2016 November
2016 November 1
Colonial Sees Line 1 Restart Saturday After Fatal Explosion
As long as the company is responsible for adequate environmental clean up and covers all damage costs to all properties involved, plus a little more for the local jurisdiction, to cover any associated costs and as a little penalty, then everyone should be happy.
2016 November 2
2016 November 3
Facebook sales surge overshadowed by forecast
A company like Facebook with $7 billion in revenue should be paying about 37% of its total revenue in income taxes. Currently, it pays about 17%.
2016 November 4
Feds to monitor voting in Cumberland, Robeson counties
Voting is currently the most important civic act in which the will of the voters is conveyed. However, it is an exceedingly blunt instrument which means that it is not at all anywhere near a high enough resolution tool that can be used to really understand specifically what the voters have in mind. If voters would be able to convey their accurate opinions to the government in a different manner, so much emphasis wouldn’t be need to be placed on the current voting system. (However, voting rights in the traditional sense should obviously always still be fervently upheld.)
To give governments perhaps the most detailed views concerning the true will of the voting-eligible population, government should mandate that each eligible voter participate, once every 5 years, in a comprehensive survey of several hundred questions. Their responses would be tallied up to constitute the current will of the voters.
2016 November 5
Melania Trump had modeling jobs in US before work visa
In cases where people who are not allowed to work actually do earn income from work, the revenues earned should be considered theft. But because it was not obtained through forced means, this theft should have a very low multiple applied to it, perhaps 1.5. In other words, Melania’s criminal bill for this offense would come out to around $30,000. This would not include court fees or any other related charges.
2016 November 6
Bridgegate verdict: Bill Baroni and Bridget Kelly guilty on all counts
Closing down two out of three lanes seems like such a childish response directed at someone for simply not endorsing a candidate, that it is frustrating that grown people both conceived of and participated in such activities. It is frustrating to have to write laws that prevent such behavior. It is also sad that some people, as is very often the case, are just a victim of circumstance and may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time and in a less than optimal state of mind to object and refuse to participate in such activities. However, the law must be enforced upon all who break it. All guilty people must be required to face punishment due to this crime that stole the time of who knows how many thousands of people.
2016 November 7
Conyers and Cummings call for investigation of FBI leaks
It appears that Rudy Giuliani knew about the new FBI review of materials in the Clinton email scandal based on what he said about him expecting the announcement sooner than it actually officially occurred, citing leaked information from former FBI agents. The leakers of this information should naturally be prosecuted, especially since this leak had an apparently obvious intentional timing to damage Clinton in this presidential election. Releasing information on an unnatural timetable for the express purpose of favoring one side or the other is clearly a criminal offense.
The best way to immunize the population against any attempt to sway the election is to just have better informed voters (and the population in general) who know better how the world works.
2016 November 8
Earthquake Causes Damage in Central Oklahoma
While earthquakes are often a natural occurrence, when they occur at a frequency and at location not historically associated with quakes, and when there is a reasonable alternative hypothesis, then these stop becoming natural events. These quakes are associated with human activities (fracking) and the people responsible for such activities must find way to mitigate such quakes. Either they prevent them from happening, compensate people affected for all losses, or compensate the local government for all losses so that, in the end, the public doesn’t absorb any of the negative costs of these activities. All businesses must operate in a way that internalizes all of their negative externalities.
2016 November 9
India: New Delhi Engulfed in Worst Air Pollution in 20 Years
The best thing we could do to solve air pollution is to make sure that all pollution costs are accurately charged to the polluters and have a pollution tax. Then, we should ensure that the true costs for fuels are reflected in the consumer prices of fuels and all other goods and services. This would reduce demand and cause people to alter their habits so that they would not need to travel so much and would not need to use so many resources.
2016 November 10
Maine became the first state in the country Tuesday to pass ranked choice voting
How can it be that we actually need to convince people that something other than a simple plurality voting system is better than what we have now? Did the other 48% who voted against this actually know what they were voting on? Anyone who thinks must know that ranked voting is infinitely better because it eliminates the ‘spoiler effect’.
2016 November 11
Report: Megyn Kelly’s new memoir suggests Donald Trump was tipped off about debate question
Questions to candidates should not be secret until asked because that lead to a game-show type setup in which only the candidates who are fastest to respond get the sympathies of the viewers. The election process needs to be organized in a way that advances the best choices for the job, not just the ones who simply provide the best appearance and best instant responses.
2016 November 12
Corrections: November 12, 2016
Newspaper corrections are inevitable, but in order to further increase any publication’s dedication to accuracy, there should be a fine placed on the publishers for every error they commit.
Small spelling errors of names that don’t significantly change the meaningfulness of the communication would constitute maybe a $0.0001 cents per physical publication (550,000 for the NYT) and unique online views for that story. The NYT gets probably about 2 million online views,so let’s assume that perhaps only 100,000 clicked on this major story where the name of Myron Ebell was misspelled, so this would add an additional $5 to the $55 charged for misspelling it in the print edition.
The minor mislabeling of the song “Bird on the Wire” should also perhaps be charged the same penalty rate.
A factual error on the scale of naming the wrong person that a union back in an election, should probably require a penalty at least an order of magnitude larger, like $0.001 per copy/view. Using the same numbers as above, the fine for this error would be around $600.
Giving the wrong location of events would justify even higher penalties. The theater entry error had a completely different address, and the fine for this should probably also be $0.001 per copy/view.
