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Labels: deinstitutionalization Labels: child sexual abuse Labels: house project Labels: intelligent design Labels: abortion Labels: homosexuality Labels: child sexual abuse Labels: telescopes Labels: house project
Never forget!
I ran for Idaho state senate in 2008--didn't win
I've written a number of history books, as well as scholarly and popular articles, (see my web page).
Sorry, high pressure isn't included.
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THE MESOPOTAMIAN: TO BRING ONE MORE IRAQI VOICE OF THE SILENT MAJORITY TO THE ATTENTION OF THE WORLD
Specializing in discussions of discrimination and affirmative action
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Impearls: a blog as electic and interesting as mine
Proving that the United States military does more than kill people and break things.
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The blog of one of my fellow bloggers on the Civilian Gun Self-Defense Blog
J. Norman Heath's Blog--a circus rigger and Second Amendment scholar (really!)
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Neocon Blues
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In Portland
My wife complains about Boise traffic; having arrived here in Portland about 4:50 PM, she says that she will no longer complain about it. Portland isn;t even a big city, as American cities goes, and what traffic!
The other discouraging aspect of the place is that almost every traffic control light on the freeway onramps (something that I had forgotten existed, since we live in Boise) had a beggar with a little sign. To the extent that this reflects Oregon's liberal policies about deinstitutionalization, it reflects poorly on Oregon's willingness to conront this problem. To the extent that it reflects the willingness of people to beg rather than work, it reflects poorly on the intelligence of the people of Portland to stop encouraging laziness.
Portland For a Wedding
I'll be in Portland for several days for a niece's wedding. This may be an interesting result: two Harvey Mudd College physics graduates, getting married. Just think of the potential offspring!
With Time Off For Good Behavior...
They won't be able to get convictions for every victim, obviously, but we can fantasize: SAN JOSE, CALIF. - A convicted child molester jailed in California may have committed sex crimes against thousands of victims, police said Thursday after finding computers, notebooks and handwritten lists with more than 36,000 boys' names and codes apparently indicating various sex acts.
It gets worse. Both of these guys have previous convictions for child molestation:
Dean Arthur Schwartzmiller, 63, is "one of the most active child molesters we've ever seen," said San Jose Police Lt. Scott Cornfield. Characterizing the case as "horrendous," he appealed for help from the public in identifying more of his victims.
With Schwartzmiller safely behind bars - held without bail on one count of aggravated sexual assault on a child under 14 and six counts of lewd and lascivious conduct on a child under 14, with each count alleging multiple victims - police were trying to reconstruct his movements over the past 30 years.
...
Police have also arrested Schwartzmiller's roommate - another convicted child molester - in the home they shared in a middle-class San Jose subdivision. The beige stucco ranch is a 10-minute walk from at least two elementary schools.
...
During a search of Schwartzmiller's bedroom last month in San Jose, police discovered at least seven multicolored, spiral-bound notebooks, listing in loopy cursive more than 36,000 children's names - apparently all boys.
The names were categorized according to the type of sex acts performed, the age of the victims and other codes whose meaning is unclear - such as an "F" or "X" at the end of the entry. Many of the entries listed in more than 1,360 pages did not include last names, and some appeared to be repeats, making police cautious about estimating how many people Schwartzmiller may have victimized.
"If one-tenth of these numbers are accurate, we're looking at hundreds of victims in a number of states. The reason we want to tell the world about this is because we believe he's been involved in child molestations in a number of countries," said Cornfield.
Schwartzmiller's roommate, Fred Everts, is also in jail after police arrested him last month. He was convicted in 1993 for sodomy and sex abuse in Multnomah County, Oregon, and spent four years in prison before violating parole and fleeing the state.
Everts also was charged with child molestation in San Jose, including one count involving one of Schwartzmiller's two alleged victims.
Police who raided the home seized several computers and a 6-foot-tall server, which is being analyzed by a forensic lab in Menlo Park. Cornfield, who is part of a special police unit specializing in Internet crimes against children, said police are trying to determine whether Schwartzmiller was operating a Web site or otherwise using his computers to lure victims. Although police say Schwartzmiller appears to have spent much of the past 30 years in California, he has also been arrested on child molestation charges in New York, Idaho, Oregon, Arkansas and Washington. He has also lived in Nevada, Texas and Washington.
How many times does a child molester have to be convicted before we lock them up, and leave them there?
In 1984, the Idaho Supreme Court upheld a 1978 conviction for molesting two 14-year-old boys and characterized Schwartzmiller as a "repeat offender" who "uses his intelligence to take advantage of the weak and oppressed and those who are in need."
Schwartzmiller "frequents areas where young boys may be found, befriends boys with no father figure in the home, entices them from their homes, lowers their natural inhibitions through the use of drugs and alcohol, and commits sex acts upon them," the justices wrote.
He's also wanted in Oregon on felony sexual assault charges involving a minor. After serving prison time in Idaho for child molestation in the late 1970s, he lived in Brazil, and was extradited from there to Idaho again in the late 1980s, Cornfield said. Sgt. Tom Sims, a supervisor with the department's child exploitation division, expressed frustration that Schwartzmiller has been able to live out of jail for most of his life, despite multiple convictions in several states.
More On Science And Evolution
Professor Volokh again has a thoughtful piece about the question of evolution and science, responding to Michael Shermer: What’s more, how exactly do scientists come to the conclusion that “God had no part in this process”? What’s their proof? That’s the sort of thing that can’t really be proved, it seems to me -- which makes it sound as if scientists, despite their protestations of requiring proof rather than faith, make assertions about God that they can’t prove.
What really irritates me is Shermer's casual character assassination: The primary reason we are experiencing this peculiarly American phenomenon of evolution denial (the doppelganger of Holocaust denial)....
I suppose that Shermer can justify this because he would argue that evolution is just as well established as the Holocaust. Sorry, but it isn't. There are plenty of Holocaust survivors out there; there are masses of films, photographs, and records establishing that it took place, and when it took place. There are minor quibbles over exactly who authorized it, on what dates, and some arguing about the total dead.
The big stuff of evolution--the divergence of kingdoms, phyla, and classes--remains an area still shrouded in considerable mystery. As even most evolutionary biologists will admit, there are substantial gaps in the fossil record that have not been adequately filled. This doesn't mean that evolution is wrong--the time scales involved are enormous, and for example, lacking the ancestor fossils for both phylum Mollusca and phylum Arthropoda, showing the split, would not be too surprising.
It does mean that macroevolution is not in the same category of historical evidence as the Holocaust. To make such a comparison tells me that Shermer doesn't understand the evolutionary dispute as well as he thinks he does--or he is prepared to smear critics of evolution as neo-Nazis.
