Author: wrongologist

Funding Infrastructure: America’s Great Challenge

The Daily Escape:

Skye Peak, Killington VT – December 2017 photo by wsquared1

Wrongo is Vice-Chair of his town’s roads committee. Just like America, our small town has an infrastructure problem; we have let our roads deteriorate through years of underfunding. It’s a small town, and most of our roads are paved, but today, like most of America, our roads grade out at “D”. That compares to the American Society of Civil Engineers’ grade of “D+” for all of America’s infrastructure. Using foam composites on these roads would be a great way to improve the infrastructure.

The federal expenditure to make things right is on the order of $4 Trillion, or 100% of the 2018 federal budget of $4.095 Trillion. About $2 Trillion of that is currently unfunded. Our town is in a smaller boat. We just received a consultant’s report saying that to bring our roads up to an “A” grade would take a one-time expense equal to roughly 45% of the town’s annual budget.

Today we started preparation for the January town council meeting that will address funding of our roads. The fundamental challenge is that we will have to double our spending on roads just to maintain our current “D” rating.

This deferred maintenance is the result of years of underfunding, years of making decisions that directed money to the most obvious projects and programs. Politicians get elected on fiscal responsibility, and then take the shortest-term possible view of what to fund in the budget process.

Accountability is elusive, even when the same pols are on the scene year after year.

The town council’s first question will be: What will this investment get us? Will more people choose to buy/build a home in our town? Will businesses think we are a better location for their next store, shop or factory? And will those decisions add to our tax revenues? Will our roads be safer?

Assuming the answer to question one is positive and persuasive, the council’s second question will be: What parts of our existing budget do we cut in order to fund this need?

This is the crux of America’s problem today.

Government at all levels refuses to raise taxes or other forms of revenue. On the town level, we have little desire to cut expenses for our schools, or our town management. In fact, the pressure is always to increase those budgets.

Turning the desirable into the possible is politically challenging, even though at the Federal level, deficit spending is the rule, not the exception. At the local level, it is always the exception. Our town has a credit rating of AA+, so we have the ability to use bond financing in this historically low rate environment, just like the federal government can and does.

The challenge is how to get the town’s people on the same page, how to convince them that it is smart to finance a long-term asset (like a reconstructed road) with a long-term liability (like a bond).

We call assets like our roads part of the commons: Assets that are not owned by an individual, but by the group, such as the town. The roads are a community resource belonging to all of us, which must be actively maintained and managed for the good of all.

A prime principle is that infrastructure investment be directed to the projects where the return for the economy is the greatest. We should rebuild roads and bridges where we will see a boost to the economy, or as required to maintain citizen safety.

Nobody wins if the commons are allowed to erode. Nobody wins if the commons are appropriated by private ownership.

Funding the commons is one of the greatest challenges facing America. Beware the “public-private partnerships” that the GOP currently has on offer for us.

They lead to absentee ownership, and to skimming part of our tax revenues for a corporation far from home.

Absentee ownership leads to poorer maintenance, and fewer repairs.

And to a lower quality of life for the rest of us.

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Monday Wake Up Call – January 8, 2018

The Daily Escape:

Frozen Waterfall in Adirondacks – 2018 photo by I_am_Bob

A December 29th WSJ article charted the growing gulf in health and well-being between urban and rural America:

About 1 in 7 Americans live in rural parts of the country—1,800 counties that sit outside any metropolitan area. A generation ago, most of these places had working economies, a strong social fabric and a way of life that drew a steady stream of urban migrants. Today, many are in crisis. Populations are aging, more working-age adults collect disability, and trends in teen pregnancy and divorce are diverging for the worse from metro areas. Deaths by suicide and in maternity are on the rise. Bank lending and business startups are falling behind

These rural counties now rank the worst among the four major US population groupings (the others are big cities, suburbs and medium or small metro areas). In November 2016, these rural districts voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump, based in part on his pledge to revive these forgotten towns by scaling back trade agreements, ending illegal immigration and encouraging manufacturing companies to hire more American workers. He also promised a $1 trillion infrastructure bill that would help create jobs, but, like the other promises, it may never become a reality.

