Here’s an article by John Petersen on why the electric car is a no-go for future energy independence due to the very limited rare earth elements that are required to produce the batteries. It is a great argument for recuperative braking, and a great argument against the obvious, that replacing fuel with batteries is an extremely naïve idea with regard to either environmental concerns or energy supplies. I was bitching about that during the cap and trade debate, if my memory serves.

Innovation is what’s needed though. The key to energy independence isn’t these wild ideas about shifting us from cars to trains, but rather developing technologies like practical energy cells. This requires investment. And fuel cells include more technologies than electric storage batteries, which are horrible.

Hydrogen is a good example. It’s a portable fuel. And it’s made from electricity which could be generated in remote areas of the country, like in mountains from turbines or in deserts from solar panels, and shipped in a variety of was to fueling stations.

Who knows what technology will produce. Hopefully though, the next leap in transportation technology will appear in the US under a US company.

There’s a lot of $$$ locked up in US companies right now, waiting out uncertainty. A lot of people would like to see taxes raised on companies, and that money used to fund research. That’s a better idea than using such monies to fund green projects using today’s piss-poor green technology. But still, the usual process in Washington is to divvy money out to congressman’s districts for supporting the bill, rather than to the most promising research projects. And that’s assuming any of those fools in Washington could determine what’s promising.

Others would like to keep the tax burden off companies so they can do their own research. This is a fine idea, but could take a long time. Such research is risky. A lot of people and corporations will certainly be losing billions before that singularity is found, and no one is in a hurry to do that right now.

Because energy is such an important thing to all of us, and is essential to safety and security, I think government should be finding ways to promote this innovation. Taxing so Uncle Sam can write checks is the wrong way to do it, because as I’ve said, Washington doesn’t reward merit, it rewards votes. So I think the best way to promote domestic fuel cell research is to reduce the capital gains tax, and perhaps the corporate tax, on such research projects.

It’s a matter of overcoming uncertainty, both from the bad economy and the gamble of scientific progress. Lowering those taxes specifically on green energy will increase the reward to investors, and thus overcome some of that uncertainty and move money in. Simple economics – complicated fuel science.

Worst case: Investors don’t move money to green energy and things stay the same, no loss in revenue. Second worst case: Investors move money out of other investments into green energy, tax revenues decrease but carefully targeted green energy investment increase. Best case: Locked up money comes loose, tax revenues rise, and someone invents a practical green vehicle fuel system.

I’d say the Liberals are basically neutered. They were out of control, but totally blew everything, like Lenny and a fragile furry creature. America’s probably learned its lesson for a decade or two, unless Sarah Palin gets elected and gives the old pendulum yet another big health *kick*

I was pondering some parallels today between Bush’s decisions about the Iraq invasion and Obama on healthcare reform.

Bush’s mistake was letting some over-confident civvies dictate troop numbers per his strategy, as opposed to his old man’s approach to desert storm and shield. Bush I sent what the Generals requested. Bush II sent what Rummy thought he could get away with.

Obama took a similar approach to healthcare reform. He let some civvie non-doctors slap together the most absurdly Liberal stack of horseshit they thought they could get away with, and inadvertently gave his enemies a big heavy stick to thump on him with for the foreseeable future.

They both had a brilliant chance to do something amazing – and shitted all over it. Bush had the chance to free Iraq in a sudden and awesome way. Just think about it!!! What if they had gone in with a slightly longer-term strategy and/or an appropriate number of troops to keep the peace in Iraq. In 2002 we would be where we are NOW in Iraq. Think of the credibility Bush would have had! Afghanistan – check, Saddam – check, Iran???

Likewise, Obama could have socialized US medicine by his 8th year in office. What if he had passed a small highly popular bill for health reform in his first year? Something including Republican ideas that would tight a few of them in? Something with real benefits that would be felt within the year or next? By end of year two, or sooner, he would have had health-reform-credibility and the capital needed to easily pass another ginger step. By his second term he could have carefully constructed the real “Big Fucking Deal.”