"Only Little Terrorists Kill Themselves"
I'm paraphrasing Leona Helmsley's famous saying, "Only little people pay taxes," of course. Coalition and Iraqi forces keep nabbing Zarqawi's lieutenants: Air Force Brig. Gen. Donald Alston told reporters Thursday that Mohammed Khalif Shaiker (search), also known as Abu Talha or the emir of Mosul, was nabbed on Tuesday. The arrest was a major blow to the insurgency in the northern city of Mosul (search), Alston said.
I mentioned a few days ago that there is evidence that some of the suicide bombers in Iraq aren't being given any choice on this. I guess Shaiker is too important to the cause to give his own life. Maybe some of the terrorists are doing what they are doing out of religious devotion--but it sounds like their leadership is a bit more cynical, or perhaps Shaiker prefers a prison cell to the seventy-two black-eyed virgins he is promised in Islamic Paradise.
"This is a major defeat for the Al Qaeda organization in Iraq," he said, referring to the group led by Zarqawi and allied to Usama bin Laden's Al Qaeda (search) network. "Numerous reports indicated he wore a suicide vest 24 hours a day and stated that he would never surrender. Instead, Talha gave up without a fight."
Shaiker was captured on Tuesday in a quiet neighborhood of Iraq's third largest city, the Alston said. He said Shaiker put up little resistance in surrendering to coalition forces and supporting Iraqi security forces, and is fully cooperating with officials.
Oh yes: for those who insist on seeing the "insurgency" in Iraq as a largely home-grown matter: try again: Spanish police have detained 16 Islamist radicals, including 11 followers of al-Qa'ida's chief in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who were said to be preparing suicide attacks in Iraq.
Authorities said 11 of those detained in a huge operation in several Spanish cities were thought to have established a network to recruit, train and send young radicals to commit suicide missions against occupying forces in Iraq.
...
"Many of those detained expressed their desire to give up their lives as martyrs for the Islamic cause, which demonstrated how dangerous and extreme they were," Mr Alonso said.
They belonged to "an established Islamist network in our country, linked to the terrorist organisation Ansar al-Islam/Zarqawi network", Spain's interior ministry said in a statement. The network, based in Spain, had links with several Middle Eastern and north African countries and Britain, but was masterminded from Syria by two recruiters and financiers of the Islamist organisation. The two, who controlled all communications with operatives in various countries, including Spain, were detained in May last year by Syrian authorities, and returned to their native Morocco.
Interesting Use of "Fundamentalist" In This News Report
I mentioned a while back that there seems to be a problem developing with disappearing African children in Britain. This report from the Evening Standard indicates that the problem seems to be human sacrifice: Boys from Africa are being murdered as human sacrifices in London churches.
Somehow, when I think of "fundamentalist church," I don't think of human sacrifices. There have been a few highly publicized incidents in the U.S. where rather cultish churches have engaged in exorcisms that left someone dead, but these are way outside the mainstream of "fundamentalist churches." Even the snake handler cults are considered bizarre and crazy by nearly all fundamentalist churches.
They are brought into the capital to be offered up in rituals by fundamentalist Christian sects, according to a shocking report by Scotland Yard.
Followers believe that powerful spells require the deaths of "unblemished" male children.
Police believe such boys are trafficked from cities such as Kinshasa where they can be bought for a little as £10.
The report, leaked ahead of its publication next month, also cites examples of African children being tortured and killed after being identified as "witches" by church pastors.
The 10-month study was commissioned after the death of Victoria Climbié, who was starved and beaten to death after they said she was possessed by the devil.
This problem in Britain seems to be a bit larger than a few oddballs: Last month Scotland Yard revealed it had traced just two out of 300 black boys aged four to seven reported missing from London schools in a three-month period.
Worrisome, indeed. Predictably, the multiculturalists are calling the report racist:
The true figure for missing boys and girls is feared to be several thousand a year. Dr William Les Henry, a lecturer in sociology at Goldsmiths College, said aspects of the reports were pigeonholing crimes together and were patronising and racist.
He said: "When we think about these cases we can see the same kind of patterns of behaviour in European cultures but they are interpreted in completely different ways.
"This is one of the crises with social sciences anyway, when they are supposedly interpreting the folk ways or cultural habits of alien cultures." He said that the models such reports are based on are that "Africans are less civilised, less rational".
But Dr Hoskins said: "This is very detailed, qualitative report that actually comes out of the communities.
"This is not white people saying this. This has actually comes from the communities authored by people in the community and that really stymies the racist line." He added: "We are dealing with real cases here. When you actually talk to them, these are hard and fast facts.
Only Happy Endings?
I received an email pointing me to an incident in which a victim shot the robber--but the robber shot the victim, with a somewhat snarky question about whether I was going to include this on the Civilian Gun Self-Defense Blog, or if I was only interested in publicizing happy endings?
Well, I would have included the incident, but my co-blogger, Pete Drum, had already beaten me to the punch on it. Yes, it isn't the perfect ending--but it is a lot better than the results that actually happen where gun control advocates get their way: the robber shoots the victim, and the robber is free to continue committing robberies.
The House Project
Okay, these drawings aren't quite up to date--there are some steps to be changed to ramps, a few more windows to add, the master bathroom wall has to move a foot or two to put in dual sinks--but we are getting there. (Also, for those who have dark plans for me--this doesn't show the boobytraps, trapdoors, the dungeon, or the minefield.)
Here's the floor plan.
Bere's the exteriors.
Here's one view of the four foot trench so that Idaho Power can run conduit from the pole to the transformer.
Here you can see the excavation to put the footings in place.
My wife looking with distress at the amount of (temporary) devastation done to the wildflowers by all the digging.
Another view across the digging where the forms will go for the foundation.
More of the power trench.
Wild flowers on and near our property. We'll have names for them soon, and I'll update these pictures when we do.
Oh yeah, the Equinox we bought to get back and forth in winter.
Weather
Yesterday was so much like our vacation in Hawaii, I was looking for the hula dancers: hot, muggy, broken clouds. I am not happy with hot weather (as is the norm here in June and July), but at least we get clear skies most evenings. This is ridiculous.
Fun With Bears
A reader saw my account of bears in Yosemite, and sent me this story: The bears outsmarted me minutes into my first visit to Yosemite, with the result that my shampoo was consumed, then regurgitated. But my mom's family's story takes the cake.
I would remember that in the future: I wouldn't use steak sauce flavored cold cream.
My Uncle Dave had bad acne, so he would put cold cream on his face before going to sleep. He and my Mom slept outside in their heavy cotton sleeping bags, while my grandparents took to a tent (Uncle Tom was off on some other adventure).
Dave is a heavy snorer, but fortunately, he is also a very heavy sleeper. My Mom woke up, and to her horror, in the moonlight she could see that a bear was licking the cold cream off of Uncle Dave's face! She said that she was so scared that she couldn't speak even if she had wanted to. That was likely a good thing as Dave slept through the whole event.
In the morning, my Mom told Dave what had happened, and he thought that she was just joking, figuring that she had somehow wiped the cream from his face. But when he went to comb his hair, ew, it was still lathered with stinky bear aliva.