Back in the late 1970s – 1980s, the nation’s basket cases were its urban areas. A toxic stew of crime, drugs and suburban flight made large cities the slowest-growing and most troubled places. But violent crime in the cities (despite claims by a well-known, Very Stable Genius) have declined to the point that there no longer is any “safety premium” from living in rural America.

Today, by most key measures of socioeconomic well-being, the largest cities are as safe, and are much wealthier than our rural and small metro areas.

For decades, America’s small towns barely grew. Rural families had just enough children to offset losses from those who left, and those who died. The decline in median household income is reflective of that trend. The graph below is based on census data. It shows that household incomes (adjusted for inflation) peaked around the end of the Clinton administration and continue to decline, and not just in rural areas:

 

 

These rural parts of America are caught in the vise of limited economic opportunity coupled with terrible health outcomes.

About half of these counties would be called “failed states” if they were countries, meaning that the infrastructure of skilled labor, healthcare, privately owned commerce and aggregate demand for goods and services are not enough to make them economically viable.

Education gaps also have long-term consequences. More jobs, particularly full-time jobs with benefits, require a bachelor’s or advanced degree. Without a larger share of college graduates, small towns have little hope of closing the income gap.

Solution? We need to create a way to finance those who might be willing to move to economically viable regions. Many people today can make a living just by being connected by phone and internet.

If they were to choose to reside in a rural town, they would become an economic generator, helping these communities that truly need the help. If the nascent infrastructure proposals by the GOP include building up our nation’s broadband system, it could help to support a dispersed work group more easily.

Every demographic region except rural America has improved on most quality of life measurements. In those aspects where things have gotten worse, such as diabetes and suicide rates, rural America has the highest rates.

Time for America to wake up: We need a Marshall Plan right here at home to renovate our small towns and rural areas. To help you wake up, listen and watch the Philadelphia sextet The War on Drugs perform “Holding On” from their 2017 album “A Deeper Understanding”. Watch the atmospheric video:

Takeaway Lyric:

I went down a crooked highway
I went all outside the line
I’ve been rejected, now the light has turned and I’m out of time

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – January 7, 2018

Via the NYT comes proof that satire is dead:

Trump, in an extraordinary defense of his mental capacity and fitness for office, described himself on Saturday as a ‘genius’ and ‘a very stable genius at that.’

Very Stable Genius has the Biggest Button. Very Stable Genius could probably solve the opioid crisis on his first try, if only he would try. This is Trump’s version of Nixon’s “I am not a crook.” The fact that he has to say he’s smart says he has a really big problem. And if America doesn’t believe him, it could be enough to cripple him.

If he could read, shit would really hit the fan:

The vaudeville act ends:

Trump is the best negotiator:

The two Koreas are taking about NorKo participating in the Winter Olympics. What could go wrong?

Iran takes up Trump’s mantra:

Mitt looks for his principles. They seem to be missing:

Trump gives Congress a message about the 2018 legislative agenda:

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Saturday Soother – January 6, 2018

The Daily Escape:

Athabasca Glacier, Alberta, Canada. It’s the most visited glacier in North America – 2013 photo by Yan Gao

The publication of Michael Wolff’s book “Fire and Fury” about Trump, seems to have validated what we on the outside already knew, that the election of Der Donald was a terrible mistake.

Wolff struck a chord that resonates by saying that everyone he talked to in the West Wing of the White House during his year researching the book agrees that Trump is “like a child”, and that every one of them agrees that Trump simply cannot function in the job.

Joe Scarborough asked in the WaPo if we can survive Trump: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)

We are a nation that spent the past 100 years inventing the modern age, winning World War I, defeating Hitler and winning World War II, and liberating half of Europe by beating the Soviets in the Cold War. But today we find ourselves dangerously adrift at home and disconnected from the allies abroad that made so many of those triumphs possible. The world wonders how the United States will survive Donald Trump. And I ask, what will finally move Republicans to deliver a non-negotiable ultimatum to this unstable president? Will they dare place their country’s interests above their own political fears? Or will they move to end this American tragedy only when there is nothing left to lose?

A consensus seems to be emerging that we have a president who is not capable of performing his duties. And so the question before the GOP powers that be is: Should they try to remove him? It looks like denial of the obvious is no longer enough. The GOP’s dilemma is: which is worse, continuing to cover for Trump? Or cover in the 2018 mid-terms for a Congress that didn’t acknowledge the danger he poses?

