Let the Car Makers Fail...

The chart at right captures very nicely one of the major reasons that U.S. car makers are failing: the legacy labor agreements they're saddled with. The average employee at the Big 3 makes $73/hour (that's $146,000 per year!) – versus less than half that for Toyota's vastly more productive employees.

The right thing to do is to allow the U.S. auto makers to fail. They'll go into Chapter 11 bankruptcy and either shed all the baggage (like these labor agreements) that keep them from being successful, or their assets will be sold off to successful companies. Consumers will win in the long run.

Another reason U.S. car makers are failing is so obvious you'd think someone in government would figure it out: they are not building the cars that U.S. buyers want. Sales of cars built by U.S. makers have fallen dramatically more than sales of cars made by Toyota have fallen. Now legislators, surely you can imagine what the actual reason for that might be? Hint: consumers are willing to pay more for a Toyota Camry (made in the U.S., by the way) than they are for a similar car from a U.S. auto maker. Now why would that be? Could it be...that the Toyota is a better car?

Spreading the Health...

Via Jim M.

At least someone has kept their sense of humor!

Sarah and the Pope...

From my mom:

Sarah Palin is invited to meet with the Pope while he is vacationing south
of Rome in Venice.

The liberal press reluctantly watches the semi-private audience, hoping they
will be able to allot minimal coverage, if any.

The Pope asks Governor Palin to join him on a Gondola ride through the
canals of Venice.

They're admiring the sights and agreeing on moral issues when, all of a
sudden, the Pope's hat (zucchetto) blows off his head and out into the water.

The gondolier starts to reach for the Pontiff's cap with his pole, but this
move threatens to overturn the floating craft.

Sarah waves the tour guide off, saying, "Wait, wait. I'll take care of this.
Don't worry."

She steps off the gondola onto the surface of the water and walks out to the
Pope's hat, bends over and picks it up. She walks back across the water to
the gondola and steps aboard.

She hands the hat to the Pope amid stunned silence.

The next morning the topic of conversation among Democrats in Congress, CBS News, NBC News, ABC News, CNN, the New York Times, Hollywood celebrities, and in France and Germany is:

"Palin Can't Swim."

Heh! But the sad part is that this story seems entirely plausible...

Photo of the Day...

An erupting volcano in Alaska.

Visualizing the Election...

The image at right is a map, drawn in such a way as to represent the results of the last election.

There's an interesting article about this, along with several other variations of such maps – all representing different ways to visualize the election results.

Mark Steyn, who's sounding quite pessimistic about the election results, writes today about this country's lurch to the left. Here's his conclusion:

I disagree with my fellow conservatives who think the Obama-Pelosi-Reid-Frank liberal behemoth will so obviously screw up that they'll be routed in two or four years' time. The president-elect's so-called "tax cut" will absolve 48 percent of Americans from paying any federal income tax at all, while those who are left will pay more. Just under half the population will be, as Daniel Henninger pointed out in The Wall Street Journal, on the dole.

By 2012, it will be more than half on the dole, and this will be an electorate where the majority of the electorate will be able to vote itself more lollipops from the minority of their compatriots still dumb enough to prioritize self-reliance, dynamism and innovation over the sedating cocoon of the Nanny State. That is the death of the American idea – which, after all, began as an economic argument: "No taxation without representation" is a great rallying cry. "No representation without taxation" has less mass appeal. For how do you tell an electorate living high off the entitlement hog that it's unsustainable, and you've got to give some of it back?

At that point, America might as well apply for honorary membership in the European Union. It will be a nation at odds with the spirit of its founding, and embarking on decline from which there are few escape routes. In 2012, the least we deserve is a choice between the collectivist assumptions of the Democrats, and a candidate who stands for individual liberty – for economic dynamism not the sclerotic "managed capitalism" of Germany; for the First Amendment, not Canadian-style government regulation of approved opinion; for self-reliance and the Second Amendment, not the security state in which Britons are second only to North Koreans in the number of times they're photographed by government cameras in the course of going about their daily business.

In Forbes last week, Claudia Rosett issued a stirring defense of individual liberty. That it should require a stirring defense at all is a melancholy reflection on this election season. Live free – or die from a thousand beguiling caresses of Nanny State sirens.

Don't miss the whole thing “ it's Mr. Steyn at his best...

But somehow the phrase “Nanny State sirens” and the reality of Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, etc. seem a bit, er, at odds...

What Am I?

