion to the Census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken</strike></font></a><font color="#9b00d3"><strike>.</strike></font></p> </blockquote> <p>This is the first outright restriction to the Taxation power and now limiting it.  Do note that this is a passive clause and that it does not mention Congress nor does it mention any other branch or any other government.  Thus this applies to all governments and all branches of all governments in the United States.  Remember in Sec 8 there is the language 'The Congress shall have...' is an explicit grant of power and as all of Sec 8 is a single sentence with many semi-colons, all of that is covered under that.  There is no need to repeat it per line as the separate grants are broken up for clarity's sake, for readability, and to let someone catch their breath if they had to read it as a single sentence.</p> <p>In Section 9 each clause is a single, stand-alone sentence, complete in and of itself.  These sentences are not started by explicit and active restrictions upon, say, Congress, but are passive and general in nature.  The Framers were more than capable of starting a sentence 'Congress shall make no law...' but these clauses do not start with that beginning.  As the Constitution is about the organization of the United States and what the role of the States shall be, when States require separate coverage they are mentioned, as in Sec 10, and I'm coming back to Sec 9, but here is the language on Taxation in 10:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it's inspection Laws: and the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>With 'No State shall...' we are given a definitive subject and then a set of Objects with modifiers.  It is this language that is absent in Sec 9 and without an actual Subject that is defined then the generalized Subject is being addressed to all levels of all governments.</p> <p>Imposts and Duties on Imports or Exports is a linking of topics in Sec 10 and due to that linkage these powers are addressed to those objects.  That explicit language and linkage then gives proper definition to the prior Congressional power on Imposts and Duties: Imports and Exports.  If a State wants a special exemption it must go to Congress and that only for the necessary execution of inspection laws.  By making those funds go to the US Treasury this is seen as a federal power granted to Congress and is for Imports and Exports.</p> <p>Now back in Sec 9 there is the final clause and one that clearly de-limits powers and it is this:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>As with the prior prohibition this one is given a passive voice and does not state 'Congress shall make no law...' nor does it start 'No State shall...' but, instead, addresses Taxation as a whole.  This is a restriction on the Taxation <strong>power</strong>, itself.  By not having either Congress or the States as the subject, as with the previous passive and standalone clause, this clause then addresses all governments in the United States. </p> <p>This is an implicit restriction on taxation of goods moved from State to State on goods exported from one State to another State.  No government may do this in the United States.</p> <p>Now lets flip this around into a different arena and ask: what is the form of this restriction on an international scale?</p> <p>The States of the United States are seen as Sovereign entities and actually have an escape hatch from the US Constitution embedded within it in Sec 10:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>This language also shows up later in the Constitution in Art IV:</p> <blockquote> <p><b><font color="#9b00d3">Section. 4.</font></b></p> <p><a name="4.4.1"></a><font color="#9b00d3">The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened), against domestic Violence.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>In Art IV, Sec 4 the guarantee of a Republican Form of Government is to the States, which are signatories to the US Constitution after ratification by the people of that State.  The protections against having this subverted are to protect the States against Invasion and domestic Violence.  In Art I, Sec 10 there are a set of powers that a State recovers if the United States does not support this and it is the ones they agree to set aside outside of these specific causes.  When you examine that list you get the conception of the broad headings that the States recover in full upon invasion, imminent threat of Danger or having their government threatened with being overturned via non-Republican means are broad and sweeping.  These powers are what we call the Foreign Policy power and the Military power, not just the defensive Militia power which is due to all men, but the assertive and external Military power.  Also it regains all the taxation powers and the powers to build new military fortifications and equipment to guard itself.</p> <p>In International Affairs a State with the full Foreign Policy, Military and Taxation power is known as an independent Nation State: a country.</p> <p>Thus the States must have these powers to set aside in this agreement known as the US Constitution, as you cannot recover what you did not have to start with.  That is simple logic.</p> <p>Taking the US Constitution as a TREATY DOCUMENT and examining what the form of Taxation is we then come to a conclusion of the limitation on the Taxation power that is startling due to the understanding that is underlying it.  It is the scope and form of Treaty that many who have argued on the necessity of unburdened trade have used at the International scale and has its full form seen with an organizations of States that agree to this view so as to have a coherent Nation amongst them.</p> <p>What is a trade agreement that unburdens trade amongst equals and limits the power of an oversight group so that it may not burden such trade via direct taxation?</p> <p>What is a trade agreement that sets up a system whereby sellers in one State that is signatory to the Treaty cannot have its goods or services taxed by a recipient State and its citizens?</p> <p>What is the form of trade agreement that abolishes duties, imposts and excises save for necessary inspection and then those funds applied only to those inspections to ensure that agreed-upon legal trade is all that is going on between States?</p> <p>Why this does have a modern term, doesn't it?</p> <p>This is known as a FREE TRADE AGREEMENT.</p> <p>Right there, in the US Constitution, powerfully stated by not being explicit, not a direct power grant, but by restricting all the governments involved, including the agreed-upon oversight body.  It is one of the most subtle and yet powerful statements on the positive value of trade between States to knit a Union together and to allow that free men when trading with other free men in States that all fall under the Treaty shall have NO TAXATION applied to that direct sale from individual to individual, State to State.</p> <p>And that means no 'Value Added Tax', 'Sales Tax' or any other thing not directly related to quantity, amount or hazard of a given good.  Taxation for tonnage is also removed unless it has safety or verification inspections involved.  The federal government can tax per gallon, per carton of cigarettes, or by any other gross weight and measure so long as it involves upkeep of infrastructure due to those particular items in the way of hazard or safety.</p> <p>What no government can do is tax by VALUE of the trade involved.</p> <p>Thus a nickel per gallon on tax is there without regard to the actual cost per galloon.  It is there if it is a penny per gallon and it is there if it is ten thousand dollars per gallon: the quantity is what matters, not the value.  And do note that is for interstate sales, only, so that in-State sales remain the realm of the State government.</p> <p>Governments will always seek new sources of revenue and tax the hell out of anything they can get their hands on and yet still be unable to balance their budgets.</p> <p>A free people have an 'out' from onerous taxation: our fellow citizens in the other States under this Free Trade Agreement embedded in the US Constitution.  As a remedy to overburdening of taxes this is one of the most sublime resorts that the ordinary citizen has to escape taxes, become closer with his fellow citizens and support the Union between the States.</p> <p>Because that is the realm of the Preamble of the US Constitution and note who is invoking it and what we promise to do:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3"><strong>We the People</strong> </font><font color="#9b00d3">of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.</font></p></blockquote> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-4523631902993263682013-07-20T14:37:00.001-04:002013-07-20T14:37:43.361-04:00Taxation via sales<p>Arthur B. Laffer, of the famous Laffer Curve, puts forth that e-commerce sales taxes could be used to cut income taxes in a <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/07/17/sales-tax-economic-growth-column/2530315/" target="_blank">17 JUL 2013 USA Today</a> article.  But this brings up the question of not only is this a smart thing to do (and there is no guarantee that governments will curb spending so as to allow for a cutting of income tax to do this) but if it is Constitutional.  In Art I, Sec. 8 is part of the answer to the Constitutional question:</p> <blockquote> <p><b><font color="#9b00d3">Section. 8.</font></b></p> <p><a name="1.8.1"></a><font color="#9b00d3">The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;</font></p> </blockquote> <p>That would apparently be it, right?</p> <p>An interesting case sheds some light on this, and that is <a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html" target="_blank">National Bellas Hess v. Dept. of Revenue – 386 US 752 (1967)</a> (Source: Justia) that involved a mail order house in MO getting charged for taxes to be collected in IL by their Dept. of Revenue.  In the conclusion there was this:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d"><em>Held:</em> The Commerce Clause prohibits a State from imposing the duty of use tax collection and payment upon a seller whose only connection with customers in the State is by common carrier or by mail. Pp. </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#756"><font color="#c0504d">386 U. S. 756</font></a><font color="#c0504d">-760.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>And going to the referenced section, the support for this is as follows:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>National argues that the liabilities which Illinois has thus imposed violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and create an unconstitutional burden upon interstate commerce.</strong> These two claims are closely related. For <strong>the test whether a particular state exaction is such as to invade the exclusive authority of Congress to regulate trade between the States</strong>, and <strong>the test for a State's compliance with the requirements of due process in this area are similar</strong>. <em>See Central R. Co. v. Pennsylvania,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/370/607/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">370 U. S. 607</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/370/607/case.html#621"><font color="#c0504d">370 U. S. 621</font></a><font color="#c0504d">-622 (concurring opinion of MR. JUSTICE BLACK). As to the former, <strong>the Court has held that</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">"State taxation falling on interstate commerce . . . <strong>can only be justified as designed to make such commerce bear a fair share of the cost of the local government whose protection it enjoys</strong>."</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><em>Freeman v. Hewit,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/329/249/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">329 U. S. 249</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/329/249/case.html#253"><font color="#c0504d">329 U. S. 253</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. <em>See also Greyhound Lines v. Mealey,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/334/653/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">334 U. S. 653</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/334/653/case.html#663"><font color="#c0504d">334 U. S. 663</font></a><font color="#c0504d">; <em>Northwestern Cement Co. v. Minnesota,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/358/450/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">358 U. S. 450</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/358/450/case.html#462"><font color="#c0504d">358 U. S. 462</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. And, in determining whether a state tax falls within the confines of the Due Process Clause, the Court has said that the "simple but controlling question is whether the state has given anything for which it can ask return." <em>Wisconsin v. J. C. Penney Co.,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/311/435/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">311 U. S. 435</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/311/435/case.html#444"><font color="#c0504d">311 U. S. 444</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. <em>See also Standard Oil Co. v. Peck,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/342/382/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">342 U. S. 382</font></a><font color="#c0504d">; <em>Ott v. Mississippi Barge Line,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/336/169/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">336 U. S. 169</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/336/169/case.html#174"><font color="#c0504d">336 U. S. 174</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. <strong>The same principles have been held applicable in determining the power of a State to impose the burdens of collecting use taxes upon interstate sales. Here too, the Constitution requires "some definite link, some minimum connection, between a state and the person, property or transaction it seeks to tax."</strong> <em>Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/340/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">347 U. S. 340</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/17/case.html#31"><font color="#c0504d">347 U. S. 31</font></a><font color="#c0504d"> 345; <em><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/362/207/case.html">Scripto,</a></em></font></p> <p><a name="757"><font color="#c0504d">Page 386 U. S. 757</font></a></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><em>Inc. v. Carson,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/362/207/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">362 U. S. 207</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/362/207/case.html#210"><font color="#c0504d">362 U. S. 210</font></a><font color="#c0504d">-211. [</font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F9" name="T9"><font color="#c0504d">Footnote 9</font></a><font color="#c0504d">] <em>See also American Oil Co. v. Neill,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/451/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">380 U. S. 451</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/451/case.html#458"><font color="#c0504d">380 U. S. 458</font></a><font color="#c0504d">.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>In applying these principles, the Court has upheld the power of a State to impose liability upon an out-of-state seller to collect a local use tax in a variety of circumstances.</strong> Where the <strong>sales were arranged by local agents in the taxing State, we have upheld such power</strong>. <em>Felt & Tarrant Co. v. Gallagher,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/306/62/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">306 U. S. 62</font></a><font color="#c0504d">; <em>General Trading Co. v. Tax Comm'n,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/322/335/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">322 U. S. 335</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. <strong>We have reached the same result where the mail order seller maintained local retail stores.</strong> <em>Nelson v. Sears, Roebuck & Co.,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/312/359/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">312 U. S. 359</font></a><font color="#c0504d">; <em>Nelson v. Montgomery Ward,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/312/373/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">312 U. S. 373</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. [</font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F10" name="T10"><font color="#c0504d">Footnote 10</font></a><font color="#c0504d">] In those situations, the out-of-state seller was plainly accorded the protection and services of the taxing State. The case in this Court which represents the furthest constitutional reach to date of a State's power to deputize an out-of-state retailer as its collection agent for a use tax is <em>Scripto, Inc. v. Carson,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/362/207/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">362 U. S. 207</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. There, we held that Florida could constitutionally impose upon a Georgia seller the duty of collecting a state use tax upon the sale of goods shipped to customers in Florida. In that case, the seller had</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">"10 wholesalers, jobbers, or 'salesmen' conducting continuous local solicitation in Florida and forwarding the resulting orders </font></p> <p><a name="758"><font color="#c0504d">Page 386 U. S. 758</font></a></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">from that State to Atlanta for shipment of the ordered goods."