Inflation, Housing Prices, Interest Rates
What will all the discussion of the Fed's concern about long-term interest rates staying so low, and their concern about a speculative housing bubble, this is interesting news: WASHINGTON (AP) - Consumer prices in May posted the first decline in 10 months as energy costs staged a sizable retreat. At the same time, the pace of activity at U.S. factories jumped sharply.
Greenspan has been quite insistent that the economy is strong--hence the continued interest rate increases, with the goal of keeping inflation in check. It does appear that we are getting both strong growth and almost zero inflation. This probably won't last. As the economy grows, eventually you run out of production capacity in some sector. You can't get enough labor. You can't get enough concrete. When that happens, sellers increase prices--and that can lead to demand-pull inflation.
A variety of reports released Wednesday depicted an economy shaking off the effects of an oil price surge in the early spring and resuming solid growth.
The Federal Reserve released a new nationwide survey of business conditions that described the economy as expanding at a healthy pace in recent weeks, with the Fed's 12 regional banks describing activity with such words as "moderate,""solid" and "well sustained."
The Fed report, which will serve as the basis for discussions when policymakers meet June 29-30, said manufacturing had continued to expand with labor markets improving in most districts.
At some point, the Fed is going to raise short-term interest rates enough to cool off this economy, and interest-rate sensitive industries such as housing will start to calm down. I don't expect it to happen in the next month or two, but enjoy (and perhaps take advantage of) your skyrocketing home equity right now--things will calm down a bit in another six months.
You can see the results in rising Treasury yields: 4.423% as of right now, quite a leap from the 4.2% of so we were seeing a couple of weeks ago.
Personal Insults Are Not An Effective Way To Win An Argument
Especially when you need to persuade the people that you are insulting. Not surprisingly, this was a dispute about how evolution should be taught in public schools. Some people showed that they lacked sufficient confidence in their position to argue against their opponent's position. Instead, they chose to insult their opponents: TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A discussion about how evolution should be taught in public schools degenerated Wednesday into personal attacks among State Board of Education members.
Oh? You were expecting the personal insults to be coming from the critics of evolution?
The board is reviewing proposed standards drafted by three conservative members designed to expose students to more criticism of evolution in the classroom. During the discussion, four board members who want the standards to maintain their existing evolution-friendly tone assailed the proposal.
Bill Wagnon, of Topeka, told the three conservative board members they were the "dupes" of intelligent design advocates, who presented what Wagnon said was bad science during public hearings in May.
"It is all based on absolute and total fraud," Wagnon said of the proposal.
But one of the three board members, Connie Morris, of St. Francis, lectured the board's four moderates for not attending the public hearings in May, during which witnesses criticized evolutionary theory that natural chemical processes may have created the first building blocks of life, that all life has descended from a common origin and that man and apes share a common ancestor.
"Had you attended, you would have been informed," Morris said. "You would be sitting here as informed individuals and not arrogantly calling us dupes."
I wish that I could say that the critics of evolution have always behaved in a respectful and responsible manner, but unfortunately, that isn't true. One biology textbook that my wife had assigned to her 7th/8th grade class in California was so unacceptable she simply would not use it. It did not address the serious questions that evolutionary theory seeks to answer, and which are legitimate scientific and philosophical questions. It did not prepare the students to be able to intelligently use evolutionary theory in subsequent science classes--which you need to be able to do, if you intend to study biology at the college level.
Most of all, we were very troubled by what a nasty tone this book had, with so much invective directed at the evolutionists. This would have been unacceptable in a book with a secular philosophy--but in a book that purported to be written from a Christian perspective, it was very offensive. Petty insults and ad hominem attacks usually betray that someone doesn't have enough confidence in their ability to argue their position. That defenders of the evolutionary status quo have been reduced to this same level suggests that the Intelligent Design critique is having some useful impact in a thesis/antithesis/synthesis way.
Whole Grain Diet & Muscle Mass
I've increased my whole grain intake the last couple of weeks, and I've notice that I am building muscle much more quickly. The gym is also involving less suffering--and on some of the machines, I am reaching the point where I will be at the maximum available weight. (Yeah!)
I've seen the claim by various vendors selling products that some whole grains, such as wild oats, increase the amount of free testosterone available for your body to use, because it prevents it from being bound into albumin. It is certainly the case that testosterone is vital to building muscle, although this article suggests that the relationship is complex.
I know that I feeel a heck of a lot better, and I can see how much more muscle I am building every week!
Is Canada A Real Country?
I don't mean to be insulting, but I read a news story like this, and it sounds like the Canadian Senate only recently figured out that they are not running an amusement park: The Senate Standing Committee on National Security and Defence is set to call for an armed presence at all Canada-U.S. border crossings in a major report on border security to be released today.
It is really nice to have an unmilitarized border, but you know, not only terrorists but even ordinary deranged criminals have been known to go from one country to the other in an attempt to avoid prosecution. Relying on the common decency of someone that uses a chainsaw to solve interpersonal disputes seems beyond optimistic, and into foolish.
The committee, which has been studying the state of border security, is expected to recommend that the RCMP have an officer posted at each border crossing into Canada and, if that cannot be accomplished, to allow Canada Border Services Agency officers at the crossing points to have guns, sources close to the committee tell the National Post.
...
RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli said in April that giving sidearms to border guards would be a "dangerous move" and contribute little to improving national security.
"I know being at the border can be risky and there are certain dangers," he said.
"But somebody who runs through the border and having a customs officer run out of his hut and shoot after them -- I'm not sure we want to do that."
"I don't think it makes a lot of sense, in terms of the expenditure of resources, to have every inch of that undefended border patrolled by Canadian, RCMP, or whoever it might be, 24/7," she told reporters in support of Comm. Zaccardelli's remarks. "I don't believe that is a rational use of our resources."
Those comments upset the CBSA officers' union, which has lobbied for greater protection for its members who staff border points in both high-density urban environments and in remote, rural outposts.
Adult Supervision In The Cockpit: A Good Idea
This news story reads like the script from a not very plausible comedy, perhaps titled X-treme Jet Pilots: Two airline pilots joked and laughed as they flew an empty commercial jet to its limits, switched seats in mid-air and ignored automated warnings before crashing into a residential area, a cockpit voice recorder has revealed.
What? This was released as part of:
Captain Jesse Rhodes and First Officer Peter Cesarz were both killed after they decided to "have a little fun" and take the 50-seat Pinnacle Airlines jet they were flying to 41,000ft - the limit of its capability. No one was hurt on the ground in Jackson City, Missouri, where the plane came down after suffering catastrophic engine failure.
"Ooh look at that," Mr Cesarz said, apparently referring to cockpit readings. "Pretty cool."
"Man, we can do it. Forty-one it," the captain replied. "Forty thousand, baby."
Two minutes later Mr Cesarz said: "Made it, man."