From my mom:

One morning a blind bunny was hopping down the bunny trail and tripped over a large snake and fell, kerplop right on his twitchy little nose.

“Oh please excuse me,” said the bunny. “I didn't mean to trip over you, but I'm blind and can't see.”

“That's perfectly all right,” replied the snake. “To be sure, it was my fault. I didn't mean to trip you, but I'm blind too, and I didn't see you coming. By the way, what kind of animal are you?”

“Well, I really don't know,” said the bunny. “I'm blind, and I've never seen myself. Maybe you could examine me and find out.”

So the snake felt the bunny all over, and he said, “Well, you're soft, and cuddly, and you have long silky ears, and a little fluffy tail and a dear twitchy little nose. You must be a bunny rabbit!”

The bunny said, “I can't thank you enough. But by the way, what kind of animal are you?”

The snake replied that he didn't know either, and the bunny agreed to examine him, and when the bunny was finished, the snake asked, “Well, what kind of an animal am I?”

The bunny had felt the snake all over, and he replied, “You're cold, you're slippery, and you haven't got any balls... You must be a politician!”

As the Instapundit would say: Heh!

The Pigs Are Lining Up...

The pigs being large corporations, and they're lining up at the Congressional trough to get the “free money” that the government is pouring out of the sky. Scott Adams has it exactly right:


Sigh. What else did we think was going to happen when we started bailing out large companies with incompetent management, who knowingly took and lost big bets?

It took the Democrats about two seconds to realize that this was the best opportunity they've ever had to force their agendas down the throats of American corporations. Pelosi and company are greeting the industrial beggars (like GM, Ford, and Chrysler) with big smiles and open arms. Why? Because they know that if they can cut a deal with those corporations to suck at the teat of the American taxpayer, they will be running those corporations.

Which means that they will be able to manipulate those corporations for their own, personal benefit. For example, imagine that the environmentalist wackos start agitating in Pelosi's district. Whattya wanna bet that within a few days GM will announce a “major initiative” to build solar-powered cars, thanks to the “visionary leadership” of Pelosi? Buried in a footnote somewhere will be the hundred-billion-dollar development subsidy and the fifty-thousand-dollar per car production subsidy.

I can hardly wait...

Singing the Blues...

Oh, how blue we got this time, folks... The graphic at right (click to expand) is courtesy of the New York Times. It shows the election results, county-by-county – but not in terms of the vote this year, but rather in terms of the change in the vote since the 2004 election (in percentages). The blue counties are those that voted more Democratic than in 2004; the red counties more Republican.

Yikes!

I think the Republican leadership better pay attention – the electorate just sent them a message of the spanking kind...

Quote of the Day...

From the Lakes Entertainment announcment of 2008Q3 results (my emphasis):

...partially offset by unrealized losses associated with a decrease in probability of opening the casino project for the Jamul Indian Village due to issues associated with site access.

That's the most pessimistic thing I've seen yet in their financial reports. The next step would be for them to write the whole investment down...

The Morning After...

Some quick post-election thoughts...

• President Obama. Those two words fill me with both fear and amazement. Fear...that Obama will not defend my country against fundamentalist Islamic terrorists, that instead he will accommodate them. Fear...of the Supreme Court judges that we're likely to see him nominate. Fear...of what his socialist inclinations will do the U.S. economy in general, and to my family's fortunes in particular. Amazement...primarily that within the span of my life, America went from segregation and overt discrimination against blacks to the point where we have elected a black man to be President.
  
  
• Senate races. The Democrats did not get their 60-vote filibuster-busting super-majority. Under current Senate rules, this means that the Republican minority can (with a concerted, near-unanimous action) block any bill or appointment. The possibility remains that they will repeal the filibuster rule, so that their simple majority can run over the Republican minority. I suspect Obama will ask the Senate to do exactly this – but I hope not.
  
  
• Proposition 8 (ban on gay marriage): as I write, it is leading – but just barely. 9% of the vote remains to be counted, and it has a 1.5% lead. If it wins, it seems like an out-of-context victory for sanity in California.
  
  
• Wacky state-wide propositions: alternative fuels, high-speed trains, free electric cars for everyone, etc., etc. These propositions all look like they're failing.
  
  
• San Diego City Attorney: this race doesn't affect me personally, but still I was interested to see that the man I'll call the “candidate of rationality” has handily beat Mike Aguirre – the incumbent who seems more like a circus clown and posturing mayoral wannabe than an attorney (much less the City's attorney!).