This is where we are at the start of 2018: In the midst of an accelerating decline of America’s capabilities at home, and a weakening of our global reach. The gap between what the US used to be able to do, and what it can still do today is widening, and we really don’t know just how wide that gap is. We don’t know what has fallen into the gap, or what remains on firm ground.

With Trump in the Oval, each passing day looks more like a crap shoot, both domestically and globally. Egypt, a US ally, has quietly leased several air bases to the Russians. This is the first time since 1973 that Russia has had a military presence in Egypt. In the past, the US would have moved heaven and earth to stop this from happening; now Trump does nothing.

The pressure will be to wait and see if Robert Mueller comes up with something.

That is understandable, but Trump’s possible criminality isn’t the primary risk to the country. Events in the world may overtake Mueller’s investigation. Korea could erupt in a nuclear confrontation, the Iranian government is being challenged in the streets, and if weakened, Saudi Arabia and Israel may see a chance to attack Iran, something that would otherwise be far too risky.

We’re entering a period of great consequence. It is probable that some of the most crucial events in the year ahead (Korea, Middle East) will be decided by one man’s gut feeling that is set in motion by tweeting at three in the morning, in response to fragmentary data about a situation too complex for him to understand, or to solve.

And we’ll live with those consequences for decades to come.

Now it’s up to the GOP, who are in a position to solve this problem. They didn’t ask for Trump, but they got him. And then, they caved until he owned them. Every Republican has jumped on the bandwagon.

Otherwise, we must force Republicans from control of the House in the 2018 mid-term election.

Nothing soothing in any of those words. But, it’s Saturday, and time to kick back. If you are in the Northeast, the prime directive is to stay warm. Grab a cup of Death Wish coffee, the world’s strongest. Death Wish has a saying:

Be the best you can be with the clarity and focus that comes with strong coffee.

It’s probably not strong enough to turn Trump into a thinker, but your mileage may vary.

Now, listen to “Deborah’s Theme” from Once Upon a Time in America, a 1984 epic crime film co-written and directed by Italian filmmaker Sergio Leone and starring Robert De Niro. The music is by Ennio Morricone, who was Sergio Leone’s long-time musical collaborator:

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Elephant and Rhino Poaching Needs a Solution

The Daily Escape:

Elephants on the march, Kenya – photo by Carl De Souza

There is a poaching boom all across Africa. Economic development in Vietnam and China has fueled a $70 billion industry of killing elephants and rhinoceroses for their tusks. Poachers illegally hunt elephants and rhinos under the cover of darkness using surveillance equipment and high-tech weaponry. The local park rangers are spread thin across the vast territory the animals call home, and have very little that they can do at night, when much of the poaching occurs.

The boom in poaching has contributed to a 9000% increase in rhino killings since 2007 in South Africa alone. Across Africa, two rhino are slaughtered every day and an elephant is killed every 14 minutes:

Source: Air Shepherd

According to Air Shepherd, a wildlife conservation group using a new drone system that deploys Artificial Intelligence to target poachers, there were 1.3 million elephants in Africa in 1979. By 2007, there were less than half that number. This is the route most often used by poachers:

Air Shepherd has conducted 6,000 flight hours over the skies of Africa testing its new AI drone system. Their drones use high-tech airborne sensors, such as thermal infrared imaging to detect heat coming from humans or animals. The drone’s mobile command center fits into the back of a van, and uses AI systems developed by researchers from Carnegie Mellon, USC, and Microsoft to detect potential poachers.

Across Africa, park rangers in each country patrol vast amounts of land searching for poachers, but only perform limited night operations. The Air Shepherd’s AI drone can supplement the on-the-ground efforts, and greatly expand the area of coverage. It will help protect wildlife by spotting poachers and alerting officials, hopefully before the killing of an elephant or rhinoceros occurs.

The big question is how will the illegal poachers, who are on the front lines of a $70 billion industry respond to the threat of drones? Certainly they will try to develop countermeasures. Let’s start with the idea that drones fly slowly enough to be shot down by rifles.