</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">362 U.S. at </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/362/207/case.html#211"><font color="#c0504d">362 U. S. 211</font></a><font color="#c0504d">.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>But the Court has never held that a State may impose the duty of use tax collection and payment upon a seller whose only connection with customers in the State is by common carrier or the United States mail. Indeed, in the <em>Sears, Roebuck</em> case, the Court sharply differentiated such a situation from one where the seller had local retail outlets, pointing out that "those other concerns . . . are not receiving benefits from Iowa for which it has the power to exact a price."</strong> 312 U.S. at </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/312/359/case.html#365"><font color="#c0504d">312 U. S. 365</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. And in <em>Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland,</em> </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/340/case.html"><font color="#c0504d">347 U. S. 340</font></a><font color="#c0504d">, the Court held that Maryland could not constitutionally impose a use tax obligation upon a Delaware seller who had no retail outlets or sales solicitors in Maryland. There, the seller advertised its wares to Maryland residents through newspaper and radio advertising, in addition to mailing circulars four times a year. As a result, it made substantial sales to Maryland customers, and made deliveries to them by its own trucks and drivers.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">In order to uphold the power of Illinois to impose use tax burdens on National in this case, we would have to repudiate totally the sharp distinction which these and other decisions have drawn between mail order sellers with retail outlets, solicitors, or property within a State and those who do no more than communicate with customers in the State by mail or common carrier as part of a general interstate business. <strong>But this basic distinction, which, until now, has been generally recognized by the state taxing authorities, [</strong></font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F11" name="T11"><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Footnote 11</strong></font></a><font color="#c0504d"><strong>] is a valid one, and we decline to obliterate it.</strong> </font></p> <p><a name="759"><font color="#c0504d">Page 386 U. S. 759</font></a></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">We need not rest on the broad foundation of all that was said in the <em>Miller Bros.</em> opinion, for here there was neither local advertising nor local household deliveries, upon which the dissenters in <em>Miller Bros.</em> so largely relied. 347 U.S. at </font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/340/case.html#358"><font color="#c0504d">347 U. S. 358</font></a><font color="#c0504d">. <strong>Indeed, it is difficult to conceive of commercial transactions more exclusively interstate in character than the mail order transactions here involved.</strong> And if the power of Illinois to impose use tax burdens upon National were upheld, the resulting impediments upon the free conduct of its interstate business would be neither imaginary nor remote. For if Illinois can impose such burdens, so can every other State, and so, indeed, can every municipality, every school district, and every other political subdivision throughout the Nation with power to impose sales and use taxes. [</font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F12" name="T12"><font color="#c0504d">Footnote 12</font></a><font color="#c0504d">] <strong>The many variations in rates of tax, [</strong></font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F13" name="T13"><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Footnote 13</strong></font></a><font color="#c0504d"><strong>] in allowable exemptions, and in administrative and recordkeeping requirements [</strong></font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F14" name="T14"><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Footnote 14</strong></font></a><font color="#c0504d"><strong>] could entangle National's interstate </strong></font></p> <p><a name="760"><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Page 386 U. S. 760</strong></font></a></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>business in a virtual welter of complicated obligations to local jurisdictions with no legitimate claim to impose "a fair share of the cost of the local government."</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>The very purpose of the Commerce Clause was to ensure a national economy free from such unjustifiable local entanglements. Under the Constitution, this is a domain where Congress alone has the power of regulation and control.</strong> [</font><a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/386/753/case.html#F15" name="T15"><font color="#c0504d">Footnote 15</font></a><font color="#c0504d">]</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>The judgment is</strong></font></p> <p><em><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Reversed.</strong></font></em></p> </blockquote> <p>Yes you really do need that entire section although it comes to a sweet and easy conclusion, the justification of it is important.  The SCOTUS is reversing itself within the entire thing, and invalidating a system that it held to be Constitutional at one point.  Thus the US Congress could impose a separate sales tax, not based on local sales taxes due to the undue burden trying to comprehend the vagaries of local sales taxes entails.  This rests upon the power domain of Congress in the realm of Interstate Taxes and the requirement of due process for collection.</p> <p>What the SCOTUS has invalidated is the 'fair share' of taxes by local governments for the protection of commerce that the interstate commerce goes through.  You can't do that as a local or State government, and attempting to impose that from the federal level incurs the exact, same problems of domain and due process.  The power domain to capture any such taxes from direct Interstate Trade is due to the federal government <strong>alone</strong>.  And the same conditions for catalog sales are directly analogous to Internet sales: it takes place via common carrier, there is no physically present operation of the seller in the buyer's State or jurisdiction unless it is within the State, then all State laws apply, and there can be no taxation to help support coverage of the infrastructure by a State or local government.</p> <p>Thus via the Constitution the Congress would be able to impose a separate sales tax, applicable <strong>only</strong> to interstate commerce which would then flow into the federal coffers.  This would put the US federal government as having an interest in the transactions involved and would allow the full power of the federal government to get information from such transactions.  The actual <strong>wisdom</strong> of that, given what the NSA, DoJ and IRS are doing at present is questionable, at best.</p> <p>Now in <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/" target="_blank">15 USC</a> 10B there is <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap10b/subchapi/sec381/" target="_blank">Sec. 381</a> that looks at State net income tax for those people doing interstate commerce and stops the State from doing that.  That would be a roundabout way to get a State 'sales tax' via the interstate derived income put under the guise of an income tax, and you can't do that.  This protects those who are not incorporated and acting as individuals from getting socked by this sort of thing by the States.</p> <p>Going on to <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap10b/subchapii/sec391/" target="_blank">Sec. 391</a>, you come to an actual interstate sales item: electricity.  And States can't tax out of State producers of that commodity, either.</p> <p>There is a problem with 15 USC, just at a glance.  There are 110 Chapters to it covering everything from Armored Car Industry Reciprocity (<a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap85/" target="_blank">Ch. 85</a>) to Sports Agent Responsibility And Trust (<a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap104/" target="_blank">Ch. 104</a>) to Pool And Spa Safety (<a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap106/" target="_blank">Ch. 106</a>) to Hobby Protection (<a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title15/chap48/" target="_blank">Ch.48</a>).  If you want to know about Interstate Horseracing, Switchblades and Global Change Research, you can find Chapters for them, too.  You would think that something like business taxation would be held under it, wouldn't you?  No that's under <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title26/" target="_blank">26 USC</a>, with the taxation stuff... but if you want an exemption, give-away, freebie or other such stuff then you gotta be in 15 USC, apparently.  And, yes, since everyone who tries to make an interstate sale will then have an interest in getting an exemption for this or that, you can expect 15 USC to explode in size.  It used to go to 19 Misc., but we passed that ages ago.  If Mr. Laffer thinks you can get an equal code to apply to all people without some trying to get special carve-outs, then he is living in a different dimension on a different world and one that is, apparently, altruistic in nature.</p> <p>In 26 USC 1, Section 11 you can find <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title26/subtitlea/chap1/subchapa/partii/sec11/" target="_blank">Taxes on Corporations</a>.</p> <p>Now how do corporations get their money?  Do they find it buried under trees in their back yards?  Do they suddenly come upon oodles of cash laying on their doorstep every morning?  Or do they get it through, oh, the sales of goods and services?</p> <p>Hands up if you answer anything other than sales, unless you are thinking of charities, certain non-profits with their hats out, religious institutions, or that ex-Governor of New Jersey who fleeced people and has never been charged with anything for it.</p> <p>Now they can get revenue from other sources and those are covered as well:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">(2) Certain personal service corporations not eligible for graduated rates</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Notwithstanding paragraph (1), the amount of the tax imposed by subsection (a) on the taxable income of a qualified personal service corporation (as defined in section 448(d)(2)) shall be equal to 35 percent of the taxable income.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">(c) Exceptions</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Subsection (a) shall not apply to a corporation subject to a tax imposed by—</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">(1) section 594 (relating to mutual savings banks conducting life insurance business),</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">(2) subchapter L (sec. 801 and following, relating to insurance companies), or</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">(3) subchapter M (sec. 851 and following, relating to regulated investment companies and real estate investment trusts).</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Yes, that is starting to leave you with that goods and services stuff.</p> <p>You can have a sales tax run by Congress or you can have a sales tax run by Congress.  If you are very, very unlucky you will get both, because, according to the US Constitution, Congress can tax you on sales and income if you are a corporation and I bet that these regulations will go down to individuals on EBay as well.</p> <p>Isn't it swell that Mr. Laffer thinks that business income taxes would go down if you get a sales tax in interstate commerce?</p> <p>Is there a problem with this?</p> <p>Oh, yes, there is.</p> <p>First – Just on the Income Tax as a proposition and I'll give you its Amendment:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">AMENDMENT XVI</font></p> <p><i><font color="#9b00d3">Passed by Congress July 2, 1909. Ratified February 3, 1913.</font></i></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3"><b>Note</b>: Article I, section 9, of the Constitution was modified by amendment 16.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Where is a progressive income tax allowed in this?  That is to say: where is Congress allowed to treat different amount of earnings differently encapsulated in this Amendment?  It speaks to source and getting it without the old apportionment via population bit that was used up to 1919, but where does it allow Congress to put in different and graduated tax rates?  Because, you know, it doesn't, and via the prior texts all citizens are to get equal treatment under the law.  No favorites.  No scapegoats.  I'm starting to think that there is a test case in all of this.  And, via <a href="http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/171487/" target="_blank">Instapundit</a>, <a href="http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/150391" target="_blank">James Huffman</a> seems to have an idea on this.</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Secondly there is Art I, Sec. 9, in part:</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">[..]</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Hmmm... well that is interstate trade, now, isn't it?  And if you are trying to tax the sales of something being exported from a State, which is what interstate trade is, then no Tax or Duty may be laid upon it.  Period.  By any government.  This would include Impost Taxes, which Congress gets as well, which are normally considered for foreign trade and Excise Taxes, which are for inland trade.</p> <p>As the US already had VT and NH, which had some trade with Canada but no ports to speak of, the Framers knew about the idea of inland trade and appear to have put a stop to trying to tax it by anyone.  There are fees for interstate transportation and inspections which are allowed, yes, but not a tax on the actual trade itself beyond those tolls, fees and other sorts of things necessary to ensure trade amongst the several States.  Excise taxes are commonly placed on commodities, like gasoline and its tax, which is done per gallon, not per amount of sales.  Similarly tobacco and alcohol can get an Excise Tax based on per unit or per volume distribution that is a set amount and not variable by the actual cost of the item involved.  As each of these taxes are for items by type, not by cost, and are regulated by graduation for that item (gallon, per number, or similar) <strong>and</strong> used to specific purposes for that Excise Tax that is not general revenue, they are allowable.  It is not a sales tax, as such, but one on the amount of a commodity purchased to cover the cost of its transportation, safety, or other clearly defined public problem to which it contributes.</p> <p>Impost Taxes usually are put into the customs and trade realm, where a percent of the value brought into a Nation is then levied against the goods, and that levy must be paid so they can be accepted into the trade of a Nation.  This is a tax to support the overhead of government to run the Nation from foreign trade and used to be a major way the US government generated revenue before the era of Free Trade.</p> <p>Third – The major sticking point is that the federal government is already collecting a form of sales tax on the total revenue of a corporation.  It is covered with that, by definition, and since Congress has made that a part of the definition of 'income' it can decide if it wants to tax total corporate income or only interstate trade sales income as a separate item.  Individuals selling to individuals, however, might suddenly find themselves with a State exemption for interstate income, but suddenly liable for a federal tax on them via this, if it isn't already considered a part of normal income.  You'll need to consult <a href="http://law.justia.com/codes/us/2010/title26/subtitlea/chap1/subchapa/parti/sec1/" target="_blank">26 USC 1 Ch.1</a> on that.</p> <p>So would a NST be viable?  Not really, particularly the Art. I, Sec. 9 piece that specifically prohibits it from State exports.  