Somehow this morning I am not all filled with hopeyness and changitude. Rather the opposite.

Monday Morning...

Some random Monday morning thoughts...

The photo at right is not mine. It's in this post only because it made me laugh...

Yesterday I answered emails from several friends in Europe, and prepared a package to mail to one of them. This was unreasonably pleasurable, taking a couple of hours to enjoy “talking” with my friends. All but one of my European friends has expressed a preference for Obama to be elected. I'm not surprised by this, actually – Obama would fit into European politics quite easily, while McCain looks (to them) like a typical American cowboy. Of course, my European friends don't have personal consequences (like higher taxes) to worry about if Obama is elected. The one exception? An Estonian friend who is afraid that Putin has a goal of reincorporating the Baltics into Russia – and who is convinced that Obama would just let it happen, while McCain would honor our treaty obligations (Estonia is a NATO member).

Our body clocks don't know about Daylight Saving time, so we woke up at our usual hour – which is now 2 am. The dogs don't know about Daylight Saving time, so they thought we went for our morning walk at the usual time. The stars don't know about Daylight Saving time, so they were in their usual, familiar places. Orion, Castor, Pollux, and the Pleiadies are now all high overhead at that early hour, and Sirius is well above the horizon.

This morning is cold and humid – 46°F (8°C) and 100% relative humidity. The humidity brings up the intensity of the piney smell from our trees to the point where we can smell it intensely...ahhhh... The forecast calls for “likely rain showers”. From our point of view out here in the fire-prone chaparral, there is no better forecast than that!

In 48 hours we'll know the result of the election. Maybe – or maybe we'll all be learning about hanging chads again. Our local (and very liberal) TV station is reporting a last-minute McCain surge – is this on the level, or are they trying to scare more liberal-leaning folks into voting?

Now it's 4 am, and I'm headed into work...

Obama Needs Joe...

Jim M. passes along this parable:

Barack Obama discovers a leak under his sink, so he calls Joe the Plumber to
come and fix it.

Joe drives to Obama's house, which is located in a very nice neighborhood
and where it's clear that all the residents make more than $250,000 per
year.

Joe arrives and takes his tools into the house. Joe is led to the room that
contains the leaky pipe under a sink. Joe assesses the problem and tells
Obama, who is standing near the door, that it's an easy repair that will
take less than 10 minutes.

Obama asks Joe how much it will cost.

Joe immediately says, "$9,500."

"$9,500?" Obama asks, stunned. "But you said it's an easy repair!"

"Yes, but what I do is charge a lot more to my clients who make more than
$250,000 per year so I can fix the plumbing of everybody who makes less than
that for free," explains Joe. "It's always been my philosophy. As a matter
of fact, I lobbied government to pass this philosophy as law, and it did
pass earlier this year, so now *all* plumbers have to do business this way.
It's known as 'Joe's Fair Plumbing Act of 2008.' Surprised you haven't heard
of it, senator."

In spite of that, Obama tells Joe there's no way he's paying that much for a
small plumbing repair, so Joe leaves.

Obama spends the next hour flipping through the phone book looking for
another plumber, but he finds that all other plumbing businesses listed have
gone out of business. Not wanting to pay Joe's price, Obama does nothing.

The leak under Obama's sink goes unrepaired for the next several days.

A week later the leak is so bad that Obama has had to put a bucket under the
sink. The bucket fills up quickly and has to be emptied every hour, and
there's a risk that the room will flood, so Obama calls Joe and pleads with
him to return.

Joe goes back to Obama's house, looks at the leaky pipe, and says "Let's see
– this will cost you about $21,000."

"A few days ago you told me it would cost $9,500!" Obama quickly fires back.

Joe explains the reason for the dramatic increase. "Well, because of the
'Joe's Fair Plumbing Act,' a lot of rich people are learning how to fix
their own plumbing, so there are fewer of you paying for all the free
plumbing I'm doing for the people who make less than $250,000. As a result,
the rate I have to charge my wealthy paying customers rises every day.

"Not only that, but for some reason the demand for plumbing work from the
group of people who get it for free has skyrocketed, and there's a long
waiting list of those who need repairs. This has put a lot of my fellow
plumbers out of business, and they're not being replaced – nobody is going
into the plumbing business because they know they won't make any money. I'm
hurting now too – all thanks to greedy rich people like you who won't pay
their fair share."