But seconds later, as an automatic system began warning of a stall, one of the pilots is heard to say: "Dude, it's losing it." A voice then said: "We don't have any engines. You got to be kidding me."
The plane crashed two and a half miles from the runway, missing houses. a federal investigation into whether pilots of small regional airlines are getting adequate training and supervision.
I guess not.
UPDATE: There are a lot of pilots upset about the coverage of this incident. You can read some criticism here and here of the accuracy of the news reporting.
Cannibalism & Abortion
I don't really want to believe this story. Someone please find me evidence that it is false. I won't even describe it. If you click over to it, be prepared to be very grossed out. They are quoting a Kansas City Police Department detective by name about it. If this is a urban legend, it is a very complete one.
UPDATE: The doctor is real, and you can read some official accounts of disciplinary actions taken here and here and here. This doctor sounds like a real piece of work--even without the cannibalism.
Bears, Yosemite, Styrofoam
Why am I concerned about bears, one reader asks? The risk of a confrontation with one is actually pretty small. Quite true. But I understand that it hurts a bit when they bite into your skull. Be prepared!
In the early 1960s, when I was too young to be afraid of wildlife, my family went to camp in Yosemite National Park for a week or so. I was growing up in an apartment in Chula Vista, near San Diego (not yet part of Mexico). I had never seen a dark sky. I had never seen a deer stop in the middle of the road, mesmerized by our headlights.
We camped somewhere near the entrance to the park the first night. I was either asleep when we set up camp, or close to it. I do remember waking up shortly after sunrise the next morning to the sound of birds chirping, and the smell of bacon frying. The sun had not quite cleared the mountain ridge. Magical doesn't even begin to describe it.
The next few days were absolutely astonishingly beautiful. We camped somewhere down on Yosemite Valley floor--at a time when Yosemite was not yet crowded, even in summer. I can remember wading in the Merced River, in the purest, clearest water I think that I had ever seen, wondering if I was looking at gold or pyrites. (Probably pyrites, but who knows?)
This is one of those vacation memories that I will always cherish--and it is only in the last few years that I have discovered that there are a lot of parents who simply do not make the effort to provide those sort of memories for their kids. I don't mean that lots of parents can't afford it--I mean that they don't care whether their kids even see things like that or not. (Thanks Mom.) This trip was, I am sure, a substantial burden on my parents. We were not wealthy--we weren't even really middle class, but somehow, they managed to work this out.
A few days before the end of the vacation, my father had to go back to work. He often had jobs far from home. (He was a welder.) In this case, he was working somewhere near Napa, and had to get back to his job. So here we are: my mother and I are sleeping in the car. My three sisters and my brother (I think) are asleep under the stars. (Or perhaps he had already been drafted--I'm not sure.) Then the black bear wanders into our campsite, and decides the contents of the Styrofoam ice chest are his. Yes, this wasn't exactly the correct protocol for food storage, but we didn't know any better.
Here's the funny part: everyone but my mother slept through this! She's honking the horn--and everyone stays asleep! The only way that we know it wasn't a dream of hers is that the ice chest, the next morning, is ripped to shreds, and you can see that a wild animal did this. (My mother does not have teeth and claws like that.)
Rev. Fred Phelps: Who Does He Work For?
You read news accounts like this, and you wonder if he is an agent provocateur for the left (which with he used to be closely associated): The Kansas preacher who tried to erect an anti-gay monument in a Boise city park says he's coming to Idaho this week to picket the funeral of a fallen soldier.
Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, says God killed Idaho National Guard Corporal Carrie French with an improvised explosive device. Phelps says God is retaliating against America for a bombing of his church six years ago.
Oh My, I'm Famous! (But Not Fabulous)
I was Googling for "Clayton Cramer" (to see what nasty things people are saying about me--183,000 hits), and I ran into this web page, which includes quotes from what it calls "Famous people: Authors > Chv-Col > Clayton Cramer".
The Real Estate Bubble
This news report shows that while not worth getting too worried quite yet, if you are in one of the real estate crazy places that I have mentioned recently, and you are considering taking your equity and running, it might be good to keep your finger on the trigger: Low long-term interest rates in the face of the Fed's tightening have helped spur huge gains in house prices in some U.S. regions. Fed officials have warned these could falter and said the risky lending practices this speculation has encouraged is drawing their attention.
"I don't see a bubble in the sense that property values over the United States as a whole are at a level that could radically drop in value. But there are local markets where it is hard to really believe that underlying demand for housing can sustain current prices," Fed Board Governor Susan Schmidt Bies said on the sidelines of the same conference.
Some fear that as rates rise, an increase in the cost of servicing home loans could undermine the property market and hit household spending hard.
Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said last week that, given the sizable amounts of equity many home owners have in their properties, prices would have to drop a long way before this hurt the economy.
New Jersey Court of Appeals On Same-Sex Marriage
The decision says that to strike down the existing state law defining marriage as one man, one woman, it has to be clearly contrary to some provision of the state constitution--and it clearly isn't.
The plaintiffs argued the right to same-sex marriage as both privacy right and due process, making the claim: The substantive due process rights protected by this provision include the right of privacy.... This right of privacy "embraces the right to make procreative decisions . . . [and] the right of consenting adults to engage in sexual conduct."
Unless there is something that I am missing, homosexual couples are somewhat limited in their ability to make "procreative decisions." Nor is the ban on same-sex marriage preventing homosexuals from engaging in sexual conduct.
The plaintiffs apparently also argued that the right to marry was one of those "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty" things that the U.S. Supreme Court finds when it wants to wax lyrical, and not have you pay any attention to the man behind the curtain: Similarly, the Supreme Court of the United States
The decision has the good sense to observe:
has recently reaffirmed that "the Due Process Clause specially protects those fundamental rights and liberties which are, objectively, 'deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition,' and 'implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,' such that 'neither liberty nor justice would exist if they were sacrificed.'" ... The Court noted that confining constitutional protection to "fundamental rights found to be deeply rooted in our legal tradition . . . tends to rein in the subjective elements that are necessarily present in due-process judicial review."Plaintiffs' claim that a right to marriage between members of the same sex may be found in article I, paragraph 1, of the New Jersey Constitution has no foundation in its text, this Nation's history and traditions or contemporary standards of liberty and justice. It certainly is an idea that would have been alien to the delegates to the 1947 Constitutional Convention who proposed this provision and to the voters who approved it.
But not to worry: I expect within another ten years, historians will be publishing journal articles establishing that gay marriage has been common from the very beginning of the Republic--perhaps by demonstrating that there were no laws prohibiting same-sex marriage.
Law Students Fails Exam; Lawsuit Raises Constitutional Questions
I'm trying not to make light of the situation that confronted the George Mason University law student; I have struggled with migraine headaches for most of my life, although I've never had one arrive at such an inopportune moment.
