Category: Pondering

Appeals court says devastation from New Deal is still okay; We lost a hero who also suffered at the hands of the New Deal

Did you know the enlightened wizards of the New Deal worked out a plan that raisin producers had to turn over a percentage of their crop to the government and not get paid for the raisins?

Yes, that was actually a plan developed back in the ‘30s.

Did you know that plan is still in place? Eighty years later?

I discussed that a year ago – Economic destruction from the New Deal just keeps rolling on.

The lawsuit I mentioned back then involved farmers who were told to give 47% of their ’02 crop and 30% of their ’03 crop to the government without compensation.  The case went to the Supreme Court, which ruled the farmers did actually have standing to sue the government. The case went to the 9th Circuit Court for consideration of their claims.

Guess what?

Continue reading “Appeals court says devastation from New Deal is still okay; We lost a hero who also suffered at the hands of the New Deal”

“Luck is probability taken personally”

Philosiblog ponders that comment from Penn Jillette.

Do we assume that when something happens to us it was good luck? Or was it random, haphazard chance that helped us? Or was it our preparation applied to an opportunity?

Be careful of the assumption that the world is in your favor: Continue reading ““Luck is probability taken personally””

“29 Ways to Stay Creative” plus a few bonus ideas

Check out this video on how to stay creative:

 

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-mlSrKo16D0]

 

A few more ideas:

30 – Read political, economic, and social opinions from people with a different worldview – Twitter is a superb for this.

31 – Read a book by an author you haven’t looked at before. I just did this and got an amazingly depressing view of post-reconstruction America while finding I enjoy someone whose work I’ve not read before.

32 – Write a blog. You will be amazed how much it stretches you.

Next post: there are times when we shouldn’t be creative.

Don’t pick a fight with someone who buys pixels by the terabyte and especially someone with 13,700 Twitter followers

There’s an old line from the newspaper era: Don’t pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel. If you do, tomorrow you will see 10,000 printed copies of the next step of the argument.

The internet equivalent is:

Don’t pick a fight with someone who buys pixels by the terabyte.

Today’s addendum is: especially when said person routinely prints 13,700 copies of tweets.

(Cross post from my other blog, Nonprofit Update.)

Francine McKenna got a threatening email from a guy who had a role in a failed company. You can read all about it: Benjamin Wey Sent Me A Threatening Email About AgFeed.

The company, AgFeed, is the recipient of litigation, a target of SEC investigation, and the subject of many news reports. Mr. Wey didn’t like Ms. McKenna’s coverage and threatened her with some sort of harm. I can’t quite tell what the harm will be (opinion), but there will be something. Continue reading “Don’t pick a fight with someone who buys pixels by the terabyte and especially someone with 13,700 Twitter followers”

What’s the disposal plan for the cadmium in solar panels? Solar #16

Cadmium is a heavy metal that can make humans quite sick. Cadmium is a major ingredient in one particular type of solar panel called cadmium telluride. Dangers of putting that into a few hundred thousand panels, risks of leakage into ground water, and lack of disposal plans 30 or 40 years from now might, just maybe, possibly, be worth considering today.

A few minutes of research starts to outline the issues. My learning points are in bold italics, with article for each idea, and my comments on the article.

  • Cadmium is bad stuff.

Continue reading “What’s the disposal plan for the cadmium in solar panels? Solar #16”

Tax revenue projections and first month of sales tax report from Colorado for state-legal-federally-illegal marijuana sales

As an experiment in the heavy hand of tax and regulation, I’ll be watching the results of Colorado and Washington legalizing marijuana. My hypothesis is the heavy sales tax burden and regulatory requirements will cause unintended consequences.

January tax revenue

First month of tax revenues in Colorado were announced this week. In January, the state collected $2.1 million in taxes and fees from recreational marijuana sales and an additional $1.4 million from so-called “medical” sales, for total of about $3.5M for the month.