States are prohibited from taxing them as well save for inspections and such in a part of Art I, Sec 10 that I don't use that often:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it's inspection Laws: and the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>So no one can tax sales between the States, as such, save to count it as income for corporations.  That 'No tax or duty...' is a passive clause of the US Constitution and by not specifying who it applies to in the realm of power domains (federal or State legislative, judicial, executive) <strong>it then applies to all of them without exception</strong>.  This is not a 'Congress shall not...' sort of deal, but a full and broad prohibition that was absolutely intentional by the Framers.</p> <p>Alexander Hamilton put it like this in <em><a href="http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa12.htm" target="_blank">Federalist #12</a></em>:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff">In America, it is evident that we must a long time depend for the means of revenue chiefly on such duties. In most parts of it, excises must be confined within a narrow compass. <strong>The genius of the people will ill brook the inquisitive and peremptory spirit of excise laws.</strong> The pockets of the farmers, on the other hand, will reluctantly yield but scanty supplies, in the unwelcome shape of impositions on their houses and lands; and <strong>personal property is too precarious and invisible a fund to be laid hold of in any other way than by the inperceptible agency of taxes on consumption.</strong></font></p> <p><a name="P7"></a><font color="#0000ff"><strong>If these remarks have any foundation, that state of things which will best enable us to improve and extend so valuable a resource must be best adapted to our political welfare. And it cannot admit of a serious doubt, that this state of things must rest on the basis of a general Union.</strong> <strong>As far as this would be conducive to the interests of commerce, so far it must tend to the extension of the revenue to be drawn from that source. As far as it would contribute to rendering regulations for the collection of the duties more simple and efficacious, so far it must serve to answer the purposes of making the same rate of duties more productive, and of putting it into the power of the government to increase the rate without prejudice to trade.</strong></font></p> <p><a name="P8"></a><font color="#0000ff">The relative situation of these States; the number of rivers with which they are intersected, and of bays that wash there shores; the facility of communication in every direction; the affinity of language and manners; the familiar habits of intercourse; -- all these are circumstances that would conspire to render an illicit trade between them a matter of little difficulty, and would insure frequent evasions of the commercial regulations of each other. The separate States or confederacies would be necessitated by mutual jealousy to avoid the temptations to that kind of trade by the lowness of their duties. <strong>The temper of our governments, for a long time to come, would not permit those rigorous precautions by which the European nations guard the avenues into their respective countries, as well by land as by water; and which, even there, are found insufficient obstacles to the adventurous stratagems of avarice.</strong></font></p> </blockquote> <p>And then they put in the things to make it difficult to exact a price for that trade in personal property that governments will seek because their hunger knows no limits, and thus it must be limited at the start.</p> <p>You want an NST?</p> <p>Do you really want to let the IRS have that sort of information about who buys what and when, how much was paid and so on?  Because it will want an itemized list, you know?  Just to make sure.  And the IRS is so safe and secure, non-threatening and non-partisan, right?</p> <p>In any event the Framers gave us Art I, Sec 9 to deal with the question.</p> <p>We don't need another tax.</p> <p>We need a smaller government that can be held accountable to the TAXPAYER.</p> <p>We don't have that now.</p> <p>And an NST doesn't get you there, either.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-30660056751736126432013-07-01T09:59:00.001-04:002013-07-01T09:59:14.706-04:00Jobs that don't go away<blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.  - Robert A. Heinlein, <em>Time Enough for Love</em>.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>I do appreciate the sentiment of the quote, but there is a problem with it, for me, in that I grew up in a socialist household and it was preached at me that an hour's work is worth an hour's work, no matter what you do.  That came from the conception of communism and collectivism that put forward a bucolic view that all work was equal and that a man should have equal results from spending a day where he fished for a couple of hours, then tended his garden, mended his clothes, shoed his horse and then went and did an hour of real work and yet would receive recompense for the entire day doing things.  Karl Marx railed against the breaking down of work into smaller processes that could be specialized and each sub-process done quickly by an individual who only had to learn one skill to work for a wage.  This is called a 'division of labor' and Marx hated it as it divorced humans from the world where they should be able to do anything they wanted and have equal recognition for that work.  As much as a number of people adore Heinlein, I hate that quote as it speaks to the division of labor and what it has allowed the world to accomplish.  It has a mistaken belief behind it that any human can turn their hand to any task and be equal in performance, results and pay.</p> <p>And yet that is just not the case, is it?  You should be able to turn your hand at various things in your life, yes, but your results will vary.  </p> <p>I'm a generalist, believe me on that.  Being able to turn your hand to any task requires a mindset, an attitude and an aptitude to accept failure and that failure is an indictment of lack of skill, by and large, not a lack of trying.  You don't get paid for trying, you get paid for doing.</p> <p>In America, today, we have an unemployment problem and it has nothing to do about unemployment and lots to do about how our society has changed its evaluation of work.  Since the start of the Progressive Era, the one that would try to make those who went through school as unlike their parents as possible, there has been an inculcation of the meme that 'to get ahead you need a diploma' or that 'a college degree means you will make more at any job you do'.</p> <p>These are lies.</p> <p>I saw that directly as I took up geology in university and the US had just hit the 'oil patch': the place where geologists from the small oil companies, some with multiple degrees under their belts, were flipping burgers just to get by.  A degree, higher education as a pathway to a good job are lies.  At the same time as I was getting a degree in geology, I was putting enough course work in to nearly minor in computer science, my second early love, and that proved to be a rewarding combination.  Note that these are not areas in the 'humanities' or ones that have a racial or ethnic or gender hyphen to them: math is required.</p> <p>So are labs.</p> <p>The lab work is that extra credit hour that goes with the main course and without which you don't get a grade.  A putative one hour lab never lasts one hour... and it doesn't matter if they only get the room for one hour or not unless it is the strictest form of lab where you must hand in your observations and results right there at the end of one hour.  I had, exactly, one of those.  Physics, of course, show all work and hand it in as far as you can process it through because methodology means more than results: do the right method and the results should follow.  A lab for seismic prospect, however, could eat up the minimal lab time and then, as you got to keep the results to keep on working at them, you could spend untold hours after the actual lab to get results.  There, in the drilling for oil and gas realm, results matter and your methodology better be correct.  Those labs are ones where you could easily spend ten or twenty hours and be working right up to the hand-in time... and only then find out the professor didn't give out enough information at the start... yet, even for the wasted time, you learned a lot.  Ditto the chemistry labs and labs on things like sedimentation where you could get one wrong sieve in place and lose a week's worth of work that you just don't have time to go back and complete because time and gravity determines how quickly sediment settles.</p> <p>You can't BS your way to lab results.  Period.  And yet lab work is just a reflection of how gathered material and information are examined, and in geology that means you get field work to do the initial gathering.  Gathering data by something other than remote sensing and actually doing 'ground truthing' can lead to jobs that take you to the middle of absolute nowhere and then involve mucking around in soils, sediment, rock, rivers and streams, and then know that the tent you brought with you is your only real form of life support and comfort.  At the end of every long, winding dirt road is something a geologist wants to look at... or at least that is the way it seemed during field camp.</p> <p>What you get from the sciences, engineering, technology and machinist world is one in which your political viewpoint doesn't get results.  Results are done through procedure, process, verification and testing.  If you think just because you are of some race, gender, ethnicity or that you are 'special' in any way, shape or form: try doing some work in the fields where education only matters in getting results via proper method, not good feelings.  At the height of the insanity in the old USSR there was the actual belief... taught understanding... that Communist science was different from Capitalist science.  That what you believed would offer you an entirely different set of Natural Laws.  Scientists outside the USSR came up with a term to describe this sort of thinking (I mean that is what those in the sciences do, after all, is discriminate and define... not attempt to define and then force the world to work to the definition) which holds for the entire field of 'good feeling' above hard results via methodology:  <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism" target="_blank">Lysenkoism</a> named after Trofim Lysenko.  Lysenkoism believes in predetermined results and then doing everything to prove the results, including adulterating lab results to fit the predetermined schema.  Luckily Lysenko got Stalin to believe in this process and it set Soviet genetics back by decades, which is very lucky as it set their bioweapons programs back by the same amount.</p> <p>Anthropogenic Global Warming is a form of Lysenkoism.  Anything that shows contrary to the predetermined belief that the globe is warming due to mankind's industrialization, like temperature readings showing that the globe has been cooling for a few decades, is thrown out in favor of the predetermined result.</p> <p>Now with students graduating with tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt for their higher education, we are seeing that the predetermined belief that a college education gets you a decent job... and therefore a good life... is a lie as well.  It is Lysenkoism in service of Progressivism, and when you can tell them apart, let me know, wouldya?  The result of making sons and daughters as unlike their parents as possible is the destruction of the work ethic and the understanding that there is no such thing as a bad job.  That took me awhile to understand growing up, as I also had that belief, but after temping out doing all sorts of jobs, I learned differently.  And with college graduates with hyphenated degrees, degrees in the 'humanities' that have little to do with human nature and more about political indoctrination, we now find ourselves with a decaying infrastructure and little to no appreciation of what it takes to actually have a civilized, modern world.</p> <p>Mike Rowe started out with about a single seasons of <a href="http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/dirty-jobs" target="_blank">Dirty Jobs</a> to do at the Discovery Channel, and figured that would be it.  A nice program to fill up some time  after he had quit being an opera singer because, really, he was an understudy and would probably always be an understudy.  I'm sure there are films about how all you need is one Big Break of the Star Performer having laryngitis, getting a broken leg, etc. for the understudy to come forward and shine... but those are movies for Hollywood, not real life.  In real life, results matter.  Mike Rowe has a great voice for TV and his voice-over narratives on shows like Deadliest Catch, amongst many, gave him a way to feed himself while he looked for other work he could do.  Dirty Jobs let him explore that 'other' work... and then the fans kicked in for seven more seasons of the program's material.  At Profoundly Disconnected there is a graphic that sums up the decades of lies comparing the poster at the guidance counselor's office and what Mr. Rowe has learned about the world:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-MDDwkYeIoCo/UdGLKBOEzvI/AAAAAAAABgQ/_B38VVzw2io/s1600-h/slide2%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img title="slide2" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" border="0" alt="slide2" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-JcBiDuJUSsQ/UdGLK-hbs9I/AAAAAAAABgY/CPxwIX75poU/slide2_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="164" height="244" /></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-PWJrMKPzF6E/UdGLLULnhAI/AAAAAAAABgg/m0jzdmVyquQ/s1600-h/slide1%25255B2%25255D.jpg"><img title="slide1" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" border="0" alt="slide1" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/--Kpd2myeeMA/UdGLMCiZUMI/AAAAAAAABgo/v0tTQBUS5z0/slide1_thumb.jpg?imgmax=800" width="164" height="244" /></a></p> <p align="center">Photo courtesy: <a href="http://profoundlydisconnected.com/" target="_blank">Profoundly Disconnected</a></p> <p>Because of the glowing belief of the 1970's that children should be aspiring to the sheepskin and not to the factory floor, we are now at a point where the jobs of actually cleaning and maintaining our modern infrastructure is putting civilization at risk.  Our way of life depends on jobs that include: welders, pipe fitters, ditch diggers, masons, sanitation workers, and much, much more.</p> <p>Julie Kantor at the HuffPo, and that is a leftist, progressive rag if they actually printed the thing, but since it is done with electrons and semi-conductors you don't get bird cage liner, was out doing her bit to help create some livable space for monkeys and ran into Mike Rowe:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#0000ff"><strong>Rowe with his signature baseball cap and jeans pointed out that in the '70s, colleges created a poster campaign that told us to work <em>smarter</em> not<em> harder</em>, and the campaign was spectacularly successful! Rowe also shared his view that this campaign was the worst advice ever given. Why? </strong></font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Because...</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Out went vocational education and skills-based learning for jobs.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">In came college, college, college-bound, NCLB, college loans, and over a trillion in debt.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff"><strong>We shifted focus off of skills and trade</strong> and the great equalizer of our country became to get kids college bound and degreed. </font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff"><strong>We became a country where testing scores are currency and not whether a child can show up on time, a positive mental attitude, focused resume and a work ethic to become an expert in a craft or skill.</strong> </font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff"><strong>We forgot how to just make something that America could sell and many 'dirty jobs' were viewed as beneath us in our quest to work <em>smart</em> but not necessarily<em> hard</em>. </strong></font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Mike and others have pointed out time and time again to us<strong> that most jobs require a two-year degree (yeah, community colleges!) or less, and technical training and certifications.</strong> Also pointed out is that many of these jobs, especially if technology or engineering are involved, can <u>start </u>with salaries in the late 40's and 50's.<strong> The U.S. Department of Labor shares that only 18 percent of jobs require a 4-year college degree.</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">"We must be prepared with the skills for America so America will be prepared," said the dynamic youth president on the podium at opening night. The event resembled a Junior Olympics or rock concert with "America Needs Me" posters abound.