Of course, he would have also needed to keep that cap and trade bill stuffed up the collective Liberal ass, and not pulled a recklessly irresponsible and totally thoughtless ‘stimulus’ bill. I’m not saying he should have continued the tax-cut Bush approach to bracing and patching the economy. I’m saying he would have had to constructed and passed an actual stimulus bill, not a goody-grab labeled as such.

He went the belligerent rout though, and will have been a lame-duck the second half of his presidency, assuming he doesn’t find a way to pull-off a second term.

Did anyone catch Obama’s Libya speech? I just watched it. He spent the first third tidying up on political points. Then he made his single valid point – that allowing Gadhafi to regain control of the country with outright military force against the citizens would have prescribed to all the other dictators losing power what to do.

Then he made a bogus comparison between this non-war-war-making and the invasion of Iraq, in an attempt to show that this is different from Iraq, specifically because the goal of the Iraq invasion was (naughty word) regiem change. Bill O’Reilly agreed with him on that point. I think they’re both full of shit…

The problem with the Iraq invasion wasn’t the goal of regime change, or the actual change. It was that the goal was reach far easier than we expected and were ready for. The damn country collapsed in on itself and insurgents pored in from every America-hatting hole in the world. From there fear and complacency came over the Iraqi people, waiting for the US to fix it.

Libya is a totally different situation. The Libyan people are a different kind of people. They formed an army out of their neighborhoods – and without social networking. FFS, the rebels have already set up a new national bank and are trying to sell oil from fields they recently captured. WTF?!?!? How smooth would Iraq have gone if a couple a couple dozen of these guys lived there??? They sure can’t fight for shit, and shoot way too much ammo into the air – but they’re industrious.

Like I said, we should have let the Enterprise savage Gadhafi’s aircraft that first day when he unleashed them on the rebels. Without Gadhafi’s fire power, the rebel’s momentum would have continued, and anyone sane would have dropped loyalty to Moe Crazy.

Of course that was never a possibility. We can’t have anything that politically looks like our unilateral Iraq expedition. But if the goal of all this business doesn’t include regime change, I don’t know what the hell is going on, and I doubt the sanity and/or honesty of everyone involved. What scenario worth our military intervention could possibly include Gadhafi still ruling Libya???

Oh shit, I’ve got to change a fuse in the bull-shit detector again…

Ron Paul and Denis Cousinage both agree on something again: Bombing Libya is wrong. lol

What in the hell are they doing over there anyway??? Does anyone have any idea? So ambiguous. I think we’re seeing a war prosecuted by committee. This should be terrible.

No one is in charge it seems. I understand what Obama is trying to do. It’s similar to how he handled the healthcare debate. He looked at history and decided the reason Clinton’s reform didn’t pass was because people associated him (or ratherher) with it. Likewise, we doesn’t want America associated with another war in a Muslim country. It makes perfect political sense. But strategically, I think we’re going to see a demonstration of a text-book fluster-fuck.

I was surprised and pleased that the UN at least voted to take military action. But after I thought about it, I was still pleased, but less surprised. I think the free world knows that America is broke, already fighting two wars, and has a pansy President. This means they can’t just argue against everything, knowing that in the end the US will take care of business – do all the hard stuff while the European leaders focus on politicking.

But the problem is, Europe can’t do anything, not even all together. They’ve been so reliant on the US military they can barely put on a fireworks display two days in a row. Right now the US is doing 99% of the heavy lifting in Libya – no one else can take that over.

Add to that the apparent fact that these rebels aren’t worth shit on the battle field… I mean, three weeks ago when they were rolling up the country, and the Libyan military was defecting out the front and back door, a long weekend of carrier-based strategic bombing would have no doubt maintained the rebels momentum and scared the loyalty out of any Gadhafi friends. We’d probably be talking about elections right now…

But what happened instead – Gadhafi stopped the rebel’s momentum, and pushed back - hard, recapturing stuff, and now has his tanks parked in urban areas, all the while the UN bickered and the White House stayed silent, not even supporting a no-fly-zone. Now, as long as Gadhafi has cash for mercenaries and loyalists, he can stay dug in for quite some time, all the while the country as a whole suffers like hell, remembering the kinder days under Papa Gadhafi.