Still, it is an interesting case (although the decision is dry as dust) from the U.S. 4th Circuit, in which the student argues that the university retaliated against her for asking to re-take the exam, and GMU argues that the Eleventh Amendment bars the suit. (You remember the Eleventh Amendment, right? The one that limits the authority of the federal courts to hear cases involving a citizen of one state against another state.)
A law student suing a law school because you are sure that you are right about the law, and that they are wrong--this is pretty arrogant, isn't it? If you win, it is a pretty strong feather in your cap. If you lose....
Scientific Fundamentalism
Very nice piece by Professor Volokh pointing out that there are people who have what he calls a "scientific fundamentalism" concerning moral questions: What rule we should use for deciding when someone should have the legal right not to be killed is not a scientific question. Applying the rule may be a scientific question; if we decide that only entities that have consciousness have the right not to be killed, then science can tell us whether John Smith has consciousness. But deciding on the rule is simply not a scientific issue: It's a matter of moral judgment, which science isn't equipped to provide. Science can't tell us whether the legal right not to be killed vests at conception, at viability, at consciousness, or at birth; nor can it tell us when the right dissipates.
Exactly. I used to lean this direction--the worship of Science with a capital "S," back when I was in high school, and during my first year at USC.
...
I can certainly see why some people, especially those who love science, might want to believe that science should be "the legal arbiter of when life ends and begins," and why they want to think that their moral intuitions are simply "rationalist legal philosophy" and any contrary moral intuitions are "a rejection of science." But they are mistaken; and they are in their own way victims of a fundamentalist (and fundamentally erroneous) perception of the role of science.
The human need to worship--and to have some Absolute Truth--is very strong. Sonoma State University, my alma mater, used to have a summer seminar on Critical Thinking, aimed at secondary teachers. I think that teaching critical thinking is very important--but as I walked by the closing session, I heard one of the professors say, "When you take the Truth back to your schools...." And you could hear the capital "T" in Truth. There was an emphasis and a near-fanaticism to the way that he was speaking that both amused me, and disturbed me. Had he closed his speech with, "Hallelujah, brothers and sisters!" it would have perfectly fit the tone of his speech.
In my experience, even those who argue vigorously for moral relativism--that right and wrong are culturally specific--usually believe in at least one Absolute Truth: that there are no moral truths that apply universally.
Real Estate Insanity
I had a long chat with my father-in-law last night, who lives in the Orange County Leisure World--and is getting rather tired of living in a community where it seems as soon as you get to know someone, they die. (This development used to be referred to as "Seizure World" by young people when I lived in Orange County, a long, long time ago.)
He has decided that it is time to move--and he was astonished at how much less expensive Boise is than Orange County, and astonishingly enough, it is actually possible to find salespeople that can speak English here in Boise. (My father-in-law says that much of the time, this is a struggle where he lives now.)
I know that a lot of people are taking their equity from California's vastly overblown real estate market, and moving to places like Nevada and Idaho. What astonishes me is that there are any retirees who are still in California. The cost of living in most of the United States is about 60% of what it is the People's Republic, and at least here in Idaho, we don't have the crime problem, or the civility problem, or the general viciousness of petty scamsters problem that characterizes Los Angeles.
Yes, the weather is a bit nicer, but consider that your $4000 a month pension in Los Angeles will buy you the equivalent of about $7000 a month in comfort in the United States--why do retirees stay there? You can fly out to visit your family and friends several times a year for the difference in living costs.
I know that the coasts have first-rate medical care, but we aren't exactly chopped liver in the medium-sized cities of the interior. I admit, you might not want to go too far in the cheaper interior direction: $32,000
Single Family Property
Area: Powell in Town
Year Built: 1999
3 total bedroom(s)
2 total bath(s)
1 total full bath(s)
1 total three-quarter bath(s)
Approximately 1216 sq. ft.
Slow Learner
After the acquittal: Basking in the jurors' decision to acquit his client of all counts, Michael Jackson's lawyer said Tuesday the singer will no longer share his bed with young boys.
I would have thought after the first accusations of child molestation he would have figured that out. But better late than never.
"He's not going to do that anymore," attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. told NBC's "Today.""He's not going to make himself vulnerable to this anymore."
I heard one of the jurors explaining that they didn't believe the mother--what sort of mother would let her children sleep with a man if she thought there was some danger? The answer, I'm afraid, is a mother who didn't mind putting her child at risk to cash in big.
Bear Spray
I've read a number of conflicting opinions on the subject of self-defense against black bears. There does seem to be some agreement that as far as handgun defense against an aggressive black bear, the minimum reliably effective cartridge is the 10mm--and even then, you need the full power loads, not the FBI's weak version.
Some readers suggested that .45 Colt (not .45 ACP) might work, but the only real confidence was in 10mm full power loads; .41 Magnum; and .44 Magnum. With the exception of .45 Colt, all of these are going to be big pistols to carry and a bit of a handful to fire. Yes, you can use lighter loads for training, but then your training isn't very realistic, is it? You really don't want to be firing a much different load during the tension of a close personal encounter with a black bear, do you?
What about bear spray? This is pepper spray with a much higher percentage of the hot stuff in it. I've heard anecdotal claims that it is very effective against grizzly bears--even more so than .44 Magnum. If that sounds implausible, remember that bears, like most mammals, have a very good sense of smell compared to a human being, and I susspect that they don't like the smell of pepper spray.
Of course, if you ask people that make and sell bear spray, they think very highly of it, so I went and looked for people with less of a financial interest in the subject. The title of this article from the University of Alaska Geophysical Institute nicely summarizes the results of a recent study of actual uses of bear spray against grizzly and black bears: Pepper Spray Works, But Don't Bet Your Life On It
This would appear to be a pretty persuasive argument for carrying bear spray. This article from the Anchorage Press (where the interest in grizzly bear self-defense isn't a purely academic concern) also indicates that it works, although not perfectly. This advisory from the U.S. Forest Service indicates that it works more reliably than a gun, as does this article by an expert who has analyzed gun vs. pepper spray defenses against Alaskan grizzly and black bears. (This particular agency, however, is the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee, who may have a bunny-hugger interest in keeping the critters alive.)
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Their study included black bears and brown (grizzly) bears in a variety of pre-spray moods that ranged from curious to aggressive. All of the bears had been sprayed with the type of pepper sprays found at sporting goods stores---a tubular canister containing propellant and 10 percent capsiacin, a toxic chemical extracted from red peppers that acts as a powerful irritant to respiratory systems and eyes.
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In the 16 cases Herrero and Higgins looked at in which pepper spray was used against brown bears in sudden encounters, 15 brown bears turned away after receiving a direct blast to the eyes and nose. Three of the sprayed brown bears ended up attacking and injuring the sprayer anyway, but Herrero said it didn't appear a face full of pepper made the bears any more aggressive than they normally would have been.
Of 20 brown bears sprayed while searching for human food, garbage, or just appearing overly curious, Herrero and Higgins found all 20 stopped what they were doing, and 18 left (only two of those 18 came back later).