</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">I spoke to him afterwards and he would like very much to be a STEM teacher in Automotive Technologies for a few years once he finishes his two-year degree and he plans to continue his education from there. </font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">Rowe suggests that the new motto should be to <em>'Work Smart <u>and </u>Hard.'</em> That's a campaign we can all get behind. Whether you go to a 4-year college, or a 2-year college, or get some vocational training,<strong> know what the jobs you want requires education-wise and what jobs pay to help you map out your decisions and training.</strong> Now that's <em>smart</em>!</font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">I hope you will also be <em>touched for the very first time</em> by SkillsUSA and groups like 4H, Girls Scouts, DECA, YearUp, Invent.org, Youthbuild, NFTE and more that teach real deal skills. </font></p> <p><font color="#0000ff">And companies... if you haven't already and your struggling to hire...</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>The estimates vary, but there are between 3 and 5 million dirty jobs in the US going unfilled.  These jobs impact getting construction work done, maintaining roads and bridges, replacing water mains and sewer systems, maintaining and replacing the current electrical grid... none of this is glamorous, none of this is what you would call high tech, but each and every single item in our infrastructure will not last without maintenance and repair work.</p> <p>We have changed from where being a politician was a job, to one in which it is a career... and yet politicians build nothing, create nothing, and only act as parasites within the organs of the civil body.  They stick around too long with ideas that are outmoded and seek a predetermined end.  Politicians love to classify things into jobs that require government... and they can and do build edifices and those are the warning signs that we must regard, today.</p> <p>As the saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day.</p> <p>It was, however, sacked in three.</p> <p>What is the amount of time it takes to go from civilized society to being uncivilized?  Three days.</p> <p>We are missing hundreds of thousands... millions... of jobs by teaching a generation that they are 'special' and that everything they do is 'special' and that Big Brother Government will always take care of them when they fall down.  From our history we can see that Rome also stood on a similar precipice, where the freeman was marginalized by the slaves and freedmen who were connected to the rich, while the citizens of Rome became marginalized.  Yet the Eternal City would not fall completely, even after sacking... that would take a later invader who understood that the aqueducts allowed Rome to be the size it was, and destroyed them.  For its day that was a complex system, and yet in mere years, Rome shrunk from Imperial Capital sized to modest town by a river size.</p> <p>What killed Rome wasn't the sacking, but the aqueducts being destroyed at key points.  The sacking of Rome was a mere warning sign on the road to barbarism, and yet it was not seen as such.</p> <p>That is where our civilization now stands: awaiting some key failures for vital infrastructure that we have no one to deploy to repair.  We have seen the acts of barbarism but do not understand that they are symptoms of a disease, at best, not the thing, itself.</p> <p>Imagine the main water system and supply of any major city not undergoing a terrorist attack, but just failing at so many points due to neglect that the entire system begins a cascade of failures that turns a major metropolitan area into something that only the surface carrying capacity of the water and ditches can support.</p> <p>The Progressives grew out from Marx's ideas.</p> <p>If you adore Heinlein you are looking to become a generalist.</p> <p>I'm letting you know that the good skills necessary to support yourself and others aren't hard to get... Mike Rowe understands this... but you are only special when you are doing a function that is necessary to the support of civilization.  </p> <p>From <em><a href="http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_copybook.htm" target="_blank">Gods of the Copybook Headings</a></em> by Rudyard Kipling:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3"><strong>In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all, <br />By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul; <br />But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy, <br />And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: </strong><i><strong>"If you don't work you die."</strong> </i></font></p> <em></em> <p> <br /><font color="#9b00d3">Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew <br />And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true <br />That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four <br />And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.</font></p> <p> <br /><font color="#9b00d3">As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man <br />There are only four things certain since Social Progress began. <br />That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire, <br />And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3"></font> <br /><font color="#9b00d3"><strong>And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins <br />When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins, <br />As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn, <br />The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!</strong></font> </p> </blockquote> <p>If you don't work, you die.</p> <p>Plan for a job and a life, first.  Then figure out what you need to get it.</p> <p>Not the other way around.</p> <p>And if you have no idea what you should do... pick up some welding skills.  Carpentry.  Brick laying.  Pipefitting.  Electrician.  Plumber.</p> <p>And if you can't decide, just start doing jobs and picking up skills as they come by.  For while specialization builds a civilized society and infrastructure, the generalist survives its collapse.  That collapse is always just three days away.  You can still do other things when being a specialist on the job... I heartily recommend it!  Do not let your job define you.  You must define yourself and your job is just something you do.</p> <p>The skills are way cheaper than a four year degree, and won't leave you with a mountain of debt.  And you should be able to find a job in THIS ECONOMY to start your life.  Decent pay.  Debt free.  Good job.  Do you really want more out of live.</p> <p>Temp out if worse comes to worse, and get a cross-section of skills: refuse nothing from cleaning out old warehouses to setting up pools on windy days to going out in the field to collect soil samples from waste dumps.</p> <p>Oh, illegals aren't doing these jobs NOW and won't be doing them if they become legalized, just so you know.</p> <p>'Lose the suits, grab some boots and get a Dirty Job.'</p> <p>- Mike Rowe and the unofficial theme song of Dirty Jobs.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-14976118407456912482013-06-09T07:39:00.001-04:002013-06-09T11:25:01.606-04:00Presumed Guilty<p>In the justice system of the US the individual is presumed innocent until proven guilty.  There is a system of law built on that assumption and its framework requiring requests to seek personal information on individuals under criminal investigation is encoded into the US Constitution in the <a href="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html" target="_blank">Bill of Rights</a>:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Amendment IV</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, <strong>but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized</strong>.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Amendment V</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself,<strong> nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>Amendment VI</strong></font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d"><strong>In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed</strong>, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and<strong> to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.</strong></font></p> </blockquote> <p>Amendment IV sets up the Judicial Branch as the one to authorize Warrants as the Executive Branch is the one doing the work of enforcing the law and cannot be said to be disinterested in a case, thus requiring a third party to adjudicate the request.  The Legislative can't do that as it only makes the law, and the Executive is the enforcer of it, so by default it is the Judicial Branch that does that work.  What you do in your life, what things you get and how you get them are thusly protected from government scrutiny because you are presumed innocent of any crime to start with.</p> <p>Amendment V puts in place the requirement of due process of law, which means that the steps of collecting evidence, going to a Judge for a Warrant, and then proceeding through a trial is required and guilt ascertained before any penalty may be put in place by government on an individual.  Amendment IV creates the process of required collection only after suspicion of criminal conduct is raised, and then evidence gathering after that via the Warrant process.  That is the due process of law and it is sustained by Amendment V.</p> <p>Amendment VI sets up the requirement that all information collected by law enforcement on an individual in a criminal proceeding be handed over to that individual and those representing his defense in court.  Also the defendant can call witnesses including those who have done the collecting and analyzing of data as that is part and parcel of the evidence itself.  With that the due process of law is given a final safeguard to allow a defendant to see exculpatory data, examine the process used to gather the data and see if any of their fundamental rights were violated in its collection.  That isn't just to keep law enforcement in line, but to allow the innocent a chance to demonstrate that the prosecution was not thoroughly done and that they have the wrong person involved.</p> <p>Got it?</p> <p>Suspicion of criminality.</p> <p>Collection of data.</p> <p>Required intercession of a Judge for Warrants to examine personal property and how it is acquired.</p> <p>Charges put against an individual in open court.</p> <p>Handing over all collected evidence and allowing the process of discovery to be a two-way street so that the investigators can be put under scrutiny as well.</p> <p>Counsel to assist in aiding the defense of the accused.</p> <p>Trial by Jury.</p> <p>A process made to safeguard your rights and liberty.</p> <p>Now fast forward to PRISM, NSA and its massive data collection storehouse in Utah.  A place that is set up to gather as much information as possible, and it does not respect borders and collects everything.  Yes the NSA is collecting data on you, too, and if you are lucky it will just sit on a disc in an array in UT... until some bureaucrat gets a Warrant to investigate you.</p> <p>Notice what has just happened?</p> <p>By pre-collecting data you are now Presumed Guilty of a crime.  This is the tool of an authoritarian if not totalitarian State seeking to have its own way with individuals by having necessary records to accuse individuals of activities that are unlawful.  Are you violating the law?</p> <p>Take a look at the list of <a href="http://www.regulations.gov/#!home" target="_blank">federal regulations</a>.  Since the start of the Regulatory State, back in the early part of the 20th century, agencies/departments with Congressionally authorized power to make and enforce regulations have blossomed to go into every corner of daily activity.  From the car you drive to the food you eat to the medications you take to the bed you sleep on: all of that is gist for the regulatory mill of fines, penalties and investigation.  On any given day you are in violation of dozens of federal regulations just by using common sense to live your life, and with the extension of federal power into banking, commerce, investments and a plethora of other areas, your chance of being a criminal jumps by leaps and bounds.  It is worth checking out Glenn Reynolds' latest paper on this topic to see how bad it is: <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2203713" target="_blank">Ham Sandwich Nation: Due Process When Everything is a Crime</a>.</p> <p>If you are presumed guilty that means that your personal expectation of privacy is out the window... say, as a side light, those supporting this set-up cannot be for Roe v. Wade as it supports a personal right to privacy under a framework of law that requires collection of evidence to start at suspicion of wrong-doing, not beforehand.  By trying to pin privacy to 'emanations' and 'penumbras' and not to Amendment IX and X, the SCOTUS has set up the overturning of privacy rights as a Judicial feature that can be undone with a single gavel.  Isn't that sweet?  If you are pro-information collection State you are against Roe v. Wade.  Ah, what a tangled web they weave, no?</p> <p>Back to the presumption of innocence being overturned by pre-collection of data.  The system described in the Bill of Rights is a hard one and puts the onus of hard work on the State, not the individual.  The State must figure out if you have committed a crime, it must show evidence that points to this, it must do the gumshoe work of collecting data de novo (which is to say afresh, although past convictions will stick to you like glue), process the evidence and then actually go to a public court to bring charges.  This is not an unburdened system and it is the burdening that protects your individual rights.  Want a Police State?  Make it easy to get data on people!</p> <p>Here is a bit from an article at <a href="http://theweek.com/article/index/245311/sources-nsa-sucks-in-data-from-50-companies" target="_blank">The Week</a>:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Armed with what amounts to a rubber stamp court order, however, the NSA can collect and store trillions of bytes of electromagnetic detritus shaken off by American citizens. In the government’s eyes, the data is simply moving from one place to another. <strong>It does not become, in the government’s eyes, relevant or protected in any way unless and until it is subject to analysis. Analysis requires that second order.</strong></font></p> </blockquote> <p>The court in question, BTW, is a FISA court, not a public court and it is a panel of Judges, not one with a sole jurisdiction involved.  Their proceedings remain secret and are never published so you can't find out what the NSA has been doing.  This is where the rubber hits the road and do note that over collection and pre-collection is a feature, not a bug of this system.  Government has already collected your data, so all it requires is a bit of judge shopping by DoJ to get that information released, like AG Holder did with the multiple investigations into journalists from AP, FOX and CBS.  Get a judge willing to let you do the dirty deed (and at the federal level you can have a large choice of jurisdictions as a prosecutor and even judges within a jurisdiction) and then just hit up the NSA for its pre-gathered evidence. </p> <p>From a <a href="http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=81BD2C9E-0453-4E41-B2EF-6626558E5ACC" target="_blank">Politico story</a> on this we get this:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">And Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.) told POLITICO that the classified intelligence briefing sessions he’s attended haven’t disclosed details on the two data-gathering programs as were unveiled this week.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Schock, in Congress since 2009, said he had “no idea” about the phone data gathering, or any briefings for House members to discuss it, until news reports this week.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Like other members who said they learned of the data-gathering efforts when they were revealed in the Guardian and the Washington Post, Schock said the administration classified briefings he’s attended have revealed very little information.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">“<strong>I can assure you the phone number tracking of non-criminal, non-terrorist suspects was not discussed</strong>,” he said. “Most members have stopped going to their classified briefings because they rarely tell us anything we don’t already know in the news. It really has become a charade.”</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Well if you see everyone as potentially violating federal laws and regulations, then the idea of 'non-criminal suspects' flies out the window as <strong>there are none</strong>.  The prejudice in the system of pre-collection goes to full fruit at this point and the burden of demonstrating innocence now falls to those being investigated.  