At least the Arab World won’t see this as yet another American military action in a Muslim country – will they????

Pass the pragmatism please…

I really like the election results. The Republicans have the house, so that puts a stop to the angry onslaught of crazy Liberal haphazard legislation. I feel safe now. But they don’t have the Senate, so that gives Obama one less thing upon which to blame his problems and failures.

Strategically, long term, this was the best result. A HUGE sweep wasn’t possible because only a few conservative Democratic districts were up for election. Had the Republicans taken both houses, it wouldn’t have been to their advantage because of the Presidential veto. They wouldn’t have been able to pass anything, or repeal anything. Now a sanity filter in on the legislative branch, which will due until 2012, when more gains might be made, specifically the Presidency, and likewise 2014, gathering back many of the star-struck Yes We Can conservative districts. And the House can pass some good-sounding stuff and let the Democrats be the opposition. All-in-all, this sets up the Republicans best for 2012.

My biggest disappointments were that Frank, Boxer, and Reid all got away. It was unlikely, but I was hoping for a joyous surprise. And California – well – good luck California, Brown will certainly lead you to victory in your war on business.

You guys watch. US business is breathing a collective sight of relief, and over the next few months we’ll see more investment. Someone essentially called Mr. Business on the phone and informed him that he can adjust his outlook more optimistically, Obama can’t whip out any big new ideas – like taxing good ideas or math – which means figures will show more money for expansion.

I’m excited to hear from Obama later today. Hopefully he doesn’t hit us over the head with an irrational perspective and an arrogant condescending attitude, which is his habit under pressure. It would be cool if he would concede that the fanciful idea that we can borrow and spend our way out of this type of recession is no longer a feasible idea – this type of recession being one of permanent change; e.g. manufacturing leaving, over-inflated housing market popping, developing countries taking over technology, and mainly the US has no new economic driver, unless you count Green Energy, but you guys don’t, because you guys aren’t stupid.

It would be cool if he were to concede that a different path must now be taken, and super cool if he would grasp the economic reality that the only possible way out of this recession is economic growth, which means we need to offer real relief to business in the only way government can: Cutting taxes. There’s no other way.

Spending cuts would be great, but there simply aren’t enough reasonable cuts to make a numeric difference in the budget, except for raising the retirement age, which needs to happen, incrementally. And raising taxes, or not continuing the Bush tax cuts, is a miserable idea for two really big reasons. 1. We’re in a recession and increasing those taxes will slow the economy! 2. Taxes are already so high, increasing them, or letting the Bush tax cuts expire, will not increase tax revenue by any helpful amount, and could very well decrease tax revenue by shrinking the economy, or driving business out of the country.

Maybe now Obama will have to act like the guy he campaigned as. You know, like how he said we have more upon which we agree than disagree. And how he said that when he disagrees with you, that’s when he’ll listen most closely to you. LOL People bought that.

The reason I’m called Squab Dove is because I’m the youngest and least experienced Dove on the team here at NoisyDove.com. Some may also refer to this as the most naive. I like to think of myself as the most daring, hopeful, and courageous. Noisy Dove probably thinks of me as a little too idealistic, but I help round things out around here I think.

I’m definitely more conservative in my views and beliefs. But there are times when I try to wrap my head around politics and politicians without thinking in terms of conservative, liberal, or progressive. One such thought is, what do politicians really get out of pushing their agendas, policies, and politics on a personal level? Do they really receive some kind of personal profit from such actions? Does the president make money himself some how by pushing climate reform for example? Or does he take hold of some kind of personal power and persuasion over the country and people that enable him to benefit from that power on a personal level, apart from maybe an ego boost?

I think this is an important question to ask, because the answer has profound implications. I’m not saying I will or can answer this, but you know what I mean. If there is no personal benefit to pushing certain agendas and such, then it would lead me to conclude that politicians do what they do because they really think it is the best thing for the country and people in it. But if they do it for real personal gain, then its all pretty much what it looks like and their is little surprise. I would love to be surprised to discover that most politicians push their agendas because they think it truly is best for the country and people. That’s the sad part really though isn’t it? That we mostly think politicians push certain agendas for personal gain of some kind.