Blasted black bears didn't seem as affected by the spray, especially those with a taste for garbage. Nineteen of 26 black bears sprayed while acting curious or searching for human food and garbage stopped what they were doing, and 14 of 26 bears left the area. But six of those 14 came back.
"The spray appears ineffective as a means of deterring black bears that are strongly conditioned to human foods and garbage," Herrero said.
Pepper spray also didn't send black bears running in the four cases where people sprayed them after aggressive sudden encounters. Although it stopped the black bears' aggressive behavior in all four cases, none of them left the area. Herrero said although their sample size of their study was too small for bombproof conclusions, black bears seem to be more resistant to the physiological effects of pepper spray than brown bears.
I don't much care if the black bear sticks around and calls the ACLU to file suit (who will doubtless look at this as an opportunity to apply the equal protection clause to an entirely new species); I do care that it stops attacking me or my wife.
It sounds like the appropriate escalation is to hose down the bear, and be drawing a pistol in the event that it gets close enough that you need to shoot it through the lungs, or up through the palate into the brain. Even .45 ACP at contact distance should be capable of causing a peppered black bear to stop long enough for you to get away.
Adding to the complexity, while grizzly bears apparently do not like getting sprayed with this stuff, this warning from the University of Alberta makes me wonder if there might not be some catnip-like qualities involved as well: In research recently submitted for publication in the Wildlife Society Bulletin, USGS researcher Tom Smith emphasized that although the spray is a proven deterrent in some encounters with aggressive bears, red pepper spray is not a bear repellent when applied to objects such as tents, food containers, clothing or other personal belongings, "nor is it claimed to be by most manufacturers." In fact, noted Smith, no pepper spray manufacturers normally suggest that the spray should be used preventively. Although it is not presently known exactly what the attracting agent in the red pepper spray is, the irritant oleoresin capsicum is the only ingredient common to all the sprays tested.
Here's a very well written discussion by Smith himself of the whole bear spray issue.
Smith said that although research has shown that red pepper spray is highly effective as a deterrent in aggressive grizzly and brown bear encounters when sprayed directly in a bear's eyes or nose, his pilot study shows that spray residues did attract brown bears when used in nonaggressive situations. Brown bear responses to red pepper spray-treated sites in his study ranged from mere sniffing to whole body rolling in the residues, an uncommon bear behavior.
In any case, it does appear that the best remedy for bear attack is to be loud, be cautious, slowly back away if you see one, don't scream, and don't act afraid. Oh yeah, and don't try to dress up their cubs in cute little outfits.
UPDATE: Michael Williams asks why I am not considering the use of a bear-proof suit. First, I forgot about it (having seen this article a year or two ago); second: I agree with the bear handler: When confronted by Hurtubise in the Ursus Mark VI suit, the bear smelled a human, but saw an alien. "There's no grizzly that's going to come near you in that suit," the bear handler told him, after he spent 10 minutes in a cage with the cowering animal.
It isn't just the bears that might keep their distance--the UFOlogists might come looking for me as well.
Finally, A Proper Science Fiction Planet
One of the charming things about science fiction has long been its willingness to imagine worlds different from the ones that we can see in our solar system. There has been a spate of extrasolar planets discovered in the last few years. These have largely been identified and characterized by the wobbles that these planets introduce into the stars around which they revolve.
Because of the distances involved, most of these extrasolar planets have been gas giants--10x and 20x as large as Jupiter. Some have even suggested that these "gas giants" are so large that they might be better characterized as brown dwarfs or failed stars. What makes this especially plausible is that some of these extrasolar planets are very close to their star--and sometimes in highly eccentric orbits. The term "hot Jupiters" sometimes describes these odd supposed planets.
Finally, we have an extrasolar planet that could fit into a Larry Niven short story--enough different from the planets we know in our solar system to be exotic, but definitely a planet: Astronomers announced today the discovery of the smallest planet so far found outside of our solar system. About seven-and-a-half times as massive as Earth, and about twice as wide, this new extrasolar planet may be the first rocky world ever found orbiting a star similar to our own.
Okay, I don't expect to be visiting anytime soon.
"This is the smallest extrasolar planet yet detected and the first of a new class of rocky terrestrial planets," said team member Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. "It's like Earth's bigger cousin."
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The new planet orbits Gliese 876, an M dwarf star 15 light years away in the constellation Aquarius. The “super-Earth” is not alone: there are two other planets – both Jupiter-sized – in the same system.
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From this wobble, the researchers measured a minimum mass for the new planet of 5.9 Earth masses. The planet orbits makes a full orbit in a speedy 1.94 days, implying a distance to the central star of 2 million miles – or about 2 percent of the distance between the Earth and the Sun.
Orbiting so close to its star, scientists speculate that the planet’s temperature is a toasty 400 to 750 degrees Fahrenheit (200 to 400 degrees Celsius). This is likely too hot for the planet to retain much gas, like Jupiter does. Therefore, the planet must be mostly solid.
UPDATE: A reader points me to this account--in which one of my favorite authors, Larry Niven, has just published a novel set around this star--and this discovery blows it out!
Concrete Shortage
My builder tells me that demand for concrete here in Boise is so much outstripping supply that he is having trouble getting a commitment on when the house foundation will be poured. The concrete suppliers are claiming that foreign demand because of the weak dollar is pulling concrete to overseas markets. I find that quite implausible--concrete is a bulk commodity.
UPDATE: Several readers tell me that cement is actually what is in short supply--and the reason is that a lot of it comes from China. The making of cement is an energy intensive (and I suspect, environmentally unfriendly, at least the way the Chinese do it) process.
The Right To Self-Defense
Dave Kopel posted an item last week about a 2001 decision from the West Virginia Supreme Court concerning whether an employer may fire an employee for defending himself from a robbery: In Feliciano v. 7-Eleven, a masked woman with a gun attempted to rob the 7-Eleven where Feliciano worked. While the robber was distracted by another employee, Feliciano grabbed her gun, and held her captive until the police arrived. "Following this incident, 7-Eleven terminated Feliciano, who was an at will employee, for failure to comply with its company policy which prohibits employees from subduing or otherwise interfering with a store robbery."
Instapundit was supportive of this decision. Professor Bainbridge was not--and chose to engage in some really insulting language to denigrate Feliciano, referring to him as a "gun nut." Well, Feliciano wasn't a "gun nut." Feliciano took the gun away from the robber; it wasn't Feliciano's gun, and he wasn't carrying a gun. If you want to call Feliciano a "nut," then perhaps a "likes to survive the day nut."
I understand and agree (somewhat) with Bainbridge's concern that at-will employment is endangered by this sort of decision that a matter of public policy trumps private employment contracts. I even agree with him that it is a stretch to argue this as a Constitutional issue, since a private employer is not engaged in state action.