The drones may be helpful, but they are merely a Band-Aid for the problem. Economics tells us that the fewer elephants there are, the more the ivory of still-living elephants will be worth in the Asian marketplace. The costs of poaching must rise to the point that many of today’s Chinese and Vietnamese buyers can no longer afford to buy the product. Still, human greed and avarice have already driven many species to extinction, so the solution may remain elusive.

The African countries involved could offer a bounty on poachers. But that solution ignores the human rights of poachers. Some might say that poachers give up their human rights by killing an animal for its horn. Maybe the solution is to re-brand poachers as “terrorists”.

If the animals are worth more alive than dead, then locals will work together to protect them. In some cases, rhinos live on protected reserves and can be “farmed” once their population is stabilized. Here is a photo taken in 2006 by Wrongo on one such reserve in South Africa:

Last June, Wrongo wrote about a different effort by US military veterans to help South African Rhinos.

Elephants are much more difficult to farm, since they migrate very long distances, and can easily break through fencing. What may help is that China has just established a ban on ivory sales. China announced in late 2016 that it would cease taking part in ivory processing and sales by March 31, 2017, and would cease all ivory processing and sales by December 31, 2017. The ban does not apply to Hong Kong, which will consider a sales ban early in 2018. Some sources say that the China trade has declined, but Malaysia has started to take China’s place in the illegal trade.

The US banned ivory imports in June 2016.

Many ideas are directed at solving the problem, but we’ve seen little progress so far.

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Wrongo’s 2018 Predictions

The Daily Escape:

Snowy Landscape with Arles in the background – Vincent Van Gogh, 1888

A tradition at the Mansion of Wrong is to attend the annual New Year’s Day Concert at the First Congregational Church of Washington CT, built in 1801. The concert is always by the New Baroque Soloists. This year, the church was packed, and among the guests were Tia Leoni and Tim Daly, the leads in the CBS series “Madam Secretary”.  For the sixth year in a row, it was another inspiring performance by the New Baroque Soloists.

Now it is time for a few Wrong predictions about 2018, most of which will probably will be wrong:

  1. The US economy as measured by GDP will grow at greater than 2% for 2018.
    1. The US stock market as measured by the S&P 500 index will end 2018 with little or no growth over year-end 2017.
    2. The Trump tax cuts will increase the deficit, and despite Paul Ryan’s best (or worst) efforts to push the country into austerity, that can will be kicked down the road for a few more years.
  2. The Democrats will not take control of either the House or the Senate in the 2018 mid-term elections. The still-growing economy, and the pittance that increases paychecks from the Trump tax cut will help incumbents enough to forestall a wave election.
    1. The Democrats will remain without real leadership or vision in 2018.
  3. Cyber and other forms of meddling by people who wish our democracy harm will continue in the 2018 elections, to broader effect than in 2016.
    1. Facebook and Google will be held to account for their failure to tamp down disinformation.
  4. Trump will continue to flounder as the leader of the Free World, while his “frenemies” in the GOP will continue to try to thwart him on domestic economic legislation.
    1. There will be some form of bi-partisan accommodation on DACA.
    2. Trump’s public-private infrastructure deal will not pass the Senate.
    3. The House will pass legislation that messes with Medicaid, but the Senate will not.
    4. Trump will have the opportunity to appoint another Supreme Court Justice.
  5. Trump will have a serious medical issue in 2018, but will not leave office, or be temporarily replaced by Pence.
  6. Mueller: By March, MAGA will mean “Mueller Ain’t Going Away”. The storm will crest, a Russiagate conspiracy will be exposed, and crud will fly everywhere. This could lead to the Democrats taking control of one or both Houses.
    1. A few additional Trumpets will go to jail, or be tied up in court. Trump will not be impeached by the 2018 Republicans. 2019 might bring a different calculus.
  7. Tillerson and possibly other cabinet members will resign to “spend more time with family”.
  8. #metoo will continue to dog politicians, Hollywood and the media.
  9. Middle East:
    1. Syria – by this time next year, the war will be essentially over. Assad will still be in power, and the US will be out of the picture. The Syrian Kurds will switch sides, and collaborate with the Assad regime.
    2. Iran – the current protest movement will fizzle out. Neo-cons in Trump’s administration will try to bring us close to war with Iran, but cooler heads at the Pentagon will prevail.
    3. Famine and death in Yemen will continue to be ignored by everyone in the US.
  10. Russia: Russia, China, and Iran will have a “come together” moment, possibly resulting in an agreement for mutual economic cooperation.
    1. Russia will continue to face ongoing battles with the US, but Putin will persist.
    2. Ukraine: The US delivery of anti-tank missiles to the Ukrainian army will not cause them to begin military operations in the east.
  11. Europe: The right-wing authoritarian movements in the Eurozone and England will become a larger factor in their domestic politics. Brexit will occur, and no one in the UK will be happy about the outcome.
  12. Will there be a war or “incident” with North Korea? Despite the scary politics, the Seoul Winter Olympics will keep the situation from escalating through June. The second half of 2018 could lead to some kind of incident between the US and NorKo, but will not be a nuclear incident.