In the end, the answer likely lies somewhere in the middle, as answers usually do. There are probably some who do receive some kind of personal gain and those that are actually more concerned with doing good for the country and people, turning down personal gain on grounds of principle and national pride.

One figure that comes to mind when I think of whether politicians get some kind of personal gain from pushing their agendas is Al Gore. I think he is a prime example of one who exploits his political position for personal gain, both financial and influential (or power). He is by far one of the slimiest SOB’s out there, well, one of the slimiest out there that is dumb enough to make his efforts and evil agenda so obvious and visible. Al Gore has positioned himself to make millions and millions of dollars off of his “green” push. He is SO bold though in doing stupid shit completely contrary to his “green” preaching, sermons, and documentaries. Like his latest hypocritical move, buying that 9 million dollar home, on the dam OCEAN. The same one he warned everyone else not to buy land on because the rising climate would cause it to be completely covered by the ocean as ocean levels rise. Al Gore is just the tip of the iceberg though. His agenda is mild and child like compared to some of the darker more insidious figures in Washington.

Perhaps some of the worst offenders are those that push an agenda that is really bad for the country and people, but they actually and truly think it is the best. Like those that think gas prices need to go to $10 a gallon to force a “green” economy and permanent shift to electric, wind, and other power sources. Or those that push an agenda that leads American toward socialism, thinking that a socialist government and country if superior to our capitalistic democracy. These people are totally whacked and need to spend a year in an actual socialist country. They would shit themselves and cry for capitalism like a bunch of little scared girls.

What do you think? are our politicians and Washington in it for personal gain? Or are they in it for noble and principled reasons and motives? I sure hope more for the later.

Think of it from the cop’s perspective, or an actual criminal’s. Profiling is police work. Of course it’s unfair when it’s racial profiling.

A lot of protestors in AZ are yelling that cops cannot be trusted with the power the new immigration law gives them. These protestors are accusing the police of being stupid, skewed, lying, power hungry, and the equivalent of “hired monkeys”.

However, being a member of an often vilified group, you should have some empathy for these “hired monkeys” who put their lives on the line every day so we can drive downtown every day to go to our nice and safe school in the middle of one of the most desperate urban areas in the US.

The AZ law requires a training course in how to implement the law without violating people’s rights. So, indeed, it is thought out. I think it has come down to this despite years of passive, PC, almost permissive efforts that have failed miserably to control immigration.

And if we’re going to not pass any law that give cops “one more tool to harass people” we won’t give them any tools at all. That’s what this law is after all, an additional tool to help police crack down on illegal immigrants, and it does all it can to prevent racial profiling and other violation of civil rights.

You should be glad police profile. It’s not a bad word. It just puckers the Liberal asshole’s asshole, which is a good sign. I wish they’d pull kids over around here more often. Cops aren’t going to pull over old ladies or Mr. Moms driving minivans – because they aren’t stupid monkeys. They pull over the type of people that do 99.9% of the crimes, mainly young men. Everyone get’s their feelings hurt over it until they are a victim – then the cops are stupid assholes for not pulling everyone over in the whole neighborhood who isn’t missing two legs and an eye.

Oh yeah. We’re in the computer age now. Latinos won’t have to carry ID on a jog, although that isn’t a bad idea for anyone. It’s always good to have ID. Last time I was “pulled over” the officer just ran my name. I was walking around the construction sight that is now new condos by my house with a pond. I didn’t have my wallet. I didn’t mind. I’m glad we’ve got those monkeys pulling young jerks over left and right.

It’s got to be frustrating and scary dealing with the dregs of society every damn day. They’re always on guard when they’ve dealt with me. You can tell they’ve been conditioned to treat everyone like a threat. If they didn’t they’d probably not last long.

Besides that, cops have a lot of oversight now a day – dash-cams, civil law suits, and so on. An AZ cop can pull over a Latino just because he’s Latino. But he has to show probably cause to check citizenship status. If he doesn’t, he/she risks getting sued – which will mean suspension. In worse cases or repeated cases he’ll probably lose his job and pension.