And as it isn't just DoJ that has policing powers, as DHS, EPA, and multiple other agencies/departments have shown, the NSA now gets to serve as a central point of common information and maybe even the coordinator between agencies for sharing information as it has this lovely pre-collection warehouse to store all of that lovely agency/department data for use by others.  Isn't that grand?  </p> <p>And since terrorists use narcotics trafficking, white slavery, trafficking in illegal gems or semi-precious stones, etc. to do their deeds, and that has an environmental impact, particularly in parks along the porous borders, the pre-justification for collecting that data into a single storehouse is now evident.  Instead of separate and defined jurisdictions and powers, the technology creates a single system with the complete set of governmental powers to wield against an individual based on any infraction of any regulation that no human can be expected to know and requires an automated system to just catalog it.</p> <p>Who knows if you are violating any of those laws, rules and regulations covering a vast array of separate domains?  <strong>You certainly can't say if you are or not</strong> because you don't know them all <strong>and you can't know them all</strong>.</p> <p>The very first thing authoritarian to totalitarian systems do is put in place a system of justice whereby you are presumed guilty.  Add in layers of unknowable law, secret courts without well defined jurisdiction, judge shopping across known jurisdictions and within known jurisdictions and all you need is one magic 'go ahead and get them', turn the key to the NSA storehouse, and within hours you can be getting summons for taking that tag off your mattress, using marine gas to fill up your car, using a detergent additive with too much phosphate... and if you don't give in or even know how to respond, well, it only starts with fines.  Soon jail time starts to get put in as you are a serial abuser of the system, donchyaknow?</p> <p>And do note that with Obamacare your medical records, what you take and who you've seen are also part of that.  Be hell to get stuck in an audit with the IRS asking you about the cost of your recent colonoscopy and wanting pictures, now, wouldn't it?  Just ask Tea Partiers and patriotic groups about that sort of scrutiny with <em><strong>just the current IRS</strong></em>.  Oh, they have police powers, too, as part of Treasury.  Isn't that swell?</p> <p>Your safeguard against such a condition?</p> <p>The presumption of innocence.</p> <p>The goal of any tyrannical or despotic State?</p> <p>Presumption of Guilt.</p> <p>It is shown not in what they say, but in what they do.</p> <p>And the pre-collection and storage of data demonstrates that they operate on a Presumption of Guilt, not one of Innocence.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-64172864172528145192013-05-29T11:10:00.001-04:002013-05-29T11:10:57.553-04:00Workshop in work<p>This is yet another post to show the types of things eating into my time.</p> <p>Anyone who has been to past posts, like this one from <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2013/01/shop-time-and-other-frivolities.html" target="_blank">JAN 2013</a>, has noted that my limited work environment is more like a mid-scale chess match in which I have limited movement space and pieces that can only fit a certain way.  Basically that post gives some idea of the problem:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-FUly0ZrIvhw/UQbE0UMvs6I/AAAAAAAABdQ/hqpiMLsgNWM/s1600-h/JAN2013-update-005%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="JAN2013-update-005" alt="JAN2013-update-005" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-upkwcL0voC0/UQbE14JdDuI/AAAAAAAABdY/crzXCnUrrUw/JAN2013-update-005_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-lMgzk2Vy4k0/UQbE3Hwy1qI/AAAAAAAABdg/Y0LbRXWMqto/s1600-h/JAN2013-update-006%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="JAN2013-update-006" alt="JAN2013-update-006" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-3btD4Vrs7UI/UQbE3lEeyGI/AAAAAAAABdo/GJaKNLHDgf4/JAN2013-update-006_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p align="left">I have long boards sitting along the back wall and then whatever can fit on that, like scrap wood ready to fall over, which means that moving anything is a challenge.  Earlier I had the carcass of the router table sitting on the bench, which meant that it was something to get greeted with when you opened the door to the shop <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2012/08/home-workshoprouter-tablephase-1.html" target="_blank">as seen last year</a>:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-PH3GIJMdet4/UB6VNYOG9BI/AAAAAAAABWE/iEhMW7BZiQ8/s1600-h/05AUG2012-RT-001%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="05AUG2012-RT-001" alt="05AUG2012-RT-001" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-c9bUWyoxIB0/UB6VPj_WCbI/AAAAAAAABWM/RKcji5Gn5cU/05AUG2012-RT-001_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>Not really what you want to have there, but do note that the previous router table from Veritas via Lee Valley, was set up on an old computer table.  That also had the shopvac under it and the new router table will house both in a more compact space and still give me some back table space for work processing.  And <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2012/02/time-in-shop.html" target="_blank">this post from early last year</a> shows the main part of the mess in the room that causes the chess match situation:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-C17fXK0X5ZA/TzLGIx-HSaI/AAAAAAAABSg/NkK9tvTg1XA/s1600-h/Shop_08JAN201_%252520006%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Shop_08JAN201_ 006" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-MA2WXUBAKP8/TzLGJKz98DI/AAAAAAAABSo/B_Zf8e7P6BM/Shop_08JAN201_%252520006_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>The problem isn't the right side of the room as you enter, but the left side that has a dead corner taken up with a cabinet that really doesn't do anything (although for the $50 I paid for it back in '95 or '96 I am NOT complaining) since it is hemmed in by the other computer table that has the compound sliding miter saw on it.  That table basically kills off the left rear corner of the room and is a mess.  It is a detritus attractor, although on a good day the contractor table saw could just fit back there:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-r7fmGSSK6G8/TzLGJZE20HI/AAAAAAAABSw/xGtiu0cZvLA/s1600-h/Shop_08JAN201_%252520009%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Shop_08JAN201_ 009" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-GTEOhkFaHN0/TzLGJpQDuoI/AAAAAAAABS4/j-OEVxlPU_s/Shop_08JAN201_%252520009_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>What a mess!</p> <p>Trying to do more with the limited active space in the right of the room leads to a dead loss and frustration: it couldn't be made better.  On the left rear, however, a better organized section of the shop meant a major rearrangement and excessing pieces.  Basically the cabinet in the corner has to go from that room as it is the space killer and isn't large enough to do any real good for storage beyond small items.  The table next to it is killing valuable floor space all to hold up the miter saw and dust collection hose.  What a waste of volume.  And along the back wall the 10' wood has to get up and off the floor because it gets more moisture there and swells, which requires plane use and often re-sawing to smaller board width.  Also to get any real storage in the left rear corner means moving one bookcase from the left to the right of the room, and that still misses getting to the magic of 60" by 1".  </p> <p>Why is 60" magic?</p> <p>Simple: common cut plywood board size that I can lay my hands on is 24" x 48" and a 48" set of shelving will not easily take in such material due to the tightness of fit between boards and any shelving.  And there is no way that I can get that final, magic 1" without moving comic book storage boxes, food storage, shelving and basically re-arranging the entire basement and that is a no-go.</p> <p>Now with that in mind and that I love boltless shelving (aka rivet shelving) I started to look for solutions.  The shelving, itself, is simple to find.  Shipping costs for any decent height (which is 7' as the basement ceiling is only 8' high) means freight shipping in a residential area with liftgate required.  Sucks like an Electrolux because it almost always adds on $135 to shipping costs.  Of course when I look at it locally that same sort of cost is already factored into the price, save that I have to get it home... and the company has added a profit margin to the total price... thus money is spent for getting it home and the total cost is more than what I can freight and liftgate it to my residence.  That is how marginal overhead cost changes prices and why the Internet is such a killer app for sales of equipment.</p> <p>I would also like additional project space so I can actually have a high energy project going on (like trying to construct a router table while doing a chess match on limited floor space) and a low energy project going on at the same time (like completing my EMP covers for critical equipment which is basically something that requires space but not a lot of effort) but that I can't do as the materials have to be stored and the high energy stuff takes precedence.  Basically digging through piles of stuff to get to another project kills my daytime energy... defeating the purpose of working on a project.  When you spend more time moving stuff to get to stuff you either have too much stuff (too bad it all is on track to be used), too little space (a major problem), or poor organization of what you have (and that is the crux of the matter).</p> <p>To get that project space in boltless is possible!  It is not, however, cross-adaptable to anything else on the market unless it simply rests on table surfaces or fits between tabletops and a ledge of metal to secure it.  So you can get basic but if you want adaptable be prepared to pay for that and generally get locked into some company's idea of modularity.  Boltless does cost less and that is a major driver as well (at least, you know, with all that shipping and liftgate stuff factored in).  I looked around at the limited offerings for boltless workstations and shelving (if you sell the workstations you sell the shelving, too, but just because you sell shelving doesn't mean you sell workstations) and for the first time in ages I found my normal supplier, <a href="http://www.globalindustrial.com/" target="_blank">Global Industrial</a>, didn't have what I wanted.  After searching around I went to <a href="http://www.actionwp.com/" target="_blank">Action Wholesale Products</a> as they did, indeed, beat the total cost of any competitor I could extract a price quote from by nearly $100.  Yes I could take a hacksaw to uprights and DIY, but if someone is going to do the work for you and think it out for you, then it must be realized that your time is money as well.</p> <p>Thus I did a mass buy of stuff there as I would also by boltless shelving for along the back wall and get all that lumber up off the floor and start a major effort to get everything that I have where I can get to it easily.  Easily is a relative term here, BTW.</p> <p>For the corner the old cabinet came out, the miter saw got moved, the dust collection stuff spent a couple of days outside under my half of a shelter under my deck, and the bookcase got moved.  That corner would get 24" x 48" boltless shelving and a 60" x 24" boltless workstation.  The back wall would get two 60" x 18" shelving units with extra shelves.</p> <p>This is what happens when all that goes up first the left rear corner:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-82_CP8GOmsQ/UaYaaGxxMKI/AAAAAAAABe8/hzyKrrnyvL4/s1600-h/MAY2013-shop-001%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="MAY2013-shop-001" style="display: inline" alt="MAY2013-shop-001" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-lfdpMdHEpuw/UaYabK6x59I/AAAAAAAABfE/CIC7zOCHESc/MAY2013-shop-001_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>I am still in the sorting phase of things, but already things are looking up!  Everything that was on the table, in the cabinet, and just generally laying around and getting too close to the freezer (which had a minor disaster of icing due to lack of door sealing) is now up and off the floor and on shelving!  One can actually walk to the back door without threading through a path of equipment and stuff threatening to fall on you.  </p> <p>Amazing!  </p> <p>There is a ton more sorting and laying out of material to do, but just with that one, single change, I've gotten back square footage to actually take more than two steps without worrying about my safety.</p> <p>That dead space behind the workstation that shelving can't be in will be taken up by long saw guides, the router guide used for planing wood, long bar clamps and the like.  If it is thin, under 8' long and used rarely, it will go in that little space and get out of the old wet bar area or other places where it is hard to get to.</p> <p>Let me back over to the entrance, which now no longer has the workbench immediately obstructing passage, although the router table is there, it is in the final construction phase but had to be dismantled to do all of the shelving assembly:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-LK1Qn69PKoM/UaYaby1pOoI/AAAAAAAABfM/6VLSylL2sj8/s1600-h/MAY2013-shop-005%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="MAY2013-shop-005" style="display: inline" alt="MAY2013-shop-005" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-XBfS9ExI5XE/UaYacqwyCyI/AAAAAAAABfU/_Fp_rNb5eqs/MAY2013-shop-005_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="180" height="240" /></a></p> <p>It is now possible to take a few steps into the shop without having to close the door to get around the workbench.  Temporarily the drill press had to get taken from its stand so the stand could be more easily moved and I have a set of post-construction casters coming in so that piece can be mobile.  The old router table from Lowe's will find a home someplace on the shelving for light use.</p> <p>Now a shot from the left center of the room looking to the right center to rear:</p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-88Rp1_P0fLs/UaYaddSw61I/AAAAAAAABfc/hpkK9GnOmqU/s1600-h/MAY2013-shop-002%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="MAY2013-shop-002" style="display: inline" alt="MAY2013-shop-002" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-C5deP0KL2fw/UaYaeW87_SI/AAAAAAAABfk/qdwFsLGtKas/MAY2013-shop-002_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>Once the router table gets back into final construction and then finishing, the table saw will go to the end of the new workstation area.</p> <p>On the workbench is a mess of hand planes, brace, hand drill, hatchet and other hand tools recently acquired that need to be cleaned, sharpened, lapped, and/or refinished:</p> <p> </p> <p align="center"><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-fAiIv-BwwmA/UaYafCs-gZI/AAAAAAAABfs/-3Xcfml_F9U/s1600-h/MAY2013-shop-004%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="MAY2013-shop-004" style="display: inline" alt="MAY2013-shop-004" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-ddKrVinqgUs/UaYafw7HfmI/AAAAAAAABf0/wTNfWGbruMQ/MAY2013-shop-004_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="240" height="180" /></a></p> <p>The ammo can used to be the vehicle emergency supply unit, but has been replaced by something a bit more sporty.  That can will be used for storage of stuff that is better off in a dark place, not having just a towel thrown over it, which means some finishing supplies.</p> <p>Once the router table is finished then the workshop will be reconfigurable around the workbench, so that the table can move to the end of the workbench or abut next to it so that the workbench can be a work support or infeed/outfeed table as needed.  In a pinch the table saw can be unlimbered and finished pieces flowed to the workbench or router table, with the other serving for infeed capacity with just a bit of temporary supports to keep things level.  At some point the sliding compound miter saw needs a real table or stand, as does a bench grinder (of which I have two, a 6" DeWalt and a 6" cheap piece of Chinese junk that may not last long but will be good for buffing, at least).</p> <p>Part of the concept here is to get as much of the equipment's work surface at the same elevation.  The workbench from <a href="http://harborfreight.com/" target="_blank">HF</a> is at 34" and that is a decent level for me at 6'3" to work with.  Anything that is custom made by me for power tools will be at 34" and on casters.  That decision came after I made the cabinet for the bench drill press as it is not handy having a drill press bed a good 10" above a workbench (or any other table come to that) and if it were just within 1" up or down on average, then I would make better use of it, more often.  That is why the router table is at 34" and I would desperately love to get the table saw down from 36" to 34" (and I'll be looking at wheels to see if that can be accomplished without skewing things).