Obama tries to straighten out the plumber: "Of course you're hurting, Joe!
Don't you get it? If all the rich people learn how to fix their own plumbing
and you refuse to charge the poorer people for your services, you'll be
broke, and then what will you do?"

Joe immediately replies, "Run for president, apparently."

Obama Meets Joe (the Plumber)...

Ego and Mouth...

Thomas Sowell (who is black) is not an Obama fan:

After the big gamble on subprime mortgages that led to the current financial crisis, is there going to be an even bigger gamble, by putting the fate of a nation in the hands of a man whose only qualifications are ego and mouth?

Barack Obama has the kind of cocksure confidence that can only be achieved by not achieving anything else.

Anyone who has actually had to take responsibility for consequences by running any kind of enterprise-- whether economic or academic, or even just managing a sports team-- is likely at some point to be chastened by either the setbacks brought on by his own mistakes or by seeing his successes followed by negative consequences that he never anticipated.

The kind of self-righteous self-confidence that has become Obama's trademark is usually found in sophomores in Ivy League colleges-- very bright and articulate students, utterly untempered by experience in real world.

Read Ego and Mouth.

Obama Concedes...

Have heard that Obama's concession speech (drafted ahead of time just in case he loses next Tuesday) has leaked? Here's the conclusion:

“In closing, I just want to thank all of the little people, and their imaginary friends, for the $600 million in contributions. You can be sure that every penny went to a good cause. Thanks to your generosity hundreds of oppressed, downtrodden and needy political operatives are able to keep a roof over their heads that they can retract in warm weather.”

“Traditionally, politicians end their speeches by saying, ‘God bless you, and God bless the United States of America’. But since you’ve probably heard that recording of my pastor, let me just say, in the words of Scripture, that I will always remember you as ‘the least of these‘, and feel confident in knowing that I have done it unto you.”

Via ScrappleFace.

Warfare's Evolution...

Reading this article by Bill Roggio (who is one of the very best sources of information on the War on Terror) got me to pondering on the evolution of warfare. There's nothing new about that, of course – the way that wars are fought has never been a static thing. Roggio's story linked above is about a Predator attack on a compound in Warzistan.

The combination of modern technology and quality intelligence is turning out to be a very effective tool for us. It seems to me that it is restoring some of the symmetry to what would otherwise be called asymmetrical warfare (or guerilla warfare).

Prior to the last few years, an enemy's leadership in a guerilla war would be relatively invulnerable to direct, personal attack. Even if we had intelligence on the location of someone in a leadership role, the only means we had for attacking that person would involve boots-on-the-ground Special Forces. Such a mission would be risky, costly, and would take precious time to organize and execute. Thus they didn't happen very often, and when they succeeded were occasion for much celebration. Some of the most memorable stories from earlier wars are exactly of that nature – Yamamoto in WWII, the several failed attempts on Hitler, the failed rescues of POWs in Viet Nam, etc.

Fast forward to today. I read stories like the one linked above every day or two. The common thread on all of them: actionable intelligence about the location of someone in the chain of command for Al Qaeda (etc.), and a missile delivered by a remote-controlled aircraft (usually a Hellfire missile delivered by a Predator). The location isn't necessarily in (or even near) a place where we have boots on the ground. The remote-controlled aircraft was generally on station nearby, ready to be used for such an occasion – this is possible because of the long “hover times” these aircraft have, and the fact that the “crew” (who are generally in the U.S.) can be switched out in seconds, so missions can last for days.

Think what this combination must be like for the Al Qaeda leadership. It's pretty much impossible for any effective leader to be invisible to his troops. Therefore lots of people have some idea where any given leader is. If you're the leader, you know that any one of those people could rat you out – and if they do, no matter where you are, no matter what time of day it is, no matter how many of your guys you're protected by, and no matter how fervently you pray as you kneel on your mat, a Hellfire missile might be the last thing you ever see.

That can't be good for morale.

Quote of the Day...

From Tim Blair:

The biggest story of the past few weeks: Sarah Palin’s massive CLOTHES budget. I join with political observers of all persuasions in demanding that the attractive Alaska governor wear far fewer clothes.

Read the whole thing.

The Three Stooges...

Consequences of Obama...

Instapundit is running one of my favorite quotes from Robert Heinlein:

Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.

This is known as "bad luck."

Glenn didn't say this, but I'll observe that taking outrageously high taxes from those who had the gumption and creativity to improve the lot of their fellow man (and thereby make a profit) is one of the most certain ways to drive those same people away...