Well done Esquire Dove (I still like Litigious Dove better). Logic and facts are a musical combination. That cleared up my thinking a bit.

I don’t like either path. As you point out, the power to tax path is just dishonest. A tax only applied to individuals who don’t do something – logically – is a penalty.

And as contrary as it is to initial constitutional Federal powers and State roles, according to precedence, a mandate most probably is, or will be deemed, constitutional by shoving it down the commerce clause pipe. Although, I’d keep a plunger handy, probably some old towels and news paper too. What irritates me most though is – what better exercise is there for a federation than to experiment with improving health care and access to it in 50 different ways?

And I agree: the Republicans shouldn’t get into this court business. But, at least they’re challenging a new law, which is healthy, instead of trying to make a new law through the courts after it fails in the legislature, or the other way around. It’s not a productive venture for them politically. They should be focusing on the stuff that will get them more seats in the legislature so President Palin can reform Obama’s reform. After all, she won’t be hindered by that silly old thing they used to do – filibuster I think they called it.

Also, forcing a decision in the Supreme court could turn a painful stretch in the commerce clause into an official big step – another powerful precedent on the slippery slope of precedence. And if it goes the other way, what then? For there to be coverage for all, all must invest. Which means, in this world logic demands a mandate, regardless if it’s Republican or Democrat reform.

If I were on the Republican’s side of the proverbial chess board, I’d minimize these court challenges and focus onshowing all the goofy flaws, confusion, contradictions, and other inherent problems any huge, hurried, and sloppily compromised bill like this has – and talk about REFORM or REPLACE and stop all the REPEAL talk. Then I’d be as reasonable as possible with this upcoming immigration reform and try to keep all the anti-amnesty enthusiasts calm, especially in the Teaparty. Protesting Liberal super-spending and taxing is perfectly rational. Some might argue anything but is irrational.

But I’ve got a bad feeling there are plenty of Tea Partiers who will protest anything containing anything that might be interpreted as amnesty. And sure, amnesty is wildly unpopular, but the alternatives are nothing and deportation. Those aren’t popular either. Regardless, Republicans need to treat immigration reform kindly so as not to keep frightening off the Latino vote. The Latino block and the recent-immigrant block are both such a good fit under the Conservative philosophy it would be tremendously unwise to piss them away irrationally fighting against amnesty – or whatever Obama decides to call it – and let the Dems scoop them up with their staple promises of entitlements.

Although Noisy Dove’s take on the constitutionality of the healthcare mandate made an interesting story, as Esquire Dove, I wanted to chime in on why I think the lawsuit filed by the Attorneys General of 14 states is likely to (and should) fail.  I do want to preface this post by admitting that I have neither read the entire healthcare bill nor the actual court papers filed in the suit at issue.  I also do not have access to the amount of legal precedent that I would like to make truly thorough arguments.  These are lay-opinions, not professional, make of them what you will.

As I understand it, the main thrust of the lawsuit (and an interesting question regardless) is that the new federal healthcare bill violates the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution. The 10th Amendment provides that, “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states.”  Basically, the argument against the bill’s constitutionality is that the healthcare bill exceeds Congress’ enumerated powers.

I agree with Noisy Dove that the best argument for the bill’s constitutionality is that Congress has the power to regulate healthcare under the Commerce Clause.  Some commentators have argued that the bill is constitutional under Congress’ taxing and spending power, but I disagree.  Even though it may be called a “tax”, the penalty for failing to purchase healthcare is not a tax but exactly that — a penalty.  The healthcare bill applies a charge only to those who do not purchase healthcare, in other words don’t purchase healthcare and you have to pay a fine.  The fine does not become a tax simply because the amount due may be delineated based on income brackets or paid at tax time.  Accounting for income levels is no different in this case from adjusting a fine based on the gravity of the offense.  If Congress had wanted to create a tax incentive for purchasing healthcare it would have been very simple – just tax everyone for healthcare and then provide a tax credit equal to the amount of tax charged for those who purchase their own care.  This is, however, not what they did.