</p> <p>A major hint to any of the major shop equipment manufacturers: if you standardized your power tools to one elevation (table saw, router table, semi-adjustable drill press, workbench, track saw system to fit on a workbench, etc.) then you would gain a leg up on getting all those tools into an individual's workshop because of the damned hassle involved of trying to retrofit or make custom pieces for them.  To get a modular workplace requires that I have a standard height for my work surfaces and a standard dust collection port system for all my pieces.  I gave up on doing that with the workbench as I needed to use its interior volume for storage but may yet add on a simple tube arrangement in back so I can re-arrange dust collection capability at a moment's notice.   I am in the mid- to small-workshop range for one person and it isn't funny just how much of my time is spent asking: 'is there a way to get this tool to a useful elevation?'</p> <p>Boltless shelving on 1.5" centers gets an allowance, but only a slight one on this score as 0.75" falls within a range of tolerance for work movement.  At 2" things get rough and a bit hairy and starts to require building of roller platforms.  Anything over that is a dead loss.  Perhaps I am the only individual who requires a reconfigurable workspace and, thusly, a high degree of modularity of equipment that all goes towards the same basic work inside the workspace.  My work flow must be modular not just due to space but due to a variety of stuff I'm having to make.  I'm not just making cabinets, or boxes, or chairs, or what have you... I can have two or three different projects ongoing that each require a different arrangement of tooling that would benefit from a modular workflow.  </p> <p>I don't always need a drill press, but when I do it is usually not for a small piece but a large one (it never fails).  The table saw isn't always cutting down 4' x 8' sheet goods, but when I need it to do that I have to turn to a track saw and saw horses, not use my workbench and router table as a support system.  Heck when I'm taking a cut off of anything over 28" with my table saw I have to go to an alternative cutting system, which means time spent moving the entire workflow outdoors and loss of precious time doing so.  And the reason for the router table having such a large space behind it is not just for precision jigs for front use, but put the fence on the other side and then use the entire back surface to hold larger sheet goods that require bits that you do not want to use with a router by hand.  That is rare but when the table is done that is now possible to do.  This means that one of the major parts of any production processes is addressing the deficiencies of equipment  for something that should be relatively standardized.  I can picture an entire contractor set-up using modularized tables that fold down and then can be transported and set up anywhere, and you get to make the workflow at the worksite that is customizable to any job needing to be done there.  And then it all folds down for quick transport again.  That would free up valuable van or truck space for other hardware or raw materials storage.</p> <p>It isn't funny the number of times I've had to adjust entire projects because of this single deficiency which doesn't allow for tools to exist at one level work surface.  You would think that a large corporation would see the extra dough they could charge for another $50 of hardware for cheap metal frames and a bit of standardization... I know the cost of extruded metals (steel, aluminum, et. al.) and hardware and am not joking at mass production levels.  Or even just asking the design engineers: 'Hey, have you tried to use this with our other tools?'</p> <p>Yeah, Dumb Looks Still Free will be the reaction.</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-44851891636509274672013-05-19T07:13:00.001-04:002013-05-19T10:58:27.596-04:00Memo to the collective<p>Greetings to all and sundry in the collective!  The collective greets itself!</p> <p>We are happy to report that the fundamental transformation, whilst slowing, continues even if it is at a snails pace.  There are unavoidable bumps in the road and the bodies are about to be piled under the bus.  To achieve that glorious end, to get to the never ending omelet of continuously breaking eggs, each and all of you have agreed to do one simple thing: <strong>follow collective talking points</strong>.</p> <p>In general these talking points are given through the agreed-upon venues set up by your fellow parrots, and have also been circulated by various lists containing the letter 'O' and through some Old Media talking heads who are semi-reliable.  Generally it is that 'You've Got Mail!' voice from your preferred e-mail platform that brings to your attention the freshest, latest and mandatory collective talking points.  The collective goes through great expense and effort to generate up these talking points and your basic agreement is to actually <strong>use them</strong>.</p> <p>As you may recall in the second paragraph of your agreement, the stipulation was that you agreed that you were minimally sentient, could walk and chew gum at the same time, knew how to copy and paste, and that you lacked the mental powers to make creative talking points.  <strong>We agreed to supply the talking points and you agreed to check all individualist thinking at the door</strong>.  You were no longer to have any morals, ethics, qualms nor any other individualist sort of second thoughts about what we handed you as you admitted you lacked the creative ability to do more than create simple sentences.  The collective was a bit dismayed at how many Harvard graduates were in that last category, but to get that never arising delicious omelet a few egg-heads had to be brought on board pre-cracked.</p> <p>A few of you, and<em> we know who you are</em>, have not only not used the now updated hourly talking points, but have backslid on your agreement further and are now using talking points hours, days, weeks, months or, in a few cases, <strong>years old</strong>.  In doing so you are attempting to show original thinking which is individualist and that is not allowed.  Further you sound like an idiot and the collective is made to look like an idiot by your use of outmoded or outdated talking points and prior circulated non sequiturs.   Do note that with <strong>every</strong> e-mail list of talking points there are also <strong>fresh</strong> non sequiturs handed out for you to use to confuse and befuddle individualists and show a bit of comedy from the collective at your expense.  As part of your agreement <em>you agreed it was better to suck as a chorus rather than as individuals</em>, and by reverting to your individualistic suck you can no longer be brought into the tone deaf choir that is the collective.</p> <p>Further you agreed that you had no ability to generate up original humor so stop it already, <strong>you are making the collective look bad</strong> with your attempts at originality which you admitted you have none in your possession.   That when combined with out of date talking points and non sequiturs have now put you into a position that you agreed not to get into, which is to suck on your own and show up the collective as unable to be creative.  Although this is generally true, the collective prefers not to play up that realm of humorlessness until such time as individualism is stamped out forever-more and the day of continual gloom without humor can be born into being.  Your job is to be without humor now, as stated in the third paragraph of our agreement, and many of you are violating that wantonly against the will of the collective.  Each of you is known and will face steep problems after the fundamental transformation is achieved so it is time to reform your ways, stick to your agreement and suck together because you will all blow it otherwise.</p> <p>To the rest of the collective we ask that you continue to report on these individuals through the known channels.  Many of them are now straying from the fold and need to have talking points and non sequiturs applied to them, with new discoveries generated hourly for you to attack them.  Those you are attacking aren't getting this memo, never fear, and they have been cut off from collective talking points at first hand and can only get them second-hand via our standard parrot outlets.  By being in the know you are stronger than these born-again individualists and they know that there is no such thing as a born-again collectivists, so their walking is permanent.  <strong>The collective has no good graces, indeed it has no graces at all, and neither do you</strong>.  That is part of your agreement, as well.  </p> <p>This means that many of you have become isolated from old friends, family and civil society and now live in basements with darkened windows, a government provided Internet connection on a government provided Obamaphone with government provided stipends and government provided excessed meals.  Since so many of you couldn't convert individualists as individuals, your only route in life that is left as part of the collective and now your poor eyesight, hygiene and dental work will need to be corrected by the IRS which will pay you a visit in the near future due to your inability to use even taxation software, like another collective member and tax cheat, and your inability to find any health care not provided to you by anyone.  We also provided running hot and cold water, toilets, toilet paper, one eco-friendly light bulb that will be replaced on a five year schedule, one old refrigerator, one microwave oven and even a surplus office carpet.  Towels were included as well.  The collective would like you to use soap with your water ration at least once a month to good effect on your body so as to cut down the stench.  That is in the fourth paragraph and followed up later on page 305 under 'Contingency Plans'.</p> <p><strong>The collective provides for you and you are to enjoy its largesse</strong>.</p> <p>For those who cannot follow their agreement and use talking points, you will soon find collective members who will seek to find out first hand what your condition truly is.  The collective cannot tolerate individualists scamming our hard earned goods, and if you are one of those you will be found and ejected from the collective via the defenestration method.  We have our ways.  More importantly <em>we have your Oreo cookies</em>.</p> <p>To those others who think that they might have found morals, ethics, a non-sanctified and non-secular approved religion, or even qualms and are distracted from your daily parroting by them, this is the time to shape up and fully rejoice in your lack of personality and self!  <strong>You know what happens to those who stray from the collective</strong>.</p> <p>Again to the collective as a whole: rejoice in your mindless repeating of talking points!</p> <p>Do as you are told.</p> <p>Have a nice day.</p> <p>Or  else.</p> <p>Sincerely,</p> <p><strong>THE MANAGEMENT</strong></p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-80200948353235491532013-05-14T11:35:00.001-04:002013-05-14T11:35:13.998-04:00Partisanship isn't all political<p>Yet more of my raw commentary from <em><a href="http://hotair.com/" target="_blank">Hot Air</a></em>, this on the long starting IRS scandal with the investigation of conservative non-profit organizations, which we are also getting hints of it going to Jewish groups and for-profit organizations in business.  Here I lay out something basic to keep track of in <a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2013/05/13/quotes-of-the-day-1374/" target="_blank">this thread</a> on the topic:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Obama refuses to put the IRS in its proper place – he calls it an ‘independent agency’ but it isn’t. The IRS is under the Treasury Dept.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Now if the Tea Party groups reporting the increased forms and illegal questions are right, then this started in 2010 and it came from the one place that had one of the fastest nominees to go in place because of the financial ‘crisis’: Tim Geithner.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Tim Geithner was pro-Obama while in the Federal Reserve and knew the ropes, and was supposed to be wicked smart while being unable to do his own taxes. TurboTax Tim should have had a real good idea how to run the Treasury Dept. and yet within a year and half of his being in charge you get this sort of thing going on.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Thus TurboTax Tim is either:</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">- absolutely incompetent, doesn’t know any of the ropes in the financial side of DC and has no clue about how to properly run a large organization,</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">OR</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">- ran a department where it was not only allowed but encouraged by lack of oversight to start running a partisan investigation of those that the Administration didn’t like politically.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">It can’t be both due to the amount of time TTT had in the FR: he did, indeed, ‘know the ropes’ and had progressed up the ladder of leadership high enough for Obama to appoint him. Basically the first option is non-viable as a cover-up fallback line.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">That means TTT had put into place individuals who would run a partisan IRS. It takes a good six months to a full year for someone to actually figure out a high level federal job (look at every Administration post-WWII for this, as few get off the ground smoothly with appointees) and then start actually exercising decent oversight (or lack thereof) from their positions. Factor in time to go through the Senate and time to figure out the job and you get nearly a year and a half because the Senate wasn’t being all too swift on appointees.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">If one remembers back to articles during the 2008-09 time frame pointed out that TTT was pro-Obama early on while he was at the Federal Reserve, so this raises the question: what, exactly, were the policies of the Federal Reserve and were they being influenced by Geithner towards partisan ends?</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Any investigation of the IRS under Geithner must ALSO look at the Federal Reserve and start giving IT scrutiny because any head of the Treasury coming from the Federal Reserve that allows such things to go on under his command may also have had problems at his prior job. </font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">If the IRS has problems, then Treasury has problems.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">If the head of the Treasury Dept. had this sort of problem under his command then scrutiny into prior job activities in the financial sector under federal oversight must be performed because of the rapid pace in which the partisanship started.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Thus the Federal Reserve tenure of Tim Geithner going all the way back to his early NY Fed. days must be on the agenda. Not just a standard scandal due to an Administration, but also this actor put in place by them in the Dept. where it originated.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">IRS then Treasury. <br />Treasury then Geithner. <br />Geithner then Federal Reserve.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Let your Congresscritter know as they might be a bit overwhelmed by the rush of events to figure this one out.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">ajacksonian on May 14, 2013 at </font><a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2013/05/13/quotes-of-the-day-1374/comment-page-6/#comment-6983609"><font color="#9b00d3">7:28 AM</font></a></p> </blockquote> <p>And then adding on to that just a bit later:</p> <blockquote> <p> </p> <blockquote><font color="#9b00d3">Spot on analysis. And TTT and the REB were college bosom buddies.</font> <p><font color="#9b00d3">AH_C on May 14, 2013 at 7:44 AM</font></p> </blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3"></font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">My thanks!</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">I try to state only what is the blindingly obvious to me and the early help of TTT with Obama was something the Left cheered about at the time. Go back to late 2008 to early 2009 in the HA archives and you can pull up some of the articles and commentary.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">TTT was one of the engineers of the fiscal situation in 2008, along with a couple of his cohorts (Bernanke and Paulson), and they were strong-arming the bailouts through Congress and Bush, and then threatening banks who weren’t taking them when Obama came to office.