A “black swan” event (an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect), could change everything for the President, the country and the world. Let’s hope that none occur in 2018.

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – December 31, 2017

We made it through 2017! Some doubted that we could, but the sun rose in the east every day, and here we are. Tonight we hoist a drink, and say “good riddance” to 2017. The question for tomorrow is: Where are we? What follows is a brief review of 2017 in cartoons.

Of course, one option is no review at all:

2017 was business as usual in DC:

Voodoo economics made a comeback in 2017:

A Year-end view of his Twitterness from the Netherlands:

#MeToo caught a few big abusers, but some escaped:

The Donald has just one New Year’s resolution:

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How Wrong Were Wrongo’s 2017 Predictions?

Wrongo is not a futurist, or a stock-picker with mad skills. On January 2 2017 he made a series of predictions about the year to come. Let’s see how wrong he was:

  1. There will be more global political and social turmoil:
    1.  The EU could collapse: That didn’t happen, as Macron soundly defeated LePen. OTOH, Merkel barely survived her election and May lost badly in a wrongly-played attempt to gain a super majority in the UK. Wrongo gets a “D” in this prediction.
    2. China’s economy is wobbling: and it still is, but a command economy can create its own reality. Wrongo gets a “C”.
  2. The US will continue to lose influence globally despite “Mr. Unpredictable” becoming our Orange Overlord: Wrongo gets an “A”. From Western Europe to the Middle East and Asia, there is not a single example of where Trump has put America in a position of greater influence in the past year. Except for Israel: they plan to name a train station after him.  Think about it, what great man only gets a train station?
  3. Trump arrives in the Oval Office as an overconfident leader, the man with no plan but with a short attention span, and within six months he will have his first major policy failure: Was his first policy failure the immigration ban? The North Korea diplomatic fiasco? The multiple attempts to repeal Obamacare? Walking out of the Trade Agreement, giving China a free hand in Asia? Give Wrongo an “A”, except that Wrongo added:

This will make him more subdued, more conservative and less populist thereafter.

Trump was less subdued, less populist, and clearly more conservative as he played to his base. Give Wrongo a “B”.

4. The triumvirate of Russia/Turkey/Iran will elbow the US firmly out of the Fertile Crescent, and secure friendly regimes in Damascus and Baghdad. An easy “A”. Wrongo went on to say:

This will push American influence in the Middle East back to just the Gulf States, a weakened Saudi Arabia, and an increasingly isolated Israel.

A home run for Wrongo, but not for America.

  1. Domestically, drug abuse, suicide, and general self-destructive behavior will continue to climb and become impossible to ignore: Sadly, another “A”. Trump’s declaration of the opioid crisis as a “Health Emergency” was a public relations exercise with no plan about how to truly deal with the crisis. Wrongo also said:

The growing antibiotic resistance to main stream drugs will impact health in the US.

This is very true here, as well as globally. There is no political push to force drug companies to deal concretely with this issue.

6. The Trump stock market rally has already turned into the Santa Selloff:  Give Wrongo an “F” on this prediction. While the Dow closed 2016 at 19,719, we are looking to close 2017 above 24,000, up nearly 18% in the past year.

