Morning Coffee (93)

Another fine Tuesday morning, right? Right. Exactly. Now enjoy.

Clarifying the PCT:

Some people took issue with yesterday’s mention of California’s possible use of programmable controlled thermostats that can be used to adjust a home’s temperature remotely by government regulators. These folks stated that this was a small thing and that it wasn’t such a big deal and that I should stop complaining. It’s not like they’re taking my first born or anything. But stating this is to miss the point. The point is not that this is a small thing; I will concede that it is.

Think of it like this: the ground upon which you walk is the freedom you enjoy, and this provides the foundation for trees, which are your liberties. Trees, with their deep roots, prevent your freedom, the ground, from being eroded and washed away by the deluge of tyranny. The hewing of a few trees here and there does not mean that the ground beneath you will immediately fall away. But every tree hewn is one closer to the deforestation of your liberties, and thus the dissolution of your freedom. If we allow it to happen, we will soon be walking on the bare stone of totalitarianism. We must protect every tree, in my humble opinion. But don’t take my word for it, for who am I but the author of a highly un-influential blog? Instead, read what the fine individuals below have to say about it.

However, it can deeper than that. The forest cannot be allowed to run free; liberties must be carefully managed. If dead growth and detritus are allowed to build up and grow unabated, the risk of fire increases, and eventually the forest will be wholly destroyed. Fire is anarchy. Having no limits to liberties is just as bad as clear cutting the forest; freedoms are eroded.

Coquettishly Complicated Stop Signs:

The stop sign. You’ve seen them before. They’re on corners everywhere, with their big, white, capital letters jumping out at you from the deep red background on the octagonal sign. There are hundreds of thousands of them, possibly millions since their also used in other countries. These stellar examples of utilitarian art command you to stop, of course. But they do so much more than that. They utterly confuse hapless drivers everywhere. Such a simple sign with such simple rules paralyzes people. I’m sure this isn’t the sort of stopping its inventors had in mind way back in 1915 in Michigan. When a stop sign encounter with other cars, especially at those four way stop, goes off without a hitch I get a warm and fuzzy feeling deep within my soul. But this is rare. Pretty much without exception, someone bungles the ordeal. My favorite bunglers are those guys who are apparently very polite, and insist that you go before them even if they’ve reached the stop sign first and have a thing called the right of way. It’s the equivalent of coming to a door that you pull to open. Except another person comes to that door first and goes in it, but then he decides that he needs to hold the door for you, so he does so by leaning through the doorway pushing the door out while you’re trying to go in, but he’s made that difficult by blocking the doorway and you have a very awkward “brush” with Mr. Polite. But at the stop sign, the guy does one of two things. If it’s dark, he flashes his high beams at you, which I guess is a universal sign meaning “go.” I didn’t see that in my driver’s handbook; but high beams are versatile after all, and can mean a number of different things depending on the situation. Absolutely no chance for confusion. If it’s light out, the man can wave to you indicating that you can go ahead and go. This is usually the most efficient method. That is if you can see him past the glare of his sloped windshield and were looking at him for the split second it took him to wave. If you were, say, looking around for other oncoming traffic, you might miss his wave, and then give one of your own. This complicates things further, because he didn’t see you wave on account of your sloped windshield, so he goes, but you also go because you though he was a moron and was perhaps talking on his cell phone. Hilarity ensues. Using the simple stop sign example, we see why there are so many traffic fatalities every year, especially when one considers the complex laws and etiquette involving highway merges and yield signs. Since driving, like smoking, will kill you if you do it long enough, we should probably ban it.

Newsflash: Reagan Died:

I know that the Republican Party has a hard time coming to grips with this, and that a majority of party members are in denial about it, but Reagan died a while back. I realize you’re all nostalgic about Ronnie and you are dying to elect someone that you feel has a deep connection to him. I realize that no candidate can mention him enough. But he’s dead. Ronald Reagan will not be on the ballot in 2008, no matter how much you want this to be so. Reagan will not be reincarnated. Nor will he possess any of the present candidates and work through them to usher in a new Golden Age of conservatism. No matter how frequently these candidates suggest that they are Reagan’s heir, they are not, for we do not live in a hereditary monarchy and we should expect nothing less than each of these candidates being their own man. I realize that every conservative talk-radio personality in America keeps invoking Reagan’s name like he’ll ward off the big bad liberals. It is time to put the man to rest, to be grateful for his service to our nation, to honor him in that regard, and to move on. We need to let our future leaders be themselves, and not hold them up to the standards of someone who has become nearly mythical through death and the passage of time. He’s dead. Move on.

Potential Presidents’ Portfolios:

Speaking of moving on, it’s obvious that I think a lot about politics and government and such. I’m not thrilled about this fact. I’d much rather be thinking about historical correlations to the present, or Roman history, or military events, or other current affairs. But I find myself drawn to politics, drawn to our political system, because I think it’s broken and I like to try to come up with ways to fix it.

The following is a very nascent idea. In the span of two minutes, I can find a number of problems with it. But the Morning Coffee is all about ideas, and without these, what have we to look forward to? What will ever change for the better?

When we hold Presidential elections, we’re not just electing a Commander-in-Chief, we’re electing a whole team of people. A man is elected and then he selects and nominates people to serve in his Cabinet. He has ideas and potential policies and all sorts of things. Why not put together a portfolio describing all these things. In it, I could find out who he wants to serve as his Secretary of Defense, or what he thinks about taxes. I’m electing the package, not just the man. Sure, Congress confirms nominations, but what measure of protection does that offer us in terms of checks and balances? Utterly worthless individuals have been confirmed by the Senate as members of a President’s Cabinet. A lot of these people are confirmed because of horse trading anyway, not necessarily because of their potential as members of the Cabinet.

This idea probably sucks. There are a number of holes in it that I haven’t put the effort into plugging yet. But coupled with some other changes to our system, it might be worth considering. In any event, if I throw out a thousand ideas, perhaps one of them will be revolutionary, or at least evolutionary. Besides, it doesn’t seem like anyone else is trying to improve our system, despite its obvious flaws. Nothing stays the same forever. Why not take an active role in shaping things to come rather than waiting around to see what happens and perhaps being stuck with a system that has evolved into something much worse?

Word of the Day: Inculcate (transitive verb): To teach and impress by frequent repetition or instruction.

On This Day in History: Otho seizes power in Rome but rules for a mere three months before killing himself (69 CE). The UN imposed deadline for the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait expires (1991). Wikipedia goes online (2001).

"When liberty is taken away by force it can be restored by force. When it is relinquished voluntarily by default it can never be recovered." - Dorothy Thompson.

"The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government." - Franklin Delano Roosevelt.