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Something was and is seriously wrong with the Federal Reserve and its role in the financial crisis and the rise of Obama, then the slathering across all banks the problems of the few (mostly Citibank) is deplorable. It shows partisanship and an attempt to centralize the fiscal power of the US in the Federal Reserve by using it to partisan ends to get people into power to further go after organizations questioning the scope of US power: Tea Party groups.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Going after Tea Party and limited government organizations is not just a help to Obama but to the FR to escape scrutiny in ITS role in the fiscal mess we are in. It isn’t the sole author, but it is a major co-author and beneficiary of the Obama spending as it now has pent-up digital cash with which it can threaten the entire global banking system by destroying the value of the US dollar. To-date that money hasn’t been released and so inflation is low… the moment it gets into circulation your dollar will drop to some small fraction of its buying power and hyper-inflation ensue.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">This time bomb must be stopped as well as the threat of financial destruction via the FR.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">The IRS is just one part of a larger machine.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">Pay attention and remember that fire must also be aimed at Geithner, Treasury and the Federal Reserve to get to the bottom of this. Geithner is a partisan and has been one to his own ends and beliefs before Obama. If you think a partisan federal government is a problem, imagine a partisan financial system that isn’t answerable to government.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">ajacksonian on May 14, 2013 at </font><a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2013/05/13/quotes-of-the-day-1374/comment-page-6/#comment-6983640"><font color="#9b00d3">7:58 AM</font></a></p> </blockquote> <p>I can point out that if one were a partisan in favor of an increased role for the Federal Reserve in controlling government policy or to evade government scrutiny, then working to quash those supporting those things would serve a dual function.  Also note that by Obama's attempt to make the IRS an 'independent agency' he is trying to isolate it from the Treasury Dept. and Tim Geithner's oversight.  This is not the case, of course, and Tim Geithner has control over these events by his position in the Treasury Dept.  It is odd to see a President try to protect an underling who should be easily bus-bound, but that is the case here.  It is by that odd protection that one must ask: why is President Obama trying to protect Tim Geithner?</p> <p>And what was Geithner's agenda in the Federal Reserve and his role in the lead-up to the financial crisis?</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-13510571005954941982013-04-28T16:48:00.001-04:002013-05-03T17:43:11.809-04:00Neither portal nor destination be<p>This is a set of musings on the nature of blogging brought on via a post at Stacy McCain's site <a href="http://theothermccain.com/2013/04/27/where-were-you-in-2002/">Where Were You in 2002</a>? (h/t: <a href="http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/167890/">Insty</a>).</p> <p>Seeing <a href="http://overlawyered.com/2013/04/overlawyered-now-cato-institute-blog/">Overlawyered</a> moving over to <a href="http://www.cato.org/blog">Cato</a> spurred on the question about 'making the big time' and 'are you a portal or destination?' in Stacy McCain's post.</p> <p>In 2002 I was healthy, working, and helping to get the last of the Afghan materials out the door in the Agency I worked in before moving over to my R&D slot which I had requested a temporary re-assignment after 9/11/01.  This did not mean I was not interested in blogging, far from it, I was an avid reader of a number of early blogs and attended conferences featuring both Old and New Media (like the old Seybold Seminars or Print '97).  Part of my work was to scour the early web for material and avenues of presenting and using data that were new or novel, that would help move information to the warfighter.  That meant learning all I could about everything from blogging to 3D interfaces to the coming transition to the post-32 bit world and IPv6.  The methodology is straight out of James Burke's <strong><em><a href="http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/james-burke-connections/">Connections</a></em></strong> series: let the pinball effect give you information and insights from multiple realms and see if the ideas cross into the realm you inhabit so as to allow it to adapt and change.</p> <p>It is from that perspective that I took in the idea that the Internet is not about portals and destinations, hubs and spokes, nor even about connected clouds of users and information.  I can't tell you who put it like this, there are numerous possible authors, but I picked up on the idea that the Internet, blogs, media sites... the entire thing from static repositories of information like the reference work sites I link to all the way to Big Old Media sites... are something called a hyperlinked conversation.  Hyperlinks are generic in type, they are an unbiased connectivity form for the electronic New Media.  Hyperlinks are also that most powerful of things that mankind invented in the Old Media: an indexing tool.</p> <p>That comes from James Burke and the power of an index of a book, that list of ideas and pages where they appear, is that they allow you to cross-index.  You can take an idea word, go to a page, find another idea word, go to its index, and find things that it links to via the index.  Hyperlinks do this exact, same function, but a far faster than you can with a static, read-only memory system with a hand/finger interface with leafs to flip through known as a book.  What a hyperlink allows, however, is the ability to show source of an idea via that link, and you can find other ideas that are linked to in the article/video/etc. and follow those links to see how ideas connect.  Everything, even the person who is a minimal utility node in a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe's_law">Metcalfe's Law</a> network offers utility because you can use a search engine (of your choice) to then find out all the other people who link to an article/video/etc. and follow those links back to their sources.  Even the most dead-end of sites, those that studiously don't link to other bloggers, is still connected to them via the link to the source material and your ability to check other incoming links and go back to those sites to find out what ideas are there.  The hyperlink is thus an indexing tool for ideas.</p> <p>From this there is no such thing as a 'portal' nor 'destination', no 'hub' nor 'spoke', nor even 'communities' of blogs and sites.  What there are is conversations that link to ideas forming their own interconnected set of sites, pathways, and journeys. Following James Burke this means that no site that requires human thought to construct sentences that purvey ideas, that have a logic connecting them, is alone unless it links to no one, and accepts no links and is an isolated node.</p> <p>That is what I thought in 2002.</p> <p>People can move around, become highlights or disappear, as I am largely doing, and yet the conversation continues within and amongst humanity.  It is a huge, extended conversation that now includes mini-thoughts via Twitter, picture thoughts and video thoughts (not necessarily stories but just thoughts and ideas) and it is all connected by the generic thing we call the hyperlink.  It is one of the most powerful tools deployed by mankind, and yet its actual invention starts with indexing.  It is the simple but powerful things that move minds, spirits and humanity.  That also has a precursor description in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noosphere">Noosphere</a> and the Internet can just be seen as a crude, physical form of Noosphere, not the thing, itself.  The next simple tool will not supplant the hyperlink nor index, but will move that conception one more step and then everything changes.  </p> <p>And yet where it comes from will be obvious.  </p> <p>What it will enable is beyond imagining.  </p> <p>Just like the hyperlink and Internet before the invention of the hyperlink.</p> <p>I can remember where I was in 2002... and with difficulty back to 1992 when there was only the first hint of html via sgml.  Yes, I can do that.  Can you remember the world without the Internet?</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20372724.post-41612978854326884232013-04-02T08:03:00.001-04:002013-04-02T08:03:04.014-04:00End Game Against Freedom<p>What is the End Game of the global elites against freedom and liberty?  We can see its path by addicting populations to 'social' provisions such as 'retirement' and 'health care', which are different things than living a good life or providing good doctors and medicine.  This is the Redistributive State which seeks to undermine freedom by giving people material goods in return for those people relinquishing ever more control of their lives to the State.</p> <p>This can be done by means of an Elite funding or promulgating a lower societal uprising so as to force society to be under enough pressure to call for a crackdown on those putting them at risk.  It is a mug's game, a violent game of 3 Card Monte in which those seeking to lead a normal life are The Mark.  When you agree to the 'good' that such government provided social programs can do at the cost of taking money from those who have rightfully earned it via their liberty, you agree to limit the liberty of all: of the rich to be rich, of the poor to realize that they are the source of their own problems, and of the middle class to purchase the passivity of the poor with the wealth of the rich and hoping for a few scraps for themselves.  When you wash, rinse and repeat this sort of thing you are in the  process of breaking the will of individuals to have a free society, to stand up for freedom and ridiculing them because they actually support the ability of people to get rich and of the poor to also have that same opportunity.  What is offered is the class system, at first, which turns into a self-fulfilling Caste System with those at the upper levels dictating to the rest of society how it shall act in its own terms.</p> <p>The modern West is in one or more cycles of this, but it is interesting to look at one society where this has reached an end-game: there are no longer any illusions of providing social goods because they aren't necessary as the will of those to have a civil society have been broken.  In China there is so much autocratic control and police suppression that it is hard to get information out, but in another place there is just enough of a shame culture left and the attempts to have a veneer of civilization remaining that we can get a look at what this looks like. </p> <p>I've reported on the Red Mafia before a number of times, and this time I'm coming at it not from the 'find all low level sources to piece together a framework' end, but at the other end of what happens when a very few who actually want to do their jobs in government AS jobs in government actually give the high level framework in stark detail.  I found this through Amazon Pime's service in  film documentary by Andrei Nekrasov who recounted the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in <em><strong><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Poisoned-by-Polonium/dp/B005IC517C" target="_blank">Poisoned by Polonium</a></strong></em>.  I had looked at part of the aftermath of this assassination of Litvinenko, but the lead-up to it and the high levels of corruption and societal abuse it points at is telling.  It is a film I urge everyone to see since, if you want to see where a quasi-western State ends when its elites assume autocratic control, there is no better overview of just how this can come to be.</p> <p>The events the film reviews are centered on the post-Soviet collapse in the 1990's where the productive capacity of the old Soviet industries came under the sway of two general classes of individuals: old Soviet elites and organized crime.  In some cases there is no differentiating between the two because they have a connecting link in the secret service, the FSB which used to be the KGB, and actually dates back to the Czar's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheka" target="_blank">Cheka</a>.  At one point they are actually referred to in their modern FSB incarnation under that term: their name changes but their methodology of violence in service to State remains.  </p> <p>From Litvinenko we hear about this directly:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">In our country, the special services are, in fact, a secret political organization that uses sharp methods, secret methods, not against spies and terrorists, but solely to keep a ruling class in power.  In 1999, for example, to seize power, the FSB used secret methods that are only allowed against terrorists and spies.  If the army were to seize power, they'd roll in with tanks and guns and fly in with jets maybe.  But everyone would notice. The FSB, on the other hand, has secret methods, and nobody noticed anything until chekists made up the government and seized every organ of power.  If the KGB was the armed unit of the Communist Party, then the FSB is the armed unit of – of a caste of corrupt Russian officials.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>Normally a 'Police State' is something created by a dictator or tyrant as a means to control the population by deploying the police as parts of the government with the sole aim to keep the people controlled by police power.  In the case of Russia this has been flipped around where it is the Secret Police that now put forward their own minions into politics to give a veneer of choice but, in actuality, by their brutal and repressive methods that they keep secret but are whispered about, there is no choice at all.  Really if something is undertaken to sway the public via terrorist means promulgated by the Secret Police who, exactly, is going to investigate them?  Anyone seeking to do so can be intimidated via the system that is in place of informers, records, laws promulgated to help keep the police in power, and then enforced by a corrupt legal system upon those who try to bring the actual truth forward.</p> <p>With tin-pot tyrants if you have a revolution to get rid of the tyrant, can you be sure that it wasn't the secret police that actually instigated the revolt to put themselves into power?  And when a society shucks off its old totalitarian State apparatus, what happens if it actually keeps the secret police around?  Unfortunately this last question is answered in Russia.</p> <p>One of the men a special unit of the FSB was to frame a man or take him out of ciruclation , and that manwas Lt. Colonel Trepashkin who was starting to piece together just what was going on inside Russia.  He recounts his story:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">My first conflict in the '90s was with today's FSB director Patrushev.  I rounded up a gang that laundered money, murdered people, consisted of war lords.  At some point, I had finally managed to get them, but then the problems really started.  There was that classic chain of protection that gangsters always have whether in the FSB, the military intelligence, or in the police.  I was told to drop the case.  I said "Why, these are criminals, we have to indict them.  I won't drop it!"</font> </p> </blockquote> <p>The agent inside the FSB who was told to frame him so that Trepashkin would be stopped and was recorded on tape in case anything happened to any of the men from the special group in the FSB:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Trepashkin knew something, and they were afraid he'd reveal it in court.  That was my first assignment in the new department that I found really suspicious.  We ended up avoiding it and never completed it.  At the concluding session of 1997 – [..] My boss Kamyshnikov came to me and said, "You must kill Berezovsky."</font></p> </blockquote> <p>There is one relevant question that can be asked of Russian society, however, before going on to how the FSB got into power: were the Russian people ready for freedom from an autocratic, indeed, authoritarian State?  For that there is an answer from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Berezovsky_%28businessman%29" target="_blank">Boris Berezovsky</a>:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Berezovsky -  So we can put forward – So a certain hypothesis can be put forward.  The better the opportunities a political system offers its members, the citizens, the more efficient the system is.  But the citizens must accept, voluntarily, certain limitations on free will.  A transition from a totalitarian system to a liberal one can only take place when enough of its citizens learn to accept certain inner limitations of free will.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Nekrasov – Perhaps the transition from external limitations to inner ones.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">B – Exactly!