Meta Prediction: Some people who voted for Trump have incompatible outcomes in mind, so it’s a virtual guarantee that a sizable minority are going to feel cheated when they fail to get what they were promised: This was hard to get wrong, so give Wrongo a gentleman’s “C”. Wrongo went on to say:

OTOH, when Trump fails, most of his base will blame anyone but the Donald. The question is, when disillusionment sets in, will the reaction be a turning away, or a doubling down on the anger? Wrongo thinks anger will win out.

An easy “A”.

Here is the part of the prediction that was 100% spot on:

The coming Trump administration will seem like a fractious family outing: Just under half of the family (the “landslide” segment) wanted to take a ride, but now, the whole family has to go. Those who wanted to stay home will sulk in the back seat while Daddy tells them to shut up and stop bitching.

Meanwhile, once we are out of the driveway, it dawns on everyone that Daddy hasn’t decided yet where to go. Everyone pipes up with suggestions, but Daddy again tells everyone to shut up, because it’s his decision alone…Daddy won’t reveal the destination, but insists everyone will love it once they get there, even those who wanted to stay home, those who wanted to go to the beach, and those who wanted to head over the cliff like Thelma and Louise.

2018 predictions will come in the New Year.

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There is no War on Christmas

The Daily Escape:

River Bann, Northern Ireland

Wrongo isn’t sure how many of you are Spotify users, and it isn’t clear whether Spotify is a true barometer of America’s opinions. But, if you look at Spotify’s “Charts” page for Christmas Day, 2017, this is what you see: Nine of the top ten songs streamed were Christmas songs, with the exception being #10, Post Malone’s “rockstar”.

And the next ten were all Christmas songs. And from #21-30, nine were Christmas songs. From #31-40, six were Christmas songs.

Mariah Carey dominated with her “All I Want For Christmas Is You” at number one, with daily plays of 2,075,827 and cumulative plays of 311,319,704. Brenda Lee was #2. Even Burl Ives makes the top ten at #7 with “A Holly Jolly Christmas”, among Wrongo’s least favorite Christmas tunes.

But Trump says that we have a War on Christmas; that it has been stolen by godless, PC elites. The fear that Christmas is “under attack” has been a recurring phenomenon in the US for the better part of the last century.

But we should see that the real war is elsewhere. Trump should take a minute and understand that legally, Christmas isn’t a Christian holiday in America. Congress passed a bill in 1870 making Christmas a national holiday. The NYT wrote about this in 2013: (emphasis by Wrongo)

If you read the language of the bill, it’s clear that Congress chose dates commonly celebrated as holidays by the American people, not for religious reasons but because of a history of recognition and celebration on those dates…they did not deny religious association with two of the dates, Dec. 25 and Thanksgiving. But the religious association with these days was not the reason behind proposing them as holidays.

Congress got it right in 1870. We get a holiday on Dec 25, and it’s “commonly called Christmas“. You could call it anything you want, or nothing. That’s simply the name commonly used. The government doesn’t presume or direct the manner in which you will spend the day, you can choose to worship the baby Jesus, or you can go bowling, or head out to the gun range to practice your precious Second Amendment rights. The government doesn’t care.

Why, almost 150 years later, Trump and his henchmen in the media are bringing up yet again what individual Americans call the day or the season, or what they do not call it, or whether they celebrate, or do not celebrate it, is not worth anyone’s time.

We live in a time of cultural transition, but one thing is sure: December seems to be about Christmas music.

Despite the fake War on Christmas.

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December 26, 2017

The Daily Escape:

Momma and baby Tiger examining their Christmas present – the Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg, Germany – photo by Fabian Bimmer

A final Christmas song for this year. Here is Freddie Mercury and Queen performing “Thank God It’s Christmas”. The song is an original, written by Brian May and Roger Taylor. It was released as a single in the UK in November, 1984, but not released on any Queen studio album, appearing only on Queen’s Greatest Hits III. It was on the first “Now That’s What I Call Christmas” compilation album, released in 1985. Wrongo likes it for its lyrics:

Sample Lyric:

Oh my love we’ve had our share of tears

Oh my friend we’ve had our hopes and fears

Oh my friends it’s been a long hard year

But now it’s Christmas

Yes it’s Christmas

Thank God it’s Christmas

 

Sure sounds like 2017!

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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