2016 November 13
Colombia, rebels agree revised peace deal to end 52-year war
The FARC criminals should be required to pay for their crimes. Yes, it may be good to give some concessions to them to agree to quit the war, but all those members must be brought to justice. Giving them credit for ‘informing’ on their own crimes as well as any other crimes, would be perhaps one way to at least begin to solve these cases.
2016 November 14
No nuclear power plant should be built unless it would be able to withstand a catastrophic destruction of all major facilities.
2016 November 15
Countries around disputed seas to safeguard marine ecosystem
All areas on the planet should, by default, be assumed to be protected to the highest degree, but then assigned a lower protected status according to human needs.
2016 November 16
West Virginia mayor resigns after racist Michelle Obama Facebook post
Ethnic slurs, especially if used in an intentionally harmful way, should qualify as a crime eligible for heavy fines depending on the ultimate viewership or listenership of such speech. For example, calling the First Lady an ‘ape in heels’ should qualify for a penalty of perhaps $100 (although that would be increased to $1,000 to meet a minimum penalty) for the intended audience (of 1) while the rebroadcast to the whole nation could cost $0.01 for each viewing/hearing (if 10 million people saw it, then the fine would be $100,000).
2016 November 17
Trump Supporter Defends Muslim Registry, Citing Japanese-American Internment Camps
Less than a lifetime away from the Japanese internment camps and we have some people that are marching right up that alley again. All it would take a just a slight shift further to the right in the nation’s sentiment and suggestions like internment camps may very well be speech within the ‘acceptable’ range of discourse. It is astonishing that humanity (in one of the more literate parts of the planet) can forget lessons of the past so quickly and regress back to uncivilized behaviors. Perhaps continuing education needs to be mandated, just like education through high-school is mandated now.
2016 November 18
Will Trump Build His Border Wall? Native American Tribe In Arizona Vows To Fight President-Elect On Tribal Land
It would be easier if the Native American tribes had their own independent countries. However, their numbers are so small that the vast majority of them would not be viable. However, several would, and if they agree to become independent, they should be given the opportunity, or at least we should grant them a greater degree of autonomy, perhaps just retaining control of their international defense issue (so we could be assured that they would not become bases of operations for foreign powers).
If needed, we could build a wall around this reservation. However, a physical wall would really not be necessary because electronic surveillance would suffice if given the proper resources and fast response times of security personnel. Land mines and other threats (with signs, of course) could also be used.
2016 November 19
Russia pulls out from International Criminal Court
This is another reason to try to create an international organization that is binding so that countries cant just come in and out so easily. However, even before an international criminal court, the higher priority should be to create an international military organization with the very narrow goal of assuming the international military defense of a member country from all external military threats.
2016 November 20
Judge: No bail for 2 teens in congressman’s grandson’s death
Gun control would have definitely reduced the chances of a gun being used during the commission of this crime.
2016 November 21
NASA Successfully Launches NOAA Advanced Geostationary Weather Satellite
The $11 billion GOES-R program is providing very useful scientific weather satellite program and because it does fulfill a fairly broad public good, it should be subsidized to a significant extent. However, additional ways to make the program a little more self-sufficient should be explored.
2016 November 22
Trump to withdraw from Trans-Pacific Partnership on first day in office
It is good that the US will pull out of the TPP. However, the tone with which the US is withdrawing, combined with all the other changes that the US (Trump) has advertised that it plans to do, means that the damage to international relations caused by our withdrawal from the TPP will be in addition to the very severe damage that will be caused by our actions in other spheres. The United States appears to begin to be wasting its goodwill ‘credit’ on an astonishingly number of fronts, which will make it harder to absorb the planned push-back from the things that I would argue we should have budgeted to deal with such push-back.
2016 November 23
Iraqis finally put out some oil fires set months ago by IS
When the rule of law is enforced again, the people who set these oil wells on fire should be required to pay for the environmental damage that resulted by paying a fee per unit of pollution estimated to have been emitted.
2016 November 24
Superintendent: 5 students killed in Chattanooga school bus crash
Video cameras on board the bus focusing on the driver may very well have yielded information to allow the authorities to more quickly determine the cause of this accident.
2016 November 25
Dylann Roof Mentally Competent to Stand Trial
Mental state should have no bearing on whether an individual is capable of standing trial.
2016 November 26
Learning curve not so smooth
Children learn at different rates and putting them all in one class with a group of kids of roughly the same age with one teacher as the standard, default learning style for virtually all age groups through high school does everyone a disservice. Education needs to be more individualized by allowing children the flexibility to learn at their own pace.
2016 November 27
Swiss reject quick exit from atomic power
Nuclear power is safe if intrinsically safe reactor designs are chosen.
2016 November 28
Obama Gives Special Forces ‘Expanded Power,’ Intensifies War on Somali Al-Shabaab
This is a bad decision because it opens up another front of a war that we have not enough of a business to be fighting. All this time and money should be spent on changing the fundamental aspects of life in these poor, angry areas. People in such areas need education, fair economic policies and need foreigners to quit meddling in their affairs.
2016 November 29
Patagonia’s Black Friday sales hit $10 million — and will donate it all
This is a great move. However, it would be an even more meaningful move and purer move if there were not all these tax advantages that occur as a result of these donations. The complex tax code allows for all kinds of deductions and credits for all sorts of charitable giving that what may appear to be a large donation, in reality is not as large as it seems because of the complex math involved. The tax code needs to be much simpler.
2016 November 30
Journalist & Activist Barrett Brown Released from Prison
Barrett Brown should continue to be punished severely and should be forced to repay all damages he caused, plus a punitive multiple. However, he should be paid for the beneficial information that he has revealed about contractor use of taxpayer dollars for illegitimate and inefficient purposes.