Continue reading “Tax revenue projections and first month of sales tax report from Colorado for state-legal-federally-illegal marijuana sales”

More good stuff on the open frontiers – 3-3-14

More good stuff on the open frontiers: energy, space, education, publishing. Good info but only time to summarize in a paragraph:  

Education

2-9 – Grumpy Economist – Mooconomics – Superb article assessing current state of MOOCs from a professor who actually taught one. Most of the technology looks like it is still very much version 1.0. Continue reading “More good stuff on the open frontiers – 3-3-14”

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”

That’s a quote attributed to Seneca in a post at Philosiblog with the same title.

The immediate implication of the phrase is that one should get ready in advance of the opportunities appearing. Get yourself prepared!

Great advice, for many situations.

The other part is to watch for and jump at opportunities.

The post at Philosiblog spends most of the discussion on the part that is missing from the saying, which is the action necessary to apply preparation to opportunity.

That missing connection is the best part of the quote.

Continue reading ““Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity””

You want to succeed in your career? Invest in yourself.

That’s the extended point made by Tony Nitti in a New Years’ post at Going Concern – This Year, Resolve to Finally Decide What You Want To Be When You Grow Up in Public Accounting.

This article is cross-posted from my other blog, Attestation Update. While the focus of the article is people working in public accounting, the point applies to every single person who has a job – invest in yourself.

Don’t rely on the networking, hand-shaking, going-out-for-drinks-after-work schmoozing, and drumming up new business to get where you want. (Those things are important in public accounting and many other fields.) Although you may have to get really good at those things, the first priority is to invest in your skills and knowledge.

Oh, as expected for any Going Concern post, there is a fair amount of naughty language and word pictures. Just letting you know.

Three superb comments: Continue reading “You want to succeed in your career? Invest in yourself.”

More good stuff on surveillance – 1-7-14

Here is my ninth list of good stuff on our surveillance society that I’d like talk about but only have time to recommend with a quick comment.

1-3 – The Atlantic – How the NSA Threatens National Security – Bruce Schneier points out the extreme level of compromised systems caused by the NSA spying fiasco is a serious threat to national security.

It is also breaking systems that we have spent decades building in America. It is breaking us financially and diplomatically. It is tearing down our political, legal, commercial, and technical systems. It is destroying trust in government, tech companies, and the internet itself.

As for the potential for abuse, here’s an experiment for you.

Continue reading “More good stuff on surveillance – 1-7-14”

How to destroy a newly legalized illegal industry: Tax it to death

How could you shut down the newly legal recreational marijuana market in states that have legalized the federally illegal drug?

Well, you could pour on the taxes and regulations so heavy the legal stuff is twice or three times the price of illegal stuff.

First, a disclaimer. I don’t have experiential knowledge of the pot market, legal or illegal. My knowledge comes from the computer screen.

Why talk about this?

Three reasons. First, it helps me learn about change taking place around us in new worlds I’ll never personally explore. Second, this specific issue will allow us to see in real-time the damage caused by taxes and government regulation by watching what happens to a new ‘industry’. Third, I expect the state lawmakers and regulators are going to get an unpleasant lesson in unintended consequences. This post will be a marker for testing the idea that regulators can damage a new industry.

Having said that, check out an article in Daily Beast by Nick Gillespie:  Pot’s Black Market Backlash – How prohibitionists and nanny staters are trying to keep marijuana illegal – or at least inconvenient.

Continue reading “How to destroy a newly legalized illegal industry: Tax it to death”

A new, built-from-the-ground-up news organization funded by founder of E-Bay

News broke this week that the founder of E-Bay is starting a news organization with major involvement by the reporter who broke so many stories about the NSA spying fiasco.

It will be a brand new, digital-only, full-scope media outlet. Plans are it will cover news, sports, and business in addition to hard-hitting investigative journalism.

Will be funded with an initial $250 million dollar investment.

Pierre Omidyar, the founder of E-Bay, was one of the people shopped as a possible buyer for The Washington Post earlier this year. Jeff Bezos bought the Post for reported $250 million.

Another frontier is open.

Mr. Omidyar decided to put the money he would have otherwise used to buy the Post into something completely new.

Continue reading “A new, built-from-the-ground-up news organization funded by founder of E-Bay”