Nonetheless, I do believe that Congress had authority to pass this healthcare legislation under the Commerce Clause.  Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution affords Congress the power, “[t]o regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.”  No matter what the original intent of the Commerce Clause, which I agree was probably as Noisy Dove describes, it has a long history of litigation and interpretation by the Supreme Court (seems like about one-third of my Constitutional Law course was spent on this one topic).  This has created several layers to Congress’ power that are not obvious from the text.

First, Congress may regulate wholly intrastate activities of interstate commerce.  See Shreveport Rate Cases.  Even though a person may not cross state lines to purchase his or her individual healthcare, and it is, therefore, a wholly intrastate activity, it is extremely difficult to argue that healthcare costs do not affect interstate commerce.  The Supreme Court has “identified three broad categories of activity that Congress may regulate under its commerce power”: (1) “the use of the channels of interstate commerce;” (2) “the instrumentalities of interstate commerce, or persons or things in interstate commerce, even though the threat may come only from intrastate activities;” (3) “those activities having a substantial relation to interstate commerce, i.e., those activities that substantially affect interstate commerce.”  United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549, 558-59, 115 S. Ct. 1624, 1629-30 (1995) (internal citations omitted).  Hospitals, insurance companies, prescription drugs and drug companies all have profound effects on interstate commerce.

In the past fifty years, the only laws passed by Congress that the Supreme Court has ruled were not sufficiently related to interstate commerce were: (1) a law involving the carrying of handguns in school zones; and (2) parts of the violence against women act.  The regulation of healthcare and the healthcare industry has a much more direct affect upon the nation’s economy than the tangential relationship in those cases.  Under the loose standards of Supreme Court precedent, I think that Obamacare passes the test.

As to whether Congress may mandate that people purchase something, i.e. healthcare, the scope of Congress’ power under the Commerce Clause is very broad.  Congress has discretion to choose its means so long as those means are “reasonably adapted” to the Constitution.  See Heart of Atlanta v. U.S..  Congress has a long history of unfunded mandates, which are often controversial, but perfectly legal.  I see this as no different.

Of course there is a powerful slippery-slope argument to be made.  For example, one could argue that if Congress can mandate that people purchase healthcare, they could also mandate that people buy GM cars (since the federal government now has a financial interest in the company).  Honestly, Congress may be able to legally mandate something along those lines, but at some point, we have to have trust that our republican form of government (not the Republican party, but our representative form of government) will prevail.  Personally, I do not think that the chances of re-election for anyone who would vote that a person must purchase a GM car would be very good, and the same may be true for those who voted for the healthcare bill.  That is the beauty of our government.  Laws are made, the people speak, and laws can be changed.  I think that there is a much greater danger in running to the courts for this type of dispute because the court is asked to interpret the United States Constitution, which is not easily changed.  Such decisions have much longer-enduring and devastating effects; just look at Roe v. Wade.  I find it extremely interesting how conservatives often complain, and in fact campaign on, “left-wing activist judges,” but yet go running to the courts to change long-established constitutional law when they lose a political battle.  Et tu?  Et tu?

Overall I don’t think the specific concern (“if doctors would be required to accept forced-on-us healthcare plans”) would become a huge problem. I know what this argument is getting at though. Medicare doesn’t pay doctors as much as private insurance. If their was a government option, it would pay as much as medicare. Cuts in medicare spending are a constant threat to control costs. “Cuts in medicare spending” translates exactly to paying physicians less for specific services. I’d be a lot more concerned if the government option was still part of the bill.

I’m not sure if private insurance will start paying doctors less if this bill passes. The way I understand it, private insurance companies pay more because of competition. They want patients to buy their insurance; doctors won’t accept insurance that doesn’t pay them well; they pay well so doctors will accept their insurance and patients will buy it. It gets more complicated with insurance through an employer, but that’s the basic idea. Hospitals and doctors accept medicare for a number of reasons. Money is one. A lot of the rest is pure human compassion.

As far as the federal government requiring physicians to accept a specific type of insurance… We doctors pay for our own training, which costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. The government had better pay us back if they want to put such financial limits on how we practice. We’re not government employees. Besides, we have a monopoly on medical know-how. That’s a lot of power. They’d better not try to push us around.