</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">N -  Inefficient systems force external limitations.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">[..]</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">B – What a price humans have to pay for knowledge.  How hard it is to rise above the common wisdom. </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">N- Is it even more difficult for Russians, would you say?</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">B -  I know what you mean.  The Russian mentality is that of slaves. That's why the system of forced limitations is so welcome. So why then am I advocating liberalism in Russia?  Am I contradicting myself, advocating freedom for the Russians, going against the nation's character?  So, is Russia ready, which means her people ready to take up the responsibility of freedom? I think they are ready.  Because once the tyrannical dictate was lifted, millions of entrepreneurs appeared, a myriad of independent politicians and journalists appeared.  Russia turned out fully prepared for this crucial, historical step.  We only needed to move forward and consolidate that freedom.  And so my main conflict with the authorities today  is about individual independence.  All those stupidities – media controls, "vertical power" – have one result.  Destruction of freedom in the minds of Russia's citizens.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>One can see where Boris Berezovsky is a very dangerous man to the FSB and those that they support.  The betrayal of freedom in Russia post – USSR started at those places that were the worst off condition-wise.  This exploitation would not only put the criminal oligarchs in power, but they would do so with the help of the FSB and the new Duma which had barely gotten time to get itself together.   The film recounts a cover-up of this period in which Vladimir Putin was involved with a company he had going in Germany which was in contact with the Colombian Cartels and served as a money laundering outfit.  Putin was, at that point, head of the FSB while sitting on the board of that company.  This is recounted by <a href="http://www.juergen-roth.com/" target="_blank">Jürgen Roth</a>, a German writer who has been tracking the Red Mafia's work:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Jurgen Roth - When the premesis of the SPAG here in the Frankfurt area were searched around lunchtime – Well, the offices were searched all day.  But around lunchtime, the Chancellor's office was informed.  That same day, the Russian Interior Ministry was tipped off about the search, which is strange.  Even before the search took place, the public prosecutor's office in Frankfurt tried to suppress the case.  </font><font color="#c0504d">What was on their mind was that Putin was central to this whole affair.  The prosecutor investigating the case didn't get any help.  </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">It all started with a report about money laundering in Liechtenstein.  In this report the BND, the federal intelligence service, there was a note about the SPAG company laundering money for Russian criminal organization called Tambovskaya.  And so the Public Prosecutor Kirkpatrick opened an investigation.  Soon after that, it was confirmed that money laundering was taking place, that the Tambovskaya connection existed and that Putin might be involved.  </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">When the company was founded, Putin was on the board of directors for half a year in 1993.  After that he was on the advisory board until 2000.  During that time he was in St. Petersburg and also already director of the FSB.  So he was on the advisory board of SPAG while he was the director of the FSB.  </font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">Now I am familiar with the workings of the FSB.  If someone somewhere so much as farted, he got a written report about it.  And it's hardly plausible that Putin was not informed about all this, about what was going on with SPAG's money and that the people behind it were criminals, classic mafiosi.  He was under investigation for accepting large sums of drug money,  which is undisputed.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">N- That was ascertained?</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">R – It was ascertained by the courts in Liechtenstein.  You can also track his longtime intelligence connections to Germany, to Dresden. I've got a list of all the intelligence officers from the GDR era, and Putin is on it.  Even back then, he kept close connections with the entire intelligence community involved in dirty business.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">N – The East German?</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">R – The GDR intelligence service.  Stasi.</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">N- Corruption and things?</font></p> <p><font color="#c0504d">R – Not only corruption.  Corruption – That's a matter of course.  No one even discusses that anymore.  It's more to do with spying and destruction.  How do I destroy a political opponent?</font></p> </blockquote> <p>This is not the first instance that Putin was involved with underhanded dealing for personal gain via criminal means.  This starts with a lead that Litvinenko gives:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#c0504d">Shortly after I gave the interview on Radio Liberty, publications appeared that accused me of slandering our president.  Not to mention that Putin was caught stealing metal assignments and funds in the early '90s in St. Petersburg.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>To properly understand what Putin was doing in Leningrad it is important to hark back to what else was going on in the Non-Ferrous Metals outfits at the time, and here I wall draw on my prior piece <a href="http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2008/07/taste-of-oil-for-food-and-its-chefs.html" target="_blank">A taste of Oil For Food and its chefs</a>, which goes over the process of 'tolling'.  With the Russian economy crippled by State facilities being unable to make any payroll at all, the workers were down to barter of goods their facilities produced in exchange for other goods from other workers in other facilities.  This was causing problems as stuff like food wasn't made locally and had to be brought into many regions and without a cash  based system to work with, there was no way to barter ovens, say, for eggs, cheese and milk.  Those who stepped in to put money into these facilities were generally of two major classes: rich elites of the former Soviet State, and organized crime.  Some facilities did try entrepreneurial capitalism, yes, but for large metal works, aluminum plants, steel foundries, titanium smelters... heavy industry in other words... you needed cash.  Lots of cash.  And these 'investors' wanted a 'sweet deal' from the new government and they insisted on 'tolling'.</p> <p>This form of 'tolling' is unlike having to pay a certain charge on a toll-based road, however, as that is a government tax on use of that road by those who travel on it.  Here it is something else entirely: the agreement by the government not to put a tariff on goods that the producers get in exchange for their output.  What this put in place was a system whereby the workers actually got paid a pittance, almost all of what was produced went outside the country, what came back after sales had no tariff on them and were then sold at above market prices locally.  If you run this sort of system then those running the business get to keep their overseas money, put a small amount in goods to come back, garner a huge windfall of increased prices for those goods versus what a competitive market would garner and then pocket those profits, as well.  Because State power is used to enforce who gets market share and is able to exclude exterior competition and their better managed systems, what you get is a near monopoly on certain regions and markets by what is effectively monopolies run by organized crime.  Isn't it great when you get to write the bills to be passed like this?</p> <p>From this the section of the film in which Leningrad (St. Petersburg) comes into clear focus because the situation was one in which Putin was part of a transactional scheme to exchange raw materials for food, or metals for food in 1991-92.  Any FSB agent who understands this sort of region and its criminal element is set to make out like a bandit which is, exactly, what Putin did and was written up and dismissed from the program by local officials about the external affairs office and has since been made to disappear as a document and is very difficult to find copies of it anywhere, even on the Internet.  The value of the amount embezzled was $11.5 million which meant that the citizens of St. Petersburg would go hungry and food would be rationed there for the first time since WWII.  That amount is a low-end figure as it doesn't go into specific foodstuff costs which were left out from the contracts.  From the report:</p> <blockquote> <p><font color="#9b00d3">There are reasons to suggest that partners did not intend to import foodstuffs to St. Petersburg.</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">[..]</font></p> <p><font color="#9b00d3">The recommendations to refer the case to the city prosecutor's office and to remove Mr. Putin from his position.</font></p> </blockquote> <p>In 2000 another investigation clarified that because of what happened St. Petersburg did not receive foodstuffs in excess of $92 million, but the total cost left unjustified to the committee amounts to $850 million.  All from an organization that was being run by Mr. Putin.</p> <p>And how did Vladimir Putin get into power?</p> <p>If you are the head of a secret police organization using illegal means to enforce power, to work with organized crime, and to partake of such crimes as well, and you have the power and means to undercut the judiciary and subvert military officers, then you are left with very little to resist you.  With that said there is one pretext for a State assuming additional powers and that is war.  In this case the war in Chechnya and, most critically, the second phase of it that started with the bombing of a bridge and then an apartment complex in Moscow.</p> <p>Those bombings had one strange artifact to them: in the case of the bridge bombing there was an FSB agent found dead at the site of it and in the apartment complex bombing an FSB agent was indicted for having supplied the necessary explosives.  Or should it be said that these were Special Agents, for they were.  The denial of the FSB is, ostensibly, 'we couldn't have done it'.  Even though agents of the FSB are implicated.  Indeed this brings into question why a tank column was stopped outside of Grozny for days and then bombed just before the other attacks.  Tank columns do not stop by roadsides for days at a time as that is wasteful in men and resources who can be better used for doing other things, like not needing field maintenance.  If you are trying to put together a meme of advancing terrorist attacks, would there be a better way to do it than just as it was done?  Because terrorists, you see, don't work on 'front lines' and don't need to 'advance' via announcing themselves with periodic attacks along a given axis of movement: they are not military units.</p> <p>To get more State power over media, over the economy, over people, is there any means better than a war?</p> <p>If the secret police of a State using illegal means put forward a program to require the current regime to delegitimize itself, would there be any better way than to start what is, essentially, a civil war and then assert 'special powers' in 'rooting out terrorists' by that self-same secret police?  And then, in the midst of awful, bloody fighting, wouldn't it be nice to have political backing, even if from extreme nationalists, for such activity?  Because that also came with the Chechen war and is one of the most startling visual artifacts of the documentary: skinheads chanting for Putin while waving a flag with a black hammer and sickle in a white circle on a red field.  The swastika replaced by the hammer and sickle.  And chants for killing them all, the Chechens and, although none had any involvement in this, the Jews.</p> <p>With the election of Vladimir Putin also came the election of a high number of FSB agents and officials also 'winning' elections so that every organ of the State was soon in control of the government.  Some may remember the terrorist attack on the theater in Russia where patrons were held captive by 'terrorist' gunmen.  One of those was an FSB agent who was put into a high position by Putin some months after the 'terrorist attack'.</p> <p>If China points to international socialism becoming a formulation of national socialism, which is to say fascism, then when genocidal war is mixed into that, as is the case in Russia, you get a form of fascism known as Nazism. Of course it will be denied up and down the line, yet the supporters of State power continue to show up with proper symbology be it that twisty, interlocking geometric design of the New Dawn party in Greece, or the swastika replaced hammer and sickle flag in Russia.  This, most virulent form of socialism at the nationalist scale, is a horror for mankind... although not a lesser horror than international socialist kind as both look to kill to get to and remain in power.  Often with tens of millions dead in that quest.</p> <p>The true horror is the attitude taken by prosecutors and governments outside of Russia when companies started by FSB agents or organized crime in Russia, and it is hard to say which is worse at this point, are then suspected of criminal acts.  Money laundering, drug running, and, of course, murder using exotic means like a highly rare, short lived, radioactive metal like Polonium.  Litvinenko thought he was safe in Great Britain, but safety is only an illusion unless the State will actually do its job to keep you safe from exterior attack... not turn a blind eye towards it or refuse to ask hard questions or even seek to shut down inquests.  Yet, in the West, we see that in Great Britain and Germany, and if that sort of thing is going in those States, one with the longest history of people seeking democratic freedom and the other the one place that should have learned its lessons about the horrors of NOT investigating such things, then what does that say about the rest of Europe and the West as a whole?</p> <p>In the US we have a man like Eric Holder who, it must be remembered, was involved in some very sorry episodes in the Clinton Administration, proving to be duplicitous in the Elian Gonzales affair, who also put forward a pardon for Marc Rich.  The same Marc Rich who would show up in post-Soviet Russia to bring 'tolling' as a concept with him to teach to the oligarchs.  It is certain Vladimir Putin knew of Marc Rich – as the head of the FSB that would not escape his notice.  And as Marc Rich had investments in operations going across Russia, east to west, it is very likely that Vladimir Putin had more than a nodding acquaintance of Marc Rich's tactics and techniques.  Did Putin actually know Marc Rich, a man then on the lam from the FBI for questioning with an international search warrant out for him prior to his pardon?  Especially as Putin used the methodologies that Rich brought with him to absolute perfection, can that be just chalked up to being a real good study of those techniques?  You don't use them by accident, that's for sure, but with criminal intent as the two commissions investigating the starving of St. Petersburg pointed out.  And as the courts in Liechtenstein also pointed to in the case of SPAG.  Makes you wonder where SPAG got its money, doesn't it?  </p> <p>Back to Eric Holder, for a moment, how does such a man pushing for a known organized crime participant to get a pardon, which he must have known in his position at the FBI, get a 'pass' by any political establishment?  How does a duplicitous public official with policing powers entrusted to him violate that trust and, yet, get promoted?  How does criminal operations of running guns to Mexican Cartels, and to other non-State operators overseas, against the treaties we have signed with these Nations, actually get a yawn from the media?</p> <p>What does the End Game Against Freedom look like?</p> <p>Vladimir Putin had many contacts in the intelligence and police community overseas.</p> <p>Here's a thought.</p> <p>President Eric Holder.</p> <p>But only after some suitable 'national emergency' has taken place in which 'extraordinary powers' need to be used to 'stop' advancing 'attacks' by organizations that don't do advancing 'attacks'.  That is the equivalent in the US.</p> <p>The End Game Against Freedom is a Police State.</p> <p>Run by the Secret Police, not a dictator creating one but a dictator put in power by one.</p> <p>Who watches the Watchmen?</p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic</div>A Jacksonianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07607888697879327120noreply@blogger.com0