I also agree that 7-11's policy of requiring employees to not resist robbery attempts is generally the safest choice of action. Most convenience store robberies are just anxious to get some money, and leave the store. But there are times that this is not the case--when the robber is one of the small number of armed predators who use robbery as the first step towards rape and murder. There are circumstances where it would be prudent for an employee to make the decision to fight back, because they can see where this robbery is going.
For example, if the robber directs you back to the cooler, it probably isn't because they want more beer to go with the contents of the cash register. I am reluctant to see anyone--especially someone who is having to work a miserable job like that--have to make a split second decision of: "Would I rather be raped and murdered? Or lose my job?" (My wife used to work at a 7-11 in Petaluma--and her boss, contrary to company policy, sometimes kept a pistol under the counter.)
I really don't like having private employment contracts subject to this sort of arbitrary abridgement. I also don't like seeing people who will never work in a job like that mischaracterize those who want to survive their shift as "gun nuts."
Violent Entertainment & Children
I've expressed my concern before about the hazards of exposing small children on a regular basis to violence. After all, if you expose children to toy advertising, they want to go buy the toy. If you show them caped crusaders jumping off buildings, some of them start to do so. (I have read that when the television series Batman ended up on the air in Britain in the 1960s, star Adam West recorded some public service announcements to get the little British kids to stop this dangerous behavior.) This is even a bit of a problem with impressionable adults: show them mass murders, and some will go off and do them.
This report is therefore no surprise: Watching violent television programs or video games may affect children’s minds even if they don’t have a history of aggressive behavior, a new study shows.
Researchers found nonaggressive children who had been exposed to high levels of media violence had similar patterns of activity in an area of the brain linked to self-control and attention as aggressive children who had been diagnosed with disruptive behavior disorder.
“This observation is the first demonstration of differences in brain function being associated with media violence exposure,” says researcher Vincent Mathews, MD, of the Indiana University School of Medicine, in a news release.
Although this study shows a link between violent media exposure and brain function differences, researchers say more study is needed before they know if the violent media exposure caused these differences.
Defining Torture
I've blogged in the past about the difference between torture and aggressive interrogation techniques, and expressed my concern about the use of torture. There might be really rare circumstances where torture might be justified ("the ticking nuclear weapon is in a major city--where is it, Mohammed?") but as a general rule, torture--defined as the intentional infliction of high levels of pain--is both morally repugnant and often ineffective as finding out the truth.
Still, the left is using the term "torture" rather too indiscriminately. Professor Volokh points out that "sexual torture" is the term now being used to describe putting prisoners in close contact with women guards (sometimes in just their underwear), and giving them reason to believe that they are being touched with menstrual blood.
From this Time magazine account sounds like the military is using very clever psychogical techniques that, while they won't make the ACLU happy, hardly qualify as torture: Al-Qahtani’s resilience under pressure in the fall of 2002 led top officials at Gitmo to petition Washington for more muscular “counter resistance strategies.” On Dec. 2, Rumsfeld approved 16 of 19 stronger coercive methods. Now the interrogators could use stress strategies like standing for prolonged periods, isolation for as long as 30 days, removal of clothing, forced shaving of facial hair, playing on “individual phobias” (such as dogs) and “mild, non-injurious physical contact such as grabbing, poking in the chest with the finger and light pushing.” According to the log, al-Qahtani experienced several of those over the next five weeks. The techniques Rumsfeld balked at included “use of a wet towel or dripping water to induce the misperception of suffocation.” “Our Armed Forces are trained,” a Pentagon memo on the changes read, “to a standard of interrogation that reflects a tradition of restraint.” Nevertheless, the log shows that interrogators poured bottles of water on al-Qahtani’s head when he refused to drink. Interrogators called this game “Drink Water or Wear It.”
Oh, the horror! Christina Aguilera music!
Dripping Water or Playing Christina Aguilera Music: After the new measures are approved, the mood in al-Qahtani’s interrogation booth changes dramatically. The interrogation sessions lengthen. The quizzing now starts at midnight, and when Detainee 063 dozes off, interrogators rouse him by dripping water on his head or playing Christina Aguilera music.
Good News From Iraq, Part 29
Arthur Chrenkoff's continuing collection of good news from Iraq now has part 29. Make sure you send it to anyone you know who is convinced that Iraq is a quagmire.
There are serious problems in Iraq still, and I expect that there will continue to be for years, but the leftist media are largely ignoring positive news from Iraq.
Bizarre Story About How The Clintons Daughter Was Conceived
Drudge Report is describing how a new book, just about to come out, will tell a bizarre story: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton turned furious and considered legal action after learning bestselling author Ed Klein would allege in a new book: Bill Clinton raped her -- resulting in the conception of daughter Chelsea Clinton!
Now, according to Drudge, this Ed Klein is a respected establishment journalist:
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"I'm going back to my cottage to rape my wife," Klein quotes Bill Clinton as saying during a Bermuda getaway in 1979.
In the morning, the Clintons' room "looked like World War III. There are pillows and busted-up furniture all over the place," an unnamed source tells Klein.
Klein source claims Bill later learned Hillary was pregnant reading about it in the ARKANSAS GAZETTE.
"The fact that his wife didn't tell him that she was pregnant before she told a reporter doesn't seem to phase him one bit, because he says, 'Do you know what night that happened?"
"'No,' I say. 'When?"
"'It was Bermuda,' he says, 'And you were there!'"Klein is the former foreign editor of NEWSWEEK and former editor in chief of the NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE. He is a frequent contributor to VANITY FAIR and PARADE.
There are a number of Clinton-hostile bloggers saying that buying into this bizarre story would be a serious mistake, because it is probably not true. As much as I despise Bill Clinton, I need a lot more than a mainstream media journalist to take such a claim seriously.
Molestation & Sexual Orientation
A while back, Anne Heche acknowledged that she was molested as a child--and after a rather widely publicized breakup with her lover Ellen DeGeneres, now has gone on to get married to a man. Ellen DeGeneres has now also acknowledged being molested: Ellen DeGeneres reveals in the latest issue of Allure magazine that her stepfather molested her as a teenager.
Oh, of course it didn't have any affect on her sexual orientation! I've pointed out in the past the very high rates of child molestation reported by homosexual men and women in one San Francisco study, as well as the strong correlations between homosexuality and self-destructive behaviors associated with child molestation, such as IV drug abuse. Why is it so hard to accept that forced or too-early sexualization might influence adult sexual preferences?
While speaking about her messy breakup with actress Anne Heche, the talk-show host said her stepfather insisted on feeling her breast while DeGeneres' mother was fighting breast cancer. She said the incident later escalated into "other things" and her stepfather, now deceased, tried to break into her bedroom.
"I had to kick a window out and escape and sleep in a hospital all night long," DeGeneres told Allure.
DeGeneres said she's speaking about the incident because "it's important for teenage girls out there to hear that there are different ways to say no. And if it ever happens to them, they should tell someone right away."
She said the occurrences, which happened in her late teens, had no effect on her sexual orientation.
Does anyone else besides me listen to Rosie O'Donnell and not hear a very injured soul? This latest stunt really captures how damaged she is: Comedienne Rosie O'Donnell banned her partner Kelli Carpenter from breastfeeding their daughter Vivienne just a few weeks after she was born--because she was jealous of their bonding sessions.
There is one area that I would hope everyone can agree upon: stop the premature sexualization of children. Yet some elements of the homosexual community and the ACLU consider this so important that they insist on arguing that there is a constitutional right to sex between children and adults.
Kelli gave birth to Vivienne in 2002, and the lesbian couple have been raising her along with their three other adopted children.
But O'Donnell admits she felt left out of the motherhood process whenever she observed her partner nursing their child.
Big Bertha Needs A Better Atmosphere
I spent a bit of time with it last night, and this evening. (For once, we have clear skies.) I still think that the mirror is less than perfect (even with the turned-down edge masked off), but I think the limiting factor is now atmospheric turbulence more than anything else. I say that because for very brief periods of time, I can see a lot of detail in Jupiter's cloud bands at 222x.
Even at 400x on the Moon, the image is adequately sharp. (Not crisp like my 5" refractor or my 8" reflector, but not bad.) At least some of the problem is atmospheric turbulence, although if I go up to 500x, the Moon gets fuzzy in a repeatable way that suggests the problem is the mirror, not the atmosphere.
An interesting aspect of the problems with Jupiter above 222x is that Jupiter is a relatively low contrast target compared to the Moon, and Jupiter's bright features are so bright that they tend to wash out the darker cloud bands. I tried using a Moon filter (which takes away 87% of the light), and that seems to help. Various color filters seem to help--it might be worth finding 50% and 30% neutral filters, and see if the trick here to turn down the brightness.
One way of reducing brightness is more magnification (it spreads the available light out over a larger area), but then the intrinsic limitations of the mirror and atmospheric start to overwhelm whatever gain I get from reducing area brightness.
I need to do the following tasks:
1. Get Big Bertha to a low turbulence sky (where my new house is going).
2. Find a couple of neutral eyepiece filters less drastic than the Moon filter.
3. Accept the fact that because of the Dobsonian mount, I wouldn't be using above 400x on this beast very often, anyway.
4. Do a side-by-side test of Big Bertha and my 8" f/7 reflector. Optical theory says that a 17.5" reflector should show more than twice the detail at 200x of an 8" reflector, assuming that the two optical systems are of comparable quality. (Resolution is directly related to diameter of the primary.) My own impression is that this is the case--that Big Bertha is showing me more detail. But I do need to do a side-by-side to make sure of this.
Insane Housing Speculation
I mentioned yesterday the somewhat insane housing bubbles in some parts of the country. A reader from the San Francisco Bay Area sent me this link, and his description of the neighborhood: This is not a nice neighborhood, though with prices like that, it's gentrifying. The neighborhood is largely Hispanic renters with some Asian and white homeowners, some Hispanic owners, and some blacks who mostly rent. The streets aren't well-kept, and the neighborhood looks "dirty". There's a significant amount of crime, but it is reasonably safe to walk around at night, if you are a little street-smart. This isn't deepest darkest East Oakland. The drug deals happen indoors here.
The house is 1020 square feet; two bedroom, one bath; built in 1922, and not exactly what you would call beautiful or classic. The asking price is $449,950.
I spoke to a friend in Santa Rosa last night, who lives in a neighborhood that he calls the barrio. It was a poor neighborhood four years ago when I would go to visit, and it has declined substantially since then. He lives in a three bedroom, two bath house that may be 1200 square feet. He believes that it would probably sell for $300,000 now. (This makes it one of the cheaper houses in Sonoma County.)
There are some serious speculative excesses going on in some markets--and clearly, Americans are pretty wealthy, if houses that are not particularly attractive, in poor neighborhoods, are being bid up to such absurd excesses.
UPDATE: A reader points out that one of the items driving the housing bubbles (not all of America is having this problem, right now) is the rise of interest-only mortgages. I had seen this article (or at least a version of it) in my local rag a few days ago: Once a frustrated renter, Chris Economou is now a happy homeowner, enjoying a splendid view of San Francisco and an $80,000 increase in his property's value since he bought the 1-bedroom condominium for $435,000 a year ago.
Yup. I remember reading that in the 1920s, houses were commonly financed at 3% simple interest--interest only. Lenders and buyers were assuming that housing would continue to appreciate, and so they paid only interest on the loan, with the assumption that at the end of the mortgage, they would simply refinance the full principal. The Great Depression hit; prices for almost everything, including houses, fell--and a lot of lenders found themselves with $20,000 homes that were worth $5,000.
He credits his good fortune to an interest-only mortgage, an increasingly popular -- and risky -- loan that enables borrowers to lower their monthly payments enough for several years to afford rapidly escalating home prices in expensive markets like the San Francisco Bay area. Economou estimates he saves $1,000 a month by having his interest-only mortgage instead of a traditional 30-year fixed rate loan.
"I'd still be looking at renting for a long time," if not for that mortgage, said Economou, 33. "Home prices are so high that it's about the only way young people like me can get into the market."
Built on the assumption that home prices will continue to rise, interest-only mortgages represent a gamble that many home owners accustomed to conventional fixed-rate loans would never take. Unlike conventional 30-year mortgages, interest-only loans typically don't require payments toward the principal for three to seven years, substantially lowering the costs of entry and making it easier to qualify for the loan.
But the financial firepower of interest-only mortgages is affecting all home owners. They are further elevating already lofty housing prices, a trend that's raising fears of crash that could plunge the economy into a recession.
"When this market adjusts, it's going to be painful," said UCLA economics professor Edward Leamer, who has been warning of a California housing bubble for three years.
"Borrowers are getting in over their heads, and lenders are too," he said.
I can appreciate the difficult situation of someone who wants to buy a home in a place that is insanely expensive, and that makes an interest-only loan seem sensible--but this is very dangerous. A lot of lenders are making 110% of value mortgages--which is fine, if you are sure that housing will continue to appreciate. It would only take a couple years of 30 year Treasury bonds with 6% yields to put a lot of buyers in deep trouble with rising mortgage payments, and a lot of lenders in deep trouble with $500,000 loans collateralized by $250,000 homes.
House Project: Ramps, Not Steps
I just finished talking to my builder. He says that using ramps instead of steps at the entrances isn't any real difference in cost--so I think we are going to do that. We aren't building the house with the goal of wheelchair accessible, but we are trying to minimize the costs if a subsequent buyer needs that, as well as making it easier to roll furniture in and out on refrigerator dollies.
My builder tells me that as wheelchairs have become more streamlined, there is less and less work required to make a home wheelchair accessible. If we do the ramps for the front door, and the sliding glass doors off the master bedroom and the family room, that's the biggest chunk of the expense.
Belt Tightening
Good news. I had to put another notch inward on my belt last night to keep it from getting too loose.
